Brexit: Now What? Part III

[abaddon]

Wiki has a nice graph about the polling on Brexit. Green = Remain, Red = Leave. All through 2014 (the year of the Scottish Indyref) the trend lines were no more than a few percent apart.

Not surprising. Everyone thought it would never happen.

It sounds to me more the "misjudgment" as that you now have 350 mn/week for the NHS.

Just another Brexit lie. The mythical 350m a week for the NHS has been done to death and shown to be false. That Boris has raised the notion again simply demonstrates the disconnect from reality, and even Boris claims that only some of that mythical 350m might go to the NHS. Maybe.

Of course, this is an NHS which is only now considering tossing the nonsense of homeopathy. It is hardly an organisation which can be relied upon to spend responsibly.

On Cameron's part, it could also be overestimation that he could wrestle even more concessions from the EU in his pre-referendum talks. It is clear by now that British politicians, as a rule, vastly overestimate their position w.r.t. the EU.

Cameron naively assumed that "Remain" was a done deal and went on the notion "No need to campaign, nobody would be that stupid."

He found out different.

 

[Pixel42]

None in the corridors of power thought it possible that Brexit was even possible at the time.

To be fair to Cameron I'm pretty sure that if he'd thought there was a real chance that the British electorate would be stupid enough to vote to leave the EU he would not have bought the silence of his crackpot right wing during the 2015 election campaign by agreeing to put the referendum in his manifesto, even if the trouble they'd then caused him had cost him the election. He genuinely believed that a few concessions from the renegotiations, plus the fact that all three major parties were recommending Remain, would be sufficient to ensure sanity would prevail. But it was a hell of a gamble to take; he was essentially relying on there being more people in this country who possessed a single frigging clue as to where their own best interests lay than there were wilfully ignorant Little Englanders. Unfortunately the country turned out to be stuffed to the gills with wilfully ignorant Little Englanders, who cared about nothing except sticking it to Johnny Foreigner.

 

[KDLarsen]

Again that circumstances changed does not make what was said a lie. If Scotland had voted to create nuScotland it would have had to apply to join the EU. At the time of the last Scottish independent referendum no major UK party believed that the UK would be leaving the EU.

And is my memory entirely off, but wasn't there talk that any such application by nuScotland to join the EU, would be scuttered by Spain? Presumably in order to stave off the Catalan independence movement.

 

[ddt]

I'm pretty sure that abaddon's country don't have 350 million extra a week for the NHS.

My apologies to abaddon for the sloppy wording.

A lot of surprisingly eager citizens who used to despise his(?) country maybe.

Who now suddenly want to be a citizen of his country.

Not surprising. Everyone thought it would never happen.

Then they had their heads stuck deep in the sand. That graph tells otherwise.

Just another Brexit lie. The mythical 350m a week for the NHS has been done to death and shown to be false. That Boris has raised the notion again simply demonstrates the disconnect from reality, and even Boris claims that only some of that mythical 350m might go to the NHS. Maybe.

Nah, it's just a mistake. A 4h grade math error. Just like misreading those polls.

Cameron naively assumed that "Remain" was a done deal and went on the notion "No need to campaign, nobody would be that stupid."

He found out different.

Very naively.

To be fair to Cameron I'm pretty sure that if he'd thought there was a real chance that the British electorate would be stupid enough to vote to leave the EU he would not have bought the silence of his crackpot right wing during the 2015 election campaign by agreeing to put the referendum in his manifesto, even if the trouble they'd then caused him had cost him the election. He genuinely believed that a few concessions from the renegotiations, plus the fact that all three major parties were recommending Remain, would be sufficient to ensure sanity would prevail. But it was a hell of a gamble to take; he was essentially relying on there being more people in this country who possessed a single frigging clue as to where their own best interests lay than there were wilfully ignorant Little Englanders. Unfortunately the country turned out to be stuffed to the gills with wilfully ignorant Little Englanders, who cared about nothing except sticking it to Johnny Foreigner.

And even then, with the polls about Brexit in mind, he could have easily designed the referendum so it would succeed. Higher threshold for Brexit, or split various Brexit options, etc. He also knew that there were high-profile members within his own party who were in favour in Brexit, so the line "the Conservative Party was in favour of Remain" is only half the picture. The same for the Labour Party.

 

[Information Analyst]

Unfortunately the country turned out to be stuffed to the gills with wilfully ignorant Little Englanders, who cared about nothing except sticking it to Johnny Foreigner.

Augmented by those who did not understand the referendum voting process and, for example, said afterwards that they didn't think their protest "Leave" vote would "count" in their own pro-Remain area.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

No, it isn't. Think otherwise? Enumerate the Scottish/EU treaties please. You won't find any. Scotland has none. Not in it's own right. The indy vote was swung on the basis that a "Yes" would render an independant Scotland as an appellant new nation, but remaining part of the UK would render Scotland a continuing member of the EU under the UK umbrella. It turns out afterwards that the UK umbrella was all spokes and no fabric. Useless IOW. Were a second indyref passed now, it is almost certain that a fast track approach would be taken for membership of the EU.

