We have, actually, and I just stopped by to re-read it, but I have poor google-fu when it comes to unfogged. I'll just twiddle my thumbs until someone who remembers when comes by.
It was in the "Dumb" thread, because some times we stay more or less on topic.
But I do think it deserves its own thread.
There's a general ethno-nationalist backlash going on right now in the western democracies, manifesting itself in different forms and strengths from country to country, depending on their idiosyncracies. Brexit is basically the British version of this.
Classist Innuendo About Educated Remain Voters
Quote: "Are you sophisticated, cultured and cosmopolitan, or an uneducated pleb?" is implicit in much of the discourse"
See below, although I am not sure if Tooze has gotten to it yet. How the discourse is directed so that the Internationalist Organized Working Class is marginalized and ignored so that chauvinism and nationalism and racism are the only options for labor to resist liberalism/neoliberalism is a question I am studying. Maybe it has to do with the petty bourgeois and intellectual class aligning and identifying with the bourgeoisie.
In other related news, Sanders is still around, and Clinton is still a warmongering multi-millionaire.
Are there even enough intellectuals to be a class? I mean in real life, not here.
4. is broadly right. This piece by derauqsd in Vox is a helpful primer.
Does Nigel Farage actually smile like that as a matter of routine or did they stick in a horrible picture because he's an asshole?
This op-ed from The Guardian gets pretty close to my feelings about the whole thing.
A banker friend of mine (he's a mathmatician who left academia after buckling under family pressure, I mention defensively) says all the currency offices in London are shitting their pants over the referendum outcome -- no holidays, no IT upgrades until it's all over. On the other hand, I saw somewhere over the weekend that the betting markets are trending strongly toward remain.
No matter the long-term effects should brexit happen, in the short term it will suck for science and therefore I'm against for purely selfish reasons, at least.
Robert Mundell and the Euro from 2012
Mundell explained to me that, in fact, the euro is of a piece with Reaganomics:"Monetary discipline forces fiscal discipline on the politicians as well."
And when crises arise, economically disarmed nations have little to do but wipe away government regulations wholesale, privatize state industries en masse, slash taxes and send the European welfare state down the drain.
Monetary discipline forces fiscal discipline breeds austerity and conservatism until it breaks into fascism.
Then: war profits!
Does Nigel Farage actually smile like that as a matter of routine or did they stick in a horrible picture because he's an asshole?
I don't know him personally, of course, but he does look like that (or considerably more punchable) in every single photo and on TV, so I'm going to say matter of routine.
That is actually how he looks. Independently, he is also an asshole.
7: I don't know, I thought derausqsd was off his game a bit there. Things like this:
Except that in this case, "concerns over immigration" aren't necessarily about immigration. The regions that are strongest supporters of Brexit, the anti-immigration UK Independence Party, and anti-immigration politics in general tend to be areas that don't actually have all that many immigrants. It is doubtful that immigration (which tends to be of young and healthy working people) can be putting much strain on the health or education systems.
...and then he goes on to say that it's therefore really all about inequality and geographical imbalances.
Number of times the word "racism" appears in the piece: 0.
"The post-industrial economy has delivered an economic boom for some British people and stagnation for others. Many Britons feel anxious about these broader shifts, and immigrants make convenient scapegoats."
Davies goes on to propose that ordinary Britons unite against their real enemy, the bankers--
Independently, he is also an asshole.
Right. That's in the name of his party.
A banker friend of mine (he's a mathmatician who left academia after buckling under family pressure, I mention defensively) says all the currency offices in London are shitting their pants over the referendum outcome -- no holidays, no IT upgrades until it's all over. On the other hand, I saw somewhere over the weekend that the betting markets are trending strongly toward remain.
Yes they are. And those two points don't really contradict each other - yes, Brexit is at three to one odds, so it is likely not to happen, but a one in three chance of something like that is still easily enough to cause angst in the financial markets because the downside is so huge and unknowable. Banks aren't going to say "well, it's only a 33% chance of disaster, so it probably won't happen, let's not worry about it".
15: Well, 1 in 4, but still, that's way more than you'd like for such a catastrophic decision. Worse than Russian roulette. Hopefully better than the chance of Trump winning.
I find the idea that deindustrialization is the cause of the current international blip in right-wing anti-immigrant semi-fascism pretty unconvincing. Especially in the US and UK, the process has been going on for at least 45 years, if not more, so why now? Ockham's razor says it's not about "neoliberalism" in general but generally sort-of middle class people feeling threatened by people who look different than they do. Maybe they could be less racist of they had better state benefits but "asshole racist older white people" seem to be a thing even in the places with the least deindustrialization and best benefits, like Austria and Denmark.
7, 12:
Man, I was already feeling unfriendly towards Vox, but what they have done to derauqsd's writing is just gross.
Do we really need to choose between "neoliberalism" and "asshole racist older white people"? At least in the US those two have at least a moderately strong connection in the classic "things are bad because non-white people->policies that make things worse for most of them -> things are now worse because non-white people -> etc." feedback loop.
Also I've already seen the term "Texit" being thrown around. I love the idea of Texas actually trying to secede from the US, but mainly in the way that I love watching techno-libertarians watch their exciting can't-fail social projects blow up in their faces.
Do we really need to choose between "neoliberalism" and "asshole racist older white people"?
We could have both.
Number of times the word "racism" appears in the piece: 0.
True, but I thought the article kind of assumed it. Maybe it should have been more explicit about the racism, but when essentially the whole campaign consists of questionable aspersions against immigrants, what remains to be said? One thing that remains to be said is that this has given a new lease of life to the authentically fascist and neo-Nazi groupuscules, including the one that the murderer of Jo Cox may or may not have belonged to. They are disowning him, but Dave Neiwert posted a photo to FB which appeared to show him holding their banner at a rally.
Do we give Sayeeda Warsi props for jumping ship because of the racism in the "Leave" campaign? We do not; nothing has changed since it started, except that some of its more opportunist adherents are now pretending to be embarrassed.
Strange fact about the egregious Farage: he has taken up smoking (again?) and is claiming that he doesn't believe the medical evidence that it's bad for you.
Does anyone--or at least anyone in Vox's audience--see "concerns over immigration" and not immediately substitute "racism" for it? It's right there on the face of it. I'm trying to think what a non-racist concern over immigration would look like--overpopulation, maybe? But you'd just say that, and it's not something that's immigration specific.
I think it is very easy to see non-racist concern of immigration. It's a net gain for the country, but a clear loss for unskilled labor.
I'm trying to think what a non-racist concern over immigration would look like--overpopulation, maybe?
In fact I've had many tedious conversations that started out purportedly being about overpopulation. But the underlying racism came through, on average, within ten minutes.
Not so much in the context that derauqsd describes. Anyway, that's an easy thing to fix through progressive wealth transfer, if you're willing to do that. (As well as via regressive transfer from taxing the immigrants, which seems like a natural fit for the nativist set.)
I wouldn't really bank on progressive wealth transfer as a thing that is likely to happen in the current U.S.
I think illegal immigration does result in a regressive transfer from immigrants to relatively wealthier citizens because they have to pay social security taxes but can't collect it.
Yeah, I guess I was thinking more in the UK context. In the US context, what proportion of those jobs that immigrants are stealing are actually desirable ones the unskilled citizen class wants, and not e.g. migratory seasonal fruit picking?
During my time in Nebraska, I saw the whole meat packing industry go from awful job that paid a middle class wage to a much, much worse job that paid barely over minimum wage. That was all immigration. The people who did that and couldn't adapt all went from middle class to underclass.
Immigration and the rise of Big Chicken.
I'm trying to think what a non-racist concern over immigration would look like
Hong Kong?
But you can't reverse that now because everybody is used to cheap chicken. When I was a kid, chicken was a treat. If the price went up to that level again there'd be riots, and the Colonel would cause some changes to be made.
Okay, fair enough. I shouldn't have been so general, I was thinking of the UK context and spoke uncautiously. But the fact that unskilled labor could provide amazing middle class jobs was a historical abnormality lasting only a few decades; if we truly value that as a society, that requires expensive work on our part to maintain. In lieu of another world war that doesn't touch us, that means progressive solutions that our electorate can't stomach. So I don't think we really value that.
31: You mean immigration into Hong Kong from the mainland, not racist efforts to keep HKers out of the UK post-1997, right? I mean, it's not racism per se but HKers can get pretty snide about mainlander habits. Rude bumpkin stereotypes to the max (maybe that's less true now). But that is a context where overpopulation does actually make sense, being friggin' tiny compared to even Guangdong.
But you can't reverse that now because everybody is used to cheap chicken. When I was a kid, chicken was a treat. If the price went up to that level again there'd be riots, and the Colonel would cause some changes to be made.
Are you thinking more Colonel Sanders or like 70s Greece rule of the Colonels?
Chicken gyros aren't nearly as good as the kind with regular mystery meat.
I'd be afraid of Sanders. He's skilled in decapitation.
35. I was thinking of the former, but the second would surprise me less and less.
34: yes, mainlanders. Yes, Hong Kongers don't like mainlanders, but you can have dislike of a group without it being racism.
Sure, there are all kinds of bigotry. But given how national borders are drawn non-racist/ethnic bigotry is the exception, not the norm.
18: +1000 to that. That's probably the first thing I've ever read from him that was not even a little bit entertaining.
If the price went up to that level again
Generally it seems the increases aren't as big as you'd think. I think the math on produce comes out to something like a fifty percent wage jump only means another four or five cents a pound. Kind of like when the founder of Papa Johns complained that he couldn't afford health care for workers and then someone crunched the numbers and found out it could be done by raising the price by a five cents a pizza.
There's loads of this kind of thing going on all over with food and manufactured goods. Small price increases could translate into huge improvements for those wages at the bottom end but we just don't give a shit as a society and it doesn't happen.
From what I recall, I think 42 is right. But I'm not going to google up the studies.
I'm sure 42 is right, but you'd need much more than a 50% increase to get wages in the chicken killing indistru back up to real middle class levels, because we'd be talking about what people think of as a middle class lifestyle now, not what they had in 1958 or whenever.
Further to 21.2. Farage is now screaming that Warsi was planted in the Leave campaign by Cameron, so that she could change sides at the most embarrassing moment. I begin to think sanity may yet prevail, though not in UKIP.
John Oliver's segment on Brexit was amusing. Liberal use of the word "fuck," so maybe NSFW.
44.1: The beef killing industry was paying $20/hour back in the 80s.
Illegal immigratints do jobs Americans won't do, but it's because our goverment policy of massive illegal immigration has transformed those jobs into ones Americans won't do.
The demographics of the leave vote, as portrayed by D^2, do not accord with my admittedly uninformed impression. I thought both the Brit equivalents of Trump and Sander's supporters (eg Boris and Corbyn followers) were for leave. So I would have expected more support for leave among a younger crowd, as well as retirees.
I am aware of support for remain by some on the left who want to reform Brussels.
Why would you think that young leftists (the Sanders/Corbyn crowd) would be for Brexit? I mean, I literally don't know -- my sense is that the only reason to be for Brexit is either racism or sort of flounderingly ill-informed panic about economics, in a right-wing rather than left-wing kind of way.
I feel like I should look up who Corbyn is, but I've already looked up Nigel Farage and Bethmann-Hollweg. I think that's enough.
No, the youth vote is generally Remain, as is the left wing (apart from the hard core of Russophiles, but they're pretty few in number).
49: If I may Yanksplain, there's talk on the left about the EU being a neoliberal project designed to impoverish southern Europe to the benefit of northern. It's mostly a crap argument, but the Germans have spent the last 8 years making it look true.
I should clarify, per 51, that 52 doesn't seem to be a widely held belief, but it is, apparently held by some.
The Dude abides, which I guess tells you how Jeff Bridges would vote if he were British.
NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL
NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL
NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL
NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL
NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL
NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL NEOLIBERAL
You cannot trust what the establishment tells you. So general rebellious against supposed experts.
I thought there was some sort of ill-founded hope that, with freedom from Europe, England, at any rate, could become more social-democratic.
But if I'm wrong, I'm wrong.
50: Corbyn is the British Bernie Sanders (elderly socialist, long time in Parliament), except inside rather than outside the Labor party. He unexpectedly won an internal party election as party leader (is that the right job title? head of the party?) which would make him PM if Labor took Parliament at the next election. The centrist/neoliberal/Blairite chunk of the Labor party is horrified and being uncooperative with him, and given that they're a very large part of the powerful people in Labor, the party is kind of in disarray.
This is probably garbled as anything -- it's gleaned from BBC radio comedy podcasts. But close enough for what an American needs to know, I think.
By the way, JRoth, thanks for the explanation.
I'm now reading the Wikipedia page on immurement for reasons that escape me.
If they'd been properly immured, they wouldn't.
58, 59: You're welcome. But now I feel like I've fallen behind on cock jokes.
56 isn't an argument I have heard: you'd have to be pretty dim to think that a post-exit Britain would lurch to the left. Under, what, Prime Minister Boris Johnson? With no WTD or other EU-level protections, no ECJ, probably no HRA? We're into the area of people gibbering about Goldman Sachs and TPP and the Rothschilds running the EU from their reeking lair beneath the Alps here.
Sanders is a much better politician than Corbyn.
56: The EU prevents the Tories from smashing workers and the environment in the face. That's why they complain about EU regulations so much.
61: Reasons can fit through the air hole.
Corbyn is officially pro-Remain, as is the bulk of the Labour party. Corbyn does come from the wing of the party that has traditionally been left Eurosceptic, so I think his endorsement of remain has been a bit half-arsed and weak* but he is on the record as pro-Remain.
* like everything he's done since becoming leader, tbh
The Times and WaPo (and many others have cut me off for the month, so this is from Thoma's
Paul Krugman: Fear Loathing and Brexit
"Unfortunately, this vote is a choice between bad and worse -- and the question is which is which..."
"But today's E.U. is the land of the euro, a major mistake... "
" You have to be really, really sure that Europe is unfixable to support Brexit.
So I'd vote Remain. There would be no joy in that vote. But a choice must be made, and that's where I'd come down."
Fuck everybody who says the Brexit is 110% and only about racism. They should move to Greece.
Agree with 66; part of it may also be that he is thinking about how Labour lined up with the Tories on indyref and got utterly screwed, so he wants to avoid that at all costs, because if they lose more seats in 2020 then he's out.
I would for the record vote remain. But I would accept the responsibility that goes with that, meaning pitchforks and tumbrels.
67.last: last I heard, 77% of Greeks wanted to stay in the EU, bob.
Most people I know are voting Remain. One woman is voting out, and I'm convinced that it's for end times/post rapture one world government type reasons.
70: Makes me wonder what is the Grecian Formula.
Greece is a terrible example -- the problem is not the EU, it's the euro.
Actually about 65% of Greeks want to stay in the euro as well. The problem is idiotic policy, in Athens and Frankfurt and Brussels (and Berlin) but the Greeks are bright enough to know that rather than just wanting to burn the whole lot down.
The problem is idiotic policy, in Athens and Frankfurt and Brussels (and Berlin)
The people are tired unto fucking death of this diagnosis and the prescription of another fucking century of the slow boring of hard boards.
Especially since it is glaringly obvious that the situation will not remain stable for very much longer, if you want to call this stable.
I don't want to hear "Fucking Tories (Republicans, Austerians)" from someone with a six figure job and a million dollar residence. That is the point of the link way up at 5.
Have you ever actually met a Greek person?
I think the people at the Greek restaurant I go to are actually Maronites from Lebanon.
Anyway, hooray for cheap housing in peripheral cities.
78: YEP, THEY TOTALLY COUNT.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-us-2016-36582770
So apparently someone just tried to shoot Trump.
I dunno, seems to be a tried to/wanted to distinction to be made here.
He tried to grab a gun off a policeman at a Trump rally, for the purpose of shooting Trump with it. I think that counts.
That might count somewhere with limited gun availability, but you have to at least meet "Squeaky Fromme" standards here.
The Limey Menace! UK immigrants attempting to assassinate our politicians!
I'm hoping leave wins and that it's the start of the end of the EU. It's an anti-democratic monstrosity.
The near term consequences would be all bad and all kinds of varieties of horrible people would be celebrating, of course, so you'd feel rotten either way.
81: And he's a foreigner! Yay! This sort of thing could in no way cause any trouble whatsoever. At least he's white, I guess, and probably not muslim.
It feels like the first time.
Anyway, when Plan A is "grab gun from a police office in a venue full of police officers on alert," my first thought is "suicide attempt."
I did see some left pro-exit supporters at London's May Day parade. A Lexit banner was carried by one of the communist parties. Photo is in the flickr pool.
Does anyone--or at least anyone in Vox's audience--see "concerns over immigration" and not immediately substitute "racism" for it?
I think your parenthetical is doing all the work there. Based on my sample of approximately eleventy gazillion, there are quite a lot of people who are very, very invested in believing that one can be opposed to immigration for non-racist reasons. (I actually agree with them in theory, but somehow the practice never actually bears that out.)
I'm sure 42 is right, but you'd need much more than a 50% increase to get wages in the chicken killing indistru back up to real middle class levels, because we'd be talking about what people think of as a middle class lifestyle now, not what they had in 1958 or whenever.
Based on the meat-processing plants I'm familiar with, this is only partly accurate. Many of them are located in really, really low cost-of-living places, and some of what makes the jobs unbearably horrible is working conditions that aren't directly about wages. So you could make the jobs a whole lot better -- even "middle class" -- without as much of a direct financial cost as you might think.
On the OP, I was actually in England briefly on my way home last week. Had the pleasure (?) of a UKIP person trying to hand me his hateful literature. I was unfortunately not quick enough on the mark to tell him my field of activism; all I managed was a recoil and an "I'm an American."
