Althouse: "British Prime Minister Boris Johnson suffered a devastating loss Tuesday on his first key Brexit vote, setting up a legislative battle Wednesday that could lead to a snap general election."

September 4, 2019

"British Prime Minister Boris Johnson suffered a devastating loss Tuesday on his first key Brexit vote, setting up a legislative battle Wednesday that could lead to a snap general election."

WaPo reports.

We take years to crank through an election and then stick with our choice for years. The British approach is nerve-wrackingly chaotic:

81 comments:

henry said...: As bad as our Congress is, a Parliament is much sillier. The entire EU is a mess, but there is no escape from it.; 9/4/19, 8:31 AM
Bay Area Guy said...: I know the WaPost can't help it, but it's not a devastating loss for Boris. It will be a devastating loss for Britain's democracy if the elite globalist weasels cancel Brexit, which was already democratically voted on by the majority (and passed).; 9/4/19, 8:33 AM
rehajm said...: We take years to crank through an election and then stick with our choice for years.

Don't you live in Wisconsin?

At the national level we have election campaigns that begin the moment the winner of the last election is announced, so there's that...; 9/4/19, 8:34 AM
Browndog said...: I don't know exactly what is going on in the latest parliament/Brexit fiasco, but I do know I don't trust any reporting from the Washington Post.; 9/4/19, 8:40 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: WaPo headline.; 9/4/19, 8:40 AM
Narr said...: This is what real political debate looks like--face to face on different sides of a table, posses at your backs jeering and hooting. Far better than some tacky studio podiums and dim-bulb moderators.

But yeah, it can get hectic.

Narr
I liked the civility lecture to Michael Gove (?) at the end; 9/4/19, 8:46 AM
Nicholas said...: The British approach was traditionally far from chaotic: there had to be an election within every five years, but the precise timing was a matter of political judgment for the Prime Minister. A very early election was a rarity, since the First Past the Post electoral system tended to cement the hegemony of the two main parties and produce a stable majority for one of them after each election.

Things have become much more febrile recently, with a coalition government after the 2010 election and Theresa May having a wafer thin majority after the 2017 election. Perhaps in an attempt to hold back this instability, when David Cameron was Prime Minister he passed a Fixed Term Parliaments Act, which does not make an early election impossible, but takes the decision out of the Prime Minister's hands alone: a two thirds resolution of the House of Commons is required for an early election, hence Boris Johnson laying down the gauntlet to (the surely unelectable) Jeremy Corbyn to agree to an early election.

Bexit ructions have led to the parties fracturing and Boris Johnson inherited a majority of just one. He's facing a pretty difficult situation, squeezed between a referendum that resulted in a vote to leave the EU and a Parliament largely composed of Remainers, who pay lip service to respecting the referendum whilst resorting to increasingly desperate measures to frustrate the Brexit process. As a classical scholar however, he will at least be able to record his thoughts on these momentous events in Greek hexameters.; 9/4/19, 8:46 AM
Fen said...: WaPo. NYTs. Might as well be reading fiction.

And I can find more interesting things to read if it's purely for entertainment:

the sun did not shine.
it was too wet to play.
so we sat in the house
all that cold, cold, wet day.

i sat there with sally.
we sat there, we two.
and i said, 'how i wish
we had something to do!'

too wet to go out
and too cold to play ball.
so we sat in the house.
we did nothing at all.

so all we could do was to
sit!
sit!
sit!
sit!
and we did not like it.
not one little bit.; 9/4/19, 8:46 AM
Michael K said...: WaPoo: Johnson=Trump

Act accordingly.; 9/4/19, 8:51 AM
Wince said...: The EU is like the Hotel California and the Roach Motel all rolled into one.

We take years to crank through an election and then stick with our choice for years.

Britain has it's Parliamentary system, we have out 9th Circuit.; 9/4/19, 8:53 AM
Two-eyed Jack said...: The problem our system tries to resolve is one of federalism; we have a system of state governments and a national government and we must choose presidential candidates by looking to both and comparing what is on offer. This used to be done on the party level at a convention. Now we have primaries, which are way too expensive and way too time-consuming. Fund raising and positioning must start 18 months ahead of time. The result is that people are beaten over the head by "democracy" with no respite and an ever-growing cynicism develops. Elections are no longer respected and rites of citizenship are reduced to mail-in ballots.; 9/4/19, 8:56 AM
Laslo Spatula said...: (pulling out old 70s vinyl) Cue 'Anarchy in the UK'.

I am Laslo.; 9/4/19, 9:07 AM
Tank said...: Browndog said...

I don't know exactly what is going on in the latest parliament/Brexit fiasco, but I do know I don't trust any reporting from the Washington Post.

