06.24.2016 06:44 AM

Winners: racists and the economically illiterate. Losers: everyone else.

economist.200

 

WINNERS

  • Racists, nativists and isolationists: There is a reason why Trump, Le Pen and their ilk favoured a “leave” vote: their prospects are always improved when people are divided and not united.   Last night, they won a decisive victory by demonizing immigrants, governments and “bankers” (cf., traditional code for The Jews).  Trump, in particular, has had his economic “vision” validated.
  • Scottish secessionists: As some of us predicted as the votes were still being tallied – because Scotland overwhelmingly voted to remain within the EU – a second Scottish independence vote is now inevitable.  It will likely succeed – not because Scots are “racists, nativists and isolationists,” of course, but because they know they must maintain trade and political links to greater Europe to succeed as a nation.  Scotland can’t let an isolated Britain pull them down into the economic muck. They won’t.
  • A united Irish: As I wrote when over there in January, Ireland has the strongest economy in the E.U. because it is part of the E.U.  The Kinsella-Cleary-Carr motherland will now move to build on that strength (which is good), and there will be a concurrent push to unite Northern Ireland with the Republic (which is potentially bad).  Bad, naturally, because it raises the spectre of a possible return of The Troubles.
  • Anti-traders: For those who can always be counted upon to rail against freer trade – the Sid Ryans and Maude Barlows and assorted solipsistic trade unionists – the “leave” victory provides a critical talking point.  To wit: “If a modern, successful nation like Britain can do it, why can’t we?”
  • The separatists: For the likes of the Parti Quebecois, this is a dream come true.  Their core argument – that new nations can be formed, that identity politics are okay – has been authenticated, paradoxically, by the very nation that they historically have used as a straw man to argue for secession.
  • Jason Kenney: Yes, Jason Kenney.  Me and plenty of others were shocked, last night, when the former federal cabinet minister tweeted triumphantly about the results.  I’m not joking, either: he did. Kenny, accordingly, is a disgrace.  He should now go back to Alberta to join the similarly-addled Wildrose Party, where he belongs.

THE LOSERS

  • The U.K. Conservatives and Labour: Cameron is gone, others will soon follow.  The vast majority of British MPs supported the remain side; all are now reflecting on their political viability as a result.  British politics is entering a period of chaos and inability, in which the voices of the aforementioned racists, nativists and isolationists will dominate.
  • Obama, Merkel, Trudeau, et al.  All took a chance, and weighed in on the Brexit referendum.  All expressed the view – properly, correctly – that a British withdrawal would hurt every one of us.  All are now going to enter a protracted period where trade agreements, political alliances and strategic military pacts will need to be re-assessed and possibly renegotiated.  It will be time-consuming and very difficult.
  • Hillary Clinton: Trump has been handed a stick, and he is not going to hesitate beating his opponent with it.  Brexit gives the putative Republican presidential nominee a perfect frame for his anti-trade, anti-immigrant, anti-Wall Street bumpersticker sloganeering.  I still believe Hillary will prevail in November.  But her task got a bit harder, last night.
  • You and me:  Markets around the world are plummeting.  Currencies (particularly, and unsurprisingly, the British one) are worth less than they did just 24 hours ago.  Investments – that is, your pension – will not be worth what they were.  Only God knows where it will lead – but, God knows, uncertainty is never good for national economies.  This is a disaster, for those of us who believe in unity, cooperation and tolerance.  Don’t believe me? Think I’m overstating things? Let me end with a comment I received from a triumphant “uRtheTyranny” [24.36.151.239] late last night: “Our jobs are shipped overseas with treasonous trade deals and then foreigners brought in by traitors to take the rest and then whites have to go to the end of the line with affirmative action. Then you fill our neighbourhoods with foreigners that hate us, rob us, rape us and kill us.  You keep demonizing us for trying to defend our people and culture. The people are resisting your Orwellian tyranny. The fire rises.”

88 Comments

  1. Joseph says:

    I think that trying to pin the murder of Sue Cox on the Brexit side was a huge mistake.

