The Politics Thread 2019

[Angry Ram]

37 minutes ago, BathRam72 said:

But it is the likes of that tool, that we are now in this mess

What mess? Bring back Nige.

[GenBr]

 

3 hours ago, TuffLuff said:

I think the Conservative Party split is genuinely fascinating.

As I see it...Its a party that, in tradition, would want to stay in the EU purely for economic reasons like trade. The referendum result then completely blew this out of the water. Do MP’s vote for what constituents want or on party lines? This hasn’t been helped by Theresa May’s flip flopping on the issue from Remain to Hard Brexit, she lost all respect. It’s utter confusion, and all they want now is to try and keep power when I’m not even sure they know what that means anymore.

Basically it’s a problem of their own making which they didn’t need to do. You’d laugh if it didn’t affect near on every part of modern life.

The funniest thing is that for the most part the Labour MPs just completely ignore the wishes of their constituencies. Two of their traditionally strong areas are the East and West Midlands and they were the two strongest supporters of leave. 75% of Tory constituencies voted leave, but it was still over 60% for Labour as well.

Both parties seem to be a shambles atm (more so than usual). Corbyn acts like a petulant child and May refuses to see reality. Both are only trying to serve their parties interests rather than what is best for the country. 

 

2 hours ago, StivePesley said:

I think it would certainly still be very close. For a lot of people who voted leave it was a protest against how angry they were about the way the system seemed rigged against them. That anger has not subsided, and for some it's got even stronger due to the omnishambles of the past 2 years.

 

However you want to view it - they were an easy target. Years of austerity, increasing wealth divide, more and more people living in relative poverty...it's easy to convince people in that position how to vote.

Note the social status and wealth of every single person at the front of the leave campaign....they have never been "on our side"

A lot of voters in the north and the midlands (ie the poorer areas of the country) voted leave as an f u to the south (read London). Obviously leaving the EU probably wont have much of a beneficial affect on these people, but for a lot of them they are in a position where they cant see it getting any worse. 

When i worked down south i couldnt believe the attitudes some of them held to northeners who voted to leave. Its easy to be clear headed when you've got jobs pouring out of your ears, streets lined with gold and huge infrastructure investment from the government.

Personally i think the centralisation of political power in London is one of the biggest causes of resentment and anger throughout the country and frankly i dont think there is anything we can do short term to fix it.

Lets also not kid ourselves that every person at the head of the remain campaign are not also extremely wealthy individuals compared to most of the population either.

 

[Stive Pesley]

43 minutes ago, GenBr said:

Lets also not kid ourselves that every person at the head of the remain campaign are not also extremely wealthy individuals compared to most of the population either.

Yes sorry - wasn't suggesting otherwise. Quite the opposite. The Remain campaign was badly run by the wealthy establishment figures who didn't ever really believe that they'd lose. They were only interested in preserving the status quo.

Just trying to get my head around why disenfranchised leave voters have been so smitten with the likes of Farage, Rees-Mogg, BoJo and Gove - when it's blindingly obvious that they have no real interest in Brexit beyond what's in it for them.

 

[GenBr]

5 minutes ago, StivePesley said:

Yes sorry - wasn't suggesting otherwise. Quite the opposite. The Remain campaign was badly run by the wealthy establishment figures who didn't ever really believe that they'd lose. They were only interested in preserving the status quo.

Just trying to get my head around why disenfranchised leave voters have been so smitten with the likes of Farage, Rees-Mogg, BoJo and Gove - when it's blindingly obvious that they have no real interest in Brexit beyond what's in it for them.

 

I think Jimmy Saville could have run the leave campaign and we'd probably still see the same result. I imagine a lot of voters would only know BoJo and Farage of the above and even then i think the newspapers/media played a much greater role in influencing voters than either campaign. I personally think most voters knew which way they wanted to vote without the two campaigns and i think they were fighting over the middle 5 to 10% who hadnt made up there minds yet.

[Sith Happens]

6 hours ago, Wolfie said:

 

Disagree.

There isn't a politician alive who could have made a success of this. The 2 rounds of indicative votes have proved that there is no majority for anything.

