Brexit effects?

[geronimo_appleby]

If it was just me, I'd stay and tough it out, and wait for the furore and hysteria to die down; I love it here, this is my home, it's where my family's from, where we've lived for almost 900 years. The verbal assaults on my wife, and now the physical assault, that's something else; she collapsed at home and it was only because I recognised what had happened that she's still alive today.

Before the Brexit campaign fanned the flames, there was nothing of note; she was the local primary school doctor, she was one of the nursery and reception storytellers, she was part of village life; if anyone had any objections, they kept it to themselves, apart from the local WI refusing to let her join, then requesting (demanding) that we give them the use of out paddock for their fete, there was nothing that she found particularly objectionable. This feeling of being under attack has been building for probably the last year or so; we've been getting some pretty loud hints that she was becoming a target, elevated verbal, assaults at the hospital, people making gestures and passing comments behind her in queue's, shopkeepers ignoring her or being rude and speaking to her like she was retarded, because all foreigners are retarded, right? that's why you have to speak to them slowly and as insultingly as possible.

London may be diluting the effect, but out here in the sticks it's plain and obvious, and she's scared about what comes next. No matter what the result, the hate and xenophobia that was so much a part of the 'Leave' campaign was going to remain long after the anger at the result has faded. The 'Leave' supporters now believe they have carte-blanche to attack all foreigners, because everything's their fault. When you deal with simpletons, you should expect simplistic reasoning.

Now she drives around in my battered old Defender, because someone in the village keyed her beautiful XK120 hard enough to crease the metal, the people in the local shops don't see her, so we shop in Oxford, which is causing even more rumblings in the village, as we don't spend any money anywhere there anymore. Why should we? These people are our neighbours, Lori used to treat their kids, now they act like they're going to catch something foreign from her. It's apparently enough for them to know she's from foreign parts, and to the local yokels, foreign parts are more objectionable than private parts.

She's even resigned her governorship from the school, which she loved, as she feels she's no longer part of the community; not one person from the village sent her a card or came and saw her to enquire about her health after she came out of hospital, it's like she doesn't exist here any more. So we're going if it works for her on Friday.

see my edit, above. ^^^

 

[beachbum1958]

see my edit, above. ^^^

I think our posts might have passed each other on the way in...

 

[OliviaM]

my wife Lori is an American, of part Korean descent (her grandmother was Korean)and she is the de-facto head of paediatric counselling and Psychotherapy at the hospital where she's based, but she's also a cardiologist of note, and a damned good surgeon.

I'm surprised they can even tell. I've known people with similar ancestry and I wouldn't have guessed unless they mentioned it.

And by the way, damn. Your wife sounds like an amazing person.

She's at home now recovering from a serious assault ...

Holy shit, dude. I'm sorry she went through that and I hope she recovers soon. One thing that's really surprised me, as an American, is learning how racist rural English and Welsh can be. I've always had this idea that England is some kind of pastoral place with incredibly polite people and a culture that loves tea and museums and Doctor Who. And it does have those things, but it also has jerks and racists and idiots like any other country on the planet.

I hope you move to the south of France and spend the rest of your weekends having drinks on the beach, and coffee and croissants in gorgeous little cafes, and that you make a friend with a really big yacht who lets you take it out all the time.

 

[oggbashan]

...

I hope you move to the south of France and spend the rest of your weekends having drinks on the beach, and coffee and croissants in gorgeous little cafes, and that you make a friend with a really big yacht who lets you take it out all the time.

Just stay clear of Marseilles. That place is seriously scary.

 

[Handley_Page]

The money? One of the ways the Irish and Northern Irish got money out of the EU was by moving livestock across the border and back again to receive subsidies. They, and the livestock, got bored with that, so they just moved paperwork.

And people claim the Irish are stupid? It was a brilliant scheme while it lasted.

There were rumours of some French farmers doing similarly underhand tricks.

