Regarding TTIP, weren't most Guardian readers up in absolute arms about the powers we were potentially ceding to big business by signing up to it? And weren't they the same Guardian readers who voted remain and are still chimping out over the result?
They were the deluded 'remain and reform' people, who were probably the worst of the bunch.
TTIP getting binned off because of Brexit would be a pretty good silver lining.
Not only that, but they refused to accept that the EU might be shit for small businesses. If you make incredibly generous assumptions, you can only stretch the statistics to 11% maximum here of businesses who actually export to the EU. The other 89% still have to adhere to all of the regulations, and small businesses have no sway whatsoever with the lobbying industry which is heavily embedded in the Brussels operation. Not only that, the EU can't even negotiate the necessary trade deals with non-shit countries so that we can diversify markets.Originally Posted by Yevrah
Really the Guardian position (or metropolitan liberal, if you will) comes down to geopolitical considerations and an embarrassment of 'Britishness'.
It's a terrible, terrible deal. If we'd voted to remain, I'd be thrilled that it had collapsed but the more concerning aspect of it is that a) this was the best deal that could apparently be negotiated and b) having negotiated it, they didn't have the competence to finalise it satisfactorily.
The other thing is that it's the same neoliberal technocrat corporate stooges who'll negotiate whatever deal happens instead, so you'll basically get the same shite.
No doubt it'll be the same once the modern-day British civil service start getting involved in bespoke trade negotiations on our behalf.
At least we can hold our parliament accountable if they ratify some sort of TTIP-like disaster.
In more encouraging news, the prospects of a Tory landslide continue to look good. This is before they've even began a sustained attack on Corbyn and his mates:
I'd say the press are doing a good job of a sustained attack on Corbyn anyway.
Yes, by having the temerity to report what he has actually said and done over 33 years as an MP.
Owen Smith says we should bring ISIS to the negotiating table. Nothing.
Jeremy Corbyn says he couldn't get a seat on a train.
He's shit but there's a clear difference in the way Corbyn gets treated to everyone else.
He's the current leader of the opposition. Owen Smith is currently just some twonk.
Nothing on Owen Smith negotiating with ISIS. Quite right:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...alks-ISIS.html
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ow...iser-n0kx7r9nh
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...ership-contest
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics...ate-isis-gaffe
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/...-a7195331.html
Not that the issue wouldn't have been more amplified under Jez We Can, but that's because he has a long record of supporting terrorism. You can write Smith's statement off as a gaffe, rather than evidence of a more insidious support for terrorism. I suggest you read further on Jez and McDonnell's support and condoning of the IRA before you claim I'm being unfair.
The train thing was a clear question of integrity/lying. Owen Smith is just a moron.
The Labour Party (the Labour Party) on 140 seats. Jesus. That would literally just be Yes2AV, coalfields, and Liverpool wouldn't it? Which would then ensure a double shitter because those are the places with the most pro-Jezza loons, who would inevitably blame any such defeat on the remaining normals as a pretext to de-select them all.
lol at that, and lol also at all of these right-wing commentators pretending to feel sorry for Labour as a 'great party', talking about the need for proper opposition, and all that shite concern. Fuck them. Stomp them into the ground.
London, the north-west and some in the north I would imagine. That's before boundary changes as well, so you could well be looking at a bigger majority once you factor both that and the impact of the campaign itself which would surely eat into the Labour vote (weakness of Corbyn as a potential PM, the Tories as the only part who'll deliver the Brexit 70% of Labour seats voted for etc.).
That's whats holding Britain back, the metric system.
They're not suggesting it's 'holding Britain back', rather having to scrap (most of) the imperial system was, and remains, evidence of wholly unnecessary EU overreach. I suspect you wouldn't have many complaints with allowing the use of the imperial system once again.
Except from embittered remain voters with a grievance like yourself.
Who would want imperial back? It's the stupidest system in the world. Why don't we do away with decimalisation while we're at it? That was what we had WHEN THE EMPIRE WAS STRONG. We could start referring to 0 degrees as 32 again. It'd be magical.
On the subject of European overreach, this is a very sound analysis of the Apple tax case in the south.
In essence, the Commission have creatively leveraged illegal state aid rules to try and 'backdoor' some element of tax harmonisation policy through. This is not an issue under their remit and taxation of this kind remains 'devolved' to the member states. They've basically decided that national sovereignty can be ignored when the policies therein don't suit them.
If it stands, it could well have an adverse impact on FDI in the south - it's benefited strongly from its advantageous tax regime, and any sense that the Commission can launch ad hoc cases of this nature - and actually win - could well deter future investment. It would also raise some fairly serious questions regarding the EU's respect for national sovereignty on issues which are not clearly within their remit.
Apple are fucking seething. It's going to take them a good week or two to make back that sort of money.
Look Dav, we don't want to hurt the Apple workers more than they already are. Imagine the amount of anti-suicide nets they'll have to put up around FoxConn. Fucking abuse of power it is.
You either accept that a country should be allowed to act within the confines of its own laws, or you don't. Ireland has not ceded control of its corporation tax regime to Brussels, therefore it is none of the Commission's business.
Not respecting national sovereignty is a big reason why your side lost the referendum.
On a separate point, Ireland has done very well out of its low tax regime and generous incentives for R&D. Much as hammering business for tax revenue may sound desirable, they'll just up sticks and move somewhere else if that's the case and that benefits nobody in Ireland.
Still, I suppose the politics of envy necessitates your positions as much as anything else.