Correcto.; 9/4/19, 9:08 AM
Charlie Currie said...: I have read this morning that the House of Lords is not going to play along with the Commons remainers. They have a bill pending regarding the process for debate and passage of the Commons bill. There's well over a hundred amendments to the bill and each amendment must be discussed and voted on twice. And, additional amendments are being proposed almost hourly. Even with a 24/7 schedule, they will not be able to get through all the amendments and vote on the bill by Monday's deadline - recess, or whatever they call it. So the Commons bill will die. And, the 21 Tory "rebels" are supposedly being booted from the party.; 9/4/19, 9:10 AM
Lance said...: Tony Blair warned Labourites two days ago that Boris Johnson was laying an elephant trap for them. Having Remainers (including Labour) fall into the trap is hardly "devastating" for Johnson.; 9/4/19, 9:12 AM
traditionalguy said...: Boris is an acting PM useful until DJT’s choice, N Farage, can take the majority.; 9/4/19, 9:13 AM
Fernandinande said...: "Parliament/Funkadelic, baby!"

Now with health tips; 9/4/19, 9:15 AM
Left Bank of the Charles said...: Boris’s plan to prorogue parliament seems to have backfired. The parliament now wants to prorogue him.; 9/4/19, 9:17 AM
tcrosse said...: I'm reading Boris' Churchill biography. Its tone suggests that Boris fancies it as a bit of autobiography.; 9/4/19, 9:17 AM
Earnest Prole said...: The American Constitution’s insight is that binding relationships with other nations should be ratified by supermajorities and not subject to the 50-percent-plus-one whims of raw democracy. We are currently witnessing the wisdom of that insight in Great Britain.; 9/4/19, 9:22 AM
Craig Howard said...: Boris’s plan to prorogue parliament seems to have backfired. The parliament now wants to prorogue him.

Not quite yet.

As mentioned above, some members of the House of Lords are planning to slow-walk this thing well into prorogation. And the Queen has to sign off on this, too. One might be forgiven for suspecting that restoring an independent Britain would appeal to the Crown.; 9/4/19, 9:23 AM
Narr said...: So, am I supposed to pay attention to the headlines and shit? I just go to the video and comment on that.

Speaking of newspapers, this is our fourth day w/o the local rag, which was the morning paper when we had two (count 'em, two) dailies but has been the only one since 1984. I have read it (OK some parts of it) since childhood, but in the last few years it has been Gannettized and USA-Todayed out of all recognition (not that it was much before).

Since most journalists (and almost all young journalists) are not very bright and know nothing of the world worth knowing, and the sports section has never interested me, we finally cut the increasingly expensive tie.

Narr
It will probably fold (ha!) before long; 9/4/19, 9:23 AM
Bay Area Guy said...: Boris is good, but Farage is even better.; 9/4/19, 9:27 AM
tommyesq said...: I actually found the Parliament debate to be refreshing - each said what they would do and why, directly to the other, in a way that doesn't happen in the United States when we discuss electing a new government. Instead, politicians here lie to the left/right during the primaries, lie to the middle during the general, and then largely ignore the promises made to each and all, Trump notwithstanding.; 9/4/19, 9:27 AM
Peter said...: Parliamentary systems can be unstable if there is a minority government or party discipline breaks down (our M'P's tend to be toadies compared to congressmen). But we aren't in permanent election mode (campaigns last about two months), don't have your very bizarre primary system and don't have meddlesome politicized judiciaries. Nor do we exhaust ourselves debating impeachment. Prime ministers are not heads of state, so there is no confusion about what kinds of criticism are or are not unpatriotic. If the 2000 Bush-Gore story had occurred in Britain, it would have been resolved in a day or two by a visit to the Palace.

It comes down to familiarity, tradition and taste.; 9/4/19, 9:27 AM
themightypuck said...: Everything that has happened was pretty much foreseen by everyone with a lick of wit. Lot's of hoping the other side blinks but with no blinking so far, here we are. Next up: pass law forcing Boris to ask for extension; Boris refuses (next blink opportunity); Corbyn blocks general election (blink opportunity); Boris brings down his own government with help of SNP (blink); caretaker government (good luck getting SNP on board)... This has been moving inexorably in this direction since it became clear Theresa May's deal couldn't pass. Which brings us to another blink opportunity: someone tries to pass May's deal again ahead of GE. There is a possibility the Tories could revolt and Boris might resign but I'm guessing everyone has gamed out all this "madness" ahead of time and the only thing that matters are the opinion polls.; 9/4/19, 9:29 AM
John henry said...: Tcrosse,

I'm currently reading bojo's "Johnson's life of London" and enjoying it immensely.

I read the sample of the Churchill book and look forward to reading it next.

I've mentioned it before but if you haven't yet, go to YouTube and watch him speak about the book. An excellent use of one's time.