Even before the hustings heated-up in the run-up to the day, the xenophobia and racism of the 'Leave' campaign was making itself felt; my wife Lori is an American, of part Korean descent (her grandmother was Korean)and she is the de-facto head of paediatric counselling and Psychotherapy at the hospital where she's based, but she's also a cardiologist of note, and a damned good surgeon.

She's at home now recovering from a serious assault;

We're flying down to Cannes later this week, where she has a job interview; she got the call this morning, and if she's successful we're moving there as soon as we can, and the NHS will have lost both a dedicated surgeon and a skilled paediatric psychotherapist and forensic psychologist.

She has spent most of her working life in the UK helping children who've suffered serious abuse, nearly 18 years, and she doesn't want to go, but her personal safety is now an issue; she doesn't feel safe at work, nor in her daily life. Quite frankly, I'm in complete agreement with her; she comes first, and where she goes, I go; the hospital that's asked her come for an interview has a brand new cardiovascular surgical unit, a child psychiatry unit, and a full orthopaedic and trauma unit, so I may well apply for a job there too.

If it was just me, I'd stay and tough it out, and wait for the furore and hysteria to die down; I love it here, this is my home, it's where my family's from, where we've lived for almost 900 years. The verbal assaults on my wife, and now the physical assault, that's something else; she collapsed at home and it was only because I recognised what had happened that she's still alive today.


.

Now she drives around in my battered old Defender, because someone in the village keyed her beautiful XK120 hard enough to crease the metal, the people in the local shops don't see her, so we shop in Oxford, which is causing even more rumblings in the village, as we don't spend any money anywhere there any more. Why should we? These people are our neighbours, Lori used to treat their kids, now they act like they're going to catch something foreign from her. It's apparently enough for them to know she's from foreign parts, and to the local yokels, foreign parts are more objectionable than private parts.

She's even resigned her governorship from the school, which she loved, as she feels she's no longer part of the community; not one person from the village sent her a card or came and saw her to enquire about her health after she came out of hospital, it's like she doesn't exist here any more. So we're going if it works for her on Friday.

Please tell Lori that the rest of us, in England, can appreciate her talents and thank her for them (and wish her a speedy recovery).

Personally, I'd like to pillory the idiot who started this anti-foreigner nonsense. Don't get me wrong, I'd hang the blaggard who kills or even harms my Grand-daughter; or at least I'd encourage his repatriation to the land of his antecedents without the option of coming back, anytime.
(Shades of "My name is Inigo Montoya; you killed my Father. Prepare to die").

Many moons ago, Tony Blair said, on his winning the election, "Education, Education, Education."
I've seen the results of his laughable attempts and it's really not funny at all.

I have little doubt that this xenophobic hysteria will eventually die down.
I sure hope so.

 

[beachbum1958]

I'm surprised they can even tell. I've known people with similar ancestry and I wouldn't have guessed unless they mentioned it.

And by the way, damn. Your wife sounds like an amazing person.



Holy shit, dude. I'm sorry she went through that and I hope she recovers soon. One thing that's really surprised me, as an American, is learning how racist rural English and Welsh can be. I've always had this idea that England is some kind of pastoral place with incredibly polite people and a culture that loves tea and museums and Doctor Who. And it does have those things, but it also has jerks and racists and idiots like any other country on the planet.

I hope you move to the south of France and spend the rest of your weekends having drinks on the beach, and coffee and croissants in gorgeous little cafes, and that you make a friend with a really big yacht who lets you take it out all the time.

Thank you for your kind thoughts, your kindness is very much appreciated. Lori has a few of her grandmother's features, so it's actually quite easy to see she's of oriental extraction. Her brothers don't look like her at all, they all take after their father's side. She does have a few of her Cajun family traits though; she has the most incredible, arresting eyes, they're almond-shaped, and a deep blue-violet, and her hair is so black it's almost blue. She was born in Hawaii, but spent her early years in Fort Wayne, IN, but did most of her growing up with her aunts and cousins in the bayous around Houma and Dulac, La. so she has a very seductive Southern accent; the first time she spoke to me it was electrifying, it still is.