(I didn't take his literature, but I did collect some I found littered on the street later, as a sort of anthropological/sociological evidence. Thankfully it was not in the bag that then got searched at Heathrow, where they confiscated my $10 sunblock because it was 113 ml and not 100. Boo metric conversions!)
Also, if you want to be really, really depressed, you can read about climate refugees from the Marshall Islands moving to Arkansas for horrible jobs in Tyson poultry processing.
To what extent is UK anti-immigration sentiment focused on within-EU immigrants, like people from Poland and the Baltics?
In fairness, who brings sunblock to England?
Well, at the moment, all of it. There's lots of hand-waving over the rest of it. (Think it's about 60% EU, 40% non atm? But I may be remembering wrong.)
cough looks superficially well-informed.
Not much to add to LB's account of Corbyn except that the man is stupendously unqualified to run a medium-sized pizza restaurant one man hotdog stand, let alone a party or a country. He has McManus levels of self-assurance without the unpredictablity. There was a completely devastating vice documentary about him a couple of weeks ago, all the more damning because it set off to make him look good. Some of his policies are actually useful and sensible, but that is wholly irrelevant under the circumstances.
93: The anti-immigration sentiment is surprisingly strong against various Eastern Europeans in the places they have settled. My daughter's shia friend (family Ugandan Asians, originally from Gujerat) used to say that the racism directed at Poles in Peterborough was far worse than anything she got, and shared by all her clan there. Of course, most of the UKIP/Express/Mail programme is racist as well, but there's a certain amount of xenophobia here that really isn't based on skin colour.
There is a left Leave vote. The silliest version is a colleague of mine, who argues for Brexit because he's pro-refugee and thinks the policy of keeping them out of the EU is immoral.
Finally, not all the Leave vote is Trump. Within the Tory party there is one group of pseudo-libertarians, who want to tear down everything that remains of social democracy to make us a lean, mean, agile shithole. They put up the money. So, think Romney bankrolling Trump.
We will be very fucking lucky to escape a no vote, and the poison now released will take a long time to settle.
I was unfortunately not quick enough on the mark to tell him my field of activism; all I managed was a recoil and an "I'm an American."
You should be all in favour of UK independence then...
93: There's plenty of racist anti-immigrant feeling (eg that which was whipped up by Michael Howard when he was Tory leader), but I'd say that 80% of the feeling that is driving the Brexit campaign is aimed at EU nationals, particularly from places like Poland and Bulgaria, and is basically economic in nature (not that this is mutually exclusive with virulent xenophobia). The remaining 20% is ostensibly about the EU but really about Syrians/North Africans.
96- I read it, it looked OK, but I don't feel it does enough to acknowledge the fact that those authorities people don't trust have given them ample reason not to trust them.
I'm a little bit curious about what evidence there is that Corbyn couldn't run a hot dog stand. It might be true, but certainly all the right people would be saying it even if it weren't.
Watch the vice documentary if you want evidence of Corbyn's incompetence. There is a breathtaking scene about 12 minutes in.
I took sunblock to Calais, thankyouverymuch. And it's a good thing I did.
I did not, however, come close to needing it in England.
I guess I should add Turks to 97.2.
Another left case for Brexit here.
I think he's right in his assessment of how corrosive EU institutions are to the social democratic project, but maybe wrong about everything else.
Still, immigration is enough reason to vote remain, not that I have a vote.
Several of the comments here seem to imply that racism requires that the other person/people has a different skin colour. If anybody actually believes this I would challenge it fundamentally. Racism is hatred of people with a different ethnicity, and ethnicity does not depend on pigmentation. I knew a man who was virulently racist towards French people.
104.
Brexit may well be the only thing that could hold the UK together and offer Labour the opportunity to rebuild on a national basis.
Except there appears to be a solid majority in favour of remaining in Scotland, and the leader of the SNP, which controls the Scottish Parliament and holds all but a handful of Scottish seats in Westminster, has said that in the event of a brexit win, she would immediately open negotiations for Scotland to remain in the EU. Hardly a promising start for holding the union together.
106: yes, that aspect was most definitely part of the 'everything else' I suspect he's wrong about.
106: Yeah, you get a lot of people in the US saying that they can't possibly be racist about Muslims, it's a religion, not a race. I think the thing to do if people start quibbling at you is flip to 'bigotry'. There's probably a sense in which the hostile feelings an English person has about Polish immigrants are different than the hostile feelings they have about African immigrants, but it's not a difference that matters much.
Don't assume it's all the same. Only buy hand-crafted, locally-sourced, sustainably-harvested bigotry. Or, go to the Balkans.
The Balkans were all about bigotry in bulk back in the '90s.
there appears to be a solid majority in favour of remaining in Scotland
This is mapped really strikingly here. The Remain vote in England is almost entirely localized to London and other major cities. It may only be Scotland that keeps us in.
I stole it from a friend who answered the phone with that phrase when I called him on Sunday and nearly made me crash the car. Share the love, I say. Also, I needed to be pseudonymous for transparently obvious reasons.
Areas where Remain voters are a majority, I should have said, not the Remain vote itself. But it's a very striking contrast around here - Cambridge itself is about 80% Remain, but the agricultural areas around (which have a high population of Eastern European agricultural workers) are very solidly Leave.
I think it's worth keeping race and ethnicity apart from each other because it can make a difference sometimes.* The thing about the people in 108, after all, is that they tend to have a pretty specific idea of what Muslims look like (unrelated to what Muslims actually look like) and it's an openly racial one. A lot of the anti-Muslim bigotry in the US seems to me to be bigotry directed at people who are, mostly, Muslim but not essentially that. (I doubt "oh but I'm an episcopalian" or something would carry much weight in their eyes, for example.)
In this case that absolutely has something to do with skin color (they aren't imagining Muslims of Swedish descent after all), but race in general doesn't have to have anything to do with skin color. (I mean, I've definitely had periods when I had darker skin than a lot of the black people I knew, but there was never any confusion whatsoever about which race I was and which they were on anyone's part.)
*I think it was AWB who posted my now favorite line about this which is, roughly, that ethnicity is about what you eat when you are with your family and race is about how strangers treat you. Watching the conservatives in America changing Hispanic from an collection of different ethnicities into a single race over the course of the last ten to fifteen years has been really fascinating (if distressing).
86 and link in 104 are clown-shoes political thinking at its finest - as though the EU were the one thing standing between us and a Europe of social democratic wonderlands, as though if the EU unravelled we'd get anything other than oligarchy, narrow revanchist politics, a dozen mini-Putins, and general xenophobic paranoia in society for generations. Yes, we're ruled by global capital, and yes it's unsatisfactory. We may have to find out (again) that there are still worse things to be ruled by.
Fortunately however this sort of magical thinking is relatively rare on the actual European left, aside from the handful of Putin's useful idiots mentioned in 51, or from left or left-leaning Americans for whom the whole thing is just this month's ideological exercise.
111: Once again, yous are lucky to have Scotland. At least those blue areas north of Cambridge have a very low population density.
Is Putin back on the old KGB trick of paying useful idiots? The only types of political activity I see around campus are about the fight for $15 or the election, but somebody keeps taping up flyers that are written to target a leftish audience and that always conclude with something pro-Russian.
Farage, of course, used to be employed by Russia Today. Just sayin'.
117: I don't think he has real ambitions of pitting the United States of America against each other, but he is deeply invested in disrupting if not dismantling the European project, by means great and small.
117: We do have a large Russian student population.
Back when I was at Local University I used to read the Maoist Internationalist Minutes over lunch. Always worth a laugh.
I know the CIA used to do the same (and probably still does), but I can't figure out what anybody expects to accomplish with those flyers.
120: I don't know about the students, but the adults are bigger assholes that usual about parking.
By Occam's Razor, shouldn't we just assume a local idiot? Unless there's contact info on it, in which might case it might just be fishing for local idiots. I would assume that we're too provincial for any big players to care about, but then again we do have a Confucius Institute so I suppose we're not nothing.
that ethnicity is about what you eat when you are with your family and race is about how strangers treat you.
Also, apparently, about how you handle emotional stress. My boss (who has been very, very supportive about the divorce) was asking after how my kids were handling things. At the response "Well, pretty deadpan. They are my kids, after all," she rolled her eyes and said "WASPS."
(Which we aren't really. But close enough for ethnic stereotyping.)
The ones I saw were very densely written, a full page of text and barely bigger than newspaper-sized type. It's probably copied from a website somewhere and not written locally. I can't recall if there was any contact info.
...asking after how my kids were handling things.
"They did a good job drafting the petitions for separation and custody, but the child support provisions said included a new car for each of them."
It takes a few years of practice to learn to avoid overreaching.
80: They're Phoenicians, you fucking arriviste.
Re: race vs ethnicity. I think that, at least in the US, our thinking on this issue might be a bit stunted. We have an illustrious history of racism against south/east Europeans*, but we've sort of forgotten about it as far as mainstream discourse goes.
*I'm putting the Irish in a separate category.
Who were literally ground up and used in fertilizer in the cotton fields. No one remembers the suffering of the Irish.
There exists a book called "How the Irish became White", which never ceases to amuse me.
Germane to the overlap between "sceptical about immigration" and headbanging racist: This woman had to resign but from a campaign that had already tweeted this cartoon
130: It probably doesn't help that "race" is jargon defined by our census bureau and we often use it in alignment with that, leading us to stumble against the edges of its definition. Are people from the Middle East "White"? Are sub-Saharan immigrants "Black"? (I've heard here of them being instructed to enter "White" on forms.) Why do the great majority of people who live on the very diverse, most populous continent get shunted into a single category "Asian/Pacific Islander"? And never mind perennial confusions over actually-it's-an-ethnicity "Hispanic." For how much we think about race, we're not great at talking about it.
133: That looks like one of the parody cartoons The Onion makes. Right down to the labeling of everything because art can't be trusted to convey a point.
"Hrm...it's almost perfect, but it's missing something."
*adds a shark labeled "Political Correctness"*
Typical of the Mainstream Eclectic Web Magazines to ridicule the conservative viewpoint. Why, he lives in Nebraska! There is a whole gallery of his work! This is among the summits of his artistic achievements -- and it completely answers, in graphic form, every nuance of what the whole referendum is about. Especially brave little Aryan Sweden being forced to walk the plank by moneygrubbing Jews Muslims.
I looked it up. He lives in Montana, not Nebraska.
The fliers about Russia are (given the small type and endless rant style) sound like someone that would be the result of a person suffering from a mental illness. But it's totally possible that some right wing group (including government ones) has managed to forget that the USSR disappeared twenty-five years ago and none of the undergraduates there were even alive, let alone paying attention to anything, when Russia was the big scary threat to the existence of the United States and anything linked to that was traitorous.
Very different. Nebraska is flat; Montana pointy.
It's all fly-over country to fancy Europeans.
You have to fly higher over Montana. These nuances matter.
137: Better still is the Arab trying to grope the ship's mermaid figurehead, entreating her with "fuck, fuck!" in German, which I guess alludes to the events in Köln...?
Contrary to the name, most of Montana is flat.
Perhaps important: KOLN is a television station in Nebraska.
That cartoon is something else.
Most of the remain arguments I see from friends and their friends doesn't adress whether the EU is a good idea or not. It's all short term issues.
This isn't a general election. You may never get another chance in your lifetime to leave, so even if the consequences of leaving will be mostly bad for the next decade or so, that shouldn't determine your vote.
re: 148
I don't think anyone has shown in any convincing way that we should expect the consequences longer term to be good. What is it that we are supposed to hold out for that will be worth a decade or more of hardship?
In that case, surely people under 30 are the most willing to look at the long term and vote Leave in their own interests.
I mean, arguments like that were made during the Scottish independence referendum. There, I think, a case could have been made that there were decisions that Scotland would genuinely make differently -- around foreign policy, immigration, etc -- if the parliament had those powers, and even under a DevoMax solution, those powers would remain with Westminster. So, I think there was a sincere left 'nat' case that could have been made for independence, even at the case of economic hardship. As it happens, that case wasn't the one that the SNP wanted to make, and I am not personally a nationalist anyway.
But, in the case of Britain as a whole, the whole thing about sovereignty being taken away by the EU that would be restored by Brexit is largely bollocks.
Long-term advantages of Brexit:
1) more control over fishing grounds, allowing you to finally defeat your true archnemesis, iceland
2) really stick it to the continentals
3) maybe the commonwealth will take you back?
4) immediate return to ruling the waves
5) collapse of pound will make british exports look better to those countries that haven't raised tariffs to spiteful levels
6) soccer hooligans will no longer be able to get visas to continental matches, thus preventing an export of your most vital national treasure
7) something else to be embarrassed about besides king charles
8) sticky toffee pudding?
At first I had Brexit confused with Corexit, the poison they used to mop up the Gulf Coast.
But, in the case of Britain as a whole, the whole thing about sovereignty being taken away by the EU that would be restored by Brexit is largely bollocks.
Instead of giving away sovereignty to the EU, join one of the United States's popular trade agreements and give away your sovereignty to Canada and Malaysia!
Democracy. And I believe that in the long term, moredemocracy leads to better policies and a healthier polity.
148. More complex and less emotional issues aside, the efforts to create the EU and its predecessors coincide with a period of 70 years during which no two major European states have been at war with each other. This is, I think, the first such interval since the fall of the western Roman Empire, and before that it was only because there was only one major state in Europe (which was usually involved in civil wars). I would prefer this unusual state of affairs to continue.
Instead of giving away sovereignty to the EU, join one of the United States's popular trade agreements and give away your sovereignty to Canada and Malaysia!
Well, we've already done that; the head of the Bank of England is Canadian. He's said he's relaxed about the possibility of Brexit because he has a lot of experience in managing loonies.
I wish 158 was true, but I daren't believe it.
157: Well, Latin Americans (for example) have stopped going to war with each other in the same period.
They have, if you ignore Central America (e.g. Football War, Contras), the Falklands War, the Mexican narcotics conflicts, the civil wars/insurgencies in Colombia and Peru, and various dictatorships waging war on their own people (thankfully much less of that today). I suppose of those only the Football War counts as a traditional war between Latin American states and it's not a major one, but at the same time it'd be absurd to consider Latin America as as peaceful as Western Europe. No, really, the EU has done a meaningful part in making a belligerent part of the world peaceful for more or less the first time in recorded history.
153: Taking the list a bit too seriously, the UK government already has the power to stop hooligans travelling abroad.
Keep your fish close and your hooligans closer.
164: Then I've completely misread the situation. It must be that what happened at Euro 2016 is part of a low-level proxy war against the Russians. Did the hooligans take a sealed train through the Chunnel?
The British government does not, however, have a machine for detecting potential hooliganosity in people who have not so far done any hooliganing. It has to wait until they actually start hooling.
"No, really, the EU has done a meaningful part in making a belligerent part of the world peaceful for more or less the first time in recorded history."
Mature democracies don't wage war against each other. Maybe the EU makes another war in the Balkans less likely, which isn't a minor thing. I guess ideally I would want to replace the EU with a much looser union, not do away with regional cooperation.
If everyone is in a small village where the village gets together to vote, we can have EVEN MORE democracy. I mean we might have to fight other villagers now and then but sonce everyone participates it will be very democratic.
If you don't want to go that far, you could have citizen legislators, just like California. The PEOPLE can vote to pass their own laws without intermediaries! Just get an initiative on your ballot and you're good to go, direct democracy. It's worked out awesome.
Mature democracies don't wage war against each other.
The trouble with this statement is that you are rather short of mature democracies to test it on, except for the ones in the European Union. You've also got the problem of what happened in WW1, when you had elected parliaments in Germany, France, Britain, Austria, the United States and Italy all cheerfully voting to go to war with each other. At which point I suppose we go into a No Truly Mature Democracy argument.
Germany and Austria were really not very parliamentary compared to the rest and they started it.
170; In that case the problem was the absence of McDonalds. No mature democracies with McDonalds ever go to war.
It also works for MacDonald's. That's why the United States and Scotland have never had a war.
Western Europe ca 1960-1992 wasn't full of democratic utopias, but it was better than what we have now.
And how do they--ignoring that a mature democracy is like a true Scotsman*--operationalize not fighting? Through closer and closer ties. If you take an inclusive view of what a mature democracy is, you have to admit that hypothesis is false (see the parallel "two countries with McDonalds won't declare war on each other" hypothesis). If you take an exclusive view, you're dealing with a very small group of countries with intense economic and domestic ties, most of which are actually in the EU and who use the EU to moderate those ties. And as you noted, the EU also encourages (with mixed success and some backsliding) the adoption of democratic norms of states at its periphery.
* I'm interested in when the UK became a mature democracy. 60s?
174: So, we need to bring back the Soviet Union.
Western Europe ca 1960-1992 wasn't full of democratic utopias, but it was better than what we have now.
For values of "Western Europe" not including Franco's Spain, Salazar's Portugal etc.
177: WORKING ON IT
In addition to WW1 which should be decisive [and also 171 just isn't true] I've never understood why us (not you Ajay) kicking out Allende and Mossadegh etc etc somehow don't count in the "democracies don't fight each other" argument. I mean sure those weren't shooting wars but only because we were powerful enough to not have to.
More generally ISTM it's the liberalism part of "liberal democracy" that's been good at keeping relative peace between nations, not the democracy part per se. People can elect crazy people who start wars and have often done so, eg Hitler or James K Polk.
Plus, central and eastern Europe are now considerably better than what we had then.
I'm working on a paper with, among others, a German, some Austrians, an Australian, and a French person. I'm starting to feel like Wilson, if Wilson felt like commenting on the internet during conference calls.
180: If we can overthrow a democratic government, it couldn't have been that mature, could it?
180.1: This Kaiser was far, far more involved in decision making than whoever was King of Great Britain (Edward?).
182. It is, I concede, the wrong thread, but we would all be so much better off if he had concentrated on doing just that. He could even have made himself useful by inventing the internet and conference calls. It would have kept him out of harm's way.
