“It is conceivable that Mrs May could, with Labour support, push such a half-baked Brexit though Parliament. But her party would be finished. For most of its advocates on the Government benches, Brexit is about global free trade or it is nothing. Leaving the single market is not enough; Britain must also regain the power to trade freely with the rest of the world. Anything less would not just be a monumental betrayal but would tear the Conservatives apart. The party split in 1846 after the Corn Laws were repealed; it would surely do so again if Mrs May sells out her Brexiteers.”
|
|||||
|
We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people. Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house] Authors
Arts, Tech & CultureCivil LibertiesCommentary
EconomicsSamizdatistas |
Samizdata quote of the dayJanuary 11th, 2018 |
 10 comments to Samizdata quote of the day |
Who Are We?The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling. We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe. CategoriesArchivesFeed This PageLink Icons   |
|||
All content on this website (including text, photographs, audio files, and any other original works), unless otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons License. |
|||||
Unfortunately the article is behind a paywall; I would have enjoyed reading it.
Mrs May believes in free trade only when it comes to selling-out.
There is no such thing as “global free trade”. There are the basic WTO rules, or else there are specific trade agreements.
It is possible to be in the “Single Market” via membership of Efta, and as such it is also possible to negotiate one’s own trade agreements with other states.
Membership of Efta (which we should never have left) is the quickest and easiest way to get out of the EU, unless you believe Mrs May’s fairytale about a “deep and special” relationship being negotiated in about the next six months.
If we leave the EU without any economic disruption, the Remainers have no argument. The only relationship which 90% of British people want with the EU is economic. We have never been attracted to symbols of “ever closer union” such as the Euro. So long as trade with the EU is unaffected, then I would imagine that the vast majority of people who voted “remain” would be satisfied, and the “remain” cause would be dead and buried.
The referendum that established the Welsh Assembly in 1997 had a 50.22% turnout, with 50.3% of votes in favour and 49.7% against.
The 2016 EU membership referendum had a 72.2% turnout, with 51.9% of votes for Leave and 48.1% for Remain.
(Figures from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referendums_in_the_United_Kingdom
By any democratic standards, the vote that established Welsh devolution had considerably less legitimacy in terms of both turnout and victory-margin … and yet, oddly enough, that result was implemented without any quibbles or vehement demands for a re-run that I can recall.
Ah, but Zerren, the Welsh vote was not overly affected by moral posturing. Brexit seemed to be 90% competition for a Morally and Politically Correct Victory than a debate over facts and consequences, at least from this side of the Pond. Much like our U.S. election, losing only made the claims of Moral Superiority louder and more extreme for said losers.
I’ve said this before, but the Conservatives don’t understand how many people voted for them because they believed that the Conservatives would get Brexit done. If they screw us over on that, then their vote will fall dramatically.
…except that is, for the threat of Corbyn. That will keep the Conservative vote bouyant for as long as Labour is run by the Commies.
Plenty of us in this part of rural Mid Wales would happily be rid of the ‘Assembly’, ghastly people in a ghastly building, led by someone who might have made a good chairman of Gelligaer UDC in a bad year and proof that the devil makes work for idle brains.
But would Mrs May care about the Conservative Party being destroyed? After all we are the “nasty party” as far as she is concerned – and as Michael is fond of pointing out, Mrs May’s speeches are filled with attacks on the beliefs of Conservative Party members (selfish, greedy, distrusting of the state…….. at least we do not eat babies, I suppose that charge is for the next speech) as was the last election manifesto, the only manifesto in history to spend more time attacking the beliefs of its own party rather than the opposition.
Since the coup against Mrs Thatcher (of whom Mrs May does not approve) in 1990, we have gone from one million members to 70 thousand members – i.e. over 90% of us are already gone. If preventing British independence from the European Union meant the destruction of the Conservative Party, Mrs May might decide it was a price-worth-paying (if a “price” at all). Mrs May has made it quite clear that she did not vote for independence and is basically opposed to it (even useing the pathetic word “Brexit” instead of independence). Independence is about ending paying money to the European Union (they owe us money – not the other way round) and ending its laws (regulations) in our internal affairs. Mrs May has promised to pay the E.U. some 40 billion Pounds (plus lots more money in various ways) and has made it quite clear that she is going to keep all Europrean Union regulations – plus any new ones they think up.
“So why did Conservative Party members vote for this person as leader?” We did not vote for her – we were not given a vote on the matter, in case we did not vote for a “Remainer”, did not vote for “Social Justice” and the “modern state”.
Mr James Hargrave – you gladden my heart.
The Welsh and Scots both have terrible governments – but the Welsh honestly admit it, most Scots think speaking against modernism (the modern all-mighty-state) is blasphemy. Only a few Scots keep the spirit of freedom alive.
“But what of the English?”
Sadly the people of England appear to be beaten down – by endless BBC (and other) propaganda) and the education system and…….
Like the Welsh we voted for independence from the European Union – but we are clearly NOT going to get independence. We do not rejoice in statism as most (although not all) Scots do, but we are defeated and cowed.
I think I speak for most people in England in saying that we would welcome death – life has become a disgrace, there is no honour in it.
What Paul says about the mindset of most Scots is absolutely correct. I live in Scotland, and to see the amount of virtue-signalling in favour of state interference in peoples’ lives, and the way businesses are allowed to operate, is nauseating. Smoking, drinking, ‘unhealthy’ diet – “something must be done!” they wail. To openly voice dissent is to invite a wave of condemnation, and to face a wall of cognitive dissonance that nothing can penetrate when you try to argue for freedom.
I recently asked a member of my staff, who’s a fervent SNP fan, how he could be in favour of freedom yet support a party that’s constantly interfering in his ability to enjoy his chosen lifestyle (drinking, smoking, eating kebabs and so on). His response: the SNP are a means to an end, i.e. throwing off the yoke of ‘English rule’ (hmm? I was under the impression that the Scots had had their own parliament since 1999, guess I was wrong). To me, that’s akin to cutting off both feet to reduce footwear costs. It’s confirmation of a view that I’ve held for a while now: universal suffrage isn’t necessarily a good idea. Giving an idiot the vote is like giving a six year old a loaded Uzi – seems like a laugh, but you know it’s going to end in tears…
Well said Mr. Marks, May is becoming as bad as the EU and will soon be its greatest fan at the rate she is going. I have asked my local MP, conservative he claims, why are there no true conservative policies from the May but he appears to be just the usual yes man and ignores it.