UK Politics: Trumpy Cat Trumpy Cat Where Have You Been?

[Hereward]

Point 2 is particularly problematic, as Sunni Salafist extremists are not turning to terrorism because their Shia Iranian enemies were robbed of a democratic regime. They regard democracy as abhorrent, and the Iranian shia regime too. Now you could argue that the enmity between the two was heightened by the existence of a revolutionary shia regime, which made them feel more threatened, but that is not the same thing as Anti-Targ is claiming at all.

[SeanF]

1 minute ago, Hereward said:

Point 2 is particularly problematic, as Sunni Salafist extremists are not turning to terrorism because their Shia Iranian enemies were robbed of a democratic regime. They regard democracy as abhorrent, and the Iranian shia regime too. Now you could argue that the enmity between the two was heightened by the existence of a revolutionary shia regime, which made them feel more threatened, but that is not the same thing as Anti-Targ is claiming at all.

The European country that's suffered worst at the hands of Islamist terrorists in recent years is France, which played no part in the overthrow of Mossadeq, and is notably cool towards Israel.

[Hereward]

Indeed, though the French actions in Algeria brought about a radicalised and broken country, with an Islamist revolution against the socialist freedom movement that spewed out displaced Islamist extremists into places like Afghanistan, and ironically spread to French Algerian immigrants, but it's not the direct causal link that others have claimed.

[The Anti-Targ]

1 hour ago, Gorn said:

The answer to both of these questions is yes. The terrorism is a natural end product of conservative reaction to the modernization of the Middle East. The first major Islamic terrorist attack in modern history, the seizure of Grand Mosque in Mecca, is completely unrelated to either of your two reasons. Also, the original enemy No.1 for Islamic terrorists was Soviet Union and not the West (see Afghanistan in the 80's).

You're kidding. You think all this started in the late 70s and early 80s?

Firstly, the whole Islamic world, but most especially the Muslims of the Middle East has had a serious beef with the West since 14 May 1948. In the 1950s the Palestinian fedayeen constantly attacked Israeli civilian targets. That seems like major terrorism a few decades before the Grand Mosque seizure or the Russia Afghan war. And part of the motivation for the Grand Mosque incident was the claim of excessive westernization of Saudi culture. If people didn't already hate the West because of decades of blind support for Israel, perhaps they would be less pissed off about western culture creeping in to Saudi life. The Russia Afghan War was going on at exactly the time the Iran Iraq war was raging, which was a proxy US-Iran war.

39 minutes ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

True. Also at some point there has to be blame attributed towards those who are committing terrorist acts, rather than constantly looking backwards and blaming ourselves for it. There are many root causes for the rise of what we now call islamic extremism, and we could point the fingers at Saudi Arabia, the US, Russia.. the British Empire.. The Ottoman Empire.. it goes on. 

Whats driving those people and making them go to extremes varies wildly from person to person. The latest UK terrorist was British born, with a history of violence who found Islam whilst in jail. What was his aim? What did he hope to achieve? Was he upset about Israel or Iraq or did he just not like the decadent west. The Charlie Hebdo massacre was about a cartoon that people didn't like. All I'm saying is we can't always be apologists for this sort of thing. 


 

One can never excuse violence by saying "they made me do it". People who are abused as kids who go on to abuse kids are not to be excused merely because of the shit they suffered as kids. But if you recognise root cause, and acknowledge the legitimacy of the grievance, while not at all excusing current behaviour, then you can work towards solving the problem to the good of everyone.

There is nothing to be done about the shit the US pulled in Iran, at the behest of US and UK oil interests. But there is something that can be done to resolve the 70 year festering wound that is Israel and Palestine.

[SeanF]

3 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

You're kidding. You think all this started in the late 70s and early 80s?

Firstly, the whole Islamic world, but most especially the Muslims of the Middle East has had a serious beef with the West since 14 May 1948. In the 1950s the Palestinian fedayeen constantly attacked Israeli civilian targets. That seems like major terrorism a few decades before the Grand Mosque seizure or the Russia Afghan war. And part of the motivation for the Grand Mosque incident was the claim of excessive westernization of Saudi culture. If people didn't already hate the West because of decades of blind support for Israel, perhaps they would be less pissed off about western culture creeping in to Saudi life. The Russia Afghan War was going on at exactly the time the Iran Iraq war was raging, which was a proxy US-Iran war.

One can never excuse violence by saying "they made me do it". People who are abused as kids who go on to abuse kids are not to be excused merely because of the shit they suffered as kids. But if you recognise root cause, and acknowledge the legitimacy of the grievance, while not at all excusing current behaviour, then you can work towards solving the problem to the good of everyone.

There is nothing to be done about the shit the US pulled in Iran, at the behest of US and UK oil interests. But there is something that can be done to resolve the 70 year festering wound that is Israel and Palestine.

