Brexit what Brexit!

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Dr. Medulla
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Dr. Medulla »

Flex wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 11:40am
Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 10:29am
This is only partially true. Right now, if the House and Senate passed a spending bill to restore funding to all these departments that are shut down without the wall nonsense, Trump would veto it. However, the bill would then go back to both the House and Senate and if they re-pass the bill with two-thirds majorities, it overrides his veto. So it's not just Trump but the Republicans in the Senate that won't defy him and pass a veto-proof spending bill. Trump's the big problem, but he has some essential handmaidens. The absurdity is that the system is set up that this kind of situation is able to exist.
I actually think Mitch McConnell deserves most of the blame here. Our structure of government is designed for the legislative branch to be more powerful than the executive. Mitch's acquiescence to Trump is the total absconding of responsibility. He could get the government open today without Trump if he wanted, but Trump can't do the same without Mitch.
In the larger picture, yes, I agree, but in terms of process it's Trump. It only comes back to McConnell and 2/3's if Trump vetoes. We don't have to consider McConnell's role if Trump drops his idiotic demand.
"I never doubted myself for a minute for I knew that my monkey-strong bowels were girded with strength, like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo dung." - Richard Nixon, Checkers Speech, abandoned early draft

Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 10:29am
Marky Dread wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 10:13am
US
I'm stunned that the president has the power to shut everything down. Forcing people who are trying to feed their families to have no job/income.
This is only partially true. Right now, if the House and Senate passed a spending bill to restore funding to all these departments that are shut down without the wall nonsense, Trump would veto it. However, the bill would then go back to both the House and Senate and if they re-pass the bill with two-thirds majorities, it overrides his veto. So it's not just Trump but the Republicans in the Senate that won't defy him and pass a veto-proof spending bill. Trump's the big problem, but he has some essential handmaidens. The absurdity is that the system is set up that this kind of situation is able to exist.
Yep that's the bit I'm stunned about. The stupid idea that Trump wants to build a wall to protect "his" people's America is hurting all.
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Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 11:33am
File under: History, Rhyming, not Repeating
In 1956, the then chancellor of the exchequer Harold Macmillan commissioned his officials to suggest the best way for Britain to integrate itself into the rapidly growing western European economy. Their plan, soon adopted as official policy, was that Britain and the emerging European Community would both join a new free trade area for industrial goods. In this perfect world, Britain would not be in the EC, would not have to pool any of its sovereignty with the other European powers, would maintain its preferential trade with the Commonwealth, would enjoy frictionless trade with Europe but would still be free to do whatever deals it wanted with the rest of the world. It could, in other words, have its cake and eat it. And why would the other Europeans agree to this? Because, as the Board of Trade explained: “The possibility of UK cooperation would be so welcome [to the Europeans] that we should be able to enter the plan more or less on our own terms.”

If this sounds familiar even to those of us who are not historians of British economic policy in the 1950s, it’s because it is the vision for Brexit that was advertised 60 years later. Plan G, as it was known in 1956, is now Plan A for the true believers: we can have all the benefits of being in the EU without the burdens and compromises of actual membership. And the other Europeans will be so glad that we have condescended to deal with them that we can dictate our own terms.

It didn’t work in 1956, not least because, as Kevin O’Rourke states in his crisp, clear and quietly devastating history, “UK policymakers had been focused on what was required in order to achieve a domestic consensus in Britain. Not surprisingly, they had produced a blueprint that was indeed a very good deal for Britain – but in so doing they had paid insufficient attention to other countries’ interests.” And of course it has not worked since 2016 for precisely the same reasons. Here, as in so much else, we see that if Brexit has a history, it is not a linear one – it loops back not just to an imagined past but to assumptions about Britain’s place in the world that were untenable even in the 1950s.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... rke-review
Scattershot journalism.
You can compare all the history like the 1956 idea/failure but that never happened and times and goverments change. The only relevant facts are that of when the UK first joined the EU (EEC) in 1973 followed by the 1975 referendum for continued membership which had a 67% vote in favour of staying. The UK has far from had it it's own way being vetoed by the French government in 1963 and again in 1967. Only in 1969 did the UK get the green light to join. So it makes no difference to what plan the UK government agrees is best it will still be down to the remainder of the EU to decide and agree.
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

Dr. Medulla
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Dr. Medulla »

Marky Dread wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 12:12pm
Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 11:33am
File under: History, Rhyming, not Repeating
In 1956, the then chancellor of the exchequer Harold Macmillan commissioned his officials to suggest the best way for Britain to integrate itself into the rapidly growing western European economy. Their plan, soon adopted as official policy, was that Britain and the emerging European Community would both join a new free trade area for industrial goods. In this perfect world, Britain would not be in the EC, would not have to pool any of its sovereignty with the other European powers, would maintain its preferential trade with the Commonwealth, would enjoy frictionless trade with Europe but would still be free to do whatever deals it wanted with the rest of the world. It could, in other words, have its cake and eat it. And why would the other Europeans agree to this? Because, as the Board of Trade explained: “The possibility of UK cooperation would be so welcome [to the Europeans] that we should be able to enter the plan more or less on our own terms.”

