UK Politics: A Farcical Aquatic Ceremony

[The Marquis de Leech]

On 29/06/2016 at 11:21 AM, Hereward said:

Then you don't actually know enough current working class Labour voters.

Well, my Welsh coal-mining grandfather and my shipyard-worker Scottish father were both big fans of Michael Foot (it was actually Jim Callaghan my father had it in for), I do think economics matters.

(Note that I'm not talking about the overall electoral viability of these sorts of ideas. Just that I don't think the working class is about to switch en masse to UKIP because of Corbyn).

[The Anti-Targ]

As Bill Clinton famously said, "it's the economy stupid". Most of the working class voted in the referendum without thinking economically. But in a general election the economy is what they think about.

I don't understand why people complain about the EU as being undemocratic. Do people not know how government works? Most regulation and stuff that affects your day to day lives are not established democratically or decided upon by elected representatives. I've written more regulation that's been enacted without any elected representative knowing about it, let alone approving it, than any one parliamentarian will in their entire political career. I'm doing it under empowering legislation passed by the House, but the detail and specifics is left up to us in the bureaucracy to sort out. Most of the time we use a different democratic mechanism of consulting with affected parties, but that gives no decision-making power to affected parties, only the ability to comment and suggest. The final decision rests with us, and a lot of the time we put requirements in place where a majority of affected parties oppose. But we know better then them, because we have much broader interests in mind. Not one single regulation that I've put in place has been overturned by people running off to the minister and complaining. A change in government as a relatively small effect on what I do.

We are part of the democratic system in the broad sense, because we use mechanisms (like public consultation) that would not exist in an undemocratic system, but the point is life affecting decisions are made all the time by unelected people in democratic systems. And government works more efficiently when those decision-making mechanisms exist. It's complete crap to complain that the EU is undemocratic and that this is a reason to not be part of it. The EU structures are part of a democratic system, even if some decisions are made by appointed rather than elected people. The fact that some of those people might be corrupt and should be in prison is not inherently a problem of the structure.

And of course, the most likely outcome of Brexit (EU-lite as Fortune calls it) is that Britain will have less say over most of its regulation not more say. Britain will probably have to sign up to 95% of EU regulation, but it will have no direct say in the formulation of that regulation. Is it a good trade off to get full autonomy over 5% of its regulation at the cost of having no say over 95% of it? Depends on the 5% I guess, but on the face of it it's not a good trade off. This most likely outcome also will probably mean the UK doesn't actually save any money. It loses CAP subsidies, and Johnson has promised to maintain subsidies at CAP levels, and instead of paying a "membership" fee for being in the EU it'll have to pay a tithe of roughly the same amount. 

[Kalbear]

 

Quote

The EU structures are part of a democratic system, even if some decisions are made by appointed rather than elected people. The fact that some of those people might be corrupt and should be in prison is not inherently a problem of the structure.

Okay, I'll ask - which elected officials from the EU are responsible for the Euro monetary policy? If someone wanted to unelect someone because of  the monetary policy, who would they unelect?

[The guy from the Vale]

55 minutes ago, Dickwad Poster #3784 said:

 

Okay, I'll ask - which elected officials from the EU are responsible for the Euro monetary policy? If someone wanted to unelect someone because of  the monetary policy, who would they unelect?

Well, the chairman of the Fed isn't elected democratically either.

That said, you'd probably want to put pressure on your own national government to elect another head of their national Central Bank. After all, the Governing Council of the European Central Bank consists of the heads of the Central Banks of its member states.

[Kalbear]

The chairman of the Fed is appointed by the president. It's very easy to decide if they did the right thing or not, and put pressure on them accordingly.

As I understand it you would have to put pressure somehow on every other country to change things. Which seems unlikely to work out well.

[The guy from the Vale]

But to change your US president, you also need an electoral college majority.

Look, all of this boils down to the fact that the EU has too little power, not too much. Because there's no office like the US presidency in Europe, and deliberately so (because it would weaken the member states). I'd be in favor of strengthening those structures too. But that proposal never had a majority, and the UK was one of the countries pressing hardest against further integration.

[Kalbear]

3 minutes ago, theguyfromtheVale said:

But to change your US president, you also need an electoral college majority.

That's true. That being said, the economic policy rarely helps certain states and kills others. We don't have states in the US with a 25% unemployment rate, and if we did we'd be changing things to fix them and using different monetary policy. 