Lori did her pre-med at Purdue, and her MD at Johns Hopkins, and spent the next 12 years as a student, then intern, then team-leader, to Head of Cardiology, and finally on the faculty at Johns Hopkins Univ Medical School, so the NHS snapped her up when she moved here. She doesn't look her age at all, and not a few of the medical students at John Radcliffe have tried to pick her up, then walked into the OR and discovered to their horror she's the surgeon who's going to teach them how to perform a coronary artery bypass graft.

And yes, I think she's amazing; she's so smart she scares me; she has two distinct careers, whereas I'm quite thick (I have Labradors, sometimes it's hard to tell us apart...), and I'm constantly surprised she chose me and sticks around. She came on a short break holiday to meet-up with some friends, came to a lecture I was giving in London, we spotted each other, and we've been together ever since, married nearly 19 years now.

England for her was always the civilised place where calm and sanity ruled, having come from a job in Maryland where the nightly ritual in the ER was tallying the GSW victims and drive-by fatalities, and now all this has happened it's kind of knocked her off-balance.

 

[beachbum1958]

Just stay clear of Marseilles. That place is seriously scary.

I like Marseille; the food is to die for, the local argot is a lot more relaxed and fluid than Academie Francaise, and I'm a connoisseur of low-dives and unsavoury hot-spots, so I fit in perfectly; Lori says it's because I was a slave-trading gun-runner in my previous life, that's why low-lifes on the wharves at Quai du Maroc treat me like a long-lost relative, they feel at home with me...

 

[legerdemer]

It's easy to generalize, but I'm not sure France is any model for the happy-go-lucky, love wins over all attitudes to its own melting pot issues. Just look at the Le Pen phenomenon and their treatment of Algerians and other immigrants, even before the more recent Islamic newcomers. In truth, no culture is safe from ignorant xenophobes.


@Beachbum1958 - A long time ago I interviewed at Johns Hopkins for a PhD program. They told all the prospective grad students that if they found themselves at work late at night, there was a room with a cot we could take advantage of rather than go home, as it was too dangerous due to the crime incidence in the neighborhood surrounding the medical school.

That's neither here nor there... at least the weather in southern France is warmer and the food not bad, not bad at all.

Good luck - may Lori's recovery continue apace.

 

[HandsInTheDark]

It's easy to generalize, but I'm not sure France is any model for the happy-go-lucky, love wins over all attitudes to its own melting pot issues. Just look at the Le Pen phenomenon and their treatment of Algerians and other immigrants, even before the more recent Islamic newcomers. In truth, no culture is safe from ignorant xenophobes.

I'd expect this to get worse in most areas of the world. It may sound vaguely Marxist, but as we continue to automate production of virtually everything, there's simply less work that needs doing, year by year, with a population that's still growing. Jobs become increasingly scarce and are given to the cheapest labor available. Bottom line, unemployment only has one direction to go from here on out, once you factor out the inevitable peaks and valleys.

Unemployed people have grievances and a lot of time on their hands, and blame and anger begin to build and fester. You don't want to take it out on friends and family, and you can't do anything about elected officials (voting them out just gets you more of the same), but those damned Others coming to take our jobs... humanity is very tribal, and conflicts tend to organize at tribal boundaries even when tribes aren't the problem.

An awful lot of the current political unrest in the US is simply this. Two candidates who are miles from anything like mainstream made good showings in the primaries - one has the nomination in hand and the other put impressive cracks in party unity. Both were preaching some flavor of economic popularism. When the mainstream wins this election (and it will), blame and anger will go up sharply. I give the Republican party here 15 years before it crumbles. I'm not sure the Dems will be all that far behind. You see related political strife in other countries; the mideast has been basking in it for decades and now Europe is feeling the same rage.

