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Thread: Brexit Begins

  1. #601
    Just because you use insults doesn't make you big or clever.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  2. #602
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    Indeed. However, the EU is big and clever and not going to give you what you want for free. Remember all that nonsense you tried to sell about the EU being a mere free trade agreement Randy? You and your lot talked yourself into believing that was the case by never listening to anyone outside of your bubble. But now your bubble is being burst for the simple fact that you have basically lost all leverage in these talks. Not only do you have very little say in what the post-Brexit relation will be, but you don't even get to decide what's being talked about. And other than in the UK, continental politicians are not used to grandstanding, they represent consensus positions. So when they start expressing what is sufficient and what is not you're not going to change that again without major concessions.

    You were lied to consistently by your political class, but that absolves you only for a tiny bit for buying their lies. Someone with your background should have bothered more to understand what you were voting against. Especially since what you wanted to keep prior to the referendum was exactly what you were told by everyone- except the liars on the 'OUT' side of the campaign- you would never get. Not because we necessarily wanted to break the Single Market, but because we don't want the Single Market to turn into a centrifugal force in the EU.

    The extent of the lies you are being sold by your government become clearer by the day. Every single paper published boils down to 'nothing should change except for the labels we use for it'. Meaning that in the end you will either be outside of the EU in name only, but without having a say in the rule setting, or you will be a slavish rule follower on the outside, duplicating everything the EU already does for 27 countries in the hope that we will allow you continue in the same way you already could as a member. You will be spending billions on extra bureaucracy just to stay in place.

    And let there be no mistake about the 'no deal' scenario; that is going to devastate your City. Because not only are your financial passports going to evaporate overnight, also the whole ecosystem around financials are in deep trouble if there is no legal basis any longer for the recognition of rulings of British judges in the countries of the EU. EU businesses could step out of contracts with British partners with very little repercussions. And guess how tempting that kind of move will become if the need arises to cut losses caused by Brexit.
    Congratulations America

  3. #603
    You're the one talking nonsense, I never claimed the EU was a mere free trade agreement. If it was "a mere free trade agreement" then I would have been an ardent Remain campaigner. Free trade is a good thing, it's all the other crap we voted to Leave.

    Believe it or not the UK manages to have businesses trading outside the EU (actually most of our exports go outside the EU) without having businesses step out of contracts with very little repercussions.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  4. #604
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    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    You're the one talking nonsense, I never claimed the EU was a mere free trade agreement. If it was "a mere free trade agreement" then I would have been an ardent Remain campaigner. Free trade is a good thing, it's all the other crap we voted to Leave.
    So, basically you are trying to say that you voted being aware of the fact that you were going to get an inferior trade deal at a significantly higher cost? That you willingly gave up influence and invoked spending more money to not change anything?

    Well, that tells me something of the kind of crazy you need to be a Breximaniac. Gonna vote Rees-Mogg any time soon?
    Congratulations America

  5. #605
    No because I believed then and still believe that it is in the best interests of both the UK and the EU to have a comparable free trade deal without all the extra stuff that you want and we don't. Canada manages to have free trade and largely free movement with the USA without finding a need to make Alberta a state of the union under President Trump.

    If a political union is in your interests then great go for it without us and with our blessing. Why would you want to drag us around with you as an unhappy member rather than trade with us as a happy neighbour?

    What is bad about having a market as a centrifugal force? If a political union is in your interests then you can safely separate the two and people will want to stay in the political union because it suits them to do so not simply because of a market that has nothing to do with the politics.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  6. #606
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    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    No because I believed then and still believe that it is in the best interests of both the UK and the EU to have a comparable free trade deal without all the extra stuff that you want and we don't. Canada manages to have free trade and largely free movement with the USA without finding a need to make Alberta a state of the union under President Trump.

    If a political union is in your interests then great go for it without us and with our blessing. Why would you want to drag us around with you as an unhappy member rather than trade with us as a happy neighbour?

    What is bad about having a market as a centrifugal force? If a political union is in your interests then you can safely separate the two and people will want to stay in the political union because it suits them to do so not simply because of a market that has nothing to do with the politics.
    Europe is not the United States and you are not Canada. So that's rather irrelevant.

    We will trade with you but on our terms and the conditions will be lesser than those of a member.

    We are not splitting anything for your convenience. It's a pipe dream and it's getting tiresome to be honest. Your exit campaign lied through its teeth but we never entertained such a notion. You didn't want to hear that but that's your problem not ours.
    Congratulations America

  7. #607
    Of course not, the EU (not Europe) < the United States and the UK > Canada but its an analogy.

