Westminstenders: Distract and divert. Just close your eyes.

[RedToothBrush]

This morning Jeremy Hunt declared that, 'With vision on both sides we can find a way through that has the support of Parliament and also works for the EU'

Of course this is 18th February 2019 and the UK has yet to demostrate they understand the problem, much less have the vision to solve it. And we leave the EU next month.

It needs to be stressed at this point: DON'T FORGET TO FOCUS ON WHAT REALLY MATTERS

Everything else is a tactic to make you close your eyes and miss what is really going on. Everything. Brexit looks increasingly like a hypnotist making their subject do ever increasing acts of ridiculousness on stage. Except I do not know if the public or the politicians are that poor sod. It is the magician who uses tricks of slight of hand to make you look the wrong way, whilst they makes all the big moves out of your vision.

There are so many stories that are coming out to try and make you miss what the government are failing to do. Stay focused. We can't ignore all these stories, but understand whether they are really important to the end game too.

A labour split, a march on the 23rd March, talk of a PV, the Brady amendment, the Malthouse Compromise, Cooper-Boles halting no deal?

No we need more than that.

The time for fantasies are gone. Its time to face reality and be pragmatic. The only thing that matters is the approaching cliff. Which we will go over not on the 29th March but in the next couple of weeks. We might not realise the ground disappearing beneath our feet at first. Our momentum as we go forward will carry for a short while before gravity kicks in.

But we can not defy the laws of physics and suddenly be able to fly because we develop magic superhuman powers of vision.

And no one will come to save us either.

Our national humilation will be total, if we don't acknowledge what is coming and stop.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eu_referendum_2016_/3492426-Westministenders-Abbreviation
Brexit Abbreviation Thread

As the great Zaphod Beeblebrox said "my heads hurts".
Thank you Red.

Cheers red

Thanks Red.

Thanks for the new thread, Red.

Member of the ERG this morning on Sky News said that it wasn't difficult to get agreement to the WA - that there were just a couple "tiny changes to the backstop in the appendices required"

He finished by saying that once the WA was agreed (with those "tiny" amendments ), then once we got into transition, then they (the ERG) could REALLY disagree with the future plans

Just as we thought

could REALLY disagree with the future plans

Can't think why we need a backstop

Thanks Red. Goodness me, what larks!
My quote is from Terry Pratchett:
Most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally evil, but by people being fundamentally people
I must admit I googled and was surprised that the Telegraph gave me what I was looking for...more for anyone who wants some
www.telegraph.co.uk/books/authors/terry-pratchett-best-quotes/

Thanks Red

Being an independent works out more difficult. And expensive:

Catherine Haddon @cath_haddon

The question you are all asking: Short Money.

If they register as political party 'The Independent Group', they get £17,673.65 for every seat, £35.30 for every 200 votes.

It's calculated from last election.

If they sit as a group of independents.... they don't.

And i think they said they would sit as Independents. So there is a cost in that.
researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN01663

There are other implications. As a political party you get various rights - Opposition days for instance. They would be down the pecking order below Lib Dems and DUP on being called for Qs (if they had a leader).

Some are on Select Committees - they can continue (other Independents have done so) though it upsets the party balance But then there are a fair few gaps already.

If they are reelected they are likely to loose those Select Committee seats...

pmk

PMK

PMK

.

If we end up with more and more independents are we going to need to have a wholesale change in the system that reflects this and supports independents better? Not sure how that would look but something to mull over.

PMK. Ta red

I think the problem is the political system is organic, and as such sees any deviations from the two-party body as a cancer, and simply works to kill it. Ultimately it's why there are revolutions - when a system cannot be changed from within. I guess a nerdy analogy (possibly with the emphasis on anal ) are changes to operating systems that can't be carried out while the computer is running ...

I found myself idly wondering recently how the UK could ever become a republic when every MP is required to swear an oath of allegiance to her madge ?

If (and I think it is unlikely ) there were a sizeable number of independents in the next (or a future) parliament, then it might be the catalyst to change from our broken FPTP system and the cancer of 2 party binary politics.

The SNP has already said it is in favour of it even though it would reduce their numbers.

I did see somewhere a Labour apparatchik arguing vehemently in favour of the AV system. Of course they would , as all it does it give a veneer of supposed support to the two party system, because it still reduces to binary choices.

Thanks for thread Red
Tick tock Tickety tock.

PMK

Tick tock Tickety tock.

947 hours ...

twitter.com/brexitcountdow1

Thanks, red 💐

I agree, whatever happens wrt Brexit will be determined within the next 10-14 days
After that, it's just play-acting, to keep the public from realising what's in store for them

The only reason I assess the chances of No Deal at 90%, instead of 99.99%, is that I have witnessed beneficial political shocks as well as negative ones.

Like almost everyone at the time:

• I never expected the Vietnam war to end

• I never expected Spain, Greece, Portugal to end their fascist dictatorships and become democracies

• I never expected the USSR & the Warsaw Pact to collapse and for communism to mostly die, except for China & a few stooges.

BBC news site manages to have no mention of Brexit in it's 13 above-the-fold stories ....

However, those shocks took at least a few weeks, sometimes several months
We're at one minute to midnight

Thanks Red.