Brexit has revealed further the rottenness of the British political Establishment, but I am still truly shocked now to see the Government of the United Kingdom negotiating a major international treaty on the acknowledged, discussed and now published basis that it has every intention of breaking that treaty once it is in force. Officially published by the Attorney General, no less.
The Westminster Government’s contempt for international law was fully demonstrated just two weeks ago when it repudiated the International Court of Justice – an act which is the ultimate disavowal of the rule of international law – over the decolonisation of the Chagos Islands. So in one sense it is no shock that they are prepared to sign a treaty with no intention of honoring it.
But what is quite astonishing is that the discussions with the DUP and ERG on how to sign up to the backstop and then dishonour it, have been carried out fully in public, and with the potential other party to the treaty looking on.
I simply do not see how the EU can now sign the Withdrawal Agreement which was negotiated with May, when they have been given firm evidence that the UK intends to cheat on that Agreement.
I especially cannot understand the pusillanimous attitude of the government of Ireland to this development. The UK has published in advance that it is taking Ireland and the Irish people for fools and has no intention of keeping to the Irish backstop. The reaction of the Government of Ireland is to pretend not to notice. That is an astonishing dereliction of its duty to the people of Ireland, North and South.
The more so as Geoffrey Cox’s “advice” is an unsubtle hint to the DUP, should the backstop become effective, to restart the Loyalist violence with which they were for decades so closely associated, in order to provide the pretext for cancelling the backstop. In reading this, it is essential to remember that this legal advice was written, as a matter of definite fact, directly for the DUP audience to try and influence the DUP in the next “meaningful” vote. To signal to an organisation as steeped in blood as the DUP that the way out of the “Backstop” arrangement which they so hate, would be to demonstrate it is having a “socially destabilising effect in Northern Ireland”, clearly gives a very direct incentive to Loyalists to restart violence.
Anybody who knows anything about the history and politics of Northern Ireland must be aware that what I have just written is true. At the very best reading, Cox’s “advice” is grossly irresponsible and reckless.
It is also very poor legal advice. Unlike Geoffrey Cox, I have actually negotiated a number of international treaties, including most of the UK’s continental shelf boundary agreements, the Protocol on Deep Seabed Mining to UNCLOS and the Sierra Leone Peace Agreement. Cox’s interpretation of Article 62 of the Vienna Convention on Treaties is complete nonsense. To start with, Article 62 is designed not to facilitate but to prevent treaties being dishonoured under the excuse of “unforseen circumstances”. It reads:
Article 62
Fundamental change of circumstances
1. A fundamental change of circumstances which has occurred with regard to those existing at the
time of the conclusion of a treaty, and which was not foreseen by the parties, may not be invoked as a
ground for terminating or withdrawing from the treaty unless:
(a) the existence of those circumstances constituted an essential basis of the consent of the parties to
be bound by the treaty; and
21
(b) the effect of the change is radically to transform the extent of obligations still to be performed
under the treaty.
2. A fundamental change of circumstances may not be invoked as a ground for terminating or
withdrawing from a treaty:
(a) if the treaty establishes a boundary; or
(b) if the fundamental change is the result of a breach by the party invoking it either of an obligation
under the treaty or of any other international obligation owed to any other party to the treaty.
3. If, under the foregoing paragraphs, a party may invoke a fundamental change of circumstances
as a ground for terminating or withdrawing from a treaty it may also invoke the change as a ground for
suspending the operation of the treaty.
Very plainly indeed, neither 1 a) nor 1 b) apply to the situation Cox outlines. Just not working out the way you intended is not grounds to dishonor a treaty. Social discontent in Northern Ireland would not radically transform the obligations under the treaty nor is social content the essential basis of consent to the treaty.
The second, and frankly hilarious, point is that Cox’s advice is demonstrably nonsense. To permit the dishonoring of the treaty, a change in circumstance must not only be “fundamental” it must also be “unforeseen”. Yet in his legal advice Cox foresees and specifies the “unforeseen” event that might lead to cancellation!
I rest my case.
It is worth reminding you – as the MSM refuse to do – that the Tory Brexiteers oppose the Good Friday Agreement, and destroying it is to them a potential gain from Brexit rather than a disaster to be averted. Remember this by Michael Gove, asserting that the British military option would be better than the Good Friday Agreement?
Ulster’s future lies, ultimately, either as a Province of the United
Kingdom or a united Ireland. Attempts to fudge or finesse that
truth only create an ambiguity which those who profit by violence
will seek to exploit. Therefore, the best guarantee for stability is the
assertion by the Westminster Government that it will defend, with
all vigour, the right of the democratic majority in Northern Ireland
to remain in the United Kingdom. Ulster could then be governed
with an Assembly elected on the same basis as Wales, and an
administration constituted in the same way. Minority rights should
be protected by the same legal apparatus which exists across the
UK. The legislative framework which has guaranteed the rights and
freedoms of Roman Catholics and ethnic minorities in Liverpool
and London should apply equally in Belfast and Belleek…In such circumstances, resolute security action, the use of
existing antiterrorist legislation and the careful application of
intelligence could reduce the IRA to operating as it did in the fifties
and sixties. Combining such security measures with a political
determination not to allow Ulster’s constitutional status to be altered
by force of arms would rob the republicans of hope.
It can be done. But does any Government have the will?
Interestingly enough, after I published an article on Gove’s 58 page pamphlet attacking the Good Friday Agreement, the Tory think tank which published it, the Centre for Policy Studies, immediately took it down from the web. I have, however, copied it to my own website.
By chance, my next couple of speaking engagements are in Northern Ireland. This is not the subject I was intending to discuss, but I never know what I am going to say when I stand up anyway. Happy to answer questions on anything.
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Putting detail to the side, the focus over recent years is that of a Xenohobic state.
Brexit, the hatred of immigrants, the hatred of the EU, the hatred against foreigners and all backed up by the policies of the Hostil Environment tell you about where the U.K. is headed.
White or predominately white Anglos Saxon supremacy trumps all is the game and it leads to exactly the type of thing that has just happened in New Zealand. The poor people in the mosques deserved to die, didn’t they. They were Muslim and they shouldn’t have been where they were. The argument is just so compelling isn’t it.
And it’s not that different from Theresa May’s government hostil environment denying a 40 year ( Windrush ) resident essential NHS cancer treatment. The intended result was exactly the same.
Folks disregard this xenophobic nazism at their peril. The dirty filthy Muslim, or black from the Caribbean today but maybe the separatist Paddy or Jock tomorrow. Burning Taigs and more might not just be a lesson from history with the course we are now on.
Scotland, sleepwalking into disaster!
sleepwalking everywhere.
Just when it seemed like you hit the bottom along comes someone to demonstrate that there are no depths to which corporatist lickspittles will not sink.
A desire to be free of the EU has precisely nothing to do with hatred of immigrants, hatred of foreigners or a deranged attack in New Zealand. On the contrary those who support the EU manifestly want to be in a union with Europe – a Europe that includes Spain where Vox are a growing force and are unswervingly loyal to Francoist doctrine. So if someone wants to be in a union with fascists then what what exactly does that makes them.
In Germany the AfD are a growing force – ,most sane people would have concerns about German nationalism. The French are rioting on a weekly basis and drawing on their revolutionary history as they seek to topple Macron – and you want to be in a union with French rioters, but are too cowardly to state excatly why.
You want to talk about hatred of foreigners then you need look no further than the treatment meted out to Greeks – but I guess they are the wrong kind of foreigner to satisfy your pitiful self loathing. If you have an interest in “burning taigs” then the EU is surely your friend. Look at how they are positioning Ireland for full spectrum economic suicide in the event that their plans to ensnare the UK backfire.
Loony
Your posts are getting very strange. So what you are saying is that if Europe is voting in fascist parties we should disingage and let them rot. But what if the same is happening here? Should we all stop and boycott engagement with politics because it is dominated by the right? And where exactly do you personally stand with your populist supporting ideas? Trump?
He loves Trump.
Not strange at all.
I was merely responding to someone who suggested that those who oppose the EU are xenophobic and in some way linked to a lunatic in New Zealand. It seems reasonable to point out that not only is this flat out false but that those in favor of the EU must by definition wish to be in a union with people – some of whom are overt fascists. My question is why would someone wish to unite themselves with fascists.
You cannot formulate an intelligent approach to the EU until and unless you understand exactly what it is that you are being asked to either engage with or disengage from. A lot of the most ardent cheerleaders for the EU are some of the most ignorant people imaginable when it comes to actually understanding what Europe is.
Donald Trump is pretty easy to understand – he is a nationalist who wants to enact policies that are in the best interests of the US. To this end he wants to put an end to pointless foreign wars and to repatriate jobs from China and confront the great mercantile powers namely Germany and China. If the British are concerned about “right wing politicians” then perhaps they could express that concern by electing people that actually represent the interests of the British people. Very few British people understand how their best interests are served by subsidizing Eastern Europe while denuding those lands of their most able people thereby ensuring a long term constant need for ongoing subsidy payments. Tellingly neither the media nor liberal commentators ever bother explaining the benefits of sending money to Eastern Europe to an unemployed person languishing in a former industrial or mining town.
Your characterisation if Trump as a Nationalist, although widely touted by him and others, is frankly Bizarre. Nationalism and MAGA and such slogans by trump and closely allied cupboard white supremacists is just a cover for US bid for World dominance by acts of international piracy. Wall Street capture is the swamp in the US which Trump is doing nothing to drain.
Having said all that, I add that the theonly sensible action that Trump did was to ground the Boeing 737 despite Boeing and the FAA resistance. That may not be altruistic but at least was pragmatically sensible.
SA not This SA. Mobiles sometimes have their own minds.
All states are fascist, the only difference is the lies they tell about the people they kill. Respectable fascists (liberals) promoting overt fascists against the people is nothing new. It worked well in Germany in 1933 so what could possibly go wrong?
No not strange at all.
The EU is recreating all the same economic conditions that led to the rise in the far right in the Eurozone.
The EU via organisations that have no status in EU treaties (such as the Trokia and the shadow banks it set up), so are totally unaccountable is suppressing any left wing opposition to EU imposed austerity, leaving the field open for the far right to pose as opposition to austerity, just like in the Weimar Republic.
The rise in the far right do not come out of thin air.
In the 1920/30s we had:
A fixed currency (gold standard now, the Euro now) under conditions of unpayable debt (war reparations then the banking bail out now), with massive trade imbalances (US trade surplus then, Germany now) under conditions of perfect capital mobility (that is guaranteed by the single market in the EU). With austerity (Hynrich Bruning then, Fiscal compact now).
Essentially after the hyperinflation of 1921-23 caused by unpayable war reparations and the strikes against the occupation of the Rhur by the French. the German government financed unpayable war reparations with US borrowing facilitated by free movement of capital. The French and the UK to a lesser extent insisted on swingling reparations to finance their own unpayable war debts to the US. The US accumulated curency from reparations and from a massive trade surplus, the US recycled this as pro-cyclical lending particularly to Germany. This all ground to a halt in 1929 when money returned home to the US cover margin interest payments making it impossible for Germany to roll over their debts. Hynrich Brunning (the hunger Chancellor 1930-32) then imposed austerity in a doomed attempt to pay these unpayable war debts and crashed the economy into a deflationary spiral, and with it tax revenues. This brought Hitler the following year, this has disturbing parallels to the EU economically and politically particularly in the Eurozone.
“In today’s debt crisis, Germany is the US of 1931”
https://www.theguardian.com/global/2011/nov/24/debt-crisis-germany-1931
The main driving forces behind the move in the EU towards neo-liberalism is Germany and the UK, (and the European Round Table of Industrialists who wrote the single European act) of . So the UK cannot help sort out problems it has helped to create, particularity not under this Government or a Labour Government containing the same MPs under Blair that created these conditions.
The Brussels Business – Who Runs the EU ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMuUEd6w54E
I was glad when Trump was elected, not because I supported him but I regarded Hilary Clinton as more of a threat to world peace than Trump as she would push Nato eastwards and would of been more involved in supporting the Jihadists in Syria.
The lunacy of the DNC Russiagate Macarithite smears only indicate just how dangerous the corporate democrats are to democracy and world peace. Trump is a truly awful candidate, how did the DNC choose somebody even worse?
Without a left wing opposition to EU imposed austerity, this leaves to door open for the far right to pose as an alternative. This is why after the failure and abject betrayal of Syriza, this left the door open for the League/5 Star in Italy as the main (and only effective) opposition to EU imposed austerity. It is the cowardice of the left in the face of globalism and obsession with single issue politics that has led them to give up on the working class as agents of change, but to write them off as thick and racist as politics becomes increasingly dominated by the middle class and their interests. In the face of their failure to effect change in the face of globalism they have turned to supranational organisation (like the EU) to impose it from above.
This is at the heart of the moral bankruptcy and irrelevance of the left as they gave up class politics outside the aristocracy of labour now in the public services, which is the only area left with significant union representation. But these are isolated and bound to fail without greater engagement with the wider working class.
The EU that is creating the conditions for the rise in the far right cannot be reformed. It is designed to be impervious to reform, such as by its complexity. Reform of the Lisbon Treaty also requires unanimity of all its members to ratify it, with the larger members having more representation (like Germany) who uses its position as a creditor nation and debt to enforce compliance from its weaker members. It is 12 years since the economic crisis, if it was going to reform it would of done so by now. The Trokia has projected austerity for Greece into the 2060s, people could be born and die of old age before Greece has recovered from its bail outs. Does this seem to suggest that the EU has any appetite for reform?
Indeed Mario Drhagi (the former GS Managing director, and President of the ECB) called time on a Social Europe in a Wall Street Journal article in 2012.
“Europe’s Banker Talks Tough, Draghi Says Continent’s Social Model Is ‘Gone,’ Won’t Backtrack on Austerity”
WSJ Brian Blackstone,Matthew Karnitschnig andRobert Thomson February 24, 2012
https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970203960804577241221244896782
“Myth-busting the European dream”
https://www.rt.com/shows/renegade-inc/453503-european-dream-economy-challenge/
No, the solution is engagement with politics with a left wing opposition and alternative economic plan to the EU, and facilitate the break up of the EU before it can do any further damage economically socially and politically.
