The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
It's a crap argument, voting for soveriegnty is like voting for the Loch Ness Monster, it doesn't really exist outside the minds of conspiracy theorists and other assorted UFO believers.
Absolute sovereignty doesn't exist, but that doesn't make it a meaningless concept. Why do you think the EU increasingly bangs on about it?
Exists in a weird form north of Gretna apparently. Giving up a greater degree of sovereignty in a non consenting union apparently gives Scots more control than ceding a lesser degree of sovereignty in a union of consent.
Non-consenting union? There was a vote on that a few years ago.
Who decides when Scotland has another referendum? Who decided when the UK wanted (sic) a referendum on EU membership?
The UK government. The UK government also decided when a referendum should be held on EU membership 40 years after the first one on the EEC.
As long as the Tories remain in power at Westminster you can expect indyref2 on a similar timeframe
Kool, thanks for agreeing with my non consent point.
Scots voted to consent to stay in the UK in the once in a generation 2014 referendum which the UK government did consent too.
They knew full well the UK government could refuse an indyref2 for decades if they voted No but 55% of them voted No anyway
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
Stag and hens for one. Sports teams starved of foreign tours. There has always been them, of course, but not in these numbers. Hotels are cheap and plentiful due to lack of business and tourist trade. Worse, they aren't diluted by local middle class theatre and restaurant goers, nor business people who are staying away. Toon, indeed the north east, has only one small, getting Pissed up centre.
Are you suggesting there is no mechanism for members of the Lords (or Commons) to introduce their own legislation, without the consent of the executive?
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
In any competition for the Patron Saint of Brexit, there is one and only one serious candidate - the one who declared in 1968 that he was "filled with foreboding".
He's not remembered with affection by Dennis Skinner, nor by George Galloway, but hey, being revered by 90% of Brexiteers is quite something.
One town that looms large in the mind of many Brexiteers is Calais, about which they have a favourite saying that they daren't repeat in public.
Since the 1979 Lancaster House agreement, their main reference point beyond Calais has been Australia, for its "points system" and for its reluctance to conduct maritime rescues.
Are you suggesting there is no mechanism for members of the Lords (or Commons) to introduce their own legislation, without the consent of the executive?
That's not what I said, and you know it
You said that MEPs write the laws. That’s not true, they amend and approve proposals from the executive. They have no mechanism to write their own laws
I see in Italy after near 3 years of only Lega poll leads, the gradual right of centre drift from Lega to FdI has resulted in crossover over the last month or so. The crossover level and the main centre left PD being towards the top of their narrow polling range has also resulted in a handful of PD leads.
Given the assumption that the very long standing tripartite Right of Centre coalition* will get a majority at the next election, which still looks sound, and given a majority is more likely to return one of the political leaders as PM, as opposed to the neutral figures of this parliament, the key question is whether PM Salvini or PM Meloni prevails. The poll shifts, the start of which pre-date Lega going into the Draghi coalition, favours the latter.
The parliament, fearing PM Salvini, has always found a way of avoiding this election, but with a latest date of June 1 2023, the benefits in doing so are dwindling. My guess is that Salvini merely joined the government to facilitate its collapse at an appropriate time - late enough that there is little benefit in putting together a new administration but early enough to maintain a chance of Lega winning the right of centre contest. It looks like a very narrow channel to navigate. My best guess is that the Italians will go to the polls at some point in spring 2022, though it is not solely in Salvini's gift.
* the names change but essentially the same 3 parties have been in alliance since the 90s
Who don't instigate laws, and who sit in a ludicrous parliament in a foreign country and for which the turnout in the last 5 elections has been about 45%, a parliament which moves every three weeks at vast expense for reasons too insane to elaborate
Juncker to be fair to him was indirectly elected like Boris after the 2014 EU Parliament elections by being the Spitzenkandidat of the EPP who ended up the largest party in the European Parliament. Just as Boris became PM as leader of the largest party in the House of Commons. The European Council then nominated Juncker to be European Commission President and the European Parliament confirmed it.
However the idea was dumped after the 2019 elections when the EPP picked Manfred Weber as their Spitzenkandidat and the EPP again won most seats but the European Council picked Ursuala von der Leyen instead, then German defence minister
The casual dumping of Spitzenkandidat - without a vote, without consultation, without a care - just to please various parties - was a particularly egregious example of the EU's rotten dysfunctionality
Spitzenfuckit was meant to be a brilliant innovation making the EU so much more democratic, at last doing something about the democratic deficit. But, nah, they just dumped it 5 years later
I see in Italy after near 3 years of only Lega poll leads, the gradual right of centre drift from Lega to FdI has resulted in crossover over the last month or so. The crossover level and the main centre left PD being towards the top of their narrow polling range has also resulted in a handful of PD leads.
Given the assumption that the very long standing tripartite Right of Centre coalition* will get a majority at the next election, which still looks sound, and given a majority is more likely to return one of the political leaders as PM, as opposed to the neutral figures of this parliament, the key question is whether PM Salvini or PM Meloni prevails. The poll shifts, the start of which pre-date Lega going into the Draghi coalition, favours the latter.
The parliament, fearing PM Salvini, has always found a way of avoiding this election, but with a latest date of June 1 2023, the benefits in doing so are dwindling. My guess is that Salvini merely joined the government to facilitate its collapse at an appropriate time - late enough that there is little benefit in putting together a new administration but early enough to maintain a chance of Lega winning the right of centre contest. It looks like a very narrow channel to navigate. My best guess is that the Italians will go to the polls at some point in spring 2022, though it is not solely in Salvini's gift.
* the names change but essentially the same 3 parties have been in alliance since the 90s
Regardless of whether Salvini or Meloni became PM either would be comfortably the most rightwing PM in western Europe and indeed the most rightwing leader in the G7
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
Stag and hens for one. Sports teams starved of foreign tours. There has always been them, of course, but not in these numbers. Hotels are cheap and plentiful due to lack of business and tourist trade. Worse, they aren't diluted by local middle class theatre and restaurant goers, nor business people who are staying away. Toon, indeed the north east, has only one small, getting Pissed up centre.
In my corner of London it is open drug dealing spreading into the royal parks, especially around Primrose Hill. It comes with gangs, violence and theft, and it started during Covid
It is sporadic. Weeks can do by and it's fine, then suddenly Eeek
You said that MEPs write the laws. That’s not true, they amend and approve proposals from the executive.
The Lords do that.
And nobody denies they write our laws (except you, apparently)
What is the purpose of this performative stupidity?
My point is that the real power comes from the executive (hence my mocking regarding the power of MEPs). True in the UK, even truer in the EU where the Parliament has absolutely no right to propose legislation.
Who don't instigate laws, and who sit in a ludicrous parliament in a foreign country and for which the turnout in the last 5 elections has been about 45%, a parliament which moves every three weeks at vast expense for reasons too insane to elaborate
Juncker to be fair to him was indirectly elected like Boris after the 2014 EU Parliament elections by being the Spitzenkandidat of the EPP who ended up the largest party in the European Parliament. Just as Boris became PM as leader of the largest party in the House of Commons. The European Council then nominated Juncker to be European Commission President and the European Parliament confirmed it.
However the idea was dumped after the 2019 elections when the EPP picked Manfred Weber as their Spitzenkandidat and the EPP again won most seats but the European Council picked Ursuala von der Leyen instead, then German defence minister
The casual dumping of Spitzenkandidat - without a vote, without consultation, without a care - just to please various parties - was a particularly egregious example of the EU's rotten dysfunctionality
Spitzenfuckit was meant to be a brilliant innovation making the EU so much more democratic, at last doing something about the democratic deficit. But, nah, they just dumped it 5 years later
Incredible
There's an example directly applicable to Brexit. Earlier in the year, the EU parliament issued an ultimatum to the UK that they wouldn't ratify the Brexit trade agreement until we implemented the NI protocol. We didn't react so they did as they were told and ratified it anyway.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
It's a crap argument, voting for soveriegnty is like voting for the Loch Ness Monster, it doesn't really exist outside the minds of conspiracy theorists and other assorted UFO believers.