    Considering you consider all that political bullshit to be a good thing then having trade only rather than trade and politics should be lesser than full membership. Only if you consider us correct that the politics is a burden not a bonus would you consider what we want better. In which case the question becomes if we're right, why don't you do something about it?
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  8. #608
    This is like saying that if you consider society to be such a good thing you should have society without government, taxes and laws.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  9. #609
    No it is not. It is like saying if you consider your own society, government, taxes and laws to be good things then you should be happy to have your own society, government, taxes and laws even if another nation has different taxes, laws and government.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  10. #610
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    No it is not. It is like saying if you consider your own society, government, taxes and laws to be good things then you should be happy to have your own society, government, taxes and laws even if another nation has different taxes, laws and government.
    No, that is not the equivalent of what you're saying. The EEA is the most fully integrated free trade area in the world, more like a society than anything else. It's perfectly natural for full participation in that society to come with acceptance of governance, taxes, laws etc. The right to participate in society necessarily comes with obligations that allow or enable that society to function properly. If you can't accept that then obviously you'll have to accept a lesser degree of participation. Obviously an actor that didn't have to follow laws or pay taxes would have an advantage over those who do. That doesn't automatically mean that laws and taxes are bad. Only a parasitic actor would expect to be able to take full advantage of participation without any obligations. I'm sorry mate but things have changed since the days of the EITC.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  11. #611
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  12. #612
    Quote Originally Posted by Aimless View Post
    No, that is not the equivalent of what you're saying. The EEA is the most fully integrated free trade area in the world, more like a society than anything else. It's perfectly natural for full participation in that society to come with acceptance of governance, taxes, laws etc. The right to participate in society necessarily comes with obligations that allow or enable that society to function properly. If you can't accept that then obviously you'll have to accept a lesser degree of participation. Obviously an actor that didn't have to follow laws or pay taxes would have an advantage over those who do. That doesn't automatically mean that laws and taxes are bad. Only a parasitic actor would expect to be able to take full advantage of participation without any obligations. I'm sorry mate but things have changed since the days of the EITC.
    Correction the EEA is the second-most fully integrated free trade area in the world. But I agree that all the other bits are part of it, which is all that politics stuff that goes with the society that we don't want.

    We're not interested in that, you can keep all that yourselves. All we want is free trade between us and the EU. No need to be part of the Single Market to trade with the Single Market.

    I'd also like us to get free trade with the USA but I'm not expecting us to join the USA either. That doesn't make me a parasite either.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  13. #613
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    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    Of course not, the EU (not Europe) < the United States and the UK > Canada but its an analogy.

    Considering you consider all that political bullshit to be a good thing then having trade only rather than trade and politics should be lesser than full membership. Only if you consider us correct that the politics is a burden not a bonus would you consider what we want better. In which case the question becomes if we're right, why don't you do something about it?
    There is zero analogy. From memory I say that the last time the USA and Canada engaged in a war on eachother is well over 2 centuries ago. What the USA and Canada were looking for was a trade agreement.

    What Europe is looking for is not a trade agreement, but an arrangement that makes war between France and Germany not merely unthinkable but impossible. And you bet your ass that I consider 'that political bullshit' to be indefinetely much more important than any trade agreement you might want. Which is why you will NEVER get what you are asking about and try to paint as mutually beneficial.

    Also, as you may have noticed last time around, when we were still taking your PM's as serious partners, we were also not willing to give you your pipe dream of a free trade zone with no strings attached.

    Randy, an analogy you may understand. You are trying to explain to us that we, while being quite content with our PBJ, should scrape off the Jelly. On top of that you try to convince us that we can do so without scraping off any off the peanut butter. You (and your government) should stop telling us what you want, and rather tell us how you're going to solve the mess you made of all this. Because we sure as hell aren't going to do it for you.
    Congratulations America

  14. #614
    Good for you. If you want that good for you and as was said by a contemporary at the time the UK can wish you luck with that while not participating in that. We won the wars in Europe when Germany turned evil and are not looking to integrate with those we defeated but be friendly neighbours instead. I'm happy to put faith in Germany not turning evil again.

    I fail to see why a trade zone without strings attached is unthinkable to you. You want the strings, you like the strings, you can have the strings that you desire. Why does it bother you if we don't have the strings since to you the strings are attractive rather than repulsive? While we were trying to be partners in the inside we were trying to ensure there were no strings at all - for us or for you - but that didn't work as you wanted them. So why not separate the issues? You keep the strings that you desire and separate that from the trade that we both desire? Or are you worried France or Germany will look at us and think "actually we don't want the strings afterall"?

    PB&J sandwiches are a fantastic example because I hate peanut butter. I can't eat it or anything with it in except Chinese style satay sauces (something in the sauce must balance the peanut butter). I can't eat peanut butter chocolate treats like Reese's when I'm on the other side of the pond either.

    So I'll happily eat a jam sandwich (what the Yanks call Jelly). But please don't give me a pb&j. I'll take the jam on its own thank you. If you want to eat pb&j then fine good for you but I'll leave the pb behind.