Her biggest mistake was calling the 2017 election. After that, she has at least tried to be consistent and show some leadership with the backdrop of being constantly undermined by her own MPs and held to ransom by the dinosaurs in the DUP.

For me it was not a mistake calling it, it should have been a masterstroke. 

Her mistake was not taking it seriously, she believed she had it in the bag and would massively increase her majority because people felt Corbyn was un-electable.

Whatever you think of Corbyn, and I dont think much of him, he was out there shouting from the houses about what he was going to do while May sat back counting in her mind her massive majority. 

 

 

 

[SSD]

Yvette Cooper is rallying the troops to take no-deal off the table by law. Unacceptable. Why are they pushing to prevent democracy in law? Stop defying the democratic vote and plan ahead for a no deal scenario rather than being busy taking the option away. Narrow minded fools.

[Spanish]

2 minutes ago, SouthStandDan said:

Yvette Cooper is rallying the troops to take no-deal being off the table by law. Unacceptable. Why are they pushing to prevent democracy in law? Stop defying the democratic vote and plan ahead for a no deal scenario rather than being busy taking the option away. Narrow minded fools.

no deal would be a disaster, calling those that think so 'narrowed minded fools' is the reason why this thread will be taken down again.  

[Comrade 86]

11 minutes ago, SouthStandDan said:

Yvette Cooper is rallying the troops to take no-deal off the table by law. Unacceptable. Why are they pushing to prevent democracy in law? Stop defying the democratic vote and plan ahead for a no deal scenario rather than being busy taking the option away. Narrow minded fools.

Well I hope your 'no-deal' Brexit turns out to be everything you ever wanted, as I assume you've considered at length what such a event would actually entail, hence your post.

Care to venture what that might be for those narrow minded fools amongst us who find the prospect of a no-deal Brexit vaguely terrifying? Perhaps you can put our minds at rest?

[Wolfie]

43 minutes ago, Paul71 said:

For me it was not a mistake calling it, it should have been a masterstroke. 

Her mistake was not taking it seriously, she believed she had it in the bag and would massively increase her majority because people felt Corbyn was un-electable.

Whatever you think of Corbyn, and I dont think much of him, he was out there shouting from the houses about what he was going to do while May sat back counting in her mind her massive majority. 

 

Oh I agree. I meant in hindsight but of course it was the disasterous election campaign that did the damage. Strong & Stable, anyone?

[FindernRam]

Yvette Cooper does that wide eyed "I'm being so reasonable" look that makes me cringe. She is another one of the say no often enough and we can stop Brexit brigade.

"Crashing out without a deal" is just another Project Fear tactic. We have wasted 1000 days already. Get on and get out. We can sort the mess later.

[Spanish]

1 minute ago, FindernRam said:

Yvette Cooper does that wide eyed "I'm being so reasonable" look that makes me cringe. She is another one of the say no often enough and we can stop Brexit brigade.

"Crashing out without a deal" is just another Project Fear tactic. We have wasted 1000 days already. Get on and get out. We can sort the mess later.

oh god not project fear again...

it would help me if you explain why no deal is so great but please don't revert to hope over realism, I can't stand those project utopia unsupported claims.  I agree we've wasted 1000 days on this but at least we have trade agreement with the Faroes, blubber sales are about to rise

[FindernRam]

Didn't say it was great but compared to not leaving I would go for it every time. 

[Spanish]

5 minutes ago, FindernRam said:

Didn't say it was great but compared to not leaving I would go for it every time. 

I cautiously ask the question, what do you see as the clear advantages of leaving.  It's your view and that's fine, equally don't respond if you don't want to.  I feared fro Derby through this process as it always seemed our small city was quite exposed.  Toyota, RR and Bombardier all seemed to have benefits form a customs arrangement.  Thing is I don't know and I'm not sure whether anybody does

[Stive Pesley]

1 hour ago, SouthStandDan said:

Stop defying the democratic vote and plan ahead for a no deal scenario rather than being busy taking the option away.