John Henry; 9/4/19, 9:31 AM
Roughcoat said...: Welcome to the Hotel EU: You can check out but you can never leave.; 9/4/19, 9:36 AM
Leland said...: politicians here lie to the left/right during the primaries

They lie in the UK too. Indeed, if they didn't lie, then this whole Brexit thing would be over the moment it went to a national vote and the majority voted to leave the EU. Just like Chris Wallace and Hillary Clinton, they demanded prior to the vote that the Brexiters abide by the results whatever the results. And since then, they've acted like the vote was illegitimate and have demanded a new vote, which is what the Remainers are attempting to make happen.; 9/4/19, 9:50 AM
Seeing Red said...: I wish England well.; 9/4/19, 10:02 AM
wildswan said...: I used to debate British style at my Canadian university. Turmoil is OK - the question is: can you keep your head and answer back. Screaming like opposing football fans over legalistic points is the way the Brits are. They think it's fun and also that it's free speech within ordered liberty, in action. All part of the rich pageant.

"Welcome to the Hotel EU ... You can never leave" as Roughcoat said, says it all but Boris is trying hard to leave. Boris was going to end this Parliamentary session before it passed laws to stall a No-Deal Brexit Exit. But Parliament managed to quickly pass a bill that says "There can be No No-Deal Brexit Exit - if the EU gives extensions for negotiations." So if the EU gives extensions then the present status of Britain in the EU remains. Thus the referendum would be undone by Parliament. But this bill has to pass the House of Lords and Boris is hoping to slow walk it there with amendments. Or, finally, if the bill is defined as a bill which affects the Crown's interests, it has to have "the Queens Consent" rather than "the Queen's Assent." This means a minister has to physically bring the bill to The Queen. But no minister in Boris Johnson's admin will do that. So then the No No-Deal Brexit Exit bill would die. Leaving a No-Deal Brexit Exit to happen October 30.; 9/4/19, 10:07 AM
daskol said...: Brendan O'neill is deeply unhappy about this vote. He's a Brit and Brexiteer, and typically a keen observer. His keening here seems more about rallying Brexit supporters, though, than reporting on events.

Blair's point about the elephant trap only applies if Corbyn refuses to step down: Blair is trying to pry his party away from the hard left, so besides Remaining, that's his agenda. The trap he describes is linking a Corbyn prime ministership to the Remain cause.

Looks like the Brits on both sides of the aisle are sharpening the contradictions.; 9/4/19, 10:23 AM
Michael K said...: I'm currently reading bojo's "Johnson's life of London" and enjoying it immensely.

I just got it and am about to start. I saw a couple of videos of him and enjoyed them, too.

I think he is so much smarter than the opponents of both parties.

I can't decide about Farage.; 9/4/19, 10:29 AM
Big Mike said...: I don't know exactly what is going on in the latest parliament/Brexit fiasco, but I do know I don't trust any reporting from the Washington Post.

@Browndog, +1; 9/4/19, 10:29 AM
Ambrose said...: It was a setback but hardly "devastating" - but at least we know who WaPo is rooting for here.; 9/4/19, 10:39 AM
Xmas said...: "If the EU offers an negotiation extension..."

The problem here is that representatives from the EU have said that they are done negotiating. They offered their terms for Brexit and are not willing to change.

So, if this bill passes and Johnson's hands are tied on an Oct 31st Brexit, nothing is going to stop him from going into an EU negotiation with the most pro-British demands possible. At which point, the EU will likely get insulted and immediately end negotiations.; 9/4/19, 10:43 AM
Ken B said...: The problem is the idiotic 2011 law. Prior to that if the govt lost a confidence vote there would (almost always) be an election. Now that no longer applies. So the Brits now have an incoherent situation. The PM has lost the confidence of the house, but cannot call an election. That requires 2/3 of the house to agree to put their cushy seats on the line, which won’t happen. The whole premise of the PM position for centuries has been that he commands the confidence of the house. Now what?

Best hope: the Lords kill any legislation.; 9/4/19, 10:50 AM
narciso said...: A holding action:

https://order-order.com/2019/09/04/revealed-lords-plan-block-remainer-legislation/; 9/4/19, 10:56 AM
Fen said...: The problem here is that representatives from the EU have said that they are done negotiating. They offered their terms for Brexit and are not willing to change.

So, if this bill passes and Johnson's hands are tied on an Oct 31st Brexit, nothing is going to stop him from going into an EU negotiation with the most pro-British demands possible. At which point, the EU will likely get insulted and immediately end negotiations.

I remember reading something about several billion dollars the UK owes the EU and would refuse to honor if they pulled out with no deal. Is that still on the table? Would be silly to pay the kidnapper the ransom after you got away from him. Of course, I think the EU is full of the worst types of authoritarians and would love to see them suffer.; 9/4/19, 11:10 AM
Harsh Pencil said...: The 2/3 to call an election law makes no sense and I can't see how it is enforceable. If I were Johnson, I would simply declare that
I was going to ignore the law "ordering" him to ask the EU for an extension, and say to Parliament "if you don't like how I'm executing my job as Prime Minister, then fire me" which Parliament can do at any time by either a no-confidence vote and putting together another majority coalition of sitting members, or by 2/3 voting for a new election.; 9/4/19, 11:15 AM
Jaq said...: Chaos is rejecting 'post democratic’ rule by nameless EU bureaucrats out of Germany and France who can’t be called to electoral account in any way.; 9/4/19, 11:22 AM
Jaq said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 9/4/19, 11:27 AM
mandrewa said...: Fen said, "I remember reading something about several billion dollars the UK owes the EU and would refuse to honor if they pulled out with no deal."

