Westministenders: Johnson defends his President whilst we try to defend Britain

[RedToothBrush]

Theresa and Donald
Sitting in a tree
K-I-S-S-I-N-G
First come Brexit
Then comes the Ban
Then comes the
Removal of Human Rights
… Damn

(Shamelessly stolen from a protest sign)

A couple of weeks ago people were still asking why we were talking about Trump on a Brexit thread. I think the answer has made itself all together too apparent.

What is happening in the US is not going to stop. It’s not going to get any better any time soon. The situation is grave with suggestions there has been a coup. What happens next is not going to be pretty. American institutions are struggling. The rule of law has been undermined. We are not talking about a developing country. We are talking about the country which has stood for freedom and democracy.

Our leadership looks weak in the face of this. We look like we are not only appeasing but endorsing. For what? A trade deal that he could revoke in 30 days?

We have but one question. How many of our ‘British Values’ will have to be sacrifice for the special relationship?

Make no bones about this: Cosying up to Trump threatens our national security. It threatens our democracy. It ruins what little moral authority we have left. It threatens our ties with Europe who we DO still need to have a relationship even if we are outside the EU. This is not world leadership. This is appeasement. This is cowardly weak and downright desperate.

Let us also not forget ‘Good old Boris’ pretending to be Churchill and calling the EU Nazis and Hitler during the Referendum and on several occasions since. He has now had the bare faced audicity to stand in the House of Commons and call MPs out repeatedly for ‘trivalising the holocaust’ or for making comparisons with the 1930s when they saying they have been told this by survivors of the holocaust. It is SHAMEFUL. I also note how many times Johnson referred to Trump being democratically elected as if this makes all the difference and he can’t possibly be a dictator if elected.

Why do they want to use the parallel themselves and HATE it when its used for things they use? Fascists hate being pointed out as fascists.

What would happen if you put it to the public? You have a choice, The EU or Trump? What would they say. At its most basic this is what Brexit is now. You can not hide it or disguise it any longer.

Get used to this. Be prepared to protest, to keep challenging, to keep calling things as they are. Fatigue might set in, but we need to keep on. This is for the long haul.

Today the a50 Bill starts in parliament. It’s not looking good, as it looks like MPs will completely fail in their DUTY to hold the government to account and will not have the balls to add amendments to the bill.

If it passes without any, get worried. It is not just about the EU.

It never was.

Having lived through the 1979-1997 period, I think the Tories could be in power for a very long time again.

Voters then punished Labour for many years after their navel-gazing "longest suicide note on history"
This time, the long drawn-out suicide takes place during the most critical period for the UK since WW2

• and Labour have abandoned their duty as the Official Opposition

They voted for policies they openly say will do harm (or skiving with Brexit migraine)

Labour made a cowardly surrender to the far right and Tory hard right - appeasement never works !

Yet their dithering confusion infuriated the fervent Leavers too.
Why would disgusted Leavers or Remainers vote for such a party even if Brexit goes badly ?

While Labour are reminding us of the 1980s, what have Cambridge Analytica - with their leading edge data-mining & psychometrics - planned for the next 10 years - a new fascist party, or just transforming the Tories into a populist hard right party ?

Corbyn is a dreadful leader, but Labour's problems won't be solved even if he goes without a bitter row.
The whole Labour brand is discredited and once a party is regarded as a chaotic shambles, it takes several years to rebuild their reputation and look like a credible an alternative government.

I think the only way the Tories won't win at least the next 2 GEs is if there is a Brexit Doomsday scenario.
However, although I expect living standards to fall for some time after 2019, it is unlikely to be a sudden crash down the cliff.

The Tories can blame most problems on either cruel EU "punishment beatings," or the UK public for voting to leave the EU - "we were just carrying out the will of the people"

Probably, May will retire gracefully sometime after winning the next GE and the Tories will choose a new likeable leader, who will win in 2025
So, I think Labour need to plan for 2030

I think there's elements of a fresh, rebranded Labour amongst its newer members (from the 2010/2015 intake).

I'd like to see Labour going back to their core brand - not hard left loonies, but not preoccupied with the champagne socialist set either; a pragmatic party with clear goals and vision.
The sooner they jettison Diane Abbott et al the better, quite frankly.

I don't think May will retire gracefully. I haven't seen her do anything with grace and I think the power has now gone to her head. But sooner or later the Tory party will get the knives out - they do seem to enjoy a good bloodletting.

"The European parliament’s main political parties are making an unprecedented attempt to block Donald Trump’s likely choice as ambassador to the European Union from EU buildings, describing him as hostile and malevolent."

Malloch, who is a Brexiter of the far right swivel-eyed type, has openly said he wants to bring down the Euro and the whole EU

www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/02/european-union-trump-ambassador-ted-malloch-parliament

The action is by the main socialist, liberal and conservative parties in the parliament.
I was hoping they would block him, because he would cause chaos & anger when both the Uk and the rEU need calm.

Any country or bloc - if they are strong enough - can refuse an ambassador whom they consider unacceptable or dangerous.
iirc the UK refused to accept a proposed Israeli ambassador in the 1980s, because he had fought in the Irgun terrorist group against the Uk 40 years earlier.

oops, that post was ok in preview
Well anyway, the main parties are trying to block Trump's proposed ambassador to the EU

Semi, Is it possible to win a GE without the Sun's support, and if not, what is to be gained by driving Labour to the left?

