Is Britain about to leave the EU?

[Takhisis]

If they make a deal with a UK-less EU they lose access to the biggest single financial market and 60-odd million potential customers. Which is totally not a concern.

 

[Akka]

It's not

I dunno why such a thing came to be

I recently saw leavers saying 'Churchill would be proud' about the Brexit result, seems they never heard about his United states of Europe speech made in 1946 just after WW11

It's amusingly unsurprising that the most anti-EU people are the one the most ignorant about it

 

[Lohrenswald]

If they make a deal with a UK-less EU they lose access to the biggest single financial market and 60-odd million potential customers. Which is totally not a concern.

they can make deals with both

It's amusingly unsurprising that the most anti-EU people are the one the most ignorant about it

If you want to call rejecting the ideological farce for ignorance then go ahead I guess

 

[Takhisis]

Meanest thou yonder menne who Googlede ‘whatte is ye Evropean Vnionne’ in ye week after ye referendvm?

 

[Oerdin]

The US had an alliance with the Royal French government and the Republicans cut the King's head off so, yes, George Washington was correct that the US had no alliance with Republican France.

If the arrogant Eurocrats want to disrupt the international order and threaten the US's oldest ally and thus America's national interests then, yes, they had better be prepared to suffer some very severe consequences for their actions.

They can either do the responsible thing and act like friends and allies or they can go down a rabbit hole which ends very badly for them. We are talking half of Europe with sovereign debt crisises and the Euro as a failed currency. Make your choices carefully because choices have consequences.

 

[Takhisis]

they can make deals with both

Why? By the logic of the 2014 referendum, it was better not to split.

If you want to call rejecting the ideological farce for ignorance then go ahead I guess

No, seriously, huge numbers of people voted without knowing what the EU is or what it does. Of course, to follow someone such as Nigel Farridge with encouragement from Donald J. Drumpf there must be something wrong.

 

[AdrienIer]

Lol Oerdin thankfully no one in the US government is as crazy as that. Only Trump is, but thankfully he won't be elected.

Also it's not as simple as "threaten" and "punishment". Negotiations will happen, and there's no way the UK gets a very favorable deal. At best they'll get a Norway style deal. Which is not what the UK wants, but there's no way the EU goes against its own interest and signs anything else.

 

[Arakhor]

If tge arrogant Eurocrats want to disrupt the international order and threaten the US's oldest ally and thus America's national interests then, yes, they had better be prepared to suffer some very severe consequences for their actions.

Quite apart from the fact that Eurocrat is a stupid word and does no favours to people who think that it's a sensible term, the US are not going to simply slap sanctions on all of Europe. That's Mutually Assured Destruction.

 

[Kozmos]

I don't see how Britain being outside of EU would lead to USA getting much more unfavourable deals from EU or whatever

Because the UK has been acting as the US stooge in all EU deals with the USA. UK/USA follow a similar foreign policy along with the blatant overreach of domestic surveillance. Luckily their electorates don't care.

 

[innonimatu]

The US won't delve into the EU's messes. They don't need to. "F* the EU" is this administration's policy, but they mean by that that the EU is irrelevant. And it is.

 

[Kozmos]

Need to? They want to. They get paid handsomely to do so.

 

[SMcM]

The decrease in poll numbers is correlated with an increase for the AfD. For this election I expect that the AfD will (have to) oppose any coalition that might form. I also cannot see that the FDP and the Linke being in the same coalition. Together CDU, AfD and FDP/Linke will block any possible coalition that does not contain the CDU, so whoever leads the CDU is likely to become the next chancellor.

The only real danger to Merkel (and the reason she has not announced yet, whether she is going to run) is a possible rebellion of the CSU.

edit: or a brilliant campaign of the SPD, but somehow I doubt that.
edit2: to Merkel, of course

Are tensions between CDU and CSU high currently? And how big an effect would a split have on the German political system? Also, surely no other party would join a collation with AfD?

Because the UK has been acting as the US stooge in all EU deals with the USA. UK/USA follow a similar foreign policy along with the blatant overreach of domestic surveillance. Luckily their electorates don't care.

I find it hard to care; it'd be the government's problem, not mine, if they were to decide to waste time and resources on keeping tabs on my activities. I'd rather we had lots of surveillance than we had increased rates of terrorist attacks; terrorist plots foiled by surveillance have been in the news a few times IIRC.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Suicide? How? Punishing Greece for daring to allow their people to break the lie was successful, don't you think?