That is how it was presented. None in the corridors of power thought it possible that Brexit was even possible at the time.

Unfortunately not. At worst, it was a naive misjudgment of the mood of the electorate. And by electorate, I mean your English masters.

Sure. But it was painted as though the only hope of Scotland remaining in the EU was to stay in the union. Scotland got the poopy end of the stick. Again.

Look, I have a great deal of sympathy for the plight of the Scots, Nevertheless, nobody forced you to be subservient to the "little Englanders", did they? Except for the "little Englanders" and their imperial delusions.

Scotland would not have been excluded from the EU following independence. That's a lie. Simple as that.

Either way if you are consistent then the situation was painted dishonestly. Either you insist that you can't say for sure Scotland would be admitted then you have to also accept that England may vote to leave to be honest. Or you put forward the most likely case for each which is that Scotland remains in the UK either way and actually is more likely to remain as an independent state since nobody in Scotland was pushing to leave.

Nobody who argued Scotland would be excluded from the EU knew that to be the case. It's far from a fact. In fact it's quite the opposite. It's a lie. It was pointed out as such at the time.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

And is my memory entirely off, but wasn't there talk that any such application by nuScotland to join the EU, would be scuttered by Spain? Presumably in order to stave off the Catalan independence movement.

Oh there was plenty talk of it. From unionist propaganda machines. Of course the UK government could have asked the EU for clarification at any point. But they preferred to maintain the lie.

 

[Information Analyst]

Nobody who argued Scotland would be excluded from the EU knew that to be the case. It's far from a fact. In fact it's quite the opposite. It's a lie. It was pointed out as such at the time.

You retrospectively declared something to be a "lie" because of an unforeseen change of circumstances contrary to the stated aspirations of those you accuse of "lying," rather than them being merely mistaken due to overconfidence. What sort of "lie" is the one you are claiming above?

 

[Garrison]

Augmented by those who did not understand the referendum voting process and, for example, said afterwards that they didn't think their protest "Leave" vote would "count" in their own pro-Remain area.

Miscalculation seems to be the defining characteristic of politics in the last couple of years and not just in the UK.

 

[Information Analyst]

Head of UK Statistics Authority reacts to Boris Johnson's re-use of discredited "£350m per week" figure:

"Dear Foreign Secretary,

I am surprised and disappointed that you have chosen to repeat the figure of £350 million per week, in connection with the amount that might be available for extra public spending when we leave the European Union.

This confuses gross and net contributions.1 It also assumes that payments currently made to the UK by the EU, including for example for the support of agriculture and scientific research, will not be paid by the UK government when we leave.

It is a clear misuse of official statistics.

Yours sincerely

Sir David Norgrove"



Source

 

[KDLarsen]

The soon to be Former Head of UK Statistics Authority...

 

[Information Analyst]

The soon to be Former Head of UK Statistics Authority...

Luckily the government doesn't have the power to sack him.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

You retrospectively declared something to be a "lie" because of an unforeseen change of circumstances contrary to the stated aspirations of those you accuse of "lying," rather than them being merely mistaken due to overconfidence. What sort of "lie" is the one you are claiming above?

No I didn't. It's quite simple - compare apples with apples. There's nothing unforeseen and no change of circumstances. I'm talking about what was know at the time. Either the discuss was about what we could be certain of in which case the risk to Scotland of staying was no less than of leaving or we are talking about what was the reasonable expectation of the people making the statement at the time in which case it was dishonest to suggest an indy Scotland would not be an EU member post independence. Lying about us not being admitted, being back of a nonexistent queue was and is lies.

The only way you get out of this without concluding dishonesty is to insist that different standards should be applied to the claims of Yes and No. That we should assess the SNP only on what is certain and the unionists on what could be true. Good old fashioned double standards.

The alternative of course is that the unionists genuinely thought that Scotland would be excluded from the EU contrary to all the evidence but maybe Boris also genuinely believes he's getting 350m a week back? It would again raise the question of why if they genuinely believes it they did not ask the EU to clarify. It seems important. Almost as if they preferred the or making the decision to be uninformed.

That the English and Welsh subsequently voted to leave the EU is neither here nor there in assessing the honesty of these claims so I'm interested in what you consider to be the change of circumstances?

 

[KDLarsen]

BoJo's attempt at damage control went south fairly quickly.

A spokesman for Johnson said: “Boris has spoken to Norgrove and he has made clear that he was complaining about the headlines and not Boris’s piece and, in fact, admitted that Boris’s wording in the piece was absolutely fine.”

A spokeswoman for the UK statistics authority said: “Sir David Norgrove does not believe the issues lie solely with the headlines. He has not changed the conclusion set out in his letter to the foreign secretary.”

Boris Johnson slapped down by statistics chief over fresh £350m claim

 

[GlennB]

BoJo's attempt at damage control went south fairly quickly.

Boris Johnson slapped down by statistics chief over fresh £350m claim

Was that Bojo's team attempting to manufacture a 'fake news' angle on his gaffe?