  2. Dan Calda says:

    Unbelievable.
    Good bye Scotland.
    Aside from the million or so economic and financial issues this will create…where will the British nuclear fleet now go…The Thames?

  3. Cory says:

    I don’t think its fair to say this was based on racism.

    If you substitute the word EU for USA and UK for Canada, you can bet that Canadians would have voted to leave. Is it racist for Canadians to not want to be in a political union with the USA?

    • Steve T says:

      Whaaa…?? Not a parallel, or even a good metaphor.

      Canada never agreed to join the U.S. as a common economic or political union (NAFTA isn’t even remotely close to the EU). If we had (and as recently as the mid-1990s), then what would have changed to cause Canadians to vote to leave? If Canadians were ranting about the dirty rotten immigrants coming through the U.S. (let’s say, from Mexico), or that Canada had to pay money into the North American union, or that Canada had to abide by union laws – and those were the reasons for the “leave” vote – then yes, Canada would be just as guilty as the UK of the things Warren notes.

      • Cory says:

        I’m asking you to imagine if Canada was in that situation. Do you think we would accept it? (there’s a reason why we’re not in that situation: because the politicians know we’d never accept it).

        Secondly, what vote was there for the UK to join the EU? There wasn’t. It was an economic agreement which evolved over time into an extra level of government without the express consent of the people.

        I guarantee if NAFTA evolved into a United States of North America similar to the EU, Canadians would vote to leave too

        • bluegreenblogger says:

          well that is a pretty comprehensive error. You managed to completely ‘mis-remember’ 50 years of English History, from the European Steel Pact to the present.

    • Francis says:

      Why would a Canada exit be guarantee? What source of irritation are you basing that presumption Canadians voting for leave?

      I don’t think you’ve been following the Brexit; just tuning in the day after to throw your own two cents in.

      The Brexit was entirely based on racism. Nigel Farage has indicated immigration as being *the* issue behind the Leave vote — countless times.

      If the guy leading the Leave campaign is insisting immigration as the fundamental basis, then you bet your ass it was based on racism.

      Numbers also don’t lie; the massive majority of the votes cast for Leave came predominately from the white and under-educated demographic.

      Again, thanks for tuning but you need to brush up on some of your information before you pretend like you know what you’re talking about.

      • Cory says:

        Guess I’m just one of those white uneducated lesser people that you’re referring too.

        Can you guarantee that the vast majority of those voting to leave did so because they’re racists? Isn’t asserting that the only people who voted to leave were white people who did it out of racism, itself racist? I guess I’ll have to inform a fellow I’ve been chatting with from the UK named Raj that he’s actually a white racist.

        As for what Canada would do in a similar situation, my assertion is based on the fact that Canadians would not want unelected politicians in New York passing laws for us, just as people in the UK felt toward unelected EU bureaucrats in Brussels doing the same.

        Funny how when the Liberals and NDP were against NAFTA because it would encourage a “race to the bottom” with Mexico, they were never accused of being racist…

        • Lyn says:

          Cory; You are bang on with your thought. The EU Parliament has 751 unelected members making decisions that became regulations. Why would you let someone else make decisions for your country….open borders. The British wanted there country back. So glad they broke away from the EU…UK got their country back and will progress forward from here.

        • Francis says:

          Oh great, you got a token minority named Raj to buttress your completely flimsy argument.

          I don’t have to guarantee what is already factual. If the number (available on the BBC and ITV) are implicitly indicating that the vast majority (majority meaning largest faction without being the whole — which is something you evidently don’t understand) of the Leave support came from under educated, white regions of the UK.

          More importantly, as I clearly stated in my previous comment to you; Nigel Farage — who was the leading figure behind the Leave side — in no uncertain terms attributed the major cause of the Leave vote as being based in anti-immigration. While David Cameron made the argument for economic stability, Farage and Johnson opted to capitalize on a pre-existing fear of immigration to the UK. I believe Farage was quoted several hundred times as saying “bring back our borders”.

