It's not very often that I direct people to the Daily Mail; least of all to a Sarah Vine column. She is, however, also wife of Michael Gove and in her column today she makes very clear that the Brexit campaign had no intention of or desire to win the referendum. As I had predicted, this is all a giant and unplanned mistake by the Tories.
But we have to live with it.
And they want to stay in government.
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It’s like a giant Comedy of Errors … except that it’s a Tragedy.
Libya or Iraq was a tragedy, this is a change of circumstances.
You’re right of course, Paul. I was just being facetious. There are real human tragedies happening around the world as we write and that’s where our attention should be focussed. Apologies for my flippancy.
The death of Jo Cox was also a tragedy.
The increased violence against minority communities since the Brexit vote is a serious concern.
Fascism is no joke.
On a more colloquial note, my mum told me yesterday that she witnessed a group of teenagers verbally abusing a Portuguese man ,on a tram in Manchester,who had been living in this country for 18 years (not that length of time is relevant) -she was appalled buy it and saddened. Police intervened.
That’s what I thought that morning, it was a bit like the first apollo mission’s press conference, strangely muted.
Boris jumped aboard to prove he was a man of great principle who would succeed cameron while stringing along the the anti euro factions with a nod and a wink forever.
Funny how things work out.
You’re not suggesting Tories lie?
Gove and many others on the Tory right passionately wanted to leave the EU. But what they didn’t want is the complications that now ensue.
Brexit provides the Tories a convenient scapegoat for their economic mismanagement and incompetence. A budget collapsed within days, and they expect us to believe Cameron’s promises on economic security? Now the blame can be laid at the door of Europe, and on the British people for voting to leave it.
Gove has been lambasted for saying the British people have had enough of experts, and comparing the situation to Einstein who, being denounced by a hundred Nazi scientists, said one would have been enough. Actually, Gove was correct. We don’t need project Fear. We don’t need a conspiracy of experts. One is enough. Richard, take a bow!
Cameron is the one who has lost it. He didn’t need to resign, except he knows that everything he stood for is bankrupt. Now he wants to quietly retreat into the shadows, and watch his successor inflict more pain implementing the “wishes of the British people” by exiting the EU. It has been shortsighted from start to finish. A budget plan they could not hope to achieve in a million years. A referendum in which nobody really knew what they were voting for. A campaign to leave the EU without a vision for the future. And they hope to get away with it.
This surprises me not at all.
It is an indication of the gross irresponsibility of those in power.
Those that thought it was fine to call an unnecessary referendum as a quick fix in the first place (see also http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/opinion/you-break-it-you-own-it.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0 ) and those who thought it was fine to propose the argument for leave but, incredibly, in spite of their education, had not thought further.
It demonstrates how our rulers are utterly emotionally disconnected from those they rule. For them the people are rather like lab rats — to be experimented on without anything so scientific as double-blind trials. They treat society as providing the material for a giant social experiment just to see if they can finally secure their own philosophy of life.
Neither did 63% of the Labour voters who backed Remain, but it’s very peculiar how both parties are now so stunned by the result that they seem to be in self-denial, apologetic or self-destruct mode.
I just think this whole saga is being manipulated by the wealthy and powerful to continue to keep their hold on the tiller.
Democracy was just a side show in my view, I don’t think the establishment expected the British people to have a strong opinion either way and are now in a state of shock that they did.
PS -re Corbyn’s travails this makes interesting reading.
http://anotherangryvoice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/is-this-last-stand-of-blairites.html
Indeed. Have you seen this?
http://www.thecanary.co/2016/06/28/truth-behind-labour-coup-really-began-manufactured-exclusive/
I’m reminded of the line from film “The Day After Tomorrow” – “When this storm is over we’ll be in a new Ice Age”.
But I do think that this image management nonsense must fail at important transition points.
I think the word ‘truth’ worries me here
I would take it to be true. N Ahmed has been pretty solid over the years I’ve been reading him.
Solid enough for the guardian to sack him last year.
Whether it is all true or not, there has been an on-going and increasingly intensifying campaign against Corbyn personally, which in my view has absolutely nothing to do with his personality at all.
He should stick to his principles, await any leadership contender to challenge him, allow the party members to decide on the party future, and deal with the Chilcot Report as required when it is published.
I agree with you Richard that it is impossible to lead people who don’t want to be led in the direction of travel that has been chosen by the members.
So what to do if that is the case yet again? Something has to give in the Labour Party, I think its own constitution holds the answers but I don’t know it inside out.
Anyone able to help interpret it?
http://labourlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Rule-Book-2013.pdf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=187&v=-a6HNXtdvVQ
Very good
Just read it – having made my way to the Daily Hate through gritted teeth. What’s more amazing is that Vine gets paid (lots) to write that sort of tosh.
Ivan, I think from the outset of the EU referendum debacle there has been a fairly consistent theme on this blog of the need for fundamental reform of the EU and UK political and economic systems.
The means to achieve that may have been a point of difference (Leave and Reform or Remain and Reform), but reform was the constant.
And so whatever short term economic and political fall out there may be from the result, reform must still be the main focus of those who wanted it then and still do now.
As for Labour, in my view Corbyn should stand his ground and fulfil his mandate to the party members while allowing the dead wood to be cleared out from his shadow cabinet and the rest of the PLP (either voluntarily or forcefully if they show no loyalty).
