Backstop

troyzer

orourkeda1977 wrote: »

Where's David Cameron these days?

He's on a few boards and does the lecture circuit.

Berserker

orourkeda1977 wrote: »

Where's David Cameron these days?

Public speaking and he spends the rest of the time with his feet up thanking his lucky stars that he isn't PM at the moment.

orourkeda1977

troyzer wrote: »

He's on a few boards and does the lecture circuit.

There's a man who got out while the going was good.

Grayson

Berserker wrote: »

Did you honestly believe that a Labour led Corbyn would be any better? He is no better than the hard left over here. He'd sh1t the bed if a general election happened and he had to take the reigns.

Ive never believed that. I had hoped that they might but I never believed that they would.

Its an irony of brexit that the opposition is led by a guy who doesn't link the EU and the person in charge of leaving wanted to stay.

There are some of his policies that I like but he's too interested in getting into power. He's willing to let the country go to sh1t to do it too.

FTA69

There’s also the fact that the EU would actively try and prevent a lot of Corbyn’s policies.

Lefty Bicek

troyzer wrote: »

Germany also weren't afraid to exert their influence during the euro crisis.

They don't have influence, they have dominance.

Circumspection about that is never 'unfounded'.

Capt'n Midnight

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

That was a very close win.

Yes the UK converted container ships and car ferries into helicopter carriers in less than two month but you have to remember they had already sold one carrier to Oz and announced the scrapping of Hermes. Had Argentina waited a few months it would have been no contest. And they are repeating that mistake now. They sold off the last of the Harriers for a song, had they been mothballed the UK would still be able to cobble something together PDQ if needed. ( A fleet in being for the cost of air conditioning a warehouse ) Instead they'll have to wait years for operational carriers.

why would they need carriers? who is likely to be invading the Falklands in the foreseeable future?

Saw these acronyms in the politics forum but don’t know what they mean.

ERG
WA

troyzer

Lefty Bicek wrote: »

They don't have influence, they have dominance.

Circumspection about that is never 'unfounded'.

Well, it is. Because Germany hasn't taken anything close to a leading role in the Brexit negotiations. It's been coming mainly from Brussels.

Grayson

Strawberry Milkshake wrote: »

Saw these acronyms in the politics forum but don’t know what they mean.

ERG
WA

ERG: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Research_Group
WA: Withdrawal Agreement

Lefty Bicek

troyzer wrote: »

Well, it is. Because Germany hasn't taken anything close to a leading role in the Brexit negotiations. It's been coming mainly from Brussels.

The statement you made which I asked you to clarify was -

Their unfounded belief that the EU is a German pawn was one of the main reasons they left...

If it's a reason that they left, your reference here to Brexit negotiations after they left, is irrelevant, and fails to answer the question.

But then you go on to say that -

... Germany is the most powerful member of the EU which itself has always been a Paris-Berlin Axis...

Yet people can at the same time hold the childish view of Germany as some kind of contrite, neurotic Santa.

ps Let's hope Boris and Jacob haven't seen you put the words 'Germany' and 'Axis' in the same sentence. It could stir up some very well-founded suspicions.

troyzer

Lefty Bicek wrote: »

The statement you made which I asked you to clarify was -



If it's a reason that they left, your reference here to Brexit negotiations after they left, is irrelevant, and fails to answer the question.

But then you go on to say that -



Yet people can at the same time hold the childish view of Germany as some kind of contrite, neurotic Santa.

ps Let's hope Boris and Jacob haven't seen you put the words 'Germany' and 'Axis' in the same sentence. It could stir up some very well-founded suspicions.

Germany is the most powerful country and does exert influence but the EU is not its puppet.

This was what I was trying to say. The UK equate its power with utter dominance and I don't think it has this status in Europe.

Mad_maxx

FTA69 wrote: »

Because they still need somewhat decent relations with their neighbours; international diplomacy isn’t just about telling people to f*ck off. You can do that if you’re Putin and constantly in a row anyway. You can’t do it when you’re an isolated country in Europe who has shat on your neighbours who can put the screws on economically if they want.

