The Brexit Thread

[Nefertiti2]

That's a good point, Fussbudget. But they weren't marching as trade unionists- and they didn't appear to ever be spoken to as trade unionists.

[Tubby Isaacs]

You selectively brought up the past to allocate blame.

I don't object to middle class people going on marches. (how could I? I shop in Waitrose too. )I object to people campaigning without political analysis or strategy and blaming Corbyn or the Labour Party for issues that are outwit their control.

Perou mentioned trade unions not stepping up. I agreed and mentioned the referendum to back that point up. You bizarrely interpreted that as me "refighting the referendum" and "selectively allocating blame". Funnily enough, seeing we were talking about trade unions specifically, I didn't list all the people responsible for the referendum loss. Of course I agree David Cameron was the main culprit.

But really, let's leave it here.

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

Comment in the Spiegel

Almost everyone who has a say in Brexit belongs to the British establishment, meaning they went to an outrageously expensive private school and completed their studies at Cambridge or Oxford. In this regard, too, we have been enlightened. What in the name of God do they learn there?

I saw that too. Spiegel is getting more ignorant and stupid in its assesment of the UK by the week. They can't see beyond the behaviour of the Tory politicians in power. Their readers would be led by that comment to believe that Cambridge and Oxford universities and their graduates are generally a pro-Brexit bunch, whereas in fact there is absolutely no reason to think that they differ from other UK graduates generally in being very heavily Remain dominated - the Brexit vote was, through the whole country, inversely proportional to education level. Cambridge as a city, whose "town" population includes very large numbers of graduates of the local uni, was the most pro-Remain city in the whole of England. More generally, Spiegel's comments about Briain and the British seem to have completely forgotten that 48% voted remain.

[San Bernardhinault]

If you distilled "Extremely expensive private school and Oxbridge graduates" away from "Oxbridge graduates" or, even more "residents of Oxford and Cambridge", you'd have a very different group. I don't think Spiegel's wrong. The people who own Brexit and are trying to run it are from a very, very small cadre of a very specific background.

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

Obviously a lot of the signs are shit; the Sunday Times front page today uses a photo of two examples that do more to demolish the march's credibility than a 2000 word opinion piece could

No doubt some Brexiteer cunt of an editor spent quite a bit of time seeking out the most egregious example of twattish banners for precisely that reason. I was on the march yesterday and saw scores of banners. Most of them were entirely sensible and matter-of-fact, a few were a bit on the twee side (like, say the naff "never gonna give EU up", or the cartoon of "Despicable May"). I saw nothing remotely as silly and alienating as those banners in the Sunday Times front page photo, which are so bad you might suspect them of being false flag actions.

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

The people who own Brexit and are trying to run it are from a very, very small cadre of a very specific background.

That may be true of the hard Brexiters in the Tory Party - they may be overwhelmingly public school and Oxbridge, I don't know. But so what, anyway. They are deluded dangerous people whether they went to public school and Oxbridge or went to state school like David Davis (who, Der Spiegel may have forgotten, was a pretty major player in the UK's Brexit efforts). And I would bet my life that amongst the public school, Oxbridge subset of the population there's a large Remain majority.

[San Bernardhinault]

Anyway, I think Nef is fundamentally right. Nobody seems to have an actual strategy to stop Brexit. There's a Tory government, and it has no reason to go to the electorate for another 4 years. Tory MPs aren't going to vote to bring down the government - that is wishful thinking. Labour can basically do very little (I think they're doing it badly, but whatever they do at the moment will be marginal).

I think that literally the only way Brexit could be stopped is through its internal contradictions, and in particular the Irish border. There seems to be no political (give or take a DUP freakout) or popular process that would do it.

[Gerontophile]

https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2018/1...-of-the-1920s/

I thought this was quite good on The North, England and what may be unleashed.

Somebody really meant that.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I really don't get how Labour supporting Hard Brexit a few months before we leave is part of a smart election-winning strategy. It's not as hard as the Tories' but if you can't deal with a taxi driver taking a fare over the Irish border, it's hard.

Most things I've seen show the public prioritizing trade over controlling EU immigration. That's where Labour needs to be. I'd much rather they'd been there a while. I'd like them to be able to say, instead of whatever shift Starmer announces (and I recognise these are positive in themselves), "Well, we've been saying for months that the government need to support the Single Market". Labour, fair play to them, support the Customs Union because they know that their voters don't want Liam Fox trade deals with China. I don't think they care all that much about "vassal state" either.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I saw that too. Spiegel is getting more ignorant and stupid in its assesment of the UK by the week. They can't see beyond the behaviour of the Tory politicians in power. Their readers would be led by that comment to believe that Cambridge and Oxford universities and their graduates are generally a pro-Brexit bunch, whereas in fact there is absolutely no reason to think that they differ from other UK graduates generally in being very heavily Remain dominated - the Brexit vote was, through the whole country, inversely proportional to education level. Cambridge as a city, whose "town" population includes very large numbers of graduates of the local uni, was the most pro-Remain city in the whole of England. More generally, Spiegel's comments about Briain and the British seem to have completely forgotten that 48% voted remain.

