So...Brexit.

[mjr]

I heard Northern Ireland might do the same also. England just destroyed the UK.

"Brexit" has also caused a resurgence of "Texit" talk by the Texas Nationalist Movement here in the Lone Star State.

[Lace Neil Singer]

Maybe in a few years... there will be Frexit (France leaving), Spexit (Spain) or even Gerexit (Germany). The entire Eurozone could collapse. In which case, it would be pretty silly for Scotland to risk leaving the UK. They'd find themselves stuck out alone, with no EU and no UK.

[mjr]

Maybe in a few years... there will be Frexit (France leaving), Spexit (Spain) or even Gerexit (Germany). The entire Eurozone could collapse. In which case, it would be pretty silly for Scotland to risk leaving the UK. They'd find themselves stuck out alone, with no EU and no UK.

France, Italy, and The Netherlands may be next...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016...rlands-now-wa/

[wolfie]

"Brexit" has also caused a resurgence of "Texit" talk by the Texas Nationalist Movement here in the Lone Star State.

They'd better be careful - or there'll be a referendum question on the ballot in 49 states "Should Texas be expelled from the United States?"

[Lace Neil Singer]

And... we made Wikipedia. Yay?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United...European_Union

[Canarr]

Considering that there's already some backpedalling going on - "There's no need to rush into things!" - I'm not too sure that Brexit is really going to happen.

Maybe it's only been intended as a ploy to pressure the EU into further improving the UK's membership terms.

[s_stabeler]

It's possible, but I doubt it. The referendum is not legally binding, but considering the EU are already putting pressure on the Government to start the process of leaving quickly, if it is a bluff, the EU is calling the bluff.

[HYHYBT]

I doubt it. The issues that caused the World Wars were basically countries trying to gain either de facto or de jure control over other countries, and a web of alliances that pulled in the entirety of europe. In this case, the EU is accepting that the UK wants out, so there's nothing to argue over to cause a war. The UK wants to negotiate to preserve some of the benefits of EU membership, but it's generally accepted the EU has the final say. As such, there's no casus belli for war to break out.

If this is the start of a larger breakup, where you wind up with all the countries that can stand alone doing so... well, it's not exactly the start of war, but it's the beginning of setting things up where one is more likely to happen eventually.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

As a voter in the state of Texas, if that succeeded I'd immediately attempt to separate Dallas from the state of Texas. If you look at a map of the state, you will see that when we vote, the pattern looks a lot like the Brexit. In the urban centers that drive the economy, you don't see that. It's these morons living in population 20,000 towns that drive that BS because it really doesn't matter to them.

But Dallas, Austin, Houston, and San Antonio would have their economies shredded if something like that happened. Basically what you just saw in the UK is why the US has supermajority rules for certain types of changes. It can't happen because of a wacky result in an election. It has to happen in a wacky result in an election in which there are concretely more people in favor of the act than not.

[mjr]

It's these morons living in population 20,000 towns that drive that BS because it really doesn't matter to them.

I don't know where in Texas you live. I don't know if I should take offense to the above statement or not, since I actually do live in a town of approximately 20K. By choice.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

Take all the offense you want or not. It's how Texas votes. Texas is solidly purple or Blue in the urban centers that fire its economy.

I don't care if people live in small towns by choice. I do care when politically speaking the voting apparatus is rigged in their favor which Texas is pretty obvious with. And I do care when people start mindlessly popping off about exiting larger unions, especially when it is not up to Houston, Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio to honor it.

Hell, how funny would it be if some vote like that passed and the city of Austin immediately held a referendum seceding from Texas?

[TheHuckster]

There are pros and cons I see in both sides, though.

On one hand, I see a case for what you're saying, D_Yeti_Esquire, where you've got a majority of people who are, per capita, producing more than the ranchers in the middle of nowhere, seeing their voice squashed by these people who, first off, aren't even really affected by the decision because they are truly urban issues anyways.

On the other hand, I could have a problem with a situation where the urban areas, due to their vast population, rule the rural areas and similarly make decisions that completely screw the ranchers. The old "tyranny by the majority" situation, if you will.

Let's use a purely hypothetical scenario: A bill gets placed which increases the statewide property tax by $100 per acre to benefit the public transit system in all urban areas. To the city dweller, this is a no-brainer. They own, on average, a quarter acre, so their property tax goes up by a mere $25. Sounds like a sweet deal.

