Davis is just horrifically incompetent, Raab is incompetent and horrific
Am a bit surpised that DD has been rather quiet thus far in the leadership race - would have thought his ego would have made him spout some bollox by now
It doesn’t, and yet whoever gets the PM gig is gonna be met by the reality that no way could (or should) the 27 back down, and no way will (the current) Parliament countenance a no-deal … so either there’s a deal of some sort to be made, or a ref2 … which I wouldn’t want to put any of my own money on.
The scarier prospect is the pospect of a GE being forced, which sees Farage Co become kingmaker. EP elections don’t normally translate to a GE, but we’ve long since left normality behind.
Guardian claiming anti-Brexit Parties won on the basis of this graphic which is nonsense in my view. Difficult to believe that the Tories are now not a leave party though as their support base is 80/20 leave. Labour support is about 70/30 remain so this looks like a dead heat to me. (or as close to 52/48 as is possible).
It will happen whether they countenance it or not, unless they approve an alternative (further extension request, ref2, some sort of deal, revoke Article 50 etc etc). So far they have been incapable of doing the latter. If they continue in their incapability then they will get the former.
The overall thrust of the author’s concluding paragraph is very hard to disagree with:
What died, with these elections, was any realistic notion of a silent majority who just wanted a soft Brexit and be done with it. If that majority ever existed, it was so silent as to be functionally irrelevant. In its place, a surge of no-dealers and a hard-core of remainers. The collective dread of a general election in these conditions – both major parties feeling blindly towards a compromise nobody wants – must surely introduce a new hard border into already vexed territories.
That is one reading of it. However, two narratives did get booted out yesterday:
May’s narrative that 80% of voters in the last GE voted for parties with a Leave manifesto so the view of the country on Brexit was clear.
That there is a silent or hidden remain majority. If there is such a majority, it is sufficiently de-motivated to get out and vote and is therefore irrelevant.
Effectively, there appears to be no common ground or way to unite the 48 and 52. So, we are polarised with all the old narratives, including the reunite/sit on the fence Labour nonsense, rendered senseless.
Not much though. I think his point was that the UK results weren’t a generalisation of what happened in the EU. There were some local shifts, such as in Italy and Hungary but in many other places there wasn’t the big chance we saw.
The odd thing for Labour is that they were at the bottom of a U shaped curve where being more overtly pro-Brexit would’ve likely improved their result and being more overtly pro Remain would also have likely improved their result. I hope they now have their internal discussion & resolve to return to the Remain position they had pre Referendum, whipping again (for a 3rd time) for a 2nd Referendum.
Unfortunately the likely outcome of all of this depends on moderate Tories (Philip Hammond & Co) backing a vote of No Confidence to prevent No Deal sometime before October and a GE occurring. If that happens & Labour stand unambiguously on a Remain ticket they can win (at least in some kind of arrangement with the SNP). If not I suspect it’ll be Farage & all that entails.
And the Government saying that the markets are bouyant and people have the confidence to spend money where as the reality is that people are buying to stockpile.
The price of gold will be the real indicator.
