The Brexit thread

[kool maudit]

Racism is both a wound constantly opened and scraped by the current imperial order, as well as the thing that would make its most central promises ("one world") untenable, and hence its devil-figure.

This is an interesting embedding-process, as it leaves those discussing the former and the latter divided by gaping and emotive chasms of suspicion and definition-fog. This then clouds the devil and swirls about his figure, making him larger and more furious-seeming.

It is the reality and the concept by which we are most controlled in 2016.

[slimmouse]

The ever thought-provoking James.....

by James Corbett
corbettreport.com
June 20, 2016

Those were the good old days, the halcyon days, the days of one week ago when we could discuss the Brexit campaign as if it were a straightforward choice between the tyranny of the EU and…well, the tyranny of the UK, but tyranny on a smaller scale. And as we discussed last week, the momentum seemed to be firmly on the Brexit side.

That was before the grisly murder of Jo Cox, the pro-EU MP and “rising star” of the Labour party, at the hands of Thomas Mair, who (as we were dutifully told several hundred times over the weekend by the MSM) reportedly screamed “Britain first!” at the scene of the crime, and who gave the name “Death To Traitors, Freedom to Britain” in court. But for every story pointing out Mair’s history of mental illness and identifying the attack as the work of a clearly deranged mind, there are several thousand attempting to tie this crime to those crazy Brexit-ers and their dangerous nationalist ideology. As UKIP leader Nigel Farage concedes, the events of the last few days have taken the wind out of Brexit’s sails.

But don’t worry! Your vote almost certainly won’t count anyway! As mainstream media from Business Insider all the way to the good ol’ Big Brother Corporation are now reporting, the Brexit referendum is not legally binding and the pro-Remain MPs will almost certainly use their sizable majority in the House of Commons (454 to 147) to block any actual moves to leave the EU common market. (The irony here will likely be lost on all but those who realize that “national sovereignty” is no sovereignty at all.)

So what does all of this mean for the would-be Brexiters? Is there any chance at all that the Brexit campaign will actually be able to succeed in seceding from the EU superstate? And if not, is there any chance that the referendum will at least spark the fires of secession and decentralization in other parts of the world (like Texas)?

Let’s use this post as an open thread to keep up to date with the Brexit referendum news and to debate the best way forward for Brits who are concerned about freedom.

Link https://www.corbettreport.com/brexit-open-thread/

An open thread discussion then follows, which looks quite interesting

[82_28]

[tapitsbo]

Mass immigration and the capitalism of the EU Jack is talking about are inextricable, of course protected states with very strict borders are also integral to the plans of the parties that benefit from endorsing unrestricted immigration to countries like Germany and the USA.

The likes of UKIP and FN are not the only alternative to the status quo. Of course the leave vote vastly dwarfed support for any parties explicitly representing "indigenous" brits...

"Racism" might be central to the conflict taking shape here but so is culture, class, geopolitics... How else to explain the varying rhetoric Mexican or Pakistani elites adopt domestically vs. that employed by their representatives in Britain or the the US?

One lesson to be learnt from current events is that the ostensibly universally assimilating milieux of left liberal Londoners on the one hand or multi-ethnic Islamists in Syria on the other have no problem targeting and excluding inconvenient ethnic or religious groups...

[stefano]

Rupert Murdoch, always there to pour oil on troubled waters, whips up the base against Parliament and puts some anticipatory pressure on the next PM:

Brussels thinks we're BLUFFING: EU diplomats say they don't believe Britain will ever formally trigger Brexit despite referendum

After referendum vote on Friday, Britain has to notify EU of plan to leave
David Cameron said process will start once a new Tory leader is appointed
But a senior figure in Brussels has said he thinks UK will stay in the union

By Richard Spillett for MailOnline

Top figures in Brussels don't believe Britain will go through with leaving the EU, with diplomats questioning whether the UK will ever trigger the formal divorce process.