Absolute sovereignty doesn't exist, but that doesn't make it a meaningless concept. Why do you think the EU increasingly bangs on about it?
Exists in a weird form north of Gretna apparently. Giving up a greater degree of sovereignty in a non consenting union apparently gives Scots more control than ceding a lesser degree of sovereignty in a union of consent.
Non-consenting union? There was a vote on that a few years ago.
Who decides when Scotland has another referendum? Who decided when the UK wanted (sic) a referendum on EU membership?
The UK government. The UK government also decided when a referendum should be held on EU membership 40 years after the first one on the EEC.
As long as the Tories remain in power at Westminster you can expect indyref2 on a similar timeframe
Kool, thanks for agreeing with my non consent point.
Scots voted to consent to stay in the UK in the once in a generation 2014 referendum which the UK government did consent too.
They knew full well the UK government could refuse an indyref2 for decades if they voted No but 55% of them voted No anyway
'You'll have another referendum when we consent to it'.
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
Stag and hens for one. Sports teams starved of foreign tours. There has always been them, of course, but not in these numbers. Hotels are cheap and plentiful due to lack of business and tourist trade. Worse, they aren't diluted by local middle class theatre and restaurant goers, nor business people who are staying away. Toon, indeed the north east, has only one small, getting Pissed up centre.
In my corner of London it is open drug dealing spreading into the royal parks, especially around Primrose Hill. It comes with gangs, violence and theft, and it started during Covid
It is sporadic. Weeks can do by and it's fine, then suddenly Eeek
I was musing. Is there a glut of cocaine? Not the drug I'd choose during lockdown. There seems to be widespread anecdotal reports of it being involved now. That, and excess alcohol, would explain at least some of the behaviour.
Who don't instigate laws, and who sit in a ludicrous parliament in a foreign country and for which the turnout in the last 5 elections has been about 45%, a parliament which moves every three weeks at vast expense for reasons too insane to elaborate
Juncker to be fair to him was indirectly elected like Boris after the 2014 EU Parliament elections by being the Spitzenkandidat of the EPP who ended up the largest party in the European Parliament. Just as Boris became PM as leader of the largest party in the House of Commons. The European Council then nominated Juncker to be European Commission President and the European Parliament confirmed it.
However the idea was dumped after the 2019 elections when the EPP picked Manfred Weber as their Spitzenkandidat and the EPP again won most seats but the European Council picked Ursuala von der Leyen instead, then German defence minister
The casual dumping of Spitzenkandidat - without a vote, without consultation, without a care - just to please various parties - was a particularly egregious example of the EU's rotten dysfunctionality
Spitzenfuckit was meant to be a brilliant innovation making the EU so much more democratic, at last doing something about the democratic deficit. But, nah, they just dumped it 5 years later
Incredible
There's an example directly applicable to Brexit. Earlier in the year, the EU parliament issued an ultimatum to the UK that they wouldn't ratify the Brexit trade agreement until we implemented the NI protocol. We didn't react so they did as they were told and ratified it anyway.
It's a Potemkin Parliament
To be fair, a lot of honest EU Federalists (not Brits like Scott) know this and admit it, they want it to have real powers, to be able to write laws, to have an elected president, demote the Commission to a civil service, in other words be the normal parliament of a normal polity
But the nation states are jealously guarding what remains of the "sovereignty" - see, it matters to them as well as Leavers - and this final step is proving hard. Which means that for the meantime the European Parliament is left as this pitiful, powerless, creepy, non-democratic hybrid.
The only answer is either dissolve it, or go for full on Federalism, give the parliament real legislative powers, finally taken from the member states - and do it soon. I bet they will do this eventually. Which makes it even less likely we will ever rejoin
You said that MEPs write the laws. That’s not true, they amend and approve proposals from the executive.
The Lords do that.
And nobody denies they write our laws (except you, apparently)
What is the purpose of this performative stupidity?
Trying to use the House of Lords as a positive example to defend the European Parliament by comparison is one of the best instances of performative stupidity I can think of.
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
Stag and hens for one. Sports teams starved of foreign tours. There has always been them, of course, but not in these numbers. Hotels are cheap and plentiful due to lack of business and tourist trade. Worse, they aren't diluted by local middle class theatre and restaurant goers, nor business people who are staying away. Toon, indeed the north east, has only one small, getting Pissed up centre.
In my corner of London it is open drug dealing spreading into the royal parks, especially around Primrose Hill. It comes with gangs, violence and theft, and it started during Covid
It is sporadic. Weeks can do by and it's fine, then suddenly Eeek
I was musing. Is there a glut of cocaine? Not the drug I'd choose during lockdown. There seems to be widespread anecdotal reports of it being involved now. That, and excess alcohol, would explain at least some of the behaviour.
There were certainly loads of reports of open coke taking in the euros, especially the final. A photographer friend of mine was at Wembley and he says it was an incredible bacchanal of agrression, exuberance and drugs - not all bad, some good humoured, but definitely scary
In London the drugs have followed the kids. During lockdown a lot of London youths discovered the magnificent parks, and realised what fun it is just to buy booze and go sit in the parks and party and have picnics and music (and it is fun, I do the same). They bring guitars. They sing and dance. There are tribes of pretty teenage girls. The boys naturally follow, hopefully
And so the drug dealers have come to serve this brand new market
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
In any competition for the Patron Saint of Brexit, there is one and only one serious candidate - the one who declared in 1968 that he was "filled with foreboding".
He's not remembered with affection by Dennis Skinner, nor by George Galloway, but hey, being revered by 90% of Brexiteers is quite something.
One town that looms large in the mind of many Brexiteers is Calais, about which they have a favourite saying that they daren't repeat in public.
Since the 1979 Lancaster House agreement, their main reference point beyond Calais has been Australia, for its "points system" and for its reluctance to conduct maritime rescues.
Good point earlier but I'd say 40% of Leavers not 90%. There was a poll which pointed to about that proportion.
Bozo and co have U-Turned on Amber Plus, or whatever they were going to call it.
Incompetent, incompetent, incompetent.
How can you U-turn on a decision that hasn’t been made yet?
They flew a kite and it crashed to the ground.
Is there anything Johnson and Co. can do, however inept, that you can't put a positive gloss onto?
It was a genuine question. Given that no decision had been made, it seemed strange to call it a U-turn, regardless of what had been reported in the media. You don't know where those briefings are coming from for starters.
Brexit seems to consume so many on here, but out in the real world I just do not hear anyone speaking about it
Their concerns are almost entirely around covid and how we are progressing in our path to more freedom and so far it does seem to be encouraging
Our Scottish family have returned to Scotland today from our son's wedding and my niece texted me to say how amazing it was that nobody at Carlisle (Southwaite) services were wearing masks
These are the real issues for people and not the bitterness of the remain v leave entrenched positions
Furthermore, as I said earlier if Boris succeeds in achieving herd immunity he will see a considerable poll boost and to be honest after todays polling on Boris v Starmer with Starmer only 1% ahead on telling the truth, I really think it is labour who have far more to worry about and just what they are achieving
I see in Italy after near 3 years of only Lega poll leads, the gradual right of centre drift from Lega to FdI has resulted in crossover over the last month or so. The crossover level and the main centre left PD being towards the top of their narrow polling range has also resulted in a handful of PD leads.
Given the assumption that the very long standing tripartite Right of Centre coalition* will get a majority at the next election, which still looks sound, and given a majority is more likely to return one of the political leaders as PM, as opposed to the neutral figures of this parliament, the key question is whether PM Salvini or PM Meloni prevails. The poll shifts, the start of which pre-date Lega going into the Draghi coalition, favours the latter.
The parliament, fearing PM Salvini, has always found a way of avoiding this election, but with a latest date of June 1 2023, the benefits in doing so are dwindling. My guess is that Salvini merely joined the government to facilitate its collapse at an appropriate time - late enough that there is little benefit in putting together a new administration but early enough to maintain a chance of Lega winning the right of centre contest. It looks like a very narrow channel to navigate. My best guess is that the Italians will go to the polls at some point in spring 2022, though it is not solely in Salvini's gift.
