Samantha Bee asked David Tennant to help her out with some pronunciation issues.
She could have gotten some pro-Brexiters to contribute, I suppose, but they all sound like Daleks.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Sound-like, perhaps, but with a smaller vocabulary — EXTERMINATE! is several syllables too many.
I love that they used that Malcolm Tucker clip.
I don’t know about that. With repetition and training, they’ve managed to use the “IMMIGRANT!” word. And they’ve grasped the concept of “IMMIGRANT! EXTERMINATE!” at least.
Only it seems to be pronounced OU! OUT!!, albeit with the amount of spittle involved, it’s a wonder no-one’s drowned.
You realise that the Welsh woman in the soundbites about immigrants was talking about the English, right? ;)
Stop insulting Daleks!
Daleks have feelings too you kn….Oh!
“Ballbag”? No true Scotsman says “ballbag”! It’s pronounced “bawbag”.
@Dunc #7
“Actual amounts of scots may vary.”
I wish the Brits would quit stalling now. It’s a really shitty thing to do to the rest of the EU and the global economy.
Saganite @9: We’re not stalling, we’re panicking.
Besides, Dave has said that it’s up to the next PM to pull the trigger on Article 50, and that he won’t be out of the job until October, so you’re up in the air with the rest of us for the next three months.
The good news is once England realizes they fucked up and decide to come crawling back, one of the requirements of membership is to adopt the Euro as state currency (they currently use GBPs).
@#10, NelC:
Unless I missed something, Cameron said he wants to be out by October, not that he won’t leave until October. (Of course, since the Leave campaign is apparently finally beginning to realize that you really don’t want to be the person who pulls the trigger, it may take until October for someone to finally be forced to take up the office.)
Meanwhile the EU side is trying to frame the argument that the referendum itself is sufficient notice that Article 50 should be triggered, which may or may not hold up in court but is apparently plausible enough to be mentioned. (Apparently the actual phrasing doesn’t require notice from the official government, merely that the intention to leave be made clear, and Cameron has said that there would be no second referendum and they would be leaving, although whether the British Parliament will vote for that is not quite as straightforward. So it is now arguably “clear” that the UK will leave the EU.) Also, of course, there’s another article which permits the EU to sanction a member whose behavior is too disruptive, so if the UK doesn’t do something soon, they’re likely to have problems from that direction instead.
About the only amusement I’ve had out of this so far was checking out a David Ike video on the result. He was absolutely ecstatic, overjoyed along with most of his commentariat, which numbered thousands. At least I felt reassured that I’d voted the right way even if in the minority.
I wonder, has anyone checked out the reactions of the flat earthers?
#9, saganite
On behalf of the people who are currently working quite hard to ensure that the UK doesn’t leave the EU: every day that the article 50 process has not started is another day where this disasterous exit plan can be averted. You might not like the stalling, but we find it preferable to driving our country and economy off a cliff.
The current schedule has the new Tory leader – hence PM selected on 9 September. At least six possible contenders have been named: three from each side of the rererendum fight (although the most prominent supporter of one has said “we are all Brexiters now”, suporting my prediction that the Tories, with their greed for power, would quickly reunify if the vote was to leave), three women, three men, one with a beard – if Stephen Crabb wins (unlikely), he will be our first bearded PM since Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, who held office 1895-1902. There have been more recent moustachioed premiers, the last being Harold Macmillan (1957-1963).
Whoever is elected may want to delay triggering article 50, to pressure the EU into concessions, but also because the Brexiters didn’t bother to come up with any plan for what to do if they won, nor did Cameron for what should be done if he lost*, and the former disagree fundamentally among themselves about whether they are prepared to concede free movement of labour (hence, continued inability to halt immigration from EU countries) in return for access to the single market. However Merkel, Hollande and Renzi (the Italian PM) have already ruled out informal negotiations before article 50 is invoked.
*If there was any justice, this gobsmacking failure to perform the most basic duties of a political leader would see both Cameron’s crew and the leading Brexiters paraded through the streets in their underwear and wearing placards bearing the legend “I am an irresponsible dolt – spit on me”.
The cheering for the result from Donald Trump and an array of British and European racists and fascists wasn’t enough for you??