That is very well argued. Thank you.
Reg
Good well reasoned response but I am not sure that the conclusion is that we should leave the EU as leaving the EU now will not solve but could very well accentuate the problem.
The EU venture went off track when it became a political and not an economic union only and when it became too close to NATO and in fact trying to enlarge NATO to the borders of Russia became the most important criteria for east European countries to join, rather than the previous criteria of robust equivalence. This was accompanied by the loss of the EU as a balancing power and its to close alignment with the Us with loss of indipendence. However dissolving or leaving the EU will not achieve the aim of breaking up NATO which will remain and be politically even more dominant and less democratic with the political fragmentation.
If you notice, many of the anti-Europe factions in Italy, France and Germany and elsewhere would also like to leave the EU. In the case of Britain leaving the EU will not create any political indipendence but even more close alignment both politically and economically, with the US and NATO as its projection. So I am afraid Brexit is actually the wrong answer to a very real problem. Notice that the strongest supporters of Brexit are UKIP, very close to US right and Trump, and the Atlanticist such as Fox, Johnson and Gove. This is not a coincidence and Brexit will mean U.K. becoming a European offshore statelet of the US and NATO.
SA, thank you too; whether Brexit would help or hinder was exactly what I was wondering.
SA
The problem is Trumps foreign policy in being against the EU is out of line with long term US establishment strategy.
I would suggest that is one of the main reasons the US establishment are trying to remove him, as he is undermining long term US strategy. After all the pre-cursors to the EU were set up largely by the US secret services as an adjunct to the Marshal plan as part of its cold war strategy against the Soviet Union and to suppress the left in Europe. The UK after all supported a fascist coup in 1944 in Greece, with the US supporting a fascist coup in Greece in 1967. A United States Of Europe was conceived only as a soft power trade block as an adjunct NATO, so in reality it is not separate at all. The EU has destabilised eastern Europe to facilitate EU expansion and Natos eastward expansion, so they are not separate at allThe actions prove this such as in Yugoslavia, when Germany recognised Croatia in 1991 despite its history or Nazi collaboration in WW2 and fascist support for Croatian separatism, that helped facilitate the break up of Yugoslavia and Croatia joining the EU and NATO. The lure of a EU trade association agreement was used to facilitate the destabilisation of the Ukraine and a illegal coup supported by the US (as indicated by the Nuland/Platt recording) and fascist elements such as the ‘Right Sector’ and the ‘Asov Battalion’.
Aldrich, R.J., 1997. OSS, CIA and European unity: The American committee on United Europe, 1948–60. Diplomacy and Statecraft, 8(1), pp.184-227.
No the greatest supporters of Nato are not Trump but the DNC and the Clinton’s. I has been long standing strategy for the US to support the UK becoming part of the EEC/EU as a US agent to ensure the compliance of the EU and that it remained a US colony, using the contrived threat of Russia to keep it in its sphere of influence. This is why Obama supported remain. As a US agent within the EU, this is why the UK supported eastward expansion of the EU that facilitated eastward expansion of the NATO and the destruction of Europe’s social model. The last thing the US wants is the UK outside the EU, with the EU developing any real independence, such as on Nordstream 2. The contrived anti Russian hysteria has the objective of disrupting Nordsteam 2. US support for the EU is two edged, particularly after the Euro launch that could challenge US $ reserve. The EU has one of the few economies that could (with China) challenge US hegemony. Russia has a very complimentary economy to the EUs, resources, investment opportunities and a close trading relationship conducted in Euro could destroy US economic, political and military hegemony. Its long term strategy (undermined by Trump) is to keep the EU close, but clip its wings to keep it as a US colony by driving a wedge between the EU and Russia and destabilising left wing governments.
No staying will not solve anything as long as the EU exists it will enforce austerity that will cause the rise in the far right as austerity is written into the EU treaties with the Fiscal compact. As the two countries most behind the neo-liberal direction of the EU are Germany and the UK, it might be possible to reform the EU if these two countries were not members, but a fail to see how it would be practically possible to remove Germany from the EU. Germany after all persists in running a destabilising trade surplus in violation of EU rules of excess current account surpluses greater than 6% of GDP. in a currency union it is destabilizing to run a trade surplus, but as its strongest member Germany continues to violate EU rules at will without sanction.
https://ec.europa.eu/info/business-economy-euro/economic-and-fiscal-policy-coordination/eu-economic-governance-monitoring-prevention-correction/macroeconomic-imbalance-procedure/scoreboard_en
Reg, your 10:10 comment seems rather confused. On the one hand the US helped set up the EU as a secret project against the USSR and the left, on another it needs the UK to be in the EU to help it control the EU, and on yet another the euro is a challenge to the dollar as a reserve currency.
It seems to me that corporations could impose austerity even if there were no governments at all, in fact it would be even easier for them that way, and smaller governments are easier for corporations to dominate than larger ones are. It seems to me that large scale cooperation of governments is about the only force that could stand up to multinational corporations, so if something like the EU didn’t exist it would be advantageous to create it.
Reg
As Clark above says, your argument is confused but also contains contradictions. The reasons for this to me are that there are obviously tensions within the system and even if the EU was helped in its creation by the US it has also developed as a creature of its own and tries to defy the US in many ways and also does offer a counterbalance to the US economically and politically though, obviously not militarily. Examples apart from the Euro being a challenge to the dollar, include Nordstream and not withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal. At the same time some politicians in Germany are showing resentment of direct US interference with German politics and the US has always eyed German surplus trade as a threat. It may be that the creature is showing signs of turning against its benefactor and that the US has now decided to sabotage the EU. I cannot for the life of me see that Britain post Brexit is not going to be much closer to the US (if that is possible) but then the economic ties will really be the final stranglehold. There is also the added bonus that all this will either send a warning message to the EU or finally break it up. The result will be a NATO dominated Europe with absolutely no clout or unity to counter any US action. Your assertion that Trump is indipendent of long term US strategy is touching but somewhat too trusting.
– Uncle Vernon, Uncle Vernon,
– Independent as a hog on ice…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9bfsT3AvLU
Trump’s independence is indistinguishable from general instability. He certainly hasn’t stopped US corporate policy towards Venezuela.
Clark SA
No my argument is not confused I am making a quite nuanced argument describing the rather confused and contradictory policy agenda of the US and the EU and how this has developed over time.
The EEC/EU was set up after WW2 when Europe was weak due to the destruction of WW2 and the US had a massive trade surplus as a creature of US geopolitical strategy, but these things develop a life of their own over time, this became obvious with the launch of the Euro in 1999 threatening US $ reserve hegemony
So the US want EU unity, but to ensure it does not develop an independent foreign policy or become economically powerful enough to challenge US hegemony. It want it as a united but economically weakened US colony buying US weapons and US debt by driving a wedge between the EU and both Russia and China.
The US reaction to Nordstream 2 and Italy participating in Chinas belt and road initiative illustrates this.
This is why I described US policy as doubled edged towards the EU, rather like the British Empires policy towards India as a colony with imperial preference and restrictions on manufacturers from India such as Calco. Great Britain wanted to keep India close but underdeveloped in a sub-servant position for exploitation.
It is untrue that multinational corporations are more able to impose austerity in the absence of supranational organisations like the EU, as no method has been devised to hold supranational organisations to account democraticly (IMF WB WTO NAFTA EU etc). This is why supranational organisations are set up by multinational organisations such as the single european act that was written word for word by the European Roundtable of Industrialists and The American Committee on United Europe (ACUE), founded in 1948 chaired by the former head of the OSS William J. Donovan, that funded the Action Committee for the United States of Europe under Jean Monnet and the European Movement using CIA funds channelled through the Ford and Rockefeller foundations.
The US security services are an arm of US corporations, and the EU is an arm of European multinationals.
So far only national governments when on rare occasions controlled by their electorate are able to counter these.
The US (not Trump) regards it easier to control Europe as a single entity using the contrived threat of Russia, providing it destabilises any left wing governments and uses the UK to destabilise ensure it does not cease to be a US colony.
This is all very confused as US policy is confused with different vested interests squabbling over the spoils against a falling rate of profit in the US wanting different things and constrained by being a failing imperial power experiencing imperial overstretch. The EU cannot be a counterfoil to US interests benefiting the ordinary citizens of Europe as it is itself an imperial project set up to benefit EU multinationals with elements that financially benefit from the destabilisation of Eastern Europe.
See documentary the Brussels Business that I linked to above, and the academic paper on the origins of the EU/EEC also above.
Clark you analysis of Venezuela is very simplistic. I did not suggest that Trump does not represent vested interests only different vested interests than that of Clinton and the financial sectors. Some of his polices are a continuation of US strategy, some not. Trade tariffs against Germany and attacks on the EU undermine long term US strategy. Even initial moves for a rapprochement towards Russia (undermined by absurd DNC conspiracy stories) also undermined long standing US strategy, the winding down of the US in Syria also undermined long standing US strategy.
The problem is Trump is just too unreliable for the US establishment. It is also absurd to suggest NATO becomes stronger without the UK in the EU pushing the EU in a more Russia-phobic direction. My view of Trump is not trusting, just understanding of different selfish objectives and motivations, none of which are altruistic.
I agree that the US has tried to disrupt the relationship between the EU and Russia.
I’m not worried about the CIA being involved initially; the US would have been crazy not to initiate unity in Europe after the Second World War.
– “The US security services are an arm of US corporations, and the EU is an arm of European multinationals.”
I’d prefer industrialists over secret services any day. According to the film you linked, The Brussels Business, Secretary General Keith Richardson of the ERT didn’t even try to throw out the activists of the CEO; he acted like the ERT had nothing to hide. If I were them, instead of acting all suspicious, I’d be completely up-front and try to negotiate random inspections of their documents.
For the population, I don’t see much difference in the problems of influencing the political structure of a nation state, and influencing something like the EU. In each case, what’s needed is transparency. In fact, I think that securing greater transparency of both governments and the private sector is the big issue of our times. It’s not a case of who’s lobbying for whom, but what is being lobbied for.
– “The problem is Trump is just too unreliable for the US establishment”
Yes, I think so too. Regarding NATO, I think Europe (EU or otherwise) should develop its own defence strategy. NATO is under too much US influence, and probably the best way to be rid of it would be to phase it out, replacing it with a European defence cooperation.
“A desire to be free of the EU has precisely
nothingeverything to do with hatred of immigrants”Fixed that for you.
N_
Painfully simplistic, the actions of the EU in Greece have proved it is impossible to be left wing and support the EU.
Marxist, I doubt it, you have heard of the reserve army of the unemployed used to force down wages terms and conditions.
Go back and read your Marx, then read the Lisbon treaty to at least try to understand the organisation you support without thought or understanding.
Reg. All very well to invoke Marxism defend Brexit. But as there is no appetite for Marxism within Europe, and the attempts of stifling any slight pink tendencies in political leanings in Britain, I cannot see how you are going to solve this problem by breaking up Europe, and reducing the chances of some sort of alliance and support for socialist parties within the EU. Leaving the EU will never achieve any Marxist aims but will only fragment the protection for workers. I say this actually being very Marxist leaning myself though not fully fledged.
Reg, is that necessarily so? The EU promoted the Social Chapter, which the UK opted out of. It included the Working Time Directive limiting working hours to 36 per week. This would seem likely to have the effect of distributing employment to more people.
SA and Clark
Exactly the EU social chapter has proved no bar to Tory deregulation and austerity, so what use is it?
The first thing you are asked when starting for an agency is to sign away your rights under the working time directives, so they are not a great deal of use.
The left has been stifled by its support for the EU confirming its political irrelevance and undermining its support.
Contrast Salvini success against EU imposed austerity to Syrizas failure and betrayal, would the left in Europe be so weak if Syriza had stuck to its guns and the mandate given by the referendum and refused the bailout and defaulted? There was strong support for the left in Europe inspired by Syriza that collapsed after Syriza’s betrayal. There is no chance of an alliance across Europe of the left as if it is not possible to organise nationally it will be impossible to organise international, this has always been the case, a strong left in the UK nationally pushing its Government leftwards has enabled the left to organise international, has never happened the other way round.
I fail to see why Brexit would prevent the left organising internationally.
I invoked Marx as N_ has a little Marxist symbol and that the Marx did not align with his understanding of Marx.
Also the Social Chapter is an irrelevance and was only PR to sell a Europe designed by the European Round-table of Industrialists to a sceptical European left. The Social Chapter even as a PR exercise was strangled at birth by the 2007/8 economic crisis as Mario Drahgi the President of the European Central Bank proved in a WSJ article in 2012.
“Europe’s Banker Talks Tough, Draghi Says Continent’s Social Model Is ‘Gone,’ Won’t Backtrack on Austerity”
WSJ Brian Blackstone,Matthew Karnitschnig andRobert Thomson February 24, 2012
https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970203960804577241221244896782
But I thought the UK opted out of the Social Chapter, and the Working Time Directive with it. Is it applied in the other 27?
My basic position on the EU and finance is that I don’t know; it’s not part of the fields that I have knowledge about. But I don’t see why, in principle, the EU has to be subservient to finance. Still, I have yet to watch Reg’s YouTube link; I’ll do that next…
03:40 – This is obviously a highly professional film, and appears to have been quite expensive to make.
05:44 – The EU Commission and Council are surrounded by lobby organisations, most for multinational corporations. This does not surprise me; I’d like to see a comparison with Westminster. The film tells us that the EU in Brussels has the second largest collection of lobby organisations; Washington DC’s is bigger. Coming heavily under US influence is what I expect will happen to the UK if it leaves the EU.
06:40 – and we’ve finally got to the title. This is clearly a propaganda film; they’ve obviously spent plenty on emotive, very sinister music, and it’s very good. I suppose I’ll find out who this film is lobbying the public for, at the end.
