Brexit

Brexit referendum: in-out, in-out, shake it all about

The EU vote offers a mirror to the British left. The right-wing “remain” and “leave” coalitions are both monstrosities. It is up to us to liberate ourselves.

quote:

A post-Brexit unfettered right-wing government speeds collapse, coupled with growing and confident far-right non-state actors it would push societies’ most vulnerable into new heights of oppression. Thus, when examining the IN or OUT vote we must be vigilant in understanding that the outcome is what counts, and that it is predominately those not voting, those trapped in wage slavery and precarious day-to-day lives who will face the wrath. Our role as revolutionaries is to play a meta-game, to forecast, to plan ahead.

Deborah Grayson, an activist in Britain recently highlighted how a lack of communal vision means a lack of possibility to counteract the right: “There’s no story about how we’re going to build a more equal society afterwards; there’s no excitement about the new institutions we might build or the positive, progressive culture we can feel developing around us.” In truth, we have nothing near an organized social force that could contest the hounds of the Conservative Party and the far-right.

Whose union?

Britain’s most important referendum for a hot minute is imminent, and to put it simply, we’re not ready. Progressives of the left posit arguments highlighting an imperial European Union, where Europe’s ruling class still seeks to consolidate its colonial influence and borders by utilizing terrorism in all forms to advance the mission of a rigged neoliberal free-trade regime.

A European Union superseded by a Troika whose structural adjustment plans plunge the common person into paying for capitalism’s crisis. A European Union that murders tens of thousands through its rampant border militarization, racist asylum laws, inhumane detention policies, unjust deportations and corporate carrier sanctions.

josh wrote:

This isn't just about Britain.  What it does will affect the whole EU enterprise.  If you want to maintain the anti-democatic, right-wing economic enterprise, a vote to remain will be good news.

But for some reason its all the anti-democratic, right-wing parties and interest groups that spearhead anti-EU sentiments in every single country. Who is against the EU? Its a veritable rogues gallery of neo-fascist xenophobic parties such as UKIP, rightwing Eurosceptic Tories, the Front national in France, AFD in Germany, the neo-Nazi Freedom party in Austria, the anti-immigrant Freedom Party in the Netherlands...meanshile who is pro-EU? all the Green parties, all the socialist parties, Jeremy Corbyn, the New Statesman, the Fabian Society, all the mainstream labour unions, etc...

The EU is a fascist organization that does not believe in citizens having democratic control over the economy of their individual countries. If you don't believe me ask the people of Greece and Spain about how their democracy works for them.

It is very telling that the mainstream parties of the "left" have all drank the corporate trade kool aid and want the Trokia to run everything. I guess that leaves them lots of time to tilt at windmills.

m.....eanshile who is pro-EU? all the Green parties, all the socialist parties, Jeremy Corbyn, the New Statesman, the Fabian Society, all the mainstream labour unions, etc...

...What better proof of the total bankruptcy of the left and Greens, to the degree this is true!
What is needed is a major realignment, where the rights of citizens, popular democracy and eco decentralism maycome together!
Shame on those fascistic oriented Greens betraying their fundamentals, for political oppportunism...this is what hurts the most as someone once engaged in building that movement ...where and when will such a realignment take place in this most compromised corrupt of countries, Kanada?

This ought to be a project of rabble!

Elderly man punched in the face for handing out remain leaflets Kind of reassuring to know what would occur if Brexit happened, eh! First murder and now assaulting senior citizens. Canadians just can't wait to join forces with a group that acts like that.

People supporting Brexit are choosing ugly bedfellows

6079_Smith_W wrote:

Do you honestly think things are going be better for working class Britain because of this?

Sorry, but it is a sham.

Yes, the EU is a sham.

6079_Smith_W wrote:

You don't know what would be good for them. Sounds like magical revolution thinking. Chop their heads off and everything will fall into place.

Wow just a tad on the dismissive "fuck you" side don't you think. Your thinking is not magical at all just regurgitation of right wing bullshit.

NorthReport wrote:

Actually I must have missed WW3 Sorry about that Anyway back from Bizarro World Leading Conservative quits Leave campaign due to hateful, xenophobic remarks I have to question anyone who wants to be associated with Farage and his ilk

NorthReport wrote:

Husband calls for fight against the hatred that killed her

NorthReport wrote:

Agreed that Europe would do much better if more fully integrated. One currency, zero internal borders. The UK could help by showing some constructive leadership, end this Brexit sham, give up the pound and join the euro

Oh, I get it. You're spouting nonsense because you don't understand the first thing about the issue. In your mind this is some PC fluffy bunny thing.

