The Brexit Thread

[Eggchaser]

It would help if Corbyn left the changing rooms to at least see where the posts were.

[Snake Plissken]

No point leaving the changing rooms when the referee can't decide what game to play. After all, today's opinion is

"Labour can’t afford to lose its working-class heartlands by backing remain" - https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...-remain-brexit

[imp]

I keep having fights with my dad about Brexit. He voted Remain, but now is a ‚just get on with it‘ no dealer, I suspect because he can‘t be arsed with it taking up the news any longer. No Deal will all work out somehow, he says, which seems to be the only argument of Jacob Rees-Mogg, Geoff Boycott and multiple other people we can all surely trust. I‘ve been listening to Radio 4 the past few days, and I’m amazed how sanguine Britain is remaining in the face of the stark truth that the country is going to be absolutely and utterly fucked if it really does take a big shit in its own stew and then eats it.

I asked my dad if, seeing as he’s now sure No Deal will work just fine, would he unplug his TV (his main companion in life) at the mains and then insist that he can turn it on using his remote control? He responds by claiming that „the Germans“ will not allow No Deal because they‘ll want to keep on selling us their Volkswagens. I keep trying to tell him that „the Germans“ have no control over Brexit, not having voted for it.

And to think that all you have to do is have the courage to revoke Article 50 and admit it‘s unworkable. The whole Leave/Remain debate is irrelevant. It‘s been a political impossibility from the start, and has remained so for three pointless, wasted years. It can‘t work and it won‘t work. What is wrong with admitting this before you shoot yourself in the head just because three years ago you promised to shoot yourself in the head? And when Farage and his brown ale, blue-rinse, village green fascists start gibbering... I don‘t know. Laugh at them? Tell them to go fuck themselves? Invite them to come up with a coherent, workable plan for leaving the EU to be considered and discussed at a later date?

[johnr]

Your dad - well, not specifically 'your dad', but you get the gist - is one of the reasons that I am very sceptical that 'Remain' would win a referendum. I've heard too many people say 'I voted Remain, but now let's get it done' to be in any way sanguine about the prospects of a properly decisive vote one way or the other.

Though, as I said somewhere near the start of this thread, I still don't think Brexit is going to happen, in any form. I admit to occasionally wobbling.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Boris Johnson is still insisting that he can unilaterally put Britain on a WTO Article 24 footing with the EU despite all legal argument to the contrary, not to mention that even were he able to do that it would still fuck agriculture, services (which aren't part of GATT rules) and leave us horribly exposed in the subsequent trade deal. Even that socialist rag the Financial Times have reiterated that today. The man is walking proof that Daddy buying you an Eton and Oxford education does not make you intelligent. He's an utter imbecile and is going to be a fucking disaster.

[Flynnie]

No point leaving the changing rooms when the referee can't decide what game to play. After all, today's opinion is

"Labour can’t afford to lose its working-class heartlands by backing remain" - https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...-remain-brexit

Can this just be entitled Labour can't afford to lose me, Jon Cruddas, because I haven't made the freaking point to my constituents that a lot of them will lose their jobs if Brexit happens?

[Ginger Yellow]

Boris Johnson is still insisting that he can unilaterally put Britain on a WTO Article 24 footing with the EU despite all legal argument to the contrary, not to mention that even were he able to do that it would still fuck agriculture, services (which aren't part of GATT rules) and leave us horribly exposed in the subsequent trade deal. Even that socialist rag the Financial Times have reiterated that today.

The FT obviously aren't a socialist rag, but equally they're far and away the most consistently anti-Brexit voice in the British press. So not particularly surprising.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Your dad - well, not specifically 'your dad', but you get the gist - is one of the reasons that I am very sceptical that 'Remain' would win a referendum. I've heard too many people say 'I voted Remain, but now let's get it done' to be in any way sanguine about the prospects of a properly decisive vote one way or the other.

Could this be because no political party has been making the case that Brexit is going to be really bad, and because labour have spent the last few years saying that "Brexit is actually going to be grand if we're in charge"? this is the price you pay for Corbyn removing labour from the "criticism of Brexit" field.


Kifnd of amusing to see people who have been clamouring for Corbyn to be calling for a second referendum to suddenly say that it isn't good enough and that he should be backing Remain in a second referendum.

It's almost as if they are shifting the goalposts.


They're not moving the Goalposts. It's what they've been asking for for three fucking years. see here's the thing, the first item on the agenda when Corbyn finally finds himself pushed into supporting remain in a second referendum, isn't going to be congratulations, it's going to be "Why have you spent the last fucking three years fighting the fucking inevitable, you mush brained, Vegan Gammon Cunt?"