19:30 – The Corporate Europe Observatory activist group occupy the offices of the lobbying conglomerate the European Round Table of industrialists. Keith Richardson, the ERT Secretary General, decides that rather than having the activists thrown out, he takes his corporate colleagues to lunch and lets the activists get on with whatever they want to do. They photocopy loads of letters between the ERT and the EU; no one stops them. They later try to send this correspondence to the press, but the press are largely uninterested. Quite a quaint story really.
30:00 – the style has softened a lot, and the music is now much less sinister. This could almost be a pro-corporatism film. Que?
Very good documentary. I don’t see it as a reason for Brexit; you’d have to show that other governments are less susceptible to lobbying, and it seems likely that the problem is universal. It seems more an argument for much more public engagement in politics.
It also suggests that the corporate media is complicit – no surprise there.
Clark
Their is a particular problem with the EU, is that it is not accountable so more open for corruption.
The Eurogroup does not take minutes and is not even an official body of the EU so is unaccountable.
Most of the bodies are unelected, with only the EU parliament elected that co votes with the (unelected) council of the European Union on legislation presented and enforced by the EU Commission (with the ECJ).as the EU Parliament cannot propose legislation, your candidate cannot stand of a manifesto of legislation the party you vote for proposes to introduce. This makes reform of the EU well nye impossible (particularly as this has to be ratified by all members). This absence of any real public accountability of EU legislation creates a vacuum into which currupt lobbying becomes more significant than a properly representative democracy. The lack of transparency and lack of much in the way of democratic oversight leads to some very currupt appointments. The preponderance of ex Goldman Sachs operatives in positions of power for example.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-features/what-price-the-new-democracy-goldman-sachs-conquers-europe-6264091.html
Jean-Claude Juncker’s who blocked tax avoidance measures despite being the former Prime minister of a tax haven (Luxembourg), who despite this became President of the EU Commission. The previous President of the EU Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso almost immediately went on to Goldman Sachs, and was accused of lobbying. The President of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi (who also called an end to a social Europe link in post above) was previous a managing director of Goldman Sachs. Mario Draghi was also implicated in the Monte Paschi derivatives scandal (see reuters below). Mario Draghi and previous President of the ECB Jean-Claude Trichet threatened to or did (Greek Referendum) withdraw funding from members private banks to influence the political process in Ireland Italy and Spain. Guy Verhofstadt (Leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe and EU Brexit coordinator) is linked to the Paradise papers. Donald Tusk President of the European Council was criticised for his alleged involvement in a pyramid scheme Amber Gold when Polish prime minister (after ceasing his career as a football hooligan). (see below). Also remember Mandelson was a EU commissioner after becoming unelectable after breaking the 13th amendment of financial scandal. Kinnock also availed himself of an expense account when he and his lovely wife pocketed £10 million according to Wales online below with lovely picture of them laughing all the way to the bank. Kinnock despite being forced to resign as part of the, collective resignation of the Commission in 1999, was reappointed under Romano Prodi who served as the President of the EU commission who was also implicated in a massive fraud scandal, (guardian below).
Reform this lot, how?
Public engagement, how if your EU elected representative cannot propose legislation?
At least in the UK you can vote out the Tories, how do you vote out Mario Draghi?
I also suggest you read the Lisbon Treaty it will cure you of any illusion of public engagement with the EU.
I also suggest you watch ‘On the Trail of the Trokia’ on its activities in Greece, the secret bailout is quite good too.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/01/jean-claude-juncker-blocked-eu-curbs-on-tax-avoidance-cables-show
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/21/goldman-sachs-executive-jose-manuel-barroso-a-former-top-eu-chief-in-row-over-brussels-lobbying.html
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/jan/17/mario-draghi-ecb-drop-membership-secretive-bankers-g30-club
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/07/business/international/ecb-threatened-to-end-funding-unless-ireland-took-bailout-letters-show.html
https://www.politico.eu/article/guy-verhofstadt-linked-to-paradise-papers-company/
https://www.politico.eu/article/donald-tusk-grilled-by-polish-parliament-committee/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/09/donald-tusk-passionate-politician-poland-fight-against-communism
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/campaign-highlights-kinnocks-10m-eu-2100178
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/sep/22/eu.politics
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-montepaschi-draghi/draghi-under-fire-over-monte-paschi-derivatives-scandal-idUKBRE90N19O20130124
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLB3uu1IXM0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xu5sTyAXyAo
http://en.euabc.com/upload/books/lisbon-treaty-3edition.pdf
Thanks for those links; it would take a while to read them, but there’s obviously a problem. But I thought this was the same everywhere. I’m not very keen on “smash the system” solutions. From the film you linked, The Brussels Business, the industrialists really didn’t seem very scary to me; they wanted a unified market, simple cooperation across the whole continent, and worked out how to build the necessary infrastructure to support that. Great!
But the trouble seemed to start when finance got involved and started demanding austerity. Again, this is the same everywhere, and what is needed is regulation of the financial sector, and again, greater transparency. But I thought the EU was ahead on regulating finance, and top financiers were pocketing a lot less in the EU than in the City of London?
Clark
The is not that benign as it as it has with the US has fomented war in Eastern Europe in cahoots with the US. Such as in the Ukraine (with the help of the far right) and Yugoslavia (also with help from the far right), where the lure of a trade association agreement to destabilise eastern European Countries paving the way for Natos Eastern expansion. So it is not either NATO or the EU as they work together and in foreign policy they are scarcely different.
The attacks on Libya by EU members such as France/UK prove that the EU is not an alternative to US imperialism, they are an ally for US imperialism. It is incoect for you to suggest EU industrialists are benign compared to the US. Bayer (a German company) now owns monasanto and roundup containing Glyphosate, with Germany blocking regulation in 2017 before finally relenting. The car emissions that were gamed in the Diesel emissions scandal were written largely by the German car industry, and indicates the corruption in the EU lobbying process and the results (such as excess deaths from pollution) are no more benign than the results from currupt US industrial lobbying. It is also worth noting two large court settlements over Glyphosate poisoning in the US, and the far bigger fines levelled in the US over the Diesel emissions scandal compared to the EU. Renegade Inc/RT documentary covers this.
The results of the Diesel emissions scandal are very scary indeed. It is not about cooperation across the EU it is about creating monopolies and passing off these excess costs onto EU consumers. The EU is massively currupt (as is London) as I proved in the links above. Ex Goldman Sachs in high positions running the EU (such as Mario Draghi) is not benign when it was Goldman Sachs that designed the debt swap agreement (pocketing large fees) that fiddled Greek entry into the Euro. This certainly was not benign for the Greek people given the massive increase in suicides as described by the BMJ, and austerity (primary surplus) projected into 2060.(Reuters below).
Financial Times “Disputed weedkiller given 5 more years after German shift” 27 Nov 2017
https://www.ft.com/content/ea40e2ec-d389-11e7-a303-9060cb1e5f44
“Myth-busting the European dream”
https://www.rt.com/shows/renegade-inc/453503-european-dream-economy-challenge/
“The impact of economic austerity and prosperity events on suicide in Greece: a 30-year interrupted time-series analysis”
https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/1/e005619
https://www.reuters.com/article/eurozone-greece-growth-plan/update-1-greece-aims-to-keep-primary-surplus-at-3-5-pct-gdp-until-2022-idUSL8N1S76L0
I totally agree with you. The messianic brexiters are scarey.
Yes, I find that too, and they seem entirely unaware of their emotional impact. Just the messianic ones, but that seems to be most of them.
Came onto the comments page to see what the response to Craig’s article would be, as it’s a really significant matter.
All i find is people squabbling about unrelated topics.
“squabbling” might not be people but algorithms, “genuine people personality” to mis-quote Douglas Adams
yes, it’s a shame. Another good article, but the same old bickering about personal agendas.
http://www.intropy.co.uk/2011/02/usa-air-force-tender-for-management.html
Persona Management Software. USAF Solicitation Number: RTB220610
0001- Online Persona Management Service. 50 User Licenses, 10 Personas per user.
Software will allow 10 personas per user, replete with background , history, supporting details, and cyber presences that are technically, culturally and geographacilly consistent. Individual applications will enable an operator to exercise a number of different online persons from the same workstation and without fear of being discovered by sophisticated adversaries. Personas must be able to appear to originate in nearly any part of the world and can interact through conventional online services and social media platforms. The service includes a user friendly application environment to maximize the user’s situational awareness by displaying real-time local information. Read more at http://www.fbo.gov
as that was in 2011, 8 years ago, goodness knows if some of the commentating disrupting personas on here might nowadays have enough CPU & GPU power to actually solve the brexit disaster!
You’ll find most on-topic comments on page 1, not page 4.
French protesters riot in Paris, accuse Macron of ‘hot air’
https://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/9399735-181/french-protesters-riot-in-paris
The Macron regime refuse to hear the people, dont he understand he will not win next election if he keeps on ignoring his people?
Gilets jaunes movement dying. Violent ‘casseurs’ continuing, no doubt financed from outside. Bannon and his buddies?
Maybe. But what if France was meant to be the new official US representative in Europe after UK exits? During the waves of so called ISIS attacks in France (yes, the same group aided and funded by France in Syria) it seemed like France was being groomed through the same kind of psychological assault which proved so effective against Americans after 9/11.
The ongoing sell off of the French state was supposed to occur smoothly and calmly , watched passively by a cowed population. And according to mainstream media, at least for now, this is still the case. By my reckoning the French seem to want to disagree beyond what’s allowed for by contemporary ‘democracy.’
Although I could be wrong. That’s how I see it until a better explanation arrives. I’m aware of yawning gaps in my knowledge so I’m more than happy to appear ignorant, at least then I stand a good chance of being corrected by someone more knowledgeable. My main argument is that I don’t see what American factions have to gain by overthrowing their own monster, these are pragmatic people.
“But what if France was meant to be the new official US representative in Europe after UK exits?”
If it ever was, that only lasted a short time. Trump is more anti-EU than anything: the EU is a threat.
I have never seen Trump as a fundamental interuption to the long term strategic movement of the US. There was a two year long dance between interests at the end of which Trump is doing exactly what he’s told, as far as I’m aware.
I agree. The US has been out to break the EU for a long time. US presidents kept the policy secret before (wisely); Trump has trumpeted it (foolishly).
Laguerre
They have been protesting for 16+ weeks, this will of course have an impact and eventually crush the neoliberal dictator when the election comes. Fear not the people, fear the dictator Mr Laguerre.
Chelsea Clinton has a go at Ilhan Omar. Donald Trump Jr comes in to defend Clinton who is a great friend of Ivanka’s. Small world over there.
Strange bedfellows: Trump’s son defends Clinton’s daughter amid accusations of stoking Islamophobia
https://www.rt.com/usa/454042-chelsea-clinton-trump-jr-muslims/
‘However, not everyone agreed with Trump Jr.’s analysis, with some arguing that Clinton had in fact participated in a smear campaign against Ilhan Omar, a female Muslim member of Congress. Omar was lambasted by the Democratic establishment after she called out AIPAC’s influence over Washington – a criticism that some, including Clinton, labeled as anti-Semitic.
“This is a lie. @IlhanMN said nothing anti-Semitic. She called out the power of the Israeli apartheid lobby @AIPAC, whose bidding @realDonaldTrump and the Clintons are equally willing to do. Meanwhile your dad inspires white supremacists and anti-Semites,” Ali Abunimah, co-founder of the Electronic Intifada, tweeted at Trump Jr.
I’m with Ali Abuminah on this one.
He’ll be overwhelmed.
Why the constant acid?
It bugs him you have a conscience? You keep rubbing his nose in something?
Let’s look at the state of countries in the E.U.
Italy in recession and virtually bankrupt, Spain, in a God Awful mess, massive youth unemployment more than 60%,
France more than a quarter of year of riots with the most deeply unpopular president of all time,
Belgium a nest of Islamists, Sweden in political crisis, Finland in political crisis, now Greece is improving fast, so that dose of Austerity has finally worn them down to do the bidding of Mutti.
U.K. very low inflation, very low unemployment, more than twice as low as U.K.
more jobs in U.K. than ever before, every year half a million people come to Britain, how many are clamouring to get into France, answer none.
Michael, all this positive for the UK. Do you think things will change if / when the UK leave the EU?
John, yes, I expect the GDP of the U.K. will leap forward.
The chains that bind us are about to be rent.
Could you explain how the GDP will leap forward?
From investment after the removal of state aid rules providing we get rid of this government and the remain supporting neo-liberals in the PLP, who weaponised remain to remove the left wing.
Hmm. I find it unlikely that any economies are going to leap forward. The whole world has been past the fastest rise of the cheap energy curve for some time now:
https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/10/the-energy-trap/
GDP – that’s the figure that gets bigger when property “values” go up, even if they’re not sold, because of the “imputed rental value”. Loansharking – good for us all, eh?
I think you will find that the nonsense of imputed rental income is standard across the OECD.
https://data.oecd.org/hha/household-spending.htm?context=iLibrary
UK? Constitutional crisis; government paralysed; falling living standards; housing crisis, rising prises and unemployment masked by selective/massaged figures; Scotland and Northern Ireland possibly close to breaking away… I could go on.
Yet another Brexiter prediction of the collapse of the EU. After forty years of such predictions, it’s getting tiring.
Going well then is it?
France, Italy, Greece, the AFD in Germany, Hungary, Poland, rise in the far right in Spain and continuing problems in Catalonia.
It will collapse, the only question is when. Italy and Greece are still to recover GDP to levels before the economic crisis. Greece is projected to have to run austerity into the 2060s by the uncountable Trokia, does that sound like a success to you?
I get more than a little irritated at messianic remainers immune to evidence who support an organisation they have no idea about how it was set up how it is structured and for whose benefit, remain is a faith based cult not based on evidence.
“GDP per capita, PPP (constant 2011 international $)” Greece Italy
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.KD?locations=GR-IT
“The Brussels Business – Who Runs the EU ?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMuUEd6w54E
“The impact of economic austerity and prosperity events on suicide in Greece: a 30-year interrupted time-series analysis”
https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/1/e005619
This is what you are supporting, and why it is impossible to be genuinely left wing and support the EU.
Forty years of such predictions. Yours is just the latest round. It’s rather like predictions of the end of the world. When it doesn’t happen on the date stated, they just come up with a new prediction.