If this sounds familiar even to those of us who are not historians of British economic policy in the 1950s, it’s because it is the vision for Brexit that was advertised 60 years later. Plan G, as it was known in 1956, is now Plan A for the true believers: we can have all the benefits of being in the EU without the burdens and compromises of actual membership. And the other Europeans will be so glad that we have condescended to deal with them that we can dictate our own terms.

It didn’t work in 1956, not least because, as Kevin O’Rourke states in his crisp, clear and quietly devastating history, “UK policymakers had been focused on what was required in order to achieve a domestic consensus in Britain. Not surprisingly, they had produced a blueprint that was indeed a very good deal for Britain – but in so doing they had paid insufficient attention to other countries’ interests.” And of course it has not worked since 2016 for precisely the same reasons. Here, as in so much else, we see that if Brexit has a history, it is not a linear one – it loops back not just to an imagined past but to assumptions about Britain’s place in the world that were untenable even in the 1950s.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... rke-review
Scattershot journalism.
You can compare all the history like the 1956 idea/failure but that never happened and times and goverments change. The only relevant facts are that of when the UK first joined the EU (EEC) in 1973 followed by the 1975 referendum for continued membership which had a 67% vote in favour of staying. The UK has far from had it it's own way being vetoed by the French government in 1963 and again in 1967. Only in 1969 did the UK get the green light to join. So it makes no difference to what plan the UK government agrees is best it will still be down to the remainder of the EU to decide and agree.
The point is only that the dream of a "cake and eat it" relationship with Europe is not something peculiar to UKIP in the 2nd decade of the 21st century. Historians are attracted to the these kinds of ideological echoes, that ideas, good or bad, never die, but hibernate and mutate and emerge again at the oddest times. William Faulkner put it so wonderfully when he said the past isn't dead, it's not even past.
"I never doubted myself for a minute for I knew that my monkey-strong bowels were girded with strength, like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo dung." - Richard Nixon, Checkers Speech, abandoned early draft

Silent Majority
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Silent Majority »

Marky Dread wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 12:12pm
Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 11:33am
File under: History, Rhyming, not Repeating
In 1956, the then chancellor of the exchequer Harold Macmillan commissioned his officials to suggest the best way for Britain to integrate itself into the rapidly growing western European economy. Their plan, soon adopted as official policy, was that Britain and the emerging European Community would both join a new free trade area for industrial goods. In this perfect world, Britain would not be in the EC, would not have to pool any of its sovereignty with the other European powers, would maintain its preferential trade with the Commonwealth, would enjoy frictionless trade with Europe but would still be free to do whatever deals it wanted with the rest of the world. It could, in other words, have its cake and eat it. And why would the other Europeans agree to this? Because, as the Board of Trade explained: “The possibility of UK cooperation would be so welcome [to the Europeans] that we should be able to enter the plan more or less on our own terms.”

If this sounds familiar even to those of us who are not historians of British economic policy in the 1950s, it’s because it is the vision for Brexit that was advertised 60 years later. Plan G, as it was known in 1956, is now Plan A for the true believers: we can have all the benefits of being in the EU without the burdens and compromises of actual membership. And the other Europeans will be so glad that we have condescended to deal with them that we can dictate our own terms.

