BBO Discussion Forums: When will Brexit Happen - BBO Discussion Forums

fromageGB, on 2019-March-20, 05:04, said:

First off, understand that I claim almost complete ignorance of this situation. That said, didn't the U.K. enter into the EU voluntarily? If so, how can that voluntary membership be termed a "yoke of repression"?

Futhermore, isn't it more likely that working in unison with other countries will provide a greater good than reliance on single-minded proclivities?

Feel free to disagree, but I would hope you can explain how independent decision making produces a better result than mutually beneficial decision-making. Frankly, to me it sounds reliance on the fictional results invented by Ayn Rand.

Winstonm, on 2019-March-21, 12:41, said:

The UK freely entered a common market.

Other European countries are trying to make this much more of a political union which many in the UK REALLY don't want.

Basically the UK's position hasn't changed and it's Europe that's moved.

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-21, 13:07, said:

A classic case of continental drift.

@Winstonm :

The repression is not in the form of compulsory membership (in the current format, though membership would be compulsory with no escape in the prime minister's plan), but in the form of laws which are invented in the EU commission and have to be adopted by member states with no choice in the matter. Restrictions too are a form of repression.

You have hit the nail on the head with "mutually beneficial decision making". This is what I would like, and this is exactly what independence can give : one state enters agreements with another that are mutually beneficial, because otherwise they would not have that agreement. Decisions are made in the EU that impact us, and where we have not previously (years ago) agreed an exemption, we must obey. We (some of us) were happy to work in unison to the end product that was then. Subsequently the product evolves in ways "we" disagree with, and having made a foolish decision to adopt in advance whatever unknown and unthought of rules the EU would come up with in the future, and having a higher court outside the country be the final arbiter of domestic decisions, we are now suffering. I call this a yoke.

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-21, 13:07, said:

In that case, shouldn't the goal be to exit the EU while staying in the common market?

cherdano, on 2019-March-22, 12:12, said:

It should but the EU won't allow it because integral to the single market are things like freedom of movement which many Brits don't want (actually for a variety of reasons, many see no reason why Eastern Europeans are favoured over South Asians with whom a sizable number of people here have ties) and also our courts being overruled by the European ones.

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-23, 04:55, said:

Two questions:

What about freedom of movement is distasteful?
Do European courts change British law or is the complaint that many in Britain don't like legitimate court decisions?

Winstonm, on 2019-March-23, 09:35, said:

European law trumps British law, and there have been a load of judgements where the Euro judges have interpreted the law in ways even the people who made them have said are not what was was intended. There is a feeling they are trying to make law rather than just interpret it.

Freedom of movement is something people dislike for differing reasons.

If you're of Indian descent, any old Eastern European can freely come here to work but your (more skilled) relatives can't. It's not even handed.

In some areas of the UK, there is an issue with higher calibre Eastern European job applicants taking jobs for which they are well overqualified but say earn more here waiting tables here than they would doing a more skilled job at home. This causes resentment among the locals who would have done those jobs.

Particular types of crime are associated with certain groups. A senior policeman said that 90% of ATM crime was perpetrated by Romanians. Pickpocketing in London is supposedly disproportionately Eastern European.

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-23, 10:22, said:

Reading this reminds me quite strongly of the types of complaints from the U.S. populists who elected Trump.

Winstonm, on 2019-March-23, 13:21, said:

the last 2 reasons yes, but being forced to take any immigrant from Europe ahead of people from the Commonwealth is a problem that I don't think is as much of an issue in any of the other European former colonial powers.

https://youtu.be/oQUAaTeIJTw

Irish PM Leo Varadkar talking about Brexit.

The headline is click-bait and I would suggest you discount it. Why the video matters is around minute 9 when he says how a "no deal" Brexit will have many of the features of the May deal

shyams, on 2019-March-23, 13:50, said:

What struck me most was what a pleasure it was to listen to him. A thoughtful guy treating questions with respect. What an idea.

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-23, 10:22, said:

Here's the thing: The same laws that let all you Brits live, work, and retire in Europe, use the the medical system over there, and the like and the ones that grant the same rights to Europeans...

Your problem is that you want all the benefits with any of the reciprocity agreements and you're just not going to get any of that...

hrothgar, on 2019-March-24, 07:54, said:

Not true at all.

The medical system reciprocity I expect to be duplicated in some way.

Retiring in Europe is beneficial to both countries, the Spanish economy would be much worse off without the Brits, and the Brits are healthier for living in a better climate.

It's only the work, and that I don't expect to be duplicated for unskilled workers, although I expect something to be put in place for skilled workers.

I am quite confident that in the unlikely event of a second referendum ("People's Vote"), it is only the youth of this country who will save the country from the disaster that is Brexit. If the younger population decide to take it easy and not turn up at the polling booths, then Remain will lose the vote again.

I have also discovered that facts don't matter in these discussions. And I have, for a while now, refrained from disabusing the Brexiters of their views. Let us be a bit more masochistic, all of us.

https://youtu.be/852pJH-V_m4 (the Brexit bit begins at 2:10)

shyams, on 2019-March-24, 11:14, said:

Brexit as a concept is fine, Brexit as put forward by May is a mess, and no deal now an even bigger one.

The EU is a cess pit of waste and corruption (yes I do have several concrete examples, including one where a deal somebody I know very well was trying to do failed because he wouldn't put a 6 figure amount of EU cash into a politician's wife's back pocket).

The EU has done what they always do, not negociate at all and wait for the country to vote again to remain.

And I agree with you, if given a second vote, the votes of the young will be critical

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-24, 09:25, said:

While on the Costa del Sol last month, I spoke to several British ex-pats who expressed support for Brexit but anxiety toward their eventual "status". There have always been ex-pats so I doubt their futures are in great peril.

Al_U_Card, on 2019-March-24, 11:43, said:

No, they spend money in Spain and own property there, if they all shipped out the property market would disintegrate and a lot of jobs would disappear. We owned a place in Spain for a long time and my late grandparents retired there, so I know well how some of the coastal towns work.

Cyberyeti, on 2019-March-24, 11:29, said:

To my ear and as analogy, those who support Brexit sound quite similar to the U.S. secessionists prior to our Civil War. There appears to be a fundamental psychological reason that drives both camps to hold alternative worldviews. If the goal is peace and stability, this divide seems problematic.

Winstonm, on 2019-March-24, 12:28, said:

Among some yes, I was not always a Brexiteer, I thought it was such a close call I never revealed how I voted and resolved to back whichever side won.

I think I said upthread that Brexiteers fall into several camps, there are a surprising number of very well educated well informed Brexiteers that the remainers don't want you to believe exist.

The guy who I trust on this is an old university friend who should be the prototype remainer. Portuguese, married to a Pole, family were left wing academics who fled to the UK to avoid persecution in the military coup, multiple economics degrees, worked all over the world in finance, son worked as an intern at the European parliament, most ardent Brexiteer I know. He predicted May would be a disaster before she became leader and pretty much exactly correctly why.

I believe there are some very well educated and well informed remainers, as well.