A country leaving the union must formally notify the European Council, setting the clock ticking on a two-year period to negotiate its split.

But a senior EU diplomat said last night that he believes the UK will never actual embark on the move and will end up staying in the union.

'We want London to trigger Article 50 now, to have clarity. I expect, as we can't force them, for them to take their time,' the diplomat said.

'And I would not exclude, it's my personal belief, that they may never do it.'

The official did not specify if he believed Britain would avoid leaving by holding a new referendum, or simply dragging out the process to extract a better divorce deal.

But the diplomat, who refused to be named, insisted all such decisions were up to London.

David Cameron has said he will resign by October and that it is for his successor to launch the process and lead the negotiations.

Despite growing pressure from EU leaders, Cameron was not expected to trigger Article 50 at an EU summit on Tuesday, another senior EU official said.

Britain's EU partners believed the notification should come by Christmas at the latest.

'There cannot be any kind of negotiation with Britain before there is a notification.'

Meanwhile the EU had received 'thousands' of emails from Britons since Friday saying they were unhappy with the result, including some from people who had voted to leave the EU and were now regretting it.

'It's the first time after a decade of hate mail from Britain, we are flooded with love emails,' said the diplomat.

It comes amid fears British and European politicians are plotting to prevent the UK from leaving the EU.

Tony Blair, Nicola Sturgeon, some pro-Remain MPs and a senior German official said yesterday that a rethink was needed on the consequences of quitting the Brussels club.

Blair said a second referendum on the UK’s membership should not be ruled out while SNP leader Sturgeon warned Scottish MSPs have to give their ‘legislative consent’ to leaving and she would advise them to veto it.

Iain Duncan Smith said the Europhiles were ‘bad losers’ yesterday.

‘There is a lot of bad losing here from the Europhiles,’ the former Tory leader told the Mail. ‘This was one of the biggest turnouts since the war and there is no justification for a second referendum whatsoever.’

[SonicG]

This song may make a good soundtrack to the coming shit-show...The lyrics seem prescient regarding Brexit...and it might be Iommi's last great riff...



"The Mob Rules"

Close the city and tell the people that something's coming to call
Death and darkness are rushing forward to take a bite from the wall, oh

You've nothing to say
They're breaking away
If you listen to fools...
The Mob Rules
The Mob Rules

Kill the spirit and you'll be blinded, the end is always the same
Play with fire, you burn your fingers and lose your hold of the flame, oh

It's over, it's done
The end is begun
If you listen to fools...
The Mob Rules

You've nothing to say
Oh, They're breaking away
If you listen to fools...

Break the circle and stop the movement, the wheel is thrown to the ground
Just remember it might start rolling and take you right back around

You're all fools!
The Mob Rules!

[stefano]

Here's Boris Johnson. Says the right things, but sounds very confident he can negotiate a free goods market without accepting some EU authority over trade rules. I doubt that'll be possible. And he downplays the very real role that resentment of immigration played - but he would. I also reckon there's more appetite in Scotland for a fresh independence vote than he "detects".

I cannot stress too much that Britain is part of Europe – and always will be

Boris Johnson

This EU referendum has been the most extraordinary political event of our lifetime. Never in our history have so many people been asked to decide a big question about the nation’s future. Never have so many thought so deeply, or wrestled so hard with their consciences, in an effort to come up with the right answer.

It has been a gruelling campaign in which we have seen divisions between family and friends and colleagues – sometimes entirely amicable, sometimes, alas, less so. In the end, there was a clear result. More than 17 million people voted to leave the EU – more than have ever assented to any proposition in our democratic history. Some now cast doubt on their motives, or even on their understanding of what was at stake.

It is said that those who voted Leave were mainly driven by anxieties about immigration. I do not believe that is so. After meeting thousands of people in the course of the campaign, I can tell you that the number one issue was control – a sense that British democracy was being undermined by the EU system, and that we should restore to the people that vital power: to kick out their rulers at elections, and to choose new ones.