184 - That's true, but the Kaiser wasn't responsible for the war or actually in charge of the German government, the German parliament was elected in a franchise broader than the British one, and both countries were ruled by sort-of kind-of democratically responsive coalitions of elites. The main difference is that the British were infinitely better organized and generally more competent, not that they were obviously more Democratic.
Wilson and I are both former members of the APSA. Though he was president of it and I stopped joining once I no longer got to pay the cheap student rate.
185: Imagine how much different history would be if cat gifs were associated with Lost Cause-ism.
184. George. The fifth of that name. His dad was Edward.
"Mature democracies don't go to war" was pretty glib. I don't believe in a strong version of that thesis.
I think the EU hollows out democracy. I think hollowing out democracy makes it more likely democracies transform into authoritarian democraturas, which seems like the likeliest path to war within Europe.
Of course, I've already partly conceded the argument in 168. I don't feel any enthusiasm for what I'm arguing, only anguish.
"Mature democracies don't go to war" was pretty glib. I don't believe in a strong version of that thesis.
I think the EU hollows out democracy. I think hollowing out democracy makes it more likely democracies transform into authoritarian democraturas, which seems like the likeliest path to war within Europe.
Of course, I've already partly conceded the argument in 168. I don't feel any enthusiasm for what I'm arguing, only anguish.
"Mature democracies don't go to war" was pretty glib. I don't believe in a strong version of that thesis.
I think the EU hollows out democracy. I think hollowing out democracy makes it more likely democracies transform into authoritarian democraturas, which seems like the likeliest path to war within Europe.
Of course, I've already partly conceded the argument in 168. I don't feel any enthusiasm for what I'm arguing, only anguish.
"Mature democracies don't go to war" was pretty glib. I don't believe in a strong version of that argument.
I think the EU hollows out democracy. I think hollowing out democracy makes it more likely democracies transform into authoritarian democraturas, which seems like the likeliest path to war within Europe.
Of course, I've already partly conceded the argument in 168. I don't feel any enthusiasm for what I'm arguing, only anguish.
I blame that on Movable Type. I didn't reload or anything.
Western Europe ca 1960-1992 wasn't full of democratic utopias, but it was better than what we have now.
Wait, what? Are you talking democratically, in which case, what Ajay said, plus military-run Greece, an even more dysfunctional Italy, and a Church-ruled sclerotic Ireland.
David is really emphatic about this point.
Why not interpreting what I say in a charitable manner?
Maybe implicitly you're arguing that the 70s European Community could be argued to have helped make Spain and Portugal, and later on Greece. But I'm not against the 70s European Community, I'm against the present day EU.
Is there a charitable way to interpret the claim that Western Europe was more democratic when it had multiple dictatorships?
The more charitable reading ISTM is that Denmark, Sweden, Britain, France, Germany and Benelux both (a) seemed better off between 1960 and 1992; (b) had more fundamentally left-wing-ish policies in that period and (c) were less subject to rulemaking from dubiously democratically-authorized technocrats in Brussels. That is mostly true (though I'd run the timeline 1950-1975 for (a) and (b)) but I am very skeptical of the impiled causal connection between (a) and (b), on the one hand, and (c) on the other.
The economic growth of the trentes glorieuses was what made European Social Democracy possible. It's true that right-ish economic policy, some of which is sort-of promoted by the EU, absolutely won't bring back that economic growth. But neither will anything else anyone knows of, right or left. And the correct solution AFAICT isn't ending the EU in the name of "democracy" because there's no particular reason to think that will do anyone any good in the long term (and might cause long term disasters, like small autocratic states in Eastern Europe) and also has obvious short and medium term consequences are terrible.
Regarding the comments above about immigrants in the meatpacking industry; It makes me think about the section in The Last Round* about Chuvalo's parents**.
* Which I recommended earlier in the Ali thread.
** According to wikipedia, Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The EU's democracy problem isn't really primarily about technocrats.
1) The ECB.
2) There's a lot of treaties that forbid governments from certain policies and committs them to other (mostly v. bad) policies. Ordoliberalism.
2) When EU governments come together and make policies (in the European Council) there's rarely much debate and scrutiny until the decisions already been made, and usually not then either.
2) When decisions have been made, the individual governments often don't have to take ownership of them, they can blame the EU. You can't have democracy without accountability.
3) Especially within the Eurozone, there's a lot of group think and pressure on weaker parties to conform.
EU or no EU, it seems like governments (elected or non-elected) have little input into economic policies. The IMF? The World Bank? The bond market? The WTO? Basel banking standards? And also the EU.
I think an "supranational but not too supranational" political union will always tend to hollow out democracy, but not automatically push you towards rightwing policy (although: hollowed out elite driven democracy doesn't feel like a recipe for social democracy). But there's also a number of ordoliberal treaties that disallows good policy.
204: There's lots of that in the next chapters of Deluge. The bond market, mostly.
204 I don't think any of those things is much of a problem as long as you're wealthy and don't have economic problems. I don't think they trouble China or Australia much, or that they would constrain for example a hypothetical Corbyn cabinet.
The bond market constrains everybody.
Although the $1.57 I got in my Amazon account today because Apple sued them is making me contemplate a spending spree.
Of course, but I don't think the bond market stops you from having leftwing economic policy as long as your leftwing policies actually lead to econimic growth.
Right but it's that last part that no one knows how to do, left or right.
Assuming you haven't borrowed a bunch to pay for a war you just won or have to pay reparations for a war you just lost.
I buy a lot of Kindle books, so I got significantly more back. Enough to make me think I buy too many Kindle books.
Ah, about the same here. Glad to hear I'm in good company.
That's a whole evening at the bar after the kid is asleep.
What purchases are you getting money back on? E-book purchases through Apple?
It's, uhh, weirdly more complicated than that. In my case, Kindle purchases through Amazon:
You now have a credit of $41.47 in your Amazon account. Apple, Inc. (Apple) funded this credit to settle antitrust lawsuits brought by State Attorneys General and Class Plaintiffs about the price of electronic books (eBooks). As a result of this Settlement, qualifying eBook purchases from any retailer are eligible for a credit.
Apple sued Amazon because Amazon did to books what Apple did to music, so I got money for having purchased books (mostly old Sayers novels and Discworld) through Amazon.
219 is wrong then. Except for what books I was purchasing. I'm probably right about that.
Neither the UK nor Sweden are in 1, most of 2, or 3.
Also, this is nonsense:
You may never get another chance in your lifetime to leave, so even if the consequences of leaving will be mostly bad for the next decade or so, that shouldn't determine your vote
While we're in the EU, any British government, at any time, can invoke Lisbon Article 50 and leave.
Outside the EU, though, we could ask to rejoin but we'd have to go through the process (up to 10 years), we might be turned down, and we'd probably have to accept whatever terms the rest of the EU liked.
If you choose to stay and you're wrong, you can still leave. If you choose to leave and you're wrong, you can't easily go back on the decision.
A rational person should therefore be strongly predisposed to stay, just because you can change your mind about staying.
You, the UK, can leave anytime you want, but you, the voter, may never get another chance in your lifetime.
You can check out of the EU anytime you'd like, but you can never leave the EEC.
The European Steel and Coal Community won't let me be.
Is it likely that there will be another referendum in the next 30-40 years? I mean, I don't know.
Chances are the hypothetical future referendum will also be full of racist scaremongering and posh evil clowns.
It's only been 41 years since the last UK referendum on the EU. Given that the U.K. doesn't seem to have many referendums, it doesn't seem at all unlikely that if some material change happened resulting in a reason to leave, there would be a referendum.
By "EEC" I meant "EEA". But that doesn't flow as well.
Anyway, not making a bad decision because you'll never have a chance to make that bad decision again is not a good reason to make that bad decision. However, I agree that if there is the political will for it Brexit will be tried again. What, you think Farage and Boris and their ilk will just slink away?
I think David is talking almost complete horseshit but Swedes do put a peculiar value on democracy, as Americans do on freedom. It doesn't really mean a particular electoral system or even a way of recalling governments. It's something more like complete participation in society and a condition of almost unanimous but entirely voluntary submission to collective ethics and goals.
With that said, it is worth remembering that Swedish social democracy lost its economic way in the eighties, outside the EU, and that Sweden joined it in a desperate attempt to get the economy working again after the crash of 90/91. So the idea that it was the EU in particular which made left-wing policies impossible doesn't stand up in a Swedish context.
It's something more like complete participation in society and a condition of almost unanimous but entirely voluntary submission to collective ethics and goals.
That sounds awful. No wonder all Swedes go to Denmark on binge drinking expeditions.
Also, the pastry is wonderful.
I should say that despite posting 104, I think Halford is basically right in 201. But I also agree with D.W. in 205!
I've been reading this book on the post-war European economy, and it's very interesting. I'm just now in the chapter about various balance-of-payments crises in the 60s-70s, and the breakdown of Bretton Woods, and it really drives home that the golden age of social democracy was *also* based on a particular European supranational order -- one that was also deeply lacking in democratic legitimacy.
Looked at from one perspective, the EU is a superstate with an absolutely godawful constitution (in American terms: a "lower house" that's basically *always* elected in off-years; an "upper house" that's basically just the state governors, and an executive/cabinet appointed by the latter subject to the approval of the former; no taxing power or real fiscal capacity; a central bank explicitly forbidden from bailouts and without any mandate to care about unemployment, despite recent behavior otherwise; constitutionally mandated deficit limits on the states)--and where amendment requires, not 3/4th of the states, but all of them; why would you want in? Looked at another way, the alternative is "normal" intergovernmental treaties, which shares many of the worst downsides (unanimity required, executive dominance) plus even more ad-hockery.
We're pretty fucked.
233: My standard contribution to discussions like this is "bring back the Holy Roman Empire", but the idea never seems to catch on.
232: yeah, but Swedes call them "Viennese pastries"
Hey thanks x. trapnel. I'll let that PDF introduction be the Designated Distraction for this afternoon's work.
Are we talking about English muffins again?
Swedish social democracy didn't lose its economic way in the 80s. The economy was overheated and there was a housing bubble, then we had a very bad crash, which coincided with a rightwing government.
David 210: Of course, but I don't think the bond market stops you from having leftwing economic policy as long as your leftwing policies actually lead to econimic growth.
Wrong. The bond market demands low to zero inflation, which essentially forbids wage increases equal to or better than inflation. Which, according to a Keynesian analysis, prevents economic growth in developed economies or according to Marxian economics retards profits and inhibits necessary Schumpeterian destruction.
And they are assholes. The loans for properties destroyed in the 1923 Tokyo earthquake were not written off until the Great Depression.
Google Kalecki 1943 for the paper most progressives use to partly understand the political economy of government financing and economic growth.
Which right-wing government was democratically elected. But it was the social democrats who took Sweden into the EU. Neither did they do much to reverse the main lines of the right wing govt's policies.
Back when James Carville said that everyone was afraid of the bond market, the 10-year rate in the US was 7%. Now it's under 2%. It was somewhat plausible in the 90s that we should be scared of the bond market, but anyone in one of the major developed economies who says it now is lying. None of these governments are constrained in any way by the bond market. The German 10 year rate is now zero, while France is half a percentage point. (Japan's 10 year rate is now negative, which I can't even comprehend. Chuck E Cheese tokens have a higher rate of return than Japanese debt.)
Then I don't feel bad that I have a plastic cup full of them.
Dave and Buster's cards see more use these days, but they don't seem as robust as a metal token.
I've read this entire thread, and I still have no idea what David Weman's argument is. The euro has been terrible, but I still don't know of a single example of a good policy that the UK could pursue outside the EU that it can't pursue inside. The Tories seem far more constrained by it than Labour, as Dave Brockington argues over at LGM.
German 2 and 5 year bonds are negative. Swiss 10s are negative. The total issuance of negative yielding gov't bonds is now enormous, not confined to Japan.
German 2-year bonds have been negative since late 2015, this is not just fear of Brexit. I have not found statistics of who holds them-- I'd guess domestic banks as required capital, hedge funds betting on change in price, jumpy foreigners, but who knows.
I should also add that the British case for Leave is about the weakest of any EU country, since they've avoided two of the worst aspects, the Euro and the Fiscal Compact.
Talk to me like I'm stupid: why would I buy negative yielding Japanese (or Swiss, etc.) debt when I could presumably buy positive-yielding Treasury debt? This FT article attempts to explain it as a sort of hedge, but I don't get it.
246: I think that's right, but isn't it also the case that this makes it a lot easier for them to leave?
Further on the bond market, bonds BB and below are paying about 7%, which is pretty low for issues from the corporate equivalent of a guy with meth teeth who sells fireworks out of his truck. Though it has been even lower, just last year.
Too much capital, not enough productive resources.
247: If you are in Europe/Japan, you still bear exchange rate risk on the dollar exchange rate. If, for example, you think that the dollar will depreciate 3% a year versus your currency, you are better off with the domestic bonds.
247. Your expenses are in Rubles, and you believe that the dollar is temporarily kind of expensive. Or your German bank regulator insists that you have safe capital set aside for all those mortgages you issued.
Lots of ordinary europeans (Brits, Poles, Swedes) have mortgage payments in Euros which are not their domestic currency. The issuing banks need capital set aside in case of default. They could buy Greek bonds or German ones.
SFr mortgages exist also. Borrow at low Swiss rates!
Do many (any?) Brits have euro mortgages?
250: Ahh, okay. So low interest rates depend upon a relatively strong currency. (And I suppose the same could be said of Americans afraid of the dollar sliding). And I'd presume that from the Japanese government's perspective, this should encourage private investment.
253. Someone who bought a UK place and wants to borrow against it now to cover Euro or Ruble expenses might want one. Maybe a bank that asks fewer questions rather than more makes this guy comfortable.
I guess that's not an ordinary Brit though. Ordinary Czechs can and do borrow in other currency, I don't know how common the practice is in Sweden.
Government bonds /= capital! They're on the same side of the balance sheet as those dodgy mortgages.
What they are, are a) risk weighted capital-free assets, so they can load up on them cheaply, and b) high quality liquid assets, so they're effectively required to hold lots of them for liquidity purposes.
Also, as far as I'm aware the volume of euro denominated mortgages in the UK is negligible. Foreign currency mortgages (especially Sfr) have been a big thing in certain European countries, however, especially in central and eastern Europe. They generally didn't end well, especially for the countries outside the Eurozone, and several countries have basically forced the banks to redenominate them at the customer's request.
"Your loan was Methodist, but now it's Presbyterian by act of Parliament."
आप संसद के अधिनियम द्वारा एक ऋण के धर्म परिवर्तन नहीं कर सकते, Moby!
Jacobin is all over Brexit today, with multiple posts, mostly, maybe entirely, remain.
Richard Seymour full-on active socialist is pretty honest. Excerpts.
First of all, "retreat to the nation state" can mean a number of things depending on the context. To oppose, not just TTIP but the whole apparatus of neoliberal trade and regulatory agreements which usurp democratic powers, could be characterized as a "retreat to the nation state."
To insist on the right of national states to impose capital controls, nationalize industries, shut down tax havens, prosecute corporate criminals, or any one or all of these things, is a "retreat to the nation state." Whether it can "benefit the Left" is a question of context and strategy.
If the recent past demonstrates anything to us, it is that the Left aligning with the center is utterly useless at preventing the rise of fascism, because it means allowing the center to perpetuate precisely the policies which give ground to fascism, while confirming the irrelevance of the Left as an oppositional pole.
Whether you like it or not, the European Union represents an immense obstacle to the achievement of left-wing ends. It is not the only such obstacle, but we do not have to behave as if it isn't an obstacle.
....
There is a lot more where that came from. Tomorrow I'll look to see if there is any posts "left Brexit"
The Socialist Case For Leave Neil Davidson, close to communist, Deutscher Award Winner
However, in spite of these problems, I don't think that socialists -- and certainly revolutionaries -- have any choice but to argue for Leave. It is different if you genuinely believe that the EU is essentially a beneficial institution, but if you don't, then you have to tell the truth about it, what it is for and what it does.
Saying "we know the EU is terrible but this isn't a good time to leave" is simply setting a trap for yourself.
What happens if Corbyn's Labour Party wins the next election and then finds that its path to reform is blocked by the EU -- do you at that point say, "Er...sorry we didn't mention this before, but the EU is actually a regime for imposing neoliberal austerity which we should maybe think about leaving"? Why would anyone listen to you then?
I really struggle to see how the EU is more of an obstacle to the achievement of left-wing ends than a Tory government.
The EU has a very good record in preventing mass slaughter in its member states, which is a feature for most of us but a bug for people who write for Jacobin and live lives in which they are very unlikely actually to be one of the bodies that gets chucked into the disused coal mines.
Jacobin is the Slate of the Left. Them writing pro-Brexit articles was inevitable from the moment the magma cooled enough to form continents.
I didn't have a strong prior opinion about the non-euro parts of the EU. I heard somebody claim years ago that the EU was a big neoliberal conspiracy, and I just thought "sounds plausible". But the left-wing pro-Brexit arguments have been terrible. There's got to be some way the non-euro EU treaties constrain a left-wing government, but somehow no one ever points to one.
Jacobite is the Slate of the right. If it existed.
So the big Remain coalition is "BSE"? That bodes not well.
269: So the 4 most recent relevant articles at Jacobin are three for remain and one for Left exit, which you would have known if you had followed the links or visited the site but apparently you make your judgements based on ignorance and prejudice. I am not surprised, you fit right in here. It also is consistent with the program of suppressing dissent and enforcing conformity as much as possible, apparently one of four is one too many.
Counterpunch is more consistently Lexit.
Dude, I'm always nice to you. I didn't say that would only run pro-Brexit articles, but only that it was inevitable they would run one. "Slate of the Left" is not much of a condemnation.
Dude, I'm always nice to you.
An unusual decision, but we support our commenters even when we find them inexplicable.
