Brexit.

[Sid]

After this, Aliens landing on Trafalgar Square on Christmas eve this year becomes much more likely.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

You mean Boy George is having his comeback there?

 

[Da5id Weatherwax]

Nah, they'll land on the National Mall in Washington. The lizard people have worked out where their kids are hiding and came to take the GOP home.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Yes, almost election time:

 

[Kara Spengler]

About as often as the aliens invade London around Christmas (on Dr. Who at least).

Well, given the last time was soon after WW1 ...

 

[Mondy Bristol]

3 months? If we do eventually leave, we will still be 'brexiting' for years to come as the next stage of negotiations start and go on and on and on and on. Do we start a separate thread for the negotiations to re-join?

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

"Mr Corbyn said his condition of taking a no-deal Brexit off the table had now been met after the EU agreed to extend the deadline until 31 January 2020."

Not quite following this, Jeremy. How does a date in January take no-deal off the table?

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Not quite following this, Jeremy. How does a date in January take no-deal off the table?

No deal on October 31, he means.

The concern was that agreeing to an election before the EU27 had formally approved an extension, the opposition would risk enabling particular procedural and legislative sleights of hand Johnson might use to crash us out of the EU with no deal at the end of the month.

No one particularly trusts him, you see.

 

[Ariane]

3 months? If we do eventually leave, we will still be 'brexiting' for years to come as the next stage of negotiations start and go on and on and on and on. Do we start a separate thread for the negotiations to re-join?

I agree. The ultimate outcome is going to be the UK (or what's left of the UK) back/staying in the EU. Even if the "old" people get their Brexit, the young people will rejoin -- probably adapting the euro to do it.

And if there is finally a second referendum that favors remain, there will be a large contingency of pissed off Englanders that will cause no end of trouble for decades.

 

[Sid]

probably adapting the euro to do it.

Of course adapting the Euro then. No choice, that is mandatory by now for new member states.
And what ever happens after Brexit, never ever allow the UK to feel like a special snowflake in the EU again during and after re-entering.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Of course adapting the Euro then. No choice, that is mandatory by now for new member states.

Would I be in charge of the UK, I would strictly keep my country out of the Euro, because by now it is quite obvious that he is a flawed concept, causing more schism than unification and utterly worthless without an European economics politics, which we still don't have.

The ECB has been pumping on negative interest rates money like crazy all over the place since years; the consequences we all do feel dearly, e.g. on the development of the real estate market. This politics of negative interest rates is an absolute catastrophe, and anyway we are living in the time of currency wars: the Fed is doing exactly the same.

 

[Sid]

There is no longer a choise for newly participating countries in the future. And that would be the status if the UK wanted to re-enter after a Brexit.
Entering the Euro zone is mandatory these days when joining the EU.

 

[Da5id Weatherwax]

The Euro is a bit of a strange beast amongst currencies. When first introduced it was to a bunch of allied but separately managed economies and was treated, mistakenly, like those economies would continue to function exactly as they had before, just measuring their financial numbers using different units while the actual values involved remained unchanged. Of course, this structure was about as realistic as building a balloon out of bricks. Behind the jingoistic rhetoric spouted in public and the quieter, better-reasoned arguments about the penetrance of sterling in non-EU economies this concern was being quietly voiced in the UK and was a factor in the UK's declining to join in.

Economic policy within a nation can be broadly broken down into fiscal and monetary policy. Fiscal policy, the business of taxing to raise funds then spending them on running the government and funding government programs has a cycle of effects that are slow to emerge in an economy but which are recovered from comparatively quickly. Monetary policy, the business of interest rates and currency valuation, is the other way around. The effect of any change here is almost immediate but has a very "long tail." Typically a government needed its hands on "both levers" to manage an economy to balance short and long effectiveness times, long and short stabilization times after those effects were felt. The introduction of the Euro without a fully stabilized ECB already in place and the mechanisms for its interaction with member states governments already worked out took one of those levers out of the hands of every member government that joined the Euro. There were bound to be "issues" and some of them were bound to be severe. As the dice rolled, it was Greece and Portugal that took the major hits but it could just as easily have been France or any other major EU economy if the trigger factors had been different.

The member states and the ECB did learn from this, and the system is now much more stable. At this point many of the valid reasons - aside from dumb nationalism, that is - that the UK had for not participating in the Euro have gone away. There would no longer be a serious disadvantage to the UK from adopting the currency. Indeed, my personal opinion is that the UK should now join the Euro, whether we remain by revoking A50 or whether we stumble into leaving and later have to rejoin, either as a union or as individual nations. But selling that to the toxic "little Englanders" aint going to happen any time soon.

 

[Mondy Bristol]

Of course, this structure was about as realistic as building a balloon out of bricks.

Believe in the impossible!

 

[Arkady Arkright]

The bill for elections at 12th of December passed the HoC, now the House of Lords needs to decide on it. One step closer to a general election in December.

While I'm normally in favour of letting the grown-ups OK what the rabble proposes, in this particular case it makes no sense - Lords are neither elected themsleves nor can they vote in such an election, so what business is it of theirs ?

 

[Innula Zenovka]

While I'm normally in favour of letting the grown-ups OK what the rabble proposes, in this particular case it makes no sense - Lords are neither elected themsleves nor can they vote in such an election, so what business is it of theirs ?

Because it's a normal piece of legislation, and not a finance bill, that provides for an exception to legislation they themselves passed?

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Tactical voting website criticised for 'bogus' advice

Best for Britain website suggests backing Lib Dems in Labour-held marginals

www.theguardian.com

 

[Kara Spengler]

Of course adapting the Euro then. No choice, that is mandatory by now for new member states.
And what ever happens after Brexit, never ever allow the UK to feel like a special snowflake in the EU again during and after re-entering.

That is what I can not figure out about this. Given how opinions are trending is the UK leaves eventually there will be enough people that want back in again. When they do all those special terms the UK got, like saying no to the euro, will be null and void. So the result of brexit will be even stronger ties to Europe.

It appears the brexit crowd is playing to short term popularism rather than what they want in the long term. Like donnie, they seem to not know what strategy is. Especially since it will be awhile before they leave, they could have spent that time telling their flocks about the good deals they got instead.

 

[Free]

Urban Dictionary: Brexiting

 

[Sid]

Last orders: John Bercow's final day as Speaker

His throaty remarks gave him fame, but Bercow will be remember as an innovator in the Commons

www.theguardian.com

He did a great job IMHO.
He stood up for the rights of parliament at the right moments.