          So I don’t know what else more you would need in the way of evidence if you are still completely unable to draw the same conclusion nearly every observer to the Brexit has been drawing and still is drawings. Then again, may “Raj” didn’t fill you in on that part.

          Nevertheless, I commented in a previous post here that I thought there were legitimate issues to debate on the Leave side. Primarily dealing with the restrictive and growingly controlling influence Brussels had on the UK policies. While issues like curved bananas were nothing more than a red-herring, situations like the Greek bailout wore heavily on the already unsatisfied state. So to your point about New York having influence on Ottawa, yes, I would agree that it would be a source of frustration for some.

          That said, the amount of control versus the amount of benefits the UK and EU relationship involved was completely misunderstood by 52% of the UK electorate. To start, the UK already had preferential treatment in the EU and was perhaps the most autonomous member state in the EU. Secondly, the UK wasn’t exactly being crushed under the pressure of Brussels economically. On the contrary, the UK benefited from being a member of a large trading block that allowed much more freedom of movement in good and services for the UK. Thirdly, the anger towards Brussels was a proxy issue for immigration. Restrictions that Leave advocates bemoaned were insignificant in the broader picture of the shared EU economy. Rather, the free borderless nature of the EU which was seen as imposed by Brussels is was fuelled the anger towards the EU. White, working class citizens with diminishing financial prosperity saw high immigration as being directly correlated/tied to their worsening situation. Immigration was, to them, a by-product of globalization that reduced their relevance in the world economy. Its the classic case of “they’re taking our jobs” and its something that Nigel Farage and the UKIP capitalized on.

          While I can agree that the main factor for some wasn’t xenophobia, the Leave side would not have won had it not been able to galvanize the anti-immigration sentiments of its supporters. Just the like the US; its possible that some Trump supporters aren’t bigots but its hard to fathom a motive for the mass majority of his supporters to proudly cling on his every word if they were receptive and empathetic to his radicalized rhetoric.

      • Manuel says:

        I don’t understand how being anti-immigration automatically equals racist. I mean sure, no doubt there are some racists in Britain. There are some racists everywhere. But there are many reasons to be against immigration. Perhaps some saw the levels of immigration increasing too quickly to allow for assimilation? Perhaps some saw it as a threat to jobs? Perhaps some didn’t like some of the cultures that were immigrating and not assimilating? I highly doubt there were many of the 52% who voted to leave did so because of brown skinned people.

        Oh, and Nigel Farage was not the “guy leading the Leave campaign”. That was Boris Johnson.

  4. Luke says:

    I am not happy about this result, for all its awful symbolic implications. Next is President Trump, I predict. I worry of prevalence of suspicion and hostility in Europe, the USA, and beyond, transitioning either abruptly or insidiously to racism and discrimination and the general contraction of minds. What else? EU disintegration? Marine La Pen in charge of France?

    I am glad we have a unifying Prime Minister at this time, who appears be the genuine antithesis to the general trend towards fear and insecurity-driven nationalism and scapegoating in the western world.

  5. Sherry says:

    Agree. Totally, with, every point.

  6. Jim says:

    You have just called over half of the British population racist and economically illiterate. Don’t you think it is possible that this backlash against the established media and self proclaimed intellectual elite is because they insist on calling anyone who disagrees with them an idiot? I see the media blaming Brexit on the old and feeble minded while the young intellectual elite voted strongly to remain. In democracy everyone has the same rights, regardless of whether they are progressive, conservation, young or old. Constantly putting down those who do not think like you by mocking their intelligence has brought us the likes of Trump and Boris Johnson. Half the people in this world might be below average in intelligence, doesn’t mean you can ridicule them whether you win or lose.

    • Warren says:

      No, I didn’t. That’s who the leaders of this movement were, for the most part. Don’t be obtuse.