Laguerre
You are falling into a classic logical trap, that is to assume because something has not happened you can project that into infinity. People were predicting the 1929 crash long before it happened to general derision, such as Paul Warburg. People made exactly the same mistake in predicting a boom would continue up to the 1929 crash and the 2007/8 crisis. For example Irving Fisher and those suggesting a Paradigm Shift in the US economy
http://time.com/3207128/stock-market-high-1929/
“At this time 85 years ago, Yale economist Irving Fisher was jubilant. “Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau,” he rejoiced in the pages of the New York Times.”
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/n/newparadigm.asp
Their were also a number of people who predicted the 2007/8 crisis to general derision. These people often predict the crisis occurring far earlier than it did, the reason being is Mathematical complexity (what used to be chaos physics), in a complex system it is possible to predict that a system is becoming unstable, it is however impossible to predict when this tipping point occurs. An avalanche is a good example the accumulation of snow makes the system more unstable, but it is impossible to predict when an avalanche will occur, only that one will occur with a possible % risk. I find this messianic nonsense about the EU really quite wearing, currency unions that are far better designed have failed in the past, why is the Euro different? Bretton Woods lasted from the war until 1971, the Gold Standard failed from 1929 as various countries dropped it. The gold standard also failed with WW1. How is the Euro different is it a gift from god with a divine right to exist?
As the man said after jumping off the 75th floor, ‘so far so good’.
Reg – all the alt-right wing Atlantic Council created,backed and managed groups are past their high point, just like ukippers in the UK vanished like the smoke they were.
In fact the local socialist grass roots have risen and gathering force, as Labour have shown and as the elections in Spain will show and in the EU parliament elections in May.
The Atlantist project to disrupt the EU failed with brexit and their installation of Macron – the moment Merkel survived that plan was doomed! (As is Macron)
Dungroanin
Untrue, and an absurd conspiracy story, Obama supported Remain.
Laguerre
“After forty years of such predictions”
Considering that the EU was created in 93 EU isnt even 40 years old.
I would say there are far more criticism against the EU than ever before, any rational person would agree with that argument.
Could you please tell us why you like EU so much?
On the plus side: top of the list, freedom of movement. The right to live and work in any EU country is fantastic. Then in no particular order: The original EU commitment to human rights, though it did transgress that over the Catalonian referendum. The unification of standards for products. Legislation restricting rip-off practices such as outrageous ‘phone roaming chargers and incompatible ‘phone mains adaptors. Treaty obligations of member states to support each other’s energy supplies, without which the UK lights would have gone off in March 2018. Commitment to reducing CO2 emissions. Somewhat more enthusiasm for regulating finance than the UK. Protection of foodstuffs from some of the worst industrial processing. Laws to protect privacy. Cooperation in science.
On the down side, top of the list, treatment of Greece, and other countries previously. Related – overly accommodating to finance, but that seems to be the norm in recent years and goes way beyond the EU. Selling out democracy to “trade treaties” and the secret “tribunals” that go with them, but again that’s not confined to the EU. “Intellectual property” laws overly accommodating to big corporations.
Others please add to these lists.
Clark
Majority of the things you count as “good” is increasingly seen as bad by more and more europeans.
Either we have nations or we do not. Neoliberalism is the idelogy of the EU and that is an ideology that I will not support considering the havoc it cause and the entrenched inequality on vital topics it produce.
Jack, you don’t speak for “more and more Europeans”. Show me an opinion poll, and/or speak for yourself; what do you see as bad in my list of positives?
You’re making a fundamental mistake, or accepting someone’s propaganda, in seeing nationalism as a solution to neoliberalism. A major pillar of neoliberalism is the corporate media; routinely, people are persuaded to vote against their own best interests. Membership or otherwise of the EU will make no difference to that.
Clark
I am of course speaking of the eurosceptic crowd and parties and their winning (or gaining in elections) of election for the past 15 years.
UK, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, Poland, Hungary, Italy, Slovenia, Slovakia, Greece, Germany, heck in almost every country they have gained more and more power, and why do they win? Because people are getting fed up with the neoliberalism and globalism snatching their democratic power away from them.
So is there nothing in my list of positives that you think is bad?
What democratic power has been snatched away from me? What democratic power do you think you’ve lost? How would things have been different had we had these powers? Have you voted in EU elections?
How is leaving the EU going to increase our power over global corporations?
I think the majority of those things is good but we cant have it all, I pick the nation over globalism.
As far as big corporations, they have all grown tremendously rich through globalism and since EU was created, they are also one of the biggest lobbying forces in Brussels.
What do you mean by ‘globalism’?
If you mean the continued rise of globe-spanning corporations, it seems to me that they are well placed to play nations off against each other, forcing a race to the bottom in corporation tax, labour laws, environmental laws – basically all the things that would help ordinary people.
It seems to me that we need continent-spanning governments in order to hold legal control over continent-spanning corporations, with eventually a global tier of government, with global legal authority and global taxation powers.
It rather worries me that corporate powers may have seeded the “anti globalism” campaign to influence voting patterns and prevent continental and global tiers of government from being developed.
Do you understand the argument I’m making here? I need you to explain to me how isolated nations can regulate globe-spanning corporate powers that are effectively more powerful than even the biggest nations.
I go by the regular dictionary description of globalism.
There shouldnt be any issue for a nation regulating rules, on how a foreign company is to operate on the soil.
At the same time, this debate
is quite obsolete in my opinion, after all, this is what globalism and neoliberalism is all about i.e. there should be as few rules as possible.
The “issue for a nation regulating rules, on how a foreign company is to operate on the soil” is that multinational corporations straddle many countries; there is no way that one country can stop them manufacturing in another. So the corporation holds the advantage. It can manufacture in whichever countries permit lowest wages, or poorest conditions, or permit most environmental damage. The corporations can therefore exert downward pressure on wages, working conditions and environmental protection, in all countries.
How does fragmentation of the EU into individual nations prevent this?
IF you cannot answer, you are acting recklessly by trying to persuade people to encourage the UK to leave the EU, are you not? So far from being “obsolete”, this debate has really only just started.
Would you quote “the regular dictionary description of globalism” please? Because I looked it up and found that it is used very differently in different contexts. I think you mean “globalisation”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Globalization
– “Globalisation is the process of interaction and integration among people, companies, and governments worldwide. As a complex and multifaceted phenomenon, globalization is considered by some as a form of capitalist expansion which entails the integration of local and national economies into a global, unregulated market economy.”
Of course a single country could regulate rules for companies, this was the situation was before the EU
and this IS the situation for states outside unions.
Corporations and politicians work together today, this is what globalism, neoliberalism is about and EU increasingly.
If you really believe nations are so weak (‘nation cannot regulate, we must be a union to solve the issue’), then my argument should be very clear on the damage the EU cause onto the nation statehood, but from
what I understand, you do not think is an issue at all.
Yes sorry, I mean globalization.
– “Of course a single country could regulate rules for companies”
Yes of course, but then what is to stop globalised corporations from simply stepping around those rules, to a country with less regulation?
– “this was the situation was before the EU”
Yes, but that was then, when countries were less developed. To manufacture or otherwise produce, corporations need infrastructure such as good transport and telecommunications, and they need an educated workforce. The corporations had less choice of suitable countries; they have far more choice now.
There also were less globalised corporations, and the ones there were weren’t so big. The whole problem has grown since then, and I don’t see a way of turning back that clock, but if you have a solution, please describe it.
– “this IS the situation for states outside unions”
Which states are the best examples? Again, you need to provide comparisons.
– “the damage the EU cause onto the nation statehood”
Well you need to show that nations outside unions have better solutions, and are less affected by corporate influence and austerity; you need to provide comparisons. I get the impression that the problem is pretty universal.
It seems to me that this is largely a problem of lack of public political involvement in the EU, and that may be because the EU is relatively new; people already had habits of interacting with their national governments via their MPs etc, but not with the EU via their MEPs.
– “what I understand, you do not think is an issue at all”
I think it’s a crucial issue. The question is, what is the best approach to changing it? The EU provides its citizens with legal and democratic structures – these are tools in the hands of the public, and Brexit means abandoning those tools. We have to be sure that what we gain by leaving is of greater value than what we give up.
Jack, this seems an interesting section on opposition to the globalisation of corporate capitalism:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Globalization#Anti-globalization_movement
Jack
Corporatist neo liberalism rules the world fullstop. It is easy to see the apparatchiks who implement the system as part of the system. They have to and the EU is no different. The problem if left wing Brexiters is that they are tackling the second tier of a system by making the first tier stronger. Brexit will strengthen not weaken neoliberalism.
There is something to be said for globalism, the right kind of globalism that is one without neoliberal corporatism. Otherwise what would be the sense of Marx’s most famous slogan “Workers if the world unite…”
Clark
Well, if the nations regulate big corporations, there is no “stepping around”, note today that the big companies lobby nation, EU hard to make their company more profitable – its not the other way around. So if a nation want to stem x company, they will have no problem.
“Which states are the best examples? Again, you need to provide comparisons.”
Well any nation outside of a union or any other collective authority. Pick and chose whatever nation you want and see how they deal with it.
Brexit mean abandoning the imposed rules and a focus that most people getting more and more fed up with.
Brexit is about – if not go back – modify, the system so it is more apt for the people that are actually affected by it. In other words, more democracy more focus on the nation.
Jack, that’s all very vague, and you haven’t answered my question about how to prevent corporations playing nations off against each other and forcing a race to the bottom. As I understand it, the EU has been a success story economically, which is why successive nation states have wanted to join. After joining, their economies improve.
Also, please explain how leaving the EU is supposed to counteract corporate globalisation? The growth of corps into global megacorps seems to be a feature of capitalism; companies buy out their rivals. Surely, won’t this continue to happen whether the UK leaves or remains, or even if the entire EU breaks up?
Well I cant say more than regulation by a nation is the only way to go. I am no expert and I am not focused on it, I am not sure it is such a important topic for me in this discussion of EU. Ultimately I am interested that money is budgeted for nation related topics. Not globalization topics.
It also boils down
to if we want the nation OR globalisation, as I said earlier, we cant have both, chosing globalisation we have to accept
alot of mega powerful corporations that will further on, soon supersede the power of nations themselves and if we chose globalization, we cannot
make up alot of regulations because this is what globalisation is very much about in the end. This is how many nations of the EU have gotten richer and there is no doubt that the GDP is rising, you are right about that but also I guess there are many reasons why nations want to join EU, the first members to avoid war but if we take the latest members from eastern europe you rather see a rise
in inequality after their break up with their old regime, and another incentive is that they also enjoy a great flow of economic aid from the other members. This is also an issue.
Why should people that work hard pay taxes that ultimately go to another nation?
Take Romania, joined EU in 2004, offically, EU (members) grant Romania some 4 times more economic billion inflow than what Romania itself give back into the EU.
Here he have the issue again, nation or globalisation. I prefer that my taxes end in my nation and benefit the nation/people that are living here, with globalisation, the outbound flow will keep on and God knows where it finally ends up? It is such a daunting bureaucracy.
“Also, please explain how leaving the EU is supposed to counteract corporate globalisation?”
I think you start in the wrong end since globalisation is the core reason for mega corporations 1 rise 2 exploitation.
Being outside EU, in my view, the focus will once again be on what is good for the nation and the population not what is i.e. good for EU or the elites or what is good for international business – big corporations, banks.
I enjoyed our debate here but I feel like I repeat myself now, 🙂 so this was my last addition on this, feel free to have the last word if you want and I will gladly read it.
– “if we want the nation OR globalisation, as I said earlier, we cant have both, chosing globalisation…”
Corporate globalisation isn’t ‘our’ choice, or any nation’s choice, to make. It happens of its own accord; a consequence of capitalism. All nations can do is choose how to respond to it.
– “Why should people that work hard pay taxes that ultimately go to another nation?”
For the same reason that people pay tax to be spent on infrastructure, education, healthcare or benefits – just at a larger scale.
– “the outbound flow will keep on and God knows where it finally ends up?”
Well hopefully with global equality of wealth, roughly. But equality between citizens depends upon politics.
– “globalisation is the core reason for mega corporations 1 rise 2 exploitation”
No, capitalism is the reason for both. ‘Globalisation’ is merely the name the effect has been given since megacorporations grew to be global in scale.
– “Being outside EU, in my view, the focus will once again be on what is good for the nation and the population”
Neither the EU, nor any nation, will ever spontaneously bring good to the people. Whether good comes to the people depends upon how the people engage politically; how they vote, whether they join political parties, unions and pressure groups, whether they protest or take direct action, and above all, whether they organise.
Look at any improvement and you’ll see the same – the US Civil Rights Movement, the anti-colonialism movements, how women won the vote, the roads protests, the anti Vietnam war protests, all the revolutions that ever happened. “The nation” is power just as any corporation is power, and power never just gives itself away to the people; the people have to organise themselves and win it, take it.
Yes and the Euro has only existed since 1999 as a accounting tool and as hard currency only since 2002, that’s 17 years not 40, and only 12 since the financial crisis started to indicate the flaws in its design.
If the British government measured youth unemployment the same way as Spain measures theirs then our youth unemployment would be near 60%; or if Spain measured their youth unemployment the same way we measure ours theirs would be exceptionally low. Britons under sanction are not recorded as unemployed because they don’t receive benefits, while people on zero-hour contracts, even if barely employed, are counted as fully employed even though they’re much closer to being unemployed and are in receipt of benefits. And those in training are not counted as unemployed either, even though they’re in receipt of benefits and are not employed. I don’t doubt Spain’s jobless figures are real but ours are pure lies, and when they show them in graphs they’re using pictures to lie.
Michael McNulty
They do measure it the same way using the ILO definitions of employment and unemployment. This is like remain lies wack a mole.The clue is in the name of the organisation, INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANISATION, not UK labour organisation.
https://www.ilo.org/global/lang–en/index.htm
I think you know full well you are being misleading, the benefit count is different from the ILO unemployment / Employment count used by the ONS and internationally. The ILO definition is a very poor definition of unemployment, but it is by definition an international definition. It is the one used by the OECD and Eurostat. The EU requires statistics to be standardised across the EU, this is why the UK had to include organised crime as counting towards GDP.
