UK Politics Thread VIII—Can't Let EU Go

[The Huskar Social Union]

But we don't seem to be interested in nuance anymore in UK political debate.

Only a Sith deals in absolutes.

...

That does explain a lot about current UK politics actually.

[An Alan Smithee Nation]

But we don't seem to be interested in nuance anymore in UK political debate.

Only a Sith deals in absolutes.

... and perfumers.

[Trumptonium1]

An Independent Group supported by people who don't want independence.

It's funny. When Carswell defected, first thing he did was trigger a by-election. Then the Tories won a Leave referendum. It appears everything the right does is with public approval.

But it appears everything the far-left does doesn't need one.

[Ifreann]

An Independent Group supported by people who don't want independence.

It's funny. When Carswell defected, first thing he did was trigger a by-election. Then the Tories won a Leave referendum. It appears everything the right does is with public approval.

But it appears everything the far-left does doesn't need one.

The Independent Group are far-left?

[An Alan Smithee Nation]

Isn't Ress-Mogg's constituency largely for remaining in the EU?

[Kavagrad]

An Independent Group supported by people who don't want independence.

It's funny. When Carswell defected, first thing he did was trigger a by-election. Then the Tories won a Leave referendum. It appears everything the right does is with public approval.

But it appears everything the far-left does doesn't need one.

The Independent Group are far-left?

Those well-known centre-right communists

[Ifreann]

Isn't Ress-Mogg's constituency largely for remaining in the EU?

North-East Somerset voted to Remain, yes.

[Dumb Ideologies]

Isn't Ress-Mogg's constituency largely for remaining in the EU?

He represents an eighteenth century rotten borough, none of his peasants have the right to vote, and the detailed and nuanced opinions of his grazing animals on twenty-first century politics are sadly lost in translation.

[Chestaan]

The abuse being handed out in this thread over today's news - and from a range of different political perspectives - is nothing short of extraordinary.

Less than ten years ago the first version of this thread was known for its civility, with NSG regulars more used to the tone of American politics astonished at how comparatively civilised British political discussion was, and how polite the participants tended to be, even to people with different viewpoints.

One coalition, two* referendums, three general elections, and various leadership changes later, and now look where we are.

Few things are more likely to convince me that something's fundamentally broken in our politics than the scale of the growth of vitriol that people feel entirely comfortable flinging at people they disagree with.

God, it's depressing.



*Scotland and Brexit; I'm not counting the electoral reform referendum.

It'd be far more depressing if people weren't fundamentally questioning the legitimacy of the system and the people manning it after Thatcherism gutted social housing, public spending, social services and British industry, the placeholder era of first minimal progress and then its rollback under New Labour, the massive transfer of wealth from the working people to bankers and wealthy shareholders under the quantitative easing program and austerity, and now the unprecedented display of sheer incompetence that is the handling of Brexit.

The social effects of these policies have been handwaved through "there is no alternative" narratives of globalisation, blaming migrants, blaming the EU, and now there's no-one outside left to blame.

And when the first real opposition arises in decades, large numbers of MPs elected to represent a re-energised Labour movement instead try to systematically undermine it and some actively, openly, seek to jump ship for a new party aiming to drag the """centre ground""" back away from doing anything to address the fundamental issues of an economy that's been stacked against the interests of the vast majority of society for decades.

The mainstream has failed. The majority of our representatives are enemies of the people who show us absolutely no respect - why do they deserve any?

Absolutely 100% right. This whole "oh we must be civil in politics thing is absurd". Politics isn't a game, and most of us don't have the privilege to be able to be "civil" or sit on the fence.

[Souseiseki]

*runs in door 8 hours late* wow the next election is going to be really punishing for these new independents if only there was some system that we could have had that would have prevented [them losing/them just getting replaced with a new MP because the constituency system is overrated/their opponents capitalizing on the spoiler effect]

[Ostroeuropa]

It'd be far more depressing if people weren't fundamentally questioning the legitimacy of the system and the people manning it after Thatcherism gutted social housing, public spending, social services and British industry, the placeholder era of first minimal progress and then its rollback under New Labour, the massive transfer of wealth from the working people to bankers and wealthy shareholders under the quantitative easing program and austerity, and now the unprecedented display of sheer incompetence that is the handling of Brexit.

The social effects of these policies have been handwaved through "there is no alternative" narratives of globalisation, blaming migrants, blaming the EU, and now there's no-one outside left to blame.

