Having Cameron and Osborne as the face of "remain" was a huge blunder.
They had been squeezing the life out of some of the poorer members of society and it became an "easy" decision to vote against them. I agree that there was a massive two finger gesture in their direction.


Having said that, you mention "stoking fear of the unknown" and we're certainly getting plenty of "unknown" and this is before the start of any trade deal.

Ironically, the UK looks like it will be doing exactly as the EU want as our ability to negotiate is utterly impotent and we need someone with "balls" to get stuck in (as far as an intransigent EU will allow).

Mrs May is becoming a total laughing stock both at home and abroad.

She's like a very poor mans Thatcher (trying to say the right things but, totally hapless in obtaining them.

On a side note, you have to commend Junkers knowledge of the English languiage in using the word " nebulous", a word not often used by many people.

Politicians lie and are self-serving because it works. Honest and selfless politicians typically don’t last long. Parliamentary natural selection, innit? And ultimately the electorate are the people applying the evolutionary pressures... along with donors, lobbyists, the media... but much of it is us.

The Leave campaign’s huge advantage, and Cameron’s great blunder, was that they were allowed to be simply against something. Attack being better than defence is one of the basic rules of rhetoric. The problem, as we saw on Johnson’s ashen face the morning after, is what to do if you win and you have to defend the new position.

It’s true that people were and are angry, and with no little justification imo. It’s sad and predictable that the only way they had to express that anger was in a way that was very unlikely to lead to any benefit to them. Sometimes it’s just a relief to be heard though, even if it is just a desperate, futile howl of rage - as a Hull KR fan, there were times when it is very easy to sympathise with that around the time of the Brexit campaign and vote!

Meanwhile in the real world we have a trade imbalance with the Eu and a trade surplus with non EU countries. Especially with the USA. The last few months various politicians from our country have helped/colluded with the EU in order to prevent any kind of meaningful brexit. Even now Blair is trying to prevent our departure. Saw dodgy dossier Campbell being interviewed by Andrew Neil. Campbell wants a new vote because 600 thousand people marched in London the other week. Neil reminded him of the time a million people marched in London against the Iraq war. No response whatsoever. If the EU is so fantastic how come large swathes of France are struggling to make ends meet. Youth unemployment in the EU is higher than the UK and has been for a number of years. Just remind me how successful macron was after visiting mutti Merkel with his super ideas for the EU. The Italian banking crisis has yet to unfold, they owe billions to French and German banks. Greece has debts they can never repay. Whilst the east Europe countries receive money from the EU it’s doubtful they will ever be in a position to contribute to the EU. World trade with the EU is dropping year on year. If the Italian people mimic the French protests, as is likely the EU will have major problems. Looking on the bright side when Albania joins the EU we will have much enjoyment when the whole of that country floods into the EU. Won’t trouble Blair, Lineker, mandelson they will be unaffected by it. Heseltine is cocooned on his country estate. Whilst nick Clegg having destroyed the lib dem party and received his gong has piddled off to the to the USA for a million smackers a year. The hypocrisy of these people is staggering and yet they wonder why they lost the vote. Forgot to mention Yvette Cooper reminded of the time she displayed a refugee sign saying welcome to refugees. Still hasn’t taken any refugees in, surprising as she has 2 houses. Probably because she has a poor memory as a majority if her voters want to leave the EU. She is openly working to remain. Funny old world isn’t it ?

Hilarious.

I’m looking forward to blaming everything on Brexit in the future. Everything. Might even start referring to it as an ‘experiment’. The failed Brexit experiment... has a ring to it.

Now we’re on the cusp of it, can anybody make a positive case for it? Because i’ll admit it, compelling and positive is difficult. For the EU, I’d go with something like ‘international institutions are best able to deal with global challenges’, but we’re only something like a Marine Le Pen presidency away from that sounding pretty hollow.

What, realistically, are the expected benefits of Brexit now? In fairness to May’s deal, as I understand it, it gives the UK full control over immigration policy, which seemed to be a key selling point. What do folks think of her deal?

Hypocrisy ??

Start with Boris and see just where it takes you

Just as we will never know if life would have been better if we had reamined in the EU (assuming we leave), we will never know if life would have been better had we never joined the "club".
How about the top brass in the Tory Party, advocating "leave", whilst hastily moving their cash away from the UK, just in case it all turns to schmidt and yet they are still telling us that "things will be better when we are out".

Quote: Cronus "I'd look at it another way. If we'd never joined and the EU invited us based on the current membership conditions, would we vote for it? <snip> Vive la EU It’s an interesting question, from a historical perspective. But you have to deal with the world as it is. As has been pointed out frequently in the media recently, Great Britain’s net financial contribution to Northern Ireland is bigger than the UK’s to the EU. Given that and the decades long ‘troubles’, maybe partition wasn’t such a good choice. Would we accept those bits of Ulster now, if they hadn’t been part of the union since the early 1920s? But on the other hand, would you advocate trying to give them back now? The EU is very far from perfect. A lot of your points are valid. But it isn’t so dreadful that throwing off its shackles is going make life wonderful in post-Brexit Britain. Our problems are more deep seated than that. And the Brexit coalition is worryingly divided about what the future should look like. If people think somebody like most-recent Brexit secretary to resign Dominic Raab is a friend to the British working man... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-19300051 On the other hand, I don’t think an orderly Brexit has to be catastrophic. It’ll retard growth a bit, we might dip into recession, but nothing anybody in middle age hasn’t seen at least a couple of times before. I do think just crashing out could be very bad though, and Duncan-Smith’s suggestion that we play chicken with the EU to secure a better deal was alarming to see this week. Most businesses don’t run with huge cash reserves, and a lot of jobs could be lost if the working processes are badly disrupted.

Quote: Cronus "I'd look at it another way. If we'd never joined and the EU invited us based on the current membership conditions, would we vote for it? <snip> Vive la EU It’s an interesting question, from a historical perspective. But you have to deal with the world as it is. As has been pointed out frequently in the media recently, Great Britain’s net financial contribution to Northern Ireland is bigger than the UK’s to the EU. Given that and the decades long ‘troubles’, maybe partition wasn’t such a good choice. Would we accept those bits of Ulster now, if they hadn’t been part of the union since the early 1920s? But on the other hand, would you advocate trying to give them back now? The EU is very far from perfect. A lot of your points are valid. But it isn’t so dreadful that throwing off its shackles is going make life wonderful in post-Brexit Britain. Our problems are more deep seated than that. And the Brexit coalition is worryingly divided about what the future should look like. If people think somebody like most-recent Brexit secretary to resign Dominic Raab is a friend to the British working man... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-19300051 On the other hand, I don’t think an orderly Brexit has to be catastrophic. It’ll retard growth a bit, we might dip into recession, but nothing anybody in middle age hasn’t seen at least a couple of times before. I do think just crashing out could be very bad though, and Duncan-Smith’s suggestion that we play chicken with the EU to secure a better deal was alarming to see this week. Most businesses don’t run with huge cash reserves, and a lot of jobs could be lost if the working processes are badly disrupted.

Andrew Guinne this morning on the Marr show , basically just repeating Labours non committal manifesto rather than answering the questions asked , then Later Chuka Amouna showing why he will be the next Labour Prime Minister

Both parties split right down the middle

The USG is on its way

So tell me, would you vote to join the EU today if we had never joined? 4.46875:5