“Accounting for drugs and prostitution to help push UK economy up by £65bn, A more inclusive approach to GDP comes into force in September to comply with EU rules on measuring the economy” Katie Allen Guardian Tue 10 Jun 2014
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/jun/10/accounting-drugs-prostitution-uk-economy-gdp-eu-rules
https://stats.oecd.org/glossary/detail.asp?ID=2791
https://www.ilo.org/ilostat/faces/oracle/webcenter/portalapp/pagehierarchy/Page21.jspx;ILOSTATCOOKIE=q_uRDcwnfHQ9kwRTJBFpJvPAYRbfhaIiIleMhMrTWwPmdtWZMtx_!1567639201?_afrLoop=14927941265015&_afrWindowMode=0&_afrWindowId=null#!%40%40%3F_afrWindowId%3Dnull%26_afrLoop%3D14927941265015%26_afrWindowMode%3D0%26_adf.ctrl-state%3Dm9k42vdpc_4
The definition (for the UK and Spain) is:
Someone is counted as employed for a entire reference week if they work one or more hrs in that reference week or were on a unpaid government employment scheme. For crying out loud the EU social fund funds workfare like the Flexible New Deal and the Work Program.
ILO definition of unemployment is not being defined as employed as above and be actively seeking work in the last month, and prepared to take up work in the next two weeks. The data in the UK is collected by the Labour Force Survey by asking a set of question from a sample of the UK population, it is a household study nothing to do with the DWP or employers. So it is irrelevant if someone is sanctioned, as if they respond to the survey they are looking for work they will still be counted as unemployed.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/surveys/informationforhouseholdsandindividuals/householdandindividualsurveys/labourforcesurvey
Definition ILO employment
https://www.insee.fr/en/metadonnees/definition/c1159
Definition ILO unemployment
https://www.insee.fr/en/metadonnees/definition/c1129
This is Eurostat with standardised definitions of EU countries employment using the ILO definition.
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Employment_statistics
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peoplenotinwork/unemployment/timeseries/a493/lms
Eurostat “Towards a harmonised methodology for statistical indicators”
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-manuals-and-guidelines/-/KS-GQ-17-007
Look up the evidence first, far less embarrassing.
The EU and its other members is just as adept at lying as the UK.
This seems to work for that horrible ilo link:
https://www.ilo.org/ilostat/faces/oracle/webcenter/portalapp/pagehierarchy/Page21.jspx
The New Zealand police say the attack in Christchurch was the work of one man acting on his own. The three others arrested were “not believed to be involved”. As for reports of there being at least two shooters, they seem to have been forgotten.
You’d have thought advertisers might pay more for space close to the stories of the “Other Three Arrestees” (OTA) and that therefore the media might be interested. I mean what have the OTA got to say for themselves? I’d be interested to hear their accounts. Why would they want to keep quiet? But as far as I know they haven’t even been named. They’re probably out of the country by now.
These days it seems almost everyone puts up stuff on advertising sites such as Facebook and Youtube. But not the OTA. Why’s that?
OK I was wrong about some of this. At least one of the OTA has been named – Stephen Millar, who says he will seek compensation for wrongful arrest. Reportedly he was wearing camouflaged clothing. He says he has always dressed like that.
Aramoana massacre was the worse mass shooting event in New Zealand till the Christchurch events.
Aramona is in the remote Southern town of Dunedin.
The Perp being held for the Christchurch Massacre was originally going to do his event in Dunedin, too.
So Terror Attack in Christchurch N.Z.
adjacent to N.Z. SIS “Offices”
Terror Attack in The Netherlands all schools, universities, hospitals and trains and trams shut down, multiple perps.
Not that far from NATO H.Q.
two days time after they shoot someone dead, they will say there was ever a lone wolf nutter, no body else involved, now move away.
Fucking Brexit
Ever read things that make you want to Scream.. Yes.. Iraq, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Venezuela, Somalia YEMEN, ECT..
I Know a lot about all that.
But here in My Country, we have this disgusting Shit going on.. SNP ( In Fact ALL Scottish Politicians ) Better get this Sorted –
” This is the story, my story and that of my family. I’m Scots, born and bred. My name is Trish and I’m married to Frans, a Belgian. We live in the Scottish Highlands, with our adult daughter Alice, who has Asperger’s Syndrome.
My husband is permanently disabled. And he receives his disability pension from his native Belgium, which I’m included upon as a carer/co-dependant. This means we don’t cost the UK government a penny. Even the NHS treatment we receive is paid for by Belgium under EU Social Security agreements.
However, Brexit is about to change all that. And in doing so, it’s making exiles of us, my husband, who chose to marry me and make Scotland his home, and myself, who has never lived anywhere other than Scotland, my native land. Yet thanks to England’s decisions, England’s xenophobia, we’re being evicted from our home like so much rubbish. If you’re an Anglophile, if you’re a supporter of Brexit, then perhaps you’d best read no further…
https://scottishexile.home.blog/?fbclid=IwAR195ZBCuMlaxnDcW06k4I7rglHbyVu_UzePNHKWrqrYBT0uVWRrDXk7XXg
It’s what May wants. Me, as a British resident of France, I’m in a similar situation. No-one knows what the status will be.
Disgraceful situation. The government is keeping everyone in the dark inluding businesses and supermarkets not to mention the Scottish Parliament. If Saddam Hussein had done this they would have been screamng about his human rights abuses against the Iraqi people. Makes you worry about what they are trying to hide. This government is nothing but a bunch of psychopaths.
This is harrowing. I didn’t see it last night.
Phil the ex Frog (repeatedly banned for haranguing Craig) is right. Forget all political parties, governments and nations. All we have is each other, and we need to build society for ourselves. If there is anyone who can help this family, please do. Here’s the link without telling Facebook something unknown:
https://scottishexile.home.blog/
Readers may be able to help publicise this family’s plight by posting links to their blog on other sites, and by commenting on their blog, posting links there back to your comments elsewhere. Cross-linking like this is a means of promoting a presence on the ‘web. Please don’t rely on Facebook ‘Like’ buttons etc. because we know how Facebook etc. throttle certain traffic, and promote feel-good and mainstream narratives instead. I have commented on their latest post:
https://scottishexile.home.blog/2019/03/18/when-folks-call-you-liar/comment-page-1/
Posting comments on their blog may also help their emotional state; so far, they have very few comments.
Involuntary gambling
I am absolutely sick and tired of being forced to gamble by communications and energy utility companies.
People don’t even recognise it for what it is, but when we buy energy or communications, we have to guess our usage in advance. If we overestimate, we pay for service we haven’t used. If we underestimate, anything over our estimate is charged at exorbitant rates.
This is gambling disguised as “packages to suit every customer”. No? The customer has to guess the outcome in advance, and pay according to how far wrong they were. That’s gambling. BT had “Friends and Family”, where you can register which numbers you think you’re going to use most, and you get calls to those cheaper. Orange had “Magic Numbers”; much the same I think. But how are you supposed to know in advance which numbers you’ll need most in the coming billing period? If it’s genuinely a favour to the customer, why can’t a discount be applied retroactively on the numbers you used the most?
And it’s on car parking too. They offer “two hours free parking”, but if you’re five minutes late back, bang! Seventy pounds “penalty” charge. There’s no option to pay for the extra at a reasonable rate, and the companies doing this apparently have no other income stream. If you use it, you’re gambling £70 that you don’t get stuck in a queue or twist your ankle.
EE have raised it to a new level. In the name of “customer choice”, you first have to buy “Credit”. Out of that you have to choose to buy from a bewildering range of “Packs” which come in monthly and weekly varieties, and the ones on-line differ from the ones you can buy by SMS. If you get to the expiry date, the same “Pack” starts “Automatically”, deducting from your “Credit”, but if you use up your “Allowance” before then you have to remember to text some code to start the next “Pack” early. But alternatively you can buy “Add-ons” to “save you money”, and you might get “Free Boosts”, whatever they are. But if these bewildering things run out, or you forget which day they need renewing, one of your services will return to being billed at the “Standard Rate”, which is absolutely exorbitant.
Of course you don’t have to go with EE, but they have the best coverage. Why? Because they invested in infrastructure so they could land the national contract for the various police forces. 999 is no charge.
I wasn’t even aware of that. You would think this would be against the rules of OFGEM but probably it is just another toothless regulator designed to give the utility companies a veneer of respectability to cover the fact that they are simply crooks.
I noted earlier that “ardent cheerleaders of the EU are some of the most ignorant people imaginable when it comes to actually understanding what Europe is”
You by contrast consider consider Brexiteers “scarey” (sic), but none of that stops you from effortlessly proving my point. On what basis do you imagine OFGEM as being capable of protecting your interests? If utility companies are crooks then they are particularly ineffective and incompetent crooks.
Surely you must know that the European Court of Justice has declared the UK’s capacity auction market to be illegal, and surely you must know that OFGEM had approved this scheme, but as they are subservient to the ECJ they are required to oversee the cancellation of this scheme.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-power-auctions/uk-must-halt-back-up-power-scheme-after-eu-court-ruling-idUKKCN1NK275
Surely you must know that the EU is a major promoter of renewable energy – and surely you must know that the EU is desperate to keep the true costs of renewable energy hidden from the public. These costs must go somewhere and so they are now starting to show up on the balance sheets of major European energy companies. See this:
https://theecologist.org/2016/dec/08/french-taxpayers-face-huge-nuclear-bill-edf-financial-crisis-deepens
and this:
https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-rwe-is-an-energy-bad-bank/a-37676387
The entity responsible for your latest set of complaints is clearly and unambiguously the European Union. If you are either unwilling or unable to grasp this then tough. There is a price to pay for supine ignorance and you must pay it.
But Loony, are you not a global warming denial conspiracy theorist? That’s no position from which to constantly proclaim your own superior intellect over all others. Make your point, but please stop trolling.
Yes, renewable energy will be more expensive, in real terms (EROEI) as well as mere money:
https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/10/the-energy-trap/
Capitalism, predicated as it is upon infinite economic growth, is incapable of a sane response to this crisis.
I am not any kind of conspiracy theorist. I do not care whether my intellect is superior or inferior to the intellect of others. I do not attribute false statements or false motives to others. Now, what were you saying about trolling?
You seem to have omitted to mention that, when it comes to electricity generation, renewable energy also increases aggregate emissions.
– “when it comes to electricity generation, renewable energy also increases aggregate emissions”
This appears to be untrue:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse-gas_emissions_of_energy_sources
Do you not deny global warming due to CO2 emissions? Do you not support burning more coal, as advocated by the Trump administration?
09:18: – “If you are either unwilling or unable to grasp this then tough. There is a price to pay for supine ignorance and you must pay it”
16:52: – “I do not care whether my intellect is superior or inferior to the intellect of others”
What I said about trolling was, please stop it 🙂
Clark
How right you are. I found myself in a bizarre situation recently when my BT phone line went down because a tree fell and severed the line. BT said there commitment was to repair within 3 day’s. I had no internet through BT for three days and had to find an alternative. I used my phone hotspot to get internet access through the desktop only to find that the 5 gb suscription that usually is only half used by the end of the month, draining away after about half an hours use, and the phone becoming too hot to handle. I therefore explored buying more gigabytes to discover a special internet only tarriff with my O2 provider for 50 gb for less than my current 5gb tarriff. As this was a no brainier in my position I subscribed but now have so much spare internet usage on my mobile.
:
Like rail service, Power and Electronic communications need to be re-nationalised.
.
Maybe core utilities do need to be re-nationalized. Oddly enough such actions are simply illegal under EU law, and would remain illegal under the type of faux Brexit allegedly favored by Jeremy Corbyn. Corbyn is fully aware that a vast swathe of his policy proposals are incapable of being carried out as they are contrary to EU law.
I would have thought that such an expert on the EU as you claim to be would know that EU law allows for re-nationlization.
kathy, thanks; I’d appreciate more details if you can.
Kathy
You stated: “I would have thought that such an expert on the EU as you claim to be would know that EU law allows for re-nationlization.” That is an untrue statement, I am getting rather irritated by this Remain lie repeated without any thought or understanding by those who have no understanding of the EU structure and are too lazy to conduct any reading around the subject to verify this. Have you read the Lisbon Treaty? Have you read the EU case law on outstanding and closed EU commission procedure on State Aid? Have you read legal advice on the legal interpretation of EU State Aid law? I have so I can tell you you do not have a clue what you are talking about.
en.euabc.com/upload/books/lisbon-treaty-3edition.pdf
Lisbon treaty, read it.
Legal interpretation of EU State Aid Law
https://www.out-law.com/en/topics/eu–competition/state-aid1/-introduction-to-state-aid/
https://www.oxera.com/agenda/brexit-implications-for-state-aid-rules/
https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/w-008-9757?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)&firstPage=true&comp=pluk&bhcp=1
Poland was forced to break up its Railways into a myriad of private and public companies to adhere to EU guidelines on State Aid as a condition of entry into the single market.
Poland’s fragmented Railway structure (previously entirely PKP)
http://www.railfaneurope.net/list/poland.html
The EUs own website on outstanding case against illegal State Aid for Poland’s Railways
http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-394_en.htm
State ownership is allowed, but this has to be open to competition, and preferential financial or non financial subsidy cannot be extended to state owned enterprises, so taxpayers cannot be used to warp the market even if this is for the public good. State monopolies are also largely prohibited under EU treaties. The problem is in a natural monopoly a state monopoly is often the most efficient method of provision as it reduces duplication needed for consumer choice needed to make a free market operate (Schools, Utilities, NHS for example).
The Piensent Masons website (outlaw above) describes this quite well when it describes the ‘The market economy investor principle test’ used by the EU Commission that describes “This asks the question: would a private investor in comparable circumstances have provided such sums or support to the recipient if it were operating under normal market economy conditions?”
.
