Westministenders: I can't believe it's not butter

[RedToothBrush]

Nigel Farage @ Nigel_Farage
Cannot believe we're seeing Nazi salutes in 21st century America.

Yeah, that's what we said on 16th June 2016, when some dickhead stood in front of a poster.

The thing is, what Farage says with faux surprise isn't unusual or isolated to him. It's widespread. It's perhaps the norm rather than the exception in many circles.

It's represents a total lack of self awareness. It represents the disconnect that what comes out of your mouth tends to have an effect on the people around you, whether intentioned that way or not when you talk about 'others' or 'not belonging'.

It's a direct effect of nationalism.

Patriotism seems to be something that people have totally lost the plot with and don't understand. It's used as a defence for nationalism. It is the last defence of the scoundrel. Patriotism and being pro-EU or not being a racist dick are not mutually exclusive, though you'd be forgiven for thinking differently these days.

I think a lot of people will sit and go, "Look at America, that is awful. I'm glad we are not like that".

Except we are far more than we realise. Grenfell says much about that.

There's an phrase and Southern Wolves and Northern Wolves when it comes to racism in America. The UK is like the Northern Wolf. Sly and silver tongued to justify and hide racism because 'Look they are worse than us. We are the good guys'.

A bit like saying, you talked to an EU citizen and they were just as racist as me, so Brexit is ok.

It's the twisted desperation to justify the othering rather than take responsibility for enabling and emboldening racism. Then dressing it up as some legitimate political cause which actually you have zero understanding or comprehension of the consequences of.

Brexit has some deep roots in Nazi type fantasies. You can not separate the idea that Britain is superior and Brits are better than Europeans from too much Brexit logic. The Empire was not a pretty thing for much of the world. It's worrying.

Not to mention we've had a right wing attack on a group of people outside a mosque in this fashion before the US had that attack yesterday.

Let's not think that because we haven't had blokes with tiki torches providing a photographic opportunity and theatre for the TV producer that we are somehow 'better'. Or not as bad as America.

The only real difference between them and us is the brash openness about it and the fact they have a bunch of guns.

This was predictable. Indeed I expected and I expect more. There will be more and it will get far, far worse in the US. Yesterday was just the start. Trump wants it. He will fuel it. He will capitalise from it. Yes your mate Donald loves a bit of bigotry, Nig.

There no guarantees it won't happen here for various reasons. It just is characterised in a slightly different way because we are British and don't really do brash in anything as it's not our way.

It's too easy for Farage. Or Johnson. Or May. Or whoever to just walk away and innocently say they are shocked and bear no responsibility because they don't wave Nazi flags about.

You don't have to do that, to share the same values or believe the same thing. Salutes and flags are just branding. A repackaged version for the 21st century is even more dangerous.

We won't forget who Farage hangs out with or courts for publicity and attention. Farage only says and does what he thinks he can get away with. That's part of the ugly truth.

We still have not even started to confront the relationship between racism and Brexit. Indeed, much seems to be happening to suggest that after blaming EU, that there are a Brexit opportunities for scapegoating opening up.

For me yesterday was depressing not because it happened, but because we saw it coming and because our country is in denial about being the same.

Farage is the very personification of it.

It's not that Treeza is terrified of the Ultra Brexiteers, I don't think.

She thought Brexit would be the ideal opportunity to "control our borders". Look at her record as Home Secretary.

So she thinks the UB's are useful allies.

And she's just hoping that a bunch of pixies will magically sort out all the problems that inconveniently accompany Brexit.

You know, Swedish, if the Referendum and it's fall-out has taught me anything, it is that optimistic hopes for a hidden-but-cunning plan or devious-but-brilliant strategy have always proved to be unfounded.

I think the sad truth is that hopes that those who are currently steering us towards Brexit cannot, really be as incompetent, craven and dreadful as they appear to be will continue to be dashed. It appears to be an unbelievable disaster because it really is a disaster that appears to be irrationally bad.

I still think that the sheer scale of the awfulness is one of the strongest pro-Brexit cards. People just refuse to believe it really can be that awful and that there isn't a secret, cunning plan that is going to make it all OK.

