Is Brexit actually going to happen?

[Crispy]

Trouble is the huge uncertainty in that poll.

That 22% Don't Know is easily enough to swing it in any direction.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

An idle thought creeps into my brain.

For those who saw in Brexit a chance to "fuck shit up" - both in a cynical Leftish view and in in the more visceral "up yours" response the referendum provoked in many places, would a second referendum be an opportunity to add to this? Especially if (and it's a big if) a secise referendum were to deepen discontent and bring it to the streets?

Is this a possible reason to goad on a "people's vote" campaign?

Or am I really, really reaching here to find something in this otherwise utterly dispiriting spectacle to cling on to?

I've been thinking precisely this.

A second referendum - with hopefully plenty of Northern/Midlands style 'Gilet Jaunes' direct action on the bourgeois and its symbols and inevitably to be condemned by middle class left types - is definitely my preferred option

 

[Raheem]

I'm sceptical that there'll be a second referendum at all. I'm even more sceptical that if there was, there'd be a three-option set of preferences with no deal included.

Labour seem poised to oppose having no deal on the ballot. I guess the polling maybe gives a clue as to why. Surely the maths is that nothing will get on the ballot that Labour MPs are whipped against.

 

[Pickman's model]

I'm sceptical that there'll be a second referendum at all. I'm even more sceptical that if there was, there'd be a three-option set of preferences with no deal included.

yeh i think it's much more likely that there'll be a parliamentary withdrawal of article 50, some sort of fudge and a general acknowledgement that this matter should never be mentioned in 'polite' society again

 

[gentlegreen]

I wish Cameroon would do the decent thing and spell out how cynical and stupid the whole exercise was.

 

[The Fornicator]

An American comedian used to tell a joke around the time of the first gulf war when a coalition was being put together to throw out Saddam. There was nothing anyone could do to persuade, even just in tokenistic name - to get Germany engaged. His joke was the proposed death, destruction and madness across the region wasn't on a scale significant enough to interest your average German.

I feel a little like that about No Deal. In it's way, it's impressive - the self-confidence in the nation. It's probably madness as well, but you have to note the balls of it.

 

[Poi E]

Which nation?

 

[andysays]

This is unlikely to help May get her deal through...

Brexit backstop plan is calculated risk - Geoffrey Cox

The UK would be "indefinitely committed" to EU customs rules if Brexit trade talks broke down, the chief law officer has said. But Geoffrey Cox said it would not be in either side's political interests to allow that to happen. The attorney general said it was a "calculated risk" and "I do not believe we will be trapped in it permanently".

 

[Sprocket.]

I wish Cameroon would do the decent thing and spell out how cynical and stupid the whole exercise was.

I wish Cameron would do the decent thing and bang his head against something pointy.

 

[Pickman's model]

An American comedian used to tell a joke around the time of the first gulf war when a coalition was being put together to throw out Saddam. There was nothing anyone could do to persuade, even just in tokenistic name - to get Germany engaged. His joke was the proposed death, destruction and madness across the region wasn't on a scale significant enough to interest your average German.

I feel a little like that about No Deal. In it's way, it's impressive - the self-confidence in the nation. It's probably madness as well, but you have to note the balls of it.

First the Irish, now the Germans, who's next?

 

[Pickman's model]

I wish Cameron would do the decent thing and bang his head against something pointy.

I wish Cameron would do the decent thing and jump off beachy head

 

[Sprocket.]

First the Irish, now the Germans, who's next?

Greenmantle has been activated.

 

[philosophical]

I have been watching AG Geoffrey Cox in the House of Commons today and I am not wont to use ripe language on here, but he is plainly and utterly a c*nt of the first order, creamed off from the upper levels of Tory establishment c*nts. He is also a lawyer c*nt to boot.
Phew.
Forgive my posting please, but I had to say something somewhere.

 

[mauvais]

A second referendum - with hopefully plenty of Northern/Midlands style 'Gilet Jaunes' direct action

So the EDL then?

 

[brogdale]

Today really does feel like a day for another outing for the Yeats line "The centre cannot hold"

 

[Smokeandsteam]

So the EDL then?

That’s how the middle class left would characterise ordinary people protesting, yes.

 

[mauvais]

That’s how the middle class left would characterise ordinary people protesting, yes.

That's the equivalent of the gilet jaunes, is it not?* It's also who, in the north, we actually see protesting.

*yes I know the reality is slightly more complex

 

[Smokeandsteam]

That's the equivalent of the gilet jaunes, is it not?

No, it isn’t.

“people are in dire straits kill the bourgeoisie”

The fact that some are itching to define Gilet Jaunes as right wing etc says more about their own poltical degeneration to be frank

 

[The Fornicator]

I have been watching AG Geoffrey Cox in the House of Commons today and I am not wont to use ripe language on here, but he is plainly and utterly a c*nt of the first order, creamed off from the upper levels of Tory establishment c*nts. He is also a lawyer c*nt to boot.
Phew.
Forgive my posting please, but I had to say something somewhere.

He's not an easy man to like.

 

[Raheem]

Looks like the gilets jaunes thing has indeed crossed the channel.

 

[agricola]

I have been watching AG Geoffrey Cox in the House of Commons today and I am not wont to use ripe language on here, but he is plainly and utterly a c*nt of the first order, creamed off from the upper levels of Tory establishment c*nts. He is also a lawyer c*nt to boot.
Phew.
Forgive my posting please, but I had to say something somewhere.