So a competitor does not even have to exist for illegal state aid to take place. The EU commission also has to be pre notified of any planed state aid (unlike under WTO rules) and can be retrospective (again unlike WTO rules). WTO rules on State Aid only consider it applicable if it affects international trade, where as EU rules also apply to internal trade. Also under WTO rules only states can bring a case for illegal state aid, under the EU companies can also bring cases against states for illegal State Aid. WTO rules only consider actual loses from illegal State Aid, EU law considers projected loses like the loses from not getting a government contract (rather like TTIP/TTP).
It is also worth noting that EU State Aid regulations have been incorporated into UK law, such as the 2012 Health and Social Care Act that has direct reference to EU laws on State Aid allowing the Sectary of State to overrule NHS trusts if they violate EU rules on State Aid.(see Section 124 – Local modifications of prices of services: agreements paragraph 908 and Section 125 – Local modifications of prices of services: applications paragraph 910). (below)
It is also worth noting that the CETA Canada deal with the EU contains the same Investor State Dispute Settlement procedures contained in TTIP/TTP that allow companies to sue governments for projected loss of income. Indeed Richard Bransons Virgin Care did exactly this under these provisions when the Sued Surrey NHS for projected loss of income for not being awarded the contract for children’s services, which was settled out of Court for a undisclosed amount of taxpayers money due to commercial confidentiality. (see independent below). The OXA website above explains the difference between WTO and EU rules on State Aid quite well, which has the following definition: ” The European Commission defines state aid as: an advantage in any form whatsoever conferred on a selective basis to undertakings by national public authorities.1″ and ” A measure constitutes state aid if it: involves the transfer of state resources; has potential distorted effects on competition and trade in the EU market; and confers a selective economic advantage to the recipients.” The EU commission can order recovery of illegal State Aid retrospectively for up to 10 years. The Thompson Reuters website (below) states: “EU state aid rules are significantly more stringent than WTO subsidies rules:” and “The default position in WTO rules is that subsidies are generally allowed, while EU rules consider subsidies to be generally illegal.” The Commons Briefing (below) has a much more extensive explanation of State Aid. Notice in this Briefing paper ‘Export-related aid is not allowed’ meaning if the UK wanted to reconfigure its its economy away from finance and towards rebuilding its manufacturing base this would not be allowed, despite the desperate need for this in the UK given the finance curse and diminishing oil supplies and massive trade deficit..
https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/w-008-9757?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)&firstPage=true&comp=pluk&bhcp=1
researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN06775/SN06775.pdf
2012 Health and Social Care Act notes
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2012/7/notes
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/nhs-richard-branson-virgin-care-legal-settlement-tendering-contract-a8080961.html
https://www.out-law.com/en/topics/eu–competition/state-aid1/-introduction-to-state-aid/
https://www.oxera.com/agenda/brexit-implications-for-state-aid-rules/
Costas Lapavitsas, former MP of the Greek Parliament The Left Case Against the EU (1/2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haps9anpCgQ
Loony is correct close alignment to the single market would almost certainly require the UK to conform to the 4 freedoms and EU State Aid regulations contained in the single market and any EEA/Norway type agreement or Theresa Mays deal that adherers to EU state aid regulations (see Briefing paper, outlaw above) and Slaughter and May on Brexit alternatives (below).
https://www.slaughterandmay.com/media/2535258/brexit-essentials-alternatives-to-eu-membership.pdf
Involuntary gambling. Please publicise that term and why it applies. In gambling, little is predictable for the punters, but overall, the bookie always wins.
Virgin Mobile use the EE network. Hence I left the extortionate EE for far cheaper and more straightforward tariffs at Virgin. Doesnt solve all the other cons you rightly point out mind
Off Topic: Events in Chch.
I know Craig Murray is skeptical about Salisbury for things like the head nurse turning up and a chemical weapons exercise happening at the same time. Well it turns out from NZ these coincidences do happen.
The shooter went to one mosque, police were unable to apprehend him there in time. He went to a second mosque, ditto. He was actually caught driving around Christchurch by a team of police who were visiting to conduct an exercise in anti-terrorism.
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/national/accused-gunman-will-represent-himself
“Their boss rural response manager Senior Sergeant Pete Stills said the pair had traveled into Christchurch to attend a training session at Princess Margaret Hospital in Cashmere.
The training was held on a disused floor of the hospital and was around room clearance and dealing with offenders in armed incidents.
“They were actually training when the call came through that there was an active armed offender in Christchurch,” Stills told the Herald.
…..
“The car was weaving in and out of lanes with its hazard lights on. They confirmed the rego, that it was the right car, and did a U-turn.”
———————————————————
Not quite sure how they had the rego (by which he means number-plate), but it is possible a quick-thinking witness phoned it in. Or perhaps by that stage they had processed his manifesto the perpetrator had sent under his name to the PM’s office and others shortly before commencing his attack. The name is probably unique in NZ so it would be a matter of seconds to find his number-plate, once the connection with the manifesto had been made.
It is concerning to think if he had been driving normally he might of being able to hit a third target (or had used a hire car). It doesn’t compare very well with the 8 minutes London police took to close down the London bridge attack in 2017, but then if you just go in and straight out again of a building, it may be quite difficult for police to intercept a committed attacker.
And one of these two police has already (as of March 17) gone overseas:
“Both are taking some time off and one has travelled overseas on a planned holiday.”
That’s New Zealand for you, Friday catch an international terrorist, Saturday off to Bali.
Really just for your interest other than any substantive point. The response we need to undertake is clear: greater gun regulation and increased monitoring of the internet.
It is not just the apparent coincidence. It is the whole story which was not just made up but kept being modified, sometimes retrospectively.
It is difficult to judge. We know that “security” has been a growth industry for nearly two decades, and this may account for apparent coincidences. Stories being updated retrospectively is the norm because evidence accumulates piecemeal; we could compare with story development of non-suspicious events as a control.
But ordinary folk like us have no access to much of the evidence in any case, so we are probably wasting our time if we hope to “bring down the entire edifice by exposing the secret plots”, especially on social media like this which encourages a self-inflating echo chamber of distortions. That approach certainly hasn’t worked regarding other attacks upon the public. Better to apply pressure politically to address matters structurally, as Sean_Lamb suggested.
Another interesting example is the siege of the Lindt cafe in Sydney. The terrorist there didn’t seem to be that keen with getting on with the killing and his hostages started to escape. Then in quick succession he killed one and a police sniper killed another one. I am not sure who shot first, I do wonder if he had neglected to kill any hostages, if the one the sniper killed wouldn’t have been credited to the terrorist.
In this case the terrorist was out on bail on a charge of killing his ex-wife, the magistrate having determined the case against him was too weak to justify detention. Apparently his ex-wife had been killed by someone wearing a burkha, but he was discovered on too many CCTV footage around Sydney to have been the perpetrator. Fortunately it emerged after his death that his current wife knew how to wear a burqa and on the basis of that overwhelming proof she was convicted. The magistrate being very careful not to blot his copybook with any further comments about “weak evidence” this time around.
Apropos of nothing at all, he first came to national prominence accusing Australian soldiers of covering up war crimes in Afghanistan.
Peter Power London 7/7 lives!
@Sean – Who put on the training course? What were the nationalities of those who attended? Which country has the police officer gone on his “planned holiday” to?
The NZ authorities haven’t even released all the bodies of the victims yet, but they let one of the two cops who apprehended the named shooter (or was it a second shooter?) go abroad on a holiday?
– “The response we need to undertake is clear: […] increased monitoring of the internet”
Better targetted monitoring; the entire Internet is already monitored to fuck. It doesn’t help, it makes matters worse, and the reason is well understood; mass surveillance increases false positives to such a huge extent that they flood out the real risks. It’s a fairly simple set of sums that anyone can do:
https://www.badscience.net/2009/02/datamining-would-be-lovely-if-it-worked/
Or see many of the interviews with Bill Binney, ex NSA technical director.
The internet is part of the problem. More “security” against terrorism is needed – every mature person can agree with that because one terrorist attack is too many – but there is no security solution to terrorism.
‘Journalist taken hostage by Farouk Brigade 2013 – ‘Syrian government didnt use chemical weapons in Ghouta’:
https://21stcenturywire.com/2019/03/17/journalist-taken-hostage-by-farouk-brigade-2013-syrian-government-didnt-use-chemical-weapons-in-ghouta/
‘…It must also be said that very few European media have published this testimony…
To tell you the truth, when I came back to Europe, I was contacted by dozens of media outlets, who wanted to interview me, and a lot of Belgian and French media of course. But when I gave the first interviews on Belgian radio in the morning, the day of my come back … I obviously talked about this issue of gas in Ghouta … Just after, the phone immediately began to ring: the media that had programmed my intervention in their broadcasts (radio and television) called me to tell me that the interview was no longer possible … For various absurd pretexts … The interviews were cancelled! Indeed, all Western media had accused the government of Bashar al-Assad of using the gas and had claimed that he was guilty. And a reporter who has been on the ground for five months was coming to testify to the contrary … That did not suit them …
Even my Italian colleague has preferred to keep quiet … I never asked him directly why, because I would not like to embarrass him … But I’m sure it was his editor-in-chief who told him not to talk about that …
Anyway. I should have shut up too. It is certain that my professional career has suffered a lot because of this revelation…..’
MSM lining up to interview him, till he slips out the truth….just like William Rodriguez, who was made a US Hero and given a medal by G W Bush, but was dropped like a hot potato when he insisted on telling people of the multiple explosions he heard on 9/11, and the fact the first major explosion occurred before the first plane hit….
Paul
I recently heard a programme on the BBC world service, which replaces Radio 4 in the ungodly hours as I was driving. Amazingly the interviewer asked 5 Syrian refugees in Beirut about returning to Syria and how this was viewed and four of the 5 said that were planning to and were positive about it. Although the questioning was not overtly political, it came through that these 4 really had nothing against the current government but left because of the sectarian violence foisted by the rebels. It seems to me that the BBC is softening its previously relentless demonisation of the SG, probably in preparing as all for making friends with the SG again.
@ SA March 18, 2019 at 02:36
The BBC has gone too far, it can never become decent again. Hopefully, a snippet or two of truth may break through the armour once in a blue moon.
You are in no position to criticise the BBC until you clean up your own act.
STOP trying to use well-evidenced perspectives as a wedge to promote anti-rational conspiracy theories. That’s exactly what the MSM does.
The BBC probably feels guilty about its propaganda image, so it broadcasts factual stuff at an ungodly hour. But I see the European press are also beginning to question narratives etc. Here’s a piece from France24,ignored by everyone else, highlighting the US response to investigation of its military atrocities https://www.france24.com/en/20190315-usa-icc-investigators-afghanistan-pompeo?fbclid=IwAR1tgX2Efi4gFn2Ha7-e9iSpsHF3bUQTo1q4Lo1D7uzNGmpAVExp6PE9jUM&ref=fb
Sanitised link:
https://www.france24.com/en/20190315-usa-icc-investigators-afghanistan-pompeo
Do commenters really have to tell Facebook whatever fbclid=IwAR1tgX2Efi4gFn2Ha7-e9iSpsHF3bUQTo1q4Lo1D7uzNGmpAVExp6PE9jUM&ref=fb means?
Paul, you seem absolutely determined to discredit important stories by associating them with nonsense. Your arrogance makes me feel sick.
Laguerre is anti GJ for some reason best known to him. Of course being a grassroots movement with no specific leadership, it is difficult to maintain. However driving around in some parts of France, you can see a visible sign of the support for the GJ in that many cars have the GJ in their dashboards. It is obviously difficult to maintain the sort of activity that would impress Laguerre because these are ordinary people who are struggling and juggling protest with survival.
The other thing is that France has become exorbitantly expensive as compared with U.K. in most things, compared to 2014 prices of many things have soared and it is obvious that Macron is unpopular. Even France 24 takes the GJ more seriously than laguerre.
The Gilets Jaunes are dying. I’m not against them, I just think it’s a useless sort of protest, because the aims are vague and not defined. You may protest against the country’s economic system, as they do, and people should do in Britain (but they don’t in Britain, they just passively accept). But changing a complete system is not going to happen that way. Industrialists have to be shown there’s another way – the main argument being that if the people don’t have reasonable pay, they can’t afford to buy the products the industrialists are making (that’s a simplistic presentation of sth much more complicated).
The violence is another matter. That’s organised, and now it’s become evident that it’s not related to the popular movement. It happens whether or not there many real gilets jaunes. It just piggy-backs onto the demonstrations. I’m pretty sure that it will turn out to be being financed. I would guess by the far right, probably Bannon and co, or their like, if they’ve managed to get themselves together to adapt to the French environment.
By the way, the gilets jaunes on the dashboard are a legal requirement, not a political symbol. You have to have them in your car.
You’re not against them . . . you just repeatedly make up unevidenced smears about them and claim they’re useless and dying.
So? They are dying. That’s a fact, not an opinion. It’s the violence that’s continuing. Are you maintaining that the violence is an integral part of the gilets jaunes, when it’s obvious it isn’t?
They are not dying. You are spreading false facts.
“By the way, the gilets jaunes on the dashboard are a legal requirement, not a political symbol. You have to have them in your car”.
The second sentence is indisputable. But I think, as you well know, most people will have them in their boot, under a seat, in the glove box (OT but I’m amazed this quaint, antiquated term is still used!), not on the dashboard. They have clearly been placed there as “a political symbol”.
— They have clearly been placed there as “a political symbol”.
Not always, if your gilet jaune isn’t visible then you simply won’t be let past an occupied roundabout. It’s a bit like having to salute when going to the baker’s in 1930s Germany.
The funny thing is about the gilets jaunes (the original ones, I mean) is that Macron is about as good a president as they’re likely to get. At least he makes an effort, and is what my Parisian friend calls ‘reactive’, that is he actually reacts, tries to do something, when something happens. Hollande was a dead loss, Sarkozy a right-wing ideologue who preferred to take his holidays in Martha’s Vineyard rather than in France or Europe, Chirac just smiled at everybody, and then quickly changed his tune when he found there were disadvantages to resisting the US over Iraq. The last decent one was Giscard d’Estaing, as far as I remember. Macron is just having to pay for the incompetence of his predecessors.
