Brexit: No-deal opponents defeat government, Boris Johnson loses in Westminster

boing
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This isn’t a critical loss for Boris Johnson. It’s a successful first step in his plan.

He wants to :

  1. Divide the Conservative party, purging critics & tightening control over party (causing the purged to join the Liberals, by tradition). He wants to purge, because
  2. He wants to engineer a win at a general election, using a friendly Murdoch press and he wants it without internal warfare.
  3. If 2) doesn’t happen, prolong the chaos of brexit as long as possible (keeping him in power) whilst attempting 1) & 2) again and again.
  4. Once in power, apply any trick to stabilise the pound. History shows us this will hurt the poor and weaken workplace laws. The poor in the UK are numerous and already hurt.

He’s a shameless and reckless gambler, worse than David Cameron, who casually flipped a coin so in the end 96,000 Conservative party members could internally elect Boris Johnson to Prime Minister.

Boris’ll burn his own party, rip up any conventions and sacrifice the jobs of any of the people in the UK and let patients die from lack of available drugs on a hard-brexit. He’ll do all that to retain his grip on power. Brexiteers claim it’s to give him the bargaining power to renegotiate. The EU point out they already did and time is ticking. Are Brexiteers delusional?

And all for what? Because Boomers miss their childhoods of spitfires and Dad’s Army? So we can start from scratch with half our GDP? When we’re currently in one of the most enviable trading positions on earth? Madness.

It’s 39 years of Conservative monetary policies that have killed the prospects of so many in the UK. Not the EU. The Conservatives took everything, bit by bit, like spivs. Now the people are broke.

Yet via electoral fraud, lies (Boris Johnson’s especially-but-not-exclusively) and an insane press controlled by a couple of billionaires spouting dangerous populist rubbish, Brexiteers have been convinced they’re on a righteous crusade attacking ‘the elite’ that did them wrong. Tragically and ironically they are, in fact, running into the billionaire’s open jaws and hurting their own children’s futures.

Anybody rationally criticising Brexit is mobbed down with simplistic catchphrases “It’s the will of the people”, “Remoaners”, “project fear” etc. No actual debate is possible. We’re told that a 48/52 split is a ‘vast majority’, it’s obviously not and the populace have swung towards rejection of no-deal as the rational spot the Conservatives for what they are : the servers of self and beggars of billionaires.

The UK (England & Wales really) has been here a few times before with the Conservative party :

Some compare Boris Johnson’s actions this week to King Charles 1st’s behaviour in 1648 :

(Spoiler alert, Charles 1st was beheaded for treason shortly afterwards)

Then there was the Conservative schism over the Corn Laws (Irish friends look away or witness again how the Conservatives starved your people to death with indifference to urgency) :

I’m hoping Boris Johnson suffers Arthur Balfour’s fate and loses half the conservative seats, as happened in 1906

Let’s see if anybody can derail Boris in time.

We get the leaders we deserve.

“Oh wait, wrong meeting… I’m also available for children’s parties…” -Bill Hicks

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There are bars in Parliament. Subsidised bars.

I’m British, therefore I drink?

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Could be, but with a new government coming there’s always some hope of something new. In any event, as fun as it might be for people in the less-immediately-affected EU countries lie Germany to watch the UK writhe or say “good riddance”, it is a little unseemly given that other EU countries are going to have their own problems as a consequence.

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But the bill allows the EU to offer an alternative date which will be accepted unless Parliament vote against it.
“Please give us until Jan 2020”
“No, we will give you until Jan 2030”
“Okay then”

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I really, really wish we could hope, but the only outcome I can see from a general election is an increased Tory majority or a Tory/Brexit Party coalition, and a redoubling of the populist agenda. At best, the delusional activists will realise how much of a liability Corbyn is and dump him for next time.

I’d prefer a longer wait, for both the Conservative and Labour parties to implode, then an election fought by a range of new parties - Brexiters on the unelectable far right, Corbyn on the unelectable far left, and the adults in a new centre ground.

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Under these conditions I’d probably vote for any DExit party with a chance of delivering. Perhaps even for the AfD.

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Do you disagree with Corbyn’s policies? They’re quite mainstream european centre-left stuff.

This appeal to the Big Other*, with the word “unelectable” is pretty sad. Just say “I don’t like him, because he will make me pay more tax” if that’s the truth. 40% of the vote in 2017 isn’t exactly “unelectable” is it?

