EU referendum

[Blue Smarties]

Can see the Brussels arrest swinging Brexit over the line if it all comes out that it is indeed another terrorist threat.

 

[mcfc1632]

No certainty there, it's gone from stagnation to bombing and taking all of us down in the very same sentence. Do we get a choice of the bomb or stagnation?

Stagnation was re the EU and bombing the Eurozone - Are you thick?

When you look in a mirror I bet your mind sees some witty and dapper person that is capable of incisive debating............. on here you just come across as a knob that acts as a thread vandal because they have nothing of value to say

Of course this may be only in my narrow opinion and everyone else on here sits by their laptops just waiting to receive your next pearl of wisdom?

 

[BigJoe#1]

Dunno beejay, maybe here?
https://www.theguardian.com/comment...s-austerity-coup-portugal-elections-eu-brexit

Cheers MF... When you read it in its entirety the article is quite revealing.... Here's an exert:

Coups, at least real ones, are unpredictable. Yet what is going to happen in Portugal is pretty clear. Next Friday, Passos Coelho and his rightwing coalition government will be sworn in by the president. He then has 10 days to present his programme for the next four years, while the leftwing parties are likely to table a vote of no confidence that will be approved by, at least, 122 of the 230 members of parliament.

With the government rejected, the president will have to take a new decision. Theoretically, he could appoint someone else from the right or an independent that he thinks capable of putting together a coalition with the Socialists (even though the Socialists have rejected this scenario); or he could nominate the Socialist leader António Costa to form a government with guaranteed approval in parliament; or, since he can’t call a new election as he is in the last months of his mandate, he could keep the current government as a caretaker government until a new president is elected. The most probable scenario is that by the end of the next month Portugal will have a leftwing government.

As a bottom line it's pretty much saying the same thing as the telegraph is it not? The people voted for an anti-austerity Givernment but the President does not want to upset the EU so he refuses to allow the majority parties to form a government. Not very democratic in the name if the EU is it?

 

[stonerblue]

Not mine but in tribute to Yep (Nopes) endless supply of pictures...

"We didn't fight two world wars to be ruled by Brussels/the Germans blah blah...."

I'm guessing, unless you are about 130 years old you actually didn't fight two world wars. I'm expecting that far from fighting any war, you've sat at home admiring your conservatory, and swallowing every euromyth Rupert Murdoch has fed you

You like the idea of "taking back control". You think leaving the EU will give you some kind of freedom. You haven't looked into the eyes of the people carrying those "taking back control" banners; Gove, Farage, Johnson. For some reason you think those guys have your best interests at heart? That they like alternative ideas? Or will allow you access to the truth? A free press? You do know that currently the UK is ranked 38th in the 2016 World Press Freedom Index? (Costa Rica, Ghana, Tonga and Uruguay all have a more independent media than the UK). That's how much our governing classes love freedom. They love their freedom (regulation-free) but not yours.

When they say "take back control", they mean; take control from Europe and give it all to them. The likes of Gove and Johnson and Rupert Murdoch. Journalist Anthony Hilton once asked Rupert Murdoch why he was so opposed to the European Union. 'That’s easy,' he replied. 'When I go into Downing Street they do what I say; when I go to Brussels they take no notice."

Maybe the likes of Murdoch and Gove and Johnson and Farage want out of the EU because the EU has been the institution that has done most to give workers rights of employment. Many of the benefits and protections British people have at work are thanks to EU regulations, and there's zero chance the Tories would make maintaining those rights a priority in the event of #Brexit (see http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/feb/25/workers-rights-are-on-the-line-in-eu-referendum-warns-tuc).

You need to know this; Murdoch wants more power and influence and the EU is standing in his way, Farage wants to privatise the NHS, even Cameron realised Gove was making a complete mess of being Education Secretary so sacked him; and Boris Johnson hates you.

The EU isn't perfect, far from it. But do you know what status Gove said the UK would have if we were outside the EU? He said we would be like Albania. He seemed to think that was a good thing (see http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/eu-referendum-britain-will-act-like-bosnia-and-ukraine-in-event-of-brexit-says-michael-gove-a6991711.html).

I know some people who live in, say Burnley, are brought up to believe that people living the other side of the hill, like, say in Blackburn, are somehow their mortal enemies. I wasn't brought up like that. I was brought up to believe our similarities are greater than our differences, that our common humanity is something to be embraced. The idea of retreating into an enclave, away from Europe, away from the world, disturbs me. We should be connecting to the world, building bridges and alliances (not retreating to a little England).

I'm voting #Remain because I'd hate the idea of living on an island with xenophobic leaders, fewer rights of employment, disappearing press and media freedoms, and an economy on a par with Albania.

Plus, I genuinely love being European. Take Boursin, for example. It's the eighth wonder of the world.

#Boursin NOT #Brexit.

couldn't agree more, apart from your choice of cheese..

 

[mcfc1632]

There are many Brexiters who don't really want Brexit I suspect. Individuals whose politics is based on sniping, telling everyone what's wrong, talking things down but who fundamentally do not know how to engage constructively and drive positive outcomes . Very much like statler and Waldorf . If we did vote out we would need constructive positive leaders and this is the conundrum

Surely you could apply that equally to REMAIN people - particularly on this thread?

 

[mcfc1632]

I was the same, changed my mind to IN until I found out about TTIP.

I'd highly advise anyone on the fence (and INers) to read this that don't know about it. Totally made my mind up on OUT because of this:

http://waronwant.org/what-ttip

...and my gut feeling I've had from the behaviour of Cameron and Osbourne they're hiding something and in the pockets of corporations wanting to enforce this. Of course they have all the "experts" paid up scaremongering too.

Absolutely no way i'm voting in!

TTIP is going to be very hard to prevent - impossible if we Remain - and forget any veto bollocks

 

[SWP's back]

So you like democracy as long as you get what you want? That isn't how democracy works, and voting to stay in an anti democratic organisation so that it can impose laws that the majority in this country don't agree with, is maybe the worst reason for voting Remain I can think of.

Yep. Democracy isn't working for me so I'd prefer an unelected panel.

Brilliant.

 

[mcfc1632]

No, that's really not a fair representation, at all mate.

The EU are negotiating in secret and any trade deal will be on their terms.

There is absolutely no basis for you to say that we'd be more likely to sign a TTIP type trade deal out of the EU than in.

Fundamentally, we'd be able to choose a party or candidate post Brexit that would have policies congruent with protecting the NHS, and signing trade deals that are not equivalents of the TTIP deal.

In the EU we're completely at the mercy of people that are not accountable to us. It's that straightforward.

TTIP is a guarantee if we remain in the EU. Just a question of when, not if.

Well said - good debunking of that bollocks. TTIP is a certainty in the EU - it is just one of those many things that are being progressed but of course things are not public until after the 23rd. If the EU is good for us why the need to hold back information on future developments until after the 23rd?

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

and the US couldn't care less about a comparatively tiny nation with whom it does little by way of trade.

We are the world's 5th biggest economy and also the 5th biggest export market for US goods, just (and only just) behind Japan and well ahead of Germany.

Sent from my HTC 10 using Tapatalk

 

[Ancient Citizen]

Short sighted of successive Labour governments not to introduce PR when they had the chance.

If they had done there would now be a coalition between the Conservatives and UKIP, so yeah, bring it on.
The system we have had in this country is to vote by constituency, not a poll of every individual (like this referendum). Surveys, and the failed AV alternative,
indicate that the general populace favour the existing system, the Labour party supports it, they lost the election, it's pointless bleating about PR.