Brexit :(

Bale them out

Kek

Hmmm, maybe May will get her deal through if she can get a veto for parliament on the backstop. It's a shit deal though. Not sure anybody wants it but they might be convinced to back it rather than a second referendum, which would be annoying.

SECOND ref would be disaster

Brexit will be a disaster

It wouldn't be a disaster (2nd ref) if a larger majority than voted leave last time voted remain. Say at least 60% vote remain this time round. That would give a clear democratic message that we've seen the options and changed our minds - which is a reasonable thing to do. Or even the other way round wouldn't be so bad (e.g. 60% leave this time) - again, clear large majority and we can just get on with it, probably under May's proposed deal or something very like it.

If it was a repeat of last time though with a margin of less than 5% either way then yeah, would probably cause more problems. I like to think that we'd get a nice chunky remain majority though and can then call it off and go and sit at the back for a few years being well behaved.

  On 12/6/2018 at 4:53 PM, BCM said:

I like to think that we'd get a nice chunky remain majority though and can then call it off and go and sit at the back for a few years being well behaved.

Isn't that what Cameron and his pals expected the first time around....

  On 12/6/2018 at 7:29 AM, goDel said:

Yeah. Its kinda like saying the concept of the dollar is fundamentally flawed.

As far as I'm concerned the flaws come from difficulties of having vastly different economies under a single coin. It's certainly not perfect. But to say it's fundamentally flawed is overselling it, imo. Sometimes things can be fixed. But I don't consider myself a specialist. It's just that theres a bunch of pros and cons. And coming from a pretty big crisis, its real easy to focus on the flaws. And rightly so, i guess. But fundamentally flawed? You could make an argument that without the euro, things could have been way worse.

Not at all. The dollar works because one entity sets monetary policy for the US, and the US also sets its own fiscal policy (as does Canada). The EU, countries set their own fiscal policy, but have no control over monetary policy. If every state in the US set their own fiscal policy but had to adhere to the monetary policy of the federal gov't, you'd see the same problems that Euro-members face.

  On 12/6/2018 at 9:29 AM, fletcher said:

The weaker euro economies are forced into austerity measures whilst the stronger euro economies bale them out.

That to me seems fundamentally flawed.

Exactly (and that's ignoring the fact that austerity measures have never worked to combat recessions). Monetary union without political union was doomed from the start.

  On 12/7/2018 at 6:41 PM, chenGOD said:

 

  On 12/6/2018 at 9:29 AM, fletcher said:

The weaker euro economies are forced into austerity measures whilst the stronger euro economies bale them out.

That to me seems fundamentally flawed.

 

Exactly (and that's ignoring the fact that austerity measures have never worked to combat recessions). Monetary union without political union was doomed from the start.

 

Ireland wasn't one of the weaker Euro economies before the crash (it was one of the strongest), and it was proof that austerity can work (because it's back, or at least on the way given the current growth rates, to being one of the strongest again). I wasn't in favour of austerity at the time, and still wouldn't be in favour given the choice in the future, but it did work (it just wasn't worth the pain, nor was it morally justified).

The fact that the Euro survived the financial crash suggests it wasn't doomed at all, in fact it's quite robust.

Ireland had a certain set of conditions that allowed it to recover in spite of austerity, not because of it. The biggest factor was probably the export activity of multinational companies. Austerity was possibly necessary to correct public finances (though there could have been other solutions), but as you pointed out, the pain imposed on the working/middle class of Ireland was completely unjustifiable.

The Euro may have survived, but the intrinsic risk is still there, and no mitigating measures have been taken.

It's not true that no measures have been taken (e.g. ESM). This won't be a permanent solution, but there are various different avenues along which it could be developed in the future into something more robust (along with banking reforms, etc), this could either take an EU focused approach (what the Germans and French want, including tax harmonisation), or keep most stuff in national control (what most everyone else wants, i.e. the new Hanseatic League, a much better idea).

The Euro isn't an ideal currency by any means, it takes a lot of work to get around the inherent problems; but given how much it helps facilitate trade, and simply for the convenience it affords individuals, it's definitely worth the trouble.

The ESM is not a mitigating measure to the intrinsic problems with the Euro currency. If the EU wants to compete with the US  (and potentially ASEAN+3 (much) further down the line) they would do well to increase centralization of policy decisions.

If the EU wants to keep the Euro (and I agree, simplified currency rules make day-to-day life much easier in a giant bloc like the EU or US), then the fiscal policy of Euro members needs to be centralized. This would actually reduce bureaucratic bloat, as it would do away with much of the bureaucracy in the individual nations. Yes sovereignty would be impacted, but that is a tough question that needs to be asked - in his globalized world, do you want to be a sovereign Greece/Italy/UK, or do you want to take more fulsome advantage of the economies of scale that a bloc with unified monetary and fiscal policy would provide.

I think the UK would actually benefit quite a lot by ditching the pound and going full Euro, our economy is more than capable of making the transition successfully. Will never happen in a million years though. Maybe the EU should adopt the pound. Maybe everyone should just say fuck it and adopt Sterling. It would certainly make things easier for everyone in the UK.

So it looks like the UK can remain without approval of the other EU members so the European Court of Justice decided. I wonder if and how this will influence the vote tomorrow.

What a complete fucking farce this has been.

Brexisn't right up my shizn't

Yep, this will certainly influence tomorrow's vote imo. We have a clear way out and I can see most MPs taking it.

Fuck's sake, there will not be a vote tomorrow now as Mrs May is delaying it - she knows she would lose spectacularly and we would then inevitably have to go to a second vote. She seems obsessed with getting her (bad) deal through and won't countenance any other options. She needs to go and we need a more pragmatic leader open to the possibility of simply remaining as we are.

can we just regress back into deranged inbred monarchy again please, I think I'd be happier as a swamp person farming moss as is what appears to be my family history

^ lol

  On 12/10/2018 at 2:06 PM, WeAreOceans said:

can we just regress back into deranged inbred monarchy again please, I think I'd be happier as a swamp person farming moss as is what appears to be my family history

Fuck that, I want to go back further. Pre-1066, back to the pagan gods and fears of witches. Bring it on.

whadda bitch move

  On 12/10/2018 at 3:49 PM, tec said:

 

  On 12/10/2018 at 2:06 PM, WeAreOceans said:

can we just regress back into deranged inbred monarchy again please, I think I'd be happier as a swamp person farming moss as is what appears to be my family history

Fuck that, I want to go back further. Pre-1066, back to the pagan gods and fears of witches. Bring it on.

 

Actually have considered ditching my current high stress engineering job in favour of building dry stone walls out in the countryside.

Probably going to be a high priority move in 2019.

All my work (releasing critical studio updates for a certain british broadcaster) keeps getting postponed as they don't want to break anything while all this juicy news is flying around. If Mrs May can sustain the clusterfuck for 4 more days Im home free till 2019

A possible silver lining might be - i'm hoping... - that after a definite brexisnt Farage and his buddies will jump into some abyss, head first.