* the names change but essentially the same 3 parties have been in alliance since the 90s
Regardless of whether Salvini or Meloni became PM either would be comfortably the most rightwing PM in western Europe and indeed the most rightwing leader in the G7
The old AN, despite being a direct descendant party of the Fascist party. were often regarded as the level heads and fiscal conservatives of the right of centre coalition compared with Berlusconi and the frankly utter swivel eyes in Lega Nord. Meloni has taken a more populist tone in the FdI incarnation for sure, but some of the old AN level heads are still in the game. I certainly don't much fancy Salvini leading the country, Meloni - I'm not saying I favour her - I'm just crossing my fingers she wouldn't turn out quite as scary.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
You said that MEPs write the laws. That’s not true, they amend and approve proposals from the executive.
The Lords do that.
And nobody denies they write our laws (except you, apparently)
What is the purpose of this performative stupidity?
Trying to use the House of Lords as a positive example to defend the European Parliament by comparison is one of the best instances of performative stupidity I can think of.
Especially as it was the unelected House of Lords which is full of Remainers and was doing its best to thwart the democratic Brexit vote
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Yes. We've taken back control but it's unclear who the "we" is.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
It's a crap argument, voting for soveriegnty is like voting for the Loch Ness Monster, it doesn't really exist outside the minds of conspiracy theorists and other assorted UFO believers.
Absolute sovereignty doesn't exist, but that doesn't make it a meaningless concept. Why do you think the EU increasingly bangs on about it?
Exists in a weird form north of Gretna apparently. Giving up a greater degree of sovereignty in a non consenting union apparently gives Scots more control than ceding a lesser degree of sovereignty in a union of consent.
Non-consenting union? There was a vote on that a few years ago.
Who decides when Scotland has another referendum? Who decided when the UK wanted (sic) a referendum on EU membership?
The UK government. The UK government also decided when a referendum should be held on EU membership 40 years after the first one on the EEC.
As long as the Tories remain in power at Westminster you can expect indyref2 on a similar timeframe
Kool, thanks for agreeing with my non consent point.
Scots voted to consent to stay in the UK in the once in a generation 2014 referendum which the UK government did consent too.
They knew full well the UK government could refuse an indyref2 for decades if they voted No but 55% of them voted No anyway
'You'll have another referendum when we consent to it'.
As I said, thanks for agreeing with my point.
Nothing you can do about it, just be thankful London is merely saying no indyref2 for a generation, not going full Madrid or Beijing
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Your second paragraph is absurd. Your stereotype applies, if at all, to a small proportion of the 48% who voted to remain, and is no better than the reverse stereotype of 'thick leavers'. And as one of the unprivileged hard-working people who voted remain, and is getting on a bit, far from "every election going (my) way until 2016", very few have done, and I've spent most of my life with governments I oppose.
There's a lot of hard truths in the second paragraphs, it's difficult to look into that mirror so I'm not surprised that remainers are so dismissive of the idea that they benefited from the impoverishment of white working class Brits by Eastern Europeans living 8 to single bedroom flats working for the minimum wage or below and turning it into an effective maximum wage for millions of people. You may have been someone who came from that background but you also pulled the ladder up.
Absolute drivel.
And yet out of the EU wage inflation at the bottom of the market has gone insane.
There’s a global labour shortage (I mean in the West), although likely worse here because of Brexit.
Check out the US data.
So the labour market does adhere to basic economic principles of supply and demand? I mean I've read about a billion papers by liberal academics suggesting otherwise and saying that EU immigration had no impact on wages. Which is it? Is Brexit having an inflationary impact on wages or did EU immigration cause have deflationary effect on wages?
Yeah the evidence is that it increased overall wages, especially for people like yourself.
I’m not sure why you are such a hysterical denialist on this subject. Your comments that Brexit is worthwhile to see other people suffer is frankly pathetic at your age.
So the rich (people like me) got richer and the wages of the not so rich and working poor got propped up by the minimum wage (which is evidenced by actual ONS data, not studies). Not exactly a great development, feels a bit like pulling up the ladder.
My view is that the people who lost could do with the experience of losing given that they (well we, given what I do for a living) had got used to always winning at life and the EU simply entrenched the advantages of the highly educated and highly paid class. Rolling that back will probably make me every so slightly poorer but if it means that people at the lower end get a decent wage and don't have their pay held down by having an unlimited pool of cheap labour to compete with then there's only ever going to be one choice to make.
In general I'm not one to get overly personal and for most people I wouldn't. There are, however, some people's bitterness that really reinforce my leave vote. On days when I wonder whether it was worth it one of them will handily pop up (not you, mind) and remind me that this is what I voted leave for, to give that class of people a loss for the first time.
Thank you for this response.
I fear you are due to be disappointed. Britain’s low wage problem is caused by a) low skills b) low productivity Indeed, the two are linked.
FDI and immigration actually both served to improve the overall skill base and indeed our productivity. FDI is now down steeply, and immigration from the EU at least has almost disappeared.
All things being equal, Brexit will keep those wages low.
One area where Brexiters *might* have a point is that for unproductive businesses, access to an “unlimited” labour pool served to disincentivise capital investment.
However, Britain’s problems in this respect are long lasting, systemic, and AIUI are not significantly impacted by this greater access to labour.
Again, I agree that the skills base has improved, it has helped people like me make more money on one side and save money on the other by making my coffee cheaper and my restaurant bills lower.
On your specific points you're absolutely underestimating the impact of having a vast pool of cheap labour on productivity and the local skills base. Employers have no need to invest in skills base improvements when they can simply throw labour at it. Why bother?
You can map the drop off in business investment to the joining of the A8 countries. I think you have an idealised version of the EU which is based on what the EU15 was, not what the EU28 was when we left.
Staying in the EU doesn't confront any of the issues facing the UK, all it does is brush it under the rug and create an effective underclass of low wage workers for whom the minimum wage is a maximum wage. So it makes me a bit poorer, so it makes you a bit poorer. The alternative would tear this nation in two as the low wage workers realise their lot in life is to exist to service people like us who want cheap coffee.
So we'll have to bother with border checks and some extra paperwork. None of that is the end of the world really, in fact escaping from EU protectionism will probably be of net benefit to the nation. Escaping the dead hand of the EU will be better than most people realise.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
Also Ireland I think. And France? Or close, anyway.
We never managed to find a “vaccine dividend”.
We did. We saved tens of thousands of lives, in the UK, by our excellent early vaccination programme. Who knows how many died in the EU, unnecessarily, because they were much slower to begin?
It was entirely predictable that all western nations would end at roughly the same time and in the same way, as they all hit the walls of vaccine hesitancy
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
I see in Italy after near 3 years of only Lega poll leads, the gradual right of centre drift from Lega to FdI has resulted in crossover over the last month or so. The crossover level and the main centre left PD being towards the top of their narrow polling range has also resulted in a handful of PD leads.
Given the assumption that the very long standing tripartite Right of Centre coalition* will get a majority at the next election, which still looks sound, and given a majority is more likely to return one of the political leaders as PM, as opposed to the neutral figures of this parliament, the key question is whether PM Salvini or PM Meloni prevails. The poll shifts, the start of which pre-date Lega going into the Draghi coalition, favours the latter.
The parliament, fearing PM Salvini, has always found a way of avoiding this election, but with a latest date of June 1 2023, the benefits in doing so are dwindling. My guess is that Salvini merely joined the government to facilitate its collapse at an appropriate time - late enough that there is little benefit in putting together a new administration but early enough to maintain a chance of Lega winning the right of centre contest. It looks like a very narrow channel to navigate. My best guess is that the Italians will go to the polls at some point in spring 2022, though it is not solely in Salvini's gift.
* the names change but essentially the same 3 parties have been in alliance since the 90s
Regardless of whether Salvini or Meloni became PM either would be comfortably the most rightwing PM in western Europe and indeed the most rightwing leader in the G7
The old AN, despite being a direct descendant party of the Fascist party. were often regarded as the level heads and fiscal conservatives of the right of centre coalition compared with Berlusconi and the frankly utter swivel eyes in Lega Nord. Meloni has taken a more populist tone in the FdI incarnation for sure, but some of the old AN level heads are still in the game. I certainly don't much fancy Salvini leading the country, Meloni - I'm not saying I favour her - I'm just crossing my fingers she wouldn't turn out quite as scary.