EU should have sweetened a controlled Grexit option with suspension of debt would have been the ideal solution. Of course Greece would have had to undergo austerity outside the EZ theres no escaping that but at least it would have had a chance to right their ship either that or default again.

The incompatible Northern stable economy and the Southern deficit spending economy didnt have much of chance of working.
Of course the French wanted to break German Dominance of the EU by adding in more countries has been a disaster

 

[Takhisis]

The standard FMI plan includes devaluation and a debt haircut. No devaluation was possible so extra austerity has to make up for that. And as for debt haircuts… Greece is still having trouble with servicing debts.

 

[FriendlyFire]

The standard FMI plan includes devaluation and a debt haircut. No devaluation was possible so extra austerity has to make up for that. And as for debt haircuts… Greece is still having trouble with servicing debts.

That and Greece has been delaying most of the reforms, so chances of any plan succeeding is minimal. Greece is not helping itself either with sabotaging the EU refugee plan with refugees again arriving in increased numbers and the borders closed. EU told greece to slash pensions and chase tax evaders. Instead of doing this Greece decided to increase taxes on the poor instead what can you do ?

 

[Takhisis]

I thought it was the Turkish government who were letting all thos refugees cross from Syria into the Ægean Sea, but that was just me, apparently.

 

[FriendlyFire]

I thought it was the Turkish government who were letting all thos refugees cross from Syria into the Ægean Sea, but that was just me, apparently.

Iam pretty sure despite the EU protesting, aka giving lip service.
The deplorable conditions in Greece and closed borders, sending refugees back into Turkey to spread information should work as a deterrent. That and Greece sending refugees back into Turkey instead of entertaining a hopless attempt to shelter them.

As for Turkey its probably burnt any bridges into the EU, The more fundamentalist religious part of Turkey has unraveled all the work the Less religious pro EU population work
Not that Turkey hasnt made everyone around its into enemies.

 

[Kozmos]

I find it hard to care; it'd be the government's problem, not mine, if they were to decide to waste time and resources on keeping tabs on my activities. I'd rather we had lots of surveillance than we had increased rates of terrorist attacks; terrorist plots foiled by surveillance have been in the news a few times IIRC.

I completely get it. Civilization has always been a trade of security against liberty that people have been rather glad to accept. The problem is the abuse of power that comes with such powerful systems and they are only getting smarter and cheaper. Terrorism seems scary because it is terrorism, that is its point. Statistically you have better odds of dying in ten completely different ways that are much more mundane. If push comes to shove terrorism can be solved crudely. You cannot say the same of an autonomous system that will collate your data, be eventually passed onto corporations and likely hacked because opsec is pretty crap in sectors both public and private.

 

[JohannaK]

The US had an alliance with the Royal French government and the Republicans cut the King's head off so, yes, George Washington was correct that the US had no alliance with Republican France.

Nevermind the War of 1812, right?

The incompatible Northern stable economy and the Southern deficit spending economy didnt have much of chance of working.
Of course the French wanted to break German Dominance of the EU by adding in more countries has been a disaster

Though I will say that Ireland and Spain, two countries which had to be rescued, both had quite low debt-to-GDP ratios. Deficit only went wild with the crisis itself, and I think that is worth a second thought other than 'THESE SOUTHERNERS'

 

[bathsheba666]

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN1130GB

Germany is still talking about punishing the UK for daring to say no to them. The US needs to come out very forcefully and declare the UK's interests are the US's vital national interests and any threat to the UK's economy is a direct threat to the US's vital national interests. If the EU closes free trade with the UK then the US will close most trade with the EU, we will close off international capital markets, we will lock them out of the credit clearing system and the international banking system. The message needs to be extremely forceful and clear that the arrogant Eurocrats in Brussels either back down from their threats or their economies are going to be sent spiraling into depression and half of Europe will have a debt crisis.

I hope cooler heads provail and the stutus quo is more or less maintained but the idea that they can punish the UK must be dealt with extremely harshly and they must be made to realize nothing but suicide lies down that path.

This sounds like arrant nonsense, only made slightly interesting by the curious mixture of sentimentality and aggression being displayed.

The UK abrogates a clear agreement to have some free movement of people, and then expects the EU to rollover and restructure in our own interests, and to the obvious detriment of a number of the constituent nations ?

After the EU sends back the nonsensical TTIP proposals to a corrupt and corporate owned US, I am sure they will give short shrift to this bellicose posturing.