Brexit 2020+

We look at Switzerland, entirely surrounded by the EU yet enjoying it’s benefits and still able to sign FTAs

Bwaahahaaaa EFTA, Freedom of Movement, European law and “that’s not the One True Brexit that the People voted for”

Yes, Switzerland is not an EU member but shares in the European cooperation is so many ways… as does Norway… just as Vote Leave and Leave.EU campaigns promised we would… so why have their people ruled that out since the referendum? And are you angry even the smallest amount about their “bait and switch” since voting for their little project?

We could have had a deal like switzerland or Norway – but the tories will not accept the obligations that entails

We can have all the trade deals in the world or still be continuing with the current one and it wouldn’t matter. In the short term (next 1-2 years) we’re ****

At this point would happily take a Switzerland EFTA deal

Tho surely Dougie was trolling with that comment

Yes, Switzerland is not an EU member but shares in the European cooperation is so many ways… as does Norway… just as Vote Leave and Leave.EU campaigns promised we would… so why have their people ruled that out since the referendum?

Ooh, ooh, I know this one….

Is it because they were lying?

As if the average Leave voter gave two hoots about the economy anyway. They stopped paying attention after ‘forriners out’.

They stopped paying attention after ‘forriners out’.

my landlord and landlady are wonderful, elderly, compassionate Christians. Welcoming to all nations/races but both very pro-Brexit beacause “we were OK for years before it so why do we need it?”
Bless. They also think Boris is OK. But they sure as **** aren’t racist.

So they are thick brexiters rather than racist ones. I think it’s always been acknowledged that both types exist.

Or ignorant. Which I can understand. It’s the wilfully ignorant that piss me off.

So they are thick brexiters rather than racist ones. I think it’s always been acknowledged that both types exist.

Three if you include thick and racist as a combined category of its own.

For the first time last week I was really thankful for Brexit. I’m absolutely certain that Britain woould have blocked the EU Covid rescue package of Eurobonds and hand outs from the ECB. As it was Holland made an attempt but is too small a fish, as were the other “frugals”, and Poland was easily bribed.

So thank you Brexiters for for saving southern Europe from even worse chaos than it is currently living through.

The ones that piss me off are the ones who can see the problems but are sufficiently selfish that they are prepared to support brexit just because they can, as a sort of act of vicious nihilistic vandalism against others who they believe will suffer worse. It’s like they think politics is necessarily a zero-sum gain where making others lose is an automatic win for them. Basically, the thrill of their imaginary “sticking two fingers up to the Germans” _plus_ screwing the feckless poor (it’s all their fault they are poor, obviously) makes the whole thing a festival of win, even though they and their own families are paying a price (to a lesser extent) too.

BTW I campaigned (just a little) in the last GE and the amount of bile and hate was just depressing. So many people motivated by what they didn’t want, rather than any sort of positive vision.

“sticking two fingers up to the Germans”

After a couple of weeks in Germany listening to Deutschland Funk when on the road and whatever people had to say when staying with them you are absolutely right about “imaginary”, captain. Their only concern is that Barnier continues to raise two fingers so there’s no deal that’s worth anything to the UK.

Oh I know that any pain felt by them will be a pinprick compared to the harm being done to this country.

my landlord and landlady are wonderful, elderly, compassionate Christians. Welcoming to all nations/races but both very pro-Brexit beacause “we were OK for years before it so why do we need it?”
Bless. They also think Boris is OK. But they sure as **** aren’t racist.

chronically misguided then.

edited to make clear what i was responding to.

So thank you Brexiters for for saving southern Europe from even worse chaos than it is currently living through.

Yes, what every person in debt wants is even more debt.

screwing the feckless poor

And yet a great many votes came from less well off people, makes you think eh? Maybe they looked at the EU, thought “what’s the point?” and voted leave.

But of course not, they were just thick/didn’t understand the implications/ uneducated?

So you’ve never borrowed money to improve your long term prospects, Dougie? Many people borrow money to buy a car to get to work to earn the money to pay the debt on a house they live in – the alternative is not being able to work or have a roof over your head.

Edit: TF1 has announced that the place you’re most likely to catch Covid is at work. If I had it then I caught it from Madame who caught it from her teacher coleague who caught it from… ?

So many people motivated by what they didn’t want, rather than any sort of positive vision.

I said something similar recently and got shouted at for it, but I wholly agree with this. Remain was fuelled by what people like, Leave by what people dislike.

Then we’ve got people like Dougie playing the “let’s all be optimistic” card with no notion of irony. He’s the second leaver to say that to me this week.

i’m sorry, but ‘debate is good’ and all, but TBH i just don’t give two **** any more what leavers want, as clearly what they don’t want is more important to them, and they’ve shown absolutely zero interest in what the other half of the population think. they present no solutions only problems. no brexit is going to be hard enough for the real drivers behind this project. the hapless, the racist, the ignorant, the stupid and the willingly venal have got their way, but they’ll never be happy, because their position only reaps more misery.
**** those guys. i’ve had enough. i’ve had enough of trying to understand, i’ve had enough of trying to make things work ( not that any of us plebs even have any influence anyway ), because they sure as shit don’t give a **** themselves. i believe in an inclusive society that helps people better themselves, provides a safety net for those who fall on hard times, and is generally interested and invested in the well-being of our fellow man/woman/other. well the last 5 years has put paid to that, and the next 5 will be crushing what remains of it in to a fine dust.
Dougie is the latest in the long line of **** who’ve posted here with half truths and outright bollocks, and just like all the others, as soon as you knock those away, the subject gets changed with no acknowledgement or further discussion, and a bit later on up pops more recycled bollocks. plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. no more for me.

