Psychoactive Substances: Rolling UK Politics in The Neo-Con Era

He's been saying that for days if not weeks. Ditto on 'British Bill of Rights'

petition's now hit 1m signatures.
Vaguely wondering what the outcome of a theoretical second referendum today would be. Not sure much would change.

I saw Ian Paisley jr was encouraging anyone who qualified to get dual citizenship if they could yesterday. Not sure the big man would have approved.

Strange days.

that jack of kent piece is exactly what i've been thinking. i can't see a brexit actually happening, and this bit is so so so otm:

The fact is that the longer the Article 50 notification is put off, the greater the chance it will never be made at all. This is because the longer the delay, the more likely it will be that events will intervene or excuses will be contrived.

Haven't heard much from Gove have we? Or I've missed it. Getting an impression that some Brexit politicians are shitting themselves tbh.

michael gove was speaking on a platform yesterday with boris johnson when he said we wouldn't do anything hasty along with their friend gisela stuart

This is not some policy that will not be implemented because its too bureaucratic or difficult to do so. I can see it being triggered unless Boris campaigns in a general election on a platform of 'lets use this to negotiate our position'. But I don't see Brussels as giving enough of a shit to give any concessions, and if they do other countries can set-up their own referendums. Not something that club would allow.

Vaguely wondering what the outcome of a theoretical second referendum today would be. Not sure much would change.

There is a vague sense of 'what have we done' from a small constituency of the Leave voters that has been bought on by Cameron's swift resignation. You can only laugh.

idk, Juncker and Schäuble have pretty much told Britain to get on with it. Cameron didn't want to be the one to push the button so has deferred it for three months so someone else has to. Europe would probably want to keep the UK as part of the EU but not at any cost and not if it means three or four years of uncertainty as the country makes it's mind up whether it's serious or not. I can't see any Tory leader not promising exit from the EU getting elected, any real reason why a second referendum would be politically viable or how it could fail to solidify UKIP as a serious threat to the Conservatives if it came about.

What is clear, though, is that the Leave camp, which isn't exactly formed of the best and brightest to begin with, have absolutely no idea what they are going to do next. The calls to avoid hasty decisions are because they haven't got a strategy beyond 'leave the EU' not necessarily because they are having second thoughts.

I'm seeing a fair number of the IndyRef No lot changing their minds quite vocally. But early days like Cozen says xp

early days indeed but feel fairly positive that the big question mark no placed over scotland's future eu membership was the major deciding factor for at least 12% of no voters

What is clear, though, is that the Leave camp, which isn't exactly formed of the best and brightest to begin with, have absolutely no idea what they are going to do next. The calls to avoid hasty decisions are because they haven't got a strategy beyond 'leave the EU' not necessarily because they are having second thoughts.

and also, "leaving the eu" in actual legal fact seems to be a p wildly protracted political process rather than an action. it is fascinating bureaucracy, if you can put aside the horror.

given a ladder, who's not going to want to climb out of the pool as it slowly fills up with shit? the rest of us will only be able to roll up our trousers and hold our noses

I think there's a load of buyers remorse in England. They are realising all the benefits of Europe they'll lose. They just need a face-saving way of backtracking.

Powell was OTM last night. Need an election, need a party campaigning to stay in or re-run the vote at least.

that jack of kent piece is exactly what i've been thinking. i can't see a brexit actually happening, and this bit is so so so otm:

The fact is that the longer the Article 50 notification is put off, the greater the chance it will never be made at all. This is because the longer the delay, the more likely it will be that events will intervene or excuses will be contrived.

― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Saturday, 25 June 2016 10:56 Bookmark

gonna need a little bit more than "It is not impossible to imagine that"

interesting stats (sorry if already linked)

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-voted-and-why/#more-14746

A majority of those working full-time or part-time voted to remain in the EU; most of those not working voted to leave. More than half of those retired on a private pension voted to leave, as did two thirds of those retired on a state pension.

