UK Politics: The Edge of Destruction

[Mosi Mynn]

4 minutes ago, Soylent Brown said:

Brexit numpties keep waffling on about all the lies Remain told during the campaign - care to list some of them? And doesn't it strike you as a bit stupid to talk about 'hyperbole and fear-mongering' as the whole thing goes to shit?

Also, Remain should have been neutral, should they? What?

Ideally Remain should have been pro-EU. 

Unfortunately the hyperbole and fear-mongering in 2016 didn't mention this particularly shitty scenario.  But yes, sorry, missed the irony there.

I'm not saying that the Remain campaign were as toxic or flagrant in their lies as Leave, but I remember wishing at the time that both sides would present actual reasons.  Remain ran a few stories on how there would be economic repercussions because of Brexit - there still might be, but it did not happen immediately.

David Cameron predicts World War Three if Britain leaves EU

Osborne warns of post-Brexit emergency budget

Brexit Armageddon was a terrifying vision – but it simply hasn’t happened

And from a much less credible source!  The Many Lies of the Remain Campaign

It's all moot now anyway.  But maybe we should have a second referendum with a more informed and aware electorate.

[Heartofice]

21 minutes ago, Mosi Mynn said:

It's all moot now anyway.  But maybe we should have a second referendum with a more informed and aware electorate.

You'd hope that the electorate would be far more informed now, but I wonder if they are. If you were to ask them about what the EU does, how it works, how Britain works within that framework, and what the future plans for the EU are.. would they be able to give you clear answers?

I think we all are all a lot more aware now of how intrinsically linked Britain is with the EU, and how difficult it would actually be to leave and get a satisfactory outcome. We are all more informed about how little we want to go through any more of this crap. 

[Mosi Mynn]

To lighten the mood, here is Gyles Brandreth explaining Brexit

[Which Tyler]

https://thebrexitparty.com/

[mormont]

I'm not sure 'here are some examples of media outlets misrepresenting and exaggerating things Remain campaigners said' is the same as 'Remain lied'. 

[Mosi Mynn]

Just now, mormont said:

I'm not sure 'here are some examples of media outlets misrepresenting and exaggerating things Remain campaigners said' is the same as 'Remain lied'. 

I don't think that's what I've done.  And I remember Cameron mentioning WW3 (you can find this reported in numerous articles of the time) and Osborne mentioning an emergency budget and imminent recession (also widely reported).

[mormont]

5 minutes ago, Mosi Mynn said:

I don't think that's what I've done.

And yet, it is. 

Osborne did mention an emergency budget, that's true, but a, this was in anticipation of a predicted crash in response to a Leave win that did not materialise and b, he resigned almost immediately after the result, that's not a particularly strong argument that he lied. Getting it wrong is not the same as lying. As for Cameron, yes, multiple media outlets went with that 'World War 3' line. But Cameron never actually said it. If multiple people exaggerate, it's still exaggerating. 

[Mosi Mynn]

I think that's a fudge.  There are ways to present predictions, which were really just guesses in this case, as possibilities rather than facts.

EU referendum: Brexit 'would spark year-long recession' - Treasury

Look at his language here Brexit would cause 'DIY recession', says Osborne  You may say he thinks he is right here in what he is saying here, but I would argue that he is presenting the figures in a disingenuous way.

[mormont]

Again, though, you are trying to put predictions that were wrong on the same footing as outright lies.

If you want to compare, for example, the claim that the UK would suffer a year-long recession immediately beginning after a Leave vote to the prediction that the negotiations with the EU would be 'the easiest in history', that would be fair. 

If you want to compare them to outright lies such as 'Turkey is about to join the EU', then that is rubbish, I'm afraid. 

[Mosi Mynn]

2 minutes ago, mormont said:

Again, though, you are trying to put predictions that were wrong on the same footing as outright lies.

If you want to compare, for example, the claim that the UK would suffer a year-long recession immediately beginning after a Leave vote to the prediction that the negotiations with the EU would be 'the easiest in history', that would be fair. 

If you want to compare them to outright lies such as 'Turkey is about to join the EU', then that is rubbish, I'm afraid. 

No, I don't want to do that.  Leave's lies were theatrical, toxic and absurd, and very very deliberate, for the most part.

Remain's lies were lazy and fewer.

Neither helped the debate.

[mormont]

6 minutes ago, Mosi Mynn said:

Remain's lies were lazy and fewer.

So few, none have been mentioned so far.

[Mosi Mynn]

24 minutes ago, mormont said:

So few, none have been mentioned so far.

OK. If you say so.

[Heartofice]

49 minutes ago, mormont said:

If you want to compare them to outright lies such as 'Turkey is about to join the EU', then that is rubbish, I'm afraid. 

Turkey might not be joining the EU in the immediate future, but Turkey has made it clear it wants to join the EU and is still a candidate to do so. 

[SeanF]

20 minutes ago, Mosi Mynn said:

OK. If you say so.

Osborne et al would have considered their lies to be noble lies, as opposed to the bad lies that were told on the other side.

[Valandil]

1 hour ago, Mosi Mynn said:

I think that's a fudge.  There are ways to present predictions, which were really just guesses in this case, as possibilities rather than facts.

EU referendum: Brexit 'would spark year-long recession' - Treasury

Look at his language here Brexit would cause 'DIY recession', says Osborne  You may say he thinks he is right here in what he is saying here, but I would argue that he is presenting the figures in a disingenuous way.