Meanwhile, the rancher owning 1,000 acres who, by the way, just had a serious drought, is about to see a bill for $100,000. They have a low population, but such a voting decision could have very serious consequences for them. In essence, the folks who pay the most for the benefits are the ones benefiting the least.

That's why I have a hard time with certain large-scale laws that should be more localized, especially if the benefits of such laws or decisions are themselves localized. Granted, the scenario I describe above is extreme, and I know property taxes aren't a flat rate based on acreage but are based on property values and the like, but there are similar decisions that have been on the ballot that, had the urban centers had all the power, would have seriously screwed the rural areas.

[Rapscallion]

Settle back, kiddies. Old Uncle Rapscallion is here.

That was a bloody close and slightly surprising vote, that much I'll admit. However, there are some things to consider.

Sure, until ratified the vote isn't legally binding, but despite the monarchy and so forth we're still a democracy, and as David Cameron said, he has to go with what the people wanted, and since he couldn't find it in himself to do that, he's stepping aside to let someone else do it. Any politician who refuses to do what the public say is going find themselves distinctly unpopular between now and the next election that they lose. In the intervening time, they will receive stern letters, and their secretaries will 'forget' to bring in the sugar cubes with the tea, or the tea will be stewed too long, and other such things. A few militant secretaries may even leave a covered tray that the politician in question mind discover to contain a glass of whiskey and a revolver with a single shot, expecting them to do the decent thing.

Also, Cameron probably swore quite a bit recently in private.

Now, bear in mind that the EU is a political ideal, even to the extent that Greece was allowed in when they failed every significant test they needed to pass to attain entry. The top dogs in the EU won't admit this, but they want us in and they want more members. Right not, it's hissy fit time. We've been somewhat half in and half out for some time, with our pouty faces and vetoes and not using the Euro (a currency that sounds like a university student vomiting into a gutter).

They want us, but they want us to be more compliant. Given their usual preferences, though, they're going to stamp their feet for a bit and then try a charm offensive. We're almost certainly going to end up either considered to be part of the EEA or some kludge similar to that. The EEA is one of the forerunners of the EU and Norway is still in that club. How that works is that there's still the open borders that I enjoy when I pop to the continent on a cheap flight, same free trade arrangement, don't have to pay, but you do have to follow the EU rules and you don't get a say in what they are. That's highly likely, I'd say.

So, what actually happened from my perspective? There's blame being assigned to the older demographic who voted more towards leave by the younger demographic who think their future has been taken from them. Now, there's an aspect whereby there were hints that if we left, the money we weren't giving to the EU (£350m a week, thought with rebates and money we get back more like £190m or so) would be spent wonderfully on the NHS, something that would appeal to the older demographic. Of course, now that hint has been withdrawn before the ink was dry on the final ballot papers, there are a few people feeling a bit silly.

There were a huge number of 'scare hint' soundbites, mostly used successfully by the Leave campaign, and most of which were bullshit. Scare stories work far better than good news, as anyone who sees the newspaper headlines will be able to attest. On that topic, whilst there's a number of Leave campaigners who don't like the federal way of doing things and have objections that way, and there's a number of people who crunched numbers to work out what they might do due to monetary reasons, there's been more than a few who were persuaded by the hints about immigrants. Apparently we aren't allowed to control our borders (we can - we have a few exemptions because we've been doing the whole half-in half-out dance for years), and I've had one person tell me they don't want their child brought up surrounded by immigrants. That's disappointing. I don't think all these people are racists, but those who aren't have been scared by racists playing on tribalistic instincts.

I've made mention of the bile from the young to the old demographic. Now, there's a very real concern that there's a racist undertone to the communities in the western hemisphere regarding immigrants. However, the older demographic isn't necessarily motivated by worrying about brown faces fleeing from countries we've dropped bombs on, but when I was growing up in the eighties when I was starting and ending my teenage years, there was a hostility towards the EU. This was based on one thing.

The French.

