The Brexit Boondoggle

[Thad]

In any case, it seems like any deal which would genuinely prevent potential disaster would have to functionally amount to "Remain in the EU", or at the very, very least "Remain in the Common Market".

Yeah, that's my take too. A bad Brexit deal will result in the same kind of catastrophe as no deal, and have the same potential to serve as a warning to other nations. A Brexit deal that averts catastrophe, OTOH, is likely to be an "exit" in name only, and probably not something that's going to inspire any other nations to attempt a hard exit.

[Mongrel]

Yeah, I mean, it really seems like under all the talk of deals, no deals, leaving, staying, etc. the choices boil down to "Keep things mostly easy and free-flowing" or "Put up walls", whatever label gets slapped on it in the end.

Well, with maybe the added wrinkles of status for migrant workers/refugees, and the chance for Northern Ireland to go back to the era of car bombs.

[Thad]

So Johnson has ordered the suspension of Parliament and the Queen has approved the order. The suspension will take effect sometime between September 9th and 12th.

A confidence vote before then seems inevitable, though it bears repeating, as always, that Corbyn is incompetent. Johnson seems to have outmaneuvered the fractured opposition; OTOH, I'm not sure he can keep his coalition given his moves to abandon the Irish backstop.

But my understanding is that even if he loses a confidence vote, he can call the election for after the Brexit deadline.

[Bal]

I just hope Scotland secedes and Norther Ireland remains stable.

[Mongrel]

The former is practically assured if Barney Rubble's plan remains unthwarted.

[Mongrel]

[Thad]

Johnson has lost his majority (with a Tory MP switching parties to Lib Dem) and Parliament is attempting to delay Brexit. Johnson has threatened that if the delay passes, he'll call a snap election and prevent any MP who voted for it from running as a Conservative.

[Mongrel]

There's (probably) no way the Tories aren't destroyed in an election, but god knows who would benefit, given the horrific mess all parties have found themselves in.

I guess one could hope that the British people would win in the sense that, first, any such election would hopefully lead to a second referendum, and second, Barney-fucking-Rubble wouldn't be in charge any more.

[Thad]

The Tories have been *extremely* lucky in having Corbyn as the leader of the opposition.

The hell of it is, Corbyn is a compelling argument for electing leaders like Blair and Brown. I don't have many nice things to say about those guys, but I sure can't picture them being as feckless and incompetent in Corbyn's shoes.

I fear that even if Corbyn manages to pull this out, Labour will still be looking at a lot of pressure to tack back to the right (and of course we're already seeing the Lib Dems benefit from Labour's lack of leadership). He reinforces the neoliberal stereotype that left-leaning politicians don't understand economics, and that's before we get into everything else that's wrong with him.

[zaratustra]

The Tories have been *extremely* lucky in having Corbyn as the leader of the opposition.

The hell of it is, Corbyn is a compelling argument for electing leaders like Blair and Brown. I don't have many nice things to say about those guys, but I sure can't picture them being as feckless and incompetent in Corbyn's shoes.

I fear that even if Corbyn manages to pull this out, Labour will still be looking at a lot of pressure to tack back to the right (and of course we're already seeing the Lib Dems benefit from Labour's lack of leadership). He reinforces the neoliberal stereotype that left-leaning politicians don't understand economics, and that's before we get into everything else that's wrong with him.

Blair and Brown would be feckless but in an entirely different manner.

Also, people keep forgetting - Labour was fucking dead when Corbyn took over. Labour was exactly the american Democrat style party that only manages to win enough seats to keep their donators sending the money in. Then they suddenly revived like some sort of dracula and pulled back so many seats Theresa May was forced to sew that agreement with the DUP to stay in power, and that destroyed their beautiful Fuck-You-Style Brexit plans.

If only Corbyn didn't have the views on Brexit of a 70-year-old northern Wiltshire "surely the steel jobs are coming back any minute now", this would have been Christmas for him.

[zaratustra]

[Mazian]

There's (probably) no way the Tories aren't destroyed in an election, but god knows who would benefit, given the horrific mess all parties have found themselves in.

The grasping-at-straws take I saw earlier was the idea that a Tory majority not requiring DUP support would be free to reopen the backstop negotiations, get the EU to make some minor tweaks and sell it as a major concession, and get a negotiated Brexit that way. Mind you, that was from earlier today, before the party started throwing out a couple dozen long-serving members and dropped down to running a minority government.

Granted, this is making two major assumptions: that enough of the remaining MPs are happy to throw NI under the bus (entirely possible), and that Boris is actually interested in negotiating a clean exit (not supported by available evidence).

[mharr]

I'm assuming a general election held tomorrow would result in a Conservative / Brexit Party coalition victory. Guy in the late night fuel station was trying to engage me in politics because it was all over the radio, and he genuinely believed Boris was the only MP that cares about democracy and all these Brexit delays are caused by a conspiracy of traitors.

Maybe if the Rebel Alliance stop and listen to these guys... https://fullfact.org/blog/2019/sep/elec ... -democracy

[zaratustra]

Yeah, if your definition of "victory" is "cut your party size by half and hand the rest to actual neonazis" then i guess Boris has a clear path to victory

the two main questions in a general election are:

1. will the public finally accept that the conservatives are lying and there will never be a brexit deal
2. given 1, will they go for a no-deal brexit anyway

[Thad]

Parliament has voted not to accept a no-deal Brexit, which...is purely symbolic and doesn't actually do anything, right? They haven't voted to withdraw Article 50 or do anything else that will actually prevent a no-deal from happening; they've just given preliminary approval to a bill requiring Boris to ask for another extension if no deal is reached by the deadline. Which...well, I wouldn't take any bets on whether Boris will just say "no" and trigger a constitutional crisis.

[Mongrel]

A symbolic show that they have to votes to do that much is still mildly important.

[Thad]

Right, ideally it signals to the EU that Parliament really doesn't want a no-deal Brexit, and ideally the EU grants another extension to give them time to work out a new deal -- after an election, if necessary. But as always, it's a question of how much the EU leadership really doesn't want a no-deal versus how much they're sick of the dithering and lack of progress and ready to cut their losses.

No-deal is still the default. All Johnson has to do is nothing.

[Mongrel]

Oh and, the important functional part of the vote is that it mean Oppositions MPs run the show in Parliament tomorrow instead of the government.

[Mongrel]

Meanwhile... a couple of funsies

[zaratustra]

news: boris johnson has lost literally everything he's asked parliament for

me: so he's losing right

news: no he's actually in a better position than ever before

me: oh fuck off