@#14 anym
What are you going to do? It’s not like the referendum could simply be reversed. Even if an anti-Brexit/pro-EU government were to come in now, don’t you think overriding the referendum would cause all sorts of problems? Maybe I’m overestimating the Leave-folks’s fervor, but if that were to happen, I would expect to see not only massive protests, but riots in the streets, crime, more murders. As far as I’m concerned, the issue has been addressed, it’s done. We need to move on now and find what stability we can in an ordered process.
I think we’re already off the cliff, and I expect trying to pretend that we aren’t is going to work about as well for us as it normally does for Wile E. Coyote.
anym@14, Saganite@17,
There’s also the point (as Giliell has stressed) that the continued uncertainty is a serious problem for the other 27 EU states – and beyond. The whole fiasco has been a fine display of British irresponsibility and selfishness. Maybe it’s time to think about what we can best do to avoid firther fucking up the world beyond our shores (and border) at this point.
Since the distinctiveness of Scotland is a theme of the thread, I’ll put this here. The following resolution was passed in the Scottish Parliament (“Holyrood”) yesterday, by 92-0, with 31 abstentions (all Tories, I think), six members absent:
I’m pretty sure the ideas floated for how Scotland (and maybe northern Ireland and Gibralter) could remain in the EU while the rest of the UK leaves won’t work. Even if Scotland became independent while the UK was in the process of leaving, I doubt it could keep continuous membership – the EU won’t want all the additional complications trying to do that would cause, nor should it risk them in my view (see #19). If we want to be in the EU, we’ll have to gain our independence, then apply to join like any other European state. But as Sturgeon says, she has to explore the possibilities – and she’s done well to get the widest possible support at home. She’s met with Martin Schulz (head of the EU Parliament) this morning, and will be meeting Juncker, head of the Commission, later today.
Amusingly, the SNP group in the UK Parliament has applied to be recognised as the official opposition, on the grounds that its leader, Angus Robertson, is supported by more MPs than Jeremy Corbyn, after the 172-40 vote of no-confidence in Corbyn passed by Labour MPs yesterday (yes, Labour have joined the Tories in fiddling about with their leadership while the Treaty of Rome burns).
Watched for Tennant, leaving satisfied!
I would sign that petition.
it’s definitely some direct democracy i could hypocritically favor.
:)
anym
Really, why should anybody be upset about the UK pushing others off a cliff? Rule Britania, right?
Nick Gotts
German news reported that Westminster said they wouldn’t agree to another Scottish Referendum and not accept ts outcome (oh the irony). Can you comment on that?
+++
The EU have declared that there won’t be any negotiations before Article 50 is declared. What I also heard on the radio (therefore no sauce) is that they’re expecting the new PM to do that immediately, within 2 weeks if they’re from the Remain side, within a day if they’re from the Leave side.
Here are some suggestions for that bright economic future for the youth of the UK, bestowed upon them by their grandparents.
Some highlights:
I’m kinda surprised he didn’t openly advocate for the abolition of child labour laws…
Nick Gotts:
I was at a meeting earlier today at work, in which a manager talked about the possible impact of the result on the company, and how we will deal with it. It struck me that it’s entirely possible that my employer has put more planning into Brexit than either the government or Boris and co. Isn’t it great being a politician? You get to fuck up entire economies with your incompetence, blight the lives of millions, and either walk away or get a promotion! Meanwhile, if I embarked on a lowly IT project with as little planning as these clowns, I would be out of a job.
As for Stephen Crabb, I don’t mind the beard. I do mind that he’s a Christian with some decidedly dodgy views.
The latest hit on Pornhub: Dumb British blonde fucks 15 million people at one
I haven’t seen such a report, but it would not surprise me: the UK government says the last referendum settled the issue – ignoring the fact that one of the main claims of the “No” campaign was that independence would mean leaving the EU! Given the result on Thursday, that probably swayed quite a few votes. Legally, the Scottish government does require a temporary devolution of powers to hold a referendum – at least, one that the UK government would have to recognise; whether they’d actually try to stop one being held I doubt – they’d probably just say it didn’t count, and advise people not to take part. Sturgeon has so far just said she wants the power to hold indyref2 if there turns out to be no other way to keep Scotland in the EU (which there won’t be, I’m near certain). She could certainly get a resolution through the Scottish Parliament for one, once it’s clear there’s no other way – the SNP at 63 seats out of 129 is just short of a majority, but my own party, the Scottish Greens (SGP) is also pro-independence-within-the-EU, and its 6 seats are enough to provide one. The SNP’s weakness in arguing with Westminster is that its manifesto at the 2015 UK and 2016 Scottish elections did not promise indyref2.
