Saw this clip on Twitter of former Labour/Respect Party MP George Galloway talking about his vision of Brexit:
George Galloway: "I want Britain post-Brexit to be what it was in the Swinging 60s, when we were the cultural capital of the world. When we had a steel industry, when we had a coal industry – when we were something!"@GeorgeGalloway | #MOATS | https://t.co/sv3MZUm41c pic.twitter.com/X4WlpCYdwl
— talkRADIO (@talkRADIO) March 8, 2019
I don’t follow British politics closely, but from what I gather, Galloway was part of the pro-Brexit populist left coalition that made common cause with UKIP/Brexit Party member (and Trump booster) Nigel Farage to support the Leave campaign. Galloway said of the relationship with Farage: “We are not pals. We are allies in one cause. Like Churchill and Stalin.”
This upcoming week is crunch time for the UK. I don’t have any idea what will happen, but I’m haunted by the similarities between the situation there and here in the US. We know the same malevolent forces were at work in driving both our countries to the brink of madness: similar species of homegrown nationalists, plus an exchange program that sent British nuts like Farage here to campaign for Trump and right-wing villains like Bannon and the Mercers to the UK to foment nationalism there, with the exact same set of Russians interfering.
Less remarked upon are the lefty counterparts in both countries who helped set the stage for the disaster, whether on purpose or by accident. One thing they have in common is toxic nostalgia of the type Galloway engages in above. It’s the same delusion that is rampant in Trump and his “status anxiety” supporters and certain (invariably white) figures on the left who seem as nostalgic for a time when they were the noble saviors in society as they are for non-achy bones and a full head of hair.
Anyhoo, to repeat, I have no idea how next week will play out for our cousins across the pond, but I’ll be thinking of our British jackal friends. I remember foolishly believing after the shock Brexit vote that we in the US wouldn’t follow the UK off a similar cliff in the 2016 election since our version of Brexit had a human avatar, and he was so odious that the idea of him ascending to the presidency was too absurd to contemplate. Boy, was I wrong!
The impact of those twin disasters is still reverberating across the Atlantic. The same forces are still in place on the right and left, and the narrative is still formed by the same vicious and/or stupid media. May we all wake the fuck up before it’s too late.
lollipopguild
Too many people in both countries want to bring back a past that never really was and cannot be brought back anyway. Not sure how we survive this when faux news is free to help destroy the country.
Gozer
Sooo…he wants to go back to an era where the left was unable to prevent the rise of Thatcherism and Reaganism?
What does he think is going to happen in a post-Brexit UK where the left has even less influence than it did in the 60s/70s or than it does now?
JPL
I want a pony.
germy
London swing like a pendulum do.
Momentary
I am trying to think of a summary way to describe George Galloway for a USAian audience. Rand Paul crossed with Lyndon LaRouche? He is a train crash fringe figure is what I’m saying.
Gozer
@JPL: That shits gold doubloons.
Mike in NC
Wow. Haven’t seen a reference to George Galloway since around the glorious 2003 Iraq invasion.
Meanwhile, our rotten media seems to have settled on two toxic words to hammer all Democrats running for office in 2020: ‘socialism’ and ‘reparations’. Republicans are applauding.
Ruckus
@lollipopguild:
Only one thing to semi correct in your great comment.
It isn’t just faux news, it’s everything Rupert Murdoch has touched. And that is “news” in both the US and the UK. His brand of conservative bullshit has been used by the conservative politicians in both countries to justify the crap that has always been conservatism, that it was better before, that life was something quite different than a lot/most people actually remember. That “greatness” of the monied class. Robber barons.
debbie
Yah, and I want a pet unicorn, bub.
Momentary
Galloway’s freakish attention-seeking antics aside, I don’t think nostalgia was/is a big motivation for the Leaver left, unless you count the traditional Labour union vote which is legit nostalgic (IMHO) for the time before Thatcher did her best to break them. For the non-union lefty Leavers I think it didn’t help at all that the referendum came right after the ugly spectacle of what was going down in Greece. I confess to having had a few fuck the EU thoughts myself around that time, but I got over it before voting.
Doug R
Building motorcycles and shoveling coal. F*cking delusional a$$hole.
WhatsMyNym
So, just a bunch of old farts dreaming of their youth??
My parents (as did many relatives) left the UK in the early 60’s because of the low pay, pollution from coal, etc…
Yutsano
I recently watched a couple of videos on this. Basically, Britain wants to maintain all the rights of EU membership but not actually participate in the club itself. It wants to be outside the EU yet get as many benefits as possible that require at least some affiliation with the EU. So if it goes hard, the whole mess goes crashing down and everything has to be renegotiated.
And there’s no way to not fuck over Northern Ireland here no matter what happens. The Article 50 declaration needs to be revoked and GB really needs to think this over again.
debbie
Also, England was not the cultural capital of the world in the ’60s. This revisionist twit would have to go much further into the past, maybe to a time when all the loos were at the end of the streets and the Navy ruled the seas. //
Ruckus
@Doug R:
Building great looking crap motorcycles. And dreaming of a job shoveling black death. Good times.
@WhatsMyNym:
What else to old farts have left to dream about? And how often are dreams real? And aren’t real dreams known as nightmares?
Villago Delenda Est
Steel isn’t coming back, coal isn’t coming back, half of the Beatles are dead, and the Rolling Stones are using walkers on stage.
Get real, idiot.
HalfAssedHomesteader
I found this to be an eye-opener:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/the-more-we-learn-about-brexit-the-more-crooked-it-looks/2019/03/08/b011517c-411c-11e9-922c-64d6b7840b82_story.html
Momentary
@HalfAssedHomesteader: Absolutely. The money behind Brexit wants to turn the UK into Luxembourg surrounded by grouse shooting estates. The old school Tory financier City of London types cannot conceive that it isn’t Manifest Destiny for all the world’s financial shenanigans to be brokered through London, always.