That isn't the case in the EU.

And in the EU you have the case where you have a monetary policy that is largely controlled by a couple of the member states (notably Germany) that is absolutely crushing other member states, and short of leaving or leaving the EU those states have really nothing they can do about it democratically. 

3 minutes ago, theguyfromtheVale said:

Look, all of this boils down to the fact that the EU has too little power, not too much. Because there's no office like the US presidency in Europe, and deliberately so (because it would weaken the member states). I'd be in favor of strengthening those structures too. But that proposal never had a majority, and the UK was one of the countries pressing hardest against further integration.

I think it boils down to the EU having the wrong amount of power. If there wasn't a Euro it would help. If there was a way to elect someone to deal with the economic management of the EU that would help. Either would be better than what is had right now.

[Chaircat Meow]

Gove has just announced he is running for the leadership himself citing a lack of confidence in Boris.

[DaveSumm]

I suppose I'd better start reading up on all these Tory leader candidates. It's all happened so suddenly I don't really know much about Boris, May's or Crabb's politics on a lot of issues. I'm not well inclined toward May after her attempts to double the length you can hold someone on terrorist charges, and human rights in general I think is a big negative for her. Do you think there's a least-worst option for the left out of these candidates?

[scotcat]

7 minutes ago, Chaircat Meow said:

Gove has just announced he is running for the leadership himself citing a lack of confidence in Boris.

Well that didn't take very long, did it?

 

[Chaircat Meow]

Reports Andrea Leadsom has also just declared.

According to the last yougov poll of Tory members May is the favourite. Lot of leavers do not support Boris and almost no remainers do.

[Angalin]

On 6/28/2016 at 7:31 AM, Emre Mor-mont said:

Did I just hear Jeremy Hunt suggest the British people should endorse any leave deal in the 2020 general election?

2020?

I've never wanted to be a real-life Mme Defarge so much as in the last week. Pass me the knitting, I'm ready for the front row now.

[Chaircat Meow]

1 hour ago, DaveSumm said:

I suppose I'd better start reading up on all these Tory leader candidates. It's all happened so suddenly I don't really know much about Boris, May's or Crabb's politics on a lot of issues. I'm not well inclined toward May after her attempts to double the length you can hold someone on terrorist charges, and human rights in general I think is a big negative for her. Do you think there's a least-worst option for the left out of these candidates?

Here's the Guardian's take.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/30/who-is-more-liberal-may-or-johnson

[Northernmonkey]

Apparently Owen Smith is considering standing for the Labour leadership. Seems like a decent bloke and would probably have a better chance of beating Corbyn than Angela Eagle because he's not tarred by the Iraq vote. 

[HexMachina]

Boris isn't standing it seems. This was unexpected

[Tijgy]

11 hours ago, Altherion said:

There is a dangerous simplification in that sentence: the establishment version of the UK was one of the most anti-European countries in the EU when compared to the establishment versions of other EU countries. However, if outsiders should get to power, all bets are off. For example, France was one of the founding members of every predecessor to the EU going all the way back to the European Coal and Steel Community in the 1950s. It has certainly been strongly pro-European in the past... but consider this interview with Marine Le Pen who is currently polling either second or first in the 2017 election (depending on the competitors and the poll). She might not win this time around, but the support for her party is definitely increasing.

Several French people are still upset with the fact the Eurocrats ignored the fact they voted against the EU Constitution in 2005. While the EU Constitution never really existed but the Treaty of Lisbon has almost the same content as the Constitution. 

Personally I think several EU officials play a very dangerous game with their disregard towards national parliaments, common citizens, ... 

[john]

Shit, we're going to get Gove for a PM.

[Chaircat Meow]

Wow. Just wow.

Boris has announced he won't run for the leadership! Gove knifed him good.

[ljkeane]

Fucking Michael Gove might be Tory leader and Labour are imploding. Jesus Christ, this keeps getting worse.

[Northernmonkey]

53 minutes ago, john said:

Shit, we're going to get Gove for a PM.

Theresa May is still favourite. All things considered that would probably be the least bad option, bearing in mind she's just abandoned her pledge to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights. Although Gove has the backing of the Sun and the Mail which might help his campaign (but how many Tory members actually read either of those papers)?