I'm afraid they're just going to have to get over the fact that Israel exists and will continue to exist.

And the only Western country that "blindly supports" Israel is the USA.  Countries that are very critical of Israel are on the receiving end of Islamist terrorism.

[Hereward]

2 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

You're kidding. You think all this started in the late 70s and early 80s?

Firstly, the whole Islamic world, but most especially the Muslims of the Middle East has had a serious beef with the West since 14 May 1948. In the 1950s the Palestinian fedayeen constantly attacked Israeli civilian targets. That seems like major terrorism a few decades before the Grand Mosque seizure or the Russia Afghan war. And part of the motivation for the Grand Mosque incident was the claim of excessive westernization of Saudi culture. If people didn't already hate the West because of decades of blind support for Israel, perhaps they would be less pissed off about western culture creeping in to Saudi life. The Russia Afghan War was going on at exactly the time the Iran Iraq war was raging, which was a proxy US-Iran war.

One can never excuse violence by saying "they made me do it". People who are abused as kids who go on to abuse kids are not to be excused merely because of the shit they suffered as kids. But if you recognise root cause, and acknowledge the legitimacy of the grievance, while not at all excusing current behaviour, then you can work towards solving the problem to the good of everyone.

There is nothing to be done about the shit the US pulled in Iran, at the behest of US and UK oil interests. But there is something that can be done to resolve the 70 year festering wound that is Israel and Palestine.

But the fedayeen were explicitly democtaric, socialist and pro-secular. It wasn't Islamic extremism. And the Iraq-Iran war, with Iraq as a sort of pro-US proxy is not relevant in the way you seem to be suggesting, as Salafist hated Iran as much as they did the US. 

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

In more important news, Article 50 has been sent as a letter.

here it is:

 

https://www.scribd.com/document/343396953/PM-Letter-to-EU-Council-President#from_embed

[Hereward]

It's strangely quiet for such a momentous day. I'm assuming people are either drowning their sorrows or celebrating wildly. Or maybe just pointing and laughing at Jeremy Corbyn. 

[ljkeane]

Just resigned to it at this stage I think.

[Maltaran]

41 minutes ago, Hereward said:

Or maybe just pointing and laughing at Jeremy Corbyn. 

Doesn't that happen most days?

[williamjm]

1 hour ago, Hereward said:

It's strangely quiet for such a momentous day. I'm assuming people are either drowning their sorrows or celebrating wildly.

Maybe because it doesn't change anything immediately, it feels less momentous than either the referendum result being announced or when Brexit actually happens in two years.

[Zoë Sumra]

22 minutes ago, williamjm said:

Maybe because it doesn't change anything immediately, it feels less momentous than either the referendum result being announced or when Brexit actually happens in two years.

I agree that today doesn't feel like it's changed anything in that regard.  I do wonder whether the kind of sustained protest currently seen in America - not just once every few months but every week for months - would make a difference to the let's-make-a-tax-haven crowd.

[Fragile Bird]

Speaking of Brexit, the former Irish ambassador to Canada wrote an article suggesting the next country to exit could be Ireland. At first we had heard stories that Scotland would leave the UK rather than leave the EU and that Northern Ireland could break off as well. Now it seems possible that Ireland could be seriously economically damaged by Brexit and it might be better for the country to leave the EU to be in some kind of economic partnership with Britain.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/after-brexit-is-ireland-next-to-go/article34185424/

As the implications of the forthcoming rupture between the U.K. and the EU becomes clearer, Irish public opinion has started to shift. In a recent poll in Ireland’s leading business paper, the Sunday Business Post, 56 per cent of those polled believed that links with the U.K. are more important than with the rest of the EU. Support for an “Irexit“ in the event of a hard Brexit was 28 per cent, but this would have barely registered any support a year ago.

Questions are being asked as to whether it is not more disruptive to break with Britain and Northern Ireland than with the remaining 26. Certainly, from a cultural, historical and family-ties point of view, Ireland and the U.K. are the closest of any two EU countries. Without the U.K., Ireland will be left with no natural allies inside the EU. It will be an island off the west coast of Europe, behind another larger island which is not part of the EU.

[Isis]

Well, Northern Ireland is potentially screwed by Brexit anyway. Thanks, Brexiters.

As for why it's quiet, well, I think we're just numb and miserable to be honest.

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

Most of my friends seem to be in genuine shock, as if they thought it really wasn't going to happen, that someone would stop it.

I'm mostly resigned to it now. At first I was in a state of deep depression. I knew the EU was a pretty much broken institution, and that immigration levels in the UK, especially London, were insanely and unsustainably high, but I always imagined it would be better to change things from the inside rather than out. 

But now I think that only enormous shocks will have any effect on the EU. It could be that the EU in its current form doesn't exist in 10 years (maybe sooner) if Le Pen gets in, and I think she will, then France will be pushing to get out as well, and the cards will start falling. The Irish news above is very interesting too. Britain might not be 'punished' so hard in that case too. 