Laguerre
So Macron is the best of a very bad lot, sovehat. He is a good apparatchik for neoliberalism, that does not make him good. The support of the GJ shown by the symbol of displaying the GJ behind windscreens has nothing to do with roadblocks. The GJ started as a demonstration of the periphery against the centrist Paris oriented policies of Macron, his attempts at appearing more interested in international politics, than concerns with problems of the ordinary French. Maybe you and your Parisian friends should get out more often as there is a bigger place out there.
Laguerre
It is of course up to the people to decide who they want to rule, dont you agree? They are not stupid, consider how impopular Macron is, obviously the people want a another, better president.
For UK readers who may wish to know more about the awful Senator Anning and the Australian/NZ extreme right, these people below do an excellent job monitoring and exposing them. When I first began commenting here I drew attention to the manner in which Anning and others were using the South African ‘White Genocide’ meme, also pushed by elements of the Australian libertarian right.
https://twitter.com/slackbastard
https://thewhiterosesociety.writeas.com/fraser-annings-neo-nazi-connections
And a very dodgy extremist ‘Church.’ Pillar Baptist started in NZ, moved to Australia. Founder ‘Pastor’ Logan Robertson was deported from Aust for invading mosques and threatening Muslims at prayer. Pillar has since expanded to the Philippines.
https://www.facebook.com/pillarbaptistchurch/
And note the ‘likeminded church’ in Dunedin.
https://www.pillarbaptist.org/Church-Directory.php
Is Anning the one who thumped the young boy who egged him? That boy is terrific.
Anning egger is to donate the money sent to him to the shooter’s victims:https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12213889
O/T. Interserve finally went into administration. There was talk of the debtors coming up with a rescue plan and ‘nationalization’
As was the case with Carillion, just before the collapse, it has been revealed that HMG awarded the company £660m of contracts, including one for £66m for FCO management services!
Interserve given ‘public contracts worth £660m in run-up to collapse’
Claim follows reports of plan to nationalise operations in event of firm going into liquidation
Mon 18 Mar 2019
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/mar/18/interserve-given-public-contracts-worth-660m-in-run-up-to-collapse
Tory security minister Ben Wallace, who went to school at Millfield and then on to Sandhurst, the Scots Guards, and the Tory party, was today on state radio explaining that the answer to terrorism was to teach people not to consider those they “disagree” with to be lower than them. What, like this?
Disgusting. They’re not even hunting with proper foxhounds.
Oh you’re such a card, @Anon1.
The point is that everything the Tories say about respecting other people is bullshit. They’ve been brought up thinking most other people are scum, and that’s what they teach their children, and that’s what they think is a good, proper, right-thinking culture. They have no respect whatsoever for the vast majority of the population, and they’re proud of it, as you are.
And if there was a proper left it would say so.
“Scum” is the number one insult thrown at the huntsmen by the animal rights nutters. It is also the number one insult used by the left on protests.
Naturally, scum is at the top, dregs at the bottom.
Sounds like you’re quoting from experience, as for these twats in red coats and jodhpurs chasing foxes around the country yelling tally-ho and blowing on their little horns. They look completely ridiculous, and it’s more than likely most people think they’re an embarrassment.
:
Craig Murray being thoughtful and perceptive (with the AG’s ‘hidden’ messaging in this case); this is as is usual – his norm – though strangely he’s not always so.
.
As if the state mouthpiece the BBC hasn’t already been shown to be a scurrilous government propaganda machine.
The latest revelation comes in the form of its journalists who in 2014, set out to prove that voting yes to Scottish independence was a foolish thing to do.
The BBC can never ever be trusted to do the right thing which in this case was to report in a unbiased fashion, RT news doesn’t look so bad next to this lot.
The BBC is Scotland’s enemy within.
https://www.thenational.scot/news/17507633.bbc-journalists-were-out-to-prove-yes-vote-was-foolish-during-indyref/
“The editor of the new news programme The Nine recently said she would defend the BBC’s coverage to her ‘dying day'”
Sounds great. But even Alan Little, an ultra-vetted, establishment-approved senior BBC journalist, is now conceding it was biased. How biased does it have to be where even someone like him is admitting it?
“How biased does it have to be where even someone like him is admitting it?”
Right to the top and over many decades, infact right back to day one, Lord Reith hated John Logie Baird.
The BBC will report in any fashion that retains the integrity of the state, even if it means lying through its teeth to Scots who fund the bloody thing.
The only real way forward for Scotland is independence, then a restructure of the current set up, whatever that may be.
Meanwhile Scots are forking out a whopping £180 million pounds a year on Trident, a Westminster pseudo- phallic symbol of their potency around the globe.
The money being thrown at the nukes could pay for 750 new nurses, 370 police officers, 1500 teachers, and 235 doctors.
Lets get shot of the ball and chain that is the union and then send the polluting nukes and subs back across the border. God only knows how much the rUK are paying towards Trident every year, money that would be better spent on hospitals, staff, doctors, nurses, teachers, police officers, social services, etc, rather than on a Westminster vanity project, that even Labour supports.
https://www.thenational.scot/news/17507578.scotland-paying-180m-for-trident-every-year-snp-say/?ref=mrb&lp=25
The aim is to keep nuclear weapons as far away from civilization as possible. That’s why they’re kept in Scotland.
Mods – can’t you block Anon1? He’s expressed support for “chav hunts” and now he’s insulting Scots, calling them uncivilised.
Not all Scots. The gamekeepers and ghillies are usually ok.
Don’t forget they make first rate cannon fodder old bean!
… and now he’s insulting Scots, calling them uncivilised.
Bearing in mind that Anon1 thinks it’s civilised to shoot children then prevent them getting medical attention, I am delighted by his comment.
N_, just ignore Anon1. Not worth expending any time/thought responding to his idiotic crap.
Philip Hammond, the Chancellor has been accused of trying to bribe the DUP, by throwing even more money at them in return for their support. It’s also claimed that the DUP wants to be deeply involved in the EU negotiations.
The Welsh Assembly and the Scottish Holyrood parliament, have no had a y input on the Brexit deal.
https://www.thenational.scot/news/17507544.blackford-warns-chancellor-dup-bribe-would-be-indefensible/?ref=mr&lp=2
Apparently a top-secret ‘Five Eyes’ meeting was held before the Tarrant shooting. No details have emerged. https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/australasia/article/3002024/five-eyes-fail-new-zealand-massacre-exposes-how-little
@Mark – I think you have misread the article: it doesn’t say that.
Tarrant is a trained assassin according to a reliable source in Syria. This meeting was singular in that it predetermined the attack.
Mark
The speed and regularity of the bullets were done by a professional assassin. I don’t expect you were allowed to hear the soundtrack in full in the UK
My statement here giyane is a belief in trust. The truth concerning the circumstances of the Tarrant massacre will at no time be made public. Tarrant is ephemeral only his actions have entered the conscious of many. That was the objective.
Yet it was not on it’s own the mass murder of innocent Muslims. It is a continuum, a perpetuity of conflict necessary for the union of power; a function of the US/UK/IS dictatorship.
I think meetings like that are held all the time, no?
The cost to taxpayers for sustaining the known Daniel Defoe’s in Scotland is rising.
“The cost of the Scotland Office communications staff now stands at around £710,000, despite the department’s reduced role since devolution. A rebranding exercise recently did away with the title of the Scotland Office, which now presents itself as the “UK Government in Scotland”.
http://archive.is/FmmZJ
O/T but BBC (presumably oblivious to the implications in their eagerness to get a ‘scoop’) have today published an item about the UK Government having a secret Department (Information Research Department, a subset of the Foreign Office) whose role was to produce fake news during the Cold War. Details have made it to a number of blogs, parochial local newspapers and alternative online news outlets but not to other major MSM news outlets.
Institute of Statecraft/Integrity Initiative anyone?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47571253
It’s going to be one hell of a purim in Britain this year.
Tim Newton-Dunn of the Scum is claiming that No.10 is saying that if it’s not apparent by when the Commons rises tomorrow that there is a majority for the Deal, Theresa May will go to Brussels on Thursday and ask for a long extension.
The big hole in this is that there is a long time between Tuesday evening and Thursday morning. Long enough to depose a prime minister and do many other things too, such as depose a leader of the opposition.
A long extension…for what? And hold EU elections in which neither major party will be able to offer a coherent manifesto? I don’t think this will happen.
Commons take control? Be serious…
N_
I think May has no choice because the Agreement is transparently written in EU remain terms and she personally wants a racist brexit.
The EU want to use free trade to bind the UK to free movement according to their red lines.
Her own party won’t agree but they have made the Irish backstop, fresh trade deals and populist racism to cover up their own hatred of foreigners.
The British people as citizens of a vast empire do not hate foreigners. The Tories see foreigners and welfare benefits as a permanent drain on their own ability to skim the economy into their own pockets.
If there were no benefits for anyone the great MSM propaganda machine would go into reverse, extolling the virtues foreign labour
I personally don’t think there’s a majority in the UK for raw Tory greed. If the Tories can’t use brexit to destroy the welfare state they will leave the status quo of our EU membership in place permanently
@Giyane – All the Tories have to do to achieve a red in tooth and claw racist cliffedge Brexit is to induce one government of the 27 to say no to an extension of the default exit date. Malta would fit the bill nicely but there are others.
N_
So somebody outside the gang gets someone inside the gang to betray the gang.
The whole point of voting to Leave is to disengage. If May thinks she can two-time the EU she is stupider than we thought.
Not a good advert for future prospective trading partners
Like Erdogan pretending to shop Saudi Arabia over kashoggi in spite of pocketing billions from them for the war against the Syrian people.
Cameron was capable of deep criminality but May … it’ll cost her more than her binge to the DUP to get advice from Erdogan how to cheatvthe EU
Long enough too for May to call a GE, leading to parliament being dissolved for the duration. It would be amusing to wake up on 30th March not knowing whether we’d actually left or not.
@MJ – The prime minister hasn’t got the authority to call a general election. There are two ways a dissolution can happen before 11pm on 29 March 2019. The first is a two-thirds majority in favour in the Commons. The second is a repeal of the Fixed Term Parliaments Act which would require a new bill to go through three readings in each House. (It’s too late for the “no confidence” method defined in the FTPA to bring a dissolution in time.)
But there is time for a prorogation…which can be ordered using the royal prerogative and would be spectacular!
Should anybody think speculation about prorogation is pedantic, be aware that Jacob Rees-Mogg has suggested precisely this. If the Tory leadership want to shut down parliament without letting Labour, the SNP, the TIG, the LibDems or anyone else get a look-in, this would be the way to do it. No need for any prior discussion in the Commons or Lords. Just tell the monarch to prorogue and that’s it – parliament shuts down until further notice.
“Just tell the monarch to prorogue and that’s it”. From the Parliament website “the Queen formally prorogues Parliament on the advice of the Privy Council.” The “advice of the Privy Council” what does this mean in practice given that the Privy Council a huge nebulous entitity? The Queen consults her kitchen cabinet and responds to Theresa’s request accordingly?
In practice it means the prime minister, perhaps stoppable if several other senior members of the
Carlton Clubcabinet tell the queen to the contrary. The Privy Council meets every week, but rather than all of its several hundred members only a few, usually including the Lord President of the Council (Andrea Leadsom, member of the ERG), turn up. I doubt it has ever voted on anything for centuries.When I wrote the above about prorogation I was unaware that JRM again raised the possibility an hour or so ago in a point of order in response to John Bercow’s MV3 statement.
It’s looking like Revoke or No Deal.
N_
To cheer you up, Bercow just tore Loathsome a new ‘un for playing with her I phone while an SNP MP was making a contribution.
@Viv – Thanks for this. It made my day! Absolutely wonderful words from John Bercow. Leadsom deserves contempt for how she was behaving, as does every single person who picks their phone when they should be listening to somebody in front of them, or otherwise taking in their physical environment.
Deputy chief whip, Christopher Pincher, tried to justify his phone fiddling by posting to the site of US advertising company Twitter! He reminds me of the guy who stood in front of me by a freezer cabinet in Tesco’s, playing with his phone. I made a sound meaning “Please get out of my way – I am trying to do my shopping”, and he gave me such a contemptuous look, as though I was the one who was being rude.
Craig is off to Belfast tomorrow and then Londonderry later on. Does anyone know if the events are being put online, or even being filmed for later access?
It says it’s in Derry on the poster. Betrays an ugly and childish anti imperialism.
That’s a pretty amazing graphic designer they got for those posters. OK a bit ugly and childish as my fellow Iain says but despite being incomprehensible they are very incentivising.
It was King James I, who invited merchants from the City of London to take responsibility for the development and settlement of Derry, hence the prefix “London”.
@Iain – I don’t quite understand where you’re coming from. Few who live in Derry are bothered about their city being called “Derry” even if they themselves call it “Londonderry”. What has childishness got to do with anything? Is imperialism grown-up?
Tongue in cheek reference to sharp ear’s preference for the imperialist title N. But you clearly know nothing of the place yourself. Only a small minority of residents, descended from British colonists, call it Londonderry.
Iain, I’ve a work colleague who talks about “Londonedinburgh” when he hears someone mention Londonderry. Maybe one day soon it will be back to the original Edinburgh…
I know that, Iain. When you said “It says it’s in Derry on the poster. Betrays an ugly and childish anti imperialism.” I thought you were complaining about the use of “Derry”.
Edit: now I realise my own post was confusing. To be clear: I am aware that only a small proportion of residents call it “Londonderry”.
@ iain March 18, 2019 at 12:46
Imperialism is ugly, but more murderous than childish.
BBC gets it wrong.
Unanimous approval from EU27 is NOT required to agree a deal in which Britain leaves the EU at another date than 29 March.
Unanimous approval of the 27 IS required to change the default no-deal date from 29 March.
Someone at the BBC doesn’t understand Article 50.
Rees Mogg today reveals perhaps more than he meant to today.
He says there is no chance that the likes of Hungary and Italy will veto an extension because they need their “political capital” for their own fights with the EU ahead.
