Westminstenders: And so it begins

[RedToothBrush]

Promises made that can not be kept.

We have already fallen at the first stumbling block: the desire for parallel talks on exit and future relationship that May wanted has been rejected. Not that this is a surprise seeing as we were told this.

This isn't two years of negotiations for a good deal. Forget any suggestions that it is. It's two years of damage limitation and domestic pr.

For both the UK and EU.

I do believe that May's attitude - which seemed to be more friendly in her speech and letter yesterday - has burnt all our bridges.

This talk of the world needing the EU's 'liberal democracy' isn't aimed at the EU though. Her use of the words that produced uproar in the HoC yesterday was deliberate. Why use it? It was always going to produce a reaction.

When May says she will have a consensus at home to achieve this goal one of two things must happen: to prove just how much we need the EU to make a political reversal possible at the expense of her head or to vilify the EU to a point that Remainers suddenly change their mind.

To get a good deal for the UK she can not satisfy her hard line Brexiteers. It is impossible purely because to do otherwise is like breaking the laws of physics. Trade is done mostly with who you are closest too. This is the inescapable truth. We are leaving the EU but not Europe as keeps being pointed out.

If we want to trade we have to accept EU regulations. If we do not, we do not trade. Rules we can now no longer influence by must obey.

We can not reduce immigration. We have had control of non-Eu immigration and that is not going down due to skills shortages. To combat this schools are getting less money.

In terms of sovereignty and British parliament we just gave that away. The 'Great' Repeal Act is a power grab by the executive. It seems to give the powers of the monarch to Mrs May and take them away from parliamentary scrutiny. At the same time we are forced to become beholden to Trump's America. A man who screws people for a living and has not a shred of honour.

Using security as our bargaining chip misses the obvious. If we do not cooperate we endanger Brits abroad and ourselves domestically. Are we really prepared to stop?

The opportunities of Brexit Britain are bleak. This will be normalised.

Good luck folks. We are gonna need it.

I've never been on FB, Twitter, LinkedIn, WhatsApp etc, being a suspicious old bag, they all seemed to me like letting the world peer into the windows of my house and go through my dustbins.

You don't have to be on social media to be counted and analysed and slotted into a category.

Even without SM, your clicks on all the websites you visit are noted. Everything that interests you from knitting to international finance to Formula One racing is followed and categorised. This is the data that CA analyses. They can build profiles of individual wards within counties based on where people go in the privacy of their own house even if they do not use FB or social media at all.

When it comes to identifying political preferences and mood they can plant stories or use existing ones or extract alignment based on all sorts of other markers. The links between CA and Breitbart/Bannon/Mercer are detailed in the link I posted a little earlier www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/27/the-reclusive-hedge-fund-tycoon-behind-the-trump-presidency.

Not for nothing has CA been called a propaganda machine. Clicks on websites are not just for generating revenue from advertisers. They are for measuring interest.

(The initial research in Cambridge that generated psychometrics used online questionnaires circulated on FB to compile enough data to extract profiles.)

Carole Cadwalladr on dark money and the Leave campaigns:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/01/dark-money-threat-to-uk-elections-integrity?CMP=sharebtnn_tw

This thread is very good on the Flynn story (from a Huff Post journalist): mobile.twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/848313129176109056

доброе утро friends!

This morning I am going to choose to believe that, even if the entire political and tabloid media classes have lost their minds, there WILL be enough pragmatism and basic intelligence in the country to result in a deal that isn't suicidal.

[sprays flowery scent around]
[prays]

There was an interesting story on Radio 4 during the week which interviewed various security personnel about false news that was planted during the 80s by the Russians, including that AIDS was the result of US government action. www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-39419560

They have been at this for a long time

not to mention how many of these originate from UN and other international bodies to which, outside the EU, we will still remain signed up."

Apropos of that - do you remember the story a few months ago about the woman who was refused free parking in Tesco because she was only buying formula milk? The Dept of Health printed some absolute hogwash on its site about how we will be free to amend our own legislation when we leave the EU. I wrote and complained. Eventually, I got a very sensible letter back explaining how the rules were Governed by the World Health Organisation and International agreements, which we followed. I wrote back to ask why they hadn't put that on their website instead of the rubbish they had printed? To which I had no reply. Additionally it would only have needed a sentence to say that a firm's car parking policies were up to the firm concerned.

So, much will not change because the underlying rules were international. Secondly, websites can be read from anywhere in the world. What sort of impression will other nations get when they see the utter tripe which was printed on that Government website? It's no wonder that the rest of the world is beginning to see us as a laughing stock.

So Spain have now confirmed that they will not stand in the way of an independent Scotland, although they wouldn't like to see the breakup of the UK,
www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/02/spain-drops-plan-to-impose-veto-if-scotland-tries-to-join-eu
Who's coming across as anti democratic now? UK cannot compete and is being humiliated by the hour.

Guten morgen, annandale

I have seen no sign of "basic intelligence" in the govt, even if some is lurking in the country (on threads like these)

I hope that Semi doesn't go: I understand and respect her pride in the work of the Armed Forces but also think that Cailleach has a valid point that we "defend" such territories when it suits us (the Chagos islanders versus the US Air base also came to my mind) - but to be fair on Semi, such decisions aren't down to the serving personnel. It's the damned politicians' fault responsibility.