Perhaps, but it is somewhat ironic that he is now in this mess because (presumably) he has given honest and competent legal advice as to the current Brexit plan of the PM which is (again presumably) so fatal to its already slim chances of success that they are willing to risk him being sanctioned solely in the hope that the amount of time it will take to deal with him will prevent the advice coming out before this meaningful vote. Greater love hath no man than this etc etc.

 

[gosub]

I wish Cameron would do the decent thing and jump off beachy head

Poor David, looking at his tweets seems to be mostly rememberinng dead people....what ever happened to this


happy go lucky man

 

[gentlegreen]

The realisation that he and Boris's Etonian japes have now truly fucked the country.

 

[Ranbay]

 

[splash]

I have been watching AG Geoffrey Cox in the House of Commons today and I am not wont to use ripe language on here, but he is plainly and utterly a c*nt of the first order, creamed off from the upper levels of Tory establishment c*nts. He is also a lawyer c*nt to boot.
Phew.
Forgive my posting please, but I had to say something somewhere.

He gave a theatrical performance

 

[Wolveryeti]

I'm not sure people inside their liberal bubble appreciate the extent to which many see a second ref as a challenge to democracy itself. People used to laugh when the Irish did this - keep voting until the political establishment got the right answer. In this thread it's gliby bandied about like a sensible, almost inevitable, course of action. Liberals in action. Esp. te BBC.

There won't be just anger if this were to be proposed, the non-metropolitan *country* will be outraged. If you put together the scale of the Iraqi war protest, the outrage of the poll tax and the determination of the miners strike - I have a strong sense that is what would come to London, and not to march but to occupy: a principled stand against the manipulation of democratic process. It's difficult to understand how people think you just override a national vote ... because politicians on both sides told fibs.

Even though metropolitan, educated liberals do truly sincerely know whats best for everyone, you really can't glibly fuck around with this stuff.

I find these 'liberal bubble' posts quite amusing. As if this peoples vote stuff is all about butthurt liberal elites in their ivory towers getting cross about how unfair it is that democracy has happened.

What about:

• A vote that excluded millions of those with a stake in its outcome: under 18s, continental ex pats, UK-based EU citizens with deep roots in their local community.
• A vote that narrowly favoured leave but said nothing at all about what form this should take, being hijacked by the right wing of the Tory party and interpreted as a mandate for a hard Brexit that looks set to accelerate the offshoring of jobs and to lower household incomes (hitting those who voted most for it hardest).
• A vote that happened in the context of millions of dodgy donations, probably originally from Russia, to fund the piping of pure racist shite and outright lies direct to people's personal Facebook feeds: www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-politics-44966969 - completely outside of the usual scrutiny and accountability which typically happens in an election.
• Deadlock in Parliament - no majority for any version of Brexit (but no end of shit pundits giving their take on what the vote 'really' meant)
• All those EU migrants with families and friends here left unsure about their status - insulted as 'queue jumpers' by the PM and sent letters making them fear for their future - and let's not forget the well publicised effect that this signalling has had on personal abuse towards people who talk foreign, look foreign, have a foreign name etc
• Numerous attempts by the government to lie and dissemble about the impacts of Brexit and frustrate any attempts by Parliament to scrutinise the process, using the excuse of negotiations (What has been achieved in 2 years? What do we know that was not clear then?)

Do you genuinely think that anger about the above is a liberal elite thing? Is your answer to the dysfunction in Parliament really to effectively screech 'will of the people', like May?

 

[Puddy_Tat]

I wish Cameron would do the decent thing and jump off beachy head

marine pollution...

 

[SpackleFrog]

I find these 'liberal bubble' posts quite amusing. As if this peoples vote stuff is all about butthurt liberal elites in their ivory towers getting cross about how unfair it is that democracy has happened.

What about:

• A vote that excluded millions of those with a stake in its outcome: under 18s, continental ex pats, UK-based EU citizens with deep roots in their local community.
• A vote that narrowly favoured leave but said nothing at all about what form this should take, being hijacked by the right wing of the Tory party and interpreted as a mandate for a hard Brexit that looks set to accelerate the offshoring of jobs and to lower household incomes (hitting those who voted most for it hardest).
• A vote that happened in the context of millions of dodgy donations, probably originally from Russia, to fund the piping of pure racist shite and outright lies direct to people's personal Facebook feeds: www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-politics-44966969 - completely outside of the usual scrutiny and accountability which typically happens in an election.
• Deadlock in Parliament - no majority for any version of Brexit (but no end of shit pundits giving their take on what the vote 'really' meant)
• All those EU migrants with families and friends here left unsure about their status - insulted as 'queue jumpers' by the PM and sent letters making them fear for their future - and let's not forget the well publicised effect that this signalling has had on personal abuse towards people who talk foreign, look foreign, have a foreign name etc
• Numerous attempts by the government to lie and dissemble about the impacts of Brexit and frustrate any attempts by Parliament to scrutinise the process, using the excuse of negotiations (What has been achieved in 2 years? What do we know that was not clear then?)

Do you genuinely think that anger about the above is a liberal elite thing? Is your answer to the dysfunction in Parliament really to effectively screech 'will of the people', like May?

Well that certainly convinced me you're not a liberal elite in an ivory tower...

 

[Wolveryeti]

Well that certainly convinced me you're not a liberal elite in an ivory tower...

Yawn

 

[Wookey]

COX OUT!!!