Brexit discussion thread VIII (Please read OP before posting)

This is brilliant - it is a description of the hard line Brexiteers who even now think anything except a no-deal is betrayal.

A quote from it -

(One Tory Brexiteer describes the three men thus: “Mark Francois: idiot, Andrew Bridgen: 75% idiot, Steve Baker: sometimes lets his emotions cloud his judgment”).

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/04/brexit-brexiteers-brincels-ultras-war-martyrdom

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

Gearing up for Chancellor Merkel in the Pheonix Park at Farmleigh.


Apparently there will be some tough talking on Ireland's preparedness for no deal and how we intend on protecting the single market.

As there should be because either our government are grossly under-prepared or as many here seem oddly ok with they have been telling barefaced lies to their constituents in a game of politics with a foreign nation. Strange when the ERG do it pretending to support the DUP and then revealing it was all political games people are more angry here than when our own govt are at it.

Water John wrote: »

Yvette Cooper's Bill looks like it will sail through the House of Lords. The lady has great gumption. This is the second time she has made a key intervention that will have scraped through. Letwin and herself were thinking 48 hours ago it was a long shot.

Jolyon Maugham wrote an article in The Guardian about it. He's not particularly enthusiastic about it. And that's putting it mildly. How he puts it is that the bill requires a motion to be passed by parliament compelling the PM to seek an extension of a duration of her choosing, but which parliament can also disagree with. If this fails, it's dead in the water.

If it passes, it opens another can of worms. The EU could come back quickly with a counter offer like January 2020 and EuroParl elections or even agreement without conditions but a different date, then the bill is silent. And now we're at Thursday and the bill suggests that she goes back to parliament for another extension request which is clearly ridiculous with a day to go.

In short, any different date or added conditions from the EU ends the bill's effectiveness because of the time constraints. Hard brexit is still very likely.

prawnsambo wrote: »

Jolyon Maugham wrote an article in The Guardian about it. He's not particularly enthusiastic about it. And that's putting it mildly. How he puts it is that the bill requires a motion to be passed by parliament compelling the PM to seek an extension of a duration of her choosing, but which parliament can also disagree with. If this fails, it's dead in the water.

If it passes, it opens another can of worms. The EU could come back quickly with a counter offer like January 2020 and EuroParl elections or even agreement without conditions but a different date, then the bill is silent. And now we're at Thursday and the bill suggests that she goes back to parliament for another extension request which is clearly ridiculous with a day to go.

In short, any different date or added conditions from the EU ends the bill's effectiveness because of the time constraints. Hard brexit is still very likely.

Plus it has the same ambiguity problems a lot of the indicative votes with almost majorities. As soon as you try and flesh out the details you will lose your majority as some will not be happy with the direction it is taking. They need all of last night's yes voters to be unanimous in what type of extension they want. Which I highly doubt they will be.

prawnsambo wrote: »

Well that's a good stretch. The silence on what happens at the border is to prevent it becoming a political football on the other side of the Irish Sea. But Revenue were on the radio today talking about their preparations. And it's all happening at the ports.

It wasn't silence. The govt clearly stated they had NO plan for a border. Whether you are ok with politicians lying to their constituents because the end justifies the means is a personal matter I guess.

ShooterSF wrote: »

It wasn't silence. The govt clearly stated they had NO plan for a border. Whether you are ok with politicians lying to their constituents because the end justifies the means is a personal matter I guess.

That depends on whether no plan for a border also means no plan for dealing with cross border trade. Because they are not the same.

Bambi wrote: »

It's embarrassing, like most of the guff The Guardian print now, The Guardian is now basically the lefty equivalent of the Torygraph with forays into Daily Mail levels of purse clutching and hysteria

It's an opinion piece, not an op ed. And for the most part it's based on what colleagues have said about a particular set of people, so it's opinions of the Tories. Who are not lefties.

His Bercow is pretty brutal.

theguzman wrote: »

They'd badly want to clean that ivy and rotten creepers off the front columns,

My first thoughts as well when I seen the pic

ShooterSF wrote: »

It wasn't silence. The govt clearly stated they had NO plan for a border..

I suspect you need to listen to the precise statements made more carefully.
Just because someone is not planning to do something- does not mean that one has not fully prepared for it.

I am sure many people who have guns do not plan to use them- but are prepared to use them is necessary.

ShooterSF wrote: »

As there should be because either our government are grossly under-prepared or as many here seem oddly ok with they have been telling barefaced lies to their constituents in a game of politics with a foreign nation. Strange when the ERG do it pretending to support the DUP and then revealing it was all political games people are more angry here than when our own govt are at it.

I don't think the Irish government should be held to account in any shape or form for any consequences arising from this debacle. If Enda Kenny was the one who triggered an Irexit, then yes, but the Gov are blameless.

seamus wrote: »

Can't believe there are still some people persisting with this British nonsense that the Germans are driving the bus and Merkel is over here to tell Leo off like a bold schoolchild.

If you've been paying any attention to print, radio & TV over the last couple of months, you'll have seen plenty of government ads about being "Brexit-ready".

I imagine if European leaders were unhappy with no deal preparations in Ireland, Leo would have had his talking to long before 5 days after the original deadline.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/apr/03/grassroots-facebook-brexit-ads-secretly-run-by-staff-of-lynton-crosby-firm?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Quite the story here.

A series of hugely influential Facebook advertising campaigns that appear to be separate grassroots movements for a no-deal Brexit are secretly overseen by employees of Sir Lynton Crosby’s lobbying company and a former adviser to Boris Johnson, documents seen by the Guardian reveal.

The mysterious groups, which have names such as Mainstream Network and Britain’s Future, appear to be run independently by members of the public and give no hint that they are connected. But in reality they share an administrator who works for Crosby’s CTF Partners and have spent as much as £1m promoting sophisticated targeted adverts aimed at heaping pressure on individual MPs to vote for a hard Brexit.

All the apparent groundswell of support "hardening" public opinion towards no-deal, all the organic support...was none of the kind.
The fact that a nonm-grassroots/organic group called "Britain Future" hiding behind an average Tory called Tim Dawson was pouring money into online campaigns was not brand new news.

The fact that all of these groups were in fact pushed by ONE organisation is massive.

Putting the likes of Tim Dawson as head actually complies with Facebook's new "transparancy" rule about and shows it up to be as useless as it is: The true backers are still invisible.

But according to the documents, almost all the major pro-Brexit Facebook “grassroots” advertising campaigns in the UK share the same page admins or advertisers

Lynton Crosby, behind Tories in 2015 and Johnson's successful Mayoral campaigns.

The "Mainstream media" group came to notice for the fake grassroots "Chuck Chequers" campaign. All that stuff about George Soros funding Brexit was them too.

Leaked documents have revealed how it boasts of its ability to run fake online grassroots campaigns that encourage users to join an online community and then be “mobilised to communicate directly with key decision-makers

Anyone who engaged with the online Fakery was given an option to contact email their local MP. The MP would then be under the impression that there is a grassroots ground-swell for no-deal.

Remember MPs and other key players are targetted in other ways and from other angles.

(Ill put another post about how the PM herself has been targetted this way with special mention to Nick Boles mentioned and Theresa May’s director of communications, Robbie Gibb)