Westministenders: May's Turd Way covered in Donald's Glittery Tickertape from his Parade

[RedToothBrush]

Where next?

Auditions for chief turd polisher to Mrs May are in full action, whilst those who don't believe in the turd, wade about knee deep in their own shit, still searching for that illusive plan for Brexit which doesn't stink to high heaven of crap.

After the dual resignation of Davis and Johnson, amongst the stench there is an air of uncertainity and expectation of all hell breaking loose.

In the last 48 hours we have been told that

1. May is more secure having crushed the brexiteers,
2. May about to be ousted by a no confidence vote, triggering a leadership election,
3. The Tory Party are about to split,
4. Brexiteers are in disarray fighting amongst themselves,
5. We will remain in the EU,
6. We get an EEA deal,
7. We will get no deal,
8. A People's vote is inevitable and
9. There will be a General Election.

Which only serves to merely highlight just how little of a clue ANYONE has about what happens next.

What bothers me now, is that Johnson seems not to have surfaced yet and there are rumours that Gove has gone to ground, whilst Donald Trump is practically on the plane and is stirring the pot praising Johnson.

Instead we seem to have a series of junior ministers and Tory HQ figures quitting in a long drawn out coordinated toy throwing out of the pram exercise, to try and get what hard brexiteers want.

If I had to hazard a guess at the general silence from key figures, I might be tempted to say that someone is going to use Trump's visit to throw a political grenade and actively invite him to endorse them.

That might sound ridiculous given that the public hates Trump, but that loses sight of the fact that the people who will vote for the next leader of the Tory Party are overwhelming authoritarian leaning and likely to be those who like Trump and would be impressed by such a move.

I note this tweet today from the wise Sarah Kendzior:

Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior
"There are parallels to past authoritarianism, but what's happening with Trump, in the digital age, is new and transnational. The president's loyalty is not necessarily to a state but to foreign leaders and multinational criminal alliances. The state is just something to sell."

It is clear that others in the parliamentary party will be very alarmed at the prospect. There were Tory MPs who were openly tweeted how please that disgusting Johnson had gone and are no fans of Trump.

May still seems to think that she can get her plan through and approved by the EU in its current form. The White Paper is due on Thursday.

Much speculation is that it will be significant if she fails to produce this on time, as she will have capitulated to the Brexiteers. And this will lead to the EU just giving up on us anyway.

She also announced to the Cabinet today, that preparations for No Deal were to be stepped up significantly.

We still are left wondering who, she is stitching up; the Brexiteers whose heads are currently exploding or the friends she keeps closest to her (friends? or ideological enemies).

The problem is that there just no other viable way forward at the moment, as the country is divided, both Labour and the Conservatives are divided and are more interested in their own future than that of the party and there are far too many ambitious 'celebrity MPs' who want to make their mark. No one gives a shit about ordinary workers or business. Plus there is the divine observation that DGRossetti made at the end of the last thread: The biggest obstacle to Brexit has been Brexiteers

The grab for post-Brexit power shows the whole of Westminister up as the cess pit of self interest it is, with Boris Johnson merely its biggest figure head.

Wait until the GFA officially has its head put on the chopping block awaiting its fate. Perhaps we can flog NI to Donald and get a Brexit Dividend afterall.

I must admit to finding it hard to have a view that is altogether different to this:
James Patrick @J_amesp
There is no way back from all of this. The next seven days simply decide how badly - on a scale of fucked to smouldering crater - it is going to end.

One final predictation, which I am DAMN certain of: Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday are all going to be grim for political watching if you are into democratic values and principles. It will be a 4 day sales pitch for Brand Trump in all its All American Overblown Horror that Brits tend to find utterly distasteful. Expect the red carpet of full of turd glitter to be rolled out for Donald Trump Show. Expect May to embarass herself in her fawning all over him, as if she's star struck. Expect that hideously cringeworthy photo thats totally inevitable.

Politics is going to get worse. It may never get better.

(But yay football gets to cover it all up... Come on England!)

Just going back a bit to the lack of WiFi at Chequers, the security services probably put up signal blockers during the visit

That's what I speculated Olennas

Those DNA tests are modern astrology.