Indeed, it could be quite a ride whichever one of them became PM, both make Berlusconi look a dull centrist by comparison, unlike Boris who never really was either actually would be the Trump of Europe ideologically.
The AN successors would have to try and be the sensible voice
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
Also Ireland I think. And France? Or close, anyway.
We never managed to find a “vaccine dividend”.
We did. We saved tens of thousands of lives, in the UK, by our excellent early vaccination programme. Who knows how many died in the EU, unnecessarily, because they were much slower to begin?
It was entirely predictable that all western nations would end at roughly the same time and in the same way, as they all hit the walls of vaccine hesitancy
60,000 lives in the UK have been saved due to the vaccines according to a report last week
Is it me or has Australia gone a bit overzealous with it's zero covid strategy ?
Not exactly.
The problem that the Australians have is that their initial attempt to lock Covid out was so successful that they didn't go Hell for leather to get hold of vaccines and then get jabbing people, like many of the worst affected European and North American countries did. They followed, in a very real sense, a policy of splendid isolation. As long as the borders were kept sealed tight enough, they were safe. There was no need to hurry with the vaccines. If the occasional case got through their quarantine systems then it could always be crushed with a snap lockdown.
Of course, all of this was predicated on the emergency snap lockdowns working. What they're terrified of with the Delta outbreak in Sydney is that, now it's passed a critical threshold in terms of community transmission, the lockdowns can't wipe it out. It's too infectious.
If true then Australia is sunk. Lockdown will have to continue until their vaccination program is well advanced; if they just give up and let people out of jail again now, then Delta will rip through the largely defenceless population, cause mass slaughter and collapse the healthcare system. But their vaccination rate is utterly pitiful, they're desperately short of mRNA vaccines, and the actions of their media, government and regulator put together have so comprehensively trashed the reputation of AZ that it's all but useless.
Latest estimates suggest that about 15% of all Australians (slightly less than 20% of all adults, and still well under half of the elderly) have been fully vaccinated. The National Cabinet (AIUI a committee of the Australian federal government and its states, which don't seem to be able to agree on much apart from the necessity of closing their borders with one another,) has said that vaccination coverage will need to reach 70% of all adults before restrictions can be significantly eased; the dreaded modellers, apparently spooked by Delta, are now estimating that 80% of the whole population will need jabbing before the country can afford to let lockdowns go. The Prime Minister thinks the country might be able to get to the 70% target by Christmas, but nobody really knows and as I said many of the boffins aren't convinced that this will be enough. It is a total dumpster fire.
Their attempt to suppress Covid is indeed zealous, but they had nothing else at the outset and they've certainly no better strategy to deploy against the virus now - and they may not be able to dig themselves out of the hole for a very long time.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
Yes, that's because of dosing strategy. The JCVI has provided compelling data that extending Pfizer to an 8 week gap gives a much better long term level of immunity.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
Also Ireland I think. And France? Or close, anyway.
We never managed to find a “vaccine dividend”.
At current rates France will overtake us in two weeks time.
I'm very grateful, living in Spain, to be double jabbed 2 weeks ago at age 67 - around 3 months later than my younger sister. You really don't get it do you.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend. Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
It's a crap argument, voting for soveriegnty is like voting for the Loch Ness Monster, it doesn't really exist outside the minds of conspiracy theorists and other assorted UFO believers.
Absolute sovereignty doesn't exist, but that doesn't make it a meaningless concept. Why do you think the EU increasingly bangs on about it?
Exists in a weird form north of Gretna apparently. Giving up a greater degree of sovereignty in a non consenting union apparently gives Scots more control than ceding a lesser degree of sovereignty in a union of consent.
Non-consenting union? There was a vote on that a few years ago.
Who decides when Scotland has another referendum? Who decided when the UK wanted (sic) a referendum on EU membership?
The UK government. The UK government also decided when a referendum should be held on EU membership 40 years after the first one on the EEC.
As long as the Tories remain in power at Westminster you can expect indyref2 on a similar timeframe
Kool, thanks for agreeing with my non consent point.
Scots voted to consent to stay in the UK in the once in a generation 2014 referendum which the UK government did consent too.
They knew full well the UK government could refuse an indyref2 for decades if they voted No but 55% of them voted No anyway
'You'll have another referendum when we consent to it'.
As I said, thanks for agreeing with my point.
Nothing you can do about it, just be thankful London is merely saying no indyref2 for a generation, not going full Madrid or Beijing
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend.Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
If true, that's a surprise. Germany vaccinated twice as many people as the UK on each and every single day in July according to OWID.
(Edit: Ok tbf OWID isn't showing the German data for 31st July yet.)
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend.Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
If true, that's a surprise. Germany vaccinated twice as many people as the UK on each and every single day in July according to OWID.
I'm not sure what the bold emphasis is for. That isn't surprising, the UK's first dose program was winding down.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Your second paragraph is absurd. Your stereotype applies, if at all, to a small proportion of the 48% who voted to remain, and is no better than the reverse stereotype of 'thick leavers'. And as one of the unprivileged hard-working people who voted remain, and is getting on a bit, far from "every election going (my) way until 2016", very few have done, and I've spent most of my life with governments I oppose.
There's a lot of hard truths in the second paragraphs, it's difficult to look into that mirror so I'm not surprised that remainers are so dismissive of the idea that they benefited from the impoverishment of white working class Brits by Eastern Europeans living 8 to single bedroom flats working for the minimum wage or below and turning it into an effective maximum wage for millions of people. You may have been someone who came from that background but you also pulled the ladder up.
Absolute drivel.
And yet out of the EU wage inflation at the bottom of the market has gone insane.
There’s a global labour shortage (I mean in the West), although likely worse here because of Brexit.
Check out the US data.
So the labour market does adhere to basic economic principles of supply and demand? I mean I've read about a billion papers by liberal academics suggesting otherwise and saying that EU immigration had no impact on wages. Which is it? Is Brexit having an inflationary impact on wages or did EU immigration cause have deflationary effect on wages?
Yeah the evidence is that it increased overall wages, especially for people like yourself.
I’m not sure why you are such a hysterical denialist on this subject. Your comments that Brexit is worthwhile to see other people suffer is frankly pathetic at your age.
So the rich (people like me) got richer and the wages of the not so rich and working poor got propped up by the minimum wage (which is evidenced by actual ONS data, not studies). Not exactly a great development, feels a bit like pulling up the ladder.
My view is that the people who lost could do with the experience of losing given that they (well we, given what I do for a living) had got used to always winning at life and the EU simply entrenched the advantages of the highly educated and highly paid class. Rolling that back will probably make me every so slightly poorer but if it means that people at the lower end get a decent wage and don't have their pay held down by having an unlimited pool of cheap labour to compete with then there's only ever going to be one choice to make.
In general I'm not one to get overly personal and for most people I wouldn't. There are, however, some people's bitterness that really reinforce my leave vote. On days when I wonder whether it was worth it one of them will handily pop up (not you, mind) and remind me that this is what I voted leave for, to give that class of people a loss for the first time.
Thank you for this response.
I fear you are due to be disappointed. Britain’s low wage problem is caused by a) low skills b) low productivity Indeed, the two are linked.
FDI and immigration actually both served to improve the overall skill base and indeed our productivity. FDI is now down steeply, and immigration from the EU at least has almost disappeared.
All things being equal, Brexit will keep those wages low.
One area where Brexiters *might* have a point is that for unproductive businesses, access to an “unlimited” labour pool served to disincentivise capital investment.
However, Britain’s problems in this respect are long lasting, systemic, and AIUI are not significantly impacted by this greater access to labour.
Again, I agree that the skills base has improved, it has helped people like me make more money on one side and save money on the other by making my coffee cheaper and my restaurant bills lower.
On your specific points you're absolutely underestimating the impact of having a vast pool of cheap labour on productivity and the local skills base. Employers have no need to invest in skills base improvements when they can simply throw labour at it. Why bother?
