The Trump impeachment is mostly done and Congress will soon be taking its Christmas break (a deranged criminal running an enterprise that has thousands of nuclear weapons and spends $100 billion per week is bad, but not so bad that you’d want to stay at your desk during late December/early January?).
My understanding of today’s news is that the UK turned out to have a larger-than-expected supply of voters who refused to follow instructions from their intellectual superiors. Thus, Boris Johnson is firmly in charge and Brexit is actually happening? Maybe our Democrats could use their Christmas break to fly over to the UK and impeach the illegitimately elected Mr. Johnson?
Related:
- Wikipedia on the UK Labour Party, which lost: “an alliance of social democrats, democratic socialists and trade unionists. The party’s platform emphasises greater state intervention, social justice and strengthening workers’ rights.” (i.e., deplorables in the UK actually voted against justice)
deplorables in the UK actually voted against justice
Are you still using Hillary Clinton’s definition of deplorables – racists, homophobes, etc.? If so, it shouldn’t be surprising that they would vote against justice.
> Brexit is actually happening?
No, but “Brino” is. The UK will remain subject to EU rules (probably with on-the-spot supervision by EU officials, see here). For example, it’s safe to predict that access to UK waters for EU fishing vessels will continue. The UK will remain liable for its membership fees for at least another year, i.e. after Brexit is supposedly “done”. The UK’s semi-detached status will be mostly unchanged, but modified by some punishments for its half hearted attempt to escape.
Democrats are already there:
#NotMyPM is trending on Twitter.
The drive to “resist the racist Johnson” is on.
Glen Simpson confirmed the Russian meddling in the UK affairs in yesterday’s Guardian.
The official Congressional delegation (aka the Squad) will be joining shortly: they are busy practicing a new X-mas carol, From the River to the Sea Palestine Will Be Free. (some local Labor activists chanted that on the election day)
I doubt there are enough Americans who understand British politics or can maintain interest in it for more than a few hours to care about the election. And my own take on the results are:
1) Despite all the hue and cry, Britain doesn’t look vastly different than it did in 2017.
See the comparison map here: https://www.bbc.com/news/election-2019-50786580
2) Yes, Conservatives won a lot of seats (not as many as the exit polls predicted) but in fact it means that the Conservative Party is now representing more left wing people than it ever has in modern history. So it will move left if it wants to keep them. In a couple of years’ time it will mean that the Conservative party is either closer to Labour in spirit if not in name, not the other way around.
3) Giving Boris Johnson the mandate to get Brexit done doesn’t make it any easier to achieve, but if he wants to do it expeditiously, he will need to move quickly to arrive at terms that the EU will agree with on a rapid timescale, which is good for the EU from a negotiating position. Now Johnson is under pressure to deliver this thing before the end of the year, or all of it has been another pointless exercise in confusion and frustration.
Sadly, I don’t see the election as much of a conservative sea change. If anything, Labour stayed where they were and the Conservatives will now have to accomodate the Labour voters who switched their votes for the sake of getting Brexit through.
Nancy Pelosi made it clear to the British authorities that any Brexit that reintroduces a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland would mean a trade deal between the US and UK would be DOA in Congress. In this, she is speaking for the entire USA as the Irish-American caucus cuts across party lines and is united on the subject. That’s why Johnson agreed to a deal that effectively keeps Northern Ireland in the EU and institutes an internal border between NI and the rest of the UK.
The EU actually prefer having Boris Johnson as British PM, as he is a useful idiot. The much-ballyhooed deal he cut with the EU ensures no tariffs on goods, but France and Germany have a strong trade surplus with the UK on goods, and this is to their advantage, whereas the UK trades mostly in services, legal, financial and so on, and those are primarily affected by non-tariff barriers which are not addressed by the deal.
You’d think the crushing fiasco will make Labour go back towards the center and repudiate antisemitism within its ranks, but Corbyn, like all marxist apparatchiks, is very accomplished at taking over the party apparatus from within (using the Momentum group of Troskyist infiltrators), and even though he will have to resign, it’s likely his successor will continue his ideological line, meaning the UK is in line for at least a decade of Tory domination in the UK, or what’s left of it when the Scots secede.
“Nancy Pelosi made it clear to the British authorities…”
Thank God they don’t have foreigners interfering in their political process!
They don’t?
https://amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/12/britain-mueller-report-russian-media-uk-us
Every time the uneducated masses dare to cast their votes, you can see Putin lurking in the back.
M: Countries whose political systems are not controlled from Russia will complain about not being considered important enough for Putin to meddle.
Those systemically unimportant (aka, s***hole) counties should not despair: if Russia seems to ignore you there is always Israel to blame.
Wags in the UK are saying the best solution is for England to Leave the UK, so Scotland/Gibraltar/NI can Remain. London would get special status, like West Berlin back in the day.
That was fast: ” Several hundred noisy protesters marched through central London on Friday to protest against Britain’s election result, chanting “Boris Johnson: Not My Prime Minister” and “Boris, Boris, Boris: Out, Out, Out”
http://news.trust.org/item/20191213183240-g4w1z
[Aside: For all we know they could be Russians, though, in which case he’s literally not their Prime Minister, but we’ll never know because the three people reporting on this story for Thompson Reuters couldn’t be bothered to figure out who the protestors are affiliated with. It’s always fascinating that the media is able to report on things that are secret, top secret, and other information by people who weren’t allowed to comment, but in a story like this they can’t identify who the protestors are affiliated with. These protestors had signs, they were organized, drew a ‘heavy police presence’ and marched past 10 Downing Street to Trafalgar Square and beyond, but nobody knows who they were.]