I agree this is probably true BUT my auntie who lives on the east coast of America did one - she told them nothing about herself beyond the DNA swab she sent in, and when her results returned with the map of her ancestry there was a HUGE bullseye right over the tiny village in northwest England she was born in. Which is a pretty big coincidence if there is no worth to them.

She was looking forward to seeing all the different places she came from but ... northwest England is apparently it for my mothers family. Mostly from the same village they grew up in and then a little bit of spread out to Warrington and Chester. No Romans, no vikings, not even saxons - nothing.
We've apparently been here since humans first came to England - and never married an outsider (there is no actual way that is possible - we're talking hundreds of thousands of ancestors - no way) ... we must be so inbred I'm surprised we can stand up .

Not to my home he's not.

the security services probably put up signal blockers during the visit
I wonder which security services.

Has anyone seen Jon Sopel's bizarre tweet exchange with Stephanie Grisham (Director of Communications for @FLOTUS Melania Trump. Former Dep Press Sec for @potus)?

There's a bit more on his timeline but why lie about this when it's so easy to disprove? I remember all the fuss about Trump coming the day after. Is it better to cover up Trump's lies or his possible dementia?

Jon Sopel
@BBCJonSopel
Bizarre. @realDonaldTrump says he came to Turnberry the day before Brexit and he told everyone that he thought Brexit would happen. And that he predicted correctly what would happen the next day. Umm.…

Stephanie Grisham
@StephGrisham45
Stephanie Grisham Retweeted Jon Sopel
He did. It actually is true. I was there. June 23.Stephanie Grisham added,

Jon Sopel
‏**@BBCJonSopel**
Replying to @StephGrisham45
Stephanie - I hate to argue as we were there together. He was NOT at Turnberry on the day before the referendum, as he said at the news conference. He was not there on polling day itself. He was there the day after, on Friday 24th. These are indisputable facts

we must be so inbred I'm surprised we can stand up - six toes must make feet very stable

the security services probably put up signal blockers during the visit
I wonder which security services.

I thought that too, turn off the WiFi and jam the mobile signal - except that's illegal in the UK.

Casting the Runes - by D.G. Rossetti (shamelessly nicked off M.R. James ...)

I'm starting to suspect we're going to get a very soft Brexit. Not only that, but when we do; that it was set up from the off, and will emerge as one of the most audacious - and ambiguous - pieces of political maneuvering ever seen in the UK.

Bottom line is Theresa May has secured what she needed for the government to push through the Brexit it wants. By allowing the remainers to play out their concerns and worries and "Remoaning", the thicker Brexiteers were herded into a bullish stance of eliminating parliamentary oversight. In fact there are probably quite a few who still think it was their idea. Like triggering A50 in the face of Remainer opposition.

If my conspiratheory (and it's interesting my spell checker thinks that is a real word ) is right, then the ERG and it's members are now an irrelevance in terms of actual power. The Government has the reins - not parliament. Even if the ERG were able to trigger a leadership challenge, they will still end up with a government bound to the White Paper Way.

At this point, I believe it's important to note that Theresa May - and her advisers - have cracked the Brexit code, and are well aware that they can say whatever they like - even if it flatly contradicts the White Paper. They can do this because (a) it's exactly what Brexiteers have been doing for years, (b) it works, (c) it's pretty foolproof.

So if we ignore the words, and concentrate on the White Paper, and the Brexit it could result in, we get a soft landing Brexit.

As for the ERG chumps, well, not only did they vote for it, they also furiously insisted that parliament should not have oversight. A casual reading of the past two years will show that Brexiteers have got everything they demanded. Well, almost everything.

Of course, the door is still open for JRM to go public, and announce that he would never have voted for the act if he had known it would have ended up like this. But I'm going to guess that even though he is spectacularly dim, he pays advisers enough to point out that making such a statement might not be received in the way he intended it.

What's that you say ? You voted for something but it turned out to be something different ? Well, who'd have thunk it ? What's that now ? You want another vote ?

I am of the opinion that tucked away in the hairsbreadth between written law and parliamentary convention (remember ? The supremacy all Brexiteers were so fetishishtic about) there is something hidden - not visible until crossed - which makes turning the White Paper into law a given. When your enemy demonstrates they don't do detail, don't do fact, don't do thinking, and don't do history, it shouldn't be that much of a task for a civil service steeped in tradition and law to wargame all sorts of arcane interactions.