But if another UK general election is held anytime soon, the SNP will put in their manifesto a promise to hold indyref2 rather than let Scotland be dragged out of the EU – and they are likely to win almost all the seats in Scotland again. That would put Sturgeon in a very strong position, particularly if the SNP got over 50% of the vote, as they well might, and the remote possibility of a unilateral declaration of independence appears if Westminster still refuses. That’s one reason (there are others that are more important) why I don’t believe the talk there has been about a general election this autumn. Assuming I’m right about that, and the new PM does invoke article 50 in reasonable time, and there’s no extension of negotiations beyond 2 years (I know, a lot of assumptions in a very volatile situation, but all look to me pretty likely to hold), the UK will be out of the EU before the next election, scheduled in 2020. Always assuming, of course, that there still is an EU by 2020 – what if Le Pen wins the French Presidency next year, and then a referendum to leave (not likely, but not beyond the bounds of the possible)? Anyhow, it’s too far away to attempt predictions when things are moving so fast.
Giliell@24,
That very much fits with this article, which I linked to before the vote.
Giliell@24, That seems like the “Singapore delusion” (and it does mention Singapore) where with the wave of a magic wand, the UK will become a bigger better (of course) Sooper-Dooper Singapore-on-Steroids. As-if that is actually desirable.
It’s even nuttier than the cherry-picked EU delusion.
There is, however, a real concern here: An important set of safety rules (worker, food, others…) are heavily-based / mandated by the EU, and those are indeed at some risk.
Nick Gotts
There’s a German saying that nobody is useless: you can always serve as a bad example. My hopes are that the UK are currently doing that job for others who think they’re better off without the EU.
Giliell@30,
That’s my hope too – and that it leads to a shift away from the neoliberalism that helped to fuel the Brexit campaign – even though those at the head of it just want to take neoliberalism further, and have proved quite willing to scapegoat immigrants to get the chance; my fear is that it strengthens the far right across the EU. We’ll see which possibilities win out.
@#14, anym
Okay, the problem with that is: nobody is going to cancel that referendum. If they were, they would already have stepped up and said so.
Cameron said “I didn’t ask for this so I’m not going to do the dirty work”, which is an implicit acceptance of leaving.
None of the Tories who are hoping to lead the party have come forward and said (presumably in less inflammatory terms) “Cameron may have been unwilling to do the right thing, but I am asking to be made PM and I promise to ignore the referendum if I am brought in”.
As for the other parties, they’re either implicitly pro-Leave (UKIP and BNP) or else in a minority (Labour and the Liberal Democrats) because the UK, for all the mockery they like to make of the US for our politics, consistently votes for MPs who are transparently as against the citizen body’s own interests as any Republican can be.
(And, I might add: even if the MPs could build a coalition across party lines to reject the referendum, they would at this point be risking violence to a degree suggesting a civil war. All those “I’m not a racist or a xenophobe but” people have already committed murders in the fairly-recent past, they’re effectively holding public demonstrations, and so riots are certainly on the table if the government attempts to resist.)
UKIP? Boris Johnson? As individuals they may not personally want to pull the switch, but they want it to be pulled.
The Queen — I have seen it suggested that she should refuse to accept a Parliamentary vote, even though usually she rubber-stamps them — would have said something by now; I’ve heard it said she was actually pro-Leave but was smart enough not to say anything in public.
Scotland and Ireland? Sorry, but (a) if they leave the UK without permission from Parliament, then they won’t be able to join the EU (Spain will almost certainly be able to veto their admission, and will do so because they’re facing a would-be secession of their own in the Catalan independence movement, and don’t want to set a precedent that a part of a country can secede against the will of the parent and then join the EU), and (b) the threat to secede by legal means is somewhat hollow; they can only hold a referendum if Parliament permits it, and Parliament really doesn’t want to cope with that right now.