I don't know if I call it ignorant xenophobia. For millennia tribal groups have competed for resources, often with hostility, and that bloody competition is literally in our genes - people's amygdalas react powerfully to the presence of other races. Our problem isn't racial this time, it's straight up economic and classist, but the brain is hardwired to assume The Other Tribe Is To Blame and it's hard to teach it otherwise. We just didn't evolve fast enough away from tribalism and racism before our technology flew off the charts and forced everyone into competition for fewer and fewer dollars and less and less work.

I don't think the next 50 years are going to be pretty. Anywhere.

Yeah... plot bunny. I already wrote a story here in which the aforementioned collapse occurred, and I put in a lot of sex because dystopias suck.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I'd expect this to get worse in most areas of the world. It may sound vaguely Marxist, but as we continue to automate production of virtually everything, there's simply less work that needs doing, year by year, with a population that's still growing. Jobs become increasingly scarce and are given to the cheapest labor available. Bottom line, unemployment only has one direction to go from here on out, once you factor out the inevitable peaks and valleys.

Yep, kinda. The problem isn't really lack of jobs, though; it's that we've trained ourselves to view "unemployment" as a bad thing and focussed on trying to make jobs for everybody, instead of thinking about what the original point of employment was.

In crude terms: the function of an economy is to create and allocate stuff that humans need, or want. Automation means more stuff to go around, less effort and more free time for humans - that could, should be a win-win situation for everybody. In particular, the jobs most likely to be replaced by robots are the shitty, dangerous, tedious jobs that nobody in their right minds would do unless they needed the money.

The tricky part is that we've tangled up the system of production (which used to be labour-intensive) with the system of distribution. Once upon a time that made sense: making stuff was hard, and if nobody felt like tilling the fields then everybody starved to death, so making labour a prerequisite for reward provided a necessary incentive to do the work. Along the way we developed a work ethic that taught that hard work is ennobling, yada yada; coupling labour to self-worth gave people extra motivation to pick up a shovel.

Automation breaks that system. We no longer have enough useful work for everybody to do. What we need is a new method of distribution; what we're doing about it, mostly, is tinkering with the system of production and artificially increasing demand (ads designed to make you want more stuff, to keep somebody else employed). Cheap and easy 3D printing is going to accelerate that.

Unfortunately, transitioning to a different mode of distribution is going to be bloody hard; we've spent so long romanticising work that "let's replace those jobs with robots and let the ex-workers enjoy the extra free time" gets written off as commie propaganda.

But some places are already experimenting with transitional ideas like basic income. It's a tough sell ("you want to use my tax dollars to pay people to do nothing?") but unless we find some better alternative, it beats rioting mobs.

 

[HandsInTheDark]

But some places are already experimenting with transitional ideas like basic income. It's a tough sell ("you want to use my tax dollars to pay people to do nothing?") but unless we find some better alternative, it beats rioting mobs.

It's not just a tough sell; it's bloody expensive. Try living on less than 20,000$/year anywhere in the US. (And that's nearly double the official poverty line). It's not exactly a life. If you want to pay unemployed people 20k$/year, and the unemployment rate is 5% (actually higher in the US, our numbers underrepresent)... I'm dishing out an extra 1,000/year to pay for it. Excuse me? Are you kidding? I'm trying to work out how I'm ever going to retire as it is. What are you going to do, print money on recycled newspaper?

When they day comes that robots do all the farming, mining, production and distribution, and the only jobs left for humans are writing the software to organize it all, then we can let everyone else retire and live free. Until then, ripping off the middle class to support the poor just means more poor and no middle class.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

It's easy to generalize, but I'm not sure France is any model for the happy-go-lucky, love wins over all attitudes to its own melting pot issues. Just look at the Le Pen phenomenon and their treatment of Algerians and other immigrants, even before the more recent Islamic newcomers. In truth, no culture is safe from ignorant xenophobes.


@Beachbum1958 - A long time ago I interviewed at Johns Hopkins for a PhD program. They told all the prospective grad students that if they found themselves at work late at night, there was a room with a cot we could take advantage of rather than go home, as it was too dangerous due to the crime incidence in the neighborhood surrounding the medical school.

