kuro68k wrote: » The British government is going to take it right to the cliff edge and hope that someone else compromises. Of course they have their excuses already lined up if no-one does, only real question is who they will blame.
briany wrote: » Norway deal? If you're a Brexiteer, then that's even worse than the current proposal, surely. At least the current deal restricts immigration. Maybe I'm being cynical, but I believe that controlling immigration was the primary thrust of the whole thing among ordinary British Brexit voters. Accepting the FFs will be completely unacceptable to all but the very softest Brexiteers. Regarding the Irish border, the GFA + Ireland remaining in the EU + wanting to maintain the integrity of the UK makes a clean Brexit impossible. One of these would need to go.
10000maniacs wrote: » There has to be a greater than 50% consensus in a referendum for it to work so therefore 3 questions are out. So it has to be 1: Mays deal or 2: Stay in the EU. But this does not cover the people who want a hard brexit. This is why I think referenda are so undemocratic. They are at best a blunt crude instrument and at worst lethal, dangerous and divisory. The first brexit vote was undemocratic too and should never have happened for such a complicated question. But there is no way of putting the genie back into the bottle now. Civil war without the ammunition for the forseeable future.
Water John wrote: » Publicly it's known that 23 have submitted letters. More may have done so and not said it. Do people believe that there are 25 shy MPs who have submitted letters? If the 48 number is achieved, will they get 100 MPs to back it? As some previous poster said, they would need that at least to have any chance.
sink wrote: » It's more than that, West Germany didn't have much of a military because the allied powers gave it a better option. The economic reforms and investment initiated by the Marshall plan follwed up by the ECSC and the EEC-EU led directly to the 'Wirtschaftswunder' or economic miracle. It's factories were busy building Volkswagens and selling them to the west, bringing lots of employment and rising living standards. Switching production to war machinery and the trade embargo imposed by the allied power which inevitably would follow, would have tanked the economy (no pun intended) and that is the main reason Germany was never interested in war with it's old enemies again. It's not really driven by the EU as much as it is driven by the former Warsaw pact states themselves. Their primary foreign policy objective is to never be dominated by Russia again. The most committed NATO members today are Poland and the Blatics for a reason. The CIS is a paltry attempt at economic union. Russia's main trade partners are still the EU and China, with the CIS being minuscule in comparison. I often think about what a missed opportunity it was. Imagine what the world would be like today if Russia was an EU and NATO member. There probably wouldn't be Trump, Brexit, the Syrian Civil War or the Iran-Saudi Arabia hegemony destabilising the middle east. The EU would share a border with China and North Korea and have a Pacific coastline.
sink wrote: » You've said it yourself, 'potential aggressor' is the key term, it's impossible for EU members to go to war with one another. They're not 'potential aggressors' precisely because of their economic co-reliance as a result of integration. The Soviet Union and now Russia is not an EU member and does not share deep economic and political integration with the rest of Europe and so it remains as the only potential aggressor for that very reason. If after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the EU and the US set up a Marshall Plan for Russia with the explicit aim of integrating Russia into the western economic system and therefor binding its potential prosperity and success with the rest of Europe we would not be in the mess we are today. Instead what happened was a strategy of economic shock therapy in which state assets in Russia were sold of to the future oligarchy for pennies on the dollar. With little assistance from the west the Russian economy completely collapsed and people couldn't afford to feed themselves or to heat their homes in the cold dark Russian winter. This allowed a strong man 'Putin' to take power and the rest is history. Had leaders in the west in the early 90s had the foresight we would be in a very different world today and NATO would be truly obsolete.
RobMc59 wrote: » Your assertion that the current global situation is the fault of the west not taking control of post soviet russia is bizarre -in addition to this russia is actively trying to cause as much mayhem and their insidious meddling,whether it's trying to undermine the EU or NATO makes them the pariah they are
sink wrote: » Putin has said many time the the fall of the Soviet Union and the ensuing chaos was the greatest tragedy ever to befall Russia and he blames the west for it. This led him directly to his current foreign policy agenda of causing mayhem and insidious meddling in order to divide and weaken the west.
Rhineshark wrote: » It was terrible as used in this context. Wrong approach, horrible set up (four countries*, three of which together aren't as large as the fourth) on a 50+1 question, wrong questions - oh and sneakily changing the rules on the electorate.There is a place for them, particularly in small, relatively homogenous - preferably with a decent level of education - states - such as Ireland or Switzerland. But there's good reason almost all large groups (I.e. nations) move away from direct democracy (not all to do with corrupt power-takers either, not that that isn't also a reason!).