You can map the drop off in business investment to the joining of the A8 countries. I think you have an idealised version of the EU which is based on what the EU15 was, not what the EU28 was when we left.
Staying in the EU doesn't confront any of the issues facing the UK, all it does is brush it under the rug and create an effective underclass of low wage workers for whom the minimum wage is a maximum wage. So it makes me a bit poorer, so it makes you a bit poorer. The alternative would tear this nation in two as the low wage workers realise their lot in life is to exist to service people like us who want cheap coffee.
So we'll have to bother with border checks and some extra paperwork. None of that is the end of the world really, in fact escaping from EU protectionism will probably be of net benefit to the nation. Escaping the dead hand of the EU will be better than most people realise.
I just disagree with this.
I think sector by sector analysis fails to prove that large scale immigration impeded wage growth except in some limited cases. Same is true for productivity.
And FDI has fallen since 2016 as we have become a less interesting investment proposition since Brexit.
Britain’s underclass is actually it’s own white working class, where it suffers from very poor educational performance - a post industrial legacy. None of this is related to EU membership.
Where I might agree is that EU membership disguised this problem. On the other hand, there’s no real evidence the current government is really interested in confronting it either.
Big scoop from @rowenamason - the boss of the Joint Biosecurity Centre that advises ministers on Covid risk has left - with no replacement - leaving the new organisation "rudderless"
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend.Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
If true, that's a surprise. Germany vaccinated twice as many people as the UK on each and every single day in July according to OWID.
I'm not sure what the bold emphasis is for. That isn't surprising, the UK's first dose program was winding down.
My comment was a response to @williamglenn's that "we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend". Apols about the bold, it was unneccessary.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
Regardless of whether Salvini or Meloni became PM either would be comfortably the most rightwing PM in western Europe and indeed the most rightwing leader in the G7
Plenty of elections this autumn in Europe and there could be significant changes in Government.
Norway votes on 13 September - quite possible the ruling Conservative-led coalition will be replaced by a Labour-Centre Government.
Iceland votes on 25 September - the existing coalition will probably continue.
Germany votes on 26 September - who knows?
Czech Republic votes 8-9 October - likely the Babis Government will fall - could Ivan Bartos of the Pirates & Mayors form a new Government?
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
I've always found London surprisingly free of aggro. Walking through the centre of my small Scottish hometown on a Friday or Saturday night in the 1990s you would see a lot more general lariness and get more of a sense of impending violence than I've ever seen down here. Of course there is a tragic problem with knife violence here, but it isn't directed at random people on the street.
If true, that's a surprise. Germany vaccinated twice as many people as the UK on each and every single day in July according to OWID.
I'm not sure what the bold emphasis is for. That isn't surprising, the UK's first dose program was winding down.
My comment was a response to @williamglenn's that "we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend". Apols about the bold, it was unneccessary.
Sorry, I misinterpreted your comment. That would indicate the German program is similarly winding down, and they've now (maybe momentarily) dropped under the UK daily count.
Regardless of whether Salvini or Meloni became PM either would be comfortably the most rightwing PM in western Europe and indeed the most rightwing leader in the G7
Plenty of elections this autumn in Europe and there could be significant changes in Government.
Norway votes on 13 September - quite possible the ruling Conservative-led coalition will be replaced by a Labour-Centre Government.
Iceland votes on 25 September - the existing coalition will probably continue.
Germany votes on 26 September - who knows?
Czech Republic votes 8-9 October - likely the Babis Government will fall - could Ivan Bartos of the Pirates & Mayors form a new Government?
Yes but none of the above would be as significant as the election of a rightwing populist in Italy in June 2023, the 3rd biggest economy in the EU.
Indeed Germany, by far the biggest EU nation having an election this year, looks likely just to produce yet another dull grand coalition led by the CDU, only question whether their coalition partner is the SPD again or the Greens
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
I've always found London surprisingly free of aggro. Walking through the centre of my small Scottish hometown on a Friday or Saturday night in the 1990s you would see a lot more general lariness and get more of a sense of impending violence than I've ever seen down here. Of course there is a tragic problem with knife violence here, but it isn't directed at random people on the street.
Yes, growing up in small city England in the 70s I saw nasty fights every weekend. Guaranteed
Same elsewhere in provincial Britain
The violence in London is much rarer, oddly, but when it happens it is nastier: stabbings and shootings
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend.Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
If true, that's a surprise. Germany vaccinated twice as many people as the UK on each and every single day in July according to OWID.
(Edit: Ok tbf OWID isn't showing the German data for 31st July yet.)
Don't you understand that in this case 'catching up' is pretty meaningless. You don't get those lost 2/3 months if you one of those unlucky enough to be seriously ill while waiting for the EU and member states to get their act together. I live in Spain and because of the f*** up over AZT my cohort 65-69 year olds are onlt just about finished with their second dose. Considering the collective wealth of the EU it's been a monumental cock-up. No amount of 'catching up' can change that.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend.Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
If true, that's a surprise. Germany vaccinated twice as many people as the UK on each and every single day in July according to OWID.
I'm not sure what the bold emphasis is for. That isn't surprising, the UK's first dose program was winding down.
My comment was a response to @williamglenn's that "we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend". Apols about the bold, it was unneccessary.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
A margin which is likely to grow as Delta spreads further in France and Spain - Spain currently has over 10k in hospital (if my translation is correct) in a country only two thirds the size of the UK.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
Also Ireland I think. And France? Or close, anyway.
We never managed to find a “vaccine dividend”.
We did. We saved tens of thousands of lives, in the UK, by our excellent early vaccination programme. Who knows how many died in the EU, unnecessarily, because they were much slower to begin?
It was entirely predictable that all western nations would end at roughly the same time and in the same way, as they all hit the walls of vaccine hesitancy
60,000 lives in the UK have been saved due to the vaccines according to a report last week
Just a pity about the 100,000 lost thanks to government incompetence.
You do realise that just makes him look somewhat endearing (and also Patel, FWIW)
No one is looking at this and raging (apart from you)
It's excellent publicity for Brand Boris. He probably staged it all
Not sure about staging it but I watched it live and to be fair Boris handled it well and I do not think this incident did him any harm
I'm joking about staging, but Boris has a natural comic gift. He can turn a potentially embarrassing incident into a laugh-with-me moment
He did it with the zipwire. He made is somehow part of his shtick
He has many many faults but a lack of showmanship is not one of them. He has an instinctive knack. And this is not unimportant, politicians can be damaged by this stuff - eg Miliband and the bacon sandwich
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Your second paragraph is absurd. Your stereotype applies, if at all, to a small proportion of the 48% who voted to remain, and is no better than the reverse stereotype of 'thick leavers'. And as one of the unprivileged hard-working people who voted remain, and is getting on a bit, far from "every election going (my) way until 2016", very few have done, and I've spent most of my life with governments I oppose.
There's a lot of hard truths in the second paragraphs, it's difficult to look into that mirror so I'm not surprised that remainers are so dismissive of the idea that they benefited from the impoverishment of white working class Brits by Eastern Europeans living 8 to single bedroom flats working for the minimum wage or below and turning it into an effective maximum wage for millions of people. You may have been someone who came from that background but you also pulled the ladder up.
Absolute drivel.
And yet out of the EU wage inflation at the bottom of the market has gone insane.
There’s a global labour shortage (I mean in the West), although likely worse here because of Brexit.
Check out the US data.
So the labour market does adhere to basic economic principles of supply and demand? I mean I've read about a billion papers by liberal academics suggesting otherwise and saying that EU immigration had no impact on wages. Which is it? Is Brexit having an inflationary impact on wages or did EU immigration cause have deflationary effect on wages?
Yeah the evidence is that it increased overall wages, especially for people like yourself.
I’m not sure why you are such a hysterical denialist on this subject. Your comments that Brexit is worthwhile to see other people suffer is frankly pathetic at your age.
So the rich (people like me) got richer and the wages of the not so rich and working poor got propped up by the minimum wage (which is evidenced by actual ONS data, not studies). Not exactly a great development, feels a bit like pulling up the ladder.
