Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Iormlund]

The more diffiult and more divisive question is what now? I'm not sure there's a UK answer but I certainly don't see an EU one either yet. What is the end-goal that the EU wants? And, which is my point about the geostrategic element, all of the models are primarily about economics (Norway, Canada, Switzerland). Is that the future relationship the EU fundamentally wants with the UK? Or is that because it's easier to drive from the Commission rather than political choices by governments?

That's not difficult at all. We look for a trade agreement, delegating negotiations to a technocratic committee accordingly.

And in the meantime we turn our political focus to where it should be, the future of the Union. Not the past, which is what the UK is now.

[Tamas]

It was weird that I learned about Sturgeon's announcement from a Hungarian site, although the Guardian daily love coverage did highlight it, just not on the front page.

Every once in a while there is a strange synchronisity in the Bititsh press on what to mute down.

[Sheilbh]

Clive Lewis's pitch for the leadership: basically Labour lost because Corbyn was too Blairite

[Josquius]

On Sturgeon...can't remember where but read an article that its all for public consumption.
She knows she won't get a referendum next year. She doesn't want a referendum next year. But having the Tories deny Scotland its democratic rights will play well for her and increase the odds of winning in a few years time when she actually wants the vote.

Clive Lewis's pitch for the leadership: basically Labour lost because Corbyn was too Blairite

Probably playing the same game that led to Corbyn being elected and just running to make sure the left is heard.
Perhaps being sure to be extra silly to avoid the fate of Corbyn :p

[The Brain]

Clive Lewis's pitch for the leadership: basically Labour lost because Corbyn was too Blairite

The only way up is left.

[Zanza]

The EU will offer the UK the choices from Barniers slide again. The more obligations regarding regulatory alignment, jurisdiction and contributions the UK is willing to accept, the deeper the future relationship will be. It wasn't the EU's choice that Britain leaves, so their strategic interest is still to have as deep integration with the UK as feasible. That said, the EU will not compromise its own frameworks for an ever more distant UK, so the choice is mainly on the British side.

[Sheilbh]

The EU will offer the UK the choices from Barniers slide again. The more obligations regarding regulatory alignment, jurisdiction and contributions the UK is willing to accept, the deeper the future relationship will be. It wasn't the EU's choice that Britain leaves, so their strategic interest is still to have as deep integration with the UK as feasible. That said, the EU will not compromise its own frameworks for an ever more distant UK, so the choice is mainly on the British side.

Those are to do with trade terms though. None of the options on Barnier's slide cover the non-trade bits of the EU - such as the stuff on security, R&D, data sharing etc which are rolling over for this year but end with our membership. And none of them have a direct trade off of alignment = access.

It's a both sides thing but there's a lot more to decide than trade.

Probably playing the same game that led to Corbyn being elected and just running to make sure the left is heard.

But they're all on the left running as one form of continuity Corbyn or other so far

It was weird that I learned about Sturgeon's announcement from a Hungarian site, although the Guardian daily love coverage did highlight it, just not on the front page.

Every once in a while there is a strange synchronisity in the Bititsh press on what to mute down.

It's just a fair reflection of how much the English/London press pay attention to any of the other nations or regions. It's part of why everyone is so pissed off

Too much nationalist hatred for the rest of Britain in Scotland?

Not really. It's a bit like I would be surprised if the Remain "movement" turns into re-join. I mean it could happen, but I wouldn't bet on it

[Legbiter]

Clive Lewis's pitch for the leadership: basically Labour lost because Corbyn was too Blairite

This is the normal human condition. If you're emotionally invested in a particular prediction/outcome and it dosen't come true your mental model of the world no longer makes any sense. Hence you re-evaluate your opinion to account for the new data and update accordingly, right? That almost never happens if you were emotionally invested in the outcome.

What happens is what was documented in the landmark cognitive dissonace study When Prophecy Fails. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Prophecy_Fails

When Prophecy Fails: A Social and Psychological Study of a Modern Group That Predicted the Destruction of the World is a classic work of social psychology by Leon Festinger, Henry Riecken, and Stanley Schachter published in 1956, which studied a small UFO religion in Chicago called the Seekers that believed in an imminent apocalypse and its coping mechanisms after the event did not occur. Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance can account for the psychological consequences of disconfirmed expectations. One of the first published cases of dissonance was reported in this book.

...Festinger and his colleagues saw this as a case that would lead to the arousal of dissonance when the prophecy failed. Altering the belief would be difficult, as Keech and her group were committed at considerable expense to maintain it. Another option would be to enlist social support for their belief. As Festinger wrote, "If more and more people can be persuaded that the system of belief is correct, then clearly it must after all be correct."