fash wrote: » Please explain how the proposed agreement is not a massive victory for the UK: Access to the Customs Union with unprecedentedly limited rules, which GB can leave at any time it chooses simply limiting the SM/CU to Northern Ireland; Precedent setting inclusion of future trade agreement aspects into the Withdrawal agreement; Precedent setting minimal checks for access to the SM (currently between NI and GB - but possible between UK and SM); It can even get NI out of the SM/CU by coming up with any other solution which will achieve a soft border and got the EU to concede that it must make good faith efforts to agree such a solution and that it subject to third party determination outside issues of EU law; There is even the possibility that the UK can engineer a situation to dump NI (which let us not forget is a parasite which costs significantly more than the red bus NHS promise) onto the EU if it wants; Special status for Northern Ireland allowing privileged access to the SM which will undoubtedly lead to greater FDI; A "settlement of accounts" which is a fraction of what the EU wanted and that spread out over years; and No more freedom of movement. Seriously, why this that not considered an spectacular victory by the UK as opposed to "humiliation"? I understand that Boris etc. wants to pretend it is bad to allow him to boo from the sidelines and why the DUP, but why otherwise is it considered bad?
cryptocurrency wrote: » Because they will be subject to EU laws, rules and rulings without helping form them. The would be accepting a deal that they are not allowed to leave on their own. They would not have met the promises in the elections of leaving the SM,CU and ECJ and this talk of an EU army and tax harmonization is against the national security interests of the UK. The last 24hrs has been interesting and the next 48 more so. The wagons are circling on May. My worry now is Leo has doubled down to please his masters in Brussels and has now put Ireland in a bad position if his plan fails. Bertie or Enda would never have been as foolish admit this man
devnull wrote: » Just watching the interview with Corbyn on Sky News - scroll back to 9am here:https://news.sky.com/watch-live Basically what we've gleened so far, is that a second referendum might be an option in the future and that there might be a general election (despite it being pointed out how unlikely that is), he will go back to the EU to renegotiate the backstop and other parts of the deal as it can easily be done in 3 months because they need the UK as much as the UK needs them and therefore even the stuff the EU say is not possible they will be able to achieve. He's pretty much as deluded as the Tories, I'm afraid, it tells you all about the quality of politicians at Westminster at the moment, the worst group of Tory politicians continue to be allowed to carry on with little realistic challenge, since the leader of the opposition continues to give them an easy ride rather than taking them on. He's also said he's not read all of the paper and pretty much displaying a lack of leadership and fantasy spin, when he said that he didn't know how he would vote in a second ref.
cryptocurrency wrote: » The last 24hrs has been interesting and the next 48 more so. The wagons are circling on May. My worry now is Leo has doubled down to please his masters in Brussels and has now put Ireland in a bad position if his plan fails. Bertie or Enda would never have been as foolish admit this man
Imreoir2 wrote: » Taoiseach Varadkar does not have masters in Brissels, he is a head of state of one of the EU member states. He has an equal seat on the European Council, to which the EU Commission is responsible. While other heads of government/state have an equal position to our Taoiseach in the EU, no one has a superior position.
theguzman wrote: » We are a Vassal state, occupied by the Franco/German EU empire, Varadkar and co. are our quisling Government implementing law from Brussels, we have no say in EU matters and makeup 0.89% of the EU population. We are in the exact same position today as 100 years ago but instead of British Rule we are under EU rule, an EU Army is looming large to occupy countries should any other country try a Brexit style stunt. Germany is currently striving to attain a Nuclear bomb and with an EU Army they will achieve this by controlling the French stockpile. The EU promote migration and social engineering to ensure the population remains docile and obedient and not one shot has to be fired. We have come a far way from a trading agreement. The EU has imperial ambitions and this is becoming clearer every day.
Rhineshark wrote: » cryptocurrency wrote: » Because they will be subject to EU laws, rules and rulings without helping form them. The would be accepting a deal that they are not allowed to leave on their own. They would not have met the promises in the elections of leaving the SM,CU and ECJ and this talk of an EU army and tax harmonization is against the national security interests of the UK. The last 24hrs has been interesting and the next 48 more so. The wagons are circling on May. My worry now is Leo has doubled down to please his masters in Brussels and has now put Ireland in a bad position if his plan fails. Bertie or Enda would never have been as foolish admit this man That last line is one parroted by Brexiters a lot. Rare enough to see it on an Irish forum as we very well know Kenny and his gov got the question on the table and got it made one of the vital points that need sorting in the WA. Hell, Kenny's last act as Taoiseach involving Brexit preparations was ensuring that shoukd a UI come about, NI woukd be able to accede to the EU easily. This was his plan that Varadkar continued. This is widely and publically known. To say that Kenny would never have carried out the plan as Varadkar has been doing is risible and seriously, only the Brexiters think so. And they don't share a reality with anyone else, let alone facts. Grant you Bertie as he had nothing to do with it. But given his comments since, I suspect you'd be on a hiding to nothing expecting him not to have defended Ireland in the same way.
An Ciarraioch wrote: » Indeed, as recently as last Sunday's Week In Politics, Bertie paid tribute to the Government's handling of the negotiations.
theguzman wrote: » This website promotes Irish jobs to Europeans, will pay them to move to Ireland flights and one month accommodation and will pay Irish employers a €1,000 subsidy for to hire a non-Irish worker instead of an Irish citizen. Like the Plantations of Ireland in the 1600's migration is being used as a weapon against the native population to cement political control.
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