So you’ve never borrowed money to improve your long term prospects, Dougie? Many people borrow money to buy a car to get to work to earn the money to pay the debt on a house they live in – the alternative is not being able to work or have a roof over your head.

Of course but the reality is that S EU countries have still not been able to pay off the last round of bailout. I posted a recent piece from the Guardian which explains the implications of this recent recovery plan.

And yet a great many votes came from less well off people, makes you think eh?

Nope, they were just targeted based on their prejudices about who could be blamed for taking ‘their’ jobs/opportunities from them. Different people were targeted with different messages depending on what could be gleaned from their social media ‘likes’, ‘friends’ etc amongst other things (remember Cambridge Analytica?)

To paraphrase Freddie Mercury et al:

“Find them somebody to ha-ate, find them somebody to ha-te, can anybody find theeeeeeemmmm somebody toooooooo HATE”.

Never before has there been so much ability for one party/campaign/cause to tell targeted, yet different, lies to so many different groups.

Where would you rather live, Dougie? A country in debt where you can’t get an appointment for your cancer within two months or another which is slightly more in debt where you can get an appointment in the time it takes to drive from London to Malaga?

I got an appointment for my cancer in a week and the operation happened the next week.

Sorry I misread your comment though, the point I was making was that the EU has now piled more debt on already weakened economies, however if you are telling me that I could have flown to Spain to get treated faster, would that have been true?

I’m sceptical on that one.

the reality is that S EU countries have still not been able to pay off the last round of bailout.

I asked you this before and predictably you completely ignored it but,

So what? Why do you care? How does the economy of some tiny piss-ant country 2,000 miles away affect your daily life?

I’ll just leave this here:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/governmentpublicsectorandtaxes/publicspending/bulletins/ukgovernmentdebtanddeficitforeurostatmaast/march2020

Lucky you dougie, my sister had a fair wait at the start of hers and died a couple of years ago.

the point I was making was that the EU has now piled more debt on already weakened economies,

~Wrong – much of this round of bailout will be grants not loans – ie not to be paid back

So what? Why do you care? How does the economy of some tiny piss-ant country 2,000 miles away affect your daily life?

I suppose not any more but it would have as part of the EU

Lucky you dougie, my sister had a fair wait at the start of hers and died a couple of years ago.

Sorry for your loss

Yes I was lucky, and touch wood have remained lucky.

touch wood

Figures.

I suppose not any more but it would have as part of the EU

Let’s try that again, pedant.

So what? Why did you care? How did the economy of some tiny piss-ant country 2,000 miles away affect your daily life?

A family member, Dougie. Chances of survival with the NHS were close to zero, in Spain better than 20% which isn’t great but we’re hoping. Sometimes dual nationality is worth more than all the health insurance you can buy.

So what? Why did you care? How did the economy of some tiny piss-ant country 2,000 miles away affect your daily life?

Because someone was constantly whispering in his ear that ‘some EU states are taking the piss, taking our money, it is always the UK that meets it obligations and other parts of the EU are having it away with us, the Germans are using our money to buy the dependence of smaller countries to achieve what they could not in two world wars (and incidentally one world cup)’ etc. etc.

Repeat to fade.

Anecdotally it was amusing to see the number of British registered cars on the autobahn between Berlin and Lodz/Warsaw. Enjoying their holiday visiting family I assume. I think we were allowed to be amused without being racist as Madame is half Polish and we were visiting her familily but on French plates.

Whilst we are on the topic of, I presume, Greek indebtedness, back in the day when I used to bother arguing with Brexies on FB I had an ‘encounter’ that typified most of these FB interactions.

Reading through a thread, alternating between reading it through my fingers and laughing out loud, I spotted a Gammony Brexie who had managed a full 180 in a sub-thread based on one of his comments.

His first comment was along the lines of “I wanted Brexit because I don’t want my money being spent bailing out a bunch of feckless feta munchers”.

Within a handful of comments he was giving it (I paraphrase) “We’re much better out of the EU, just look at how the heartless teutonic bullies are treating those poor impoverished Greeks”. His language wasn’t as flowery, mind, and the spelling was atrocious…

When I pointed out that he was trying (probably unconsciously) to play both ends against the middle he insulted me and issued a physical threat.

He called me a little this and a little that. Funnily enough, though, looking at his profile pics I would say he was under average height, whilst I am a tad over. Now, playing amateur psychologist for a moment……

Back in 2008 I had some tense debates with German friends about Eurobonds to bale out the Greeks, Portugese and Spanish who were facing interest rates between 12 and 25%. Now even the Germans recognise that help should have been given and not doing so this time around would be repeating the same mistakes.

Last time around Europe failed to recover from sub prime as fast as those ecomonic zones that simply printed money and handed it out. Germany suffered from its own tight fistedness. This time around they don’t want to repeat being in a zone that is slow to recover.

I don’t want my money being spent

I can’t remember exact figures, but assuming an average wage (a bold assumption in Gammonland) your contribution to the EU annually was I think something like fifty quid. An individual’s contribution to sending aid to Greece was likely in the order of fractions of a penny.

The amount of money we paid into the EU was grossly overstated and as has been said more than once previously is in total less than brexit has already cost us.

People got upset that they saw some countries getting more out of the EU than they put in… because they could not accept that ALL members get out more than they put in. This confuses them ‘if they are gaining, we must be losing’, they can’t comprehend the multiplier effect of countries working closely together.

People got upset that they saw some countries getting more out of the EU than they put in… because they could not accept that ALL members get out more than they put in. This confuses them ‘if they are gaining, we must be losing’, they can’t comprehend the multiplier effect of countries working closely together.

It stemmed from a mindset that approached everything to do with the EU as ‘them and us’ and that ‘they’ were on a gravy train with ‘our’ money. Back to the early 90s again. Drip-drip.