If I am right, it's sheer genius. If we start from the position that any Brexit had to be as soft as possible (the one thing that was clear on June 24 2016) then the best way to achieve it was to trick the Hard Brexiteers into removing parliament from the equation. Ideally (and if I'm right, correctly) by using their own dirty tactics against them.

Or maybe I'm just hoping I'm right. But the more I think about it, the less I believe the ERG cabal can actually do. They may be able to get a new leader. It might even be BoJo. But even he as Prime Minister is going to be committed to the White Paper. With weeks to go.

If anyone is unhappy with the White Paper (again, ignore what is said) then we need a new government. And there is only one way to achieve that.

And, like the rumours that Churchill had to let Coventry burn in order not to show the Allies hand, the disruption to business we have seen since 2016 had to happen to make the extreme Brexiteers believe they were going to get what they wanted. Sadly we needed real blood (i.e. jobs) to be spilled to convince the enemy.

And if the above isn't true, does anyone want an option on my next novel ? (Which would actually be a dusting down of my first, which was a retelling of the Arthurian myth set in a post apocalyptic Britain ... and that's potentially outing )

I supposed Monday is the next big day ? JRM and his amendments ?

Trevor Noah's ( current US Daily Show host)

I can highly recommend "Afraid of the Dark" - his stand up show from last year. He talks to a US audience about Brexit, and notes that the one race on earth that has no right to complain about immigration is the British. Who went around the entire globe as (unwanted) immigrants for centuries. When he points this out, the US audience go wild. Because they totally know about being oppressed by the British. It's literally written into their constitution. (Which I suspect few, if any Brexiteers have actually read).

Trevor Noah did a joke about walking with his father as a child, and being "dropped like a bag of weed" if they saw a policeman.

That ties in with my pondering, DGR , that May might actually have been very cunning and deliberately timed the White Paper to coincide with Trump's controversial visit. That way attention and analysis got diverted from it

Trevor Noah, about airport announcements, worth a

DRG - I had wondered something similar, albeit less sophisticated.

This is credible...

At this point, I believe it's important to note that Theresa May - and her advisers - have cracked the Brexit code, and are well aware that they can say whatever they like - even if it flatly contradicts the White Paper. They can do this because (a) it's exactly what Brexiteers have been doing for years, (b) it works, (c) it's pretty foolproof.

But how do you reconcile that with the red lines and initial conversations like this ? It would be a sort of two year long double bluff...

www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top-stories/my-brawl-over-brexit-with-prime-minister-theresa-may-1-4807899

Heads up on who's paid for today's fascist march in London.
US organisation MEF
www.hopenothate.org.uk/2018/07/14/american-think-tank-funding-tommy-demos/

Trump ambassador 'lobbied Britain on behalf of jailed right-wing activist Tommy Robinson

UK warned of criticism from US if Robinson not treated more 'sympathetically

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/donald-trump-tommy-robinson-ambassador-britan-right-wing-activist-a8447051.html

It is already looking v bad today.

The minute brexit looks like it's going 'soft' watch out for the obvious events happening; like today in London, like Thursday in NI. Not good.

BBC News (UK) @BBCNews
Sir David Attenborough polar ship set for launch

hattie du lac @hattiedulac
look, we voted for boaty mcboatface, it’s the will of the people, boatface means boatface, it doesn’t matter if it’s a ridiculous outcome from a poll that never should have existed, you have to respect the people’s choice for a hard boatface result

The White Paper: At the risk of sounding crass, we know that Brexiteers struggle with reading. As long as she says what they want to hear, they're happy.

When someone does draw pictures of what's in the white paper, they are then hoist with the petard of experts and fake news - again.

Again, if I'm right - or close - it would be illuminating to know (not that we ever would) who was in on it. My guess is no one in the cabinet, who - even now - might think they are somehow in charge. Certainly the three dunces would never have seen it coming. Or not until it was a done deal - at which point they knew their game was up. But it was too late. Once again they were stymied by their own flaws. In this case pride (what comes before a fall) and the desire to avoid the threatened walk of shame at Chequers.