I am not surprised, you fit right in here.
Okay, bob, let me ask you point-blank: why do you waste your time here, among such contemptible people? Is it for the edification of the lurkers?
(Note that I have not the slightest interest in "policing" "boundaries" here -- I think I've made my own ambivalence pretty plain, and I'd never presume to ask anyone else to leave. So that's not it. But I am so puzzled. Why go out of your way to converse with idiots and assholes, unless out of a staunch belief that some impartial set of eyes is judging you favorably by comparison? I know people do shit like this online all the time, and tbh I don't understand it as a general phenomenon, but the sheer monumental Sisyphean scale of your contributions here put them in their own class. How can you fucking stand it?)
He's a really worldclass troll, and we're a good audience for it. I would not expect an informative answer to your question other than that from him.
Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!
I believe bob has indicated in the past that his writings are directed towards posterity.
I sometimes forget that people who aren't us can read this.
Oh, I'm sure the real answer is "inertia." It usually is. But if this is world-class trolling it's also an extraordinary investment in being played, like every damn day, and so the puzzlement. (But perhaps that is in fact the appeal.)
280: Every so often I am reminded of that (person I know in real life commiserating with me about the divorce), and I am surprised. I mean, not in a bad way -- I wouldn't have posted about it if I weren't completely done with keeping it a secret -- but it is surprising that anyone who doesn't comment reads.
279: The only statement by Milan Kundera I have ever appreciated:
Once upon a time I too thought that the future was the only competent judge of our works and actions. Later on I understood that chasing after the future is the worst conformism of all, a craven flattery of the mighty. For the future is always mightier than the present. It will pass judgment on us, of course. And without any competence.
Kundera: always trolling, and mostly boring. But there's a grain of truth to that one.
Bob is the best troll, and we should feel proud of attracting the best troll. So many stupider places attract stupider trolls.
It's almost incomprehensible to me that anyone who doesn't comment here reads. I mean I did that for years, but still. Isn't it insanely boring?
Eh. I still read even in periods when I comment less (shut up. There have been periods where I have not commented obsessively. Short periods, but they've happened.) I could see following the conversation, and having a sense of the people, without saying anything.
Speaking for myself, there's a big barrier to commenting that doesn't apply to reading. At most places I've worked in the last few years, typing would be a noticeable and divergent activity, which reading isn't. And at many jobs, including my current one, html outside of approved, work-related sites is blocked. I get around this by using the rss feed, scaled to resemble a field in my ordinary display.
And once it becomes habitual to read without commenting, commenting becomes harder and less spontaneous: you lose the knack.
It's like shitting your pants. You never forget how but after you've stopped for a while, it doesn't feel right.
276: Ethnology;anthropology; alienation requires reinforcement to be an effective tool
"When ambition ends, happiness begins."
Thomas Merton
If I even pretended to have a purpose, here or anywhere, I would be lying to myself and indulging pride.
I know, I have tried it, and becoming a total hermit requires and creates an unbearable amount of compassion.
"Yet it is in this loneliness that the deepest activities begin. It is here that you discover act without motion, labor that is profound repose, vision in obscurity, and, beyond all desire, a fulfillment whose limits extend to infinity."
Thomas Merton
As a Japanophile, sort of, I should probably just hit y'all with a stick. Kaaya-viveka!
If you meet the Buddha in a comment thread, disparage him.
I must have missed the point of Seven Story Mountain.
I'm sure I finished that book. I was more persistent in my youth.
288 suggests that the analogy ban may be stifling worthwhile expression.
I only vaguely comment any more and I read (many, but not all of) the threads. Did that for years before I ever managed to comment.
Also, based on my like, literal hyperventilating anxiety about Brexit, I'm not sure I want to be an unmedicated me come the US election.
Often don't comment because subject on reflection could have some connection to professional life therefore not worth even moindre risk, can't be bothered to type on phone (virtually all my reading and comment here in phone), someone else has already or likely to contribute basically same thing, or opinion would be unproductively not congenial (eg most parenting and many relationship topics).
Nearly always can find time and force to lob in an emoji that may delightfully annoy, tho!
That's why they make chocolate and vanilla.
Hey any commenters in Miami? Up for a last minute meetup?
More evidence for the question in 8.
Jesus. He looks as if he's going to unhinge his jaw and swallow the photographer like a snake.
Just a reminder for you actual Brits: today is the vote! Don't forget!
I think calling bob a troll is unfair (that is, I tend to read negative connotations into it, although if other people read it more neutrally, never mind), inaccurate (it usually means trying to start a fight. That's apparently how he started, but he hasn't been effective at it in years and doesn't seem to mind), or both. Any attempt to give him a coherent, simple motivation would lessen him. He defies categorization.
As for Unfogged activity in general, I've never been one of the heavier or wittier participants. For years I've mainly visited Unfogged while at work. My visits lessen a bit when I'm busy (although my jobs have never been so busy that I couldn't spend 10 minutes a day here if I wanted), and they stop almost completely when I've discovered a more effective time-waster. For a long time, it was Reddit. Far more discussions with far more people about a wider range of topics... who cares if I actually know the people or if they actually have anything intelligent to say, amirite? I still browse Reddit now and then, but less these days. The main reason is the new job. I've gone to Unfogged on my work computers tentatively and it didn't set off any alarms, but Reddit or other popular stuff still seems too risky. Maybe in a few weeks.
300: His mouth is much less scary than his left hand and whatever he's doing with it.
He looks as if he's going to unhinge his jaw and swallow the photographer like a snake.
Somebody should add that image to the Wikipedia page for "Pyrrhic victory".
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I had a great date last night. And I have another one lined up with her. Woohoo!
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Just a reminder for you actual Brits: today is the vote! Don't forget!
Already done!
I was in a car back from a gig last night* and of the four of us, I was the only one with UK citizenship, and two of the people in the car had different citizenships from their kids (who have UK passports). It's going to be a fucking mess if we** vote for exit.
* B&S at the Albert Hall, very good.
** by which I mean the inclusive we, including asshole fellow citizens.
"Do you have Prince Albert in a Hall?
Also voted. And in a direction intended to minimise potential for mess.
This is a city/country split like nothing else. The cities are all Remain and the countryside is Leave (with the exception of Scotland which is pretty much all Remain).
I think calling bob a troll is unfair (that is, I tend to read negative connotations into it, although if other people read it more neutrally, never mind), inaccurate (it usually means trying to start a fight. That's apparently how he started, but he hasn't been effective at it in years and doesn't seem to mind), or both.
Are you kidding? He only deviates from textbook trolling in that he's much better at it than average. Did you read that Aristotle pastiche, On Trolling, that went around recently? Read it, and think about Bob.
You're right that he's not terribly effective at starting fights anymore, because he's working with a small audience that mostly knows what he's doing and doesn't get into it, and he is astonishingly dogged for someone who's being so ineffective, but it doesn't mean he's not trying his best.
(It is possible that the anime posts aren't trolling. I am so entirely uninterested in them that I don't know what they're about.)
I hate anime because Netflix/young boy at home. Apparently, nobody in Japan doesn't shout all the time and everything has to be explained explicitly. You'd think maybe we could assume the guy is angry because he's shouting and being assaulted, but his worthless friend has to narrate aloud to tell everybody.
I realize Naruto was probably never meant to be deep, but Power Rangers has better dialog.
Oh, mine went through a Naruto period a while back.
Anyone arguing Bob isn't trolling is surely trolling.
Since I'm a bad person at heart, whenever a major turning point arises part of me wants the world to take the bad path just to see what happens. The day before the 2004 Presidential election, part of me wanted Bush to win to see if we really would invade Iran.
So now that everyone seems to think Brexit is going to lose, I'm slightly disappointed. Now we won't see if the pound will crash, or if the FTSE will tumble, and if England will wake up tomorrow with a big case of buyer's remorse. I'm that guy that Terry Pratchett described who would push the big red button that says "Do Not Push Under Any Circumstances".
I have a really bad case of 316. I used to think that it was because I lived on the other side of the world to all the possible bad things that might happen, but perhaps if Americans also get it it's a global problem.
I think the word "trolling" is far too constricting a word to describe the many different rhetorical forms the man uses as he strives to enlighten.
316 is kind of how I feel about Trump - it would be interesting to see just how nuts America could get, under the right leadership. Sort of like one of those Top Gear rebuilding stunts.
316: I don't get this at all. Thing aren't horrible enough?
I would gain financially from Brexit as almost all my income is in foreign currencies, not to mention that a house price crash might mean I could start to think about maybe possibly conceivably buying a place to live, rather than renting into my impoverished dotage. So although I voted altruistically, I have a horribly guilty case of 316 as well.
I get anxious about the "good" side winning, because I know things will continue to be horrible, and could still get worse, because virtue usually doesn't do any good in the world.
I have felt that about Trump as well, though these days it's mainly enjoying the spectacular failure of his campaign. I guess it has to be more of a close-run thing to trigger it. I didn't really wonder what would happen if Romney won.
320: You're a good person, peep, so you are incapable of understanding it. I think for me it's a coping mechanism for uncertainty. Could things get as bad as they say? Let's find out!
Since I'm a bad person at heart, whenever a major turning point arises part of me wants the world to take the bad path just to see what happens.
I have this, but for my life choices.
Could things get as bad as they say? Let's find out!
That's really a question? Of course they can! Just look around the world. Just study a bit of history.
I don't think I feel this in general, but I've basically been rooting for Trump all along because a. hell with all those smug people who said it was impossible, but couldn't identify any actual mechanisms to stop him (or considered Marco Rubio's brilliance and charisma to be one such mechanism), b. it would be useful to pull the mask from what the GOP really is, c. I think he's truly unelectable, especially against a competent, steady candidate*, and d. yeah, I kind of want to see how big a shitshow it can be. For a long time it wasn't clear whether Cruz or Trump would be worse for Republicans as a whole, but I think it's becoming apparent that it really is Trump, between the fundraising and the inability to control himself even a little. Yes, Cruz' repulsiveness would be impossible for downticket candidates to run away from, but his professionally-run campaign would be really easy for the media to treat as respectable and basically the same as Hillary.
BTW, I freely acknowledge that the rise of Trump has unleashed some horrible things in this country, and so I feel kind of shitty rooting for him. OTOH, I'm not certain that pretending it wasn't there beneath the surface all along has done a ton of good.
*see how the aftermath of Orlando redounded to HRC's benefit; it turns out that, in the aftermath of terror, people don't want right wing answers, they want someone strong and steady. Traditionally Republicans have been assigned that role by the media, but that ain't Trump.
316 is kind of how I feel about Trump - it would be interesting to see just how nuts America could get, under the right leadership. Sort of like one of those Top Gear rebuilding stunts.
How about you guys go first. Elect Jeremy Clarkson both Prime Minister and King.
it would be useful to pull the mask from what the GOP really is
I sort of agree with this, but the media (at least the occasional bit of NPR I listen to) is having serious discussions about the merits of his ideas. They mostly come down against, but still. Perhaps Tigre was right about Trump's effects on the Overton Window.
re: 327
The thing is, Clarkson is a cast-iron dickhead, but, he's not an idiot. And, he's pro-Europe. A lot of his schtick is just that, a schtick. I have a strong suspicion that Clarkson as PM would be orders of magnitude more sensible than Trump.
We thought that about Trump, until he started pandering to his hardcore fans on the campaign trail.
329: It's hard to imagine who wouldn't be orders of magnitude more sensible than Trump. Gohmert?
I would have a hard time voting against a Clarkson-ocracy. Think of the cars! I'd have to ask my wife to lock me in the house in election day, or something.
If you read Clarkson's car criticism from maybe ten to twenty years ago, before he went totally off the deep-end, he would say quite insightful stuff whenever he got away from crap about sportscars that went really fast and hahaha Lotus. He could be really perceptive about, say, why a mid-market European small car worked, or didn't, and in a way that was really different to the Daily Telegraph parody idiot he ended up being.
Anyhow, Boris Johnson is the Trump equivalent, in that he's such a stereotypical natuonal idiot of a particular nation that it doesn't seem possible he's actually real and not the product of really bad, hacky TV writing.
I know you don't call it car criticism but that's what it basically is.
re: 333
One of his Euro travel shows a while back had some quite insightful things to say in favour of France, too. In among a load of cheap Frog-bashing, of course, but he was genuinely admiring of bits of the big-engineering TGV/Millau Viaduct side of France.
I do like it when Clarkson gets genuinely excited about some silly car thing. Vicarious passion is a lovely experience. But yet he is a brute, off camera as well as on.
334: yes, this. Trump is basically what people who really dislike America think America is like. As John Oliver said about Francois Hollande sneaking out of the Elysee on a scooter during his two-hour lunch break to meet his mistress: "An image so full of national stereotypes it's actually offensive".
328: From what I can remember hearing from NPR before it became clear that they fully intended to keep going down that road as quickly as possible (which means, years ago) the only difference there would be that they're mostly coming down against them. Coming from someone else those same ideas would probably get a balanced-and-sophisticated discussion that somehow ended up just being a bunch of lies from the conservative followed by some mumbling about complicated issues where people can disagree in good faith.
The main difference I've seen this election is that the media for whatever reason feels free to point out that pretty much everything Trump says is utter horseshit and would lead to unbelievable catastrophes, whereas before those exact same claims would have gotten Very Serious treatment because they were coming from a fancy talking hard-headed wonky real politician with gravitas (like Marco Rubio).
It's freaky the extent to which Trump embodies the stereotype. He's like a character out of a bad satirical novel. Who would have guessed that Bush Jr. would turn out to be the "tragedy" part of the tragedy-farce dialectic?
I'm still waiting for someone running for president to say, "The gun is good! The penis is evil!"
Martin Amis's new novel (is he still alive?) will just be Trump's life story, with Trump's name changed to something like "Hector Bulge".
339: I have previously described Trump as the Republican/conservative/right-wing id, but I think it would be more meaningful and accurate to call him the American id.
331: Pete Rose. Bobby Knight. You could probably grab a random college sports team coach and get someone worse than Trump.
All the disrespectful Yanks posting about Trump should turn their efforts to Brexit limericks while there is still time.
310. I understand desperate 3rd generation unemployed rural people voting for anything but the existing situation, but can somebody explain why wealthy farmers, who stand to lose massive subsidies and most of their casual seasonal workforce as well, seem to be solidly pro-Brexit. Pure, bone headed racism, or am I missing something?
Do they want to restore the Corn Laws? That should make them a pretty good profit.
So now that everyone seems to think Brexit is going to lose
I'm not putting the champagne on ice yet, by a long way.
In the case of Trump, I think people outside the United States would have even more to worry about if he won than Americans.
Yes. I try to take some comfort in that.
351 is so wrong, and yet so funny.
349 is probably right. And to enforce the Black Act with the full rigour of the law.
wealthy farmers, who stand to lose massive subsidies and most of their casual seasonal workforce as well, seem to be solidly pro-Brexit. Pure, bone headed racism, or am I missing something?
They're morons. For example, they spent ages complaining that the Milk Marketing Board was unfairly interfering with their ability to make huge profits on milk, and finally the NFU was able to talk the (Conservative) government into abolishing it, as a result of which the big supermarkets and dairies were free to screw the dairy farmers down to poverty prices, about which the farmers have been bitterly complaining ever since. It's quite possible that they think the same thing about the EU.
Plus, of course, they won't lose their casual seasonal workforce at all. They will simply go to the gangmasters and employ illegal immigrants (as indeed many of them do already), thus saving money on wages, National Insurance, and indeed safe working conditions, because why would you worry if one Chinese guy gets caught in a thresher? Lots more where he came from.
Farm work is dangerous here also, but why is anybody in front of the thresher?
Because nobody has taken the trouble to explain that they shouldn't be.
It's not a subtle thing, like PTO.
Per a certain blogging sf writer, I am looking out for whether a narrow Remain result will be ascribable to the Scottish margin, in which case, break out the popcorn.
348: If it's anything like in the US it's rich-right-wing solidarity. It doesn't matter if they'd be worse off, not having it would count as a loss for their team overall and so they can't have it.
And 354 is a big part of it too.
360. Most rich people live in cities and vote Remain. It's only farmers among the plutocracy who seem to go overwhelmingly the other way. I suspect ajay is right that they're morons. And there may be a bit of this sort of tinfoil hattery in the mix as well.
A lot of the people I know who are voting Leave are quite well off. All are middle aged and white. Ironically, at least a couple of them have businesses that depend on EU trade, and one consults all over the EU. I've no idea what the fuck he's thinking.
How many "rich farmers" or "rich rural residents" in England are actually-enobled nobles? I suppose not many. Still, that's different than just being some dude in Kansas who owns 5,000 acres.
re: 363
Rich aristocrats own literally about 30-40% of the country. So, a fucking lot.
I think an enormous amount is just that they are reactionaries. Things were better for them before. They believe (possibly rightly) they will get worse in future. Therefore they are instinctively hostile to progress and leaving the EU appears to them to be a simple "Undo" operation, which will wipe out everything that has happened since, oooh, 1983? 1956?
And, as Ajay says, you don't have to be clever to be a farmer. You need only to have had the right parents and to understand how to work the subsidies
They keep their estates entailed, which I don't understand except that it's something aristocrats do with their estates and cats with their butts.
That's about 5x more than I would have guessed. Wow.
364 is an important point. Whenever you hear about aristocrats having "an income" in the novels of yore, it's from their family's land holdings. There's nothing like that here.
I didn't figure that out until very recently. Why does this guy have "an income"? He doesn't even have a cushy job with the family business. The family doesn't even have a business. They seem to do nothing.
I guess it's not much different from having investments and living off the interest.
365.2: I've watched enough to them to see that you have to be at least a little bit clever not to go broke at it here.