Basically, by now everyone in power is pretty sure the UK is going to invoke article 50. The only reason there’s any hesitation is that everyone wants to know what the terms are going to be — will it cost more to leave the UK and set up business elsewhere, or stay and pay the new tariffs? Will there be some sort of relief program for businesses which stay, or assistance for businesses coming to the EU? Without knowing this stuff, businesses can’t decide what they’re going to do, and countries can’t really make any plans until the UK finally bows to the inevitable and invokes article 50. All of which means that the economies of the UK and the EU are theoretically going to hemorrhage money in the form of opportunity costs at least until the negotiations start.
Since the EU, ironically, potentially has more to gain from the departure of the UK than the UK does, they will be putting as much pressure as possible on the UK. The first step was to announce that there will be no informal negotiations: it’s Article 50 or Nothing, and the Nothing had better be backed up with an Act of Parliament (which apparently isn’t happening). The next step will be to ignore the UK in day-to-day business of the EU (apparently already underway), and then will come the sanctions against the UK for destabilizing the EU by not getting out. (That one will take some time, because apparently Germany is hesitant and has been reluctant to get in line with the rest, but it will happen eventually if there’s too much delay.)
@#31, Nick Gotts
It is an unfortunate truth that neoliberals learn nothing and forget nothing, which is why they are really more like conservatives in many ways. The only way to change course is to vote them out and then keep them out. (Unfortunately, the public which does the voting learns almost nothing and forgets everything, so that probably isn’t in the cards anywhere — the EU won’t be easing up on the Greeks, TTP and TTIP are still going forward, Clinton still wants to start wars and is turning the Democratic Party’s convention platform into something which would please Ronald Reagan, etc. ad infinitum.)
The Vicar@32,
Much of what you say is correct, but there are a number of obvious holes in your knowledge of UK and EU politics:
1) The BNP is a complete irrelevance politically.
2) By “Ireland” you presumably mean northern Ireland – the distinction is crucial.
3) No, refusing to abide by the referendum result would not lead to “violence to a degree risking a civil war”, although it would lead to a rash of racist attacks, and possibly a few riots. Refusal to abide by the result is most unlikely to happen, but that’s because it would lead to a disastrous split in the Conservative Party.
4) While some EU countries might gain from the migration of financial business from the UK, the EU elite has a lot to lose (realtive to elites elsewhere) from the UK leaving – which is why they were almost universally opposed to it. The UK is a sizeable chunk of the EU economy, and also remains politically, diplomatically and militarily important (G7 member, UNSC permanent seat, key NATO member, huge arms industry, ties with the USA and the rest of the Anglosphere…) That’s quite apart from the fact that Brexit could be the start of complete disintegration, encouraging far right anti-EU parties everywhere.
5) “It is an unfortunate truth that neoliberals learn nothing and forget nothing.” If that was actually true, they could not have been so successful. They are quite capable of tactical and even strategic flexibility. The French PM has already suggested France might veto TTIP.
Some unexpected news, which I put here as the current site of Brexit discussion: Boris Johnson is not going to run for leadership of the Tories! Apparently the at-least-equally-vile Michael Gove’s decision to run has made him realise he wouldn’t win.
Shouldn’t that be
@34: So is there a less than completely awful option for the Tories to nominate for PM?
Why? Simply having the referendum has plunged the UK into economic crisis, increased racial and ethnic tensions, and reinvigorated independence movements in various subsections within the UK. It’s also set up a crisis within the Tories and it should have set one going within UKIP as well, given that they’ve already admitted that immigration rules aren’t going to change so the whole rationale of “controlling our borders” is a bunch of crap. Who benefited? Why would any EU country look at this and say, “We’ve got to get some of that for ourselves?” If anything, I would think the UK vote would convince people in, say, Greece or Spain that they ought to stay in the EU, that whatever its problems it is better than breaking up and tanking their economies for no benefit whatsoever.
I wonder whether Boris Johnson sees his future more in the media than in politics? I can easily imagine him feeling that the editorship of the Daily Telegraph is his for the taking – and this probably looks like a more pleasant prospect than piloting the country up shit creek without a paddle. I don’t know whether he engineered Gove’s change of heart, but it may have come as something of a relief to him.
