Europe IV: The Final Hour

[QualityChimp]

I was asked today:
"What's going to happen with Brexit?"

"Well, our French-owned company will realise it's cheaper to produce our products in their French factory because of the crippling import/export taxes we will have to start paying, they will close our factory and we will become unemployed."

"Oh, you're one of those."

"Seeing as you're retiring Friday, I guess that doesn't bother you. At least we have lovely blue passports that we can't afford to use."

[Zaki]

I was asked today:
"What's going to happen with Brexit?"

"Well, our French-owned company will realise it's cheaper to produce our products in their French factory because of the crippling import/export taxes we will have to start paying, they will close our factory and we will become unemployed."

"Oh, you're one of those."

"Seeing as you're retiring Friday, I guess that doesn't bother you. At least we have lovely blue passports that we can't afford to use."

Cuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn nnnnnT!

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/aug/14/no-path-to-a-second-referendum-says-unite-leader

The leader of Unite gives some insight into Labours thinking... and how it's so woefully incompetently wrong about every facet of how it's dealt with the Brexit years. Utterly moronic.

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/aug/14/labour-bloc-plans-radical-move-to-push-through-brexit-deal

A bloc of Labour MPs have an emergency Brexit No Deal killing idea... resurrecting May's Deal and Meaningful Vote 4
Genius - what could possibly go wrong?

[MartyG]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...gh-brexit-deal

A bloc of Labour MPs have an emergency Brexit No Deal killing idea... resurrecting May's Deal and Meaningful Vote 4
Genius - what could possibly go wrong?

This has moved on to https://www.theguardian.com/politics...o-help-oust-pm

Which will see Labour being completely annihilated at the subsequent general election for seizing power, leading to Johnson getting a far bigger majority and leaving with a No Deal Brexit because of his apparent mandate, thus just delaying the inevitability rather than stopping it.

That would be an absolute gift to Johnson, I'll bet Cummings is rubbing his hands with glee.

[Neon Ignition]

This ceaseless pursuit of personal interest over national interest is obscene. Once we leave it's going to be a career bloodbath

[MartyG]

Here's why Corbyn seizing power to delay Brexit and force a GE is a fool's errand ...

https://britainelects.com/polling/westminster/

The Tories are currently stripping votes away from the Brexit party by shifting further to the right (and it looks like the Greens have picked up Change-UK's supporters). If Corbyn pulls a coup d'état it'll martyr Johnson and galvanise his support which has been hardening of late. Cummings is playing a blinder here strategy wise.

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/aug/16/sadiq-khan-lib-dems-jo-swinson-corbyn-only-viable-pm-stop-no-deal-brexit

In a world where either Corbyn temporarily steps aside in the national interest or doesn't and thereby is directly complicit in facilitating Johnson's No Deal outcome, the right thing would be that Corbyn would shortly be ousted as Party Leader for choosing the latter. In our Dark Timeline however...

[QualityChimp]

https://heterocephalusgabler.wordpress.com/2016/12/14/behind-brexit-lies-a-yearning-for-a-past-we-destroyed

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2019/aug/19/brexit-latest-news-jeremy-corbyn-speech-labour-could-be-officially-neutral-in-any-second-referendum-campaign-john-mcdonnell-suggests-live-news

BJ says he's convinced the EU will blink and cave in to his backstop dropping wish

JC meanwhile confirms that Labour will be calling a vote of No Confidence and if they are able to force a GE then they will pledge a Second Referendum in their manifesto, albeit campaigned as a neutral party most likely.

[Zaki]

https://heterocephalusgabler.wordpre...t-we-destroyed

"You had multiple chances to vote for enlightened self-interest, and you blew it because you didn’t like how that funny-looking bloke ate a bacon sandwich."

[charlesr]

I live in a grower area. Mostly flowers, a bit of fruit, and then open crop fields. Met a neighbour today. He was very excited about how Brexit will make it easier to earn a living as a grower, once the EU aren't in control any more.

I thought, OK, finally someone who can tell me that everything will be good and the reasoning.

I delved further. His current tenant for his glass (greenhouses) is Greek, so he's likely to lose him after Brexit. His previous tenant went bust last year because all the Eastern European workers went home after the Brexit referendum result.

I was lost.

Other issues. Supermarkets don't pay enough to growers to live. Unrelated to the EU?

I'm pretty sure he'll still blame it on the EU when he goes under.

The only way I can see it working is if we leave and the EU folds. Then we won't be fighting the protectionism of the EU and can work with everyone....

[fishbowlhead]

We’re going to hit a recession that’s for sure now. No stopping it. Gov and news can spin it whatever way they want, call it a pink tea party, itle still be a recession.

[QualityChimp]

Boris Johnson has written to Donald Tusk saying the backstop needs to be scrapped because it is "anti-democratic".

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2019/08/20/johnsons-letter-to-donald-tusk-was-not-written-in-good-faith/

"His argument is:
The backstop locks the UK, potentially indefinitely, into an international treaty which will bind us into a customs union and which applies large areas of single market legislation in Northern Ireland. It places a substantial regulatory border, rooted in that treaty, between Northern Ireland and Great Britain. The treaty provides no sovereign means of exiting unilaterally and affords the people of Northern Ireland no influence over the legislation which applies to them. That is why the backstop is anti-democratic.

This is, of course, nonsense. Northern Ireland has, in effect, a written constitution that the people of Northern Ireland voted for. It is the Good Friday Agreement. And that is binding. It was democratically chosen. And no border is part of that Agreement. So this argument cannot apply to Northern Ireland.

Nor then can it apply to the rest of the UK either. That’s because we are a signatory to that agreement. And in any case, first of all Northern Ireland is a separate jurisdiction from the rest of the UK, with its own law, Parliament (albeit suspended) and very clearly different constitutional arrangements that have, in my lifetime, permitted the ending of free movement between Northern Ireland and Great Britain. To suggest a border in the Irish Sea is not democratic is then wrong, not least when it already exists on abortion rights and so many other issues.

Whilst to argue that we cannot be democratically bound by a commitment given is absurd. I suggest the UK tries to reclaim the USA if it thinks matters once decided can be reversed and then see what happens."

[QualityChimp]

There's also a saucy little line from Johnson:
"Although we will remain committed to world-class environment, product and labour standards, the laws and regulations to deliver them will potentially diverge from those of the EU."

Basically, he wants to lower standards that match US levels, but then we wouldn't be able to trade them with the EU.
Like chlorinated chicken.

->Open Spoiler<-