BREXIT SCHMEXIT

[dogstar]

Rather than clog up the politics thread thought I'd plonk this here for any of you who are interested.

Can someone like, oh, say, dogstar explain the Brexit situation for us (well me at least)? I understand the choice is to stay or go from the EU but how does it feel on the ground? Is it causing a furor (or at least a loud buzz) at the pubs and around the water coolers? What are the major arguments on each side? What i read comes down to it's too close to call, the antis are all about them damn foreigners and the pros are all about it's the 21st century.

Not sure what you’ve been hearing about this in the US so let’s start with the simple stuff and go from there.

At the last general election the Conservatives put a promise in their manifesto to have a referendum on the UK’s membership of the European Union (EU) during the next parliament. This was basically a way to fight off the right wing UKIP party’s challenge and also to placate the Eurosceptic wing of the Tory party. So in three weeks we have a referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU with the Eurosceptic wing of the Tories, UKIP and a few others lined up against everyone else.

The campaign has been running for a few weeks now but seems to have picked up pace over the last week. The two sides are running neck and neck at the moment with the remain campaign slightly in the lead. People are definitely talking about this at work, in the pub and I get a lot of stuff coming through on my facebook feed. Interestingly most of the people posting on facebook seem to be in the leave camp, not sure why that is but there’s a definite bias.

The arguments can basically be boiled down to

Remain – it will be bad for the economy
Leave – we won’t have to put up with those nasty foreigners telling us what to do or coming to our country.

Another way of looking at this is to say that the remain campaign is looking forward and the leave campaign is looking back to past glories and hoping to regain them by leaving.

I'm pretty much a remain supporter because I' almost totally in agreement with the economic arguments against leaving and also the focus of the leave campaign on immigration makes me feel uneasy about what this says about our country.

I'll leave it at that.

[beantownbubba]

Thanks. I appreciate the balanced, clear & concise summary.

Sounds like it's not all that different in undertones from what's going on here (the nativist, isolationist, racially tinged if not outright racist aspects of the campaign).

What I don't understand w/ the brexit situation is the same thing that I didn't understand about the Scottish independent vote: It seems inarguable that the clear trend is towards "bigger is better" when it comes to the economic development & success of nation-states. Is there even a plausible construct of how England can survive economically outside the EU, or is it simply that those concerns are overridden by the other stuff?

[PonyGirl]

Referendum veteran here... They are often based on emotion, intangible ideas and/or recreating "the way things used to be..." The ones I've suffered through have never involved an actual, legitimate, concrete plan for secession. However the UK is probably better set up for it than Scotland or any Canadian province as they continue to posses their own currency.

[dogstar]

What I don't understand w/ the brexit situation is the same thing that I didn't understand about the Scottish independent vote: It seems inarguable that the clear trend is towards "bigger is better" when it comes to the economic development & success of nation-states. Is there even a plausible construct of how England can survive economically outside the EU, or is it simply that those concerns are overridden by the other stuff?

First this is a UK wide referendum not just in England so if the vote is to leave Northern Ireland, Wales, Scotland and England all come out of the EU. One of the interesting things is that no one seems to be addressing what a leave vote would mean for Scottish independence (at least not in England). The Scots Nationalists have said they want to stay in the EU so I would assume a leave vote would result in a call for another independence referendum.

I'm not entirely convinced by the big is beautiful argument but I think the main issue here is the costs of coming out of such a large block and then having to renegotiate your relationships with it, the leave campaign are suggesting the costs are minimal, which I don't believe is correct. The most recent example I can think of where a country might have come out of a larger block is when the Greeks were having their financial crisis a few years ago and they were fighting tooth and nail to stay in the Euro as the costs of leaving were just too high. The leave campaign are focussing on the sovereignty issue rather than the economics and David Cameron was even accused last night of scaremongering.

The arguments in the UK do seem to mirror those the in the US at the moment. The fracture lines are also similar

old v young
liberal v conservative
educated v uneducated
town v country

[blackwll]

How would leaving benefit the UK economically, other than not bailing out Greece?

[dogstar]

How would leaving benefit the UK economically, other than not bailing out Greece?

Bailing out Greece never enters the equation as the UK isn't part of the Eurozone, i.e. we still use good old pounds rather than Euro's.

I can't see any economic benefits at all to leaving. All I can see are downsides.

[beantownbubba]

Just in case you need the Yanks to explain it all to you.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/08/world ... d=39564728

[blackwll]

How would leaving benefit the UK economically, other than not bailing out Greece?

Bailing out Greece never enters the equation as the UK isn't part of the Eurozone, i.e. we still use good old pounds rather than Euro's.

I can't see any economic benefits at all to leaving. All I can see are downsides.

Another dumb question - how can UK still be part of EU without adopting Euros as currency? Sounds like halfway in anyway. Are Euros accepted in UK?

[RolanK]

How would leaving benefit the UK economically, other than not bailing out Greece?

Bailing out Greece never enters the equation as the UK isn't part of the Eurozone, i.e. we still use good old pounds rather than Euro's.

I can't see any economic benefits at all to leaving. All I can see are downsides.

Another dumb question - how can UK still be part of EU without adopting Euros as currency? Sounds like halfway in anyway. Are Euros accepted in UK?

Euro is not a requirement for EU membership, Sweden and Denmark also EU members without being part of the Euro system.

[beantownbubba]

According to CNN, as of a minute ago, "leave" is ahead by exactly 1 percentage point w/ a little less than 40% of "precincts" (they call them "voting areas") reporting. Yikes. I don't know whether the more statistically important areas have been counted or not, but damn, this seems as close as predicted.

[dogstar]

Apparently I live in an insane asylum

[LBRod]

I hope you already changed some pounds into dollars for your visit.