    PS I'm not allergic to nuts or anything like that, its purely a taste thing that I can not stand it. I'm not suggesting you scrape off the pb, that is what we were suggesting when we were members, that nobody should have peanut butter. Now I'm merely suggesting that you can have pb&j to your hearts content since that is your preference. Please just let me eat a jam sandwich on its own. You can look at my jam sandwich and think that I'm missing out, I have an inferior sandwich to yours since yours has not just jam but peanut butter too. Whereas I can happily have my own lunch that I enjoy without bothering anyone else with my endless complaints about having peanut butter forced on me.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  15. #615
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    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    Good for you. If you want that good for you and as was said by a contemporary at the time the UK can wish you luck with that while not participating in that. We won the wars in Europe when Germany turned evil and are not looking to integrate with those we defeated but be friendly neighbours instead. I'm happy to put faith in Germany not turning evil again.

    I fail to see why a trade zone without strings attached is unthinkable to you. You want the strings, you like the strings, you can have the strings that you desire. Why does it bother you if we don't have the strings since to you the strings are attractive rather than repulsive? While we were trying to be partners in the inside we were trying to ensure there were no strings at all - for us or for you - but that didn't work as you wanted them. So why not separate the issues? You keep the strings that you desire and separate that from the trade that we both desire? Or are you worried France or Germany will look at us and think "actually we don't want the strings afterall"?

    PB&J sandwiches are a fantastic example because I hate peanut butter. I can't eat it or anything with it in except Chinese style satay sauces (something in the sauce must balance the peanut butter). I can't eat peanut butter chocolate treats like Reese's when I'm on the other side of the pond either.

    So I'll happily eat a jam sandwich (what the Yanks call Jelly). But please don't give me a pb&j. I'll take the jam on its own thank you. If you want to eat pb&j then fine good for you but I'll leave the pb behind.

    PS I'm not allergic to nuts or anything like that, its purely a taste thing that I can not stand it. I'm not suggesting you scrape off the pb, that is what we were suggesting when we were members, that nobody should have peanut butter. Now I'm merely suggesting that you can have pb&j to your hearts content since that is your preference. Please just let me eat a jam sandwich on its own. You can look at my jam sandwich and think that I'm missing out, I have an inferior sandwich to yours since yours has not just jam but peanut butter too. Whereas I can happily have my own lunch that I enjoy without bothering anyone else with my endless complaints about having peanut butter forced on me.
    You didn't win any wars, you were on the winning side. Which makes you a whole lot less special than you think you are.

    And impressive how you ran with my analogy and still didn't get that even in reverse the same holds tru;removing the one means removing parts of the other. There is no Jelly sandwich for you to be had. Not with our Jelly anyway.
    Congratulations America

  16. #616
    We won the wars with our allies but its moot. Doesn't matter one jot whether we won, lost or abstained that is not the point. The point is that after our allied victory you guys chose to join France and Germany with us as friendly neighbours but not as part of the union. At no stage was uniting the UK and Germany to prevent war between us an objective and so there's no reason for it to be today.

    I'm not proposing we remove anything. I'm proposing that we make a new sandwich, put the jam on it and not put peanut butter on it. Sandwich made, everyone happy, life goes on. You guys can enjoy the platter of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and we can enjoy a jam sandwich. We can even refer to yours as jelly and ours as jam despite it being the same thing if that is what people prefer.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  17. #617
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    Oh, you didn't sign up to the Treaty of Rome you say? That's a bit of a big booboo Randy. Or a massive lie. Have your pick.

    And get it into your thick skull; we're not going to reform anything to make you happy.
    Congratulations America

  18. #618
    I didn't say that. We did sign the Treaty of Rome. We (the British electorate) were told at the time that it was not a political union and were told repeatedly down the years that it was a eurosceptic lie to suggest it was.

    You have no need to reform anything. You can keep eating pb&j to your hearts content while we just have the inferior plain j.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  19. #619
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    I didn't say that. We did sign the Treaty of Rome. We (the British electorate) were told at the time that it was not a political union and were told repeatedly down the years that it was a eurosceptic lie to suggest it was.
    This is a lie. I refer you back to the previous discussion we had on this topic.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  20. #620
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    Productivity is a bizarre metric with known issues as we are at record employment levels. A lot of jobs created (and a lot filled by migrants) are of a low value-added variety but they are better than having people unemployed.

    The irony is that productivity only looks at those employed so if the marginally [un]employed are the least productive members of society then your productivity is inflated when unemployment goes up and deflated when unemployment goes down.
    My mistake, I was initially thinking of production, which is what the report in the link describes. While your observation about the pitfalls of interpreting labor productivity statistics is correct, I fail to see how the interpretation implied in your post makes things look any better given the high likelihood that many of the the low-value-added positions are temporarily being filled by non-British EU nationals.