Serving officers are usually the least warmongering and the voice of reason, because they understand the consequences of such decisions, whereas the politicians, in their cushy office and only the newspaper barons to worry about don't have to take the life-and-death risks

Richard North's article is again a worthwhile read. Most of us would be reasonably happy with an EEA arrangement. Except May, the FoM requirement won't fit in with what seems like a personal vendetta against immigrants. Nor will it satisfy her right wing Eurosceptics. But it's time she told them, 'This is the best deal for the greatest number of people in the UK. You won, now put a sock in it.'

Good morning to you too Annandale

Not sure if this has been posted yet

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/03/31/brexit-and-britains-delusions-of-empire/?utm_term=.19ec61bb2fe3

....yet another article pointing out that the UK is harking back to the glories of a mis-remembered Empire and will be coming down to earth with a bump

prettybird that WP article, "the fantasy of Britain’s past collides almost farcically against Britain’s present" is what Brexiters cannot see but we "forriners" have been thinking for a long time. I suppose the illusions de grandeur have always been under the surface but are now the deluded official discourse, repeated ad nauseam even by people who used to have common sense.

WRT to Spain, it appears that have now "officially" said that they will not veto iScotland joining the EU...

www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/02/spain-drops-plan-to-impose-veto-if-scotland-tries-to-join-eu

This is from a mass circulation tabloid in Hong Kong hk.apple.nextmedia.com/supplement/columnist/畢明/art/20170402/19977244

No chat please, we're British #Brexit

If May had ever realised the UK brand has an image problem overseas then wouldn't all this overseas media coverage be a worry?

Spain didn't veto the accession of Slovakia, Slovenia or Croatia.
So they are just being consistent.

Their sticking point is that independence must be achieved constitutionally, i.e. not via a UDI. However, NS has never threatened UDI

There must be a temptation for Brussels, if the govt is particularly dense during Brexit negotiations, to facilitate Scottish membership of say EEA / EFTA.

Brussels fallback for Brexit is probably to use it as an object lesson, to discourage far right nationalist delusions throughout the E27

IDS and Alistair Campbell were in debate on Radio 4 a couple of days ago. IDS still thinks the city is going to retain the passport in negotiations, never mind even his own Brexiteers are conceding the cake will not be had and eaten. Completely deluded.

Thought you'd like this cartoon from Der SPIEGEL : "Is there life after Brexit?"

Full marks for May for colour and imagination but if it's a science project, methinks it is Juncker who will get the pass

Bundestag (German Parliament) Study: Britain Risks Economic Crash
(they have done the studies that DD couldn't be bothered with)

https://global.handelsblatt.com/politics/german-parliament-study-britain-risks-economic-crash-738352

"The German parliament, in a study obtained by Handelsblatt, forecasts that Brexit will cause significantly more economic damage to Britain than the other 27 E.U. member states.

According to the study, Britain’s gross domestic product could drop by up to 9.5 percent by 2030 compared to what it would have been if the country had remained in the European Union.
“While the British economy will face considerable losses, particularly in the case of a hard Brexit, the effects will be limited for the EU 27,”

9.5% over 10-12 years might be like the gradually boiling frog

However, if S England becomes a lorry park within a few days of Brexit, that would indeed be noticeable to the most fervent Brexiter.

I'm sure they'd find something else to blame it on

Mass immigration of cabbages, alien invasion or just the trusty brexitter fallback of "what do you mean, it's always been like this?".

Oh, and remainers not bigging up our customs, of course.

However, if S England becomes a lorry park within a few days of Brexit, that would indeed be noticeable

@faisalislam Mar 31
TSC's Tyrie tells Govt "collapse in confidence" in new customs system, as HMRC tries to plan for Brexit trade checks
Customs go from green to amber already:
www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/treasury-committee/news-parliament-2015/collapse-in-confidence-cds-16-17/

and will have to cope with this:
@faisalislam Mar 31
@faisalislam
In this reply, HMRC reports that they are planning for post Brexit extra 200 million customs declarations at the border or a 5 fold increase

Looks like we'll have lots more in common with totalitarian Erdogan (customs jams and).....
government funded misogyny:
www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/01/tampon-tax-anti-abortion-group-anger

On economic frog boiling:
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/benefit-freeze-cuts-austerity-measures-welfare-state-inflation-a7661196.html
"Spending freeze to cut extra £4bn from benefits as raft of new benefit cuts kick in. The figures come as Theresa May puts into force a raft of new austerity measures this week, hitting thousands of the most disadvantaged people across the country, including parents, widows, the disabled and young people"

It's a good news day to hide it in.

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/eight-things-more-expensive-april-1-council-tax-energy-bills-utilities-mobile-contract-vehicle-a7662451.html

On the above cuts to 18-21 year old housing benefit, rape clause for 3rd child, cuts to widowed parents' benefits and ESA no comments from Labour. But Farron and SNP quoted.