Westminstenders: Competitive Stupidity

[RedToothBrush]

A week of wondering which MP is going to be the most dumb.

There is stiff competition between parties and remain / leave.

Expect incredible bids of ignorance and incompetence to curl your toes, with a bit of constitutional craziness thrown in for good measure.

Valentine's Day beckons...

... And so does the No Deal Divorce.

Steps in what way is it a punishment?

Given our red lines and the EU rules (many of which we wrote), the deal is pretty much as expected.

If you read the EU No Deal notices they have rolled quite a few things over, for mutual benefit.

RG started it, not me

Kinda underlines the point too

No idea if this will work, or even if it will link to the right song. But Tom Lehrer...

Your comments are about as well thought through as the 'leavers' a year ago

My comments about the EU being on the verge of a recession and a punishment deal are entirely valid.

A 'punishment' deal. Pah. a) we don't actually have a deal yet, we just have a withdrawal agreement settling divorce issues. b) we have a non-binding political declaration which /could/ be used to hop off in all kinds of directions. The only reason the future deal looks like it will be punishing is because Theresa May has decided we are leaving the single market and customs union, i.e. she has decided on a hard Brexit. i.e. we have decided to punish ourselves. If our red lines shifted, so would Europe's. Barnier did his staircase diagram for a reason.

So, what is better? Being huddled in with a bunch of mates in tough economic times (who have lots of Most Favoured Nation status as a trading bloc). Or being Billy NoMates?

And our decision to Brexit is hardly going to help economies around the world is it? If you want to avoid recession, surely you should be arguing for revoke and for us to remain?

Steps I know everyone calls it May's Deal, but it is a withdrawal agreement.

The deal comes later.

Europeans are close neighbours

and. I would hope, close friends.

There is a saying in Dutch "Beter een goede buur dan een verre vriend" - "its better to have a good neighbour than a far away friend"

tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp-growth

UK growth is soooo much healthier at 0.2% than German growth (whose stats aren't out yet ).

I also noticed this bit in the commentary:

Private consumption and government consumption were the main driver of growth, while gross capital formation and net trade contributed negatively.

...that will be that portion of the public that is stockpiling advance purchasing and/or having a final blow-out for Chrismas/buying their capital goods (like washing machines, new cars) before tariffs and inflation hit (or they just can't get them ) and the government which has found a magic money tree is spending merrily on Brexit preparations (and the MoD is advance purchasing )

And which country is it that is running a trade surplus?

Pasty

One word: Backstop

Or what bellini said. Same difference

Pasty

There is a saying in Dutch "Beter een goede buur dan een verre vriend" - "its better to have a good neighbour than a far away friend"

Isn't there a Sweden/Norway joke (can't remember which way round, but it could easily be adapted ...)

Q: What does Sweden have that Norway doesn't ?
A: Good neighbours.

I'm here all week.

Sorry about that, ha ha.

Read up about it, we don't even have to get to the position where the backstop is activated.

ec.europa.eu/commission/sites/beta-political/files/the_withdrawal_agreement_explained.pdf

Based on what evidence? We will be able to make new trade deals. Countries within the EU won't be able too.

Countries in the EU make new trade deals as a block and therefore get really very good deals as has been demonstrated recently by their deal with China and recent economic partnership with Japan. They don't need to make deals as individual countries because... well...why would you do that when you can do better as part of a group?

The UK had nothing like the leverage of the EU as a block and is just not going to get as good trading deals. To believe otherwise is just a bit ridiculous.

Our politicians' rants about the backstop just makes me feel that they have no faith in their negotiating skills.

They may well be onto something

The backstop - the solution to the fact that we are parties to an international peace agreement, and underwrites the Good Friday Agreement - and that again, wasn't required or really being talked about UNTIL SODDING THERESA MAY SAID THAT BREXIT MEANT LEAVING THE SINGLE MARKET AND CUSTOMS UNION.

Oh, I'm grumpy today.

@Stepladders007

We ve a great deal now, whatever we negotiate simply cannot be as good as the current one, see the loss of access to security databases and Galileo.
Contrast with the ESA and how countries cooperating together can match the US and Chinese space programs.

We lose 70 FTA's inc partial ones, we need to renegotiate those just to stand still, then seek new ones... with which economies?

The EU can negotiate new FTA deals just as well as we can.

French wine, German cars will still be sold here regardless, we will just have less money to buy them.

You just seem to be the sort of leaver who delights in seeing Europe get into difficulties.

Yeah, that pesky little international peace agreement might hamper some people's plans. Trashing it and keeping our UN seat might be impossible.

Is the "punishment deal" described in detail in the 500-page Brexit White Paper?

They'll come on and say they are not a leaver now...

The "punishment deal" may just be a stray post-it note, intended for the modern day Madam Cyn .