My view is that the people who lost could do with the experience of losing given that they (well we, given what I do for a living) had got used to always winning at life and the EU simply entrenched the advantages of the highly educated and highly paid class. Rolling that back will probably make me every so slightly poorer but if it means that people at the lower end get a decent wage and don't have their pay held down by having an unlimited pool of cheap labour to compete with then there's only ever going to be one choice to make.
In general I'm not one to get overly personal and for most people I wouldn't. There are, however, some people's bitterness that really reinforce my leave vote. On days when I wonder whether it was worth it one of them will handily pop up (not you, mind) and remind me that this is what I voted leave for, to give that class of people a loss for the first time.
Thank you for this response.
I fear you are due to be disappointed. Britain’s low wage problem is caused by a) low skills b) low productivity Indeed, the two are linked.
FDI and immigration actually both served to improve the overall skill base and indeed our productivity. FDI is now down steeply, and immigration from the EU at least has almost disappeared.
All things being equal, Brexit will keep those wages low.
One area where Brexiters *might* have a point is that for unproductive businesses, access to an “unlimited” labour pool served to disincentivise capital investment.
However, Britain’s problems in this respect are long lasting, systemic, and AIUI are not significantly impacted by this greater access to labour.
Again, I agree that the skills base has improved, it has helped people like me make more money on one side and save money on the other by making my coffee cheaper and my restaurant bills lower.
On your specific points you're absolutely underestimating the impact of having a vast pool of cheap labour on productivity and the local skills base. Employers have no need to invest in skills base improvements when they can simply throw labour at it. Why bother?
You can map the drop off in business investment to the joining of the A8 countries. I think you have an idealised version of the EU which is based on what the EU15 was, not what the EU28 was when we left.
Staying in the EU doesn't confront any of the issues facing the UK, all it does is brush it under the rug and create an effective underclass of low wage workers for whom the minimum wage is a maximum wage. So it makes me a bit poorer, so it makes you a bit poorer. The alternative would tear this nation in two as the low wage workers realise their lot in life is to exist to service people like us who want cheap coffee.
So we'll have to bother with border checks and some extra paperwork. None of that is the end of the world really, in fact escaping from EU protectionism will probably be of net benefit to the nation. Escaping the dead hand of the EU will be better than most people realise.
I just disagree with this.
I think sector by sector analysis fails to prove that large scale immigration impeded wage growth except in some limited cases. Same is true for productivity.
And FDI has fallen since 2016 as we have become a less interesting investment proposition since Brexit.
Britain’s underclass is actually it’s own white working class, where it suffers from very poor educational performance - a post industrial legacy. None of this is related to EU membership.
Where I might agree is that EU membership disguised this problem. On the other hand, there’s no real evidence the current government is really interested in confronting it either.
It’s basic economics. If you increase the supply of labour, wages will fall.
And @MaxPB is right re having cheap labour available is a discouragement to firms investing and thus driving down productivity. Look at farmers - wailing about how not having access to cheap E European labour would kill them and, when they realised they would n out get their way, started to invest in crop picking technology that was there all along, just they hadn’t bothered to invest in it because of the supply of...cheap labour.
There are many plus points you could argue for the EU but defying the law of economics is not one of them.
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
Also Ireland I think. And France? Or close, anyway.
We never managed to find a “vaccine dividend”.
We did. We saved tens of thousands of lives, in the UK, by our excellent early vaccination programme. Who knows how many died in the EU, unnecessarily, because they were much slower to begin?
It was entirely predictable that all western nations would end at roughly the same time and in the same way, as they all hit the walls of vaccine hesitancy
60,000 lives in the UK have been saved due to the vaccines according to a report last week
Just a pity about the 100,000 lost thanks to government incompetence.
Is that the cause in all the other countries with similar or higher death rates?
The 88% net favourability rating for Liz Truss is as preposterous as the woman herself. A reflection of the Conservative Party and the times we live in, I guess.
Your bitterness over the UK having an independent trade policy is one of the best rewards of Brexit. Thank you.
Hate to ask, but if FF43's (alleged) bitterness really is one of the best rewards of Brexit, was it really worth all the hassle? What are the other top five say, for context?
It's probably spaces 1-3, personally along with the bitterness from other EU supporting fifth columnists.
If "remainers" are fifth columnists for the EU are Leavers fifth columnists for Putin? Which would be worse? I think as Brexit is now "done" people trading insults over it just make themselves look a little silly. There are many on both sides of the argument who have done service for their country, and often much more than the people from the opposing side that suggest they are "traitors" perhaps?
The trouble is that, for some, this was their Great Patriotic War to save democracy. Not all, but some. And rather than being saluted for their sacrifices in victory, they are being moaned at or- worse- ignored.
For while, my theory has been that the internal logic of Brexit makes most sense to those born in the 50's and 60's. The most Eurosceptic generation in both 1975 and 2016. Always lived in the shadow of the generation who actually experienced WW2. Too old to see the benefits of a continent without borders for work and play as anything other than a dangerous novelty.
And deep down, some of them suspect that it will all get reversed the minute their backs are turned. Their great achievement down the swannee. And slowly, by a thousand accommodations, chips and cuts, they're probably right.
Johnson understandably won in 2019 on "Brexit is in Peril. Defend it with All Your Might." Unless things change in a way that they haven't so far, there will come a point where the considered response of the public is "Brexit is in Peril? Good".
Meanwhile, time passes.
Although I think Brexit was the biggest foreign policy folly since Suez, I think it would be a mistake to try and re-join. That said I can't help wondering whether in my dotage I will have a good old titter at all those Brexity Col. Blimps when re do regain membership. It will be very funny.
What is funny is how Remainers always insist their vindication is coming. No matter the evidence, the great moment when the up-to-now foolish public suddenly turns around and embraces their Europhile betters. Not only will they regret the decision that has been made, they will actually seek to go back to an even worse membership status than we had before. And to do that when the EU is even more integrated in the years and decades to come. When the UK's economy and trade profile has been restructured completely and status quo bias works in the opposite direction. When the EU is an even smaller share of the world economy than ever.
I suppose it is the only way they can psychologically deal with it. As an upper middle class professional group, they have never really learnt how to accept defeat. They got sent to nice schools, had the way padded to nice universities, and went into nice jobs, where their living standards were padded by the benefits of cheap immigrant and outsourced labour. And they had every election go their way until 2016.
Then they lost, and have been looking for cope ever since. Part of that is the religious certainty that deliverance will arrive in the end. Part of that is the need to assure each other of their moral superiority, with snide comments about how ghastily white, middle aged and - horrors of horrors - *British* those damn Brexiters are. Don't they know how culturally superior Provence and Tuscany are?
Yep. Brexit is essentially about the humbling of social & financial elites (exactly as you explain here) but what's strange is that almost all its leading proponents in public life are reactionary right wing Conservatives. It seems these chaps have all got the wrong end of the stick. I know when it comes to politics that Right doesn't equal Bright, but still, it's a puzzle.
Brexit was also a massive great Fuck You from Provincial Britain to London. You can't blame the yokels, they spent 30 years watching property owning Londoners get insanely wealthy, through no personal merit, while also enjoying all the restaurants, bars, girls, boys, fun, parties, better weather and nice shiny new trains
Brexit was regional Britain saying "this is our country as well": to arrogant Londoners
Talking of which I can report back from my Groucho lunch. The restaurant was jammed, the menu was oddly truncated (lack of staff?) but delicious, the new decor is beautiful, and central London as a whole - the bits of Soho, Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury, and Marylebone that I walked through - definitely feels a whole lot better. Many places are shut but many are reopening. The pavements are busier than I have seen since 2019.
And I don't think it is just the effect of a nice sunny day: it isn't. It's overcast, quite cool.
Central London might be reviving, for real.
That's great news that the Groucho is buzzing. Can't wait to get myself there and see what all the fuss is about.
As for Brexit being a cry from the provinces for a more equitable split of power, wealth and opportunity in early 21st century Britain, it's a nice thought, but I wonder if it's accurate.