The money the UK owes the EU or that the EU owes the UK is a minor side issue, but it's a symbolic one.

The real issue is whether the EU will rule and control the UK. If the UK can get free of the EU at the cost of $39 billion pounds or whatever, the money is not that big a deal.

Under Theresa May's Withdrawal Act, the UK would have ended up completely under EU rule. The EU would have been able to unilaterally impose almost anything on the UK. It would have been the very opposite of leaving the EU.

Beyond May's obscene lies where she claimed to do one thing while doing the very opposite, the frightening thing about all of this is the many people that supported this kind of crap, including of course the majority of the press.

Why so many educated people are such fucking Nazis, I don't understand. But routinely and over and over again, they demonstrate that they are.

The Remainer thing is not about principle. It's about hating people. Because that is what really drives the British Remain perspective. They hate the ordinary British citizen that believes that Britain is their country and that it is something to be proud of.

By large Remainers know very little about the EU superstate that they so eager to stay within. You would think that would be the opposite since a significant minority of these people are degreed and privileged and etcetera.

But it's just not the case, and although of course there are exceptions, most of them just argue by insult, which by the way I just did above, but challenge me and I'll back it up with data and reasoning, and that is just not what happens with the majority of the metropolitan elite.

Somehow people can go through how many years of education and graduate, and yet they still haven't learned to think.

In any case I'm trying to point out what the real issues are, which are actually dismayingly hard to deal with, and yet at the same time should all be so familiar.

The question of whether the UK owes the EU anything is in contrast quite simple and therefore a lot more people are willing to make strong statements about it.

And therefore one might confused that this a significant part of the problem. But it's not.

And it should be obvious without going in to any detail that it's highly debatable whether anything is owed and one could easily make a strong argument for debt in the other direction.; 9/4/19, 11:51 AM
Birches said...: Give em hell Boris; 9/4/19, 12:02 PM
Yancey Ward said...: This is WaPo cheerleading for Remain. I think it quite likely that Johnson expected this outcome- I think it is why he asked the Queen to prorogue Parliament- he wants the cards on the table as early as possible- an election before the Brexit date is probably preferable to him and the Tories/Brexiteers than one afterwards. The disgust with the interminable process of leaving has energized Johnson's electoral support, and he is planning to use that to rid his majority of the lying Remainers in his caucus.

The Remainers have lied the entire time- this claim that they only want a good deal on leaving is just that- a lie. They want to kill Brexit altogether, and an election will make that position very hard if not impossible to hide. This is the blade that Johnson's actions have pushed them against.

There is only one way they are going to get a Prime Minister to request an extension- they will have to replace Johnson with such a person. Legally, the only way to replace Johnson is with a no confidence vote followed by either a general election, or the cobbling together of a coalition government that replaces Johnson. Who is going to head this coalition- it would have to have the support of pretty much all of Labour and the Liberal Democrats, and I don't see Jeremy Corbyn as either being the head of such a government or him allowing anyone else to take his place. This leaves a general election, and Johnson is setting it up so that the election comes before October 31st.

However, all of this legal maneuvering may be moot- the House of Lords still has to approve the Commons legislation on which Johnson "lost", and the Lords can attach and debate as many amendments as they like and send it back to the Commons. It is still possible this all dies in the Lords unless the Remainers change the rules to force a quick up and down vote- if they don't, the legislation will die there by the deadline of September 10th, and the Remainers will have to come back on October 14th for a second try, but will likely fail for the same reasons.

The Remainers, if they were honest people, would have this week simply offered and passed a bill revoking the Article 50 notice of the UK leaving the EU. This not only delays Brexit, but stops it altogether until a future government reinvoke Article 50. However, the Remainers don't want to do that, so you get the lying about wanting a good deal Brexit.

Now, if they aren't willing to go to elections or able to cobble together a new government, the Remainers, I predict, will then go to extra-legal means of stopping Brexit, and this is where it gets dark and dangerous.; 9/4/19, 12:21 PM
cubanbob said...: If only Trump could have the ability to do what Johnson did- Johnson essentially flushed out of Parliament their equivalent of their NeverTrumpers. All the parliamentary shenanigans aside, they will have a general election and either the Johnson Conservative Party will come out the winner (with a coalition of smaller but where it counts similar parties) or the Labour and it's coalition will win. It's high stakes poker and say what you may about Johnson, he does have brass.; 9/4/19, 12:23 PM
Ralph L said...: In some ways, Parliament is like Congress, but they cede power and (more importantly) responsibility to the EU bureaucracy instead of the Federal bureaucracy.; 9/4/19, 12:38 PM
Michael K said...: By large Remainers know very little about the EU superstate that they so eager to stay within. You would think that would be the opposite since a significant minority of these people are degreed and privileged and etcetera.