But of course you haven’t had Brexit yet. This terrible mess is just your parliament trying to agree what terms to ask for in leaving. Don’t worry, if Brexit ever actually happens, those predictions will materialize, or something close. 

It’s my view that it won’t happen now though, long delay, followed by more long delay, second referendum and problem solved. “Brexit” doesn’t exist as a coherent concept, it never did, it’s a portmanteau that appeared when the Greeks were having their difficulties and “Grexit” was being floated. Not sure it’s even possible to do

everybody means something different when they say it from “Brexit in name only” style customs union, to forcibly building a fence around the island and along the border and tossing out everyone who “sounds foreign”

[Mosi Mynn]

13 minutes ago, Valandil said:

But of course you haven’t had Brexit yet. This terrible mess is just your parliament trying to agree what terms to ask for in leaving. Don’t worry, if Brexit ever actually happens, those predictions will materialize, or something close. 

It’s my view that it won’t happen now though, long delay, followed by more long delay, second referendum and problem solved. “Brexit” doesn’t exist as a coherent concept, it never did, it’s a portmanteau that appeared when the Greeks were having their difficulties and “Grexit” was being floated. Not sure it’s even possible to do

everybody means something different when they say it from “Brexit in name only” style customs union, to forcibly building a fence around the island and along the border and tossing out everyone who “sounds foreign”

Osborne was talking about a Leave vote rather than actually following through with Brexit.

I agree with most of your post - except that I think Brexit probably will happen if May doesn't allow a 2nd referendum, and nobody will be happy with it!

[SeanF]

On 4/11/2019 at 8:49 AM, Mosi Mynn said:

I think these elections could be hugely important.

UK voters have the chance to elect credible MEPs and show that we could be/want to be (some of us) committed to the EU.  The LibDems and Greens should campaign hard during these elections to give Remain a voice, however briefly heard that voice might be.

The D'Hondt system could work against pro-Remain parties.

The Green Party, CHUK, and the Lib Dems are probably competing for the same pool of voters.  The risk is that if they each poll 6-8% of the vote, they'll fall short of getting anyone elected in most regions.  

[Ser Hedge]

28 minutes ago, Mosi Mynn said:

Osborne was talking about a Leave vote rather than actually following through with Brexit.

I'm not sure exactly what he said, but the effect of the vote has certainly worked it's way through over that last 3 years. The UK was outperforming the eurozone by 2% in GDP growth between 2012-2015 and has underperformed by .5% since the referendum as investment was held back and factories are being slowly closed.

If you actually have a no deal Brexit, it's going to be much worse and it will be quite sudden, but it's impossible to actually get through with these arguments to a lot of Brexiteers, and as the Trump era has underlined there is a general distrust in the intelligentsia amongst the 'left behind' people who seem to blame immigration or globalism (EU/Nafta-China) for their frustrations, when they would actually be even worse off without either. They will never understand it though.

[Serious Callers Only]

Yet another round of right wing nutjobs sabotaging the (mainly white) lower voting class so they can blame their racist and 'yurope bad' feels instead of their right wing government that does things such as defund the NHS, which in turn will make their lives even harder by knock off effects and further enable nazism and mafiosos taking over. No wonder humanity collectively decided 'this is fine' on global warming and the oligarchy if basic pattern recognition is at this level. Britain at least is somewhat lucky that global warming might improve their agriculture, paltry as it is.

 

Oh the glorious days of agricultural serfdom. Pity they'll be automated eh? You'll have to settle for company serfdom if you're intelligent enough to get a degree. If not, i dunno, die in the streets. A real shadowrun live-action roleplaying experience.

[Ser Hedge]

1 hour ago, Serious Callers Only said:

Yet another round of right wing nutjobs sabotaging the (mainly white) lower voting class so they can blame their racist and 'yurope bad' feels instead of their right wing government that does things such as defund the NHS, which in turn will make their lives even harder by knock off effects and further enable nazism and mafiosos taking over. No wonder humanity collectively decided 'this is fine' on global warming and the oligarchy if basic pattern recognition is at this level. Britain at least is somewhat lucky that global warming might improve their agriculture, paltry as it is.

 

Oh the glorious days of agricultural serfdom. Pity they'll be automated eh? You'll have to settle for company serfdom if you're intelligent enough to get a degree. If not, i dunno, die in the streets. A real shadowrun live-action roleplaying experience.

Austerity was terribly implemented and way overdone. A small part of the blame perhaps lies with Labour for bloating the public sector a bit, but obviously a lot of the austerity served as cover for Tory profiteering. It also seemed very ideological, beyond what was dictated by economic necessity, and, yeah just plainly unfair and very harsh.

There is a wider problem that not enough jobs are being created around the world. Even emerging countries with high growth are doing so without the corresponding accompanying increase in jobs you might otherwise have expected. Automation, people working for longer, higher productivity etc.

So ultimately, the extreme right-wing ideologues have to accept a reasonable transfer payment to those that aren't able to fit into the modern economy or are unwilling to do the most basic unskilled/semi-skilled jobs that immigrants (at the moment) are still happy to do. The demonizing of those on benefits is just so sick. Besides the human/moral argument, it's also a price you pay for social stability (-if that is the only way to get this across to certain people)