I believe that millions of people who voted Leave were also inspired by the belief that Britain is a great country, and that outside the job-destroying coils of EU bureaucracy we can survive and thrive as never before. I think that they are right in their analysis, and right in their choice. And yet we who agreed with this majority verdict must accept that it was not entirely overwhelming.

There were more than 16 million who wanted to remain. They are our neighbours, brothers and sisters who did what they passionately believe was right. In a democracy majorities may decide but everyone is of equal value. We who are part of this narrow majority must do everything we can to reassure the Remainers. We must reach out, we must heal, we must build bridges – because it is clear that some have feelings of dismay, and of loss, and confusion.

I believe that this climate of apprehension is understandable, given what people were told during the campaign, but based on a profound misunderstanding about what has really taken place. At home and abroad, the negative consequences are being wildly overdone, and the upside is being ignored. The stock market is way above its level of last autumn; the pound remains higher than it was in 2013 and 2014.

The economy is in good hands. Most sensible people can see that Bank of England governor Mark Carney has done a superb job – and now that the referendum is over, he will be able to continue his work without being in the political firing-line. Thanks in large part to the reforms put in place by David Cameron and George Osborne, the fundamentals of the UK economy are outstandingly strong – a dynamic and outward-looking economy with an ever-improving skills base, and with a big lead in some of the key growth sectors of the 21st century. We should be incredibly proud and positive about the UK, and what it can now achieve. And we will achieve those things together, with all four nations united. We had one Scotland referendum in 2014, and I do not detect any real appetite to have another one soon; and it goes without saying that we are much better together in forging a new and better relationship with the EU – based on free trade and partnership, rather than a federal system.

I cannot stress too much that Britain is part of Europe, and always will be. There will still be intense and intensifying European cooperation and partnership in a huge number of fields: the arts, the sciences, the universities, and on improving the environment. EU citizens living in this country will have their rights fully protected, and the same goes for British citizens living in the EU.

British people will still be able to go and work in the EU; to live; to travel; to study; to buy homes and to settle down. As the German equivalent of the CBI – the BDI – has very sensibly reminded us, there will continue to be free trade, and access to the single market. Britain is and always will be a great European power, offering top-table opinions and giving leadership on everything from foreign policy to defence to counter-terrorism and intelligence-sharing – all the things we need to do together to make our world safer.

The only change – and it will not come in any great rush – is that the UK will extricate itself from the EU’s extraordinary and opaque system of legislation: the vast and growing corpus of law enacted by a European Court of Justice from which there can be no appeal. This will bring not threats, but golden opportunities for this country – to pass laws and set taxes according to the needs of the UK.

Yes, the Government will be able to take back democratic control of immigration policy, with a balanced and humane points-based system to suit the needs of business and industry. Yes, there will be a substantial sum of money which we will no longer send to Brussels, but which could be used on priorities such as the NHS. Yes, we will be able to do free trade deals with the growth economies of the world in a way that is currently forbidden.

There is every cause for optimism; a Britain rebooted, reset, renewed and able to engage with the whole world. This was a seismic campaign whose lessons must be learnt by politicians at home and abroad. We heard the voices of millions of the forgotten people, who have seen no real increase in their incomes, while FTSE-100 chiefs now earn 150 times the average pay of their employees. We must pursue actively the one-nation policies that are among David Cameron’s fine legacy, such as his campaigns on the Living Wage and Life Chances. There is no doubt that many were speaking up for themselves.

But they were also speaking up for democracy, and the verdict of history will be that the British people got it right.

[American Dream]

Brexit was fueled by irrational xenophobia, not real economic grievances


Brexit is xenophobia, and we should react as such

UKIP leader Nigel Farage

Over the past 20 years, the percentage of Britons ranking "immigration/race relations" as among the country’s most important issues has gone from near zero percent to about 45 percent. Today, 77 percent of Brits believe that immigration levels should be reduced.