Reason I'm skeptical is that I very much want that, whereas you very much don't, and I very much voted Remain whereas you very much voted Leave. That's close to being a disprove when you think about it - given both you and I are astuties who know what we want and know how to get it.
My extended family in Cornwall - a large bunch of people - is generally pro-Leave (like the rest of Cornwall). Get them a bit tipsy and ask them about their Brexit vote, and a general resentment at London having all the fun and money emerges. I am sure it is a driver across provincial Britain
And you are simply wrong that I "very much voted Leave" - tho I can see why you might think that, so this is not a critique
My vote was finely balanced. My head and heart were both split. I liked aspects of the EU very much - FOM the most of all. Tho I respect voters who wanted an end to it, as it was damaging their lives. This was a real issue. I also strongly suspected Brexit would damage the country economically (but not grievously), and be bad for London property owners - eg me
But the sovereignty argument won out, on the morning of the vote. I do believe we will be better off governing ourselves, in the end, and more prosperous too, and there are just too many repulsive aspects to the EU. The fraud of the Lisbon Treaty/Constitution was an unforgivable outrage against the European people
So there you are, I actually voted UNSELFISHLY. I voted against my own perceived financial interests, and for the betterment of the country and the country my daughters will inherit. But it was a close call
Well, as I think I've mentioned before, if you thought we were governed by Brussels rather than Westminster - truly thought it, I mean, rather than just embraced it as a talking point - you'd have been relaxed about the election of a left wing Labour government. Course you would since such a government would be toothless, the real power residing with unelected Eurocrats. Yet you weren't relaxed about this at all. You tended to shit bricks at such a prospect. Ditto all the other right wing Brexiter pundits, on PB or elsewhere, who make the most play of this "sovereignty' point. So I conclude it's a red herring. It's a bit of self-aiding doublethink.
No attempt to engage with the argument, just a retreat to your comforting shibboleths. As ever
I'm homing onto the very crux of your argument. You say it was about sovereignty - I'm showing that it really wasn't. The question therefore begged is what was it about. And there, I will not tread. I think I know but I'm not 100% sure and I need to be before going to press with it. You throw up just enough dust to get in my eyes sometimes and prevent a firm read.
Sovereignty is fundamental to the question of immigration, which nobody would deny played a part in the vote. Do we as a political community have the right to set conditions on migration, or do we merely elect people to administer the province of the UK?
Yep, in the EU debate sovereignty is largely Leaver code for immigration. EU membership entailed the free movement of people within the EU. Given we had - in the true rather than Leaver sense of the word - sovereignty, we could leave the EU if we were so unhappy with this that it made us feel oppressed and violated. And that is precisely what has happened.
While I think this is true for most Brexiters, there *is* a principled case for greater U.K. sovreignty outside the EU and the ECJ.
I guess this appeals to maybe 5% of the population?
Maybe less, because even those who major on this seem completely unworried by Boris’s “executive” power grab versus Parliament which has a much more tangible impact on sovreignty.
Because Boris can be ejected by the voters
Voters can't eject the Secretary General of NATO either. I think the point is if you don't think the EU has any value you might as well leave, but if it does do useful things you really don't care about Ursula von der Leyen.
I despise Boris Johnson but I don't see him as a reason for leaving the UK. There's more to the Union than the sleazebag occupying No 10.
The early vaccine fiasco in the EU (now largely remedied, but it still happened) is proof that your argument is entirely wrong
[SNIP]
Spain has now fully vaccinated a higher proportion of its population then the UK according to OWID.
That's not the reason - Spain is on a par with the UK for single doses, ahead on fully vaccinated.
That's because the UK is standing still when it comes to single doses.
Although we did more in raw numbers than Germany over the last weekend. Germany looks like it will finish with the lowest vaccination rate of the major European countries.
Is there any difference between the old western and eastern parts of Germany ?
Given that Eastern Europe as a whole has lower vaccination rates that might have an effect in Germany as well.
"I've been to Magaluf, but this was just crazy..." LOL.
There's a point here - we've gone from forced abstinence to encouraged excess almost overnight.
Some people can't handle that.
Oddly enough, going racing with restricted crowd numbers was a real pleasure yet I'm told it's not the same without a "crowd".
No, it's much worse but I can understand why Lingfield Park want a crowd of 10,000 drinking rather than 2,000 enjoying the racing.
Indeed there is a point. And you've put your finger on it. Newcastle City centre has had a distinctly, evil air abroad in the late hours recently. Stag and hens, aren't in Prague and Amsterdam. The quayside bar staff I know reckon it has never been anything like this bad. Not local accents. Blood, urine and vomit on the Tyne is all mine.
Why and who?
Some parts of London have definitely got edgier, some are quieter than ever.
Stag and hens for one. Sports teams starved of foreign tours. There has always been them, of course, but not in these numbers. Hotels are cheap and plentiful due to lack of business and tourist trade. Worse, they aren't diluted by local middle class theatre and restaurant goers, nor business people who are staying away. Toon, indeed the north east, has only one small, getting Pissed up centre.
In my corner of London it is open drug dealing spreading into the royal parks, especially around Primrose Hill. It comes with gangs, violence and theft, and it started during Covid
It is sporadic. Weeks can do by and it's fine, then suddenly Eeek
I was musing. Is there a glut of cocaine? Not the drug I'd choose during lockdown. There seems to be widespread anecdotal reports of it being involved now. That, and excess alcohol, would explain at least some of the behaviour.
There were certainly loads of reports of open coke taking in the euros, especially the final. A photographer friend of mine was at Wembley and he says it was an incredible bacchanal of agrression, exuberance and drugs - not all bad, some good humoured, but definitely scary
In London the drugs have followed the kids. During lockdown a lot of London youths discovered the magnificent parks, and realised what fun it is just to buy booze and go sit in the parks and party and have picnics and music (and it is fun, I do the same). They bring guitars. They sing and dance. There are tribes of pretty teenage girls. The boys naturally follow, hopefully
And so the drug dealers have come to serve this brand new market
Maybe I’m getting old. But London increasingly feels lawless, grimy, threatening. A place to leave rather than a place to go to. Went in a few weeks ago. Took mere seconds after my arrival before the station was evacuated for an Inspector Sands announcement. Very hard to avoid the urge to say “bugger this for a game of soldiers, back to the shire I go”.
Comments
They knew full well the UK government could refuse an indyref2 for decades if they voted No but 55% of them voted No anyway
Hotels are cheap and plentiful due to lack of business and tourist trade.
Worse, they aren't diluted by local middle class theatre and restaurant goers, nor business people who are staying away.
Toon, indeed the north east, has only one small, getting Pissed up centre.
Since the 1979 Lancaster House agreement, their main reference point beyond Calais has been Australia, for its "points system" and for its reluctance to conduct maritime rescues.
Don't you ever bore yourself? Do you read over what you write on here and think Errr......
Given the assumption that the very long standing tripartite Right of Centre coalition* will get a majority at the next election, which still looks sound, and given a majority is more likely to return one of the political leaders as PM, as opposed to the neutral figures of this parliament, the key question is whether PM Salvini or PM Meloni prevails. The poll shifts, the start of which pre-date Lega going into the Draghi coalition, favours the latter.
The parliament, fearing PM Salvini, has always found a way of avoiding this election, but with a latest date of June 1 2023, the benefits in doing so are dwindling. My guess is that Salvini merely joined the government to facilitate its collapse at an appropriate time - late enough that there is little benefit in putting together a new administration but early enough to maintain a chance of Lega winning the right of centre contest. It looks like a very narrow channel to navigate. My best guess is that the Italians will go to the polls at some point in spring 2022, though it is not solely in Salvini's gift.
* the names change but essentially the same 3 parties have been in alliance since the 90s
Spitzenfuckit was meant to be a brilliant innovation making the EU so much more democratic, at last doing something about the democratic deficit. But, nah, they just dumped it 5 years later
Incredible
And nobody denies they write our laws (except you, apparently)
What is the purpose of this performative stupidity?
Incompetent, incompetent, incompetent.
It is sporadic. Weeks can do by and it's fine, then suddenly Eeek
As I said, thanks for agreeing with my point.