[Snake Plissken]

But It's Not About Corbyn Personally, Oh No.

I doubt that you noticed, but the current "demand" is that Corbyn support an option on a second referendum that the organisation most pushing a second referendum have refused to say would definitely be on the ballot. Because they refuse to say anything would.

[imp]

Look, bollocks to a referendum. Don‘t have one, you don‘t need one, it can‘t work yes or no, just revoke before you fly into the fucking sun. It’s like Britain is on a fucking space ship, 52 astronauts out of the 100 are feeling pissed off about the standard of food in the space ship‘s canteen so they voted to fly into the sun as a protest, and while they‘re talking about the fact they should maybe think again, Head Astronaut Boris, certifiable now for decades, is at the wheel and OH LOOK HERE COMES THE FUCKING SUN. Who saw that coming?

[Satchmo Distel]

I have just read Stuart Maconie's Jarrow book* and he quotes Cruddas approvingly at several points, calling him the "Blue Labour" position, ffs. Essentially the position is that you can't call people racist just because they only want white Anglo-Saxon Protestants to have jobs, healthcare and safety nets, because that would be slandering the whole white working-class.

*The stuff on the march is actually very good, and there are some insights into why the marchers were treated in the way they were, and the double standards around that. The reading of Corbyn and Labour is irredeemably shit, assuming that you cannot support multiculturalism and identity politics if you want to keep the nothern working class, which is surely just another way of saying you don't think the working-class need to be protected from non-white foreigners rather than being persuaded that they have a joint class interest in internationalism.

[Satchmo Distel]

I'm still not sure what Johnson's true position is. He lies that he can reopen negotiations on fundamental issues and won't identify himself purely as a No Dealer, but when you strip away the negotiations lie, No Deal is the only option remaining in his position.

Based on talking to my Gammon family members, Johnson's unwillingness to admit that he is a pure No Dealer is actually making them very angry and might still cause them to go for Farage in a GE. Johnson's calculus is that the Gammons will just forget this prevarication post-31 October. Possibly a fatal assumption.

[Diable Rouge]

I have just read Stuart Maconie's Jarrow book* and he quotes Cruddas approvingly at several points, calling him the "Blue Labour" position, ffs. Essentially the position is that you can't call people racist just because they only want white Anglo-Saxon Protestants to have jobs, healthcare and safety nets, because that would be slandering the whole white working-class.

*The stuff on the march is actually very good, and there are some insights into why the marchers were treated in the way they were, and the double standards around that. The reading of Corbyn and Labour is irredeemably shit, assuming that you cannot support multiculturalism and identity politics if you want to keep the nothern working class, which is surely just another way of saying you don't think the working-class need to be protected from non-white foreigners rather than being persuaded that they have a joint class interest in internationalism.

TBF, "white Anglo-Saxon Protestants" seems somewhat of a generalisation - much of the older Irish diaspora in Britain would be ideologically indistinguishable from their local counterparts. Completely agree with the remainder of your point, however, that the priority should be to prioritise living and working conditions for all members of communities, rather than playing on base ethnic fears.

[George C.]

That's very much his M.O.

Make many 'promises' which are then conveniently 'forgotten'.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

But It's Not About Corbyn Personally, Oh No.

I doubt that you noticed, but the current "demand" is that Corbyn support an option on a second referendum that the organisation most pushing a second referendum have refused to say would definitely be on the ballot. Because they refuse to say anything would.

But the problem with any discussion of the UK political system, is that so much of it comes down to the personalities of the weirdoes that you elect to lead you. The major reason that the Labour party has been so utterly resistant to opposing brexit, is because a largely remain party is lead by a fucking pensionable bennite, who is using the distraction of internal labour factionalism to push through brexit, by keeping Labour out of the way. It is difficult to explain how weird and outlandish Corbyn's behaviour over the last three years has been. It's the sort of thing that a lot of people are going to regret tolerating and supporting in years to come.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

TBF, "white Anglo-Saxon Protestants" seems somewhat of a generalisation - much of the older Irish diaspora in Britain would be ideologically indistinguishable from their local counterparts. Completely agree with the remainder of your point, however, that the priority should be to prioritise living and working conditions for all members of communities, rather than playing on base ethnic fears.