One of my great uncles was an unsuccessful farmer in Oxfordshire, but he was on the other hand quite astonishingly thick
The other huge landowner in this country is the Mormon Church, which I seem to remember owns about 10% of the farmland. Serious investment strategy
Why? Are they hedging for when Utah becomes too dry to farm?
364/367. Not so much a fucking lot of aristocrats as a few aristocrats each owning a fucking lot of land.
Though I now dimly recall that a lot of British land is still held in fee by aristocrats but leased out on very long term 100-yr tranferrable leases that were paid in lump sums years ago. So maybe the 40% number as a practical matter is different than 40% land ownership in the US would look like.
361: I'll see your tinfoil hattery and raise you this, from UKIP Daily Possibly the greatest and certainly the most literal dolchstoss theory I have ever come across.
I guess it's not much different from having investments and living off the interest.
They do that too, don't worry. If you read about "consols" at any period after the early 18th century, you're reading about government issued securities designed by Robert Walpole to deal with the explosion of government debt after the South Sea Bubble.
377: It's preposterous. We all know those assassinations were carried out personally by the Kaiser.
And, as Ajay says, you don't have to be clever to be a farmer. You need only to have had the right parents and to understand how to work the subsidies
Two things here. First off, if they know how to work the subsidies, why are they voting for cutting off one of the largest sources of subsidies?
Second, you do have to have a bit of a turn for it. After both world wars the government encouraged officers to plough their demob payments into farming, and they went bust in droves. Which partly explains why the survivors are so damn rich. They hoovered up all the land.
Chris, I take your second point. As for the first, I think they assume that if the EU doesn't subsidise them, the British taxpayer will. I don't suppose for a moment they are imagining a NZ future, where there are suddenly no subsidies at all. Very good (long) piece by James Meek on just this mystery in the current LRB
379: I've just deliberately voted against my own economic interest because I think it's the right thing to do. Why shouldn't they do the same?
379.2: Those that went broke here in the 80s expanded too quickly in the 70s. But anybody who started with a typically sized farm in 1950 and didn't expand got squeezed out.
It really takes quite a good balance of business sense and caution.
Why? Are they hedging for when Utah becomes too dry to farm?
They have a lot of farm interests. Deseret Cattle and Citrus is that huge operation they own in FL that's on about 300K acres.
The ancestral Hick farm is by Seventh Day Adventists. Or was. I don't know if they are still there.
I don't know if the Adventists are still across the road. I know that the farm is still held by various relations.
I feel like 375 belongs in the Tooze thread.
Ancestral Carp farm is a country club and golf course.
The thing about Clarkson vice Trump or whoever is basically that he appeals to a different model of masculinity. Clarkson is willing to be open to Europe because he knows he's a champ - dominance through generosity. He's OK with those people so long as he gets to be at the centre of things. It may be a delusional belief in one's own specialness but it beats the (sometimes equally delusional) belief that you're so mediocre that only building more fucking walls higher around everything, or tearing down the post-war euro-atlantic alliance to see what happens, will relieve the fear that you're not all that.
I still don't know what's going to happen, but I spent the afternoon stocking up on canned food -- well, canned tuna and anchovies and stuff, in Waitrose. I don't think you can get more Remain than that, unless you have access to a Whole Foods
Whole Foods won't let me in now, but my wife is allowed. And people say women not taking a husband's name on marriage hurts men.
So, Brits, when do we find out the result?
A lot of the people I know who are voting Leave are quite well off. All are middle aged and white. Ironically, at least a couple of them have businesses that depend on EU trade, and one consults all over the EU. I've no idea what the fuck he's thinking.
Genuine question -- do you think he's thinking that other more pragmatic people will vote to Remain, and he's free to indulge his emotional desire to Leave without actually suffering the consequences?
I definitely have the sense in the US sometimes that some reactionary voters are counting being outnumbered by nonreactionary ones.
The result should be clear by around 5 am our time. Earlier if the margin is more emphatic than expected.
The stock market went way up today and it's typically gone down at signs Brexit is more likely. My little emerging markets ETF gained more today than I think it did all year before today. I wonder if it's irrational exuberance or if someone knows something.
I heard a rumor that hedge funds are doing their own exit polling, so any market moves are in response to that. Or they're random noise being magnified because everyone has heard this rumor.
395: Supposedly hedge funds have done their own private polling.
I do like it when Clarkson gets genuinely excited about some silly car thing. Vicarious passion is a lovely experience. But yet he is a brute, off camera as well as on.
I've posted this before, but I love this interview of Christopher Eccleston by Clarkson because, as it goes on, it feels like there's a genuine thread of hostility between them, and Eccleston isn't intimidated by Clarkson at all.
Fuck. Newcastle barely went Remain.
Much bigger win for Leave in Sunderland than expected, too. It'll be interesting to see how well Hanretty's predictions do work out once the total count is in, but if they're correct then we may actually be fucked.
Is this binding or can Cameron call backsies? Was the original treaty entered by referendum or legislation?
Legally it's entirely advisory. But it would be political suicide to go against it. Unless the markets literally blow up the economy, I guess.
Well of course "Sunderland" would vote Leave. How many more of those are there? "Exeter"?
Best results site? preferably one with a map. Not finding.
Strange map. Everything is the size of Wales except Wales.
Make Britain look like a fat chicken.
Why is Gibraltar in Ireland?
Who knew that Gibraltar was in the EU (via the UK) but not the Isle of Man. Not me I guess.
Remain seems to be up in the latest results, but it's very very close.
The current slight victory for Remain looks almost totally due to huge margins in South London, e.g. Lambeth. But "Barking and Dagenham" (according to Wikipedia "Th[is] borough has also been found to be the most unhappy place to live with the fewest new business incorporations") went for Leave.
Why would Gibraltar be in the Isle of Man?
I can't tell if this is an entertaining game about Brexit and UK geography or an entertaining trolling of non-British people and our geographical ignorance. Either way, great fun.
Who else saw the map in 406 and started looking for the Principalities of Glantri?
OK, there's still a lot of London out and the margins there are huge, so it's probably OK, but still -- British racists, you are coming too close to crashing the world economy. If that happens I for one favor invasion.
I mean that would just unite their racists with our racists, but it would be punishment of a kind.
Although even that might be too optimistic. Some prognosticator says based on results coming in so far Leave should get a 12 point victory. Fuck you British racists!
Why is Wales so pro-brexit? Aren't they usually sensible when England charges ahead with some idiotic idea? Bad post-industrial economy?
And don't generally areas with linguistic minorities get a lot of EU funding? I'm surprised that Na h-Eileanan Siar was only 55.2% remain. Ditto with North Wales and Anglesey going for exit.
Speaking of crashing economies et cetera, I don't understand stock and bond markets well enough to know if this critique of Paul Ryan's Social Security plan is true. Can it really be?
It turns out that, if you take 6.4 percent of every worker's paycheck who participates in this program, you wind up with a whole lot of money. In fact, you wind up with so much money that, if you invest these funds in stocks and bonds, the sheer mass of these investments will eventually push all other investors out of the market. As Dylan Matthews explains, under Ryan's Social Security plan, "investments in the stock and bond markets would skyrocket such that by 2050, every single stock or bond in the United States would be owned by a Social Security account. This would mean that the portfolio managers at the Social Security Administration would more or less control the entire means of production in the United States."
Bernie Fraudnders, where was your "leadership" on Brexit? Instead of swanning about wasting the Secret Service's money, try organizing something for once,
or an entertaining trolling of non-British people and our geographical ignorance
Real Americans know that the answer to "South Tyneside voted to leave, 62.05%. Where do you think it is?" is "Who gives a shit?"
I'm realizing that I know more about British geography than most Americans. Tyneside is where Newcastle is! Sunderland is a city near Newcastle that's like one of our Rust Belt cities! Hampshire is... a place in the south, where there are farms and suburbs, I think.
428: I had the opposite experience while staring at a Tube map while on a 50-minute ride to Heathrow. I saw literally two dozen place-names that I recognized from British children's books etc and was astonished to realize that many of them were either London neighborhoods or very close-in suburbs. I'm much better at nation-level geography than within-country geography.
Ah fuck. I'm going to bed. I fully expect to wake up to a completely fucked country.
If you're on Twitter, Finance Twitter is the place to be looking right now.
https://twitter.com/toby_n/status/746171110480293892
All of my UK geography is based on football, so I know where Burnley is but I'm vague on Cambridge.
Looking forward six months to a non-EU UK, a Trump presidency and a tanking world economy. Suddenly my daughters' interest in The Walking Dead seems utterly rational, like survival school.
Check out the demographic charts at the bottom of the Grauniad page. Pretty eerily high correlations. They'd be even higher if you removed the Scottish districts. So congrats uneducated, unqualified, poor, lower class, old white people. You did it!
Can I just say again, fuck you British racists? Mostly I'm just hoping the financial system has priced enough of this in to contain the hurt to Britain itself, sorry British people, but if your racist assholes crash our markets it's totally not cool.
Also, the fat chicken map is going to look pretty funny. Yellow head, blue body, but about to birth an enormous golden egg.
436:
Having watched the financial markets for the last month all I can say is I wish I could be more reassuring here, but the markets were swinging like crazy in response to polls. My measly IRA gained as much value today as it had in the two months since I purchased it on news that polls were showing remain.
So this maybe is something to worry about when it comes to Trump's appeal. I think the Democrats have covered their terrorism bases pretty well. I'm more worried that if this causes large or sustained global economic problems (and boy are we collectively stupid enough that I think it could) that put people out of work here in the US, you could have Trump screaming about how he was right all along that relying on trade with other nations is a bad idea and we need to make our shitty hats and t-shirts right here in the USA. And that might pick up traction.
So congrats uneducated, unqualified, poor, lower class, old white people. You did it!
They have the biggest stake in the future, it's only logical that they can continue to decide policy.
441: Trump himself is currently in Scotland for some reason, and low Scottish turnout may end up determining the result. All the pieces fit.
Pound now lowest against the dollar since 1985, and still falling.
Hitting refresh on the BBC website isn't helping. What can I do?
You'd think something this important (not that I understand why it's important) would require some kind of supermajority.
Seriously, never have referendums. Or initiatives. Just don't do it, ever.
Yeah, one thing that occurred to me was to be thankful that as screwed up as our system is, at least we don't have national referenda on stuff like this.
444 foolish me, I still have a couple hundred GBP left over from my June trip thinking I'll be back in the fall so why bother changing back.
Bloomberg coverage is pretty good
Do they have Remain doing better? That's what I'm looking for.
I think we should have more referenda with the caveat that it takes more than 50% to substantially alter the status quo. A 51-49 vote should never decide something of this magnitude. 70-30 though probably should, even if it does cause a disaster.
So, Brits, what are the chances that Parliament overrides?
455: I dunno, I think in most cases when something has 70% support you don't need a referendum to enact it.
Referenda aren't the UK system either; it's a non-binding referendum. To be pedantic.
So congrats uneducated, unqualified, poor, lower class, old white people. You did it!
Of course this was going to happen. AFAICT from commenters here and the occasional conversation with my UK relatives they've had the same issues we have here with the multi decade erosion of wages and way of life for the working and lower classes. Here and over there that is a hell of a lot of relatively uneducated white people. There's a lot of similar undercurrents in this country and all this talk of racism is missing a big piece of the picture.
I still can't believe that the prime minister chose to schedule this referendum.
Also, the pinned tweet at the top of the kebab shop's Twitter feed is even better.
461.2 yeah, that one is good too. But I like the one I posted for the bracing inclusion of "fuck patriotism".
Eh, things are going to get worse before they get better. Go do something fun and look for the upside in the world, like how drugs are bad for you but give a hell of a thigh gap.
And I hope you Americans are all feeling good and sanguine about the Trump polls.
And the BBC just called it for Leave. Thanks racists!
gswift is dead on. You'd think that democracy by referendum would be enough incentive for elites to not loot public education and break the social contract. A big problem in this situation and a big problem with Trump is that if there is no constructive outlet for working class organization, you get nationalist fascism.
BBC calling it. Farange: "victory for decent people ... without a shot being fired"
I agree with Chris Hayes on this: https://twitter.com/chrislhayes/status/746181566351679492
BBC calling it. Farange: "victory for decent people ... without a shot being fired"
As I was just reminded on Twitter, Jo Cox might disagree with that assessment.
465: I sure as fuck am not. I'm in the small "needlessly paranoid" camp, hopefully with time to figure out what to do to change things before our election. Trump has tons of time to turn this around. My family (in Wisconsin, where they all learned the hard way) is in despair about the likelihood of a Trump win.
This is shit, but I admit that I'm tempted to run down to SFO with all the cash I can grab from an ATM and get some pounds sterling for a vaguely-planned visit to the UK within the next 6 months. Looks like there are automatic machines outside security? (I won't do it... I guess... phooey.)
459: Another way to look at it is that the intellectual identity center-left formed a fucking alliance with the Financial, but cosmopolitan Right, and the fascists won. Why the hell did they think they could be on Cameron's side? Who the fuck are you people who are buddies with Cameron?
Probably won't happen in the US, this year, but 2018 and 2020 are in play.
Of course, if you are in any way worried about Trump, I suggest you start yelling "RACIST!!!" ten times louder, and HRC and the Dems can drop all that silly brosocialist dribble about jobs and the economy, and devote the entire campaign to reparations. Since minorities and Wall Street aren't racist, the reparations need to come 100% from the white working class, via forced labor if necessary.
That'll win.
Can't wait for Trump to blame the coming financial turmoil on Obama and Clinton.
Oh my God wait a single fucking day before handwringing about the working class and the purported solutions everyone already had in mind. Personally, I don't think the results have fuck all to do with the working class, especially given the map and the party supporting it. It has to do with a bunch of depraved lower middle class old shitbirds scared of losing minor privileges, like every other fascist uprising since time immemorial, including Trump's. I do seriously never want to hear about how England is basically a reasonable country again, though. Or, actually, I don't care, but I just don't want these fucking despicable racists to fuck up the world economy for the rest of us.
So this makes Scottish independence more or less inevitable, right? 300 years is admittedly a good run for a country cobbled together from different ethnic groups that hate each other.
"But we aren't buddies with Cameron"
Yes, you fucking are. The Democratic Party from Clintons keynote speech to Blair to H Clinton's nomination have been kissing Finance's butt for thirty fucking years.
And this is like a fucking law of politics:
Liberals + finance => fascism.
Watch it and weep. I have no sympathy for you.
I have sympathy for the people you will kill in your coming wars.
457:
Gun control has that in the US, though. I can't remember if single-payer does or not, but it does have majority support.
Sure hope so. Maybe London can join up with Scotland or become some kind of international free city.
First as tragedy, then as farce department: Scots rebuild Hadrian's wall to keep English goons out.
To tie that in to the British geography subthread, let me admit that I have no idea where Hadrian's wall stands with respect to the current Scottish border.
478: Yeah, that was the counterexample that led me to add "in most cases." I think that's kind of a special case, though. A lobby that powerful could probably keep a referendum off the ballot almost as easily as they could block legislation.
457- Oh, like the aspects of gun control (background loophole, etc.) that consistently poll at 80%?
Shit, I just moved $5k to Euros last week. But I guess if they destroy the economy, rent and all the stuff I need to buy will also fall?
Bob gets it exactly right. Don't think I've ever typed that before.
486 - Literally racist and gross, especially in context. With 100% non joking non trolling sincerity, fuck off.
You're going to have to explain that before I fuck off.
Yeah, gswift has a point. Bob just has directionless vitriol.
Everyone is pouring into Yen right now. Maybe that'll make Bob happy.
Here is what you just agreed with. In the context of a literally and explicitly anti-immigrant and pro-fascist vote.
Of course, if you are in any way worried about Trump, I suggest you start yelling "RACIST!!!" ten times louder, and HRC and the Dems can drop all that silly brosocialist dribble about jobs and the economy, and devote the entire campaign to reparations. Since minorities and Wall Street aren't racist, the reparations need to come 100% from the white working class, via forced labor if necessary.
475 to 488, I think, especially this part:
Personally, I don't think the results have fuck all to do with the working class, especially given the map and the party supporting it. It has to do with a bunch of depraved lower middle class old shitbirds scared of losing minor privileges, like every other fascist uprising since time immemorial, including Trump's.
Semi-pwned by Tigre himself, I guess.
No, 490 explains the "fuck off." 492 is my theory but I don't claim to have a deep enough knowledge of either British sociology or politics to make off the cuff statements about what caused the result with any great degree of confidence.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.
Eh, my eyes glazed over on that paragraph. I was referring to the liberal+finance parts.
494: Fair enough. I definitely agree about Trump but also don't know enough about Britain to have an informed opinion about this result.
Also, I agree about England (and especially England, not the UK) basically not being a reasonable country anymore. Conservatives + UKIP won a majority in England last year, now this.
I was referring to the liberal+finance parts.
Counterpoint: The US 1945 to present(ish). Lots of governmental mistakes and problems, of course, but not a whole lot of fascism prior to Trump.
The "minor priveledges" include raises, financial security, affordable homes and healthcare. Obviously, they also include reassurances of racial superiority as they always have, and a party demagogues have played on that like they always do.
Remind me which British political parties have been generally supportive bzw. opposed to the NHS again? There are so many of them.
The "minor priveledges" include raises, financial security, affordable homes and healthcare.
Do they, though? I don't know about the UK context, but Trump voters in the US typically are doing fine by those measures. There are exceptions, and they're certainly broader problems at a societal level, but I haven't seen any evidence that they're the main things people are angry about.
Also, FFS, it's not like an ex-EU UK run by the Tories is going to be better on social democratic criteria than an in-EU one.
Trump voters in the US typically are doing fine by those measures
Are they? What do you think their median net worth is? How many years of retirement do you think they can afford? They might be doing better than the median but the median's no doing so well.
Oh, fuck off Tigre. Like I said, keep yelling "Racist" ten times louder. That way you don't have to take responsibility for anything, like for instance the fucking fascists winning. Always the other guys fault.
