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European Parliament elections

Brian said:
There should not be a second EU referendum, but IF this should happen the options need to be "leave on WTO terms" or "leave on whatever deal is agreed by parliament."

There has been a referendum on leave / remain and the majority result was in favour of leave.
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Why?

What's in it for you? What's in it for the majority (a real majority, say 67%, not 52)?


It astonishes me that (reasonable) people can still wish to Leave on WTO terms in face of all the evidence...
 
Brian said:
There should not be a second EU referendum, but IF this should happen the options need to be "leave on WTO terms" or "leave on whatever deal is agreed by parliament."

There has been a referendum on leave / remain and the majority result was in favour of leave.
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If that were to happen then I would spoil my ballot paper. I'd urge every remainer to do the same.
 
I think Brian is struggling to count - there clearly needs to be a third referendum which has some actual concrete options rather than hand wavy unicorn options. I tihnk we might need a referendum about whether there should be another referendum
 
Of course it’s no longer about the economy. The Economic Shangri La story was blown out of the water a long time ago. It’s at its core something more visceral and they’re prepared to pay heavily to get it.
 
Far-right racist/misogynist UKIP party leader Gerard Batten on Sophie Ridge’s show doing exactly what he does (including trying to laugh off the rape threats against Jess Philips etc). What an utterly vile character. A remarkably slow-witted bigot, really thick as mince.
 
ff1d1l said:
You changed your mind. I'm guessing the acquisition of more information. Isn't that the sort of thing a country does?
Or are countries condemned to keep coming out with the same old crap, forever?
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Yes to both.
 
S
Tony L said:
Far-right racist/misogynist UKIP party leader Gerard Batten on Sophie Ridge’s show doing exactly what he does (including trying to laugh off the rape threats against Jess Philips etc). What an utterly vile character. A remarkably slow-witted bigot, really thick as mince.
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Sky News platforming the leader of a fringe, declining far right racist party?
 
ks.234 said:
Which has been the problem with Leave all along. Leave is a rant and nothing more. It’s an angry response to perceived ills. It doesn’t have a coherent argument in favour of something better
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Absolutely. I've said before that the Leave vote was in many cases a hitch hiker with a sign saying "Anywhere but here" They've now had the time to work out that a free ride to a luxury hotel in Monaco was never on offer, and the realistic choice is between a lorry park in Rochdale and an underpass off the M62 near Bradford. A second vote means that they can take one of these or decide that in fact they would rather go home.

If there is a 2nd leave vote based on reality rather than lies then I'll accept it. I may not stick around to see the end of the party, other parts of Europe are attractive, but I'll shut up and let it happen.
 
stevec67 said:
Absolutely. I've said before that the Leave vote was in many cases a hitch hiker with a sign saying "Anywhere but here" They've now had the time to work out that a free ride to a luxury hotel in Monaco was never on offer, and the realistic choice is between a lorry park in Rochdale and an underpass off the M62 near Bradford. A second vote means that they can take one of these or decide that in fact they would rather go home.

If there is a 2nd leave vote based on reality rather than lies then I'll accept it. I may not stick around to see the end of the party, other parts of Europe are attractive, but I'll shut up and let it happen.
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Yes, except that having accepted a lift from the (foreign, you know what they’re like, eh?) hairy arsed truck driver, he’ll want a little something for his trouble, and having left all other options behind, your powers to negotiate yourself out of an, er, uncomfortable situation will be limited.

This is the reality of Brexit; that having negotiated ourselves out of the best trade deal on offer, we will be so desperate for any deal from anyone anywhere, that once we’ve sold the family silver (the NHS) we’ll prostitute ourselves with any and every salivating greasy whore monger going.
 
Much to my surprise Andrew Marr was actually half-decent today. He managed to skewer Umunna on the austerity conflict between him and other CUKs such as Soubry. It really does look like this lot are dead in the water now. He was also good with Corbyn exposing him as the non-committal fence sitter he is, every question answered with a remarkably Blair-like “No, what I’m actually saying is [insert evasive waffle-flub/doublespeak/deflection]...” along with an absolute refusal to present any real position, opinion or conviction on any question asked. Vince Cable is clearly past his sell-by date too (even attempting to defend his time with the Tory coalition FFS!). Even so he made the best arguments of the three on Brexit and if they manage to get someone young and articulate in place as leader such as Layla Moran or Jo Swinson I suspect the party could continue to recover their position quite well against such weak competition.
 
Tony L said:
Much to my surprise Andrew Marr was actually half-decent today. He managed to skewer Umunna on the austerity conflict between him and other CUKs such as Soubry. It really does look like this lot are dead in the water now. He was also good with Corbyn exposing him as the non-committal fence sitter he is, every question answered with a remarkably Blair-like “No, what I’m actually saying is [insert evasive waffle-flub/doublespeak/deflection]...” along with an absolute refusal to present any real position, opinion or conviction on any question asked. Vince Cable is clearly past his sell-by date too (even attempting to defend his time with the Tory coalition FFS!). Even so he made the best arguments of the three on Brexit and if they manage to get someone young and articulate in place as leader such as Layla Moran or Jo Swinson I suspect the party could continue to recover their position quite well against such weak competition.
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Marr also did a pretty good job of rattling Farage recently.

 
Tony L said:
Much to my surprise Andrew Marr was actually half-decent today. He managed to skewer Umunna on the austerity conflict between him and other CUKs such as Soubry. It really does look like this lot are dead in the water now. He was also good with Corbyn exposing him as the non-committal fence sitter he is, every question answered with a remarkably Blair-like “No, what I’m actually saying is [insert evasive waffle-flub/doublespeak/deflection]...” along with an absolute refusal to present any real position, opinion or conviction on any question asked. Vince Cable is clearly past his sell-by date too (even attempting to defend his time with the Tory coalition FFS!). Even so he made the best arguments of the three on Brexit and if they manage to get someone young and articulate in place as leader such as Layla Moran or Jo Swinson I suspect the party could continue to recover their position quite well against such weak competition.
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You’re being economical with the truth on Labour/Corbyn Tony, he clearly stated their/his position, campaigning hard in 2016 for remain, standing by the result, but ensuring a safe way forward concerning a deal and the future, with a possible back to the public vote too, seemed clear to me.
 
Having just ploughed through the last 25 pages of this thread, I'm surprised that many people here seem to think of these European elections mostly in tactical UK terms, as if this was a FPTP sort of contest. It clearly isn't, for several reasons:
- quasi-proportional representation makes it easier for smaller parties to get seats
- the UK only gets 10% or so of seats, and the mix of those seats will most likely not swing the European Parliament's composition especially as...
- ... UK MEPs will most likely be gone this time next year because of, erm, Brexit, so they will have very little practical influence anyway.
So all the reasoning about voting tactically to prevent Farage or the Tories from doing this or that to the UK economy or the NHS seems completely off to me. This election is as close as it's going to get to being a single issue vote: which sort of Brexit, if any, do you want? It's not a GE, it's not a vote about who enabled austerity, it's not a vote about Corbyn or Boris or any of the other cast of characters.
 
I'm not sure of your point PsB. I think it's seen as a single issue vote. Endorsement of, or rejection of the current direction of travel. In which case, I would have thought tactics were pretty important.
 
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