The best explanation is that Britain’s xenophobia over immigration is being activated. They see immigrants around them, and they start looking for ways to prevent more from coming in. It’s not about assessing the harm immigrants are doing to Britain; it’s about being terrified that they’re changing the "character" of Britain to be more "foreign."

You can see this fear in the the language of anti-immigrant campaigners like Farage. Much of it is downright bigoted against immigrants of all kinds, from Muslims to Eastern Europeans.

Farage has called some Muslims a "fifth column living within our country, who hate us and want to kill us." He once warned Britain of a "Romanian crime wave" sweeping the nation. His party officially debuted this poster to warn of the dangers of letting in more migrants, which was actually reported to the police for resembling Nazi propaganda:



This is not the language of a rational immigration skeptic. It’s the language of a fearmonger.

The rhetoric became so heated that some native-born, non-white Britons are now worrying that xenophobia whipped up by Farage and others will end up targeting them.

"After an appalling referendum campaign, dominated by daily front-page scare stories regarding immigration, we’re wondering if people will again be questioning if we should be going back to our ‘own country,’" Joseph Harker, the Guardian’s deputy opinion editor (and a black man), writes. "It seems only a matter of time before the intolerance that has been unleashed, reinforced and normalised, looks for the old, easy targets of people who look different. People like me."

Its perhaps understandable why xenophobic rhetoric appealed to some Brexit supporters. Resolution’s Bell found that even though pro-Brexit voters weren't from places that had ​recently gotten poorer since the mass immigration wave, they were from places that had ​historically been poor — going back to the 1980s. These people have good reasons to be angry about the status quo. They’re looking for someone to blame, and immigrants are an easy scapegoat.

But the fact that their bigotry is comprehensible doesn’t make it any less bigoted. Nor does it excuse the politicians who catered to it — nay, encouraged it — over the course of the debate over Brexit.

More at: http://www.vox.com/2016/6/25/12029786/b ... xenophobia

[Searcher08]

George Soros: "Brexit Makes EU Disintegration Irreversible"
Tyler Durden's picture
by Tyler Durden
Jun 25, 2016 11:48 PM


Just four days ago, the "big guns" when George Soros wrote a Guardian op-ed titled "The Brexit crash will make all of you poorer – be warned" in which he said that "as opinion polls on the referendum result fluctuate, I want to offer a clear set of facts, based on my six decades of experience in financial markets, to help voters understand the very real consequences of a vote to leave the EU." We promptly countered that Soros' set of "facts" may be clouded by his far greater equity stake in interests around Europe, and the globe, which would be drastically impacted by not only a Brexit, but by a European Union which is suddenly on the rocks. That's precisely what happened when, as we wrote earlier, the world’s 400 richest people lost $127.4 billion Friday following the Brexit vote.

Soros was among them.

However, seemingly unhappy that his generously altruistic warning was so roundly ignored by the peasants, not to mention his sudden concern about the future of the European Union whose collapse would also destroy the premise behind Soros' Open Society globalization initiative, the 85-year-old billionaire has decided to follow up with a case of sour grapes and go all in, making another forecast - since his first one was so clearly rejected - and in what may end up roiling markets even more, moments ago Soros said in his second op-ed of the week that the "catastrophic scenario that many feared has materialized, making the disintegration of the EU practically irreversible. Britain eventually may or may not be relatively better off than other countries by leaving the EU, but its economy and people stand to suffer significantly in the short to medium term. The pound plunged to its lowest level in more than three decades immediately after the vote, and financial markets worldwide are likely to remain in turmoil as the long, complicated process of political and economic divorce from the EU is negotiated. The consequences for the real economy will be comparable only to the financial crisis of 2007-2008."

But while Soros is lukewarm on the UK, his forecast about Europe is far more dire.

But the implications for Europe could be far worse. Tensions among member states have reached a breaking point, not only over refugees, but also as a result of exceptional strains between creditor and debtor countries within the eurozone. At the same time, weakened leaders in France and Germany are now squarely focused on domestic problems. In Italy, a 10% fall in the stock market following the Brexit vote clearly signals the country’s vulnerability to a full-blown banking crisis – which could well bring the populist Five Star Movement, which has just won the mayoralty in Rome, to power as early as next year.