    It's also not clear that increased employment is sufficient to explain the UK's underwhelming productivity statistics, either now or over the past decade. I have not seen any analyses that have found this problem to be an artefact of increased employment even though the UK economy's dependence on low-value-added on-demand service jobs likely explain some of the productivity issues. Scholars seem to attribute less than one percent of the estimated shortfall to the shift to greater dependence on low-skilled jobs.

    This problem is by all accounts a mystery that has baffled everyone for a long time, and your convenient explanation therefore seems insufficient and implausible. The only conclusion I've come across around which there may be a growing consensus is that the UK's productivity shortfall is a symptom of a demand-constrained economy afflicted by depressed demand.

    So? We are in a state of uncertainty, that won't last forever.
    It calls into question Lawson's understanding of the facts as well as his interpretation.

    No it is what economics would predict when you have the lowest unemployment rate since the 1970s - a 42 year low
    Not relevant. Persons not in the UK are not counted in unemployment statistics and those statistics don't say anything about staffing shortages. The wage-increasing effects of high employment are also primarily enjoyed by people in high-paying jobs. Wages and esp. real wages in the rest of the labor market have gone down. Either way, it also calls Lawson's facile analysis into question because he disregards an increasingly difficult problem that many businesses are being forced to grapple with as a direct consequence of Brexit.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  21. #621
    Quote Originally Posted by Aimless View Post
    This is a lie. I refer you back to the previous discussion we had on this topic.
    "There are some in this country who fear that in going into Europe we shall in some way sacrifice independence and sovereignty. These fears, I need hardly say, are completely unjustified"
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  22. #622
    Like I said, I refer you back to the previous discussion we had on this subject.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  23. #623
    Yes you weren't convincing then and nothing has changed.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  24. #624
    You're right, nothing has changed--you're as ignorant now as you were then.

    https://medium.com/@UKIPNFKN/uk-vote...f-2f565b972cd6

    http://www.richardcorbett.org.uk/we-...er-hoodwinked/

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2...new-what-we-w/

    If the British public hadn't wanted a political union, they wouldn't have voted for one, nor would they have continued to vote for leaders who pursued precisely the goal of an ever closer union.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  25. #625
    LOL at your second link. Your response to the claim that we did not say we were going to join a political union is to say that we were joining a political union. And proof that we knew we were joining a political union is a newspaper article saying:
    Political union will not come unless and until we - and the French and Germans - are ready for it. And we're nowhere near ready for it now, and a lot of us probably won't live to see it.
    That is the political reality. And everyone knows it. That is why political union is not much of a live issue now.
    Well guess what: we're still not ready for it! We weren't ready for it in the seventies, or the eighties, nineties, noughties or today. And now we're told not only must we be ready for it but that it was always what we voted for in the past. No, no it is not.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  26. #626
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    LOL at your second link. Your response to the claim that we did not say we were going to join a political union is to say that we were joining a political union. And proof that we knew we were joining a political union is a newspaper article saying:

    Well guess what: we're still not ready for it! We weren't ready for it in the seventies, or the eighties, nineties, noughties or today. And now we're told not only must we be ready for it but that it was always what we voted for in the past. No, no it is not.
    No, taken as a whole the information on those sites show clearly that voters should have been aware of the fact that the EU was a political union, just as their political representatives were aware. Your country gave up EFTA to join a political union. At this point you're just beginning to look kinda thick.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  27. #627
    Yes saying "political union will not come ... political union is not much of a live issue" is clear and concrete proof that political union would come, was what we were joining and was what was voted for!

    You are the one being disingenuous or kinda thick.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  28. #628
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    Yes saying "political union will not come ... political union is not much of a live issue" is clear and concrete proof that political union would come, was what we were joining and was what was voted for!
    No, but repeatedly speaking of the EU as a political union and clarifying on many occasions what that entails is in fact clear and concrete proof that the public as well as political representatives should have been well aware of what they were voting for or against. They weighed the arguments and facts and decided. What you're saying is that one or two isolated remarks somehow misled the public by drowning out the rest of the debate in its entirety, which is manifestly false (see repeated quotes showing that people were actively discussing this subject and continued to discuss it even after joining). To pretend that you were lied to then and not this time is just ridiculous, not to mention pathetic. Grow up.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  29. #629
    Except the often out of context quotes in the links DON'T speak of the Community/Market (as what later became the EU was interchangeably called) as a political union.

    Where political union is refered to it is explicitly saying the Market was NOT a political union.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  30. #630
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    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    Except the often out of context quotes in the links DON'T speak of the Community/Market (as what later became the EU was interchangeably called) as a political union.

    Where political union is refered to it is explicitly saying the Market was NOT a political union.
    At the time you joined there wasn't a common market.
    Congratulations America

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