I'll give you a little advice. When someone makes an intelligent argument on a matter of international politics and economics and you don't understand any of it, it's better to keep the ol' pie hole shut.

Doug Woodard wrote:

Brexit would make Britain the world's most hated nation (mostly a good review of the EU and its history, its importance, and the Euro mistake):

http://gu.com/p/4mx8j/sbl

Intelligent article. Hysterically-infantile utterly-absurd title. (Something tells me the author did not come up with it.)

I disagree with the conclusions. The UK is on the periphery of Europe. If the UK withdraws from the European Economic Union, and that causes the EEU to fall apart, then the EEU should fall apart: i.e., it's a big mess that's more trouble than it's worth. Then it's back to the drawing board.

If a Brexit does not cause the EEU to fall apart, it will certainly bring about an enormous amount of pressure to fix what is wrong with it: especially the euro-zone which is certain to cause the EEU to fall apart along Axis and Allied lines as fascist revolutions break out (as they did in the 1930s under similar economic chaos.)

A thumbs down on the Brexit will be taken as a thumbs up to the establishment's stranglehold over the continent.

To simply the euro-zone argument there are two options: a) each nation in the territory is a nation with its own currency, central bank and fiscal policy; b) each nation in the territory is a province in the European nation/empire; economic problems in some provinces can't be remedied with empire-wide monetary policy; therefore they must be remedied with fiscal transfers and automatic stabilizers (public benefits like UI and welfare which are distributed across all provinces equally and managed by the empire government.)

With option b) living standards must be equal in Germany and Greece (like they are in different Canadian provinces.)

What exists now is b) without the fiscal transfers leaving troubled provinces to rot in a pointless depression to 'suffer for their economic sins'. (I.e., a flood of capital in euros was invested in the "PIGS" causing big current account deficits which are typically accompanied by big budget deficits [according to the Twin Deficits hypothesis.] Then the bubble burst, the Great Recession hit and the "PIGS" were on the hook for the flood of capital in an essential foreign currency. Apparently it's a 'sin' to allow foreign investment! It's certainly dumb to have no democratic oversight and regulation over it — unless you're looking to wreak economic havoc a la Friedman's 'disaster capitalism.')

Axis and Allied lines?More likely on affluent and not so lines, if it gets that far. Somehow I don't see Germany, Spain and Italy in the same boat.

(and funny that the talk during the Greek crisis was that it would be Germany which might have to make the decision to leave)

Another take on the left supporters of Brexit:

http://qz.com/708979/the-loudest-supporters-of-brexit-are-on-the-right-b...

(edit)

Cross posted White Cat.

Yes it would be convenient to make your strange bedfellows just disappear or turn into a pizza once you are done with them. But the fact is they will still be there, and in more of a fighting mood to push the rest of their agenda, which probably doesn't include singing The Internationale.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/sadiq-khan-britain-first-london...

George Soros: EU exit risks 'black Friday':

http://gu.com/p/4m4e6/sbl

6079_Smith_W wrote:

Axis and Allied lines?More likely on affluent and not so lines, if it gets that far. Somehow I don't see Germany, Spain and Italy in the same boat.

(and funny that the talk during the Greek crisis was that it would be Germany which might have to make the decision to leave)

Another take on the left supporters of Brexit:

http://qz.com/708979/the-loudest-supporters-of-brexit-are-on-the-right-b...

(edit)

Cross posted White Cat.

Yes it would be convenient to make your strange bedfellows just disappear or turn into a pizza once you are done with them. But the fact is they will still be there, and in more of a fighting mood to push the rest of their agenda, which probably doesn't include singing The Internationale.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/sadiq-khan-britain-first-london...

 

 

As with your neo-liberal, Reaganite bedfellows.

Cody87 wrote:

I was hoping to learn a bit on this topic from a left wing perspective, so I just spent about 20 minutes skimming this thread. I didn't read the articles. This is my take:

"Brexit would deal a blow to global neoliberalism (with some disagreement as to how strong a blow, but certainly a blow nonetheless), which we want, but Brexit is supported by the facists and racists. Therefore, remain."