Its very hard to look at the last 1000 years of English, and by extension a lot of world history, without coming to the conclusion that the strongest thread running through the whole thing is Divide and rule. From your long succession of foreign rulers, seeking to exercise control over a relatively huge and populous country, via the colonization of wales, and Scotland (on an on/off basis) Through the whole empire period, and extending to domestic politics. It's just Divide and rule all the fucking way, and it has fucked things up in a lot of the countries that were exposed to it, from Belfast to Kashmir, and now finally it's back to bite the bollocks off the UK.

[Diable Rouge]

The kernel of the issue, as ever, is that even Leavers can arrive at no consensus as to what Brexit they would prefer, but the one clear finding is that No Deal is very much a minoritarian position:



If the window of opportunity for an EEA Brexit has slammed shut, then Corbyn would appear to have less to lose by fully swinging behind Remain.

[Satchmo Distel]

Does Corbyn sincerely want to remain in the EU?

[Diable Rouge]

Does Corbyn sincerely want to remain in the EU?

It doesn't matter whether he personally does, more whether his Shadow Cabinet is of that perspective.

[Satchmo Distel]

He believes in party democracy so Remain would be an honourable position for him even though he wasn't a convinced Remainer.

[ursus arctos]

Johnson doesn't believe in anything other than his own advancement and the satisfaction of his current desires.

That has been his consistent mode of operation at least since Eton and likely before then.

As such, his only current political concern is to ensure that he will be elected leader by the Tory membership. They are very much in favour of being resolute in the face of the foreigners, threatening not to pay the 39 billion and for No Deal. They aren't concerned about the consequences of any of those positions, so neither is he. And now that he has found two lawyers with frightfully little trade experience to support his fanciful interpretation of Article 24 of GATT, he can ride that horse to the acclaim of the Tory faithful for his brilliance until it collapses under him.

He may or may not abandon one or all of these positions later in the process, but really isn't concerned about anything other than the next exam he needs to bluff his way through,

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

He believes in party democracy so Remain would be an honourable position for him even though he wasn't a convinced Remainer.

Er, if Corbyn believed in Party Democracy Remain would already be Labour's stated policy. That it isn't is down to Corbyn' s fear of what voters in Labour constituencies (not party members) would do to them if they changed sides now.

[johnr]

[i] "you mush brained, Vegan Gammon Cunt?"

You really do let yourself right fucking down sometimes, TAB. Seriously, I'm embarrassed for you.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

It doesn't matter whether he personally does, more whether his Shadow Cabinet is of that perspective.

I think you'll find that it does. It's really important, because the leader leads the shadow cabinet, and gets to control the boundaries of discussions. For instance look at the way that they knobbled those motions calling for Labour to support a referendum. That was a masterful, (if straightforward) piece of conference chicanery, and agenda setting. All that conference motion has achieved is nine months of nothing and a halving of Labour's electoral support.

I don't know if he does want to stay in the EU or not for sure. It would seem on the face of it, and based on his actions, and the consequences of his tactics that he probably does want to leave. One thing is abundantly clear though from the last three years, is that he sure as fuck doesn't understand the first thing about it, or what it does. If he did, he would have behaved in an entirely different manner. From the point of view of a left of centre political party seeking to resolve many of the worst casual barbarities of UK life, Leaving the EU is on a par with Giving up on Electricity.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

You really do let yourself right fucking down sometimes, TAB. Seriously, I'm embarrassed for you.

I stand over every word. Corbyn isn't the opposite side of the coin to blairites. He's the opposite side of the coin to those Gammon cunts who are so keen to relitigate the political battles of the seventies, and the early eighties. It should be obvious. He's the same age, and forged in the same fires. The world has fucking moved on.They all haven't. He is Vegan Gammon. The Rest is crude abuse for someone that I have completely lost patience with.

All this bullshit in England (and it is primarily in england) isn't an abstract topic of interest for us. This is going to fuck us over completely. The Terrible thing from our point of view is that we have to watch this incredibly avoidable and fucking obvious car crash happening in front of our eyes, while waiting for the People opposed to national suicide to get their fucking act together. And they are nearly every bit as much of a fucking disgrace as the leavers. The Labour party are a fucking disgrace, and they should be fucking ashamed of themselves. They are gutless, spineless, leaderless, and brainless. They are ignorant of even the basics about how the world works, and the EU in particular, and they seem to be particularly clueless about how their own system of govt operates. But they are also fucking clueless about What they are supposed to want, and how to go about achieving it. They are an utter disgrace, and will bear a lot of the responsibility for what happens next, for not even trying to try.