So, Bloody Stupid Johnson has decided to keep on doing what he’s been doing for all his life: Make a mess and then call somebody else to clean it.
It certainly pays better – he earns (earned?) £250,000 a year for writing a column in the Telegraph. He claimed that the amount was “chickenfeed” and said that he “write[s] extremely fast”, so he can “knock off” the column on a Sunday morning “as a way of relaxation”.
All of the candidates are completely awful in their own distinctive ways, with the possible exception of Andrea Leadsom, who I’ve never heard of and know nothing about.
So, kind of like looking at the Republican candidates early in the primaries and being unable to identify the token sane one? My sympathies.
Giliell, professional cynic -Ilk- @ 39;
Sounds about right. I wonder why Trump-lite didn’t try to follow through on what appeared to be his plan to use the leave vote to oust Cameron and then seek to take his place? Johnson seemed to be the front runnner amongst the Brexit idiots for the job.
I can’t help but feel that it has finally dawned on the mop-headed muppet just how much damage he has done to the UK and beyond, and he is now is back peddling furiously lest he is left in office when this whole mess really comes home to roost. He probably doesn’t want to go down in history as the man in charge when the UK fractures into its component states.
So, not just a cynical arsehat happy to use xenophobia to advance his career, but a coward into the bargain, too weak to stand and face the consequences of his actions. He missed his vocation – he should have been a Republican.
I remind you mini–trum-prat was the the troygraph’s correspondent in Brussels some years ago:
Ouch!
@blf #43: Johnson managed to get fired from the Times for not being accurate enough? That had to have taken some doing.
And Labour decides now is the time to say another to their supporters and try to install-by-palace-coup a tool.
What better time to do it? What are the voters going to do? Go support the Tories? UKIP maybe? Well, in Scotland the answer appears to be go SNP, but in England that’s not an option.
dianne @ 44;
Yup – there is no more grievous insult than that, and Boris deserves every syllable.
Because he’s actually pro-EU, never expected Leave to win, and realises that it will be a disaster?
Not but that I found Corbyn’s lack of support for the remain campaign when it was clear that a leave vote, at least at this time, was an economic and social disaster to be a poor choice, at best.
When in doubt, listen to some Scottish songs (performed by an English band) about the joys of living next to England.
Rogues in a Nation*
Cam Ye Oe’r Frae France**
*In this case, the rogues are Scots who sold out for English gold.
**Jacobite song mocking the royals.
@24 Giliel
Here are some suggestions …
Never mind repealing the child labour laws, it’s surprising he is not advocating Swift’s Modest Proposal
allow in more Canadians and Indians
I realise it’s the Telegraph but that man is clearly delusional. Allow in? He’s joking.
I live in Canada and I can just imagine a Canadian thinking about moving to England any time in the next 20 years.
And with UKIP rampaging around I’d suggest any Indians who had been thinking of moving to England is filling out applications to emigrate to Canada or Australia as I type.
Dianne
Corbyn won an overwhelming 75% Remain in his constituency while most of his opponents lost theirs to leave. Oh, and his current opponent kept praising his “days that would make a 30 year old tired” in support of the Remain campaign. Corbyn always had the support of the Labour basis, but never of the Labour establishment, aka the people who did so much to ruin Labour.
@#33, Nick Gotts
Except in the sense that they still exist and are obviously going to reabsorb quite a large chunk of UKIP now that UKIP has accomplished its only reason for existence.
To be honest, I was thinking both of Northern Ireland and Ireland as a whole. The English are continuing to not give a fuck about either one. I’m kind of hoping that the referendum will serve as a wake-up call to unionists in NI, that Parliament really can’t be depended upon after all, and maybe the last 20 years will let them realize that they’ve had more peace when someone other than the UK is in charge of mediating their relations. So far I’ve seen a lot of nervousness and everyone says that it wouldn’t take much to reignite the Troubles, but I haven’t seen any reports of actual violence, no bombs or murders or anything outside the background of minor acts of violence which has continued anyway, so I’m cautiously hopeful that NI and I (the country, this time) can at least continue this state of affairs.
The problem with what you just said is that the violent idiots are spread out. If the roles were reversed, and it were the Remain voters who were causing the violence, then riots would be containable. But the Leave vote is spread out all over, a significant minority of most larger cities (even London) and a majority across the country. If even 5% of those people decide to resort to violence, there won’t be any easy way to suppress it, even if it’s 5% of 52% of the 75% who voted.