I'm still stunned when I read comments from people that suggest they still project their wishes onto the likely outcomes of al this, rather than look at what is actually going on. You know, "Oh the outcome of all this will be a soft Brexit", "This is going to be good for trade in the long run." How do you know? That's hoping. Nothing that has happened so far has indicated any of this.

Hmm, yeah, you're right Patty. I think I still try to look for something actually good about her. I think I'm still swayed by an Observer article about her from a few years ago.

You're right as well cat. It's a human instinct to protect us from shock and ensure we carry on, I think. We have to look for something, anything good or hopeful. But this time, it's really not there.

The 'news' about the increased terror and crime risk is annoying me today. I've no idea why this, in particular, is annoying me, when there is so very, very much about Brexit to get irked about.

I seem to recall C4 News having a whole bunch of senior people from she security agencies spelling all of this out during the Referendum campaign. Very clearly.

I think it irks me because there was a young woman on a course I did recently who kept banging on about her Uncle, who worked in some connection with Military Intelligence, who voted Leave because 'immigration increased security risk'.

I figure he couldn't have been involved in a very responsible position because it seems as though anyone involved in a responsible position was very clear that the costs of leaving the EU, wrt to intelligence, policing, etc., far outweighed the benefits.

And this is not news.

I am still irked by the fact that there is still such a level of wilful self-delusion amongst people. A dissimulation, even to themselves, as to motivations and decisions as to how to self-inform, that is actually intractable.

Just read your last comment, Swedish. That is very wise. I think it can be applied to a lot other aspects of the psychology of Brexit, too. Somehow, I feel less irked thinking about it in such human terms.

There is a theory, disputed by some, that humanity is innately optimistic as a survival strategy i.e. if we kept thinking about all the things that could go wrong, we'd stay frozen in a state of terrified inaction and die of thirst or hunger or be eaten by more mobile and less angsty predators.

There may be something to it. I've always found the "oh, it'll be alright" school of risk assessment alarmingly widespread.

For some reason, talk of the psychology of Brexit reminded me of the reply an Apollo astronaut gave a reporter who asked "what does it feel like to go into space ?"

I just remind myself I'm sitting on top of what the lowest bidder built

If Treeza was capable of a cunning plan she would not have ballsed up the election so thoroughly......

Ramone influenced Remain T shirts for Manchester
manchesterforeurope.teemill.com/product/remain/

I think one problem is is that there is an assumption amongst the chattering classes (for want of a better phrase) that TM absolutely cannot be as bad as she appears to be and so there must be a cunning plan somewhere, lurking, waiting to be discovered.

I think the psychology of optimism is true, but so is the converse - the convulsive psychology of the herd, when people begin to suspect that the emperor is lacking undergarments (as in Galbraith's 'Great Crash' 1929).

I do think people are inherently optimistic, and convince themselves that someone in authority 'must have a cunning plan' (or just any sort of plan that stands a reasonable prospect of being negotiated, even if you don't agree with it).

I think it probably helps not to read history books (unless there are any optimistic ones that highlight our greatness as a nation. Maybe war films are a better idea.

Ian Dunt's piece on it:

The government's new Brexit position paper is actually pretty good

The position paper basically makes the case against ECJ involvement by laying out all the kinds of alternatives on offer in the way the EU conducts itself with other parties. There's a Moldovan arrangement, the mechanism written into the Canadian free trade deal, and, of course the European Free Trade Association (Efta) system. Here, the Efta court presides over the EEA agreement allowing Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein to share the single market.

This is particularly interesting to Brexit critics. The Efta court is the body which makes a soft Brexit in the single market possible. The fact it is being looked at speaks volumes. While the ECJ doesn't have to pay attention to its rulings, the Efta court does have to "pay due account" of the ECJ's.

