The Brexit Thread

[Benjm]

I really wish there was an option for the EU to expel the UK as only the most drastic measures are going to allow this country to move on I suspect...

It is painful to accept, but increasingly a period on the outside followed by a chastened request to rejoin does look like the most realistic way of finding a way back to sanity. And even then the chances can't be any better than 50/50.

[Ginger Yellow]

I really wish there was an option for the EU to expel the UK as only the most drastic measures are going to allow this country to move on I suspect...

Well, there is. Just don't agree to whatever deal may be cobbled together and refuse to extend the negotiations. Which is not all that unlikely to happen the way things are going.

[Moonlight Shadow]

Well, yesterday TM showed she is either a deluded fool (as well as incompetent and a liar that can't accept her mistakes - see foreign students visas comments) or that she now sees herself as a kind of lightning rod in order to save Brexit. That Bone MP idea of a national hero is probably shared by few people...

I guess either the UK crashes out without any kind of deal, outside of all regulatory arrangements in some kind of Year Zero frame of mind or there is going to be the most abject of surrenders at the last minute if enough people at the top regain some sanity.

I still am in awe on how this country is behaving. It's like decades of resentment, frustration have exploded and it is now gesticulating wildly, shouting "Look at me, I was a player, I ran the show, show some fucking respect and give me something to wet my beak". It is an incredible spectacle and future historians will have a field day discussing the events that led to it and followed.

[Ginger Yellow]

I've been enjoying, a a gallows humour kind of way, watching the Japanese diplomats this week saying "what the fuck are you doing?" in as many different ways as possible.

[Snake Plissken]

It is becoming clearer how the UK expects things to go - we don't do any work, just wait for the EU to come up with something and we tell them they are wrong. Same as it ever was, really.

[Ginger Yellow]

That went well. Another month pissed away. Great job, Tories.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Take that, traitor Corbyn.

Don't pay anything, (presumably) repeal the European Communities Act and the Irish question is simple. Cede Northern Ireland.

[Lang Spoon]

fuckin Scargill, such an arsehole

[Tubby Isaacs]

Interesting population statistics too. Seems to be taking 2004 as his base.

Is he trying to insinuate there's 8 million Poles here? I think he is.

edit- I've no idea what he's talking about.

[Tubby Isaacs]

That "Brexit as first domino to fall" theory isn't looking great. Tough line beats soft line everywhere.

[Ginger Yellow]

Impressive that "very hard" beats "very soft" in the UK.

[Toby Gymshorts]

[Tubby Isaacs]

Spain's interesting there. No "those tourists are money". They want us cast out as far as possible, and already measuring up our old seat at the European top table.

[Toby Gymshorts]

Well, the smell of blood is in the air. What's worse is that it's the result of self-flagellation.

[Lang Spoon]

There seems to be a concerted effort by shady god knows who funds them U.K. Think tanks to keep Irexit on the agenda in the Irish media. Of course, the useless Irish Times (think they published some utter bollocks from former "professor" from den of cunty West Brit MBAs Smurfit Business school Ray Kinsella) are loving this click bait bullshit (y'know, for Balance). Support for an Irish exit barely exists here, but we do have a lot of fucking idiots left and right, and I wonder how shallow the affection for the EU is, especially if folk keep getting reminded of Losing their Sovereignty in the bailout. If the Mail and Indo started pivoting to Irexit, I'd worry there's just enough cunts for it to almost become spoken of seriously.

[ursus arctos]

Spain's interesting there. No "those tourists are money".

In terms of Spanish public opinion, the Idiot Andy Capp Expats are much more front of mind than the tourists, with the possible exception of cities like Barcelona, where tourists are currently personae non gratae and British louts are public enemy number one.

Spoony, it really doesn't take much money at all to fund a think tank. It's the "both sidesism" that you rightly decry that do the bulk of their work in terms of public exposure for nothing (in fact, they actually PAY the muppets).

[Tubby Isaacs]

Policy Exchange have pushed it.

[Lang Spoon]

Brian Lucey has a delicious line by line Fisking of Kinsella's article on his blog. Just about every word (including his job description in the byline) is exaggerated, unsupported or flat-out untrue.

[Tubby Isaacs]

This is what Brexit is all about.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41119355

Sales of vacuum cleaners producing more noise and heat than suction are restricted under EU rules from today.
Vacuum cleaners using more than 900 watts and emitting more than 80 decibels will be banned when stocks run out.

"Without EU energy efficiency rules, the UK market risks getting flooded with inefficient and cheap imports from China which waste more energy and break easily due to lower standards."

Energy efficiency, boost for European manufacturing, everyone's a winner, eh?

UKIP's Roger Helmer said: "By all means let's make pathetic under-powered vacuum cleaners for export to the EU.
"But we must retain the right to make and use sensible full-powered appliances in the UK. This shows why we must not agree to be bound by EU rules after Brexit."

Yeah, that'll work.

[Snake Plissken]

It's weird that Brexiteers are so obsessed with vacuum cleaners and light bulbs.

[Tubby Isaacs]

There's a "green" angle, so bad. And anyway, these so-called experts were telling us there was a new ice age coming in the seventies. Plus "design" sounds poncy.

[Snake Plissken]

I'm sure that flooding the country with low quality Chinese vacuum cleaner imports was precisely what James Dyson had in mind when he encouraged a Leave vote.

[Toby Gymshorts]

Fuck Dyson and his incredibly manoeuvrable balls.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I'm sure that flooding the country with low quality Chinese vacuum cleaner imports was precisely what James Dyson had in mind when he encouraged a Leave vote.

I've no idea what he had in mind, any more than I do what Mr Wetherspoon was thinking. Euroscepticism has always attracted businessmen with a sense of "destiny". Referendums are a gift to people like them, their one chance to do the fun bit of politics, without having to govern. Remain had rational folk from the likes of Nissan, who couldn't even get the vote out in Sunderland. Not that he's my favourite person by any means, but Remain needed somebody like the 80s Richard Branson (ie when he was known for nice stuff like music and air balloons).

[Tubby Isaacs]

Not that The Times can be relied on after this week but it's saying the Tories have agreed a £50bn Brexit bill.

Might be trying to do May a favour by setting up a "triumphant" negotiation down to £40bn, but striking nonetheless.

Caroline Flint is worried about Brexit getting too soft.