Doing what you say could provoke economic sanctions, UN condemnation and also reignite a conflict within UK borders they’d be obliged to participate in again. Doesn’t sound too appealing does it?

Wouldn't happen as America would veto it, the usa is oceans closer to the UK than any other country in Europe.

The U. S wants brexit as it weakens Europe

troyzer

Mad_maxx wrote: »

Wouldn't happen as America would veto it, the usa is oceans closer to the UK than any other country in Europe.

The U. S wants brexit as it weakens Europe

This particular administration with its loathing for multilateralism may want Brexit to weaken Europe but normal politicians don't.

Brexit is a disaster for Atlanticism which relied on the US having a strong voice in Europe via the UK which largely agreed with it on security matters. There is no Atlantic voice left in Europe now. The French have never been Atlantacist in nature, the Germans don't have the military and Italy is going into meltdown. The rest of the countries are far too small to fill the vaccum.

Folkstonian

jmayo wrote: »

Actually sometimes they were just plain lucky.
When you look through some of Britain's military history it is littered with cockups in no small part due to incompetent leadership from their aristocratic officers.

The madness of World War 1 being the pinnacle of that stupidity.

You’ve been watching too many episodes of Blackadder. The British militwry command were certainly not incompetent in World War One.

Lefty Bicek

troyzer wrote: »

Germany is the most powerful country and does exert influence but the EU is not its puppet.

This was what I was trying to say. The UK equate its power with utter dominance and I don't think it has this status in Europe.

Well, I really wanted a simple answer as to what the people who made the 'pawn' reference on the IT podcast, gave as their reasons for doing so.

In fact, who are they ? Always a consideration.

The formation of the Euro to meet the needs of the German economy, and the benefit that continues to accrue to Germany from that, is power-politics. Where you have power-politics, you will have pawns.

The Brits have their historical view of Germany, and a well-justified caution about them does condition that.

Mutter Angela's solo-run on opening the floodgates, shows that German hand-wringing about their disgraceful past makes them do imbecilic things.

The bigger issue is that it is ignorant to call Brexit 'stupid' or 'mad' as so many do, on the grounds of the economic impact. It isn't just the economy, stupid. There are decades of research on that, to the point where some analysts suggest that a re-run of the vote might still be extremely close.

troyzer

Lefty Bicek wrote: »

Well, I really wanted a simple answer as to what the people who made the 'pawn' reference on the IT podcast, gave as their reasons for doing so.

The formation of the Euro to meet the needs of the German economy, and the benefit that continues to accrue to Germany from that, is power-politics. Where you have power-politics, you will have pawns.

The Brits have their historical view of Germany, and a well-justified caution about them does condition that.

Mutter Angela's solo-run on opening the floodgates, shows that German hand-wringing about their disgraceful past makes them do imbecilic things.

The bigger issue is that it is ignorant to call Brexit 'stupid' or 'mad' as so many do, on the grounds of the economic impact. It isn't just the economy, stupid. There are decades of research on that, to the point where some analysts suggest that a re-run of the vote might still be extremely close.

I know this is going to sound lazy but I can't remember the exact details of the argument to rehash them.

If you want, you can listen here. It's pretty good so I recommend people listen to it anyway.

As far as the rest of your comment goes, that's just general criticism of Germany. Whether or not the British had a reason to believe the likes of Volkswagen and BMW could single handedly hand them a good deal is seperate from your argument and is still ludicrous.

Have a listen anyway and tell me what you think.

Lefty Bicek

troyzer wrote: »

I know this is going to sound lazy but I can't remember the exact details of the argument to rehash them.

If you want, you can listen here. It's pretty good so I recommend people listen to it anyway.

As far as the rest of your comment goes, that's just general criticism of Germany. Whether or not the British had a reason to believe the likes of Volkswagen and BMW could single handedly hand them a good deal is seperate from your argument and is still ludicrous.

Have a listen anyway and tell me what you think.

Thanks for the link, I will listen to it this evening and not comment again until I have done so.

Raheem Euro

Theresa May
Chin up old girl. 48 fewer christmas cards to do.