And when the first real opposition arises in decades, large numbers of MPs elected to represent a re-energised Labour movement instead try to systematically undermine it and some actively, openly, seek to jump ship for a new party aiming to drag the """centre ground""" back away from doing anything to address the fundamental issues of an economy that's been stacked against the interests of the vast majority of society for decades.

The mainstream has failed. The majority of our representatives are enemies of the people who show us absolutely no respect - why do they deserve any?

Absolutely 100% right. This whole "oh we must be civil in politics thing is absurd". Politics isn't a game, and most of us don't have the privilege to be able to be "civil" or sit on the fence.

Austerity has killed 120,000 of our countrymen.
There is no "civility" to be had with a Tory who supports those policies.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/heal ... 57306.html

For the record, even if the paranoid ravings of the anti-corbynites were realized and he threw all the billionaires in a gulag, that would be a death toll of 134 people.

Mortality rates dropped under Labour continuously, and immediately reversed once the Tories took office. More people are dying, and the mortality rate continues to escalate. The longer the Tories hold on to power, the more people will die.

[Trumptonium1]

Here's my amateur attempt at predicting Tory defections

Name	Likelihood	Deselection status + chance
Heidi Allen	Very high, said she would quit for a new centrist party	Deselection blocked by Theresa May but faces no confidence vote in May
Sarah Wollaston	Very high, said she would resign if no deal still on table by March	Letter presented to association Chairman who will determine today when to organise a vote on her future. 54% Leave vote, deselection virtually certain if organised. Received 48% of local vote in 2009
Nick Boles	Very high would quit on No Deal being policy and wrote several articles criticising "entryism by UKIP types" in Telegraph	Was the first Tory MP to have officially been threatened with deselection last month. No confidence vote confirmed for 2nd week of March. Deselection virtually certain -- he has zero chances of continuing as a Tory MP beyond his current term so he either ends his political career on principle or tries to salvage it.
Dominic Grieve	Very high-ish, heavily pro-Remain but not the type to hang around with the high tax and anti-landlord lot. Likely would sit as independent working with pro-EU MPs. Said he would resign by end of February if no A50 extension	Sudden addition to my list as I was writing this. Telegraph just confirmed he'll have a deselection vote in his constituency party on March 29th. Awkward. Deselection virtually certain. Will probably quit politics, however. Not a careerist.
Anna Soubry	High, Mentioned more than once she'd quit for a centre party, hangs around with Chuka everyday	Defeated deselection attempt as the local party Chairman resigned. Association runs by executive (conveniently Soubry's friends,) so she's unlikely to go. However grassroots can complain to CCHQ, which appears likely. Deselection virtually certain if it was put to vote. Constituency heavy Leave.
Antoinette Sandbach	High-ish, did a round in pro-Brexit papers after reporting a pensioner to the police for saying he won't vote for her after her treason. One of Cameron's quota girls.	No moves as of yet. Aaron Banks trying hard, though. Association procedures mysterious. Appears they don't actually have any.
Justine Greening	Medium, would leave on JRM being leader but pro-Remain anyway.	No moves yet, unlikely to begin.
Alan Duncan	Medium, infamous Thatcherite and one of the few pro-EU ones. The guy who called people earning under 100k failures. Thinks Tories gone too far left on econ and right on society. Likely will just vanish to thin air.	Deselection vote confirmed for March 15th. Said the Brexit vote was a "tantrum thrown by plebs" -- constituency almost 60% Leave, so the dude is toast. Virtually certain.
Nicky Morgan	Hard to judge -- Remain rebel. One of Cameron's many liberal quota girls. Could leave out of solidarity.	No moves yet. Unlikely to begin, constituency remain.

Are Tory deselections common?

Used to be in the past but not now. Last deselection of sitting MP/candidate was Tim Yeo of South Suffolk over lobbying/bribery scandal in 2014. Generally reserved for some kind of national scandal or faux pas.
More info here: https://www.conservativehome.com/platfo ... ur-mp.html
https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/po ... ct-tory-mp

Appeals?

Theoretically, incumbents can appeal to CCHQ. There is a procedure for it and all, straight to 1922 Committee. But it has never been tested. Not that it would do much as they would still need a confirmation by the local association. Also - incumbents liked by CCHQ can simply be parachuted to safe seats elsewhere. They could try placing them in Tory Remain seats

TL:DR

Dominic Grieves, Nick Boles and Alan Duncan will pretty much with one hundred percent certainty no longer be Conservative MPs by Brexit Day. Others may quit.