HalfAssedHomesteader
@debbie: Maybe Galloway trying for a Beatles reunion?
Ruckus
@Yutsano:
Conservatives being conservatives, this won’t happen. They are incapable of looking forward with their heads so firmly planted in their back sides. They just know that everything was better at some time before now, facts be damned.
Conservatives fail to realize that life always ends the same way for every living creature. They’ve built fairy tales about a life after so that the righteous will live. But really they should enjoy the ride every day, make it a better place for those that come behind, recognize that being alive creates suffering and embrace what is beautiful around you.
Josie
None of them seem to realize that peak oil and climate change will not permit us to go back to the “good old days,” no matter how much they may dream about them.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
and Keith Richards quit drinking! truly the world has changed
rk
I saw an interview with a woman who voted for Brexit. Her disabled son works in a cafe of some kind opened with help of EU money to help the disabled find meaningful occupations. She knew her son may lose his job, but voted to leave anyway. What can anyone do with people like this?
Raven
Like Jane Hamsher and Grover Norquist.
Raven
@rk: .22 behind the ear
Villago Delenda Est
@rk:
Put them on ice floes and let the polar bears have their way with them.
mrmoshpotato
@rk:
Beat the hell out of them with our votes.
Reminds me of the article I read about a woman who voted for Dump, and her husband was deported. Can’t say they didn’t know.
Raven
@Villago Delenda Est: That’s pretty mild for you!
danielx
@Raven:
Better be something bigger, with a skull that thick a .22 might just bounce off.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@rk: John Oliver did a segment on Brexit, and he interviewed a florist who got his flowers every day from the continent. He’s worried his supply will be interrupted. He voted FOR Brexit, saying he never thought of it as connected to his business.
Yutsano
@Ruckus: Us saying that to them makes us sound like dirty old hippies. Cons always believe the life of their childhood is always best, and any change from that time is wrong. It makes me wonder how we as a society have ever advanced at any time, other than the rare occasions we outvote them.
HalfAssedHomesteader
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Which, oddly, says something about the success of the EU.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Holy crap, I finally watched the clip of Erik Prince and Mehdi Hassan talking about Prince’s secret meeting at trump tower in 2016. The absolute self-confidence in the too-aptly named Prince is a sight to behold. A man who has never faced consequences for anything, and believes he never will
Cermet
This sick ass-wipe is really saying – “Lets get back to the days when white males had the good paying jobs and could tell all those dark skinned n-chang to go back to the jungles; better still, when we could say these things during those golden times, and no one cared.
Emerald
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
And he is likely correct.
germy
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’ve seen a few clips. Does anyone here have a link to the entire interview?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@germy: this looks like the whole thing, about 50 minutes, at The Intercept website
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Boy the way Glenn Miller Played
Songs that made the Hit Parade
Guys like us we had it made
Those were the days.
And you knew who you were then
Girls were girl and men were men
Mister, we could use a man like Herbert Hoover again
Didn’t need no Welfare state
Everybody pulled his weight
Gee our old Lasalle Ran great
Those were the days!
Ruckus
@debbie:
He means the 1560s to the 1860s.
rk
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Politicians usually win elections by saying vote for me because I will do x, y, z, and it will benefit you. Here we have people who are voting for politicians or on issues that they know will potentially harm them, not just harm but cause profound disruptions, loss of livelihood etc and yet they still vote for the harm. We have a significant percentage of populations in the world with a murder suicide mentality.
Josie
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Leopards, faces, etc.
JDM
In other words, Mr. Galloway, delusional.
MomSense
@lollipopguild:
It’s so true. You can never go back to the way things were.
Mr Stagger Lee
If I was Scotland, I would do an end around and maybe declare Scotland independent, and looks like Ireland is going to have another round of the Troubles.
Mary G
Watching the Brits flail around refusing to face reality all these months has been a stomach-churning experience. Putin must be laughing his ass off.
Ruckus
@Yutsano:
By George I think you’ve got it!
MattF
There’s also traditional British disdain towards Europe, modulated by anxiety about Germany and Russia. It’s… interesting the way European countries are drifting back to pre-WWII attitudes. But not a good sign, IMO.
Momentary
@MattF: When I listen to older Brexiter farmers here, they never mention Russia, but they talk about Germany like WWII was yesterday.
Jay
Chris Grey’s The Brexit Blog has been covering Brexit since it started.
It can be summed up as the Brexiteers not knowing what the EU is, what the EU does, other than it was (((Globalist))).
They had 2 years to learn, but couldn’t bother. They preferred to stick to their fantasies of the EU, Britian, etc, right to the bitter end.
MattF
@Momentary: But I’d guess the ‘ruling circles’ in Britain care about Russia. Not to mention in central Europe. These sorts of interaction all seem to be fixed features in European politics, and I can only wonder if there’s anything one can do about them.
MomSense
@Yutsano:
And it seems like we only outvote them after crises. The problem is the cycle of GOP crises followed by Democratic clean-up is speeding up. Every fucking time we have a GOP President we end up in scandal and economic recession – or meltdown. Then the Democrats get elected and spend all their time dealing with the crises and not making enough forward progress. So the idiot far lefties blame the Democrats,abandon them at the polls, and then we end up with Republican assholes who undo the progress and break more things leading to another crisis. Rinse. Repeat.
JPL
Trump thinks Brexit is a good deal, so what more proof do the brits need.