That's neither here nor there... at least the weather in southern France is warmer and the food not bad, not bad at all.

Good luck - may Lori's recovery continue apace.

Us ignorant xenophobes call the problem, YOU AINT IN KANSAS ANYMORE. MUHAMMAD.

 

[Quiet_Cool]

It's not just a tough sell; it's bloody expensive. Try living on less than 20,000$/year anywhere in the US. (And that's nearly double the official poverty line). It's not exactly a life. If you want to pay unemployed people 20k$/year, and the unemployment rate is 5% (actually higher in the US, our numbers underrepresent)... I'm dishing out an extra 1,000/year to pay for it. Excuse me? Are you kidding? I'm trying to work out how I'm ever going to retire as it is. What are you going to do, print money on recycled newspaper?

The best part of that is that it really only is just paper. What will it be worth when those poor people can't even pay the loans it's based on? 15-20% is closer to accurate. You're only counted if you're collecting on the Unemployment Insurance, which means most of those unemployed have no income.

When they day comes that robots do all the farming, mining, production and distribution, and the only jobs left for humans are writing the software to organize it all, then we can let everyone else retire and live free. Until then, ripping off the middle class to support the poor just means more poor and no middle class.

Think this over: What would it mean if the government actually did enforce a higher minimum wage? Say a 25% increase, then declared and enforced a 30 hour work week?

Mull that over for a while...

Back to Brexit. To start, I'm American (U.S. citizen to be exact) and the topic of the EU and it's reason for existence is something I haven't looked at in a while. Not out of arrogance or not caring, just distance and the immediacy of things going ridiculous on our home soil. Here's what I'm curious of: Is this a problem that has been created out of the initial creation of the EU? Or is it something that postponed by the EU's influence? I'm not talking about the social divide. I mean the political and socioeconomic repercussions. It seems to me (maybe for reasons it shouldn't) that perhaps the marriage analogy Bramblethron gave was accurate; the rocky road ahead might be less related to divorce and more to the fact that the marriage wasn't so bright an idea.

Q_C

 

[Cruel2BKind]

An old pal of mine has avowed never to phone me after I told him that I was pro-Exit and he Pro-remain.

I only know you from the internet and I already think of you differently.

She's at home now recovering from a serious assault; a 14 year old boy beat her so savagely she sustained a subdural haematoma and needed an emergency craniotomy to relieve the pressure on her brain. She's been recuperating at home for nearly three months now, and, in light of the result of the referendum, and the rising tide of racism and hate, she's undecided whether to ever return to medicine in this country; actually, she's more like 80/20 leave or stay, that's how disillusioned and scared she is.
.

I hope she recovers, and get's a fucking fantastic job. Nobody should have to go through something like that. And they are abusing Doctors??? What next? Lifeguard assassinations? EMT-bashing? Nurse-tipping?

 

[Bramblethorn]

If you want to pay unemployed people 20k$/year, and the unemployment rate is 5% (actually higher in the US, our numbers underrepresent)... I'm dishing out an extra 1,000/year to pay for it.

Not quite. You're already paying to subsidise low-income folk. Basic income would replace a lot of those other subsidies. SNAP alone costs over $70 billion a year, so deduct that and other such programs from the cost of basic income.

It's also cheaper to administer; it's not predicated on making people prove that they're Deserving Poor, so you also save on the compliance/enforcement costs from those programs.

You also get indirect savings. People on small and uncertain income tend to skimp on things like preventative medicine, which pushes up healthcare costs for everybody in the long term.

After deducting those savings... yeah, it still costs. But, as Amy Dentata puts it: "if you're wealthy and hate the idea of basic income, think of it as guillotine insurance".

 

[Handley_Page]

I find it difficult to comprehend that, after weeks of preparation for a vital vote, our different factions seem to have no no cohesive plan for "what do we do if. . ." to put into the public arena.
Most seem to be running round like headless chickens. The latest idiocy in one Party is ABB [anyone but Boris].