[linkous]

Apparently I live in an insane asylum

As do I.

What a clusterfuck

I can hopefully see a bigger picture here after this ludicrous outcome.

The UK is broken, and will disolve.

Scotland will vote yes in a referendum to leave the UK , hopefully within 2 or 3yrs.

Sinn Fein will lobby strongly for a referendum on a United Ireland after NI voted to remain in EU. Ireland will unite at last, I mean this vote shows the UK wants fuck all to do with Europe and Ireland is a European country.

The Tories will crumble as disastrously as Labour. Cameron is a busted flush, England and Wales can enjoy a future with Osbourne then Boris driving the 2 wheeled rusty old bicycle.

The monarchy as it stands is now a busted flush for obvious reasons. England and Wales are welcome to the old boot and her inbred dysfunctional family.

Corbyn possibly comes out of this stronger. He is probably secretly happy at this vote.

[linkous]

Doesnt look a very "United" Kingdom to me. Blue voted to remain, Red to leave.





With this "leave" vote the old and insular have let the youth of tomorrow down. The table is proof of that



The young travel, embrace Europe, learn and work in Europe, love the different cultures and races.

My 2 kids are gutted.

[dogstar]

Apparently I live in an insane asylum

As do I.

What a clusterfuck

I can hopefully see a bigger picture here after this ludicrous outcome.

The UK is broken, and will disolve.

Scotland will vote yes in a referendum to leave the UK , hopefully within 2 or 3yrs.

Sinn Fein will lobby strongly for a referendum on a United Ireland after NI voted to remain in EU. Ireland will unite at last, I mean this vote shows the UK wants fuck all to do with Europe and Ireland is a European country.

The Tories will crumble as disastrously as Labour. Cameron is a busted flush, England and Wales can enjoy a future with Osbourne then Boris driving the 2 wheeled rusty old bicycle.

The monarchy as it stands is now a busted flush for obvious reasons. England and Wales are welcome to the old boot and her inbred dysfunctional family.

Corbyn possibly comes out of this stronger. He is probably secretly happy at this vote.

Apart from the bits about Osborne & Corbyn I have a horrible feeling most of this will come to pass. Instead of making Britain Great again I have a feeling it will just be England and Wales on their own in a few years time.

[tinnitus photography]

[beantownbubba]

Astonishing result in all the obvious ways and a scary result in that it will clearly lead to significant uncertainty and unexpected outcomes in the next few years (presumably including those described by linkous and dogstar, I defer to them). But just as w/ Trump, if one wants to find a more positive reason than the lowest common denominator fear, xenophobia, etc, I think it's the same motivation: A vote of no confidence in the powers that be. And on that level, it's hard to argue. The PTB's have abandoned their version of noblesse oblige which at least worked for some of the people some of the time in favor of greed is good, which works for a couple of people all the time. Unfortunately, elections are a very crude, imprecise sledgehammer when a scalpel would be a better approach.

That map of the voting is really eye-catching. I agree that it's hard to see what advantages NI and Scotland will find in remaining in the not-so-UK.

[Flea]

[Zip City]

A cautionary tale for any American secessionists

[Tequila Cowboy]

A cautionary tale for any American secessionists

It's a cautionary tale for all of us. Polling failed and underestimated the simmering fear and anger in the electorate. Of course Trump is excited, it just breathed new life into his candidacy.

[beantownbubba]

Trump clearly doesn't know the difference between Scotland/England/UK, etc. And he wants to be "the leader of the free world"????? And millions of people want him to be???

[John A Arkansawyer]

Trump clearly doesn't know the difference between Scotland/England/UK, etc. And he wants to be "the leader of the free world"????? And millions of people want him to be???

Why else do you think he's going to win?

[Clams]

A cautionary tale for any American secessionists

It's a cautionary tale for all of us. Polling failed and underestimated the simmering fear and anger in the electorate. Of course Trump is excited, it just breathed new life into his candidacy.

What TC said. Exactly. This result should strike fear into the heart of anyone in the US who either leans left or opposes Drumpf. It proves that what was once unimaginable is now very possible.

[PonyGirl]

Interesting day at the office today... When someone happily responded to a query on their well-being with, "Super, it's Friday!" They were met with, "So glad that you can feel so optimistic in the face of imminent, global, economic collapse."

It's pretty scary here in generally irrelevant, old Canada...

I'm not usually much of a doomsayer, but if Trump wins, I'm buying a dog and a cabin up north and my horse, new dog and I will hunker down there and not come out for like a decade. I'll be ready when the world goes all Mad Max. (That's an exaggeration because I like cities and hate winter. But the worry is real.)

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

On another site I saw someone getting these ready, just in case:

Grexit.
Departugal.
Italeave.
Fruckoff.
Czechout.
Oustria.
Finish.
Slovlong.
Latervia.
Byegium.

[Bill in CT]

"Trump baffles with bizarre appearance in Scotland"

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show ... e-scotland

[Flea]

On another site I saw someone getting these ready, just in case:

Grexit.
Departugal.
Italeave.
Fruckoff.
Czechout.
Oustria.
Finish.
Slovlong.
Latervia.
Byegium.

Remainia will likely stay.

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

On another site I saw someone getting these ready, just in case:

Grexit.
Departugal.
Italeave.
Fruckoff.
Czechout.
Oustria.
Finish.
Slovlong.
Latervia.
Byegium.

Remainia will likely stay.

Can't believe it fell to me for this one:

Splitzerland



and to whoever points out that Switzerland isn't an EU parther

[Smitty]

we should retroactively refer to the South's secession as the "Sexit".

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

we should retroactively refer to the South's secession as the "Sexit".

and if Texas were to secede it would have to be the Textit




I'll show myself out