Goes back to Hobson and Hilferding if you want, your number got called a century ago. You liberals are still around because you do the capitalist and fascists preparatory gruntwork. Part of what you get in return is self-righteousness and easier exile when the killing of those who can's afford to leave starts.
If you are on the same side as a Cameron or a Clinton, find or create another fucking side. Sanders tried.
503: Are you under the impression that I'm defending their political choices?
Holy fuck! I did not see this coming. I can't imagine the EU is going to treat the UK with very favorable terms.
Trump voters seem wealthier because they are old. Young people have no net worth, old people have some but not enough.
506: If you were a British citizen how would you have voted today/yesterday?
What the fuck. I had my first byline in the TLS just a couple of weeks ago, and when the complimentary copy got to our house it turned out to be the "please don't Brexit" issue, with lots of letters from the culturally prominent and a cartoon on the front with a bemused-looking Britannia about to cut the line across the Channel while the lion and unicorn looked on aghast ("She is not going to do it, is she?")
At least they already set the dollar denomination for my (token-ish) payment.
Also, it's not like Trump voters don't have young relatives. They may even care about them and worry about their prospects.
499: Oh really? Tell it to the 50s Iranians, Vietnamese, multiple South and Central Americans. Etc. Etc. Etc.
Like I said, try Hilferding. Or Lenin. The fascism get outsourced to the colonized and periphereal. Until excess accumulation brings it back home.
Aww, fuck it. America land of the free and brave, benevolent protector of all humankind, 1945-2015.
Latest estimate is 20+ million dead for America profits in the period.
Trump voters seem wealthier because they are old. Young people have no net worth, old people have some but not enough.
Right, with the caveat that this only applies to white people. On average, non-white people in the US own nothing regardless of age.
This isn't actually much of a sign not to trust polling, is it? It looks like in polling the average was about an even split, not clear either way.
509: Remain. The Euro seems terrible but the EU has obvious benefits and I'm not aware of good arguments to leave.
Also, it's not like Trump voters don't have young relatives. They may even care about them and worry about their prospects.
Yes, which is why they want to kill all the Mexicans who are stealing their jobs. (As I've said before, Trump is a moderate.)
506 - No, but you're playing into a dumb and simplistic narrative without much evidence. It would be much easier for everyone's conscience if right wing populism was just about working class people not doing well economically, but in fact it seems to be mostly about middle class people, especially old ones, being anxious about change and foreigners. In a world with limited resources it's very very unclear that "help working class people" or even "provide middle class people with more government benefits" is the path to get out of right-wing populism. And you can see this because (a) it's generally precisely the people who get such benefits who vote for the right-populist fascists; (b) it's generally the people who don't get such benefits (or who do but who are still really poor) who don't.
But it's easier if you just say neoliberal neoliberal neoliberal fifty times fast. Particularly after a major disaster that nobody really understands or can take the measure of. And it's even better if we stop giving stuff to black people or immigrants and start supporting the real working class, i.e. white people.
I was just talking to a British friend, who is a gay Muslim socialist brown person, about this. He didn't vote because he felt like it was a choice between Cameron and UKIP, and he despises both. I wonder if more people feeling like that depressed results a bit.
Also, I thought I read somewhere that Cameron called this referendum? WTF was he thinking? A referendum between neoliberalism and fascism rarely ends with neoliberalism winning.
Yes, they've found the shittiest, most vicious way to channel their insecurities. But what positive program have the neoliberals offered them?
But beyond absolute poverty, experience of relative poverty are actually more important in daily life. Life expectancy for white women has actually dropped in the US. People have to work harder to remain slightly worse off than they were 15 years ago. The same phenomenon is happening in China. Poor landless peasants want another Cultural Revolution. In terms of absolute wealth, they are orders of magnitudes better off than they were in the 60s. In terms of relative wealth, they're orders of magnitudes worse off. The psychological effects might not be sympathetic, but they shouldn't be dismissed.
AIHSAN, Marx has already written about this in the 18th Brumaire. You offer people the crushing working conditions of capitalism, the default is to react in a really nasty way.
Yes, they've found the shittiest, most vicious way to channel their insecurities. But what positive program have the neoliberals offered them?
The chance to live in a Western democracy with at least some semblance of a welfare state, which is a hell of a lot better then the places a lot of these immigrants are coming from even if the Tories are in the process of dismantling it.
518.1 I hope you don't take this the wrong Buttercup but your friend is an idiot.
Rafael Behr: "And it was precisely because there was a reactionary undercurrent of racial animus to the leave prospectus that voters in metropolitan areas voted in droves for remain. Those vast majorities in central London do not express enthusiasm for the EU so much as emotional attachment to a liberal ethos of openness to the world - an ethos that is much easier to endorse by people whose pockets are swollen by its economic bounty."
The rage goes to racism, nationalism, imperialism and fascism because the workers are told that Int'l Socialism is bad and not an option. Cause 100 million dollar Hillary Clinton is a great human being, so how can you hate or blame wealth and Capital?
Racists aren't fucking born that way. Capital makes them, cause they're profitable.
Crossed with Buttercup, who admittedly gives some reason to doubt the attractiveness of 523.
But what positive program have the neoliberals offered them?
They haven't offered them one, even assuming that "the neoliberals" are an actual thing. But the question is what positive program should these folks be offered. And there I dunno. Many of them are old and culturally resentful. And their sense of status is as Buttercup says driven by relative status. There's not a plausibly left-wing program that is going to give these folks what they want. They don't want poor people to do better; they just want to be able to lord it over the poor. They don't want to be taxed more to pay for anything. They'd like rich people to be less rich than them, but are fine with some rich people as long as they get to keep their own status, and there are fewer foreigners around them.
This looks ok to me: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/06/22/uk-and-europe-face-mutual-assured-destruction-if-they-botch-brex/
524
Yeah. I mean, he's not actually, but it feels the UK equivalent of Bernie or bust. Ironically, he is a Bernie-or-buster when it comes to US politics as well (not that he can vote here). I give him a tiny bit of a pass because opposing hawkish foreign policy in the Middle East and I-P in particular is really important for him personally and professionally, but still, however bad Clinton would be on that front Trump would probably still be catastrophic, even if the only even marginally sane stuff Trump has ever said has been on the I-P issue.
He was also completely shocked by the results. I imagine he thought that he wouldn't vote, but most people would vote to remain (which yeah, is the wrong way to go about it.)
He gets to make that mistake once. I haven't met very many people who have made it twice, I admit.
The chance to live in a Western democracy with at least some semblance of a welfare state, which is a hell of a lot better then the places a lot of these immigrants are coming from even if the Tories are in the process of dismantling it.
So... the status quo?
But it's easier if you just say neoliberal neoliberal neoliberal fifty times fast. Particularly after a major disaster that nobody really understands or can take the measure of. And it's even better if we stop giving stuff to black people or immigrants and start supporting the real working class, i.e. white people.
This is the position you're attributing to me? In your mind pointing out that even old hateful people have legitimate, unaddressed grievances means I want to fuck over black people?
Neoliberal.
530 - well, he's fucked now. I'm sure he'll take comfort in the blow this result inflicted on neoliberalism.
533.1: Yep. From which they benefit relative to the plausible alternatives, including Brexit, regardless of whether they realize it.
It would be much easier for everyone's conscience if right wing populism was just about working class people not doing well economically
I don't claim it's just about economics.
In a world with limited resources it's very very unclear that "help working class people" or even "provide middle class people with more government benefits" is the path to get out of right-wing populism.
Resource limits are insignificant compared to maldistribution. Have you ever worked out how much of the economies assets were transferred upwards over the last thirty years? I don't remember the fraction but it is enormous.
And you can see this because (a) it's generally precisely the people who get such benefits who vote for the right-populist fascists; (b) it's generally the people who don't get such benefits (or who do but who are still really poor) who don't.
Sure, some groups have made much smarter political allegiances than old, white people. Just because they've misdiagnosed their problems doesn't mean we should.
With Eggplant and gswift. And bob has a point. Yelling about racism is preaching to the choir and achieves next to nothing.
The chance to live in a Western democracy with at least some semblance of a welfare state, which is a hell of a lot better then the places a lot of these immigrants are coming from even if the Tories are in the process of dismantling it.
It is unclear if neoliberalism, which seems to be more about the dismantling of the welfare state than its creation, has positively offered many people the chance to live in a Western democracy with at least some semblance of a welfare state. Brexiters and Trump voters do indeed live in such a democracy but not that's not a positive program neoliberalism has offered them, afaict.
And this is a massive disaster. IIRC this is the first* major-state defection** from the postwar order.
*Arguably DeGaulle and NATO, but that was less drastic and still totally commited to Europe.
**Defection is a strong word, still EEC, whatever. But a deliberate major step backward.
Yeah. I mean, he's not actually,
Are you sure? Because his conception of the vote sure sounds idiotic.
I think I'm going to celebrate Brexit with a private screening of Bear Patrol, aka Much Apu About Nothing.
542: He's returned? This could be worse than I thought.
541 - yep. We're about to find out that even if neoliberalism is in fact a thing, there are lots of things that are worse.
Or, that's strong. Who the fuck knows what will happen. But we're playing with finding out things that are a lot worse than "neoliberalism," in a big way.
One of the delights of humanity is that people are vindictive enough to be willing to make their own situation worse, even much worse, in order to make the hated other suffer.
The one tiny crumb of comfort I can get from this is that this is a victory for the votes of the poor, the rural and the uneducated, and now they're all fucked and serve them right.
546- I think he just forgot to vote. Actually he kind of fits the profile of Bernie-or-bust too.
518:
Cameron promised a referendum a few years (?) ago as part of a bid to keep the Eurosceptic Tories in line. Basically, he sacrificed the United Kingdom (I assume it will break up) in order to be PM. It was completely self-interested.
FUUUUUUUUCKKKKK! My children are grounded for the week for not doing more to stop the post-war order from unraveling.
Hilferding was a dumbshit moron who single-handedly put Hitler into power, so it's unsurprising that bob is fan.
I wonder how harsh the EU's terms for exit will be. I'm sure there's a natural tendency towards non-harshness but this is kind of an existential crisis for them and ISTM they need to act quickly and harshly to avoid a mass outbreak of right wing euroskepticism. Basically treat Britain like Russia, move as much of the City of London as possible to Frankfurt, high tarrifs for everything. What's England got for leverage? Other than finance, which can move in months, and some luxury goods it doesn't really make stuff people on the continent want to buy.
The only remaining question is when the EU will invade to bring the UK back into the fold. The shadowy power behind the non-British throne won't go down easy.
They need to recreate that Simpsons scene with Barney and Wade Boggs but have them arguing about who the worst PM was instead of the best.
"David Cameron!"
"Neville Chamberlain!"
"David Cameron!"
"Neville Chamberlain!"
"Ok, you asked for it Boggs!"
554 is correct - promised it in 2013 because he really, really wanted to carry on being leader of the Conservative party. And now he's not going to be that any more.
So I can add that to the list of people who I don't mind suffering from this.
Farage's wife is a German. I hope they refuse her visa if she tries to go back to visit family.
It isn't a great time to look your 15 year old in the eye. Sorry sweetie we broke the world.
Do you know what you should do if you're British and don't like neoliberalism? Don't vote for the fucking Tories.
Here's history of the UK for the last 40 years. Labour was a super left-wing, pro-working-class party. They lost to Margaret Thatcher, who hated the working class and loved finance. Labour then continued to lose elections until they gave up and turned the party over to Tony Blair, who didn't care about the working class and also loved finance. He won! Several times! Then Labour went with people who slightly to Blair's left, and then lost the next two elections. If the voters didn't like neoliberalism or finance, they could have, you know, voted against it sometime between 1979 and now.
I was trying to explain to my 11-year-old daughter why I was so upset. I completely failed.
Just for clarification; were the press and the institutions of British public life generally pushing a right wing line that whole time? I.E were the British people bathed in right wing propaganda that whole time?
I don't know if the EU will be that harsh, but both Frankfurt and Zurich will try to steal the City. I don't know if the EU has the appetite for the lawlessness necessary. Switzerland will do anything for money, but maybe their treaties with the EU will prevent it.
I keep going back and forth on whether to say "British" or "English", since the vote was so lopsided by region.
Hmmm, Cameron is leaving but not quite yet. Resume your fantasies.
565: Depending on what paper they read, yes. Every time I looked at The Sun it was literally full of lies about Brexit.
In solidarity with both UK and EU residents I am apparently not going to sleep for a while, because my shoulder and neck are too fucked up to lie on. Ask me anything.
Lurid keyaki OK what is your ATM account number and passcode?
Lurid keyaki, what is good in life?
Is there in truth no beauty?
The prices shown in dollars on Whiskey Exchange haven't dropped yet. Does anyone know of another scotch site that ships to the US so I can immediately profit from this tragedy?
I'll be selling off my husband's whisky collection (which is a good one) if the economy collapses!
You didn't ask, Walt, but I think "English" is probably fair: the many Welsh Leave voters can suck it up.
570: you need an account and passcode to ATM? Or were you going to pick up a fistful of pounds for me? I think they've bounced up from the 30-year low.
There is probably no beauty in my true statement that I don't know of another Scotch site. But I'll let you decide. The good in life is apparently having the sense to see a doctor sooner rather than later when you're in significant pain, and this insight likely generalizes in a self-helpy way.
Or maybe I'll just drink it. Starting now.
569
Oh no! Shoulder and neck injuries are the worst.
What will happen to the UK? Will Europe burn them down and salt the earth? Will they break up? My wild guess is Scotland leaves shortly after and rejoins the EU, but I don't know about Wales or N. Ireland. Also, does the queen stay monarch of all those places if they're separate? If not, can Scotland confiscate crown lands?
I'm also so moving to Scotland.
If things go badly for the UK now, I claim dibs on the inevitable "Jacques Delors, thou art avenged" joke.
Woah, Delors is still alive.
My wife was depressed for about half an hour, until she heard that the pound crashed. Then she started looking at EasyJet prices.
If Brexit actually goes ahead and the government doesn't find a way to wriggle out of it (for example: renegotiation, get some cosmetic victories, second referendum in 2017, recession-traumatised population votes Remain) then, yes, there will be another independence referendum in Scotland, and the pro-independence side will win, and Scotland will then come to some agreement to remain in the EU when England leaves.
And, yes, the queen will probably stay as head of state - after all, she's head of state of lots of countries apart from the UK.
Interesting question about the crown estates: last I heard they were in the process of transferring the management (and revenues) of the Scottish crown estates to the Scottish government, so no need to seize them as they will be run by the Scottish government anyway (at present the London government runs them and collects the revenue). They aren't part of the monarch's private property.
I leveraged the exchange rate to donate to the Jo Cox memorial fund. For realz. However, I have a sinking feeling that sitting up with the computer thinking about politics is not relaxing my upper body.
On a purely selfish level, feeling a bit worried about my decision to change jobs right now, as the economy tanking could mean that I move only to be laid off. But, on the plus side, the company concerned have a head office in Scotland. So there's that.
I'm waiting now for the fascist cunts to start reneging on the pre-referendum promises to allow all EU citizens currently here to stay in the event of an exit. I could genuinely start kicking random baby boomers in the fucking head.
New job?!? That's exciting. I'm sure it will be ok.
When you look at the age breakdown, it is so heartbreaking. Yes, thank you, old people, now we get to live with this.
582
It's funny, I was just thinking, fuck the baby boomers. They were given a world that had problems but which was in an age of general peace and prosperity, and the greedy fucks completely trashed it, hoarded the wealth, and rolled up the ladder behind them. Now that they're older they're just becoming nihilistic assholes burning down the planet before they die.
PS to Tigre: Try Master of Malt.
I need to find a new job over the next year or so, and one of the places I was going to look is the UK. But I imagine it'll now be too confusing whether to hire foreigners.
I was just about to post 584.
Then Labour went with people who slightly to Blair's left, and then lost the next two elections. If the voters didn't like neoliberalism or finance, they could have, you know, voted against it sometime between 1979 and now.
To be fair, they didn't think they were voting for neoliberalism or finance in 2010. You can thank the Lib Dem leadership for that.
You know who else can go fuck themselves? Retired people who are worried about foreigners taking their jobs. You don't have a fucking job, you're retired!
It also bothers me when categories like education are presented without reference to age. Low education levels might mean working class, but probably just means old.
On second thought the first defection was Bush II USA. But even that was limited to parts of foreign policy. Overall, integration continued.
And the Union shouldn't salt the earth, they should leave the door open for fast-track reentry as soon as the winds/demographics change.
Re: 556 - While I'm sure there's going to be a strong temptation to be harsh in the exit negotiations, I think (hope) the bigger concern will be staving off a slide back into recession, and hence minimizing disruptions.
The main theme this morning seems to be people who voted for it whining that they got what they voted for, and I'm not in the least surprised that Bob - who was yelling about "Lexit" yesterday - is now whining too.
I just woke up to Boris Johnson on NPR. I knew it had to be mad news. A friend of mine was a huge EU skeptic. Hard-core Labour supporter, but I think she considered voting for UKIP in the European elections. She died a few years ago at age 98. She's the only person I know who would have been happy about this result.
Something my niece posted on Facebook a few days ago has led me to infer my sister planned to vote Leave. I don't know if that's actually true, I may be misreading it, but if she did, words will be had.
To be fair, they didn't think they were voting for neoliberalism or finance in 2010. You can thank the Lib Dem leadership for that.
Right. When it started to look like "leave" might win, I was reminded of how fucking shamelessly the Lib Dem leadership sold everyone out. If brexit was driven in large part by inchoate frustration, they deserve a good bit of the blame.
