The Political Thread

[Tjm86]

The worst thing about the whole Brexit scenario is that it has done so much damage to the political process.  Allowing the rise of pretty unsavoury types that operate by scaremongering and distortion and sidelining reasoned debate.  By the time this fully plays out they will have scarpered off back into the old dark holes that they infested, leaving those who believed them to deal with the fallout.

It would be nice to think that everything is going to be rosy and that all of the predictions about fantastic opportunities will come true.  That said, I would also like a Unicorn.

To top it all off the White House now has a socially maladjusted teenager in residence and Boris the clown is off to make nice with him for our benefit.  Is it time to stock up on the tinned goods yet?

[IndigoPrime]

Brexit and Trump essentially gave racists and xenophobes an excuse to spout their hideous thinking and label those opposed to it as snowflakes, while repositioning the term 'politically correct' as something overtly negative. Meanwhile, as you say, the political process has been thrown out, and anything left of the middle-right does not understand how to deal with it. Outright bullshit is now fine, as is constantly rewriting history. No-one is held to account.

With Brexit, apparently the £350m for the NHS was "just an idea", obviously, and yet anyone voting in favour was also voting in favour of quitting the single market and customs union, obviously. Brexit has become like extremist Christians referencing the Bible – you take the bits you want as sacrosanct and ignore the rest. Meanwhile, anyone but the very rich will be royally screwed, especially the regions who voted in favour. (If anyone thinks the Tories are going to give a flying shit about Wales and the North-East, given the kicking Labour will get at the next GE, they've got another thing coming. Matching EU spending? Yeah, right. And I'd bloody hate to be a farmer now. Agriculture in the UK is going to be destroyed.)

[Jim_Campbell]

And I'd bloody hate to be a farmer now. Agriculture in the UK is going to be destroyed.

Particularly alarming, given that we already import over a third of all our food, and Sterling is going to be devalued still further in the event of Brexit (given that it's over-valued and insulated in large part by being the de facto reserve currency of Europe, thanks to the UK being in Europe, but outside the Euro). A non-trivial chunk of the UK population is already struggling to put food on the table... a substantial hike in food prices is hardly likely to help that situation...

[IndigoPrime]

Pre-Brexit estimates mostly put Sterling's low after leaving at $1.20. That's one cent lower than where it's already fallen to. Last I looked, people aren't even talking about parity any more – they reckon Sterling will be worth less than a dollar by the time this is done. In effect, food, fuel and everything else will be a third or more pricier, and in return we'll have got fuck all.

Still, I might be somewhere else by then, trying to figure out how to start a new life in Ireland, or grappling with Swedish or Danish.

[Old Tankie]

Inflation up:- down to Brexit. Sterling down:- down to Brexit.
Unemployment down:- we've not left yet. Interest rates down:- we've not left yet.
Employment up:- we've not left yet. House prices steady:- we've not left yet.
Wages up:- we've not left yet. Economy growing:- we've not left yet.
Stock market booming:- we've not left yet.

Ice caps melting:- down to Bre........

[Hawkmumbler]

Nice bit of straw manning their, Tankers.

[The Legendary Shark]

"I'm definitively wrong and have made myself look like a total c*nt in the process of trying to deny this, so I'd like to talk about something else now."

YMMV.

Not even the first time this has happened, but a new low in terms of mis-characterising those who disagree with you, even for you.

More name calling, Jim? Tell me, were you a bully at school?

[Jim_Campbell]

More name calling, Jim? Tell me, were you a bully at school?

I didn't accuse anyone of being indifferent to the Holocaust, Hiroshima or Nagasaki just because they disproved my rather shaky rhetorical point. You don't get the moral high ground on this one, Mark.

[Steven Denton]

Inflation up:- down to Brexit. Sterling down:- down to Brexit.
Unemployment down:- we've not left yet. Interest rates down:- we've not left yet.
Employment up:- we've not left yet. House prices steady:- we've not left yet.
Wages up:- we've not left yet. Economy growing:- we've not left yet.
Stock market booming:- we've not left yet.

Ice caps melting:- down to Bre........

Fair comment,there is a lot of conformation bias on both sides.

Every mention of Brexit has had a direct effect on the value of the pound, and the stock market and economy may actually be experiencing a short term gain as a sort of fire sale takes place... but I would say that as a remain voter. However a leave support could say Brexit hasn't happened yet and the pound will bounce back when it does, and the economy will not crash.

I don't think either side predominately voted because they thought it was the best thing for the economy, so both are just looking for proof that the other has made a terrible tangible mistake.

[The Legendary Shark]

More name calling, Jim? Tell me, were you a bully at school?

I didn't accuse anyone of being indifferent to the Holocaust, Hiroshima or Nagasaki just because they disproved my rather shaky rhetorical point. You don't get the moral high ground on this one, Mark.

See, I didn't accuse anyone of that either, as you well know, but don't think such things can be diminished through the application of statistics. Governments kill people, that's my point, as you also well know - or would if you were paying attention. But you can't accept this idea as you are a statist, nor can you disprove, mitigate or defend it, so what's left? Name calling, of course!