I almost wish I was young enough to go live elsewhere;
at least until the dust settles.

 

[HandsInTheDark]

I find it difficult to comprehend that, after weeks of preparation for a vital vote, our different factions seem to have no cohesive plan for "what do we do if. . ." to put into the public arena.
Most seem to be running round like headless chickens. The latest idiocy in one Party is ABB [anyone but Boris].

The day before the Brexit vote, the US market soared by 200 points, a largish gain. The markets had decided in advance the vote would be Remain. That was collective wisdom of politicians and money people; and even supported by polls.

The next day, if our news sources can be believed, you had enough rain to keep the less passionate voters home- and Exit gets voted in by a small majority. US market fell 500+ points; billions in value lost. It simply didn't see that coming, and that means neither did politicians. They largely didn't want it, no matter what they said, and they had no plan.

Brexit hasn't happened yet. The EU hasn't even been notified yet. It would not completely shock me if somehow a way was found to make Brexit not happen, though that would have huge political cost.

Just hang tight. England has a decent economy and while you won't get any promised benefits from leaving, it probably won't be all that damaging either. The money people will take care of it.

 

[Carnal_Flower]

Racism is not "hard wired" into our brains.

If anything, the opposite is true, ie observe children who have never been exposed to racism as a learned ideology.

"Racism" is the invention that justifies behavior. Humans are hard-wired to have intelligence, that's about it.

"Tribalism" is a product of thinking. It doesnt reside in a tiny little organ in our anatomy.

I don't know if I call it ignorant xenophobia. For millennia tribal groups have competed for resources, often with hostility, and that bloody competition is literally in our genes - people's amygdalas react powerfully to the presence of other races. Our problem isn't racial this time, it's straight up economic and classist, but the brain is hardwired to assume The Other Tribe Is To Blame and it's hard to teach it otherwise. We just didn't evolve fast enough away from tribalism and racism before our technology flew off the charts and forced everyone into competition for fewer and fewer dollars and less and less work.

I don't think the next 50 years are going to be pretty. Anywhere.

Yeah... plot bunny. I already wrote a story here in which the aforementioned collapse occurred, and I put in a lot of sex because dystopias suck.

 

[Bramblethorn]

The best part of that is that it really only is just paper. What will it be worth when those poor people can't even pay the loans it's based on? 15-20% is closer to accurate. You're only counted if you're collecting on the Unemployment Insurance, which means most of those unemployed have no income.

This is not correct. (I hear a lot of people making an equivalent claim about Australian unemployment stats; it's not true here either.)

The USA follows the International Labour Organisation standard for measuring unemployment. Short version: every month the Census Bureau contacts a sample of about 60,000 households across the USA, and asks questions about whether the residents worked or were looking for work during a particular week. If you were looking for work in that week, but didn't get any, you're counted as "unemployed".

That definition certainly has its limitations - in particular, if you did even one hour of paid work during that week you're counted as "employed", and if you want a job but have given up looking you're counted as "not in labour force". (I believe the USA does collect other data to measure that sort of thing.) But it is not dependent on insurance status.

More detail here. (Linking to archive page because the BLS site seems to be down just now.)

To start, I'm American (U.S. citizen to be exact) and the topic of the EU and it's reason for existence is something I haven't looked at in a while.

Short, extremely simplified version: people who'd been through two devastating wars in thirty years wanted to prevent it happening again, and believed that closer ties and trade between European nations might achieve that. In 1946 Churchill called for a "United States of Europe" and many others felt the same way.

That led to the formation of the European Coal and Steel Commission, which evolved through several steps to today's EU.

As Stross notes: "...it has been staggeringly successful: no army has crossed the Rhine river in more than 70 years, and this is the longest period of peace on the Rhine since before the rise of the Roman Empire. This is the dog that doesn't bark, and therefore doesn't make the news."

 

[Bramblethorn]

Brexit hasn't happened yet. The EU hasn't even been notified yet. It would not completely shock me if somehow a way was found to make Brexit not happen, though that would have huge political cost.