Foxconn and friends are like they are because Chinese people are inherently evil sadists, not because of Apple. Apple are simply happy to cash in.
The standard rate of Irish corporate tax is 12.5%. The Commissions's investigation concluded that Apple had effectively paid 1% tax on its European profits in 2003 and about 0.005% in 2014.
I earnt more than the UK national average when I was on my internship and just tripled my salary. I'm all good mate. If you want to make money out of a society, you have to pay back into it. That's all it is.
Hammered with taxes!
Apple have published an open letter to 'The European Community' in which they claim to employ 1.5 million people, (so it's fine not to pay taxes) the main issue here being that they seem to be counting App Developers (people who pay Apple for app dev software and then have 30% of any revenue made taken by Apple)
I wonder, if I was an Apple Dev, if I could ask for them to only take 0.005% of a cut instead. You know, because of how much I'm giving to 'The Apple Community'.
Ireland should really follow us out, but, like Greece, they probably associate 'Europe' with not being as shit and poor as they used to be.
That's not the issue in the context of the Apple case. It's a matter of whether the EU Commission have the right to leverage illegal state aid rules to impose tax harmonisation by the backdoor. Whether you agree with the Irish tax regime is another matter. I do, you don't (I assume), but equally I assume we can all get behind the idea that the EU shouldn't be muscling its way into areas of legislation that remain the purview of the national parliaments.
The south has done very well out of the EU, although that may start to change once we leave.
The far bigger issue for Ireland and Greece is that they're Eurozone members, which is only going to lead to more problems further down the line. Until the Germans stop sticking slavishly to centralised 'rules' and penalising smaller countries when they break them, there's always the risk of serious economic hardship arising as a consequence of single currency membership.
I'd be all for inviting them back into the United Kingdom, mind you. We can keep the border, just to aggrieve the ex-IRA lads further.
When did GS start posting like Harold?
Also lol at wanting to bring back imperial measurements, there's nothing wrong with it but there must be about four greengrocers who still give a shit. Plus it hasn't been taught in schools for about 40 years so we're left with about 8 biddies who remember how many bananas you get in a pound. What's the point?
But Disco, don't you get it? The frogs and the huns told us we had to and we caved. Are you some kind of beta cuck coward?
I've even got a slogan to put on the bus seeing as "350m to the NHS" didn't work out. "Make Britain Groat Again!"
Yeah why not, do I get a hat?
Phonics spectacularly missing the point once again.
Seeing as we're not giving it to the NHS and I got a cut-price deal, due to my new trade deal with China (it's just the best trade deal, a great deal), to produce them. You can have 350 million of them.
It's over, mate. Let it go.
On a similar theme did we ever get our doomsday budget? I've been buying up candles and baked beans in preparation.
Of course not.
You get about 48 pounds to the pound if anyone was wondering, and you can buy a drum (a fucking drum) of chocolate pound coins for less than fifty quid.
What a world we live in.
I wouldn't get too excited. World War III should be just around the corner.
We've already got a wartime PM in waiting.
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Just add powdered egg.
People can stick the boot into Farage if they want, but he'd have been flying the planes in the Battle of Britain whilst the likes of Jez would have been agitating for strikes on the factory floor to stop the planes being built in the first place.
Alright mate, it was just an excuse to make a joke about powdered egg.
Which is fair, but the Lord Farage gets a mighty amount of unfair stick.
I doubt you'd understand, given your peculiar ability to miss the point constantly.
Farage is one of the most consequential politicians since Thatcher. He should be in the Lords.
The undemocratic, establishment Lords? He'd fit right in.
The Lords as an unelected chamber is fine, in principle. It prevents them adhering to populism in pursuit of votes and should allow them to act as a sensible revision chamber where the merits of the argument are all that matter. Alas that's not the case.
The issue that you have now is a) the abuse of the system by the political parties in terms of appointees and b) Lords overreach. The latter is particularly prevalent. The Lib Dems (with their eight MPs) mobilising their Lords to derail benefit changes because they didn't have the vote in the Commons was particularly problematic, whilst the Lords (Patience Wheatcroft, for fuck sake) suggesting that they might 'block' Brexit would have been a laugh. Still, the latter should be avoided because St Theresa is going to treat the invocation of Article 50 as a royal prerogative power.
It needs reform to throw out the wasters and to give it much clearer, narrower parameters than it has at present. Some sort of new legislation to update the Parliament Act should suffice.
The FT have suggested that the Lib Dems could be down to four MPs once the impact of the boundary changes comes through as well, which would be fucking excellent. They're pointless.
Until they do come up with a proper reform package, how hard would it be to just have a bollocks half-way house of a peer for every MP (or one for every two and a few cross-benchers)? It would be easy enough to choose who you wanted, because hardly any of them want to work.
It shouldn't be hard to have a chamber that's reflective of the make-up of the Commons. More genuine cross-benchers and policy experts, 'experienced' statesmen. Perhaps some sort of list system would suffice for the parties to select their representatives.
Clearly the current shambles of Lib/Lab mobilising their Lords because they're in the minority in the Commons can't continue, nor can it possibly sustain the lol-worthy 800-odd members it has at present.
https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.ne...electorate.pdf
This is amazing, by the way. Jezza is going to increase his MANDATE, and he's doing it on the back of a landslide of voters who joined after the last election. For those who joined after September 2015, he's winning 86-14 - so clearly the 'saving Labour' campaign worked well.
Smith had hopes of winning in Wales, apparently, but even there he looks like getting hammered. Although that's hardly surprising given he's a moron.
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