Which, incidentally, is what we warned earlier today when saying that "it appears that the trade now is not to sell Sterling, at least not anymore: one should have done that at 1.50 when everyone was wrong about the Brexit outcome based on manipulated polls as we explained ahead of the event. If anything, sterling will rebound following the positive boost to the UK economy following the devaluation. It's the long EUR trade we would be far more concerned about here."

One can be absolutely confident that Soros, who as revealed earlier this month is short the markets, is very, very short the Euro.

[coffin_dodger]

It's not just racist bigotry. The Brexiters I've spoken to were, in the main, concerned with big government and protesting against elites.
Stirring the racist pot at this time is not helpful and will only lead to further diviseness and increased tension amongst a whole heap of people that are already nervous. Rationality can be absent in these situations.

[MacCruiskeen]

Over in the Labour party, at a time when the Tories are rudderless and leaderless and have as much idea of where they’re headed as a kitten in a sack on a canal side, you might just think that the People’s Party would be poised to step in as the voice of reason and the defenders of the working classes. But instead they’re far too preoccupied with playing stick the knife into Jeremy Corbyn. This attempt at a Blairite coup may or may not be related to the uncomfortable fact that the Chilcot report on the Iraq war is due to be published in a fortnight. So my money is on may.

https://weegingerdug.wordpress.com/2016 ... y-britain/

[JackRiddler]

Yeah, pretty amazing how those steeped in the neoliberalism have learned the lessons of "never let a crisis go to waste" and move especially quickly to exploit the crises for which they are responsible. So that even the demented punditocracy found that "neoliberalism has failed" in 2008, whereupon the only acceptable response was doubling down on the neoliberalism.

No one is more responsible for the Brexit vote than the Blairites who continued the Thatcherist program and created the conditions for an overwhelming anti-establishment vote (even if the vote itself was misguided and basically on the wrong question, UK asked to vote on the obsessive internal split of the Tories).

These fakers of conscience were preparing to wage suicide attacks against Corbyn from the beginning. They saw his election as an affront to their elitist privilege and the neoliberal creed. Brexit was just the opportunity to pretend to have an issue. The idea that the Leave vote was Corbyn's fault more than their own is absurd. Labour voters went for Remain by 68-31 (Tory voter majority for Brexit). How much higher would it have had to be before it was not Corbyn's fault? There's nothing Corbyn can do to satisfy these fuckers other than kill himself.

It's good to see these people go now rather than exploding a leftist government under Corbyn. He should survive the parliamentary challenge (the tough part because that's where this brood is concentrated, they have far less sway among the members), and if it comes to a vote of the members he will prevail handsomely. That is probably why they will not take it that far, if they can't topple him through this present uprising of the parliamentary faction they know they'll lose an actual vote.

With a bit of luck the early part of Prime Minister Corbyn's tenure will also see the conviction and life imprisonment of the war criminal, Tony Blair.

[coffin_dodger]

the conviction and life imprisonment of the war criminal, Tony Blair.

Good Lord! - we have common ground after all, Jack.

[MacCruiskeen]

The one piece of good news in this whole fiasco is that the Pigfaced Pigfucker has resigned and will now have to scrape a living on his sizable stock portfolio, his extensive property holdings, his rents, his inheritance, his wife's fortune, his lucrative sinecures as a member of a dozen boards, and his gigantic international speakers' fees.



Which porker will replace him? An actual pig would be a very distinct improvement.



"The Hamptons are not a defensible position." - Mark Blyth, June 2016.

[MacCruiskeen]

The people of Scotland should head for the border en masse and saw through the island in a straight line from Gretna to Berwick. Then just row the whole lump up to Iceland and apply for collective asylum there.

We have the technology (Made in China).