Just hang tight. England has a decent economy and while you won't get any promised benefits from leaving, it probably won't be all that damaging either. The money people will take care of it.

The money people are making plans to leave the UK.

 

[AlwaysHungry]

In crude terms: the function of an economy is to create and allocate stuff that humans need, or want. Automation means more stuff to go around, less effort and more free time for humans - that could, should be a win-win situation for everybody. In particular, the jobs most likely to be replaced by robots are the shitty, dangerous, tedious jobs that nobody in their right minds would do unless they needed the money.

...Automation breaks that system. We no longer have enough useful work for everybody to do...

BT, you know how much I enjoy arguing with you. The fact of the matter is, there is an extraordinary amount of work that needs to be done. I don't know about your neck of the woods, but here in the mighty US our transportation infrastructure is amazingly primitive and inadequate. We waste literally millions of man-hours every day as our population is trapped in traffic jams, attempting to commute. The southwestern portion of the country is slowly dying of thirst, because the water diversion program that was designed to solve this problem in the 1960s was never built. We don't have enough electrical power plants; here on the west coast we are being advised that there will be blackouts this summer, especially during heat waves where elderly people die without air conditioning. We don't have enough hospitals, and more are being shut down every day due to the rapacious for-profit "reform" under Obamacare.

Now, these are all examples of problems that can't be solved by automation. The construction work can't be done by 3D printers. Why don't we get down to business and build what we need? After all, the US at one time was known for its bold infrastructure building under presidents like Lincoln and FDR. The truth is, both political parties have embraced a ban on infrastructure, for ostensibly different reasons. For the Democrats, infrastructure building offends the Luddite/Malthusian/"Green" outlook they have adopted, whereas for the Republicans, it offends them because they believe in diverting all investment capital into sleazy fast-buck schemes (this is called "fiscal conservatism.") You have very similar problems in Europe. The poorly educated populations don't understand the nature of the problem, but they are upset about it nonetheless, and prone to jump on populist bandwagons, be it the Tea Party, or Occupy Wall Street, the Brexit (although this is more complicated than it seems in the media depictions), or the Sanders and Trump campaigns. This is a volatile situation, where we could wind up replacing a suave, urbane form of fascism with a more rambunctious one.

The countries that are not afflicted with this disease are the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and their allies. They have tamed finance (the "money people") and made it into the servant of the real economy, and they are building the most magnificent infrastructure projects in the history of the planet. So naturally, the Western press has identified them as the enemy, Obama has led us all into a new Cold War, and we are frantically trying to Regime Change every last one of them. If that doesn't work, we can always fall back on our new $1 trillion nuclear weapons program. Maybe that will create a few jobs.

 

[Quiet_Cool]

This is not correct. (I hear a lot of people making an equivalent claim about Australian unemployment stats; it's not true here either.)

The USA follows the International Labour Organisation standard for measuring unemployment. Short version: every month the Census Bureau contacts a sample of about 60,000 households across the USA, and asks questions about whether the residents worked or were looking for work during a particular week. If you were looking for work in that week, but didn't get any, you're counted as "unemployed".

That definition certainly has its limitations - in particular, if you did even one hour of paid work during that week you're counted as "employed", and if you want a job but have given up looking you're counted as "not in labour force". (I believe the USA does collect other data to measure that sort of thing.) But it is not dependent on insurance status.

More detail here. (Linking to archive page because the BLS site seems to be down just now.)

I looked this up. Thank you for the information. For the record, when the unemployment rates over here "dropped" it was surprisingly well timed with Obama's Unemployment changes (Bush's extensions due to economic hardship were wiped clean and everyone was off in 6 months regardless of need). I should have looked it up earlier, but that timing is probably contributing greatly to the confusion over here. The way they do this actually seems less effective than just using the collection number, but it is truly different.

Thank you for the link.

