Westministenders: The One Where We Finally Get A Leadership Challenge?

[RedToothBrush]

Tick tick tick.

What do we think?

Yes? No?

Another week of wtf-ing at British politics.

[BigChocFrenzy]

The DUP is reported as stating that they they might refuse to support the govt if there is a No Confidence motion AFTER the WA has been passed

So the govt should be safe until the WA is passed and maybe even after that.

imo, Corbyn renders the DUP threat impotent:

If he - or any other Labour leader - becomes PM, he could get a better deal than May, simply by accepting the Irish Sea as the border for all extra checks

Then the complicated whole-UK CU becomes unnecessary

and mainland Britain can have any kind of deal it wants, without the millstone of the NI backstop.

[BestIsWest]

Any one seen @garius Twitter thread on the events of the last few days, can’t link sorry but very funny.

[BigChocFrenzy]

Carole Cadwalladr: Being called a ‘crazy cat woman’ was an attempt to control and shame. It won’t work

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/18/the-chilling-undertones-of-andrew-neil-mad-cat-woman-tweet

And this is why Neil’s actions and the BBC’s response are so chilling.

Because for well over a year Banks, the Bristol businessman who donated upwards of £8m to Nigel Farage’s Leave.EU campaignn*, has been seeking to undermine my credibility as a reporter.

He’s been seeking to intimidate me and the Observer and stop us from publishing.

The “crazy cat lady” image didn’t come from Neil.
It came from Banks.
It’s been a key piece of his arsenal in his campaign of targeted harassment against me.

And now it has been sanctioned by Andrew Neil.
It has unleashed a whole new torrent of hate and abuse on to my laptop screen.

Because a “crazy cat lady” isn’t a harmless animal lover with free-thinking views;
it’s a woman who’s outside acceptable society.
Who doesn’t conform to conventional norms.

Who a few hundred years ago would have been burned at the stake.
I’m a middle-aged woman, without children.
And this is my lot.
I occupy one of the last few remaining categories of acceptable prejudice.

[BigChocFrenzy]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/nov/18/dadaist-pm-and-vague-corbyn-make-nonsense-of-current-state-of-brexit

Dominic Raab....
The former Brexit secretary imagines himself to be a natural leader, a Marvel superhero.
The rest of the world sees him as Captain Mainwaring in Lycra 😂

[AsleepAllDay]

I believe in the worst impulses of the Conservative Party. As soon as someone thinks they have the numbers, they'll break ranks

[prettybird]

From the end of the last thread: I've managed to think of at least one real benefit of leaving to mention to ds, but one that has a dreadful cost for the poorest and most vulnerable in UK society

Maybe the UK/Westminster will then finally understand that the British Empire is long gone and that it needs to learn a bit of humility. And that working with, rather than trying to control, other countries is not a sign of weakness - it is a sign of self-confidence and strength.

[Violetparis]

Has Boris put a letter in ? His Telegraph column will be interesting tomorrow. Have many Tory MP publically backed May's plan ?

[RedToothBrush]

Michael Fabricant @ mike_fabricant
I am NOT putting in a letter to the 1922 to trigger a confidence vote. Unwise. If she won convincingly, and she might, it would strengthen Remainers hands in the Government.

However, this deal as it stands is unacceptable. If unchanged, I will vote against it.

Fabricant would be someone you might expect to no confidence May.

[RedToothBrush]

Tim Montgomerie @montie
Those 48 letters need to go in soon or the credibility of the ERG will be toast

And here's where you can find the ERGs 7 page document saying the WA is crap
brexitcentral.com/erg-publish-right-know-case-governments-brexit-deal/

No I can't be bothered reading it either.

[Mightybanhammer]

Odd- this new thread not showing in my list of Brexit topics - have to access it from the previous thread. Happened to last thread too.

[1tisILeClerc]

Despite a poor exam result in English I can see 2 mistakes on the title page.

[UnnecessaryFennel]

That @garius thread is perfect. Especially the characterisations of GoVE and Failing Grayling

[BigChocFrenzy]

Why Britain Needs Its Own Mueller
Carole Cadwalladrr*

www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/11/16/why-britain-needs-its-own-mueller/

[BigChocFrenzy]

Chris Greyy@chrisgreybrexit*

With the ERG now acting like a completely separate party in loose coalition with Tories
and Brexiter ministers forming their own sub-Cabinet,
it's hardly an exaggeration to say that in effect the UK no longer has a functioning government, at least as regards Brexit.