I have a feeling that, after the economic crash which is not over but has reduced in speed for the time being, the secessionists elsewhere are going to find that they actually have a harder time making a case to leave. As you say, the UK is important in its own right — and yet leaving is in process of trashing them and they haven’t actually even left yet. Le Pen’s opposition, to take an example, will be able to point at the UK and say “okay, do you really want to end up like them? They just blew everything by choosing to leave, and they were in a better position than we are.”
As for the UK having more to gain: well, obviously there is an overall loss with the UK leaving. Two smaller markets, with a barrier between the two, will be less profitable and less secure than one, and the uncertainty will at the very least keep the economy from expanding as it might otherwise have done. But if you take it as a given that the UK is leaving, so that the contractions are a given, the EU is probably going to come out of this better-off than the UK. Businesses which were in the UK to get access to a large market will leave for EU nations — the EU market is something like 10 times the size of the UK one, and that’s without assuming Scotland or Northern Ireland or Wales depart the UK — and without EU protection, businesses in the EU will be able to steal UK markets even beyond that. (For example, I was just reading about a business which basically makes a living out of supplying cheddar cheese to France. They are protected by EU laws, because genuine cheddar cheese is a protected regional foodstuff. With Britain leaving the EU, it will be possible for a French company to start making cheddar cheese and simply take most of this market from the UK.)
It’s mildly amusing, as an American, to see Europeans talk about the evils of neoliberalism and point to the leading lights of the EU as examples. It’s like seeing the seven dwarves argue about the evils of being too tall and pointing to Bashful as an example of how such extreme height is dangerous. The Greeks, who everyone agrees are victims of neoliberal policy, aren’t significantly worse off in terms of quality of life than a lot of places in America which aren’t considered to be particularly abnormal, and the opportunistic trade deals with Africa which cheat them may be, it is true, nasty, but they don’t compare to the Obama administration’s military maneuvers there seeking resources while claiming we’re there to help and protect the citizens. (And no, I’m not referring to the drone bombing, which is in the Mideast and Asia. The American military has been expanding its presence in Africa dramatically over the last 8 years, but it hasn’t gotten much media play.)
@#47, dianne
And yet you don’t have a problem with Clinton pulling the same nonsense. I really wonder about you sometimes.
Ever consider it is your paranoid antipathy toward Clinton that makes us take your word at less than what you would wish?
It’s my understanding (based on Boris himself admitting it), that he was fired for literally making up quotes and attributing them to people he was writing about.
it’s not so much paranoia… when you see the direction she is currently taking the DNC platform:
-pushed the DNC to go ahead with the TPP
-will not restrict or ban fracking in the US
-STILL will not follow kyoto protocal and start plans for carbon tax
-refuses to deal with Isreali occupation, or include any language regarding a palestinian state.
since they have already voted on these platform issues, and that is WITH Bernie supporters there to vote as well (they voted the opposite on all of these). it’s pretty clear that there will not be progress on a lot of important issues under a Clinton administration.
Now, that’s just the platform, and the DNC might be deliberately leaning centrist in order to attract a wider swath of voters… but so far, independent voters I have seen are rather looking in the opposite direction.
I don’t understand this, but I suppose she could change her mind once she wins the general. maybe.
dianne@37,
The result was enthusiastically welcomed by the far right throughout the EU. It’s true the effect of the shambles in the UK is likely to dent their immediate appeal, but unless the sky actually falls in on the UK economy in the next year, which I don’t currently expect, I think the medium-term effect will be to benefit them. But I hope you’re right.
You’re confusing the official (largely Tory) Leave camapign with UKIP (which ran its own). Farage is attacking the immigration “backsliding” among Tories.
@58: It’s not unlikely that I confused the two campaigns. I must admit to not having followed the whole campaign much up until the end, being distracted by US and German politics. Farage can attack the backsliding all he wants, but the fact is that, as of now at least, the official position is no change in immigration policy so leaving the UK is not a magic ticket to immigration restrictions. Also, aren’t there a ridiculous number of Brits living in the EU? They’ll need new permissions to stay, at the least and if things go sufficiently bad may not get them.