This referendum was lost because the old Labour traditional vote turned to UKIP. This is in the long term the result of the destruction of the unions, which were themselves unaggressively but unmistakably racist: their role was to protect their members' jobs from other people. But -- unlike the Faragists -- they weren't primarily racist. ie, they'd have hated, and do hate, white people like us quite as much. So I don't think that shouting "Racist!" would have helped us much.
I do worry a fair bit about the real agenda of Farage and co, and the Tory fellow travellers.
Is there a nickel summary somewhere of the implications of Brexit, for those of us who have been paying zero attention so far?
Britain was never part of the Euro, so I don't really understand what ordinary Britons get out of exiting the EU.
I don't think that the racist shout would help, but I swear to god I am so tired of hearing about immigrants. I know most think of me as a 'good immigrant' but if it makes me feel alienated, I can't imagine how it affects the average immigrant.
Scotland will likely leave the UK. Gibraltar may be forced into joint sovereignty with Spain. Who knows what will happen with Northern Ireland. 3 million EU citizens living in the UK may be forced to leave, and similarly for the 1.2 million UK citizens living in the EU. Multinational corporations with European headquarters or factories in the UK may need to relocate or face difficulties getting their products approved for sale in the EU. Oh and the pound has lost 10% of its value.
I see Dan Hannan being quite slowly slowly regarding the exit terms on the BBC News, and more or less targeting remaining part of the EEA. Which is obviously at odds with the whole anti-immigrant tenor of much of the leave campaign.
If it does get as far as triggering Article 50, something like the Norway model might be the least bad option. That might appeal to the libertarian wing of the Tories, but I'm not sure it's what the crypto-fascists like the prick Farage want.
Woah, Delors is still alive.
Under those circumstances I will send him a crate of champagne.
Genetically, aren't these the same people who seceded in the American South? Maybe it's a thing with them.
Also, I thought I read somewhere that Cameron called this referendum? WTF was he thinking?
He was thinking of putting a sticking plaster over the cracks in his own party at the time of the 2015 election, and giving that priority over the good of the country. Which is why facebook is today full of people saying, rightly, that he has overtaken Anthony Eden as the worst PM since 1945.
England: proving that democracy doesn't work since 1776.
606: isn't that backwards? I'd have to look it up but I have the impression that the Confederate States had more Scotch and Irish than English and Welsh. Massachusetts was famously Puritan, which was English. Lots of the rest of the colonies were Dutch, French, or German.
That would admittedly be a bad factset for my theory.
Spain is taking the opportunity to call for "co-sovereignty" over Gibraltar.
re: 607
He has always seemed like an idiot. Not just in the way that most politicians seem like idiots, i.e. because the nature of their job tends to mitigate against even the smart ones sounding like normal people, and because it's convenient for them to ignore things they know to be true, or pretend not to understand things which are in fact completely clear, for reasons of expediency.
But more like an actual idiot. The sort of posh but dim character that has been an ancient trope in British literature and popular imagination since time immemorial.
I never understood what made him so much more electable than the other post-Major Tory leaders.
Everybody I knew said back in 2010 that the shocking thing about this bunch of Tories wasn't that they were evil, because after all they're Tories, but that they were such fucking hopeless amateurs. And they haven't got any better.
I have no idea, but I have poor instincts on this. I thought he seemed like a shiny faced prick since day 1. Since before he even became Tory leader. And I felt the same way about GWB, and (to a lesser extent)* Tony Blair.
And I thought that both Gordon Brown and Ed Milliband were fairly congenial. And the electorate didn't.
* I didn't really have strong feelings about Blair in 1997, although my then girlfriend who was better informed and more plugged into internal Labour party politics and had, I think, more of a sense of Blairism than I did, disliked him. But I'd already started finding him creepy as fuck even before Iraq.
I never understood what made him so much more electable than the other post-Major Tory leaders.
Labour were in office when the great recession hit. The other side usually wins after an economic SNAFU. Nothing to do with Cameron personally.
But I'd already started finding him creepy as fuck even before Iraq.
If you remember, he'd had to go on TV to defend himself as "a pretty straight kind of guy" just a few months after he was elected.
I'm somewhat flabbergasted by this result. The UK is in for a real ride.
I wonder if this will lead to a change in how the EU operates. I don't have first hand experience, but I hear a lot of complaining about heavy-handed EU regulations and a lack of accountability, and apparently that was an issue for some of the Leave voters.
I think that's a problem. There are real issues with the EU and it's hard to defend it in good conscience without admitting them. (The benefits outweigh the negatives, of course, but...) However, the Leave campaign felt free to defend their platform without acknowledging the truth .... which is basically how I feel all liberal vs conservative conversations go nowadays.
I wonder if Cameron recognizes how badly he's fucked up. He had one term of economic underperformance, and then a second term that ended abruptly with blowing up the entire foundation of the UK's foreign policy, plus potentially the UK itself.
I have a friend who used to work in banking and is still in a social circle largely of bankers. I think he voted for the Tories last year, and he was sufficiently anti-Milliband that I think his entire social circle was. (I didn't find out outright because honestly I didn't want to know if the answer was yes.) He's now crushed that the country voted Leave, as I imagine his social circle is. I'm trying to figure out how to subtly communicate "Ha-ha!"
619: What are they? Serious question. Name an issue with the EU other than the euro or immigration.
Some people who take EU have experienced head aches, muscle weakness, or loose bowels.
My entire family was murdered by EU bureaucrats. I have vowed revenge.
What are the odds that a year from now, when the consequences of this vote are clear to everyone, that there will be an second referendum which ends with the entire U.K. effectively saying "Just kidding!"
2-1 against. It's not impossible, but very difficult to arrange.
The messaging from the EU jointly has been very dry, although the Germans were more conciliatory.
Germans are known for their warmth.
What are the odds that a year from now, when the consequences of this vote are clear to everyone, that there will be an second referendum which ends with the entire U.K. effectively saying "Just kidding!"
The problem is, the Article 50 process can't* be stopped once it's set in motion. Depending on who takes over from Cameron, they could well give the notification before the economic consequences really start to bite (at least in a way that shows up in statistics).
*Obviously, if it did happen like this, there would probably be some sort of Eurofudge as there always is. But it wouldn't be pretty for Britain and it would be a miserable few years for EU nationals in the UK (and I guess British expats on the continent).
Perhaps on topic: Relics of the two most prominent English martyrs (Thomas Moore, John Fisher) are right across the street. I should have asked them to pray for the descendants of their executioners.
I just heard Boris Johnson on the radio saying he's not going to invoke article 50. At least not yet. So that's something.
My uninformed general heuristic is to be happy about anything that causes David Cameron to resign in disgrace. Possibly that heuristic is leading me astray in this instance. But I don't feel the least bit sorry about Cameron.
I thought he seemed like a shiny faced prick since day 1.
Shiny-faced prick is some funny imagery.
Anyway, we have an official name for the coming rump UK:
the provinces of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. (Call them the PEWNI, pronounced as spelled.)
562 +1000. All of this bullshit "but they aren't racists, they just hate neoliberalism!" to describe people who have voted relentlessly for neoliberalism* for almost 40 years running needs to STFU.
*which, again, in 1982 was coined in America to describe liberals who opposed Thatcher and Reagan, but is now used by lefty Americans to describe Thatcherism and Reaganism as well as Clintonism, because why not?
I wouldn't bet the farm on NI staying around.
I must say, I've been anti-anti-Boomer for a long time, but 584 (and events in general) are changing my mind.
My pet theory is that every Boomer who didn't partake of the "fun" part of the '60s has been stewing in bitterness and avarice ever since. Certainly that seems to be the pattern among actual IRL Boomer politicians (contrast BClinton with Cheney, frex).
636: The knifecrimers must correct me, but AIUI Thatcherites only occasionally won majorities of votes cast, much less of actual population, but could still control parliament because of FPTP voting.
Are the Leave folk embarrassed that Trump is so enthusiastically on their side?
I'd have to look it up but I have the impression that the Confederate States had more Scotch and Irish than English and Welsh.
By raw (white) population this may be true, but the Scots-Irish were the poor mountaineer types, while the planters and slave-owners who actually ran the place were English through and through, second sons pushed out of England by primogeniture and Cromwell--the reason Virginia is "Old Dominion" is that that's what Charles II called it in reference to all of his loyal supporters who were there.
As further evidence for this split being critical, West Virginia, home of Scots-Irish, actually seceded from Virginia in order to stay in/return to the Union. And secession votes were often (always?) manipulated to make sure that the planter vote held the upper hand.
So, bottom line: I'm pretty sure that ogged was right: if any Americans in 1860 were descended from English Tories, it was those who voted for secession.
Isn't Appalachia where the Welsh mainly went?
639: I would be genuinely curious to know the voting history of a typical Brexiter. Most of them are old enough to have voting records back to Callaghan, if not Wilson and Heath. It's possible that most of them were resolutely Labour until Blair betrayed them, but that sure isn't what analogy with USian voting would suggest (not that such analogy should be considered reliable, esp. considering the different labor history, but I've always understood it to be broadly applicable).
Where, per Tooze, they financed armies of mercenaries to kill labor organizers. So, on the Tory side of things.
640. The ones who know who Trump is are incapable of embarrassment, and some of them probably support him. The great majority of Brexit voters wouldn't know Trump from a hole in the ground.
642: the only major Welsh area I know of is NE Pennsylvania, which is not Appalachia (anthracite, not bituminous). Here in "the Paris of Appalachia", there is literally no apparent Welsh influence, but we're actually at the northern end, and it's possible that farther down the ridges there are Welsh descendants.
Yeah, many of the Daily Fail commenters love him. A sample from yesterday:
"Trump is one of us."
"WELCOME TO THE NEW PEOPLES BRITAIN Mr TRUMP.. you are very welcome and we look forward to trading with you in the near future."
"Good luck in November, Mr Trump. I hope true Americans get behind you."
"Good chap, Mr Trump. Bit brash and noisy but the Americans do things that way. Says all the right things. Miles beyond Mrs Clinton who comes across as somewhat creepy and shrieky. Good luck in the run for Presidency, Mr Trump."
621: I phrased that badly. Rather than 'problems with,' I perhaps should have said, 'policies with which I disagree,' - of which there are more than a few. None of them are a reason to leave, and most of my issues Britain supported. (Also, I'm fairly sure you know more about all of this than I, so maybe I'm totally off base. It happens.) A lot of them are related to the Eurozone, though - mainly austerity policies - so perhaps that doesn't count? But that's primarily what I was thinking of. A policy that most Brits I come into contact with seem to find extremely controversial (although I agree with the EU on this matter) is the latest human rights legislation giving (returning) the right to vote to prisoners. This one is difficult to argue about, I've found.
I also think the EU suffers from a lack of transparency and redundancy that makes it difficult for ordinary people to see how they are being represented at the EU level. This, again, is no reason to leave the EU, but is one of the things that I meant made it hard for Remain people to get their point across, especially while Gove, Johnson and Farage were promising ponies for everyone.
Anyway. I didn't mean to imply that there was really a legit reason to leave the EU, just that I come up across stumbling blocks when discussing it with Leave people who aren't Farage-bots. Every time I do think about all the great legislation the EU has produced recently (the fisheries! anti-pesticides! climate change!) I just want to cry. Also, yay for having to pay debts in the dollar with my newly depreciated pounds!
641: Heh, West Virginia is what I was thinking of. Hatfield-McCoy and all that, and McCoy sounds Scotch. Maybe I should have thought a little harder about it. (For the record, Wikipedia says that both sides of the feud were on the Confederate side of the war except for one single McCoy, but fair enough, Ogged's analogy fits much better than I thought.)
The great majority of Brexit voters wouldn't know Trump from a hole in the ground.
To be fair, even those who know Trump personally sometimes mistake him for a hole in the ground.
Anyway, to the extent that Brexiters had a legit case, shouldn't Merkel (and Germans more broadly) take the lion's share of the blame? If she/they'd done the right thing the last 8 years and allowed some fucking inflation at home while skipping past the bullshit nationalist demonization, the continent as a whole would be in much better shape, there would, in fact, be fewer poor EU immigrants in the UK, and claims that the EU is fucked would have a lot less solid ground.
Are Christian Democrats "neoliberals" too?
My uninformed general heuristic is to be happy about anything that causes David Cameron to resign in disgrace.
We're all motivated by different things, I guess, but isn't the main reason to hate a politician like David Cameron is because he screws everything up through malice or incompetence? There's really no cause for joy in him leaving if it's because he made the mother of all irreversible fuck-ups. If I were offered a trade of 5 more years of Cameron, but UK remaining in the EU, I'd take it in a heartbeat. Hell, I'd probably take 10.
Most of the people I know who voted Leave are Tories.
I think the whole post-factual/post-truth thing is key here. The Leave campaign lied like bastards throughout. Thoroughly, completely, without same, on every single issue. it didn't matter.
I think the whole post-factual/post-truth thing is key here. The Leave campaign lied like bastards throughout. Thoroughly, completely, without shame, on every single issue. it didn't matter.
This. This. This.
So is anyone celebrating at the moment? I imagine that the people you'd expect to be leading the celebrations are now instead explaining why a recession has come about in the last 12 hours. Or was "The pound will crash, but it's worth it" part of the campaign?
A policy that most Brits I come into contact with seem to find extremely controversial (although I agree with the EU on this matter) is the latest human rights legislation giving (returning) the right to vote to prisoners. This one is difficult to argue about, I've found.
Yeah, and it's another one of the things that made me a particularly ineffective Remain campaigner. I'm enthusiastically in favour of giving prisoners the vote. The bitterness with which the government fought it is just baffling to me. Cameron (or at least a proxy) said the idea made him physically sick. I mean, I kind of understand the law-and-order mentality most of the time, but what about simply having the franchise (in a European election, only for people convicted of minor crimes, at that) is so bad?
658: God, yes, they're out in force on my FB. "This turmoil is all short-term, the pound will bounce back and we'll benefit economically from leaving. The important thing is that we've taken back sovereignty and are moving toward a bright future at last."
652 - Walt or someone who knows more can correct me, but I don't think that's right. First the wage gap between eg Poland and Romania and the UK is big enough so that even if it were boom times in Romania people would be streaming into the UK if they could. Second Merkel's fiscal management didn't have much to do with Britain's. Third, a huge chunk of England's economy is finance, which has done fine in recent years. Fourth England sells way more to Germany than it does to Spain or Italy or Greece or other parts hard-hit by EU macroeconomic policy.
Frankly Germany looks like the best-governed major country in the world right now. We're OK until November 08 but are dragged down by our insane Congress. I guess I don't know enough about Japan.
Was the term "neoliberal" really coined in the US? I find it incredibly hard to pin down, which probably is a sign that I'm a sell-out working for the Man. It bothers me that people like Paul Wolfowitz can both be accused of being a neoliberal and being a neoconservative.
Really, the best definition of neoliberal I've been able to come up with is "inside the Beltway libertarian who doesn't work for the Cato Institute." Perhaps "libertarian in sheep's clothing" would be better.
Well, the turmoil probably is going to die down quite a bit, right?
I wonder how many people voted Leave believing the polls that Remain would win, so they thought it would be a free protest vote?
I've seen reports saying there were a lot of those.
A former student of mine previously opined that having Putin take over Ukraine was better than letting the neoliberal EU do it. He has since gone on to say that the UK leaving the neoliberal EU is a good thing, no matter what stupid reason motivated it.
He's Romanian by birth, describes himself as an old school communist, and writes nostalgically about the Soviet Union. I find his worldview puzzling, and it is generally the first thing I think of when I think of people who are centrally fixated on "neoliberalism" as the biggest enemy.
661: I certainly could be wrong, and I suspect you're right that Merkel hasn't directly harmed the UK economy (much*), but I'm mostly talking about the status of the EU. Merkel has created literally tens of millions of extra unemployed in Spain, Italy, and Portugal; how can that not impact, at least at the margins, the 3M EU immigrants who've come into the UK? Wouldn't some fraction of those people be in other parts of the EU if they weren't so fucked?
More important, I'm talking perception: the EU looks broken right now, in part because it kind of is, because the Germans refuse to inflate.
*I mean, it's simply not possible for the Eurozone to be 5-10 points of cumulative GDP growth behind without a country as close as the UK is to be unaffected, regardless of specific trading partnerships, but it's all indirect and incremental. A better-run EU doesn't create full employment in the UK (especially not with Cameron in charge).
Minor quibble, but I would say Obama beats out Merkel as best leader. Merkel's pretty good, but her obsession with austerity post 2008 is and was a problem.
Frankly Germany looks like the best-governed major country in the world right now.
Aside from fucking up the entire Eurozone and their own economy, the Germans have been brilliant.
The US is pretty obviously better-governed these days, as faint as that praise is.
Frankly Germany looks like the best-governed major country in the world right now
Possibly true, but their economic performance is enhanced by the euro effectively making their exports cheaper and most of Europe's more expensive. Without the euro they'd be a whole lot poorer and most of Europe a lot richer. Uniting all threads, Germans is assholes.
So semi-randomly, does anyone know what time 401Ks and the like tend to buy into the market? Kind of hoping mine slept in a bit this morning.
thought it would be a free protest vote
There's a lesson to be had there. Not that the people who need it are likely to take it.
Was the term "neoliberal" really coined in the US?
It was coined twice, apparently, once by Hayek (or another Austrian I believe) and once by Charles Peters in the Washington Monthly. And yes, their coiners meant very different things by them. From Corey Robin's perspective, Hayek==Larry Summers, but the rest of us don't have to live in his world.
Or to put it another way: the way Robin uses the term is the way Republicans point to pre-1965 Democrats to prove that the Dems are the real racists. The shared name tells you nothing, especially since the neo- is modifying completely different terms (liberal, as you know, meaning libertarian in Europe and, well, liberal here).