[BigChocFrenzy]

re 47 or 48 letters

Matt Dathan@matt_dathan

Sir Graham Brady has now cleared this up: _
Threshold for triggering a no confidence vote is "at least 15%" _of Tory MPs.
So that would have to be 48 in whole people.
So nothing has changed.

[DGRossetti]

Those 48 letters need to go in soon or the credibility of the ERG will be toast

Credibility with whom FFS ???? Surely I can't be the only one who has repeated suggested that they are an absolute nothing in the scale of things. Full of piss and wind, as Shakespeare might have said (if indeed he didn't ....).

If there are really people in the Tory party who have quaked in fear at the idea of JRM and the ERG as some sort of pastiche Gestapo, then they should hold their manhood (or womanhood) cheap that they were blinded by the lights and noises of fools ....


Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. The days creep slowly along until the end of time. And every day that’s already happened has taken fools that much closer to their deaths. Out, out, brief candle. Life is nothing more than an illusion. It’s like a poor actor who struts and worries for his hour on the stage and then is never heard from again. Life is a story told by an idiot, full of noise and emotional disturbance but devoid of meaning.

[borntobequiet]

That ERG document reminds me of a text I wrote for my Critical Thinking class, titled The right to know.
It was an initially plausible looking piece but deliberately designed to be a very poor argument littered with problematic reasoning and dubious evidence, so it could be torn to pieces by even the least able students. I was very proud of it!

[Jason118]

Red
No I can't be bothered reading it either.
I read it and the arguments are all reasonable when compared with their own expectations. Unfortunately it relies on I/NI suddenly not existing, and the EU not caring about international treaties. It's a good answer, however it's not answering the right question.

[lljkk]

I miscalculated earlier, I meant Monday eve not Sunday eve when Graham Brady will either act or not on his x-many letters. If he doesn't have enough by Monday evening then I think the deal will proceed to fail vote in commons & who knows what happens after that.

I read ERG 7 pgs of complaining (their attempt to reduce the 500 pgs to plain English). Other than claiming that for £39bn UK will get nothing, I kind of agree with most of what they say. However, I also believe that pigs don't fly. Whereas ERG still hope for winged porcines. So I didn't expect Brexit to look any better than the proposed current deal.

Steven Nolan (R5L, about 10:30pm) did a long interview last night with some rep from ERG, the rep talking about ERG's 7 pg summary. One of the very best political interviews I've heard in ages.

[UnnecessaryFennel]

The odious Peter Bone on Sky News now trying to suggest that Brexit will, in fact, solve UK poverty because we can import cheaper food and clothes. And that the UN's special rapporteur on poverty is 'talking rubbish' when he suggests that the UK has a poverty issue.

He makes me want to scream and throw things.

[PineappleSunrise]

We have the cheapest clothes we've ever had in history at the moment. Food prices are quite decent as well. It's our housing costs, higher education costs, and low pay that's the problem.

Honesty, spot the man who's never set foot in H&M or Primark.

[Hazardswan]

cheaper food and clothes

Good job Peter Bone(head) says we need that to fix the poverty that we don't have

Three cheers for diabetes, antibiotic resistance and clothes that fall apart after one wash. Hip, hip Hhhooor....aaa... Wait a minute, no body wants that.

[Hazardswan]

I posted this month's ago

www.wired.com/story/farm-antibiotics-human-illness-hidden-link/amp

But thought it was worth linking to again as a reminder for all those awkward conversations and MP letters that await!

[Buteo]

Was pleased to hear my Tory Remain MP on the R4 World This Weekend saying what the UK has never done is put itself in the EU’s shoes to see what kind of deal could possibly be acceptable. She, at least, won’t vote against it as she thinks it is the only compromise on offer, and Leadsom et al are on a hiding to nothing to try and tweak it.

Even the Chair of the Tory party in Boston and Skegness said, much as he loathed the deal, it was better than the chaos of No Deal or the climb down of No Brexit.

[1tisILeClerc]

Viewed from 'the continent' on a foggy day you can't even see the UK.