Westminstenders: Pro Rogues

[RedToothBrush]

The Pro Rogues plan to prorogue again this week.

The Queen might be challenged to sack Johnson. Or he might be forced to extend.

It depends on which newspaper you read. Either way it strikes you that no one really knows what's going to happen...

To clarify my friend will be in Europe

Just watching Duddrige Bercows. Odious little turnip is a fair description I reckon.
Angela Eagle is asking him if he has "seen the full document himself" and he won't say.
I suppose if he were Arlene Foster he would have seen it in full.

tobee I'm wondering about travel arrangements too. I've got a work trip (academic) to an EU country scheduled for mid-November. I can't imagine bringing my laptop and USB stick of slides will be an issue; I take that stuff to North America regularly. But I'm quite worried about immigration queues and flight disruption. I've committed to going and as it's for a thesis examination, I feel cancelling would be completely unfair on the student. I think if things look bleak I will have to ask if we can arrange a worst case scenario video link.

People don't want Brexit and they really don't want No Deal Brexit - despite what social media and MSM might have us believe.

Sadly, people do still seem to be prepared to vote Conservative.

Which, of course, makes no sense at all.

🤷‍♀️

The Independent: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-no-deal-deadline-boris-johnson-eu-poll-voters-a9146196.html

We're supposed to be going to a Golden Wedding celebration in Germany in mid-November (which rather shows my age!). Have told our friends it will depend on whether we can get there, if our usual exit port (Dover) is restricted to freight only, or if the M20 (and indeed Kent in its entirety) is a no-go area.

Just another little thing to thank Brexiteers for.

DGR I feel you pain re surname and websites.
Mine is O'Something which causes no end of bother with online purchases. Round and round in circles because of a bloody apostrophe! The most annoying thing is the site will tell you the problem is a different field, all the while I know it's the bloody apostrophe! So irritating.
Funnily enough when booking flights with the national carrier of Ireland it's no problem,...because no matter what Brexiters think of the Irish, they know what a fucking apostrophe is!

You know, I think the vilification of Blair & the Blair governments - has served its purpose in securing Corbyn and is, I suspect, now somewhat counter-productive.

It stops, for instance, the ability to point to previous Labour governments and argue how much better they are than our current bunch.

Which that are. By a long, long way.

Murdoch, for example, backed Blair partly because he realised they were going to win, had the support of many of his readers, and he tended to think, first and foremost, about revenue.

It's worth not sinking into depression.

Parliament is a mess.

But only a third of the electorate want No Deal.

It is increasingly unlikely that a government really would be willing, even with a GE win, to impose that level of hardship and disruption on an unwilling population.

It really is worth writing to MPs, especially Conservative MPs, to point this out.

Not all MPs are so rich they can afford private security for themselves and their families.

Things are horrid now - but, my goodness, imagine what imposing No Deal on an unwilling population would do.
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It stops, for instance, the ability to point to previous Labour governments and argue how much better they are than our current bunch.

Blair did do some good theres no denying that especially after Thatcher and to a much lesser extent Major but he's also the reason that Labour lost Scotland, the PLP selection for life mentality that some in the party are pissed off with wrongly Corbyn for reinstating the reselection process

MShip: Brexit is such a fucking PITA for organising work travel. I'm in France and because I don't have my renewed residency card yet, I won't commit to travelling in November. Hoping to get to S. Africa and the U.K. in December but I'll be telling our travel agent to book flexible tickets in case I cancel. I'm not travelling unless I know I can get back - plus my mum (who is supposed to be babysitting while I'm away) has to be able to to travel safely from the U.K.

(I know these are first world problems compared to what some people might face.)

DGR I feel you pain re surname and websites. Mine is O'Something which causes no end of bother with online purchases. Round and round in circles because of a bloody apostrophe!

haacked.com/archive/2007/08/21/i-knew-how-to-validate-an-email-address-until-i.aspx/

Which I knew in the 1980s ... (don't be fooled by the 2001 date of RFC 2821 - it builds on early ones from the 70s ...)

Luckily so few places use email these days, it's not a worry.

(I once worked with a lady whose surname was "D'Souza" and full credit to the IT bods, they set her email up perfectly).

Not sure it was Blair that lost Scotland. Statesman https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2016/03/strange-death-labour-scotland

Really, I think if we want to win, or even have enough seats for a progressive alliance in a hung Parliament, in the forthcoming GE, we need to start capitalising on the successes of previous Labour governments, not damning them.

Labour governments really do mean more money for schools, for the NHS, homelessness falling, youth crime (and deaths) falling. These are provesble things - and we are failing to capitalise on this really important fsct at the moment.

Labour governments save lives and change lives for the better. They really do.

A Labour government, or a Labour - LD + progressive hung Parliament, will stop Brexit (by way of a PV).

