Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[mongers]

Don't worry chaps, it's all going swimmingly.

After all what could possibly go wrong after a PM intentionally place three of her main challengers into offices of state dealing with brexits; one might think she set them up to fail along with the UK?

[Tamas]

Instead of infighting, Torys should concentrate at the real enemy, Brussels, says Chancellor Hammond.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/oct/13/no-brexit-deal-treasury-philip-hammond

[Admiral Yi]

Wow. The bias of the media is truly shocking.
Corbyn was asked the question may refused to answer. Would he still vote remain.
He clearly said its a theoretical and there wont be a second referendum but I voted remain and haven't changed my mind.

....
Reports on this event claim he too refused to give a straight answer

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4663866/jeremy-corbyn-follows-theresa-may-in-refusing-to-say-he-would-back-brexit-in-a-second-eu-referendum/

That part was talking about May's comment.

[grumbler]

Wait.. what?

You guys are seriously arguing over something from The Sun?  Anyone who finds a Sun article "shocking" is too naive to be allowed out in the real world.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Instead of infighting, Torys should concentrate at the real enemy, Brussels, says Chancellor Hammond.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/oct/13/no-brexit-deal-treasury-philip-hammond

Very careless of him, the current correct term is "European partners".

[Zanza]

Theresa May issues fresh threat to leave EU without trade deal unless new arrangements agreed by next Summer

Theresa May has issued a fresh threat to leave the EU without a trade deal unless the terms of the UK's future arrangements with Brussels are agreed by next Summer.

The Prime Minister said that the point of having an implementation period, due to last around two years after Brexit in March 2019, is that it would allow Britain to "move to the future partnership".

She suggested that if the UK does not know what that future partnership will look like by the tail end of 2018 then the Government could leave the bloc without the transition deal that she is targeting.

[...]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/10/23/jean-claude-juncker-claims-nothing-true-leaked-brexit-dinner1/

I don't get who is being threatened here. To me it sounds like the British are threatening the EU to not just shoot themselves in the left foot, but also in the right foot. But while that's deplorable, it's not a credible threat.

LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May signalled on Monday that any Brexit transition deal would be put together as part of a wider trade agreement - potentially stripping companies of the time they need to prepare to leave the European Union.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-business/transition-to-be-agreed-with-brexit-trade-deal-may-idUKKBN1CS0TI

This is just bizarre. As Phillip Hammond correctly stated, the transistion period is a wasting asset. If they only conclude it by late next summer, it's too late. By that time every prudent business has already started implementing a no deal contingency plan. And if there is already clarity on a future trade relationship, why not put it in place right away starting on 29-03-2019? 

[crazy canuck]

Theresa May issues fresh threat to leave EU without trade deal unless new arrangements agreed by next Summer

Theresa May has issued a fresh threat to leave the EU without a trade deal unless the terms of the UK's future arrangements with Brussels are agreed by next Summer.

The Prime Minister said that the point of having an implementation period, due to last around two years after Brexit in March 2019, is that it would allow Britain to "move to the future partnership".

She suggested that if the UK does not know what that future partnership will look like by the tail end of 2018 then the Government could leave the bloc without the transition deal that she is targeting.

[...]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/10/23/jean-claude-juncker-claims-nothing-true-leaked-brexit-dinner1/

I don't get who is being threatened here. To me it sounds like the British are threatening the EU to not just shoot themselves in the left foot, but also in the right foot. But while that's deplorable, it's not a credible threat.

LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May signalled on Monday that any Brexit transition deal would be put together as part of a wider trade agreement - potentially stripping companies of the time they need to prepare to leave the European Union.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-business/transition-to-be-agreed-with-brexit-trade-deal-may-idUKKBN1CS0TI

This is just bizarre. As Phillip Hammond correctly stated, the transistion period is a wasting asset. If they only conclude it by late next summer, it's too late. By that time every prudent business has already started implementing a no deal contingency plan. And if there is already clarity on a future trade relationship, why not put it in place right away starting on 29-03-2019?

Its like watching a train wreck coming from miles away.  You know it is coming - but the people in charge seem to have no knowledge about how to properly operate the train.

[Iormlund]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInMR7QQUVc

[Josquius]

They don't even know what a train is. They're staring out of the window in amazement at how they're travelling so fast without moving their legs.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Essentially the hard brexiters are winning. By next summer, some would say as early as Christmas, it becomes far less pressing to get some sort of deal as the costs of leaving will be largely set in stone by then.