At the moment the government is not proposing joining the Efta court. It can't, because it still resisting staying in the single market. It is just taking it as an inspiration. But the fact that this court is considered compatible with Westminster's red line on ECJ jurisdiction is important. Previously this would have been considered way too close to the ECJ for it to be tolerable.

www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2017/08/23/the-government-s-new-brexit-position-paper-is-actually-prett

Challenge to UK Government/DUP deal for breaking Good Friday Agreement
www.crowdjustice.com/case/challenge-dup-deal/?utm_source=case_page_social&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=sumo_widget

Interesting. The EFTA court is known to follow the ECJ even though it doesn't have to. Early on after the ref-vote I went to a general meeting of employment lawyers about the possible impact of withdrawing from the ECJ and I seem to remember learning that the EFTA court even implemented the working time directive. But I'm no expert.

Can someone link to swedish thread mentioned upthread?
I've been away and missed it.

Sky News Newsdesk
The Prime Minister Theresa May says the Supreme Court will be the "ultimate arbiter " of UK law after Brexit

David Allen Green @ davidallengreen
As it is already, before Brexit.

Snigger

www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/leading-finnish-historian-threatened-with-detention-and-deportation-in-absurd-brexit-ruling-by-home-a3618176.html?amp
Leading Finnish historian threatened with detention and deportation in 'absurd' Brexit ruling by Home Office officials

The letter said she was considered “a person liable to administrative removal...as you have failed to evidence that you are exercising Treaty rights in the United Kingdom”, and that she was “a person who is liable to be detained”.

It gave her a month to leave. The Home Office said the letter was a mistake and one of around 100 sent to different people “in error”.

Dr Holmberg, an expert in early British History, moved to the UK last August with her British husband James Chester, an optician, after being seconded to Queen Mary from the University of Helsinki.

She told the Standard the Home Office’s “absurd” decision was “unlawful, arbitrary and disproportionate”.

Have I Got News For You sum up Brexit in a single tweet: twitter.com/haveigotnews/status/900336349588275200

Mother, its all PR. They know they are talking bollocks, but they also know that the people they are talking bollocks to, are largely none the wiser. (See the entire Leave Campaign).

What gets me, is that it is Remainers who are hounded for 'looking down their noses' at many who voted Leave.

The people who looked down their noses the most were the ones who lied knowingly, to dupe many Leavers, knowing they were spouting bollocks.

BRITAIN TO BECOME LEADING EXPORTER OF CIRCULAR REASONING, BOASTS DAVID DAVIS by Jeff Sanchez and Johnny Zenith
www.newscrasher.com/2017/08/19/britain-become-leading-exporter-circular-reasoning-boasts-david-davis/

"Britain will become a world-beating exporter of circular reasoning, the Brexit Secretary has boasted.

Speaking out after a series of embarrassing failures, David Davis said: “British businesses must do more to embrace the great opportunities presented by the senseless destruction of our economy by Brexit.”

“We had a non-binding referendum which we won based on a pack of lies, and now business leaders must respect the will of the gullible and help us go through with this unnecessary and avoidable economic suicide.”

“Even though all of our companies will go bust or else relocate to the European mainland, Britain can still become a world-beating exporter of the finest circular reasoning, along with jams, biscuits and flip flops.”

“In fact, when companies move their head-quarters and jobs out of the UK as a direct result of Brexit, this is a kind of export boom and Remainers should be doing more to acknowledge this success.”

It gave her a month to leave. The Home Office said the letter was a mistake and one of around 100 sent to different people “in error”.

I was particularly annoyed by the BBC news this evening. Its main story was how the UK wouldn't be bound by the ECJ, but after spending some time on this item, didn't manage to mention that it was a climbdown by the UK and that we would still be bound by many of their rules (some of which we helped to make, so shouldn't want to ignore.)

There was only a passing mention of the Finnish woman and the 100 letters sent in mistake - no interview with her, no detailed analysis of what the Home Office is doing to put things right.

There was only a passing mention of the Finnish woman and the 100 letters sent in mistake

The cynic in me thinks there was no mistake and it's a slightly jazzed up version of the 'Go Home' vans, hoping to scare off a few more foreigners. They're just going with the mistake angle because they were caught out.

Patty I like the idea of being double-barreled aristocracy