I know less about British politics than I know about US but the Remainers seem to be the financial industry of London and their dependent politicians. This is mirror image of US "Resistance."

The "Remainers" would like to reverse the "Reform Act of 1832."

It was so much easier then.

When the Tory government was ousted later in 1830, Earl Grey, a Whig, became Prime Minister and pledged to carry out parliamentary reform. The Whig Party was pro-reform and though two reform bills failed to be carried in Parliament, the third was successful and received Royal Assent in 1832.

The Bill was passed due to Lord Grey's plan to persuade King William IV to consider using his constitutional powers to create additional Whig peers in the House of Lords to guarantee the Bill's passage. On hearing of this plan, Tory peers abstained from voting, thus allowing the Bill to be passed but avoiding the creation of more Whig peers.

Possibly this is Boris' plan.; 9/4/19, 12:45 PM
Unknown said...: Once the Deep State gets a hold on your rights, they won't let go easily, no matter how many votes you take.; 9/4/19, 12:49 PM
Jaq said...: “What a momentous self-own. They have literally traipsed through the streets saying ‘Britain is a dictatorship’ and ‘Boris has stolen our democracy’. Now, Boris hasn’t only disproven this claptrap (dictators don’t usually suggest holding an election). He has also helped to expose the fact that if anyone is agitated and even disgusted by the idea of democracy right now, it isn’t the imaginary jackbooted generals of Downing Street – it’s the pseudo-democratic Remainer elite.”

There are other takes besides that of the WaPo, which we know is easily triggered by certain hairstyles.; 9/4/19, 1:01 PM
Balfegor said...: Re: mandrewa:

By large Remainers know very little about the EU superstate that they so eager to stay within. You would think that would be the opposite since a significant minority of these people are degreed and privileged and etcetera.

I think very few people understand much about the EU superstate since it's terribly convoluted and obscure. But wealthy professional-class Remainers understand the most important thing about the EU superstate, which is that, fundamentally, it is run by people like them, for the benefit of people like them, with a few sops to the lower classes to keep them pacified. There may be confusion about the precise mechanisms by which regulations and directives are arrived at and implemented, but all of that is of secondary importance, when you can coast along serenely confident that whatever the precise details may be, the people making the decisions share your interests, and won't sell you out on behalf of those other people.

And conversely, the kind of people who tend to support Brexit are precisely those who don't have that confidence that the EU bureaucracy share their values and their interests.

That's not unversal, of course. People like Farage or Rees-Mogg are a little atypical -- traitors to their class, if you will -- in that they both have a background in finance (Farage was at Natixis, and Rees-Mogg was head of a fund management company). Finance is one of the industries that has been most assisted by the EU, because financial services firms registered in one member state are automatically allowed to operate in other member states without getting local licenses. Because financial regulation tends to be particularly onerous, the costs of getting registered in every single European jurisdiction (and filing whatever reports, or being subject to whatever inspections) would just be a huge deadweight on the finance industry. So when they push for an exit from the EU, they're arguing against interest, much as Trump (whose money comes from construction and development of residential and hospitality projects) is obviously arguing against interest whenever he pushes for controls on illegal immigration.; 9/4/19, 1:06 PM
mandrewa said...: Michael K said, "I know less about British politics than I know about US but the Remainers seem to be the financial industry of London and their dependent politicians. This is mirror image of US "Resistance." "

It's more complicated than that. Or at least so I think. First there is more support for Brexit within the financial industry that the media acknowledges.

The one legitimate argument that the Remainers have is that a true Brexit will cause significant business disruption and uncertainty.

But for the UK financial industry they already know that regardless of what happens they are going to be targeted by the EU. This was the case even before the referendum.

The Germans and the French think it's unfair that there is such a concentration of financial industry in London and so London was already under regulatory assault years before the vote for Brexit.

Since that vote the regulatory assault on London has been amped up ten times at least. So actually the traders and etcetera, they all know this. And they all know in a certain sense that they are screwed, and they even know that their only real chance of resisting the attack from the EU is for the UK to actually become independent. Which if that happened would open up some paths of resistance.

But on the other hand the financial industry is part of the same metropolitan culture that has made Brexit its enemy. So it's a cultural thing; it's a tribal identity thing. But still I don't think the financial industry is what is actually fighting Brexit.

Typically most small business owners are for Brexit. And probably many or most medium-sized business are also for it. While pretty much all of the really large companies, in particular the ones that aren't even British, are opposed.; 9/4/19, 1:20 PM
Fen said...: "Why so many educated people are such fucking Nazis, I don't understand."