Yeah, I thought that exert was very odd too.

The problematic common factor isn't "Oxbridge", it's the Conservative Party. What happens to them in there? And in the public at large, it's pensioners. I suppose people becoming more nativist as they get older is grimly predictable.

[Nefertiti2]

I really don't get how Labour supporting Hard Brexit a few months before we leave is part of a smart election-winning strategy. .

Labour isn't supporting Hard Brexit. Saying that it is in entirely about your agenda, not Labour's.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I always understood that outside the Single Market was hard Brexit.

And given our dependence on services, I think that's an entirely warranted definition.

[ad hoc]

If you distilled "Extremely expensive private school and Oxbridge graduates" away from "Oxbridge graduates" or, even more "residents of Oxford and Cambridge", you'd have a very different group. I don't think Spiegel's wrong. The people who own Brexit and are trying to run it are from a very, very small cadre of a very specific background.

This. What exactly are Eton et al teaching people. We've a nation destroyed by Cameron fuelled by Johnson and Rees Mogg. These people are utter scum. They hate people. They wish to create misery and poverty among people who are not them. Fucking vile vile people who believe that all that matters is their enrichment and the emiseration of the non "ruling class"

[johnr]

I always understood that outside the Single Market was hard Brexit.

And given our dependence on services, I think that's an entirely warranted definition.

What would be your definition of a soft Brexit?

[Tubby Isaacs]

What would be your definition of a soft Brexit?

Single Market.

That's how I've always understood it. Customs Union membership is a step in the right direction, and would certainly help eg car manufactures who are important and have political resonance. On this matter, I wonder why Barry Gardiner is still in his job.

[johnr]

Single Market.
.

Do you think that it was possible to stay in the SM once we lost the referendum?

[Tubby Isaacs]

I think it's been feasible for a while.

As for earlier, I think Corbyn, just in terms of internal Labour politics, would have had to be very careful. Lots of the people in the tank for the Single Market/second referendum now might have been tempted to oppose it just to piss him about. But they can't do that now.

I take Snakeplissen's point that the Starmer tests are set up to be failed. But since it's clear they are going to be failed, I'd like to see them act on that. The later they leave it, I think it's going to give the Tories (not to mention the Flint tendency) an easier time to froth about Labour "supporting open door immigration".

[Tubby Isaacs]

I suppose the manifesto is a bit of a problem here, as that said they'd leave the Single Market. As you know, I don't like all the policies, but I think it was very skilful, including on Brexit.

I think they've enough room to say "Well, we gave the government time, they fucked it up, staying in the Single Market is the only way out of their shit".

[Moonlight Shadow]

There was a section of the Leave coalition, Liberal Leave, that advocated EEA for up to 20 years in order to prep the country for a new relation with the EU, new treaty, etc

Theirs was the only plan that would have delivered an orderly and pissibly even good Brexit. Sadly, impatience of the rest took us where we are now.

EEA+CU and a fully implemented FoM could work, include some buffer date objective in 5 years to ensure progress is made.

Impatience has fucked Brexit

[Tubby Isaacs]

There was a section of the Leave coalition, Liberal Leave, that advocated EEA for up to 20 years in order to prep the country for a new relation with the EU, new treaty, etc

Yeah, I think that was the view of Christopher Booker and Richard North, of all people.

[Nefertiti2]

Do you believe Keir Starmer ? (I do)

https://twitter.com/corbynator2/status/1053952771454578688?s=21

It’s a good point Moonlight. That’s why taking the Labour Party out of the debate by launching the coup was so disastrous. I think it led to may implementing . Article 50 far too soon to appease the ERG

[Diable Rouge]

Do you believe Keir Starmer ? (I do)

https://twitter.com/corbynator2/status/1053952771454578688?s=21

It’s a good point Moonlight. That’s why taking the Labour Party out of the debate by launching the coup was so disastrous. I think it led to may implementing . Article 50 far too soon to appease the ERG

Positive news, but to completely avoid a hard Border, either NI or the whole UK needs to be in the Single Market also.

[ad hoc]

https://twitter.com/corbynator2/status/1053952771454578688?s=21

"A hard boarder" sounds like we're back to discussing private schoolboys again

[johnr]

I think it's been feasible for a while.

Sorry, maybe I wasn't clear; I meant, did you think, the day after we lost the referendum, that it was possible to stay in the SM? My memory is that everyone thought that leaving the EU meant leaving the SM - but if you're now saying that outside the SM was hard Brexit, what was the soft option?

(not sure that is any clearer, sorry...)

[Diable Rouge]

Yeah, I think that was the view of Christopher Booker and Richard North, of all people.

His EU Referendum blog is genuinely decent on Brexit developments, and most of the BTL comments are from a pro-Remain perspective (pro-EEA at a bare minimum).