You always end up calling people names, don't you, James? How many times is this for you now? "I don't like what you say, therefore you're a c*nt."  It must be depressing to be trapped in a shackled mind incapable of producing or processing an original thought, a mind incapable of recognising its own hypocrisy (government is divine but gives us evil Brexit, evil politicians, evil laws and supports evil businesses - but hey, if we keep doing the same things over and over again, keep elevating the most egregious people we can find, keep allowing our money to be used to buy bullets and bombs, keep putting up with the empty promises and lies, keep paying attention to the vacuous rhetoric, keep being taken in by the blatant fallacies,
keep watching the political floor show instead of looking backstage, keep doing what we're told by people we detest and distrust, keep being scared of terrorists, keep watching the banks and corporations getting what they want while the rest of us can go hang, keep listening to billionaires telling us to tighten our belts, keep watching as our forests and farmlands get fracced, keep allowing our hospitals, schools and services to be eroded, keep waiting for the Messiah of Government to turn up and save us, keep mistaking organisation for government, keep being afraid of the state, keep bestowing rights and powers we don't have on lunatics who don't deserve them, keep our heads down and our arses up, keep believing in the unbelievable  - then, someday and somehow, it's all going to miraculously start working properly and we'll all be saved). It's utter madness. This monstrous thing called government, no matter what it claims to be or claims credit for, bullies you and steals from you and you love it, as if transfixed by Stockholm Syndrome. As if all the behaviours you find reprehensible in individual human beings are somehow made tolerable, or even elevated to virtues, when displayed by ordinary people who happen to win a pointless and rigged popularity contest every four or five years. It's insane and you know it is - but you can't admit that because you've invested so much in this insanity already that all you can think to do is save face by continually betting on the same numbers and bullying anyone who disagrees.

Were you a bully at school? Or were you bullied? Whichever you were seems to have stripped you of all sense of decorum and left you with the idea that all you have to do is parrot whatever you happen to have heard on Question Time or Any Answers or read in the Daily Mail and pass it off as your own considered opinion, calling anyone who doesn't agree with your comfortable little borrowed views a c*nt, when your comfortable little borrowed views have little or no foundation in reality.

This, to you, is the moral high ground? Come off it, it's all based on fear - the fear of children contemplating being separated from their parents. Who will look after me if my mummy and daddy won't? It's pathetic.

[M.I.K.]

(Looks at this thread)

(Looks at threadjacking thread)

(Looks back at this thread)

Mmm-hmm.

[Tjm86]

Meanwhile, anyone but the very rich will be royally screwed, especially the regions who voted in favour. (If anyone thinks the Tories are going to give a flying shit about Wales and the North-East, given the kicking Labour will get at the next GE, they've got another thing coming. Matching EU spending? Yeah, right. And I'd bloody hate to be a farmer now. Agriculture in the UK is going to be destroyed.)

Aye, here in the South Wales Valleys it has been interesting considering the amount of EU funding that gets thrown this way considering the pockets of poverty around here.  That said Cardiff Bay County Borough Council (Sorry, the Welsh Assembly) has done a particularly poor job in its use so it doesn't always look like anything is being done by the EU.  Corus closed in Ebbw Vale.  Rather than using funds to regenerate the local economy and develop jobs in the community they spent it on a single track rail line to Cardiff.  Blaenau Gwent has some of the highest levels of unemployment in the valleys now and that is saying something.  Improvements to the Heads of the Valleys have come 10 years too late.  As you say, bit like Turkeys voting for Christmas.

[IndigoPrime]

Inflation up:- down to Brexit. Sterling down:- down to Brexit.
Unemployment down:- we've not left yet. Interest rates down:- we've not left yet.
Employment up:- we've not left yet. House prices steady:- we've not left yet.
Wages up:- we've not left yet. Economy growing:- we've not left yet.
Stock market booming:- we've not left yet.

Ice caps melting:- down to Bre........

People will cherry pick, but Sterling is down due to the markets freaking out about uncertainty and that's leading to price increases across the board. Employment is doing fairly well, although you'd have to delve into the TYPE of employment to see whether that's beneficial. Figures suggest a lot of people may be 'employed' but not to the point they can actually support themselves. They're just not counted as unemployed.

That we're seeing ~5% price rises when we haven't even left yet is worrying, since that was the commonplace guess after we'd left. It seems Sterling still has a long way to slide, and even optimistic Brexiters are saying there could be a decade of turmoil. That's probably OK if you're in a secure job, with savings, and the means to make cuts that won't adversely affect your life. It's not so great if you're already living from paycheque to paycheque, with nothing you can sell, and perhaps relying on foodbanks to not go hungry (foodbank use having skyrocketed in recent years).

That said Cardiff Bay County Borough Council (Sorry, the Welsh Assembly) has done a particularly poor job in its use so it doesn't always look like anything is being done by the EU.

Yeah, I don't doubt funds have been used poorly a lot of the time, but at least they are there. (From what I saw during the Brexit campaign, it was also very rare that people had any idea EU-funded things were funded by the EU. That tends to be clearer on the mainland.)

As you say, bit like Turkeys voting for Christmas.

England was always going to vote out, bar London, and Scotland was always going to vote in. But Wales was the big surprise for me. Wales elects Labour or Plaid Cymru for the most part, so you do wonder whether this government will give a crap about Wales. (The Conservatives could lose all 11 Welsh MPs and it wouldn't make the slightest bit of difference.) Mind you, everyone seemed to act all surprised post-vote when it was revealed existing funding levels couldn't be guaranteed beyond 2020 or even at all. (See also: Cornwall; the North-East; the agriculture industry...)

[Dandontdare]

Rather than using funds to regenerate the local economy and develop jobs in the community they spent it on a single track rail line to Cardiff.

They would argue that they did the latter to achieve the former.

What do you think they should have spent money on? It's easy to create subsidised, uneconomic jobs but that's not a long term solution. Business relies on transport links so it's not uncommon for regeneration to involve investment in roads and railways.

I do think the Welsh voters were shooting themselves in the foot though . I saw an interview with some locals moaning about how deprived their area is and how Europe has never done anything for them - all filmed outside a huge leisure centre that had a big sign explaining how it was built with European money

[The Legendary Shark]

What do you think they should have spent money on?

Hookers and crack.