It's the Ctrl-Left. They get off on making other people do things.; 9/4/19, 1:21 PM
Fen said...: And thanks for the lengthy explanation.; 9/4/19, 1:21 PM
StephenFearby said...: Breathless reporting:

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-politics-49584841/live-coverage-of-brexit-proceedings-in-parliament; 9/4/19, 1:41 PM
Martin said...: Only 2 or 3 days ago, Blair was publicly warning Corbyn that Johnson was trying to engineer a snap election because he (Johnson) and the Conservatives are suddenly up in the polls, and a large part of the electorate find Corbyn so radioactive (my word, not Blair's) that they would even vote for Johnson and Brexit rather than risk putting Corbyn in Number 10.

Suddenly, that's all backwards?

This is like the old Seinfeld "Bizarro World" episode.; 9/4/19, 2:12 PM
dreams said...: I predict Boris wins, a little backbone and a good brain is a good thing.; 9/4/19, 2:15 PM
dreams said...: And this...

"He's showing courage. He's not losing his nerve. Voters will take note. And while nothing is certain, it seems more than a little likely that with his gutsiness and steady hand, he will win this election, sweeping out the weaklings in his party, and then steam full speed ahead toward Brexit, which is what the British really voted for, deal or no deal. The E.U. in such conditions, unlike now, is going to really, really, really want a deal."

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/09/no_boris_johnson_isnt_defeated.html#ixzz5yaR59Gs5; 9/4/19, 2:40 PM
rcocean said...: If you think Chuck Schumer is disgusting, Jeremy Corbyn is 10x worse. Its be hard to find a bigger combination of arrogance, stupidity, elitism, socialism, and complete SJW wankery in one person. He only seems to have 2 objectives, gain power, and destroy England 1.0.

The 21 Tory So-called "Rebels" are in fact traitors. Just like Maverick McCain betrayed his pledge on "Obamacare" these traitors campaigned as Tories and vowed to respect the Democrat decision to leave the EU - and now they are combining with Labour to keep the UK in the EU. Complete lying scum.; 9/4/19, 3:54 PM
rcocean said...: BoJo is showing "courage". He's also accepting the reality of the May 2019 elections. Tories have 2 alternatives: deliver on Brexit *or* become the UK's 4th party behind Labour, Lib-Dem, and the Brexit party.

52% wanted to leave the EU. They've waited 3 1/2 years. They're through waiting.; 9/4/19, 3:57 PM
rcocean said...: The Remoaners are almost all "open borders" types. Globalists. Its all part of the same puzzle. They know if they stay in the EU, they can get all kinds of policies that never could have gotten through Parliament. These polices will be IMPOSED on England by EU judges and EU bureaucrats. Control over immigration will given to the EU. Sidenote: The Irish want to be part of the EU, because they make $$$ off it. They'll wank about how the EU is 'Dictating' to them. Or crab about the strict fiscal policies but its just Irish blather.; 9/4/19, 4:08 PM
narciso said...: so this schrodinger's election:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/09/04/hypocrite-jeremy-corbyn-rejects-general-election-break-brexit/; 9/4/19, 4:24 PM
tim maguire said...: I follow this pretty closely and I still have no idea what’s happening. Or what the significance of these votes are for Johnson’s Brexit plan.; 9/4/19, 4:43 PM
MountainMan said...: I used to work in Britain occasionally, either in the Lake District or North Wales. I remember one incident that occurred when I was over there, maybe around 2000 or so, that illustrates why so many people there eventually wanted to leave.

There was a story in the news about a green grocer in a smaller town or city in England - maybe Salisbury or Bath, some place like that - who, while doing a major housecleaning of his shop, came across a set of old balance scales and weights that had once been used to weigh produce. By this time Britain had decimalized its currency and had switched to all SI units for measuring produce, meats, and packaged foods. The grocer thought it would make a nice advertising display to put the old scales in his shop window with some bananas and show the pricing and the calculated total cost of the bananas in pounds and ounces and the old pounds/shilling/pence currency notation.

Somehow the EU found out about this and informed him this was in violation of EU regulations. Some EU board or court hit him with a stiff fine for improper pricing of his product. He tried to explain it was just an historic advertising display to get people interested in stopping by his shop, not how he was actually selling the bananas. They didn't care. To add insult to injury, a few weeks before he had bet on the winning horse at the Derby and the fine he was assessed took all his winnings and then some.

Just before the Brexit vote the EU was prepared to slap some new energy efficiency regulations on electric tea kettles and toasters, staples of the British kitchen and breakfasts everywhere. The regs were delayed until after the vote because the EU regulators were worried they would negatively affect Briton's perception of the EU.; 9/4/19, 4:48 PM
tcrosse said...: Having read Boris' Churchill book (a steal at $4.99 for the Kindle version, you-know-where) my money's on Boris. This opinion is buttressed by my reading of the Telegraph every day. The Telly seems to like the fellow.; 9/4/19, 4:58 PM
dreams said...: The people voted for Brexit but they might not get it, we're losing our democracy too.