It didn’t work in 1956, not least because, as Kevin O’Rourke states in his crisp, clear and quietly devastating history, “UK policymakers had been focused on what was required in order to achieve a domestic consensus in Britain. Not surprisingly, they had produced a blueprint that was indeed a very good deal for Britain – but in so doing they had paid insufficient attention to other countries’ interests.” And of course it has not worked since 2016 for precisely the same reasons. Here, as in so much else, we see that if Brexit has a history, it is not a linear one – it loops back not just to an imagined past but to assumptions about Britain’s place in the world that were untenable even in the 1950s.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... rke-review
Scattershot journalism.
You can compare all the history like the 1956 idea/failure but that never happened and times and goverments change. The only relevant facts are that of when the UK first joined the EU (EEC) in 1973 followed by the 1975 referendum for continued membership which had a 67% vote in favour of staying. The UK has far from had it it's own way being vetoed by the French government in 1963 and again in 1967. Only in 1969 did the UK get the green light to join. So it makes no difference to what plan the UK government agrees is best it will still be down to the remainder of the EU to decide and agree.
DeGaulle did not want the UK in
a lifetime serving one machine
Is ten times worse than prison


www.pexlives.libsyn.com/

Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 12:26pm
Marky Dread wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 12:12pm
Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 11:33am
File under: History, Rhyming, not Repeating
In 1956, the then chancellor of the exchequer Harold Macmillan commissioned his officials to suggest the best way for Britain to integrate itself into the rapidly growing western European economy. Their plan, soon adopted as official policy, was that Britain and the emerging European Community would both join a new free trade area for industrial goods. In this perfect world, Britain would not be in the EC, would not have to pool any of its sovereignty with the other European powers, would maintain its preferential trade with the Commonwealth, would enjoy frictionless trade with Europe but would still be free to do whatever deals it wanted with the rest of the world. It could, in other words, have its cake and eat it. And why would the other Europeans agree to this? Because, as the Board of Trade explained: “The possibility of UK cooperation would be so welcome [to the Europeans] that we should be able to enter the plan more or less on our own terms.”

If this sounds familiar even to those of us who are not historians of British economic policy in the 1950s, it’s because it is the vision for Brexit that was advertised 60 years later. Plan G, as it was known in 1956, is now Plan A for the true believers: we can have all the benefits of being in the EU without the burdens and compromises of actual membership. And the other Europeans will be so glad that we have condescended to deal with them that we can dictate our own terms.

It didn’t work in 1956, not least because, as Kevin O’Rourke states in his crisp, clear and quietly devastating history, “UK policymakers had been focused on what was required in order to achieve a domestic consensus in Britain. Not surprisingly, they had produced a blueprint that was indeed a very good deal for Britain – but in so doing they had paid insufficient attention to other countries’ interests.” And of course it has not worked since 2016 for precisely the same reasons. Here, as in so much else, we see that if Brexit has a history, it is not a linear one – it loops back not just to an imagined past but to assumptions about Britain’s place in the world that were untenable even in the 1950s.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... rke-review
Scattershot journalism.
You can compare all the history like the 1956 idea/failure but that never happened and times and goverments change. The only relevant facts are that of when the UK first joined the EU (EEC) in 1973 followed by the 1975 referendum for continued membership which had a 67% vote in favour of staying. The UK has far from had it it's own way being vetoed by the French government in 1963 and again in 1967. Only in 1969 did the UK get the green light to join. So it makes no difference to what plan the UK government agrees is best it will still be down to the remainder of the EU to decide and agree.
The point is only that the dream of a "cake and eat it" relationship with Europe is not something peculiar to UKIP in the 2nd decade of the 21st century. Historians are attracted to the these kinds of ideological echoes, that ideas, good or bad, never die, but hibernate and mutate and emerge again at the oddest times. William Faulkner put it so wonderfully when he said the past isn't dead, it's not even past.
Don't disagree with you or Faulkner. However my point is simple move on and change history. No one ever (voters) thought for a second that the so called "cake and eat it" relationship with Europe was ever obtainable. There are many different views to why people want to stay or go. A lot of it as I said before is generational a lot of older people are of the opinion that they are sick and tired of being governed via Brussels and certain EU legislation is simply stupid. This is no doubt feulled by the UK press printing fron page picture of the wrong shaped bananas etc. The younger generation are a little more savvy and obviously require a much brighter future.

I'm still of the opinion that a second vote now would yeild a far bigger remain vote. Most people are sick to their eye teeth of Brexit and want the mess brought to a close. The politicians are secretly loving every bloody minute of it taking centre stage, sadly it's not about the "them" it's about the "us".
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

Silent Majority wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 12:42pm
Marky Dread wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 12:12pm
Dr. Medulla wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 11:33am
File under: History, Rhyming, not Repeating
In 1956, the then chancellor of the exchequer Harold Macmillan commissioned his officials to suggest the best way for Britain to integrate itself into the rapidly growing western European economy. Their plan, soon adopted as official policy, was that Britain and the emerging European Community would both join a new free trade area for industrial goods. In this perfect world, Britain would not be in the EC, would not have to pool any of its sovereignty with the other European powers, would maintain its preferential trade with the Commonwealth, would enjoy frictionless trade with Europe but would still be free to do whatever deals it wanted with the rest of the world. It could, in other words, have its cake and eat it. And why would the other Europeans agree to this? Because, as the Board of Trade explained: “The possibility of UK cooperation would be so welcome [to the Europeans] that we should be able to enter the plan more or less on our own terms.”