While I agree that the US Democratic platform is an issue worthy of discussion, as is the US Democratic nominee and election in general, could we maybe have just one thread that’s about a different country’s politics?
The Vicar@54,
(1) Nope. Both because the BNP is a shadow of its former self, and not even the most successful of the parties to the right of UKIP (that would be Britain First); and because UKIP will have plenty to feed on in the “backsliding” within the Brexit camp about immigration (see #58 and the link therefrom). You really don’t know anything about the British far right, and should stop pretending you do; I’ve been following its bizarre and disgusting machinations for twenty-five years.
(2) OK, you mis-spoke: “Scotland and Ireland? Sorry, but (a) if they leave the UK without permission from Parliament”. “Ireland” is not in the UK (in British political as opposed to geographical parlance, “Ireland” without qualification means the Republic). The chances of the NI Unionists abandoning their core identity as such for either Irish unification or independence are as near zero as makes no matter.
3) “If even 5% of those people decide to resort to violence”. Risible: it wouldn’t even be .5%, probably not more than .05%. And of course they wouldn’t have firearms. Organised mass anti-government violence – anything beyond the odd riot – needs an appropriate cultural tradition, which simply doesn’t exist in mainland Britain, as opposed to northern Ireland.
4) See #58 again. And I didn’t say the UK has more to gain. Economically, both the UK and the EU are likely to lose – on this we appear to agree – but the kind of disaster for the UK economy that could reasonably be described as “trashing” or “blew everything” looks unlikely at present.
5) It’s mildly amusing seeing you go off on a completely irrelevant tangent when one of your grandiose ex cathedra pronouncements is challenged, and you can’t support it.
dianne@59,
Yes, what I was denying was your claim that there should be a split in UKIP – whereas in fact the backsliding – and a potential split over this in the Tory Party – will give them ample political opportunites. In fact UKIP’s not entirely without its internal problems, as their sole MP, Douglas Carswell, dislikes Farage and criticised the most blatantly racist UKIP poster; but he doesn’t have anything like Farage’s prominence or political skills.
Given the UK’s history of dubious quality control on its food, this would be all to the good. One of the complaints about the EU the British had was “regulation”. You know, regulations like ensuring that your food supply was safe and not contaminated with whatever bacteria, virus, or prion is running through British farms these days. I’d be very dubious about eating British cheddar, but French? That’s got a decent chance of being okay. Not a certainty, but a decent chance.
@Nick 62: I strongly suspect you’re right: The broken promises will only make the people who voted for leave because they’re worried about immigrants more strongly UKIP supporters. Lovely. Though right wing parties, at least in Germany do show a great facility for the circular firing squad, so maybe they’ll disappear in a puff of mutual animosity.
The Austrian Consitutional Court has ordered a rerun of the Presidential election, narrowly lost in May by the neo-Nazi candidate, Hofer. We may get a better idea of the effect of Brexit on the EU’s far right from the rerun, although of course other issues will also affect it. We’ll at least see if either side makes use of it in the campaign.
Nick Gotts
This is scary. Not just that the small scale fascist gets another chance, but also that I thought exactly the same when I heard it on the news.
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Yesterday I was talking to my friend about all this mess and here’s a discussion she had.
A lot of UK people who are in an international marriage are deep in shit if freedom of movement is revoked. The UK has some of the worst regulations concerning non-EU spouses (you have to earn a fuckton of money to “sponsor” your spouse so they can live in the UK).
So far this wasn’t a problem for UK-EU couples and many UK-Non-EU couples opted for living somewhere else in Europe where they actually respect your right to get married (at least for heteros).
Now this friend had this discussion with a Canadian married to a Brit on Facebook. The Canadian lady is understandable worried. But guess whom she blames. The EU. Because freedom of movement for EU citizens apparently forced the UK to implement these horrible rules.
Yep, the Austrian elections are going to be…interesting. Yes, that kind of interesting.
Giliell, I didn’t know that about non-British spouses. I have a friend who recently married and had a baby with a British guy. To complicate the issue further, he’s Jewish and I’m going to make a wild guess that the anti-immigrant movement has an anti-Semitic edge to it too. I hope they’re okay. At least they’re in a mostly remain area.