"But yet another Republican’s retiring. Retiring! Why? Now, people will say, “Well, Rush, I’ll tell you what it is. The truth be known: There’s a bunch of Republicans that just can’t stand Trump.” That’s not what it is. That’s what they want you to think. That’s not what it is. You know what I think’s going on? I think — and don’t doubt me on that. I can’t prove this ’cause this is just a supposition. But I think based on how I have seen Democrats and their operatives act, I think — and that given that nobody, no human being is clean and pure as the wind-driven snow.

We’ve all got something in our closets. We’ve all done something that we don’t want people to know about. I think the Democrats are finding dirt, and they’re going to these Republicans, and they’re saying, “Do you want people to know about this? We are glad to publicize this about you.” “Oh, no, no. No, no! Please don’t.” “Well, okay. Then you gotta retire.” Now, I can’t prove it, but some of this stuff — and some of it may be legitimate. I mean, people retiring after ten years, they may think it’s enough. It’s five terms."

https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2019/09/04/why-are-so-many-house-republicans-retiring/; 9/4/19, 4:59 PM
Balfegor said...: Of course Corbyn and the Remainers don't want an election -- they think they'll lose. Polls right now are predicting that Conservatives + Brexit will have less than a majority, but polls before Brexit also predicted that Brexit would lose, when in fact it won by almost 4 points in an historically high participation vote: 72% turnout. For comparison, the 2010 general election was 65%, 2015 was 66%, and 2017 was 69%. You have to go back to the 1992 election (78% turnout) for a vote with higher participation.

I don't think Johnson is certain of victory in an election, if the election is about Brexit, but he is probably guessing that it maximises his chances of forming a majority pro-independence coalition, notwithstanding the polls. And I think he is correct. After all, there was a poll on the day of the Brexit vote indicating a 4 point lead for Remain, i.e. they were about 8 points off on the day the vote was actually being held.

Kind of angels on the head of a pin, though, since Parliament are afraid to face the voters right now. His strategy now is apparently going to be to get the Lords to bog down the anti-No Deal bill with amendments, so that the clock runs out before October 31, and Brexit becomes a fait accompli.

At that point, Johnson will have maximum leverage against the EU. The EU will no longer be able to place conditions on negotiation: they either negotiate on the UK's terms, or nothing. They can't hold the Irish border over the UK's head because -- too late! There's either a border or the EU negotiates terms to avoid a border for their Irish subjects.

Johnson et al. are probably planning to use GATT Article 24 to freeze existing trade arrangements pending re-negotiation. In the meantime, the EU has more to lose than the UK from disruption to trade, since the UK runs a 64 billion Euro trade deficit vis-a-vis the EU, which is probably why Johnson thinks he has pretty good odds of forcing the EU to agree to Article 24, although the EU also has to worry that if they don't inflict maximum pain on the UK, their other constituent countries may start agitating for independence. The EU bureaucracy are probably willing to force their citizenry to suffer a lot of economic pain just to punish the UK for its insolence -- pour encourager les autres -- so I don't think it's a done deal. And I suspect Johnson and Rees-Mogg and the rest understand that.

If Trump wins a second term, the UK will also probably be at the front of the queue to negotiate a trade agreement with the US. UK will also find it easier to negotiate trade agreements outside of the EU than in, simply because they won't have a bunch of other Continental industries (e.g. French agriculture, German automobiles) to protect as part of a trade deal. Fewer moving parts. If Trump loses, I think we'll have someone who is much more willing to play along with the EU bureaucracy to punish the UK. Like "Back of the line" Obama.

But the Remainers probably still have a number of procedural cards to play. And it seems like they're willing to blow up the UK constitutional order to block Brexit, so who knows how this is all going to turn out?; 9/4/19, 5:06 PM
The Godfather said...: I don't understand what's going on in UK re Brexit. Except that I DO understand that Parliamentary democracy is inconsistent with direct democracy. The Brits should NEVER have allowed a popular vote on Brexit separate from a general election vote. If Johnson leads this process into a general election in which Brexit is a major issue, and he and his party win, then Brexit will happen (and I expect the EU's negotiating position will be substantially different than it has been). If Johnson's side loses in a general election, then that should be the end of Brexit.; 9/4/19, 5:15 PM
Yancey Ward said...: The House of Lords has to pass the legislation by the end of business on Friday. Right now that is looking iffy, but there is also one other problem- even if the bill passes, it is Johnson, as the PM, who has to ask the Queen for royal assent, and he won't do that, and they can't go around him either- he has to be replaced if they expect this bill to become law. Johnson is trying to force them into a no confidence vote before prorogation begins on the 10th- that is his cudgel. The only option other than a general election is to do the no-confidence vote then cobble together a majority to pick another PM, and who is that going to be? Jeremy Corbyn? LOL!; 9/4/19, 5:19 PM
Balfegor said...: Re: MountainMan:

I honestly think Remain would have won if Merkel hadn't, in the summer of 2015, decided unilaterally to throw open the EU to any self-proclaimed "refugee." This policy was so obviously idiotic that Germany quickly moved to reintroduce some screening of refugee claims. Since then, I think they've become even more strict, and EU countries have even begun introducing internal border controls to deal with the mess Merkel made.