We really need to stop setting light to our historical assets and start utilising them to negotiate our way out of this extremely dangerous chaos.

hester54 Peace is everything to do with the EU

The organisation has evolved since 1950, same as people do

Do you say accomplishments of someone 50 years ago are not theirs now, because that 75 year is so massively different in experience, assets etc to the 20 year old they were ?

Much as I hate Blair , I don't think that he can be solely blamed for the demise of Labour in Scotland. The number of Scottish Labour MPs remained remarkably consistent under his premiership (the drop in 2005 was more to do with boundary changes although there was a slight theoretical drop based on an assumed comparison).

I think its near wipeout in 2015 was more to do with Scottish Labour's decision to work with the Conservatives during the Indyref campaign - and Brown's intervention in the final days of the campaign, followed by the betrayal of the Smith Commission.

But Blair's comments comparing the Scottish Parliament to a "parish council" certainly didn't help

I hope the lady who called Johnson a toerag, is much more typical of people that the Media would like us to think.

Me too, Peregrina.

There was a great article in The Guarduan today by John Harris.

He argued that people are far less divided - and far less pro-Brexit - than the media would have us believe.

I'll see if I can find it.

John Harris article

He argued that people are far less divided - and far less pro-Brexit - than the media would have us believe.

I can believe that. Up here in my corner of Leeds it feels a lot less divided when I'm out and about than the internet or news tell me it is. For the most part no one talks about it (almost as if they don't actually care that deeply about leaving the EU!) and everyone rubs along much as they always have.

When I go on (smaller) marches (because they don't dare yell at the big marches) I see more people just watching, or taking photos then we get abuse hurled at us. But of course ... it's the abuse hurlers everyone remembers, and it's this very small minority which means I don't feel safe on smaller marches.

There's definitely a radicalised and unpleasant hard core element running through society ... but the idea that average people are all a tinder box waiting to explode into civil war ... I'm not seeing it in real life.

I'm also getting all teary eyed about the wonders of a labour govt from your posts cat You should work for their marketing campaign

The Independent (pro remain, pro PV so take it with a grain of salt) is touting a commissioned poll of 15,000 people from which they extrapolate a 1.6m voter swing to Remain from Leave. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-referendum-millions-leave-voters-best-for-britain-no-deal-theresa-may-conservative-government-a8521346.html

In total, it concluded that 2.6 million Leave voters have switched their support to Remain, while 970,000 have moved the other way – a net gain for the pro-EU side of 1.6 million.

The study found that Labour voters accounted for 1.4 million of the 1.6 million switchers to Remain, significantly outnumbering the 837,000 Tory voters who switched the other way.

Trus, MShip - but it chimes with other polling.

Pretzels I could hug you.
I get so frustrated.
I'm old enough to remember what the shift from a Conservative to a Labour government felt like.
It was like bloody Narnia after the arrival of Aslan.
And I can honestly tell you, you don't realise the stress and pain you are holding inside you until, suddenly, miraculously, it stops.

That is a really powerful story that the right and left are preventing being told.

But it is true - and it really, really matters.

People have to know they don't have to submit to this torture. Better is possible.

Trus, MShip - but it chimes with other polling.

I think I unintentionally gave the wrong impression there, the polling is likely fine, it's the slant that the paper gives it that deserves a raised eyebrow. They used as a stick to beat Corbyn.

The Labour government was reducing inequality and looked as though it might actually reverse it, along with making serious inroads on child poverty.

Now ? Now we have life expectancy reversing, and people dying because of austerity. And a first: a suicide which named Brexit uncertainty as a cause.

But, somehow, you can't talk about the obvious, proven benefits of a Labour government because you will be called a Centrist.

It's madness.

It plays straight into the hands of the most crazy, dysfunctional manifestation of the Conservative Party we have ever seen.

It's crazy!!

It delivers us into the jaws of No Deal.

Sorry, MShip.

I'm a bit depressed and off-centre today.

As you may have noticed ...

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2019/oct/07/brexit-latest-news-boris-johnson-court-to-decide-if-boris-johnson-can-be-forced-to-sign-extension-letter-live-news?page=with:block-5d9b395c8f08fbb0c1722785

Bruno Bonnell, a French MP for Emmanuel Macron’s En Marche! party:

"It’s not a final version - it’s almost like a joke.
We don’t even understand it ...

This is not a genuine offer.
This is clearly a political manipulation to put the responsibility of a no-deal Brexit on the EU’s side.
.....
First of all, what he is suggesting right now is a very complex process, and even more complicated than what is proposed by the backstop.

Secondly, it’s again a last-minute proposal, as if he wanted to force the issue and put the responsibility of a no-deal Brexit onto the EU’s shoulders.

I mean we don’t want to pick and choose here.

He is the one who refused the deal that was in place, that was proposed, that was negotiated."