Momentary
@MattF: I don’t know, I suppose it depends which ‘ruling circles’. I think there’s a money fixer class that cares about continuing to be a haven for Russian money and expat Russian billionaires, and which is happy to take Russian money to pay for political dirty tricks to ensure they get what they want. The political ruling class that is currently in control seems too stupid and ignorant to think about Russia much, as per Jay’s comment above.
MattF
@Momentary: Yeah, well. Stupidity and ignorance are the great equalizers.
Ruckus
@rk:
NO. WE. DON’T.
These people just don’t have the same concepts of what’s good for them that you have for yourself. They have been led over the last 60 or more years to believe that all of their problems are caused by others. Here it is black people, first they didn’t want to be slaves and then they actually wanted a reasonable life. In many countries, such as the UK it is foreigners coming in and taking their shitty jobs. Which our conservatives have taken a hold of and are using that here. But we have a lot more land to support more people than the UK does. But it’s always someone else’s fault, never the people who vote for the conservatives who want to go back to a simpler/better time. Which of course never, ever fucking existed.
They aren’t different than you and I except that we don’t blame everything on some mystical bullshit people. Life mostly sucks for everyone is what I was saying in my comment above, they just want someone to blame for that, and we recognize that it’s just the way life is, it sucks so you have to look for things that don’t suck or at least don’t suck as bad. Look for the beauty in life. It’s there, but you have to open your eyes to see it. And you have to not blame those who did nothing to cause it to be shit. Because “others” aren’t any more guilty of creating that suckage than anyone else is. Of course there are exceptions. Racists, conservative politicians – but I repeat myself, and people who profit from creating that distinction that really isn’t there.
NotMax
This is what comes from a lifetime of eating Marmite.
:)
Patricia Kayden
@JPL: A pink pony with a rainbow colored tail which farts out sprinkles.
On a serious note, this “Make the UK Great Again” nonsense from Galloway sounds eerily familiar.
Momentary
@NotMax: Hey, we have to get our B vitamins somehow!
Baud
@MomSense: Seconded. We need to learn to stay focused for the long haul.
MattF
@NotMax: There’s actually a complex and disgusting narrative concerning English candy.
Baud
Great post, Betty C.
Yutsano
@MomSense: I would REALLY like to think after all the poo flinging after Dolt45 is gone (one way or another) the Republican party is nothing but damaged goods now. I would like to think anyway. But at some point he will be gone. What do the Republicans do then? And will the damage be enough for something like a Depression era dominance of the Democrats so some things can really get fixed? I don’t know the answers here. And whatever happens the cycle needs broken.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’ll have to make a google later, but in 1996there was a huge scandal about Al Gore using the wrong credit card to bill fund-raising phone calls, and which room he was sitting in when he made them. Also IIRC something about a fundraiser attended by Chinese nationals, some of whom made donations that were immediately returned. It was a large part of Dole’s platform. “Where’s the outrage? !”
in other news, a freshman MoC from Brooklyn said something about capitalism at SXSW
ETA: Also, I found those tweets in Rick Wilson’s feed. You think Chuck Todd or Jake Tapper follow him? Something tells me they do
debbie
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
NPR also covered the florists’ dilemma.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
he would’ve had to stop playing army man and lived off the income from his inherited billions? will no one think of the heirs!
Yutsano
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: But how are we supposed to scare folks about socialism with a boring story about some Chinese madam who might have the biggest sex scandal in US history? Don’t you see that takes WORK? How are we supposed to have time for all our DC parties chasing some story that might get us accused of being liberal? How are we supposed to “both sides” a story like this? Chasing AOC around is easier you see.
Ruckus
@HalfAssedHomesteader:
Remember there was trade between the UK and the rest of Europe before the EU existed. What the EU did was basically become the US with the independent counties that belonged acting as states. Free travel and movement of EU citizens, far easier transfer of goods, a common currency, laws, one set of regulations for things like cars, and a voice among now equals.
England had for centuries been a world leader, but the world got bigger than them and what they could do, around 100 yrs ago. Many of it’s citizens figured that out long ago, a number of them haven’t figured it out at all.
We are in somewhat of a similar situation. We’ve been the dominate country until lately, because of WWII and our military. But the industrialization of the world, the electrification of most people’s lives have evened out that power a lot. Many countries can now make more of some kinds of food than they need, some are mfg powerhouses and make goods that the rest of the world wants. The world is changing and some will fight that to the end of their stupidity and deaths, as they have always done.
NotMax
@Momentary
Isn’t that what lager is for?
:)
Patricia Kayden
@Yutsano: I’m not sure that Republicans consider what Trump has done to be damage. He’s gotten ultra conservative judges on courts, rolled by regulations and ginned up the racist base. None of those are minuses in the Rightwing bubble.
MattF
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: FYI, AOC’s district (NY 14) spans eastern Bronx and northern Queens. I realize all the NYC boroughs look alike to non-New Yorkers, but they really are different.
Jay
@rk:
Most people are utterly ignorant of what the EU is and what it does, other than some fauxrage click bait hyped by Media.
As a result, the moron Florist before the vote probably thought that “well, I buy flowers, and they sell flowers, so after Brexit we’ll still be buying and selling”. Probably didn’t even realize until November last year that he’s screwed himself.
And of course, during the Referendum phase, the Brexiteers were selling BS by the ton on how they would get a better deal with the EU, and even if they didn’t, WTO, Global Trade, so many mountains of horseshite that there had to be a pony in there some where.
And rather than “inform” or “educate” their audiences, the Media chose to entertain instead. As a result, “ Leavers” know even less about the EU, and how if effects Britian in trade, services, education, research, travel, food, medicine and rights, than they did two years ago.
namekarB
I’m curious why we continue to use the term “cousins” when referring to the UK. Certainly a large percentage of Americans may share some ethnic Scot, Welsh, Pict, Angle, Saxon, Celtic, Dane and/or Norse background but it was only by a slim majority that our common language is English instead of German and I have no doubt that many Americans are left wondering who the “our” is when referring to “our cousins.”