By way of relief, some new footwear for @TheScreamingEagles
https://twitter.com/p_maverick_b/status/1422193166279712777
Not the drug I'd choose during lockdown. There seems to be widespread anecdotal reports of it being involved now.
That, and excess alcohol, would explain at least some of the behaviour.
To be fair, a lot of honest EU Federalists (not Brits like Scott) know this and admit it, they want it to have real powers, to be able to write laws, to have an elected president, demote the Commission to a civil service, in other words be the normal parliament of a normal polity
But the nation states are jealously guarding what remains of the "sovereignty" - see, it matters to them as well as Leavers - and this final step is proving hard. Which means that for the meantime the European Parliament is left as this pitiful, powerless, creepy, non-democratic hybrid.
The only answer is either dissolve it, or go for full on Federalism, give the parliament real legislative powers, finally taken from the member states - and do it soon. I bet they will do this eventually. Which makes it even less likely we will ever rejoin
In London the drugs have followed the kids. During lockdown a lot of London youths discovered the magnificent parks, and realised what fun it is just to buy booze and go sit in the parks and party and have picnics and music (and it is fun, I do the same). They bring guitars. They sing and dance. There are tribes of pretty teenage girls. The boys naturally follow, hopefully
And so the drug dealers have come to serve this brand new market
Is there anything Johnson and Co. can do, however inept, that you can't put a positive gloss onto?
Their concerns are almost entirely around covid and how we are progressing in our path to more freedom and so far it does seem to be encouraging
Our Scottish family have returned to Scotland today from our son's wedding and my niece texted me to say how amazing it was that nobody at Carlisle (Southwaite) services were wearing masks
These are the real issues for people and not the bitterness of the remain v leave entrenched positions
Furthermore, as I said earlier if Boris succeeds in achieving herd immunity he will see a considerable poll boost and to be honest after todays polling on Boris v Starmer with Starmer only 1% ahead on telling the truth, I really think it is labour who have far more to worry about and just what they are achieving
Impressive
How did that happen?
ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explorer
And France? Or close, anyway.
We never managed to find a “vaccine dividend”.
On your specific points you're absolutely underestimating the impact of having a vast pool of cheap labour on productivity and the local skills base. Employers have no need to invest in skills base improvements when they can simply throw labour at it. Why bother?
You can map the drop off in business investment to the joining of the A8 countries. I think you have an idealised version of the EU which is based on what the EU15 was, not what the EU28 was when we left.
Staying in the EU doesn't confront any of the issues facing the UK, all it does is brush it under the rug and create an effective underclass of low wage workers for whom the minimum wage is a maximum wage. So it makes me a bit poorer, so it makes you a bit poorer. The alternative would tear this nation in two as the low wage workers realise their lot in life is to exist to service people like us who want cheap coffee.
So we'll have to bother with border checks and some extra paperwork. None of that is the end of the world really, in fact escaping from EU protectionism will probably be of net benefit to the nation. Escaping the dead hand of the EU will be better than most people realise.
It was entirely predictable that all western nations would end at roughly the same time and in the same way, as they all hit the walls of vaccine hesitancy
Its been fewer cases, fewer hospitalisations, fewer deaths and fewer restrictions.
The AN successors would have to try and be the sensible voice
The problem that the Australians have is that their initial attempt to lock Covid out was so successful that they didn't go Hell for leather to get hold of vaccines and then get jabbing people, like many of the worst affected European and North American countries did. They followed, in a very real sense, a policy of splendid isolation. As long as the borders were kept sealed tight enough, they were safe. There was no need to hurry with the vaccines. If the occasional case got through their quarantine systems then it could always be crushed with a snap lockdown.
Of course, all of this was predicated on the emergency snap lockdowns working. What they're terrified of with the Delta outbreak in Sydney is that, now it's passed a critical threshold in terms of community transmission, the lockdowns can't wipe it out. It's too infectious.
If true then Australia is sunk. Lockdown will have to continue until their vaccination program is well advanced; if they just give up and let people out of jail again now, then Delta will rip through the largely defenceless population, cause mass slaughter and collapse the healthcare system. But their vaccination rate is utterly pitiful, they're desperately short of mRNA vaccines, and the actions of their media, government and regulator put together have so comprehensively trashed the reputation of AZ that it's all but useless.
Latest estimates suggest that about 15% of all Australians (slightly less than 20% of all adults, and still well under half of the elderly) have been fully vaccinated. The National Cabinet (AIUI a committee of the Australian federal government and its states, which don't seem to be able to agree on much apart from the necessity of closing their borders with one another,) has said that vaccination coverage will need to reach 70% of all adults before restrictions can be significantly eased; the dreaded modellers, apparently spooked by Delta, are now estimating that 80% of the whole population will need jabbing before the country can afford to let lockdowns go. The Prime Minister thinks the country might be able to get to the 70% target by Christmas, but nobody really knows and as I said many of the boffins aren't convinced that this will be enough. It is a total dumpster fire.
Their attempt to suppress Covid is indeed zealous, but they had nothing else at the outset and they've certainly no better strategy to deploy against the virus now - and they may not be able to dig themselves out of the hole for a very long time.
(Edit: Ok tbf OWID isn't showing the German data for 31st July yet.)
I think sector by sector analysis fails to prove that large scale immigration impeded wage growth except in some limited cases. Same is true for productivity.
And FDI has fallen since 2016 as we have become a less interesting investment proposition since Brexit.
Britain’s underclass is actually it’s own white working class, where it suffers from very poor educational performance - a post industrial legacy. None of this is related to EU membership.
Where I might agree is that EU membership disguised this problem. On the other hand, there’s no real evidence the current government is really interested in confronting it either.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/02/johnson-hints-amber-watchlist-travel-plan-may-be-ditched
Like an umbrella…
Norway votes on 13 September - quite possible the ruling Conservative-led coalition will be replaced by a Labour-Centre Government.
Iceland votes on 25 September - the existing coalition will probably continue.
Germany votes on 26 September - who knows?
Czech Republic votes 8-9 October - likely the Babis Government will fall - could Ivan Bartos of the Pirates & Mayors form a new Government?
No one is looking at this and raging (apart from you)
It's excellent publicity for Brand Boris. He probably staged it all
Indeed Germany, by far the biggest EU nation having an election this year, looks likely just to produce yet another dull grand coalition led by the CDU, only question whether their coalition partner is the SPD again or the Greens
Same elsewhere in provincial Britain
The violence in London is much rarer, oddly, but when it happens it is nastier: stabbings and shootings
31/7 - 251,017
1/8 - 139,450
Germany:
31/7 - 177,129
1/8 - 110,426
But I'll shut up on this as my challenge is clearly not striking a chord with anyone.
I remain very grateful to have recieved my 2nd jab 3 months ago! :-)
Thank-you JCVI and NHS!
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/france/
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/spain/
https://www.mscbs.gob.es/profesionales/saludPublica/ccayes/alertasActual/nCov/documentos/Actualizacion_431_COVID-19.pdf
https://dashboard.covid19.data.gouv.fr/vue-d-ensemble?location=FRA
A margin which is likely to grow as Delta spreads further in France and Spain - Spain currently has over 10k in hospital (if my translation is correct) in a country only two thirds the size of the UK.
Ireland I don't know about.
There was a whole thread about it yesterday.
His fans love him. His enemies hate him. Stunts like this change neither opinion.
But, people who hold neither view are not more likely to vote BoZo as a result.
And yes, he is an International laughing stock.
He did it with the zipwire. He made is somehow part of his shtick
He has many many faults but a lack of showmanship is not one of them. He has an instinctive knack. And this is not unimportant, politicians can be damaged by this stuff - eg Miliband and the bacon sandwich
And @MaxPB is right re having cheap labour available is a discouragement to firms investing and thus driving down productivity. Look at farmers - wailing about how not having access to cheap E European labour would kill them and, when they realised they would n out get their way, started to invest in crop picking technology that was there all along, just they hadn’t bothered to invest in it because of the supply of...cheap labour.
There are many plus points you could argue for the EU but defying the law of economics is not one of them.
Given that Eastern Europe as a whole has lower vaccination rates that might have an effect in Germany as well.