Do I have the right of it?

Quote:

"Brexit would deal a blow to global neoliberalism (with some disagreement as to how strong a blow, but certainly a blow nonetheless), which we want, but Brexit is supported by the facists and racists. Therefore, remain."

Do I have the right of it?

I think I suggested mostly the same thing in #45, but if you read the thread you can see that evidently I was just hallucinating or somethin'.

Nobody's saying "do" or "don't", but if you "do" then you're standing shoulder to shoulder with UKIP.  Think about that!

When it acts like a duck, and talks like a duck, it probably is a duck! 

EU referendum: Khan and Davidson clash with Johnson on immigration

London mayor accuses his predecessor of ‘project hate’ during BBC’s biggest referendum event

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/21/eu-referendum-khan-and-d...

swallow wrote:

[img]https://grrrgraphics.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/brexit_ben_garrison.jpg...

I noticed the fellow with the turban on, mumbling "fuck, fuck", and reaching for the cringing woman on the masthead, and figured I should take a closer look at that cartoon. I do appreciate you posting it (because it is good to know how these people think, and I had never heard of this guy), but holy cow what a racist, xenophobic piece of work.

Turns out is isn't from one of the regular media; ben Garrision has his own blog.

http://grrrgraphics.com/index.html

And it turns out people have been taking his works and making them even more racist. But as it happens this is his own work.

http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2015/12/22/ben-garrison-how-the-internet-m...

Brexit and the Left

quote:

Johnson, as leader, would depend on the hard right and feel compelled to give them red meat. In the new polarization of politics, post-Brexit, a more right-wing Tory party would once again win the election, and the protections and rights in British law, conforming to EU regulations, would be rolled back.

And thus would descend a long reign of reaction.

Well, that’s one way of calculating the possibilities, and it’s a real risk. But it isn’t the only way to think through the prospects, and these aren’t the only considerations.

We don’t know that the Tories wouldn’t split down the middle after a Brexit. We don’t know that Jeremy Corbyn wouldn’t find the 2020 election much easier. We don’t know that, deprived of their key mobilizing issue, the radical right might not begin to run out of steam.

I am not claiming that all of these outcomes are likely, merely that there is a degree of indeterminacy. On the other hand, we don’t need to speculate too much about what staying in means — it means Maastricht, Lisbon, the fiscal pact, competition laws, etc., along with the free movement of labor within the union.

It means privatization and competition in the public sector. It means neoliberal limits on borrowing and spending.

It means for sure that the further centralization of power in the hands of its unelected institutions will continue apace. It means that the iron cage of the bureaucracy, codifying the interests and demands of the European Business Roundtable, will continue to tighten around the representative institutions.

That is a lot of ifs.

And why on earth would the radical right run out of steam after a great victory, sold on the promise of shutting the doors to immigrants, and threatening non-whites who are already in Britain? Seems to me they would be itching for their next move - to pay a visit to Sadiq Khan's mosque, as promised, no?

This is also rather like "chop their heads off and see what happens", and depending on virtually everything going your way, and any opposition just giving up. And considering those opponents control parliament, that is really wishful thinking. How many times has that happened in past cases like this?

This video by Owen Jones on the DIRE consequences of a Brexit is well worth watching:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FqAaD_lsRw&list=PLTYmWuFco1_1xD06DoY0BR...

Italy's 5-star wants vote on euro, joining wave of referendumsWed Jun 22, 2016 1:37pm GMT Print | Single Page[-] Text [+]

Any referendum on the euro would be merely a test of public opinion because Italian law does not allow such votes to change international treaties. It would also require a lengthy parliamentary procedure to organise and would be highly unlikely unless 5-Star first won power at a national election.

But if it were to eventually produce a popular rejection of the euro it would send a clear signal to the government.

Supporters of 5-Star say Sunday's mayoral election results, where the party won in 19 of the 20 cities that went to a runoff vote, including the capital Rome the northern industrial city Turin, as a possible springboard to national rule.

Its founder Beppe Grillo has also called for a referendum on whether Italy should stay in the European Union.

"We are now waiting for the results of the Brexit referendum. The mere fact that a country like Great Britain is holding a referendum on whether to leave the EU signals the failure of the European Union," Di Maio said.