Other than my nit picking, your commentary is spot on IMO.
The Pale Scot
The next 5-10 years are going to be crunch time. This current scrum is all about what UK wants to do today. The “working agreement” proposed is just a temporary state of affairs while the UK and the EU hammer out what the final trade agreement will be. That kind of agreement historically takes years to hammer out. The EU has a deep bench of salaried experts that have been negotiating these deals for over twenty years. The UK has single A league… no strike that. Ya know those comedy clubs out in the middle of nowhere you find down here in Fl, showcasing local talent for the benefit of newly moved snowbirds trying to convince themselves they’re still in the 1st world. Take the local talent and enter them in a comedy cage match at the NYC Improv against Robin Williams, George Carlin and Bill Hicks. That’s the expertise differential. A thin majority thinks that UK goods are renowned the world over and that the world is desperate to open the UK market. And that the world owes them for defeating Hitler (all by themselves, seriously, that’s put out there all the time in the rag sheet comments). They haven’t taken the first steps to address the fact that the UK has to set up its own regulatory regime and replace the certifications that goods have to have if they’re to be exported. The EU has been implementing temporary stop gaps to protect EU business in case of a NO Deal. These Jaboneys think it’s to help the UK.
Momentary
@Jay: Yes, all of this. And the Brexiters in government actually thought they would be able to go make trade deals with the individual EU countries, and couldn’t believe those countries would refuse and tell them they had to deal with the EU as a whole.
Emerald
@Yutsano:
No, because our intrepid media have been in the Republican ranks for decades now, and that is not going to change.
In the 30s and 40s, especially with the war, the media were on our side. They were still at least neutral in the 70s, which is how Nixon got canned. They got bought during the Reagan era and it wasn’t just the elimination of the Fairness Doctrine that caused it. It was actual money going to the media owners.
They drive the narrative, and they will find a way to keep Republicans in power, mostly. I don’t even take the 2020 election for granted. Learned that lesson in 2016. Despite the Russian propaganda and all the Republican ratfucking, if the media had only been neutral we would have won in a landslide. Gonna be the same in 2020. Our only hope is that enough people have learned their lesson and will vote for once.
Failing that: tumbrels.
TS (the original)
Britain PMs seem to have problems. Tony Blair falling all over George Bush & taking the UK into Iraq was his big fail and David Cameron even considering, let alone having, the vote on Brexit was his big fail. Neither had any idea of the consequences and both gave legitimacy to world changing events that could just so easily been avoided.
Another Scott
@namekarB: I assume it’s an allusion (conscious or not) to “Our American Cousin” – the last play Lincoln saw.
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Agreed. And based on my feed, so do liberal blogs.
Ruckus
@The Pale Scot:
Everyone thinks in terms of their own issues. That’s why negations take so long and so much effort to get close to right. Countries that were at one time powerhouses think that they can demand their way and always get it. That’s why England is so fucked with the EU and why we are so fucked with our attitude that we are still the dominate country in a world in which everyone else is a third world country, even our friends. Because it is no longer true. Of course trump just accelerated this process with his bullshit and stupidity.
divF
@MattF: Ah, yes – gin marshmallow and sweet-and-sour eggplant. Also, Bertie Bott’s every-flavour beans.
Aleta
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@Villago Delenda Est: They’d freeze first which is good because polar bears deserve better, and raven’s idea is faster. When the Rs are in power, ammo is cheap.
TS (the original)
@Yutsano: Many media people seem just scared to go after trump – or maybe it relates to not wanting to take the consequences for what they did – they hated on Hillary, they elected trump, ipso facto trump must be the good guy. They will never accept that they were conned, they supported a fool and now have a US President who has the intellectual abilities of a walnut.
Ladyraxterinok
@Momentary: In late 80s, early 90s whe I had chance to be in Germany some British politician was ranting about how Germany lost WWII but was now winning the economic war–and Britain couldn’t allow that! I
Momentary
@Ladyraxterinok: Sounds all too familiar! =(
Jay C
“Toxic nostalgia” – and at a polonium-laced Novichok level of toxicity, at that – does seem to have been one of the main movers in the “Leave” campaign. At least George Galloway’s retrograde fantasies only want to take the UK back to 1965 or so: a large number of Brexiteers seen to think that once the exit is done, it’s going to be 1910 again, and once “liberated” from the “shackles” of “EU regulation”, the country will be free to revert to its “natural” position of Global Superpower Empire, in a world where everyone drives on the left…..
MattF
@TS (the original): Well, Republicans had a pretty large set of candidates to choose from– and they selected Trump.
scav
So the poor boy wants his Land of Cockaigne and he wants it now! With a sound track from the Beatles and all the miniskirts! Well, apparently he’s got company and we’ll see how far their Bulldog pouting will get them.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Another Scott: in LeCarré’s fiction, it’s the way the British spies refer to their American counterparts. I don’t know how widespread it is otherwise
Momentary
@Jay C: Back when my professional life required it, I spent time with Tory upper class money fixer types who earnestly explained to me that post-Empire Britain’s established understanding of Asia put it in a natural position to broker finance between Asia and the West in a digital world. Feel free to throw up in your mouth a bit, I certainly did.
Baud
@Baud:
And, of course, this just went up a daily Kos
I like AOC generally, but this amount of hype will only end in heartbreak.