Also he now views Brexit as a “Process” and not as he previously did as an “Event”. This leaves the way open for him and the ERG to hold their noses and reluctantly support May’s deal/treaty as it at least gets the UK halfway out, and the “Process” can continue. The alternative being May’s two year extension and the effective cancellation of Brexit completely.
Bercow has just vetoed putting Theresa May’s deal to a third vote. Time to cut to the chase. May’s resignation before the working week is up!
Would it really make much difference if she’s immediately replaced with the likes of Michael Gove or Jeremy Rhyming Slang?
Not directly, but a new Tory leader / Prime Minister would doubtless feel “morally impelled” to put their position to a General Election (polling beng favourable) in order to establish their “legitimacy”. An Autumn GE would in probability free the new Government from the DUP obligation. With the DUP out of the equation, Customs checks at Belfast and Larne resolve the Backstop and it’s chlorinated chicken for NewYear’s lunch 2022.
@Viv – What would a Tory GE manifesto say about Brexit?
I don’t think we will be compelled to consume chlorinated chicken, G.M. corn or hormone beef
but rather we will not ban the filthy stuff from coming into our country.
Surely if you go to Morrisons and ask for chicken, you would have a choice, British or American?
Manifesto? Managed, No deal Brexit effective 01/01/2022 presumably. This may be delusional, based on an assumption that the EU would agree but Boris has the brass neck to campaign on this being “the easiest negotiation in history”.
@ michael norton March 18, 2019 at 17:14
Not forced, but the Yanks will do their damndest to make sure you don’t know it is GMO, or chlorinated, and/or chock-a-block full of hormones, by insisting it doesn’t have to be labelled.
Very true, Paul.
I never dispute moderators actions here but I’m genuinely puzzled as to why my comment was deleted as there was nothing factually wrong with it nor was it in anyway libellous ? It was off topic with blog entry , yes , but that’s the only thing wrong with it .
[ Mod: The comment can be found on the relevant thread: https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2016/04/the-strange-case-of-gordon-brown-and-the-mccanns/comment-page-6/#comment-844634 ]
Thank you for letting me know where it has been placed .
Already there is a photo of a Turkish suspect, taken on a tram, and a name. What is going on?
Mosques are locked down and the terror threat has been raised to max.
Well according to the media we were meant to be very angry with the last one and this time we are supposed to turn the other cheek. This is a #prayforutrecht type incident.
Yeah a lot of phone footage, no shoe picture just yet, and plenty of footage of Dutch police with guns, one Dutch police officer had on white training shoes. Plenty of sirens and the obligatory announcement that defcon five in i play.
At a tram stop apparently. It’s all a bit pat.
Tram shooting in Dutch city of Utrecht kills 3, injures 9, attacker at large
https://www.rt.com/news/454104-utrecht-shooting-victims-police/
Three others again??
‘It is still unclear if the shooter acted alone or had accomplices. “A man started shooting wildly,” an eyewitness told Dutch news outlet NU.nl. But the AD.nl website cited a witness who said there were four gunmen who opened fire at a woman near the tram station.
24 Oktoberplein street, where the shooting took place, is an important traffic junction in Utrecht, the fourth largest city in the Netherlands.’
“A bit pat”? hardly anybody knows the details, but you are able to offer a judgement from hundreds of miles away. Some people died, it’s all bit pat for you. The conspiracy theories are being prepared before any reliable reports have surfaced. Facepalm.
Yes, the police are a bit pat.
Three dead. One shooter. On the run.
No demands, no manifesto, no statements.
Yet this is called an act of terrorism!
Might as well have been an argument about the fare.
Btw., note the fancy police outfits and the posh Audi.
That’s where all our money goes.
Yet this terrorist went unnoticed.
Now being referred to as some sort of domestic incident.
YCNMIU.
A mate of mine was very close to the incident as it happens, he heard the commotion. They got cleared away fast and put the schools on lockdown. Later he was told to take his kids home and stay there.
“A bit pat” – WTF does that mean?
What is the meaning of the anecdote about your friend?
Erm…look it up, its short for patronising.
A bit handy your pal being in the locus eh.
BTW, locus means, och I’m sure you’ll look it up for yourself.
BJ: My friend lives in Utrecht. Visited him there often. He called me about it before I’d heard it anywhere else.
RepublicOfGoogle: Always appreciate the edification from a luminary such as yourself. But I don’t think many people find it “handy” to find themselves almost in the middle of a shoot-out, even if steel-nerved universal experts such as yourself would appreciate the experience.
@glenn_nl
So did your friend feel terrorized or fearful and were you trying to convey that?
Did you feel fear. Was that the meaning of ‘your’ story.
Your mention schools and ‘the kids’.
But that’s the first and only time I’ve seen anything about `the children’.
You see what’s up here?
BJ: It happened to occur pretty close to my mate’s kids’ school.
Instead of being quite so coy, would you explain your line of questioning here? Oh – I get it. Being an agent of the state, I’m playing up this “false flag” by pretending to have a (albeit third hand) personal connection, and being all emotive an’ all by bringing kids into it. Duly rumbled – you’re a genius!
By being an idiot instead of using your head you certainly don’t advance your point.
No, that’s not what I meant.
Well why don’t you just say what you’re trying to say then?
Actually he wasn’t afraid so much as calling the guy a “fucking idiot” and then sent some jokes about perhaps he just forgot his medication that day, and the nuisance the bastard had caused, and why can’t they keep domestic disputes at home and so on.
bj, you did seem to be insinuating something, ie. these scare quotes:
– “Was that the meaning of ‘your’ story”
When we consider connections between people, the world is surprisingly small. Say you know of 1000 people, who each know of 1000 others etc. So an acquaintance of an acquaintance of an acquaintance – just three links – gets you to a billion people. Social media brings others even closer.
Clark you should stop being condescending with you impromptu math lectures (I don’t need them I can assure you).
And saying that I insinuate anything when I am trying to get someone to see how rumour starts and also how it spreads.
I was trying to see if we might together perhaps come to the conclusion that there is one ultimate question that needs to be asked and answered: what was the motive for the police to call this an act of terrorism.
Everything else followed from it, the fear, the lock downs of schools apparently (again, I haven’t seen confirmation of that, and glenn_nl doesn’t provide it other than hearsay, this is central to my inquiry), I haven’t seen schools/children being mentioned in particular.
Actually your remark if anything touches upon the way rumours spread and narratives take form. “A friend of mine told me…”, “Did you hear about the thus and so…”.
Terror in essence is fearmongering to achieve a particular goal, often societal or political.
What if this was an argument ran out of hand on fare, or a domestic issue.
Again, what was the motive of the police to call it an act of terrorism. Did the suspect a political motive? None is mentioned in the briefings. ‘Terrorism’ is now the default label on an crime where a nutcase goes berserk. I am trying to see if that’s the case here.
If the police cannot provide their motive or evidence for calling this an act of terror, in that case — who really perpetrated the terrorism here today, who instilled fear into the mind of thousands?
And it is worrisome that the police’s information/public relations department is at the same time their propaganda department. We have a police nowadays that through their briefings have the ability to massage the body politic (and citizens) to the point that where their statements today can have a certain desired effect on budgetary decisions made by governing bodies. I purposefully poointed at the fancy police gear, the Audi.
Here’s my take:
‘Terrorism’ has become a convenient budgetary tool, a motive to quench the cravings of the police.
The ones profiting the most are Intel, Audi, Glock, Lockheed (randomly chosen, other brands are available).
Note that if this was an act of terror, all those changed privacy laws, all the surveillance powers that they have, and all that fancy gear and equipment wasn’t able to prevent it.
It must all be protecting something. But I suspect it isn’t you or me.
By the way, since I’ve got your attention, why don’t mods respond here to repeated inquiries about mysterically vanishing comments whose contents can in no way shape or form be considered to have crossed a red line?
BJ: You are a little bit condescending yourself, are you not?
Apart from calling me an idiot for failing to respond correctly to your sly insinuations about this “rumour” I was apparently promulgating, you patronise us with some mini lecture on what terrorism is.
Having a lock-down of local schools where there _might_ be a terrorist attack nearby shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone – but since you “haven’t seen confirmation of that, and glenn_nl doesn’t provide it other than hearsay”, and it being “central to [your] inquiry”, presumably it didn’t happen – right?
Well I guess that makes me a liar then, or at least a credulous enough fool to believe the lies of a personal friend who happened to live there and told me about it while it was occurring.
You can probably guess my response to you concerning that insult.
bj, thanks for clarifying your motivation; I really couldn’t infer any of that from your earlier comments. I think we should all strive to be clear and specific, for the very reason you mention, that rumour and innuendo tend to self-amplify. And sure, there will be conspiracy theorists who will dismiss any personal accounts as “all agents just playing their parts in the plan”.
I agree; many acts of mass violence are labelled ‘terrorism’ even though no group credibly claims responsibility and no demands are made. The definition of terrorism has a problem with “lone nutter” incidents that don’t quite fit its template, eg. recent New Zealand shooting where there is no group, but the individual posts a manifesto of political objectives.
I think you have to allow some time for the police to determine the nature of an incident. If there’s an attack upon the public, it’s sensible and probably essential to treat it as terrorism initially, as there may be other actors, groups, explosive devices etc. It wouldn’t be a safe policy to always assume any incident to be isolated until there was evidence to the contrary; the priority has to be to protect the public.
However, what the police say later is a legitimate subject for your concerns, as is the tendency of the media to leave police accounts unchallenged and even amplify them:
https://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2010/12/andy-coulson-andy-hayman/
I agree that the exaggeration of threat is used as a tool for bloating the budgets and contracts of both police and private security, erosion of civil liberties by governments, and erosion of privacy which is then exploited by the whole market research and advertising sectors. The prime responsibility for all of these lies with the media, which serves money rather than the people, and thus fails to investigate and challenge.
I therefore also think it is wrong to criticise the posting of personal knowledge as glenn_nl did, because this is our alternative to the mainstream media. But we also need to allow that individual personal accounts are hardly ever 100% accurate, because conspiracy theorists have repeatedly shown that they will construct fantastical stories out of ‘anomalies’, ie. discrepancies between accounts. Such discrepancies are perfectly normal and to be expected, as has been demonstrated repeatedly in controlled experiments.
Clark: “But we also need to allow that individual personal accounts are hardly ever 100% accurate, because conspiracy theorists have repeatedly shown that they will construct fantastical stories out of ‘anomalies’, ie. discrepancies between accounts. Such discrepancies are perfectly normal and to be expected, as has been demonstrated repeatedly in controlled experiments.”
That is such a good point. Independent witnesses rarely agree on the facts when it comes to a simple car crash, yet suspicions are being raised here by BJ – and rather insulting jibes about the truthfulness of one of our correspondents here – simply because a small detail hadn’t been found by him or her yet!
But surely by now the veracity of my statement could have been found? Is BJ seriously allowing a lazy lie like that to stand?
BJ – I rather doubt you have the character to give an apology, but you ought to after reading these:
—
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1101632/Utrecht-shooting-tram-station-Netherlands-police-emergency-terror-fears
Quote: “Emergency services including armed police, anti-terror units and paramedic teams raced to the scene and parts of the city were on lockdown with schools told to keep their doors locked until further notice”
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https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/utrecht-tram-shooting-suspect-arrested-a4094976.html
Quote: “Schools were told to shut their doors and paramilitary police increased security at airports, other vital infrastructure and at mosques.”
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/world/europe/utrecht-shooting.html
Quote: “For several hours, the tram service was shut down around Utrecht, people were told to remain indoors, schools were locked down and officers in body armor were deployed to police stations, airports and other key locations.”
Surely – after effectively calling me a liar – BJ could have found the above, like I did moments ago?
Nah. Cheaper and easier to call someone a liar, and not bother to follow it up. What do you say, BJ?
Sorry Craig, off topic, but this is something I think you and all who post/read here will want to see, further apologies if it has already been posted.
The film “WitchHunt” about Labour, Corbyn and antisemitism, which Chris Williamson’s attempt to screen in Westminster contributed to his suspension from the Labour Party, is now available to watch here:
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/watch-film-labour-mps-didnt-want-you-see
Or, indeed, here:
https://witchhuntfilm.org/
Thanks for that. I look forward to watching it.
@ Peter March 18, 2019 at 14:46
Great. I’ve been looking for it..
Meanwhile –meanwhile to what, you ask, meanwhile to you sitting there– meanwhile, ‘Master spy’ Christopher Steele admits he used unverified internet post to create Trump dossier:
https://www.rt.com/usa/454066-steele-dossier-cnn-ireport-trump/
I don’t buy it.
It’s too easy a full stop.
Too easy a swivel of the spotlight, away from certain state institutions.
France to ban Yellow Vest protests in ‘worst hit’ areas if radicals spotted – French PM
https://www.rt.com/news/454143-macron-mulls-elysees-protest-ban/
This is what people feared, banning the protests movement altogether when they get too strong. Now Macron could simply bus his agent provocateurs’ into the Yellow vests crowd to accomplish this ban.
So what you want is violence. An unpleasant view, I have to say. The violent casseurs are obviously different from the original gilets, but you seem to think they are the same, and consequently you support the violence.
Laguerre
Do you support the possible ban? Do you support the violent suppression by Macron?
Laguerre’s disappointment unfortunately seems to have turned into defeatism.
Laguerre, I saw masses of people Saturday, crowding the vicinity of L’Arc.
Yes, there were violent ‘elements’. (And there were great numbers of provocative
police everywhere, doing their best to bias the whole thing, as ususal).
But the majority were ‘common people’, from young to old, just being there in protest.
Laguerre make up all reasons not to support Yellow Vests, now he focus on violence to discredit the movement.
I wish Laguerre could elaborate why he is so much against the Yellow vests.
“The violent casseurs are obviously different from the original gilets”
French history of protests are laced with violence, its the way they go about it. Louis the (Whatever) would still be sponging off the people of France, if not for the hot blood French.
Sure there’s bound to be some anarchist infiltrators, however you can’t make an omelette without first breaking some eggs.
Urgent statement:
Bercow: Third vote will be blocked unless the Brexit deal changes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tb_M8-twOFU&t=194s