That said, when the Brexit vote took place in June 2016, the EU was still suffering the hangover from Merkel's dumb decision. There were news reports about refugee fraud, refugee violence, etc. The Calais Jungle was in the news. And the fact that the German Chancellor could do this unilaterally without the consent of other member states brought home just how risky signing on to the EU really was.

If Merkel hadn't screwed up in 2015, we wouldn't have Brexit.; 9/4/19, 5:20 PM
Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...: Mandrewa: “Why so many educated people are such fucking Nazis, I don't understand. But routinely and over and over again, they demonstrate that they are.”

Their “education” is their indoctrination, hence their totalitarian mandate. They are right, you are wrong.

You racist.

The modern university is the delivery system for this self-righteous dogma. They graduate ignorant, impetuous totalitarians.

The education system is the vector for this ideological pandemic. And operating this adult public works program has become obscenely expensive.; 9/4/19, 5:23 PM
Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...: “You would think that would be the opposite since a significant minority of these people are degreed and privileged and etcetera.”

Those last “degreed and privileged” bits tell you everything you need to know.

The degreed are smarter then you, and a piece of paper tells them so. Just ask them.

The privileged have nothing to lose, so they just go along with their degreed friends who will eventually have to work for a living.

Poor sots. A pity.; 9/4/19, 5:29 PM
Bay Area Guy said...: Corbyn is an unreconstructed Socialist, probably a Marxist. The guy is very-well disciplined, so he's dangerous.; 9/4/19, 5:32 PM
Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...: Fen: “It's the Ctrl-Left. They get off on making other people do things.”

Yep. Exactly.; 9/4/19, 5:32 PM
narciso said...: credentialed, not educated, Andrew marr, of the bbc, who was probably a strong remainer, described how a media, corporate and political machine, would block Brexit a year before in his comic roman a clef, 'head of the class' the title suggests to what length they would go, interesting he had a brief boris Johnson term in the story,; 9/4/19, 5:32 PM
Michael K said...: The Germans and the French think it's unfair that there is such a concentration of financial industry in London and so London was already under regulatory assault years before the vote for Brexit.

That's why the financial industry is in London. The French have a saying, or did when I was last there. "We have a Silicon Valley, but it is in the Thames Estuary." The Thames Estuary is how Europeans refer to London.

Technology has been driven out of Europe, much as Mitterand drove the rich out of France,; 9/4/19, 5:51 PM
narciso said...: Trotskyite, head of a faction called momentum, just a nasty piece of work,; 9/4/19, 5:53 PM
rcocean said...: "The Brits should NEVER have allowed a popular vote on Brexit separate from a general election vote."

This was a "clever" ploy that backfired on Cameron. The Tories were losing votes to the UKIP party, so Cameron promised a referendum on leaving the EU. The British PEOPLE voted in referendum to go into the EU, if you remember. Cameron expected it to lose. But it won. So he resigned, and then May tried to cut a deal that was Brexit in name only. Only Parliament wouldn't approve it and didn't have the guts to leave with no deal or tell the people they were fools for trusting them.

Now, Labour and remouning Tory traitors are trying to stop Brexit by delay. They've delayed it 3.5 years and want to keep stringing it along till people just get tired.; 9/4/19, 7:05 PM
rcocean said...: This isn't a failure of "direct democracy". Its a failure of the parliamentary elite who LIED to the British people. They said they would abide by the people's vote and they refused to do so. Of course, in the USA, that's Standard Operation procedure. People are always happy when some un-elected judge overturns a referendum. The British aren't like that.; 9/4/19, 7:07 PM
Marc in Eugene said...: My understanding is that the Parliament can elect to continue to do business (i.e. working through the Benn pro-Remain nonsense) over the weekend.

"It is this day ordered by Her Majesty in Council that the Parliament be prorogued on a day no earlier than Monday the 9th day of September and no later than Thursday the 12th day of September 2019...."

From the Times (Henry Zeffman, August 30):

Thursday to Sunday (at least) Even if MPs can rapidly get legislation through the Commons the upper chamber could pose grave problems. It operates differently in many ways. Most importantly the controls for majorities are much looser, and there is a majority against no-deal. There are no “guillotine” motions to curtail debates and speed up the agenda. No time limit can be put on speeches by peers.

That means there is ample scope for filibustering from Brexiteer peers and the government. The last emergency anti no-deal legislation made swift progress through the Lords partly because the government subtly smoothed its path.

There are probably ways for the majority against no-deal to get around this. But to do so with the clock ticking towards prorogation could require sitting long into the night and at weekends.; 9/4/19, 7:23 PM
Unknown said...: Why don't the citizens use their 1st and 2nd amendment rights, speak up, and demand self governance?; 9/5/19, 6:09 AM