Baud
WaPo
schrodingers_cat
@namekarB: The unspoken assumption is that this country belongs to the WASPs, the rest of us are only visiting. I am paraphrasing Matt Damon’s character from The Good Shepherd.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I worry about that. She’s sent strong signals she’s willing to be a team-player, but the way she talks makes me think she thinks that twitter is an accurate reflection of American politics. Atrios may be mad as a hatter, but he had a great line in the Bush years about how respectable Beltway opinion ran the gamut from The New Republic to Free Republic. Rose Twitter think they speak for the American people because their tweets get liked and not ratio’d (think I’m using that right), and Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are the face of the Center Right, if not further.
zhena gogolia
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
It’s an incredible clip and makes me so sick that we have no journalists of that caliber.
Seanly
Okay, first, that guy looks like he’s maybe 65? So born in mid-50’s. He was still some stupid kid in the 60’s. I was born 1968 and my view of everything before about 1980 is pretty spotty.
Secondly, those times are gone in Great Britain just as they are in the United States. The steel mills, coke factories, and coal power plants aren’t coming back. They just aren’t no matter how much all these old fossils wish it were so. Shooting yourselves in the foot to relive some fantasy of the happy times won’t work.
And more importantly, the demographics of those times aren’t coming back. The Indians, Pakistanis, Chinese, Haitians, and all the other minorities are just as much a part of British & American society as European ancestry. Women aren’t going to just tie on an apron and stay home w/out it being their choice.
AnotherBruce
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He ought to donate his liver to science. That liver has to be the hardest substance known to man. Could probably cut diamonds with it
SiubhanDuinne
As is so often the case, Gilbert & Sullivan got it exactly right (this from Iolanthe):
schrodingers_cat
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yes that’s where I have read it too. I think though, that Le Carre’s cousins were the CIA, not ordinary folk.
schrodingers_cat
@SiubhanDuinne: I doubt Galloway is a peer, he seems more House of Commons than the House of Lords.
Jay
@The Pale Scot:
Naw, it’s “crunch time”.
This week defines what happens next. May’s “NotDeal”, stall, tear up Article 50, or Hard Brexit.
Because even the Brexiteers can’t agree on what Brexit is, and how to Brexit, there’s enough votes to kill May’s “NotDeal”. There’s enough votes to kill “stall”. There’s enough votes to kill “Tear Up”.
I’m guessing that May’s tactic of trying to run out the clock to force a “fear” vote for her “NotDeal” is going to result in a Hard Brexit.
But you are right that other than “Tear Up”, the “hard work” starts Monday, and Britian is unprepared and outmatched.
Momentary
@Jay: My hope, such as it is, is on an agreement being struck to vote through May’s deal with the requirement that it must be ratified by referendum, with the choice being between May’s deal or staying in. Fingers crossed.
Ksmiami
@rk: ice floes and tumbrels?
Jay
@Baud: @Baud:
AOC’s the anti-Dolt 45. She is his opposite and brings joy and hope in a time of Trumpistan. As a result she’s as addictive as Dodo stories of puppies, for the politically addicted.
Kathleen
@germy: England Swings by Roger Miller:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9PsJm-oRAM
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Fangirls gotta fangirl.
Kathleen
@rk: Like the people in Kenfuckty who had KyNect/health insurance for the first time in their lives and they voted for the gubernatorial candidate who campaigned to abolish KyNect.
chopper
so, another mod revival then?
David Evans
@Dorothy A. Winsor: To be fair to the florist, he was told that Brexit would be easy and that, because everybody wants our trade, we would easily negotiate better trade terms than we had before. Any contrary views were labeled “Project Fear”
Ksmiami
@MomSense: but at a certain point, a government that works in opposition to the majority of its citizens will fall hard. We are about there…
NotMax
March Madness, indeed.
Immanentize
Galloway is a groovier Ralf Nader. Same nostalgia for when THEY mattered.
@Kathleen: Love Roger Miller. How about Winchester Cathedral? (starts at 2:51)
trollhattan
@Aleta:
Terrible. :-(
Immanentize
@schrodingers_cat:
The Supreme Court tells me the country belongs to Catholics.
SiubhanDuinne
@schrodingers_cat:
I wasn’t trying to show a literal parallel; just indicating that G&S had an excellent grasp of the never-ending Zeitgeist. Gilbert was a brilliant and prescient satirist.
Baud
@Jay: Fair enough, but it doesn’t change what I said. All addictions end in heartbreak.
Duane
@Momentary: Brexiter’s thought they’d make a great trade deal with the US, too. Obama told them that wouldn’t happen, but they listened to dishonest people like Trumpov instead.
Kathleen
@Immanentize: I forgot about that! I like their shtick. The older I get the more I appreciate some of the music I used to disdain.
Immanentize
Can we now call Netanyahu a racist? Or is that anti-Semitic?
Kathleen
@Immanentize: We are so screwed. I mean actually mentally and emotionally screwed (too many of us for the physical part).
Speaking of which, here’s link to article about how right wing billionaires are taking over the Catholic Church. They make Opus Dei look like the movie Going My Way.
https://sojo.net/magazine/march-2019/rise-catholic-right
cynthia ackerman
@lollipopguild:
Quoting Corrado Soprano, “I’d like to fuck Angie Dickinson. Let’s see who gets lucky first.”
Immanentize
@Kathleen: There was a similar article about the Knights of Columbus (KofC) recently. I thought those guys were just like the Shriners of the Catholic Church, not crazy and powerful RWNJs.
Jay
@Baud:
Not all addictions end in heartbreak. Zydego, jazz, flyfishing, good coffee, good chocolate, to name a few.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@Jay: yesterday, she denounced FDR as a racist.
Robespierre would be proud.
Immanentize
@Kathleen: If you watch Wayne Coyne from Flaming Lips, I think he steals a lot of his moves from the singer of the New Vaudeville Band.