White voters voted to leave the EU by 53% to 47%. Two thirds (67%) of those describing themselves as Asian voted to remain, as did three quarters (73%) of black voters. Nearly six in ten (58%) of those describing themselves as Christian voted to leave; seven in ten Muslims voted to remain.

think it has more than that. every minute that passes, the thing that parliament eventually votes on becomes separate to the referendum. the more there's a "deal" or anything else attached, the easier it becomes to shoot it down without it even being a case of denying the electorate their wishes.

xpost

like - we know people voted for brexit, but what brexit? how can we ever agree about that?

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Ill-vs-Good-768x757.jpg

Hell the nuttier Tories can shoot it down because whatever deal reached does deny the voters their wishes

well, exactly. it's going to be chaos. guess you'd have to worry about brexit sustaining a long and bureaucratic conceptual defeat and some more virulent hatred rising in general elections as a result. like how do you satisfy the people who voted for this? cos now they've waved their miniature union jacks around, the next year or two of legal wrangling and political bullshit sure ain't going to be satisfying.

One of my Facebook "friends" (I don't actually know him) has announced he's deleting his account because of the vitriol he's received from the "remain" camp (none of it from me- like I said, I don't actually know him). Good. Go back to skulking in the corners, you prolicidal fuck.

like how do you satisfy the people who voted for this? cos now they've waved their miniature union jacks around, the next year or two of legal wrangling and political bullshit sure ain't going to be satisfying.

licence to be more openly racist will give succour to some

This is A+ trolling. The Sun, after relentlessly begging their readers to vote leave, now tells them how much worse they'll be off financially.

bomb the sun

any politician who says 'hey the sun, hey the mail, hey the express, fuck you forever, put my face on any vegetable you like, run smear campaigns, wank yourself stupid with hate, the people can see through your horseshit now' has my vote regardless of anything else

biggest evil in our society

One of the 'working class' areas that voted for Remain was Liverpool - where they don't read the Sun...

Talk from Europe getting tougher.

What is clear, though, is that the Leave camp, which isn't exactly formed of the best and brightest to begin with, have absolutely no idea what they are going to do next. The calls to avoid hasty decisions are because they haven't got a strategy beyond 'leave the EU' not necessarily because they are having second thoughts.

and also, "leaving the eu" in actual legal fact seems to be a p wildly protracted political process rather than an action. it is fascinating bureaucracy, if you can put aside the horror.

― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Saturday, 25 June 2016 10:11 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

LG I think we work in vaguely similar fields and with big sweeping calls/promises I tend to ignore the rhetoric - as in, I've literally no idea what Cameron's even said most of the time - and just think about the mechanisms, flow of funding, and legal processes, because I know from painful experience it usually comes down to this kind of 'detail' which often ends up quietly delivering something different from the promised headlines. Which does mean I'm often clueless about the political/strategical side of things. This whole thing has been surreal to me precisely because of the 'what Brexit are we voting for?' question, which I haven't really seen answered anywhere beforehand, and the sheer scale of actually implementing it/anything. All the statutory instruments that'd need looking at!

otm, especially the scale of it
was trying to get head round it at work yesterday
I mean trade tariffs alone - look at this thing:
https://www.gov.uk/trade-tariff

"The Labour leader is being blamed by some of his own MPs for not campaigning hard enough to keep Britain in the EU."

Most of them have been too busy sharpening their knives to do any better themselves. I can't think of one labour MP who has campaigned with any conviction for remain. Chuka probably possesses the PR skills that some on here wish Corbyn had and he is a nauseating twat who probably sent more voters towards Leave than even when Blair/Brown/Darling did.

Otmfm

xp I used to work in you guys' broad field as well. The yawning gap between the claims and the frantic figuring out what it might all mean behind the scenes (and the struggle to actually make it mean something) were a big shock when I joined. I must have been very naive.

not that Leave voters would care about their job prospects in Europe, but only EU citizens are permitted to hold civil service positions in France (except for faculty in higher education, happily in my case). there'll be more than a few English teachers in France out of their (permanent) jobs after this. and there are no exceptions. being a non-EU citizen here has made a lot of things pretty hard, only eased by my being a civil servant. & I doubt French law is very different than the law in other European countries in this regard.