My thinking is that a multi tier system for the EU will work far better, and it might be that Britain will be able to join one of the looser outer tiers at some time in the future. 

[Which Tyler]

14 hours ago, ljkeane said:

Just resigned to it at this stage I think.

This, it's not like it's come out of the leftfield and caught us all by surprise.

Something we've spend 9 months knowing is ging to happen, has happened; and for the time being, absolutely nothing has changed, and there is absolutely nothing new to talk about (on Brexit)

2 hours ago, Isis said:

Well, Northern Ireland is potentially screwed by Brexit anyway. Thanks, Brexiters.

As for why it's quiet, well, I think we're just numb and miserable to be honest.

You could have just said "we're British" - it's many fewer letters

[Fez]

 

10 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Speaking of Brexit, the former Irish ambassador to Canada wrote an article suggesting the next country to exit could be Ireland. At first we had heard stories that Scotland would leave the UK rather than leave the EU and that Northern Ireland could break off as well. Now it seems possible that Ireland could be seriously economically damaged by Brexit and it might be better for the country to leave the EU to be in some kind of economic partnership with Britain.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/after-brexit-is-ireland-next-to-go/article34185424/

 

 

I thought the Republic of Ireland was making a push for Dublin to replace London for all the businesses, especially banks, that wanted to keep their headquarters in a primarily English-speaking city within the EU?

Has that not been going well?

[The Anti-Targ]

So is Theresa May really going to use security cooperation as a bargaining chip for trade?

For one thing, this apparent threat coming so soon after divorce proceedings were formally initiated smacks of desperation. For another thing, it is a monumentally stupid negotiating position.

[The BlackBear]

1 hour ago, The Anti-Targ said:

So is Theresa May really going to use security cooperation as a bargaining chip for trade?

For one thing, this apparent threat coming so soon after divorce proceedings were formally initiated smacks of desperation. For another thing, it is a monumentally stupid negotiating position.

It was always one of our strengths, so we were clearly going to use it as one of our 'cards,' (as they insist in calling the lives and fortunes of people.) The thing is that it was implicit, she really didn't need to spell it out in the blunt terms we've had.

 

I just really want to say how massively unhappy I am with politics in general right now. I think we're making a terrible misstep here, and that the momentum is too great to change course. The government in charge is not one voted for, and are following a mandate they have mostly imagined based on the vote. I have little to hope for those in opposition: the SNP care primarily about IndyRef2 (which will not fix the problems,) the Lib Dems are an irrelevance, and no matter what Tim Farron (the human equivalent of tumbleweed) says a second vote won't happen, and greatest of all: Labour, a fucking disgrace of a party, Jeremy has proven himself incapable of running his party, let alone a country. The argument that he was being treated badly by the press is over, he had his chances to right the ship and he decide to turn his guns on his own party time and time again, my wavering metaphor aside the damage is beyond irreparable. A General Election would actually cement the governments majority. Lets not mention the rise of populist Nationalism around the world. Rant over.

I'm really at a loss as to what a centrist lefty like me is meant to do in this situation, I want to see positives but it just looks so fucking bleak.

[The Anti-Targ]

2 hours ago, The BlackBear said:

It was always one of our strengths, so we were clearly going to use it as one of our 'cards,' (as they insist in calling the lives and fortunes of people.) The thing is that it was implicit, she really didn't need to spell it out in the blunt terms we've had.

 

I just really want to say how massively unhappy I am with politics in general right now. I think we're making a terrible misstep here, and that the momentum is too great to change course. The government in charge is not one voted for, and are following a mandate they have mostly imagined based on the vote. I have little to hope for those in opposition: the SNP care primarily about IndyRef2 (which will not fix the problems,) the Lib Dems are an irrelevance, and no matter what Tim Farron (the human equivalent of tumbleweed) says a second vote won't happen, and greatest of all: Labour, a fucking disgrace of a party, Jeremy has proven himself incapable of running his party, let alone a country. The argument that he was being treated badly by the press is over, he had his chances to right the ship and he decide to turn his guns on his own party time and time again, my wavering metaphor aside the damage is beyond irreparable. A General Election would actually cement the governments majority. Lets not mention the rise of populist Nationalism around the world. Rant over.

I'm really at a loss as to what a centrist lefty like me is meant to do in this situation, I want to see positives but it just looks so fucking bleak.

Yeah, but in international diplomacy, especially between what are meant to be friendly, dare I say it allied, nations, you don't threaten to sacrifice security cooperation on the alter of trade. It's just wrong. Even if it is one of your unique strengths you just don't go there, not with friends. This suggests an incredibly bad faith approach from Britain. But equally, if the EU team is looking to be petulantly punitive and protectionist on trade, then they are no better.