May's role in this is strange, she is the fall guy and will get the blame for the adverse effects (I'm expecting a recession and will be very pleased if it is not severe). Is she so lacking in political nous that she doesn't realise this? I think she could make a useful start by sacking some deadweight to assert her authority, Boris and Hunt (excuse my rhyming slang) come to mind. If that led to her sacking in turn then who cares? A PM without authority is no PM.

[Tamas]

Essentially the hard brexiters are winning. By next summer, some would say as early as Christmas, it becomes far less pressing to get some sort of deal as the costs of leaving will be largely set in stone by then.

May's role in this is strange, she is the fall guy and will get the blame for the adverse effects (I'm expecting a recession and will be very pleased if it is not severe). Is she so lacking in political nous that she doesn't realise this? I think she could make a useful start by sacking some deadweight to assert her authority, Boris and Hunt (excuse my rhyming slang) come to mind. If that led to her sacking in turn then who cares? A PM without authority is no PM.

Yeah I have been wondering for the last week or so - what's in it for her in all this? Does she really think she can salvage her power and reputation? Seems to me the only thing she has left to do is leave before the real trouble starts, so she doesn't get the full blame of history.

[crazy canuck]

All hope - lost?

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/oct/24/universities-mccarthyism-mp-demands-list-brexit-chris-heaton-harris

[Richard Hakluyt]

Easy enough to write back and tell him where to stick his request.

[Josquius]

So. How long before we start burning books?

Hilarious to see in light of all the anti academic  reporting the brexiters trying to paint academics as the wealthy elite.

[Tamas]

I found this comment under a Guardian article explaining how the true person to blame for Brexit is... wait for it... Martin Luther, of 1517 fame.

Anyways, the comment is much better and seems like a plausible narrative for why things happened the way they did:

English exceptionalism is sure a factor in Brexit, but I am not sure how much that can be laid at the door of Protestantism, as opposed to multiple other factors - viz. the island geography, a singular political history pre-dating the Reformation, Britain's imperial pre-eminence outside Europe from the 18th to early 20th century, and the 'stand alone' saga of 1940 etc etc.

In addition I tend to think the nationalist narrative angle is overstated. After all, it did not stop the UK joining the EU by a large majority in the 1970s.

What I most dislike about this line of argument about 'English national character' and where I think it is most mistaken, though, is that it tends to treat UK political and general culture in a homogenous way when, surely, the fundamental point of Brexit is it revealed how divided the country is.

If you wanted to push the point, you could say Brexit was (is) fundamentally a British civil war coming out of socio-economic developments since Thatcher and where the EU was 'collateral damage', caught in the crossfire.

The protagonists were a younger metropolitan Britain on the one side in the thriving capital and other metropolitan cities that had grown up since Thatcher's reforms, and were not in thrall to some supposed UK identity or nationalist narrative of the type discussed by Kettle from the Left and, say, Tombs fro the right, but very comfortable with Europe - hence Boris 'divided loyalties' jibe. And Boris was right about that. A new more international Britain existed and was growing, not beholden to the shibboleths of the past

And on the other side an older Britain located in the left behind de-industrialised towns and, what is often forgotten but is even more important, the shires and suburbs where the traditional Mail and Telegraph middle and lower middle classes, if not poor (lets be blunt - many are propety owners a damn site better off than young metropolitans they ludicrously disdain as 'elites'), had seen their place in the relative national pecking order slip back as the younger and more diverse metropolitan areas got ahead.

To their enormous resentment.

We first saw this not about Europe but with the Countryside Alliance. Ostensibly about fox hunting, this was clearly touched a much wider unhappiness with the way the country was going triggered by the election of the metropolitan Blair so that their people were no longer in charge.

That resentment of a (relatively)) declining and older non-metropolitan Britain for a thriving go ahead metropolitan Britain, I would argue, lies at the heart of Brexit and the resonance of the Leave slogans that 'they don't listen to us/care for us', 'the country is going in the wrong direction', about 'London elites', about 'wanting our country back' and 'taking back control'.

It was at heart a revolt of the unfashionable Victor Meldrew non-metropolitan types against UK socio-economic developments that affronted their view of the natural order of UK society and their place within the pecking order as upstart younger Metropolitan areas surged ahead, and a demand to turn the clock back to a 50s golden age where they felt more valued and secure.