Because in my view the Labour top team is wrong as it is not united in supporting the core Labour voter, the top team failed to recognise that going into this referendum despite it being clear Corbyn himself and a large number of the members had major reservations about the EU, and therefore the top team needs reshaping around the mandate that Corbyn received from the party.
That is the sign of a good leader (not the pathetic excuses and wimpering of those who don’t have the balls to stand up for the job or support their party members clearly expressed interests).
So let’s see how things develop over the coming days, but the bold must be brave in my opinion!
Frank Mercantile is a plagiarist – I wrote this earlier this week!
Richard my stalker/impersonater/troller seems to be back?
Might you email me the original and copies?
Email on blog
I read this today in disbelief. If it is true then it makes things even worse.
What a bunch of chancers – toffs treating the country as a play pen or back yard to play politics in.
The BREXIT camp has been truly had.
We should start calling it ‘Wrecks-it’ because that is what Cameron and Co have contrived to do. They’ve wrecked the economy and now our international reputation. We are surely a diminished nation now globally. And they are wrecking communities as people react.
I’m astounded at the arguments that have taken place at work this week. I’ve never seen people so upset, embarrassed and if pro-BREXIT – belligerent and defensive – more so than in any general election. People are stopping their work to debate this.
As for the Corbyn saga – Labour people I speak cannot believe that Labour is choosing to do what it is doing now. It detracts from the fact that Johnson and Gove do indeed seem to lack a plan.
The EU will be hard on us in order to send out a message to remaining countries that disunity cannot be tolerated given the forces at work waiting to pounce in Europe if given a smidgen of a chance.
Eric Hobsbawm would call this ‘The New Age of Unreason’ if he were to write about it – I’m sure of it.
Having been in the depths of despair over all this shenanigans, including the PLP, like others, my mind has been focused on the loss of what we have lost. Suddenly, this morning, I have realised that as never before we have a golden, if white knuckle ridden opportunity.
We have spent the last 6 years trying to chip away at edges of this neoliberalism system, where the majority of actors have been hard bitten neos or neo lite. It’s been Animal Farm. Our political class has been so captured and corrupted, there has been no way to break through.
Well. Now it’s broken. All of it. And it is evident for even the most disinterested citizen to see. The whole lot of it, and therein lies a massive opportunity.
People want certainty. They are being offered, left, right and centre an establishment who are broadcasting to them that they don’t give a stuff for them, and they will continue to pay them for fools and tools in their personal ambitions, whilst having not a clue what to do next. Tories & Labour. (With apologies for generalising to individuals who are exceptions on both sides, but under the neocons have been shouted down).
Change doesn’t come from the centre. We are now in an all too clear vacuum. Now is the time for those who have had a plan, hitherto on the fringes, to get the messages out into this void more loudly. There is all to play for: the public are ready – leavers & remainers; the economy is ready – we have just shout the Fox on growth – so a green New Deal is a fresh start; the political class is totally discredited but the public knows that there must be other people out there with the amazing qualities of Jo Cox. They exist and now is a fabulous opportunity for those L,R, and centre to come together in common cause, genuinely for the good of the country.
It’s broke. Lets not try to glue the old pieces together. Let’s strive for what the majority of the contributors to your blog Richard, evidently want. A forward looking, inclusive, sustainable beacon that could show the world that there is an alternative.
Naive? Possibly. But we need hope and vision, it’s where the journey starts. And I, for one, am sick of feeling miserable and powerless.
So where do we sign up?
🙂
I am still working for all of that
I just don’t have a sign up button
I wish I did
Well, lets see if more politically savvy contributors can come up with some suggestions. We really do need to give ourselves and fellow citizens hope and a return of respect, personally and nationally.
At the moment we are looking like turkeys internationally, and that hurts as well.
We have a choice as a country : to sink into the irrelevance of a once proud, now clearly broken country, or to rise like a phoenix from the ashes of our self immolation.
What have we to lose by making the latter choice?
I dont have your eloquence, economic understanding or brainpower Richard, but I have bags of enthusiasm and (normally) a glass half full attitude. There are continues out there who clearly can contribute other skills and competencies. We just need to find the channel. Am not asking you to do it, you have enough on your plate. But you do provide a vehicle – we just need a fleet of them!!!
Contributors not ‘continues’. Bah!
Richard,
TOPIC: I’m thinking of launching a petition to charge several people for TREASON. I see you’re overwhelmed – but what diu think?
and here’s what I first wrote this morning…
your blog and contributors (PSR) are fantastic to read, an island of sanity and hope in this utterly stupid crisis resulting from contemptuous irresponsible behaviour of tory politicians. I’m appalled at the prospect of Gove, Johnson, May or any of these people remaining in charge.
I’m sure several individuals could be charged for treason and punished for jeopardising our entire society, our economy, and our security.
I live and work in Brussels and assure you every Brit and every single thinking person is LIVID about the role of the few individuals who have postured and LIED, distorted information and caused this crisis. Their arrogance and contempt, their disgraceful manipulation of voters must be sanctioned and they should be held to account.
keep up your work – I’d vote you in as PM 🙂
I’m not sure treason is a reasonable charge
As yet…