Jay C
@Momentary:
Yeah, I’ve know British folks like that, too. However, an overly-inflated assessment of their own level of “understanding” is a trait not restricted only to the “upper class”.
@Duane:
IIRC, one of the big “selling points” of the pro-Brexit crowd (though admittedly, mainly post-referendum and post-Trump-election) was that the Leave campaigners’ BFD connections with the new Admin (Mercers, Steve Bannon, etc.) would lead to a more-positive outcome re US-UK trade “deals”. Which, I think, did revolve around the notion that Nigel Farage would become PM, or some such fantasy, so that’s still up in the air.
However, I wouldn’t put it past Trump to try to get some sort of preferential treatment for the Brits shoved though, like he did with his destructive tariff regime: but I’m not sure that’s going to be enough to counterbalance the damage post-Brexit.
Lapassionara
@Baud: Oh, so it’s not that we will need a visa, we will just need to fill out forms and pay a small fee, like one would do when getting a visa.
Isn’t that special.
Immanentize
@Jay C: Didn’t I read somewhere that recently that the Trump admin said no special trade deal for the UK?
debbie
@Immanentize:
Better not! //
Immanentize
@Lapassionara: I believe I read that you can get the on line one-time pass type thing as described; or if you have signed up for global traveler or the like, that will be fine. The cost is that of the new security requirements imposed by the US.
burnspbesq
If Bexit leads to a hard border, the likelihood of Irish unification goes from “nae a fookin’ chance” to “Next Tuesday, lads?”
And the DUP will go the way of the Whigs, thank God.
Immanentize
@debbie: You have noticed, I did NOT do anything like that. Nor would I!! Just checking on appropriate timing.
debbie
Never mind.
Sloane Ranger
To Brexiteers WWII happened yesterday. I had lunch with my Uncle and his wife on Friday and he can’t wait to leave the EU, which he considers a fiction Germany has used to dominate Europe and take revenge on the UK. He points out that the UK is a net contributor to the EU and believes that the money is better spent in our own people. He was also raving about how the UK betrayed the Commonwealth by no longer buying New Zealand lamb (which is not even true).
I was reminded of the row my Dad had with him when my Dad discovered he’d signed a petition against an Indian family taking over the village shop. My Dad, who was not a progressive by any means, said that if the price of keeping a shop in the village was welcoming an Indian family, he’d gladly pay it. My Uncle responded with a list of racist stereotypes.
The petition won, the village shop closed and my father and uncle didn’t speak for several years.
Baud
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: He kind of was.
@debbie: What crack?
Jay
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
FDR was a racist, as were most white men of his day. Many of FDR’s “relief” policies in the New Deal excluded minorities by design, not omission.
A corner stone of the GND’s “aspirations” is to embed social justice into economic/environmental/energy policy. In other words, no more putting leaking toxic chemical storage sites in POC communities because the community can’t fight back. No more Flints.
tobie
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Do you mean this statement?
There’s some truth to this but I don’t know what the point in mentioning it is if you’re trying to spearhead a movement for big government after years of corrosive small govt ideology.
germy
@tobie: To convince minorities they won’t be ignored this time.
Sloane Ranger
@Immanentize: Depends on what day of the week you read it. Trump has been all over the place on this. All I know is I wouldn’t rely on it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Immanentize: @Sloane Ranger: He’s really pissed Betty didn’t get out her solid gold buggy for him to ride in
debbie
@Baud:
Damn, you’re fast. I went on a tangent from the younguns and their tweetering to Omar’s crack about Obama being just a pretty face, but then thought it was too far afield.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@Jay: the online left spent 8 years screaming Obama should be like FDR. To this end, they idealized, mythologized and enlarged FDR beyond what he was in life. Now that they no longer need FDR to bludgeon Obama they pretend they never really liked him.
Jay
@Jay C: @Immanentize:
Preliminary trade talks have started between the US and Britain, and the US is taking a hard line. British “red lines” like chlorinated chicked, ag dumping, aviation have all been crossed and the general concensus so far is the Brits are going to get screwed and hard.
The US Ambassador to the UK said as much a few days ago and that the Brit’s would never get “special treatment”.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: FDR, hell, they canonized LBJ based on legends about peeing with the bathroom door open and putting recalcitrant Senators up against the wall to get legislation passed. The theory being that if Obama had yelled at Joe Lieberman and Blanche Lincoln, we’d have single payer now. And ponies.
Jim Parish
@namekarB: The bit about German is a myth; see Snopes.
The Pale Scot
@Jay: So wadda think Jay, is it the WA or no deal? Will reality raise it’s weary head after being tossed out of the room over and over again? That would mean political suicide for a bunch of back benchers. Are there pols over there with the guts of the Dems that voted for the ACA knowing that it was the end of their career? It seems that politics over there is way more clique, right schools>to right internship>to back bencher to fuck man I’m a minister.
I don’t think that there’s enough of those types, the whistle is gonna blow and everyone gonna sit in the trenches imploring others to go over the top. So it’s no deal and the question is how soon the EU will play hardball. If they want to let reality set in hard and fast they’ll implement WTO rules right away and shut down UK to EU exports. When the UK does its proposed no checks at the border for food from the EU the EU backs up USA and Chinese demands that they be given no check passes also. Heads explode.
Or, The EU has tried to keep things civil and avoided noticing the insults coming from HMG’s personages and media oafs with the view of long term relations. I think that view is diminishing. If things do not devolve into food and medicine shortages that means only that the EU has decided on playing a long game. They’ll keep the UK propped up and methodically strip the UK of every educated youngin’ and every business that has potential over the course of a decade. All of the problems that Brexiteers blame on the EU is the result of UK politics and policies. In a just world I could hope that HMG resorts to mandatory turnouts of the retired population (majority pro Brexit) to harvest the turnip crop.