This is A+ trolling. The Sun, after relentlessly begging their readers to vote leave, now tells them how much worse they'll be off financially.

― Le Bateau Ivre, Saturday, 25 June 2016 11:39 Bookmark

"Will it affect the cost of my holiday?" genuinely appears to be every leaver's second question ime

Having had some time to think about it, I think I'm going to start volunteering time for the labour party some how. Does anyone else do anything? I'm a bit unsure where to start, do i just go and be like "hiya diane abbott sure i'll put the kettle on and sort mail"? Is there a good website that details how to help?

Im bored of things being shit but not doing anything about it. Get off yr arse Sam etc.

Likewise, though in my 72%-Remain area I don't want to preach to the choir either. Does seem to me like the post-industrial areas left to die are the most pressing problem for Labour. (And the country)

can cameron really last until october? don't see it happening. also: is george osborne really thinking he can ride this one out?

I'd love Brexit to somehow not happen, but maybe millions of (the non-regretful) Leave voters feeling cheated and angry is an even more terrifying prospect for Britain.

I think he can. Key thing is that the majority of the parliamentary parties and their leaderships all want to remain. It seems like everyone is angling for the classic Yes Minister "let's do it when the time is right" approach. (Same as we did with joining the euro, as Tom E pointed out)

Another problem is that tactic will depend on patience from Scotland and the EU, neither of which seem inclined to have any. Though an indyref II is another good way to postpone Article 50.

xp yes but in cold terms they're as powerless as they were and in warm terms it's damn overdue that something made people notice them and take account of them.

(Am meaning there the Leave voters who voted Leave not because of actual anti-EU sentiment but because they've had the shit end of the last 30 years and things are only getting worse. I think the true directly anti-EU sentiment is the fringe it always was, especially when people understand what they get from it).

I've read that the EU technically have no way to force the UK to trigger article 50 - are there indirect ways that they can pressure the UK to do this though, aside from rhetorically? what leverage do they have? will there be pressure from the markets to invoke article 50 to try and reduce uncertainty?

xp I used to work in you guys' broad field as well. The yawning gap between the claims and the frantic figuring out what it might all mean behind the scenes (and the struggle to actually make it mean something) were a big shock when I joined. I must have been very naive.

― ljubljana, Saturday, 25 June 2016 11:59 (40 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

right? Me too. Although at times I'm almost too far the other way now, something gets announced, I think 'pfft' because I know we don't have the data or whatever to do it, or because it seems like a total u-turn and then it happens anyway. I've been trying to tell the Leavers in my family about 'behind the scenes' but they are the ones who think 'just getting people to add things to policy' is free.
Actually, same with a previous job in a law firm relating to a high-profile new act that was passed. I think that was when I figured out that as soon as you see something you know about being discussed in the press you realise the press just talks bollocks. Poss slightly different now because now we have blogs and zany memes, woo

there's possibility that the referendum result itself could be seen as triggering it, or that combined with representations of the govt during/after the neogtiations prior to the referednum. the text of article 50 gives no method or means of notification. few legal academics like green and maugham mostly seem to dismiss this. there are probably better ways to pressure politically rather than legally.

if the referendum was ever going to trigger it then there must have been pre-identified conditions like thresholds for turnout and majority. or am I totally mad to think that.

Yeah the referendum has no legal weight - it was an advisory. The EU can't in a sane way use that as notification.

Am assuming the EU don't truly want Britain out, but maybe they do?

nothing to do with its legal validity within the uk (it has none, unlike the av referendum) but that in the absence of stipulated means of activating article 50, it could be seen as automatically triggering within eu law. doesn't seem very plausible but the european court of justice have made some sophistic judgments under political pressure before.

xps right, suspect that making this happen this would soak up most of the resources of a lot of departments. If it goes ahead, staggeringly expensive + fuck all else is going to get done.

Doesn't seem remotely plausible imo. Would be like a poll result triggering leave. The U.K. State has to notify under Article 50. An advisory poll does not have the authority to speak for that state. xp