Of course the new ministers - Raab and Hunt - are now signed up to the White Paper. Whatever their personal views. So May appointing Raab is a further masterstroke. It's a clear pro-Brexiteer appointment. But he's had his wings clipped. Of course he could have refused the brief. But how would he sell that to the Brexiteers ?

I think Gove might have twigged early on. But he was probably easy to contain, since rather pleasingly, he really does only care for Gove, and thus easily bought. Do we have a deputy Prime Minister any more ? If not, I would not be at all surprised to hear Gove being put forward for the position. Again, something Brexiteers could not conceivably object to.

Having railed all through these forums about how the English ruling classes have managed to hold on for 1,000 years, I should have paid more attention to myself. They didn't do it by being as shit as they have been for the past 2 years.

Anyone know how to contact Dan Browns publisher ?

DRG I have thought for some time that TM is either very stupid and weak or astonishingly cunning and determined. Your post articulated my unformed musings far better than I ever could, though I’m still not sure what’s going on.

But how do you reconcile that with the red lines and initial conversations like this ?

I said we needed real blood to convince the Brexiteers. In fact that's probably the only thing that would have convinced them.

Remainers need to listen to themselves, sometimes. If (and I count myself in here) we believe that to Leave the EU is the biggest possible disaster that could befall the UK, short of actual war, then how much is an acceptable price to pay to avert it, or to neutralise it ? We've all been so angry and unbelieving that they could be so destructive and so cavalier, and so nihilistic. But given that they are, then real damage has to be done, and be seen to be done in order to assuage any doubts they may have had. Again, they've been played. The second the referendum result was known you could hear the sound of people scuttling as far as possible from actually being associated with Brexit as you could. No way were the Brexiteers going to get involved if they thought they could bully others into doing their dirty work. So they were spun a very long line.

A soft Brexit even plays into the narrative of saving the Tories. As a catastrophic hard Brexit would surely see the end of them. Or so some think.

It's horrible to think that all this uncertainty and job losses, and lost investment and lost prestige has been inflicted as part of some sick game. But given we know ("fuck business") that Brexiteers are quite happy to throw us all under a bus, then maybe the lesser of two evils is to throw a few under the bus, so the rest of us can live. And unless you have actually served and fought in a true tanks-over-nurseries type war, such decisions are - thankfully - beyond our ken.

DGR! Sorry.

I think your conspiracy theories are too coherent for Dan Brown's publisher.

However I do fear you are giving far too much credit for intelligence to ...someone, in orchestrating all this. As you always say - it's usually not malice - just incompetence. I think this is similar - it's not cunning and guile - just incompetence. That it may turn out alright in the end, anyway, is just blind bloody luck.

I have thought for some time that TM is either very stupid and weak or astonishingly cunning and determined.

I think she's no smarter that the Brexiteers. That's the genius. Unless she's some sort of latter-day Claudius, she's really none too bright.

I do think there are some very capable minds that hover around her. Maybe so hidden that she's not quite aware they are there, or what they do. She is almost certainly being guided - maybe invisibly.

This isn't some kohl-eyed mysticism I'm imagining. Just a country which over the centuries has acquired odd little roles in odd little parts of government. Never written. Never laid into law. Maybe never even paid by the state. But a solid body of wide heads that can counsel outside the bear pit of politics.

Imagine you had to write the Brexit episode of Yes Prime Minister, and you wanted the outcome I have imagined, but that it had to be (as all episodes were) totally believable.

Let's put it this way: I doubt it's just the ERG that have discovered Whatsapp.

I'd love to believe TM is an evil genius

Oh she's not. If she was, there's no way the Brexiteers would have fallen for it. The key to my entire house of cards is that they genuinely believe she's capable of being manipulated. Which of course, she is. Only she's being manipulated by smarter minds than the Brexiteers. Not that it would be hard.

If I am right, then the course we are ploughing was determined before she became leader. And we all thought that was a put up job (as my DM would have said). But crucially, it was Brexiteers who thought they put it up.

Brexiteers have had two full years now to get the Brexit they wanted. The fact they didn't crack on with it at once, but instead wasted two years fighting off any threat to whatever Brexit they imagined they wanted is not going to stand them in good stead when they start carping at the White Paper. Especially if they start saying they feel tricked ....