Last week, Nigel Farage, leader of the pro-Brexit UK Independence Party, said the victory of 5-Star's Virginia Raggi as Rome's first woman mayor, followed by a British vote to leave the EU in Thursday's referendum, would be the start of the disintegration of the EU.

EU Referendum: Nazis, the Queen, and Free Tattoos

https://www.rt.com/uk/347713-eu-referendum-leave-remain/

'Leave' and 'Remain' make final pitches (LIVE UPDATES)

Stockholm wrote:

The European Union as we know it started in the late 1940s with e the European Coal and Steel Community between France, West Germany and Benelux...that quickly evolved into the European Commin Market which had a European Parliament in Strasbourg. European integration was essentially to NOT having the countries of Europe not reverting to all the enmities that characterized the interwar period.

Dreams of Eurpoean unification have gone all the way back to the Roman Empire, and have continued through such historical events as Napolean Bonaparte and Adolf Hitler. Despite the dreams of elite Europeans, Europe is a vast, diverse continent with far too many differences politically, culturally, and economically for that kind of unity to be feasible. The rise and fall of the EU is just another example of this history playing itself out.

As for the idea that the right-wing xenophobes are in favour of Brexit, therefore the left should oppose by default? Yes, the rising xenophobia around the world is frightening and must be confronted. But has anyone ever stopped to ask why xenophobia is on the rise, even in "tolerant" countries like Sweden where the nationalist party recently topped the polls, or Canada where a major political party won 30% of the vote based on Muslim-bashing? It is because for decades, people have been told (with acquiescence from left-liberal parties like the Liberals, Labour, Parti Socialist, SPD, PASOK, PSOE) that governments must not play a role in major economic decisions and instead allow "the market" to solve problems. So you have things like lower wages, higher unemployment, higher taxes and fees, and fewer government services taking a toll on people's lives, and they hear over and over that there's nothing they can do about it. That only tends to breed frustration, and after a while people who are that frustrated will look for easy targets to blame. Remember the controversies we've had about temporary foreign workers in Canada in recent years? Have you ever wondered why that anger didn't descend into a mob mentality of "these workers are taking away Candian jobs?" It's because critics of the program did a good job blaming companies for relying on TFWs as a source of cheap labour and pointing out that it hurt TFWs who were being taken advantage of as well as Canadian workers who weren't even being considered.

Aristotleded24 wrote:

Stockholm wrote:

The European Union as we know it started in the late 1940s with e the European Coal and Steel Community between France, West Germany and Benelux...that quickly evolved into the European Commin Market which had a European Parliament in Strasbourg. European integration was essentially to NOT having the countries of Europe not reverting to all the enmities that characterized the interwar period.

Dreams of Eurpoean unification have gone all the way back to the Roman Empire, and have continued through such historical events as Napolean Bonaparte and Adolf Hitler. Despite the dreams of elite Europeans, Europe is a vast, diverse continent with far too many differences politically, culturally, and economically for that kind of unity to be feasible. The rise and fall of the EU is just another example of this history playing itself out.

As for the idea that the right-wing xenophobes are in favour of Brexit, therefore the left should oppose by default? Yes, the rising xenophobia around the world is frightening and must be confronted. But has anyone ever stopped to ask why xenophobia is on the rise, even in "tolerant" countries like Sweden where the nationalist party recently topped the polls, or Canada where a major political party won 30% of the vote based on Muslim-bashing? It is because for decades, people have been told (with acquiescence from left-liberal parties like the Liberals, Labour, Parti Socialist, SPD, PASOK, PSOE) that governments must not play a role in major economic decisions and instead allow "the market" to solve problems. So you have things like lower wages, higher unemployment, higher taxes and fees, and fewer government services taking a toll on people's lives, and they hear over and over that there's nothing they can do about it. That only tends to breed frustration, and after a while people who are that frustrated will look for easy targets to blame. Remember the controversies we've had about temporary foreign workers in Canada in recent years? Have you ever wondered why that anger didn't descend into a mob mentality of "these workers are taking away Candian jobs?" It's because critics of the program did a good job blaming companies for relying on TFWs as a source of cheap labour and pointing out that it hurt TFWs who were being taken advantage of as well as Canadian workers who weren't even being considered.

Yes, just because some of the people support Brexit for the wrong reasons doesn't mean you shouldn't support Brexit for the right reasons.