[Salandriagado]

Well, antisemitic dickbags or no, Hamas are the elected officials forming (what passes for) a government in Palestine, and Palestine is one of the two states of the two-state solution that successive Israeli administrations have spent decades undermining.

Not bringing the Palestinian government to the table of talks in a UN-backed two-state solution would be pointless, no?

Elected officials or not, they're still a terrorist organisation. We should kill terrorists, not negotiate with them.

You realise you're in a thread about politics in the country that executed one of the single most successful terrorist negotiations in all of history, right? And that the descendents of those terrorist organisations literally have seats in our parliament, right? We should do whatever works, and talking to people works more often than shooting at them.

[Trumptonium1]

An Independent Group supported by people who don't want independence.

It's funny. When Carswell defected, first thing he did was trigger a by-election. Then the Tories won a Leave referendum. It appears everything the right does is with public approval.

But it appears everything the far-left does doesn't need one.

The Independent Group are far-left?

Yes

Isn't Ress-Mogg's constituency largely for remaining in the EU?

North-East Somerset voted to Remain, yes.

Bath did

[Souseiseki]

Yes

no they aren't. show me a single shred of evidence that this is even remotely the case. do not look it up. any far-left group will be advocating such radical change to the political and economic structure of the united kingdom that you should be able to rattle off a list immediately.

[Trumptonium1]

Yes

no they aren't. show me a single shred of evidence that this is even remotely the case. do not look it up. any far-left group will be advocating such radical change to the political and economic structure of the united kingdom that you should be able to rattle off a list immediately.

Far-left views are generally associated with authoritarianism and anti-democracy. Precisely what they are doing by turning their back on 33.6 million voters expressing their say.

[Souseiseki]

no they aren't. show me a single shred of evidence that this is even remotely the case. do not look it up. any far-left group will be advocating such radical change to the political and economic structure of the united kingdom that you should be able to rattle off a list immediately.

Far-left views are generally associated with authoritarianism and anti-democracy. Precisely what they are doing by turning their back on 33.6 million voters expressing their say.

and? even if we accept that they're authoritarian and anti-democracy i may as well say far-right views are also generally associated with authoritarianism and anti-democracy so they're far-right. pinochet and franco did not become far-leftists by virtue of not being a fan of democracy. please come up with something that is actually far-left.

[Trumptonium1]

United Arab Emirates partners with Japan's largest bank SoftBank for a new multimillion pound tech fund in Europe.

Destination? UK.

Oops.

https://www.ft.com/content/36d3e592-304 ... 51022932c8

[Eglaecia]

The Independent Group are far-left?

Yes

the hard left, marxist-leninist-maoist policies of... freedom of press and social market economics.

[Trumptonium1]

Far-left views are generally associated with authoritarianism and anti-democracy. Precisely what they are doing by turning their back on 33.6 million voters expressing their say.

and? even if we accept that they're authoritarian and anti-democracy i may as well say far-right views are also generally associated with authoritarianism and anti-democracy so they're far-right.

here goes your 'no shit' quota of the day?

[Souseiseki]

and? even if we accept that they're authoritarian and anti-democracy i may as well say far-right views are also generally associated with authoritarianism and anti-democracy so they're far-right.

here goes your 'no shit' quota of the day?

i don't get it. you're claiming they're simultaneously far-left and far-right?

...

my god, the radical centrists have pulled it off again, the absolute mavericks

[Trumptonium1]

here goes your 'no shit' quota of the day?

i don't get it. you're claiming they're simultaneously far-left and far-right?

...

my god, the radical centrists have pulled it off again, the absolute mavericks

no i misread that

[Ifreann]

The Independent Group are far-left?

Yes

There's no thonk gif sufficient for these thonks.

[Vassenor]

The Independent Group are far-left?

Yes

North-East Somerset voted to Remain, yes.

Bath did

A group made up of MPs who thought Labour needed to move further right is Far Left?

Sheesh.

[Kavagrad]

Yes



Bath did

A group made up of MPs who thought Labour needed to move further right is Far Left?

Sheesh.

Corbyn's not a commie... he's a Super Commie

- Julius Evola, probably