Jon Cohn on the term in 2007:
[Neoliberalism] was based on the premise that sometimes liberals were a greater menace to liberalism than conservatives -- by failing to recognize the public sector's fallibility, by not taking seriously middle class resentment over the use of taxes, by putting the needs of constituent interest groups above the greater public good, and so on.But to the extent that premise was ever true -- and, surely, it was true in at least some instances -- it is no longer. I would argue that turning point came no later than 1994, when Newt Gingrich and the Republicans came to power....When the party in power has, say, declared war on the welfare state, one should probably defend said welfare state's existence before harping on its modest, if still regrettable, flaws.
And yet, unlike my friend Ezra Klein, I'm not quite ready to say that neoliberalism failed, either. One reason it no longer seems relevant is that the liberal left, broadly speaking, has embraced some of its best teachings.
Fucking link rot, btw: I'm quoting Drum quoting Cohn, and the links to both Cohn and Klein are dead.
To follow up 673.last, I think this is indicative: Peters specifically favored means-testing of Social Security*, a position zero Democrats hold, but that doesn't mean that Robin won't call Democrats neoliberals. Because that slur also brings in people like Hayek who opposed all social insurance, so you get to lump Obama and Paul Ryan in one evil pile to which Corey Robin stands superior.
*actually, he favored means-tested universal social insurance; he thought that having lots of different programs was pointless and inefficient
News is not all bad this moning:
Fire officials say more than 30 people attending a Tony Robbins event in Dallas have been treated for burns after the motivational speaker encouraged them to walk on hot coals.
You got to wonder about the 30th guy.
653: oh, I'm not in any way suggesting that dropping Cameron and Europe simultaneously was on balance a good trade for Britain. But I'm glad to see Cameron in disgrace nonetheless. Lemons, lemonade, silver linings.
675: It's basically the same story, it's just the results were more immediate.
I think 665 embodies why the term is useful only insofar as it should make you skeptical of anyone who uses it without explaining exactly what they mean. I mean, it literally can cover everything from a mixed economy to Nozickian libertarian utopia.
Does Corbyn benefit from this? It looks like the Tories are discredited by demanding this referendum, and UKIP are discredited by leading the Leave campaign which will now not produce any of the things they said it would produce.
The commentary yesterday, assuming Remain would win and the whole thing was just a protest vote, was about how Corbyn's Remain support could permanently drive away half of his working class support. Maybe not now.
Corbyn is facing a no-confidence vote within the party so maybe not? No idea how that is going to go or what happens after though.
Oh, all those guys are facing no-confidence votes, you can't conclude anything from that.
Sorry, Robin pisses me off so much:
Third, the reason the earlier coinage matters (and some scholars will challenge what I'm about to say) is that one part of the program the original group of neoliberals set out at Mont Pelerin, however divided they were at times, does bear a resemblance to the "neoliberalism" often bandied around by the Left today.So the program is to "roll back the welfare state and social democracy, to revalorize capital and the capitalist as a moral good, to proclaim the ideological supremacy of the market over the state." OK. Now you've got Reagan on one side, and Clinton on the other. But you want me to believe that the program is better embodied by the latter? It's absurd*, but it serves Robin's rhetorical purposes, so he'll just roll with it.Insofar as that was a program to roll back the welfare state and social democracy, to revalorize capital and the capitalist as a moral good, to proclaim the ideological supremacy of the market over the state (the practice is more complicated), "neoliberal" is in fact a useful term to describe a political program that has gained increasing traction around the globe in the last half-century.
And it results, I'd add, precisely in garbage like Lexit. Not that Brits need know or care about the history of the term in the US, but to the extent that the EU is "neoliberal" it is, in fact, in the Peters sense of the term. Brussels bureaucrats are not, in fact, seeking destruction of government involvement in markets, which is what the OG neoliberals wanted, but Peters neoliberals did not.
*especially since, as Robin glosses over, there's really no evidence that Peters was inspired, or even aware of, the Hayekian usage, and given that the term "neoconservative" had just been coined and was causing great buzz in Peters' circles
The knives are out for Corbyn already. There will be an attmepted parliamentary coup against him. It will fail, messily, because the mass membership still backs him or someone like him.
Corbyn, if he were half way competent, would have a coherent post-brexit programme: tariff walls, controlled immigration, capital controls: back to 1945, in fact. Since a very clear majority of Brits over 24 reckon British society has got worse since 1945, this might do better than people now believe. it would certainly pop the great London housing bubble. But he isn't halfway competent, so that's not going to happen. Nor does his party as a whole believe in it. They fought that one out in the 1980s
It just occurred to me that, if finance really does leave the City, there are one hell of a lot of shiny new towers that are going to empty out.
Also, I wonder if all those Russian- and Arab*-owned residences in London are about to plummet in value. From more than depreciation, I mean.
*I think?
661: I notice you didn't put me in the category of someone who knows more than you. Dammit, man!
The main party to blame here is the Tories. Cameron and Osborne crushed the UK for 4 years (deliberately, I think), and then let up just in time to win the election. If they had not pursued austerity, immigration probably wouldn't have been as big of an issue.
The behavior of the EU didn't help, since it pursued inadequate monetary policy and incompetent fiscal policy. Germany deserves a big share of the blame for that, but all of Northern Europe was aligned around the same approach. But the UK could have ameliorated that and didn't.
687.2: Don't forget East Asians, who have huge investments in property in London and around (like the Battersea Power Station redevelopment, built by a Malaysian consortium and sold mainly to Chinese investors). Oh, how I hope they lose their shirts. But often the buyers just put a small amount down and try and flip the property before it's finished.
It's not really hard to find pictures of shirtless East Asians, if that's what you are into.
I looked at some data, and it's a bit hard to judge. Immigration from Eastern Europe picked up again in 2013, but there was a big upward trend from before the crisis. So maybe it's returning to its normal trend? It's figure 2 here.
About Cameron, ever since 2010 he's had a record of launching big shiny initiatives, often to get himself out of a tactical fix, and then not caring about the implementation or not following through on it. This is a perfect case - he pulled it out of his sleeve in 2013 to deal with a Tory internal row, and then promptly forgot about it for the next two years, before going "Oh! Is that the time?" and announcing a "renegotiation".
It then turned out he hadn't decided what he was going to ask for in the renegotiation. He just...hadn't given it any thought in the meantime. Partly this may be because he didn't expect to win the election in 2015, and thought either that some other government would come to power that wasn't committed to go through with it, or that IBGYBG and it would be his successor's problem. But it was also because that's him - the Essay Crisis PM, as Alan Beattie calls him.
So you don't like the term neoliberal. What word or phrase would you like to use to describe ostensibly liberal people who embraced deregulation and unconditional free trade, and eschew government programs in favor of market mechanisms?
It just occurred to me that, if finance really does leave the City, there are one hell of a lot of shiny new towers that are going to empty out
Yep. Commercial Real Estate transaction volumes are way down from last year already and the property agents have been calling the top of the London office market for some time now, even without Brexit. There's 20m sq ft of Central London office space due to be completed by 2019. Good luck filling that now.
The bonds backed by some of the biggest Canary Wharf towers fell 10 points today. And those are mostly well let buildings. The new build stuff is going to collapse in value.
I've seen "Third Way" used for that sort of Clinton/Blairism, but don't have a clear sense of the origin or original reference.
Acute schadenfreude seems to have seized the U.S. media. (My first thought: schoolkids? Do they still use the google?)
The thought of the plunder that would follow a London real estate crash is depressing.
693 is just straight-up "libertarian" in the U.S., isn't it? Are regular "liberal" is the U.K.
I think the "neo" was just stuck there to make people think of Dick Cheney.
I can't link to it because phone, but there's a picture in the NYT website of these pro-leave dudes in three-piece suit vests and ties shouting in celebration and ... these are seriously the most punchable obviously evil people in the world. I mean in a totally stunning way. If England has anything like the bar fighting tradition I've been led to believe it has, I hope that at least a few vest-wearing dudes get punched.
I just came to link to 696. Now I have nothing to contribute.
There seem to be an awful lot of people who changed their minds since yesterday.
You just need to flip one in a hundred people to Remain and you've got a majority for some weird fudge that's unveiled in six months as a way out of a sharp recession.
My sense of the problem with the EU is that it's correctly seen as a source of ordoliberalism, handing down all these decisions from on high that can't be challenged. Of course without the EU there would similar big-business dominance both in regulation and in economic policy favoring the rich (the latter is already there in the UK's case, since they passed austerity on their own). But the EU is seen as at the top of the heap, and therefore given the blame for the overall squeezing of the working/marginal class. [analogy]Sort of like how Islamic terrorists often come from areas screwed over by their national governments (like Asir Region in Saudi Arabia) but see the US as the top enemy keeping it all together.[/analogy] Plus all the racism and immigration-hate, obviously.
693: Is there a problem with "centrist liberal"? Or does that not rile up the proles enough? Maybe "market liberalism"?
I mean, "neoliberalism" was basically fine until the Robins of the world came along to conflate it with Hayekism. If you're using one term for Reagan and Clinton*, you've broken the term. I mean, this was the big fight we had here months ago, where leftier commenters were insisting that "neoliberals" wanted to pursue economic policies diametrically opposed by IRL neoliberal par excellence Larry Summers. Because, again, lefties like Robin decided it should just mean "stuff Corey Robin dislikes".
*other than, like, "American" or "President"
697: I think I agree with Eggplant, but I assume that by "liberal" he meant "left-wing."
For example, Clinton and welfare reform. I'd be happy to call that "Third Way", but "neo-liberal" seems very similar, better known, and if anything more specific.
Regions with the biggest votes for Leave are also the most economically dependent on the EU -- parallels with U.S. politics there are eerie/demoralizing. No advice for you.
you've got a majority for some weird fudge
There's ALWAYS a majority for weird fudge.
You just need to flip one in a hundred people to Remain and you've got a majority for some weird fudge that's unveiled in six months as a way out of a sharp recession
Technically, sure, but I don't see how you get from a narrow popular majority to actually preventing this happening. Given the electoral landscape, you need way more than a small majority to get a parliamentary majority against Leave in a snap election, and the only other way I can see it happening is if the new Tory leader immediately commits political suicide and calls a second referendum. Cameron hasn't got the balls to do it himself.
702 seems like a reasonable analysis.
In fact, you've gotten sort of the same dynamic as the states/Feds here, where e.g. Brownback can destroy Kansas singlehandedly, but the existence of the Federal gov't, which his supporters are inclined to blame always, means that he somehow escapes blame. Tory rule has been a disaster, but Tory voters get the choice between blaming the people they voted in (which is to say, themselves) or this shadowy, outside presence.
Honest to God, I don't understand how democracy has worked this long, given that it no longer seems possible for bad ideas to lose.
Still waiting for someone to cite a single example of an EU policy that actually applied to Britain that was constraining it into some kind of "ordoliberal"/neoliberal/be less fucking pompous and define your terms, whateveryoudontlikeliberal policy. Not saying one couldn't exist but I've yet to see even a single one cited.
707: This. I've been essentially optimistic about the course of the world, because progress has basically overwhelming numbers behind it. But this, and austerity, and climate change, and and and...We seem to be losing everything by sheer fucking carelessness. Sleepwalking into our own Deluge.
Systems are always vulnerable to this sort of thing. By which I mean, everyone who is unhappy with the current state of affairs votes against it without any thought for what other state of affairs would actually treat them better. There will always be a majority in favor of changing; they just won't agree on what changes to make. That's why sane governmental systems require supermajorities to change membership or change the rules. It's too easy to get a majority to say "let's break this".
Exactly why I don't much mind the whole filibuster thing (except for when I do mind it). Or superdelegates.
How about the Common Fisheries Policy? It's something that probably in the end is quite reasonable, and is even the exact kind of place I'd want technocrats in charge, but it still involves setting fishing quotas mostly at the European Council level and with MEP input, but not MPs so much. So it's perceived as an end run around sovereignty, reasonably or not.
The social service cuts, slow NHS hollowing-out, increase in education fees, etc. are as I said own-goals, not the EU's fault. But I can see people seeing it as all of a piece, especially since the ECB is inclined in the same direction politically.
Clinton (B or H?) and Reagan can easily be on the same side of a term. As I define it, Neoliberalism is based on a fundamental premise 1) Marxism has failed, 2) we should embrace post-Fordist/flexible accumulation/late-stage capitalism, 3) society should more-or-less gently ease the new permanent lower classes into the state of affairs. Reagan was less on (3), Clinton was more on (3). I recall the Clinton presidency and Democratic establishment of the time beating up on the Mondale wing of the Democratic party for being pathetic lefty dinosaur losers and moving the party pretty hard to the right on economic issues. You can radically disagree pretty strongly with people whom you share fundamental premises.
And I realize a lot of Brexit supporters were probably in favor of the social service cuts and all, but I'm thinking of the Labour areas that swung for it.
708: Does the voting rights for prisoners thing count?
666:
My British friends claim that it's immigration from Eastern Europe that people are pissed about, not immigration from the Mediterranean states.
Stuff like 714 makes me want to shoot people in the face. Mondale wasn't a Marxist. Some people in the 80s and 90s thought that you could use market mechanisms in limited ways for some good ends. They were wrong about some but by no means all of that but it was basically just a phase in a long history of trying to figure out the best way to accomodate some social democracy with capitalism. That's it and that's all.
but it was basically just a phase
In higher education, the push to get rid of state support, privatize everything, and make sure that as much money as possible gets funneled to various grifters is still going strong.
712 - that's plausibly a "loss of sovereignty" (for good reason! It's international fishing) but is exactly the opposite of forced deregulation. The complaint was that unaccountable euro-bureaucrats were regulating the fishing fleet, not that unaccountable euro-bureaucrats were preventing good left wing fishing policy.
What's the strategy from the European side going forward? Do they try to negotiate as many deals as they possibly can to preserve the status quo? Alternately, do they just welcome Scotland, and maybe Norther Ireland, with open arms and punish Britain and Wales?
For literally the first time ever, I used the Stocks app on my phone (which I'll soon be able to delete!). Seems like all the major indices are down 3-4%. EXCEPT the DAX and Nikkei, which are down 7-8%. The DAX I... kind of get? But why the Nikkei?
Oh wait, is this the thing mentioned upthread about capital flowing into the Yen?
721 Seems to me that it has to obviously suck for the Brits, lest other folks try the exit strategy.
Maybe we're closer to a united Ireland than any time in a century?
721: No one knows, but CW right now is Britain must be made to suffer, over and above what would normally come out of leaving the EU. That seems to be what France is leaning toward, and if Germany agrees, it's game on.
I don't think any of the big EU players have made any statements of substance, yet. Merkel will very likely think about this for a while before doing anything.
If they punish Britain and Wales, does that mean Wales gets punished twice?
Genetically, aren't these the same people who seceded in the American South? Maybe it's a thing with them.
England: proving that democracy doesn't work since 1776.606: isn't that backwards? I'd have to look it up but I have the impression that the Confederate States had more Scotch and Irish than English and Welsh. Massachusetts was famously Puritan, which was English. Lots of the rest of the colonies were Dutch, French, or German.
If i remember the book reviews i read of Albion's Seed, the South was set up by second/third sons of english aristocrats, who used indentured servants and then slaves in places of peasants to set up a neo-feudal system. The scotch-irish are the appalachian people who are numerically dominant now but less influential in setting up the superstructure, thought they did contribute the general poor social outcomes (anti-education, clannishness, teen birthrate, etc).
This is probably what the Brits are really anxious about --
Brexit: Does leaving the EU mean the UK can't enter Eurovision?
714: So the premise is that, other than personal ambition, literally the only thing Clinton disliked about Reaganism was that it was a little too enthusiastic about fucking over the permanent underclass?
This is why I can't take any of this as serious analysis. Reaganites have zero fucking problem seeing a difference between themselves and WM-neoliberals, but if you're 6" to the left of Hillary Clinton, it's just one big blob of evil to your right.
It's a complete mystery why any Democrat wouldn't want to pursue Mondaleism.
708: railway privatization. They didn't have to go as far as they did, but the rail directive would have made renationalision impossible.
720: Oh, I see I'm on a different tack from your current argument with others. I'm not sure if EU regulation is a major force for deregulationist/pro-wealth policy; I suspect it plays a role but am not prepared to argue the point. I'm more trying to get at how people perceive its regulatory role, and associate it with Masters of the Universe pulling strings and other bad consensus policies their sovereign nation subjects them to; in that context, good regulation can be lumped in with bad de-, as long as it chafes.
Can anyone provide more informed context on the EU's role in, say, financial or competition regulation? Not that it's on the table, but if a member state wanted to reimpose exchange controls as a permanent policy, would EU/ECB standards preclude that?
Eh, this is well beyond my capacity to argue, but a quick google suggests that the rail directive doesn't mandate privatization, just provide for some access to the rail system (and of course, as you say, the UK privatized its rail system long ago and for reasons that had nothing to do with the EU).
671: I *think* if your contribution was set to go in today, then you'll get the price everything closed at today. I hope that is the case, as it's payday for me too.
Yeah, more or less 733. The directive mandates equal access to track. But it doesn't prevent renationalisation, as can be seen from the fact that the UK has in fact renationalised certain franchises.
717. The point at which I jumped off the bridge was when I learned from a fairly plugged-in British Asian that a lot of that community had voted leave to stop the Romanians taking all the jobs.
721. What has already been said, plus the EU want negotiations to be quick and clean, so they can get on with the important stuff, and they're not likely to accept any delaying tactics with good grace.
The UK dodged most of the weird ordo-liberal stuff thanks to Gordon Brown, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
736: Another reason some members of established minority communities voted Leave is the difficulty people have nowadays in obtaining visas for spouses and family members from outside the EU. The minimum income requirements imposed in 2012 have hit them hard, especially people living outside London and the SE in areas where the minimum salary of £18,600 required to sponsor a spouse visa is a much bigger deal. Visas approvals for elderly family members have also almost completely stopped. The implication from Leave has been "If we can control EU immigration, it will be easier for you to get visas for family members again."