Jay
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
Did AOC? Please show your work.
The US really could have used more “New Deal” after Dubya Dubya Me Too and the Banksters blew up the Global Economy. Bailing out the Banksters rather than homeowners resulted in the largest property transfer/wealth transfer in economic history. POC home ownership in the US is now and will remain for generations, lower than during slavery.
tobie
@germy: Why call your climate action plan a green ‘new deal’ if you’re so ambivalent about the ‘new deal,’ or have become ambivalent about it after advocating for it for the last 8 years? I’d be quite happy with having a robust climate action plan, a vigorous jobs plan, a housing plan, an education plan etc. because putting everything in one package that may or may not fly is a recipe for disaster in my opinion. Every bad boss I’ve ever had came in to the company with a bold comprehensive plan to change everything, top to bottom. It never worked.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
those were the days:
https://balloon-juice.com/2013/11/04/the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations-5/#comment-4700316
https://balloon-juice.com/2013/11/04/the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations-5/#comment-4700318
https://balloon-juice.com/2013/11/04/the-soft-bigotry-of-low-expectations-5/#comment-4700346
germy
I agree with her.
Omnes Omnibus
@tobie: What makes you think that it is going to approached as one package?
Baud
@germy: True, but that’s been the GOP strategy since Nixon. To their credit, it works
tobie
@Omnes Omnibus: Because the GND itself includes jobs, housing, and healthcare guarantees. All these things are important IMO, but they don’t all need to be in a bill about combatting climate change.
Jay
@The Pale Scot:
I think it’s going to be a Hard Brexit. The EU started putting policies into binders to deal with a May’s “NotDeal” and a Hard Brexit. March 20th one of those two sets of binders go into play.
After dealing with May’s Moron brigaides over and over again, and the insults, I’m pretty sure that the EU’s given up trying to stop Britain’s cliff divers and is just interested in mitigating the fall out to the remaining members of the EU.
I get the feeling that long before the UK get’s a post Brexit trade deal from anybody, we will be talking about England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales again.
tobie
@Jay: The LIBOR rate was something like 4% in fall 2008. The economy would have crashed if banks had stopped lending to each other, which is where we were heading at the time. That’s why the bailout was needed. What stinks to high heaven is that the Senate voted against forcing the banks to give consumers a break on under-water mortgages after that.
debbie
@tobie:
The problem with the bailout was that the banks sat on the bailout funds rather than making loans to small businesses. Had that happened, communities would have recovered much more quickly.
Uncle Cosmo
@Ruckus: Just FYI, “dominate” is a verb – the adjective you want is “dominant.” You’ve done that twice now. Do it again & I’ll send kids around to steal your SocSec check out of your mailbox, you superannuated bubble of methane laced with digestive odors. :p
VOR
@Lapassionara:
My cousin, a hard core Trump supporter, commented this showed the Europeans understood the importance of controlling illegal immigration. I responded that visa overstays were a huge source of illegal immigration to the US and building a costly wall wouldn’t do squat to solve the problem. No response.
Kathleen
@Immanentize: While I’d call my dad a devout Catholic, he was always liberal politically and viewed KOC with disdain, as he did American Legion and VFW because of their support for Republicans. I have been writing them off as a vestige of reactionary Church but boy was I wrong.
Jay
@tobie:
GND is a apirational resolution. All it does is suggest that all aspects of the GND be considered when drawing up a Climate Plan, Work Legislation, Environmental Legislation, Finance Reform, Industrial subsidies and research.
When the City of Chicago built a new plastics recycling facility, they stuck it in a POC residential commmunity, even though they knew it would expose the residents to toxic chemicals, waste and byproducts, because the community lacked the political and economic power to NIMBY.
All the GND is, is a “commitment” to consider all aspects and impacts when writing legislation, going forward, so that “unintended consequences” from what appears to be a “unrelated” piece of legislation, are minimized or mitigated.
As an example, the BC Goverment, BC Hydro and Corius, created a subsidy/grant program to reinsulate, weather proof, solarize and upgrade appliances in rental property. They did not include rate caps in the legislation. As a result, a mass of low income housing got “gentrified” on the public dime and a lot of renters became homeless.
tobie
@debbie: There were plenty of things that could have been done better in hindsight. But having a run on the banks and the banks crashing with no liquidity would have been a disaster. I agree, though, that strings should have been attached to the bailout.
Omnes Omnibus
@tobie: When you make a list of tasks to do, do you try to do all of them at once?
Kathleen
@Immanentize: Being one of “The Olds” I have never listened to or watched Flaming Lips. Thanks for the rec! I will check them out on You Tube. I appreciate an artful appropriation/incorporation of styles and music from the past. Somewhat OT but I’ve noticed that several TV commercials feature jingles in the style of early 60’s R&B styles and old school R&B music from mid-late 60’s/early 70’s.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@VOR: ask your cousin if he has a problem with Drumpf marrying two illegal immigrants. Also too, ask if he minds Drumpf using undocumented workers at all his establishments.
Shakti
@mrmoshpotato: The Brexit voter and the Dump voter are passive aggressively expressing their wishes to be rid of their son and their husband, respectively.
Being “dumb” is a way to avoid expressing that wish openly.
Jay
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
I wish the so called Media would ask Drumph or Sack ‘o Shit Sanders this question.
tobie
@Omnes Omnibus: No, but I’m not making a list of what I think everybody should be doing or prioritizing. The Democratic party platform contains hundreds of different resolutions but no one would put the party platform forward as a single Congressional resolution. If there are examples of this in history, I would be genuinely curious to hear about them.
Omnes Omnibus
@tobie: I think that you are getting too wrapped up in the idea of the GND as a unitary proposal rather than seeing it as a to-do list. Perhaps thinking of it as a non-evil Contract with America might help.