*the Big Other is a psychological construct, basically it’s what we believe everyone else believes, regardless of what we actually think. Groupthink and all kinds of bad stuff comes from the Big Other

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I don’t have much hope either – as I wrote in another thread, even after this vote I think that a Halloween no-deal Brexit is the most likely outcome, with a January Brexit at #2 – but even a tiny chance is probably worth the effort.

There are many people who are happy with the centre-left policies but do not want Corbyn as PM, either because they think he is a terrible leader, or too tolerant of bigotry, or too mired in the past like other Bexiteers.

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To those people I would say, if you want those policies, the only way is Corbyn. Because the thing is, if you replace Corbyn with someone else who’s equally likely to implement the social democratic program, they will be just as demonised by the press and the rentier classes. Even if you had someone extremely young like Laura Pidcock, she’d be a “terrible leader, too tolerant of bigotry and mired in the past” too, because she would be threatening the material interests of the rentier class.

For proof on this, take a look at how Ed Milliband was treated. And his program was Austerity Lite! He had a mug that said “controls on immigration” and they still called him a communist.

If you don’t like Corbyn because of his policies, that’s fine. If you don’t like him because of his media portrayal, maybe you could go see him at a public rally, or take a look at one of his videos and make up your own opinion. But ultimately, you’re voting for the policies.

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Wossat you shay?

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Yeah having pubs in parliament is probably not the best way to grease the gears of government…

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I wasn’t particularly disclosing my own political views in my previous post, which was based more on polls than ‘big other’, but since you ask: that’s the wrong question. :wink:

My contempt of Corbyn is personal, and quite independent of my views on his policies (which aren’t necessarily the party’s policies - that’s the problem). He is an appallingly bad leader - indecisive when decisions are needed immediately and liable to further his own principles at the expense of the party’s - and unable to compromise on those decisions/principles he formed in the 70s. That’s okay in a rebellious back-bencher, but unacceptable in a party leader. Why should anyone follow him when he routinely opposed his own party under previous leaders? Wiki says he defied the whip 428 times during Labour Governments.
His tacit support of antisemitism further makes him unacceptable.

More personally, I wouldn’t support him because he all-but-supports Brexit.

I’m happy to consider the Labour party’s policies (and pay more tax :wink: ), but not whilst Corbyn is involved. I can’t stress this enough: Corbyn personally is the barrier.

Generally, I’d agree, but one needs confidence that the policies are those of the broad-based party, not the leader personally, and that the leader can - or is even willing to - deliver the agreed policies.
And Corbyn inspires that confidence no better than Johnson.

[ETA: Sorry; that was rather off topic! If a moderator feels it should be deleted, I won’t object.]

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I agree with your skepticism about Corbyn as a leader, and worry that he won’t push for the second referendum that’s the only way out of this omnishambles because he’s still pining for the go-it-alone 1972 socialist British paradise that might have been. However, I’ll still take him over a fascism-enabling vandal like de Pfeffel in the short run in the hope that everyone else can make him see sense.

Once (or if) the Brexit mess is cleared up, though, the party needs to thank this relic of a bygone age for his service and then get rid of him and find a progressive leader who’s focused on the future (one within the EU) rather than the past.

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I followed part of the debate yesterday and was, again, reminded that some parts of society and parliament basically think that the EU is the German’s having won WWII in the long run, and the French have won the Napoleonic wars in the long run, too.

I’m not even exaggerating, I think - merely paraphrasing.

For fucks sake, British ultra-nationalists with politics which could at least in part be characterised as neo-fascist are up “in arms” because they want to defend themselves against foreign rule? By the Germans?

What. The. Actual.

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Sadly, it also seems as if some German ultra-nationalists/nativists (not you, obviously) want the UK to crash out of the EU and face the consequences out of some kind of twisted revenge ffantasy. Never mind that a no-deal Brexit will result in actual deaths and violence amongst the almost half of the country who didn’t ask for it, never mind that they’re hurting their own economy, as long as they get to feel superior.

Fortunately, the grown-ups are in charge in Brussels, so it’s more likely they’ll do their best to help the British Remainers buy as much time as they need to stay in the union and push the xenophobes and their greedhead enablers out.

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There is a rifle range which could be put to good use

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While the current situation is still pretty much universally awful, I’m at least glad that that image of the loathsome worm Rees-Mogg has become instantly iconic.

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This is my favorite so far

image
image.jpeg1076×952 132 KB

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