If this sounds familiar even to those of us who are not historians of British economic policy in the 1950s, it’s because it is the vision for Brexit that was advertised 60 years later. Plan G, as it was known in 1956, is now Plan A for the true believers: we can have all the benefits of being in the EU without the burdens and compromises of actual membership. And the other Europeans will be so glad that we have condescended to deal with them that we can dictate our own terms.

It didn’t work in 1956, not least because, as Kevin O’Rourke states in his crisp, clear and quietly devastating history, “UK policymakers had been focused on what was required in order to achieve a domestic consensus in Britain. Not surprisingly, they had produced a blueprint that was indeed a very good deal for Britain – but in so doing they had paid insufficient attention to other countries’ interests.” And of course it has not worked since 2016 for precisely the same reasons. Here, as in so much else, we see that if Brexit has a history, it is not a linear one – it loops back not just to an imagined past but to assumptions about Britain’s place in the world that were untenable even in the 1950s.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... rke-review
Scattershot journalism.
You can compare all the history like the 1956 idea/failure but that never happened and times and goverments change. The only relevant facts are that of when the UK first joined the EU (EEC) in 1973 followed by the 1975 referendum for continued membership which had a 67% vote in favour of staying. The UK has far from had it it's own way being vetoed by the French government in 1963 and again in 1967. Only in 1969 did the UK get the green light to join. So it makes no difference to what plan the UK government agrees is best it will still be down to the remainder of the EU to decide and agree.
DeGaulle did not want the UK in
Hated the British and had a huge grudge against the Americans.
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

coffeepotman
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by coffeepotman »

[quote="Marky Dread" post_id=514554 time=1547648018 user_id=123

US
I'm stunned that the president has the power to shut everything down. Forcing people who are trying to feed their families to have no job/income.
[/quote]

I think most Americans are stunned that this is going on, people are being forced to work though not getting paid. It's just the normal insanity, nothing surprises me anymore. SNAFU

Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

coffeepotman wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 2:51pm
[quote="Marky Dread" post_id=514554 time=1547648018 user_id=123

US
I'm stunned that the president has the power to shut everything down. Forcing people who are trying to feed their families to have no job/income.
I think most Americans are stunned that this is going on, people are being forced to work though not getting paid. It's just the normal insanity, nothing surprises me anymore. SNAFU
[/quote]

Yep sadly this both sides of the pond.
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

101Walterton
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by 101Walterton »

coffeepotman wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 2:51pm
[quote="Marky Dread" post_id=514554 time=1547648018 user_id=123

US
I'm stunned that the president has the power to shut everything down. Forcing people who are trying to feed their families to have no job/income.
I think most Americans are stunned that this is going on, people are being forced to work though not getting paid. It's just the normal insanity, nothing surprises me anymore. SNAFU
[/quote]

Forget the circus and the wall of death I think this is the single point I find unbelievable.

Silent Majority
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Silent Majority »

DUP earning their billion.
a lifetime serving one machine
Is ten times worse than prison


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Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

Silent Majority wrote:
16 Jan 2019, 4:02pm
DUP earning their billion.
Fuckers!
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

Dr. Medulla
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Dr. Medulla »

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... or-purpose

The external problem is almost always an expression of an internal problem.
"I never doubted myself for a minute for I knew that my monkey-strong bowels were girded with strength, like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo dung." - Richard Nixon, Checkers Speech, abandoned early draft

Marky Dread
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Marky Dread »

Dr. Medulla wrote:
18 Jan 2019, 7:51am
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... or-purpose

The external problem is almost always an expression of an internal problem.
So the guy wastes all those words talking about Alice in Wonderland and the Dodo and so on. Just so he can state the bleeding obvious. Yes we have an archaic goverment system that the majority of Brits would love to see destroyed. Getting blood from a stone would more achieveable that getting those old bastards out of the house of lords.
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

Dr. Medulla
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Re: Brexit what Brexit!

Post by Dr. Medulla »

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"I never doubted myself for a minute for I knew that my monkey-strong bowels were girded with strength, like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo dung." - Richard Nixon, Checkers Speech, abandoned early draft

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