Jay
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yup.
The Pale Scot
@Jay:
That is the problem. The MSM lifted conflict talk radio from sports TV. Get two people who are opinionated and not well informed, from both sides of an issue and let them at it. Cheaper than a sitcom, no writers, one set, and if they’re lucky the politician will spend somebody else’s money to stage it and provide hours of free video feed. With the appearance of this new video editing software that can seamlessly manipulate so can make it appear that someone is saying they’re not this could change into something scary
Enhanced Voting Techniques
I thought the whose reason for the British Invasion in the ’60s with the Beetles and Monty Python was the economy in England sucked so hard all these collage educated kids were forced to work in the arts.
tobie
I need to chew on this some. I see your point that the GND is more of an agenda than a specific policy proposal. I just don’t know if it needs to be a resolution. I really haven’t thought this through.
Omnes Omnibus
@tobie: I don’t care what form it takes. If it is a set of good policies and/or goals, I am okay with it.
mrmoshpotato
@Jay: Or just openly ask what their problem is with black and brown people, and stand back as their heads explode.
Spoiler alert: “You’re the racist!”
Jay
@tobie:
The point of it being a broad based resolution containing a lot of Social Justice issues, is to try to ensure that “all” coming legislation tries to cover off all the points.
So that Climate Change costs are not the burden of the poor. So that tax changes, trade deals and subsidies don’t undercut Climate Change or Social Justice.
It’s an affirmational “checklist” to be applied to all legislation going forward.
That’s all it is.
tobie
@Omnes Omnibus: @Jay: “Social justice” and “economic justice” strike me as pretty abstract when it comes to legislative language. I’d like a jobs program but not a job guarantee so that’s already one thing that I would want taken out of the GND. But mostly I’d like to hear about what we will do to meet the benchmarks set by the IPCC of a 45% reduction in global greenhouse gases by 2030 and complete decarbonization by 2050. I’d be more inspired by that than broad set of objecitves but that’s obviously a matter of taste.
The Pale Scot
@Immanentize:
Is that Agarn from F-Troop on the horn?
Jay
@tobie:
So, in my BC example, the grants/subsidies was very effective at creating a lot more energy efficient rental housing and going a long way towards meeting BC’s Carbon goals.
It also created a shit load of homeless working poor in some of the most expensive cost of living cities and towns in Canada.
One preminent BC Economist believes that when the numbers are in, it will actually have resulted in a increase in Carbon output, due to the alternative heating and energy methods used by the homeless.
If they had thought it through all the way, they would have realized that the renovations required to make the rentals much more energy efficient would result in homelessness, and put in protections to the program to ensure that didn’t happen.
But they didn’t think about it because they were not looking a broad impacts and instead, a narrow goal.
The point of the GND is to try to prevent or mitigate “unintended” consequences by applying a broad template of “goals” to be considered.
Matt McIrvin
@Emerald:
I was just arguing over on LGM with a guy who said he’d vote for almost any Democrat but promised to help throw the election to Trump if the Democrats nominate Biden. A whole bunch of people were arguing with him, but he kept saying he’d do it “to punish you for nominating Biden” even though none of the people he was arguing with supported Biden.
Maybe some of us have learned. Maybe it’s not enough. Too many of us seem willing to blow up the world to prove some point or other.
Omnes Omnibus
@tobie:
If I were a member of Congress, I would have no fucking idea how to do this. OTOH, I would know it should be done and I would know that, with the resources I had as a member of Congress, I could find some people with the technical know how to do it.
JR
We’re only making plans for Nigel
He has his future in British Steel…
Jay
@Omnes Omnibus:
That’s what the House’s Climate Change Commitee is for.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jay: That would be one of the resources I mentioned.
Matt McIrvin
Thatcher shutting down the coal mines to break organized labor seems to be such an epochal event in the eyes of the British left that it leads to some odd phenomena. There’s some lefty mythologizing of the coal industry that is kind of disturbing from an environmentalist point of view. I remember a few of them embracing climate denialism on the basis that global warming was just something Thatcher concocted to shut down the mines.
The Pale Scot
@Jay:
Can’t say the Gael in me doesn’t mind that, no deal the Scots are gone, if ROI can play the UK to continue to subsidize NI’s integration as the price for erasing the continual red ink, that make puts England with no International law claim on the N.Sea. No fisheries, no oil leases. Scotland supposedly has the best wind generation to potential market ratio of any country. Windmills generating juice that’s cabled to the mainland, oil and gas sold into national sovereign fund.
But the UK has nukes, and I don’t see them selling them off to the US, Fr, or Rus to get back in the green.
I hope that the WA gets passed and decades of SW vs EU type negotiations ensue between the UK and EU.
Ruckus
@Uncle Cosmo:
Obviously you are behind the times.
SS does not send checks without a lot of effort on the recipient’s part. So you could stand by my mailbox till you die of starvation and you’ll never see that check.
Now on to new business. I’ll make as many fucking grammatical errors as I damn well fucking please. But it is nice to see that someone is paying fucking attention. My only advice is to get a fucking job where someone gives a fuck.
Ruckus
@Uncle Cosmo:
Oh, and thanks.
J R in WV
@tobie:
So, you don’t want a good job? Being a progressive in a state controlled by right-wing managers, you think you’ll be able to get a good job?
Good luck, sucker. Times have changed, and unless you’re willing to suck a Nazi’s ass, you won’t work in the Trump world. And that’s what guaranteed jobs is aimed to prevent. Asshole. Think for once!
rikyrah
@HalfAssedHomesteader:
I thought that it was obvious that it was a complete scam by the reactions of the “winners” , who up and left soon after the vote.?