Semi, Is it possible to win a GE without the Sun's support, and if not, what is to be gained by driving Labour to the left?

Not really sure what you're asking tbh.

Driving Labour to the left?
Is pragmatism, clear vision & returning to their core goal of being the party of the working class 'driving it to the left'?

And yes, I do think it's perfectly possible to win a GE without the Sun's support - social media is a far bigger media tool than the printed press these days.

Just turned Question Time on. Did someone actually just admit on national TV that she voted leave because of straight bananas, or am I hallucinating??

The party of the working class is by definition on the left, yes. Unless said party starts to make pragmatic compromises like Blair and Brown did in the broader interest of all classes and then it gets too complicated for voters (clearly), and they become vulnerable to whatever the Sun says.
Just my take on it (if it makes sense).

Many blue collar working class people voted Tory as well though.

Working class is not by definition hard left - I would say it is more centrist tbh.

"Just turned Question Time on. Did someone actually just admit on national TV that she voted leave because of straight bananas, or am I hallucinating??"

She has be some sort of plant. I mean, presumably, she'll have to go to work tomorrow? One of the "I voted Remain but now I'm fully behind Brexit and we should all jolly well get on with it" type of plants.

Maajid Nawaz is very handsome

Fawful,
the party of the working class is not by definition of the left. Most of the true working class nowadays are right wingers. It's only the non working class that vote labour.
Most of us low income people are fed up of having our wages subpoenaed to subsidise people who choose the dole as a lifestyle.

Maajid Nawaz is indeed very handsome Swedish!

I did meet a real life person before the vote who felt that we probably didn't have enough information to make a fully informed decision, but as all she had to go on was the stories about bendy bananas etc she was going to vote leave. The referendum has revealed things about apparently normal people that I would never have believed possible.

Kaija:
The lack of information was dreadful.
I have come across Remainers who voted that way because they were naive enough to believe that the EU is democratic.

Hilarious

Labour GAIN Dinnington (Rotherham) from UKIP.

Liberal Democrat GAIN Brinsworth & Catcliffe
(Rotherham) from Labour.

You prove my point, Redactio

Fabian Society Report on Labour's Prospects

FS was one of Labour's founders (part of their core ?) in 1902 and is officially affiliated to it.

"Stuck - How Labour is too weak to win and too strong to die"

www.fabians.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Stuck-Fabian-Society-analysis-paper.pdf

"Based on analysis of existing poll data and historical trends, the study predicts that the next election, whether held imminently or in 2020, is very likely to see Labour win fewer than 200 seats for the first time since 1935, possibly falling to about 140"

However, they think FPTP will act as a “firebreak” against a worse collapse.

Many Leavers love the democratic way Trump rules - by issuing Executive Orders, bypassing Congress and ignoring court decisions against him

Speaking of bendy bananas I met someone who thought Brexit had already happened.

WTO: Horrendously Complex

Unlike so many think:
It's not as simple as just jumping out of EU and straight into the WTO

"Tariff rate quotas are a nightmare. They are the one part of the WTO arrangement that Britain can't replicate, or seek to join, or copy and paste into existence. They require very careful calculations."

"And here's the rub: every country in the export quota list ... can launch litigation against the UK if it does not approve of the quota we put down."

www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2016/12/15/if-liam-fox-messes-up-we-re-all-in-deep-trouble

"The potential for multiple trade disputes is vast .... There are countless quotas, from meat of bovine animals, to citrus hybrids, to mushrooms, to countless varieties of cheese.

And these are complex !
You've got quota rates for whole Cheddar cheeses "of the conventional flat cylindrical shape of a net weight of not less than 33kg but not more than 44kg
and cheeses of the conventional flat cylindrical shape or cheeses in parallelepiped shape, of a net weight of 10 kg or more", which must have "a minimum fat content of 50% by weight in the dry matter, matured for at least three months".

You've got 'edible offal of bovine animals' rates for "pasture-grazed animals, aged between 22 and 24 months, having two permanent incisors and presenting a slaughter liveweight not exceeding 460 kg".

I'd like to see Labour going back to their core brand
The vote on Wednesday was a vote for mob rule. Justified in many ways as a brexit vote was, by not standing together as parliamentarians after Jo Cox's murder, the response was completely partisan.

The message was 'you're on your own' if you are a 'traitor'.

Who would vote against that?

If parliamentarians do not feel safe or empowered to vote on their consciences within parties and within parliament, democracy is then dead.
Labour is one of the largest parties in Europe. Its new membership boost was in no small part due to the excellent organisation and 10% wage deduction for membership of the Socialist Workers Party, in many ways comparable to a fundamentalist sect. They share with the evangelicals an almost biblical desire for the rapture of capitalism's implosion and what they see as inevitable revolution. The tories and ukip and banks cannot believe their luck. A large and active trade union movement used to mediate and moderate extremists, that's gone in Britain.

Life is more complicated and should be more compassionate than the SWP or alt right view, but who wants to hear that? Who would vote for traitorous quiche eaters? Look at French elections, although I'm not sure it's about pastry recipes.

The more alt-right people I know are those who've relied or do currently rely on benefits but don't like how they're only basic levels so resent forriners for either getting them too or using the nhs etc. All money they'd prefer in their pockets.