 

[Information Analyst]

No I didn't. It's quite simple - compare apples with apples. There's nothing unforeseen and no change of circumstances. I'm talking about what was know at the time. Either the discuss was about what we could be certain of in which case the risk to Scotland of staying was no less than of leaving or we are talking about what was the reasonable expectation of the people making the statement at the time in which case it was dishonest to suggest an indy Scotland would not be an EU member post independence. Lying about us not being admitted, being back of a nonexistent queue was and is lies.

There is a difference between a "lie" and something you disagree with or just don't want to believe. At the time, there certainly was a great deal of uncertainty about Scotland's possible post-independence status in the EU, far less than if it remained in the UK. It's certainly my recollection at the time that the EU made clear that Scotland would have to re-apply, and in fact this has been reiterated in the context of a post-Brexit independent Scotland:

"[European commission’s head of representation in the UK, Jacqueline] Minor said the commission’s position on Scottish membership had not changed since the independence referendum in 2014, when it repeatedly said Scotland could not automatically take up separate membership just because it was part of an existing member state.

“The position in Scotland hasn’t changed,” Minor said. There is a clear process for any applicant country under article 49 of the European treaties. “That would also apply to Scotland. If Scotland became an independent country I think article 49 is the normal starting point,” she said."

There was certainly not the equivalence between the two possible outcomes of the independence referendum, as you are trying to claim, mainly because at the time, while some did aspire to Brexit, hardly anyone else would have considered it remotely possible.

The only way you get out of this without concluding dishonesty is to insist that different standards should be applied to the claims of Yes and No. That we should assess the SNP only on what is certain and the unionists on what could be true. Good old fashioned double standards.

The alternative of course is that the unionists genuinely thought that Scotland would be excluded from the EU contrary to all the evidence but maybe Boris also genuinely believes he's getting 350m a week back? It would again raise the question of why if they genuinely believes it they did not ask the EU to clarify. It seems important. Almost as if they preferred the or making the decision to be uninformed.

Except that the EU did clarify. Repeatedly.

 

[The Don]

Was that Bojo's team attempting to manufacture a 'fake news' angle on his gaffe?

Perhaps, but it seems that if that was the case then it wasn't a very good attempt. The key is to keep up with the fake news angle DESPITE the facts and not to chicken out the second, third or fourth time that actual events contradict the story.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

There is a difference between a "lie" and something you disagree with or just don't want to believe. At the time, there certainly was a great deal of uncertainty about Scotland's possible post-independence status in the EU, far less than if it remained in the UK. It's certainly my recollection at the time that the EU made clear that Scotland would have to re-apply, and in fact this has been reiterated in the context of a post-Brexit independent Scotland:

"[European commission’s head of representation in the UK, Jacqueline] Minor said the commission’s position on Scottish membership had not changed since the independence referendum in 2014, when it repeatedly said Scotland could not automatically take up separate membership just because it was part of an existing member state.

“The position in Scotland hasn’t changed,” Minor said. There is a clear process for any applicant country under article 49 of the European treaties. “That would also apply to Scotland. If Scotland became an independent country I think article 49 is the normal starting point,” she said."

There was certainly not the equivalence between the two possible outcomes of the independence referendum, as you are trying to claim, mainly because at the time, while some did aspire to Brexit, hardly anyone else would have considered it remotely possible.


Except that the EU did clarify. Repeatedly.

There is a difference between a fact and something you do want to agree with or believe to be true.

There is a difference between actual uncertainty and manufactured ******** scaremongering based on lies.

There is a difference between honesty and lying and a difference between seeing a lie and finding any reason to excuse it because it suits you.

And no the EU did not clarify. You said yourself there was uncertainty. Clear and uncertain are not synonyms. And the question was why the did the UK government not request official clarification rather than rely on the opinions of talking heads reported in the press?

And no there certainly was equivalence between the two referendum outcomes since it was clear that one required hitching our cart to a horse that was agitating to leave and that had expressed clear anti rule sentiment repeatedly and consistently while the other would have been led by a group possibly the most pro Europe in the UK. One was clearly most risky. Just not the one the media and unionists lied about.

 

[The Don]

A key official is moving from the Brexit department to Number 10 apparently due to falling out with David Davis. This is being interpreted in some quarters as Theresa May taking more control over the Brexit process.

The government's top Brexit official, Oliver Robbins, has left the Department for Exiting the European Union and is moving to the Cabinet Office to work more directly for the prime minister.

It is understood there had been tension between him and Brexit Secretary David Davis, the BBC's Laura Kuenssberg said.

She added that the move was also part of Theresa May taking more control of Brexit negotiations.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41308081

IMO, one indication of an ineffective leader is an unwillingness or inability to delegate and instead attempting to take control of everything personally.

 

[Darat]

Johnson has obviously had to take steps as he has been upstaged in upper-class twittery sorry eccentricity by Jacob Rees-Mogg! Let's not forget what is important about Brexit - Boris becoming PM!