Capt'n Midnight

Aegir wrote: »

why would they need carriers? who is likely to be invading the Falklands in the foreseeable future?

They don't need carriers. A few dozen Harriers on the back of a container ship is enough to put the frighteners up most small countries. Six billion pounds worth of carriers won't scare anyone until they have operational aircraft. (ie. double the original price)

BTW the Falklands now have an airbase. Because of the possibility of oil , and the fishing.


HS2 , the train line that will save 20 minutes from London to Manchester is also likely to double in price to over £100Bn , enough to pay for EU membership for bleedin' ages.

end of the road

Raheem Euro wrote: »

Theresa May
Chin up old girl. 48 fewer christmas cards to do.

just in, she has survived the confidents vote on her leadership. 200 yes 117 no

Capt'n Midnight

end of the road wrote: »

just in, she has survived the confidents vote on her leadership. 200 yes 117 no

117 fewer Christmas card stamps, it all adds up.

TCM

end of the road wrote:

just in, she has survived the confidents vote on her leadership. 200 yes 117 no

Cannot be challenged for another year. However Brexit crash out is imminent, unless there is somehow another referendum. No agreement Brexit will lead to a hard border and sadly a return to the "troubles" as a physical boarder will not be tolerated by hard line republicans.

theguzman

TCM wrote: »

Cannot be challenged for another year. However Brexit crash out is imminent, unless there is somehow another referendum. No agreement Brexit will lead to a hard border and sadly a return to the "troubles" as a physical boarder will not be tolerated by hard line republicans.

No it won't as they have no support either side of the border like they had back in the troubles. I'm sure the British have learned the lesson and are hardly going to go back to the likes of Bloody Sunday making martyrs of a whole new generation which would give the hardliners the support they crave.

A hard border would not be good but I think it would hasten a United Ireland, if the economy here collapsed again and there was trouble and the British Army deployed then it would be back to the troubles as there would be plenty in the south with nothing to do and easily recruited to go North causing trouble however.

Capt'n Midnight

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

BTW the Falklands now have an airbase. Because of the possibility of oil , and the fishing.
.

“Now” has an airbase?

RAF Mount Pleasant was established 30 years ago and was built because a country 500km away keeps threatening to invade every time their government needs to distract its people from their own incompetence. It has **** all to do with oil or fishing.

Aegir

Aegir wrote: »

“Now” has an airbase?

RAF Mount Pleasant was established 30 years ago and was built because a country 500km away keeps threatening to invade every time their government needs to distract its people from their own incompetence. It has **** all to do with oil or fishing.

Don't be giving the British any ideas now..........

Fann Linn

theguzman wrote: »

No it won't as they have no support either side of the border like they had back in the troubles. I'm sure the British have learned the lesson and are hardly going to go back to the likes of Bloody Sunday making martyrs of a whole new generation which would give the hardliners the support they crave.

A hard border would not be good but I think it would hasten a United Ireland, if the economy here collapsed again and there was trouble and the British Army deployed then it would be back to the troubles as there would be plenty in the south with nothing to do and easily recruited to go North causing trouble however.

Do you really think the Btitish have learned lessons?

It was they that played the 'Orange Card' again almost 100 years since they originally played it.

realdanbreen

Folkstonian wrote: »

You’ve been watching too many episodes of Blackadder. The British militwry command were certainly not incompetent in World War One.

You reckon filling poor and young misfortunates full of rum and forcing them up out of the trenches to face certain death was military excellence!

Junkyard Tom

troyzer

May is asking for a 12 month limit to the backstop. What's the point if it's time limited?

The whole point is that it's there in case all else fails to avoid a hard border. It's there as a stick to make sure the Brits can't just give up and walk away from what's going to be a really difficult negotiation.

This idea that May is pleading with the EU because she can't win over Tories is pathetic. If she can't win over Tories on the backstop, how is she going to win them over on an inevitably lopsided trade agreement? The answer is, she can't. Which is the reason why we have the backstop in the first place.

Ironically, the better she's able to cajole her party into agreeing to the backstop, the less likely it seems to me that we'll need it.