Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/12/12/britons-and-some-irish-head-to.html
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Best of luck to all the British Happy Mutants. You’re gonna need it.
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What about Sinn Fein takes their seats at Westminster to make Boris Johnson PM?
I mean, Johnson is already planning on putting a border between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. A majority of Brexit supporters think it’s worth losing NI from the union to get Brexit. I can’t imagine Sinn Fein taking their seats for any reason other than to vote for a measure that would separate NI from the UK, and Johnson is the only one would possibly put such a measure on the table.
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I’d like to think that BJ hasn’t a chance in hell, but this is politics, and anything can happen, and often does.
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Because culture eats strategy for breakfast.
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Well Sinn Fein hasn’t always been hot to trot for reunification. But they’ve been pretty consistently, and pretty loudly anti-brexit. Their campaign right now is basically built on being a remain party, and their current push for Reunification is formated as a consequence of Brexit. If Brexit happens then there must be a border poll.
So I suppose it’s possible they’d trade Brexit for a vote, but only if they could be sure it would go their way. A reversal on Brexit wouldn’t be good for them otherwise, and there’s more than just UK election going on. The Northern Ireland Assembly/local parliament is currently suspended after a scandal triggered an election and no one could put together a functional government.
Supporting Brexit would put them in line with the DUP on what’s probably the biggest political issue right now. That’s a significant risk whenever there’s movement on the deadlock. And if Reunification is the goal, most of the conventional pathways run through the Assembly.
Oh, I wasn’t thinking of trading Brexit for a vote. I was thinking of trading Brexit for a fiat. One thing about lawless authoritarians is that they can get things done that others wouldn’t dare. (And I’m not saying I think this could happen in a million years, I just find the idea of Sinn Fein taking their seats in the UK parliament pretty outlandish unless something huge was on the table.)
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I don’t think there’s any basis in law for doing it by fiat. When you get right down to it they could try but that would be a shit show. And you have a problem in that Ireland would also have to accept it, and there’s no way in hell that the UK says “You take this now” and Ireland goes along with it. That would be more of the UK dictating to the Irish like they still control the whole Island, which is a major reason why the Reunification talk is escalating.
The Reunification process formalized in the Good Friday Agreements requires of vote in both countries,
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For those of us still trapped inside the failing state that is the UK, this election is part of a long nightmare in which our eyes are fixed, clockwork orange style to everlasting re-runs of the Boris and Nigel show.
We face yet more years of hideous nastiness, grinding poverty for everyone outside the 1%, the sale of all remaining public services, and collapse into an insular, colonial society, unless people defy the polls and pull back from the hideous vision in front of us.
The continuing popularity of Boris and Brexit despite everything we know now- despite the lies, the hiding in fridges, the horrible xenophobia, the misery of a decade of needless austerity, and the forthcoming sell out of everything for a trade deal with the US, demonstrates something ugly about many of the voting public, and proves onca again that Carthage the Union must be destroyed.
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Same neoliberal hellscape currently under construction in the U.S.
And elsewhere.
Goddess help us, but I do have hope that more and more of us proles are waking up to the blundering greed-- and despite appearances, the vulnerability– of those in the penthouses, executive suites, country estates, private islands, mega-yachts, etc etc
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Yeah, Boris couldn’t offer reunification, only separation. But I also think the after separation reunification would be a tough things to fight. No one wants a border between Ireland and Northern Ireland and without the Tories there to fuck everything up anymore I think reunification - being the only no-border solution - would probably happen.
Anyway, my wild conjecture is wild. I could keep clarifying the way in which it is wild, but it will never be reasonable.
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[bojo]'s a liar, a racist buffoon and notoriously incompetent – pollsters think he’s got it in the can.
Two popular pollster tricks to watch if the fortunate should occur and bojo goes down:
The weather-forecaster-dodge: “There was a last-minute occurrence/shift which wasn’t included in such-and-such a poll.”, that is, we correctly predicted the outcome if the outcome had out…come earlier.
The jean-dixon cherrypick one prediction: “Here’s a poll that we published which predicted this outcome almost exactly!” uh… four of your last six polls predicted the opposite, but I guess we’re going to just forget about those?
That is, pollsters are un-disproveable; they’re always “We predicted the last election pretty well indeed!”. And that alone means they are not properly done statistically. (hell, the whole sqrt(1/1000) => 3% margin of error maneuver is utterly bogus as the notion of a proper random sample is out the window). Do not make important decisions based on opinion polling! (looking at you politicians)
50ft queue outside my polling station. The folks volunteering said they’ve never seen it that busy in 40 years. The turnout for this election is gonna be huge.
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I mean I can see that but with a separate NI much of the process for Reunification is gone. And it’s a far more fundemental violation of the agreements than a border is. The root of that end of it is that the North Irish can’t be removed from the UK without their consent, but neither can they be kept in the UK without their consent.
Northern Independence has also been the traditional position of a chunk of your Republican/Nationalist groups. And down south, people are Ideologically on board with Reunification. But as a practical, right now sort of thing the majority has been opposed. With independence often offered as the alternative.
So suspect and independent Northern Ireland would just wind up an independent Northern Ireland. Which is a much messier, worse outcome for the Northern Irish. If only cause Reunification outside the UK and current agreements is harder, and kicks it NI out of the EU while it gets figured out.
I suppose it’s possible, given the high weird going on. But a deal with Corbyn for a no border soft Brexit (which seems to be his personal goal) would make more sense to me on that front. If a vote failed, NI is less fucked. But that very form of Brexit might preclude reunification.
I’m assuming Reunification doesn’t get serious legs until Brexit is a forgone conclusion or actually happens. And how serious or likely it gets is gonna be down to how bad Brexit is. Its just such a cautious, status quo friendly issue.
From that stand point it’d make more sense for Sinn Fein to work as hard as they can to maintain deadlock. A no deal crash out might be the best basis for Reunification.
Well, until they realise it means putting up with a bunch of DUP TDs.
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Well that’d be the practically opposed thing.
The most common position on the topic seems to be “not now”. Basically reunification is good, but reunifying is bad.
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Based on the enormous queues (US:lines) for polling, a lot of new voters are exercising their democratic right. As has been said, anything is possible. However, the Conservatives need an overwhelming majority. Labour could win with a landslide - it’s possible - but even if they don’t, a hung parliament will see the Conservatives out of government. The Lib Dems won’t form a coalition with Labour (and who wants them? They are Conservatives pretending they aren’t nasty) but SNP and the Greens will. People are sick of Austerity, and many of us are sick of Brexit, too. Repeal Article 50 - hold another referendum if you feel you need to, but stop this Empire Madness!
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It must be serious, Alan Moore is voting!
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Exit polls suggest an 86-seat Tory majority.
Was sticking to Corbyn really worth it?
Berxit.
BERXIT.
THIS TWEET HAS BEEN UP FOR THREE HOURS.
NO MISTAKE.
Is this what having a stroke feels like?
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