See, the UK has fought with pretty much every country in Yurp, and on the side of the same countries at other times. Most of them are not notable in any way, barring the Germans who are overly guilt stricken about the whole WW2 thing. The French, though, are perceived as standing out as the most arrogant country going. To be fair, in my experience this is just the big city French, such as Parisians, but it does happen. When our country wanted in to the trading club, General de Gaulle was the first and loudest to say 'Non!'. This is the same de Gaulle who was given safe haven in England and resources to run his resistance movement, and received the support of British Military Intelligence, with consequent loss of life of special operatives, and all that good stuff. This is the same de Gaulle whose country is the resting place for thousands of US and other country servicemen who charged German machine gun nests when liberating his country so he could go home and be declared a hero.

This isn't just in the UK. I went to Amsterdam in about 2000 or so, and the French were not considered highly. In the UK, most of our money exchange places were called, "Bureau de Change", but in Schipol airport and other touristy spots, they were called, "Money". We found this odd. Later on, we went on a tour of the red light district. It was very educational, and properly so, and the young lady who led our group around discretely came from a religious village and used euphemisms all the way. However we found out at the end that they only ever do tours in English. They don't even do them in Dutch. Do you ever get any requests for other languages?

"Only from the French, but fuck them."

It was a very casual, glib manner of speaking that threw me. She'd been using terms such as 'lip action' and 'window ladies' for the last two hours on a tour of 'tolerated' prostitution, but when it came to the French she was fine with condemning the entire country with four letter words.

There's more, but suffice it to say that the French are not highly thought of within Yurp, and definitely not in the UK by the older demographic. London has a fairly large French population thanks to the chunnel these days, so attitudes amongst the folk there will have softened somewhat, but you get the idea. It's not the threat of the brown faces that concern the older element as much as known ungrateful so-and-sos.

So, where now? The French and other founding nations are likely to try and get us back in. However, with the UK deciding to leave there's nationalist pressure from other areas such as Scotland and Northern Ireland for them to split, because if we can then they can. Also, there's the chance that Welsh nationalism is going to start recurring, and that's been quiet for some time.

Will France leave? The EU was suspected as being set up to feed other peoples' money to French farmers. I suspect that's not going to change. Greece? I can't see them going voluntarily, since they're desperate for finance to keep them afloat after financiers swooped in, took all the money, and buggered off perfectly legally. Others might follow, but I don't want to make any predictions.

I can't see us doing anything other than something like the EEA arrangement as we will still have cheap flights to the EU and if they have to set up extra passport controls to inconvenience UK travellers then it's going to cost them fiscally to do that. Also, they export more to us than we sell to them.

So, there's quite a bitter divide within the UK right now, mostly fomented by the independence (aka fuck the foreigner) groups, many of whom have received messages of congratulation from far right parties in other countries, which is never a good look.

What I think should and probably will happen is that the top politicos of Yurp will be taking a long, hard look at themselves. Either their policies and antics have alienated over half the voting population of a member state enough to leave, or they've left the perceptions of them in that state. There needs to be some house cleaning at their end, methinks, before they try any charm offensive to keep us in the union.

Feel free to ask questions.

Rapscallion

[s_stabeler]

it's a little more complicated than that. To cut a long story short, there has always been a perception that whenever anything was suggested by the UK to advance our own interests, France and Germany have shot it down, insisting on their own interests being advanced at our expense.

In short, to mix metaphors, a lot of voters in the UK think the EU sees us as a piggy bank, and want the EU to know they have shot the goose that laid the golden eggs. ( they may be right, to an extent. For all the banks, etc, talk about leaving the UK, I doubt they will. The labour market is nowhere near as flexible in France or Germany, and they rely on a flexible labour market. As such, I doubt the more doom-and-gloom predictions for the economy. depending on what kind of trade deal we get from the EU, it may well not even be particularly painful.)

[Rapscallion]

There were claims a few years ago that only Germany and we were net contributors to the EU. As I'm a suspicious sort, I actually checked that recently and it's not the case - many more are net contributors these days. However, there's still that perception you mention.

Actually, I forgot some more crap spewed out by the Leave campaign. Quite a number of regulations come out from Yurp, but there are huge numbers that aren't anything to do with them. The whole thing about the shape of fruit and vegetables, for example, is to do with supermarket standards, not the EU. John Oliver pointed out that the Brexit campaign claimed something around a hundred regulations regarding the pillow, but upon investigation found that this included cereal in the form of a pillow etc. I'm not saying that the Remain campaign was honest, more that the Leave campaign was more dishonest.

Rapscallion