Short, extremely simplified version: people who'd been through two devastating wars in thirty years wanted to prevent it happening again, and believed that closer ties and trade between European nations might achieve that. In 1946 Churchill called for a "United States of Europe" and many others felt the same way.

That led to the formation of the European Coal and Steel Commission, which evolved through several steps to today's EU.

As Stross notes: "...it has been staggeringly successful: no army has crossed the Rhine river in more than 70 years, and this is the longest period of peace on the Rhine since before the rise of the Roman Empire. This is the dog that doesn't bark, and therefore doesn't make the news."

Interesting. I'm gonna try to spend some time looking the history over more closely. The question remains on whether or not it was the best move for the UK or not, and whether the full development was necessary for the desired result, but I guess that information might be ahead in my research.

Q_C

 

[Handley_Page]

One might have thought that those in favour of 'Remain' or 'Leave' would have put their cards on the table and illustrated what they'd do after the Vote. But it would seem that the result came as a bit of a surprise; the 'Remain' camp thinking that things could go on the same as before and the "Leave" camp wildly protesting.

But no; we get very sparse information (top of this evening's news is about the Bomb at Ankara Airport and the rials of the opposition Party.

I find it very dispiriting to watch this opportunity to really do Something Good being wasted by headless chickens doing nothing but scrat about in a panic.

<groan>

 

[OliviaM]

I read a few comments from people who voted Leave who seemed to think their vote was just to negotiate with the EU, I guess for border controls. But yeah, Leave leadership seemed to promote the idea that the country would just revert to some kind of nebulous "good old days" with no bloody furiners around.

I really hope the US learns its lesson from this and does not just stay home in November, or cast votes just to be contrary. We can't just ignore politics and assume everything will work out just fine.

 

[oggbashan]

I read a few comments from people who voted Leave who seemed to think their vote was just to negotiate with the EU, I guess for border controls. But yeah, Leave leadership seemed to promote the idea that the country would just revert to some kind of nebulous "good old days" with no bloody furiners around.

I really hope the US learns its lesson from this and does not just stay home in November, or cast votes just to be contrary. We can't just ignore politics and assume everything will work out just fine.

Early on, some of the campaigners for Leave did say that a vote to Leave might mean a re-negotiation of the UK's relationship with Europe and therefore the UK remaining in a reformed EU - but that was rejected by Jean-Claude Juncker (President of the EU Commission)and some EU leaders.

Brexit does require serious negotiation on what happens WHEN the UK leaves but the idea that we could vote Leave and get a better deal than was offered to David Cameron was not a possibility.

The deal offered to Cameron took a lot of hard work by EU countries. In practice it was nothing like enough and never could be, because it did not address unrestricted movement of people in Europe. The other countries see that as a fundamental principle of the EU which they weren't going to modify just for the UK. But without any change on that, David Cameron had nothing substantial to offer the UK's electorate.

Juncker added that what had been offered to Cameron was subject to the offers being in compliance with the EU treaties. That meant that even the concessions that were offered could be overruled by European courts.

BUT - the UK has not invoked Article 50. Until it does, the process of leaving the EU doesn't start. David Cameron is stepping down as Prime Minister and has said he will NOT invoke Article 50 but leave that to his successor.

The referendum result is advisory and not binding on the UK Parliament. There is no majority in Westminster for leave, in fact there is a massive cross-party majority to stay in the EU. Whoever becomes the next (Conservative) Prime Minister will have a difficult task to get Parliament to agree Brexit, to invoke Article 50, and to pass the lengthy and complex legislation that would be required. No party has a mandate to leave the EU. No party had promised to leave the EU. All that had been promised is that a referendum would be held.

Now the referendum result was NOT what Parliament expected, they don't seem to have any idea what to do now. They won't do anything at all until the Conservative Party has elected a new leader and therefore a new Prime Minister. But when he/she is appointed, he/she has a big problem. Does Parliament ignore the result of the referendum, or does it invoke Article 50 when almost every Member of Parliament sees that as the WRONG thing to do?

Don't know are the most popular words now.