In this case, if Keech could add consonant elements by converting others to the basic premise, then the magnitude of her dissonance following disconfirmation would be reduced. Festinger and his colleagues predicted that the inevitable disconfirmation would be followed by an enthusiastic effort at proselytizing to seek social support and lessen the pain of disconfirmation.

And indeed that's what happened. Most members of the congregation when the prophecy failed did not just shrug their shoulders, admit they were wrong after all and go on to do something else with their lives. They instead redoubled their efforts and became even more fervent in their beliefs.

It's an interesting filter to have on life, once you become aware of this universal human phenomenon you can never quite unsee it. From my own neck of the woods, when the Social Democrats and Greens were devastated in a general election resulting in a new center-right government which enacted a de facto withdrawal of the EU membership application process some years back the most prominent intellectuals, journalists and activist types on the losing side had to hallucinate an entire new reality that their fellow countrymen were actually a bunch of irredeemably ignorant awful racist shitfucks, etc, etc, in order to avoid cognitive dissonance. Whereas the slight majority who had voted for the winning side experienced no disjunction between their predictions and observed reality. And which saw the subsequent antics of the losing side in an acerbic, yet humorous light. Sound familiar?

[Richard Hakluyt]

What would Talleyrand say about the Labour party? Ah yes - "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing".

[Oexmelin]

The Brexiters who won't Brexit:

tl;dr: major wealthy Conservative donors sought to buy citizenship in Cyprus to keep their own personal access to the EU.

https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-conservative-donors-exclus/exclusive-the-brits-who-wont-brexit-idUSKBN1YN191

[Sheilbh]

Today in Labour politics the Corbynite candidate, RLB, has appointed a Stalinist (as in - he does like wearing a badge with a picture of an icepick and the slogan "Goodnight Trotsky" ) to help run her campaign.

There's been a fight within the Corbyn camp over who would run the campaign and shape her leadership. On the one side there were various staff members around Corbyn who are harder left, a little more "no compromise with the electorate" and a litt more about doing things in backroom briefings. On the other hand John McDonnell (who was a mentor to RLB) and his team who are the more pragmatic more adaptable hard left. Apparently McDonnell was spitting tacks over this appointment so it looks like the staff camp have won (for now).

Also lots of Labour starting to worry that the RLB campaign so far is just behind the scenes briefings (especially to the friendly media), so far no interview, no speeches, no social media engagement. Though obviously as the Corbyn team's preferred candidate she is expected to win.

Honestly I wouldn't be surprised, if he ran for it again, if Corbyn would win another 50%+1 first round victory

[Sheilbh]

What would Talleyrand say about the Labour party? Ah yes - "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing".

Frankly I think the hard left are fine. They have the Labour Party (which has always been their goal). They have more power and influence than they've ever had in this country - it's been a successful fightback since the 80s. And I think they'd be happy to keep their grip on the Labour Party even if it meant endless Tory governments, see the stuff about this being a "30 year project".

It's people who want the Tories to lose again who need to engage and start pushing back, through the tedious long march armed only with their Labour rule-book to win back sub-committees and local parties etc bit by bit

Edit: Also I find it astonshing how this recurs. We've got family friends in Liverpool who my mum and dad just can't talk politics with because of what went down in the 80s when they were on different sides of the Militant debates. So, for the sake of friendship, they just decided to cut that thing they are all passionately interested in out of their lives.

It's sort of happened again because I have friends where we just no longer talk politics because of how radically differently we view the Corbyn experiment.

[Valmy]

Well wouldn't want for their to be problems when they retire to Spain.

[The Brain]

I get the impression that the UK could use some centrist parties. The extremist parties (Tories and Labour) seem completely unfit.

[Zanza]

The EU will offer the UK the choices from Barniers slide again. The more obligations regarding regulatory alignment, jurisdiction and contributions the UK is willing to accept, the deeper the future relationship will be. It wasn't the EU's choice that Britain leaves, so their strategic interest is still to have as deep integration with the UK as feasible. That said, the EU will not compromise its own frameworks for an ever more distant UK, so the choice is mainly on the British side.

Those are to do with trade terms though. None of the options on Barnier's slide cover the non-trade bits of the EU - such as the stuff on security, R&D, data sharing etc which are rolling over for this year but end with our membership. And none of them have a direct trade off of alignment = access.

It's a both sides thing but there's a lot more to decide than trade.

No, they all have similar trade offs as the prominent trade negotiations as they all work within the political and institutional framework the EU provides, no matter if it is security, military, research, space, education, etc. Look at Britain being excluded from Galileo, European Arrest Warrant or Horizon research programs. Some EU programs are more open than others but a lot of them are limited to members and even more open initiatives might still require acceptance of e.g. ECJ jurisdiction.
The idea that the EU will do special EU/UK programs with their own instituons is fanciful. Britain has even less leverage there than in trade.