Problem is that no deal takes the most planning - and it would take more than two years, let alone the week or so we have left

So to say "get on with planning it" is a bit late! If the plan was always going to be leave without a deal then that should have been made clear on the referendum paper and then they could have at least done *some* planning for it. That said if the leave vote was for an explicit no deal scenario then they probably wouldn't have won. A lot of leave voters assumed that we'd be able to negotiate a decent deal and wouldn't have voted for a  no deal

[Mostyn6]

40 minutes ago, Spanish said:

I cautiously ask the question, what do you see as the clear advantages of leaving.  It's your view and that's fine, equally don't respond if you don't want to.  I feared fro Derby through this process as it always seemed our small city was quite exposed.  Toyota, RR and Bombardier all seemed to have benefits form a customs arrangement.  Thing is I don't know and I'm not sure whether anybody does

Your answer is in there somewhere. Bombardier for example sourced metalwork from Eastern Europe at fraction of the cost of keeping a few hundred Derby folk in work. 

People harp on about tarrifs and deals as if the public benefit from it. 

Wake up. These people will piss in your pocket and tell you it’s raining! 

[alexxxxx]

No deal is frankly madness. I don't understand how anyone could consider it as a serious option as it is the UK that has the most to lose.

May frankly messed this all up pretty predictably and has made so many clear errors. Contradictory red lines, underestimating the EU's solidarity, treating parliament with contempt and a very poor election campaign are all unforgivable.

ERG/Toru hardliners could have secured Brexit by voting for the deal but they got greedy and bottled it.

Before everyone got worked up about customs unions, free trade areas, trade deals etc, May should have looked more carefully about what was possible at the time (close economic ties, in both UK and EU's interest) and then sorted it.

 

[ossieram]

9 hours ago, eddie said:

Juncker can be voted out - he is an elected official, and serves a fixed term. It's the same position that was held by Roy Jenkins.

By the public? Or is it left to him mates in the European parliament to vote him out?

[Norman]

26 minutes ago, StivePesley said:

Problem is that no deal takes the most planning - and it would take more than two years, let alone the week or so we have left

So to say "get on with planning it" is a bit late! If the plan was always going to be leave without a deal then that should have been made clear on the referendum paper and then they could have at least done *some* planning for it. That said if the leave vote was for an explicit no deal scenario then they probably wouldn't have won. A lot of leave voters assumed that we'd be able to negotiate a decent deal and wouldn't have voted for a  no deal

So out of our top 10 trading partners, only China, Switzerland and the US are outside the EU.

We have a deal with Swirterland with no tariffs.

The US have given us a mutual recognition deal. They are our bigggest trading partners. The deal is very good for pharma companies.

Which leaves the EU and China.

We have more agreements with Austarlia and New Zealand. Most of the Carribean, some in Africa, Israel, Palestine etc.

We have most of the 70 something aviation deals done.

Japan is close, but unlikely to be done in the next two weeks.

More than I thought tbh. Never really took an interest in No Deal until I just read up on it. Never going to happen anyway.

[Stive Pesley]

1 minute ago, Norman said:

More than I thought tbh. Never really took an interest in No Deal until I just read up on it. Never going to happen anyway.

Trade is a big part of a no deal scenario but by no means the only part. In the old Brexit thread there was a huge list of other areas that would need sorting. I hope you're right that it won't happen - primarily because we don't appear to have done any of the required preparation. People I know who work in the civil service have loosely been told "if we leave without a deal you may have to be reassigned to the priority areas" - but it's all with an air of "like that will ever happen"

But it raises a good point - if we do leave with no deal and our entire country is on a war footing to deal with the priorities - how much stuff that we take for granted is going to get dropped? SO much will be ripe for exploitation while we're all distracted. I'm sure there are no disaster capitalists pushing that agenda though...

 

[Spanish]

25 minutes ago, Moist One said:

Your answer is in there somewhere. Bombardier for example sourced metalwork from Eastern Europe at fraction of the cost of keeping a few hundred Derby folk in work. 

People harp on about tarrifs and deals as if the public benefit from it. 

Wake up. These people will piss in your pocket and tell you it’s raining! 

? nice