      • Bill says:

        This is not a fair assessment of the Leave campaign – for every Nigel Farage there is a Michael Gove. Moreover, it is a simplistic characterization of a very complex situation facing all of the developed economies. We all know there is a problem but progressives are still doggedly pursuing an agenda of a global welfare state which has never and can never work. And while free markets have been successful in the past in creating enormous value and improved standards of living, it is simply blind faith to suggest more of the same is going to get us through again. The world is quite different today. No one has the answer but I would be happy if we could first just recognize the problem. It is difficult to be optimistic when the largest economy in the world is going to choose between two people who should never be anywhere near government let alone the President of the US. If the developed economies don’t change course and reverse the increasing polarization of positions, it is not going to end well for any of us.

    • Joseph says:

      That’s how it looked to me too..I think it’s a Quebec thing when they lose a la Jacques Parizeau…. ““bankers” (cf., traditional code for The Jews).”.. Who knew?

    • Maps Onburt says:

      I think it is hugely intellectually lazy to call those who disagree with you racists or idiots. I don’t agree with Trump, Le Pen, or Boris but I wouldn’t bet they are lazy, stupid or racist. People who call Jason Kenny a racist are just plain not paying attention. The guy spent the better part of a decade running around to town halls, churches, synagogues, temples and mosques courting minority votes and almost single handedly them over. I don’t want him as leader but he’s in no way a racist. It’s a cheap shot.

      • Lyn says:

        Maps Onburt: You are completely right. I like what you said, It’s a cheap shot!!

      • Derek Pearce says:

        Boris I admit I’m not familiar enough with– but if you don’t realize that Trump and Le Pen are just flat-out racists then you have a cognitive problem to say the least.

        • Maps Onburt says:

          Please point out to us so cognitively challenged what Trump has said that makes him a racist? I guess you are painting Le Pen Senior’s sins on the daughter… I wonder if you do the same for Sonny’s Dazed?

    • bluegreenblogger says:

      I can ridicule anybody or anything that is ridiculous. Like people who vote one way because someone told them to vote the other. Even more ridiculous, I LIKE to ridicule people who claim that someone ELSE is responsible for the way they voted, because that somebody ELSE told them vote the other way. Hm, that was the argument you made. Can I start the ridicule now?

  7. Michael says:

    Another group can be added to the “Losers” column, in my opinion:

    Pollsters.

    Most of them were predicting a narrow victory for Remain. They must have either erred en masse, or had their heads in the sand and not want to see what was coming.

  8. Darren H says:

    In regards to Jason Kenney, Quebec is not the province you should be worried about leaving Confederation. But hey, keep attacking our way of lives here in sunny Alberta and call us whatever names you like. The fact is this country is headed for trouble not seen in a generation or two.

    • Michael S says:

      A landlocked, isolated province economically dependent on mining a dirty resource in decline. Bye!

    • Lyn says:

      Darren H: I agree with you totally. Ontario and Quebec floundering economies rely on AB for subsidies but no thanks at all. Ignorant people.

      • Cory says:

        Why is it when Quebec talks about leaving Liberals twist our country into knots to appease them but when somebody from Alberta mentions separatism its, “Good, see ya later”?

  9. Jeff Paul says:

    Once again emotional voters have carried the day. Where a political campaign can seize on people’s emotions, they are winning. Ford, Obama, Trudeau, Trump and now Brexit. The only thing stopping Sanders was the monster head start that Hillary had. 3 more months on that campaign and he wins.

    This is why we will see Trump win in November. He has cornered the market on emotional voters in the US. Hillary gets rational voters, sure, but that won’t be enough. People tend to agree with presentations of facts that validate their feelings. The internet gives people an unlimited number of facts that they can use to validate how they feel.

    Trump voters are emotional voters and that is why he is going to win in November unless somehow Hillary can bring in emotional voters. I don’t see that happening.

    • Peter says:

      Once again emotional voters have carried the day.

      With respect, when I read that kind of thing, I despair of mainstream progressives-at-large ever getting past the stage of repeating their beloved shibboleths instead of getting out to see what their lyin’ eyes tell them. For quite some time now, the EU has suffered from three major, very high-profile problems that has led to its steadily decreasing popularity. The first is the democratic deficit and a never-ending bureaucratic interference with small businesses and traditional livelihoods. Economic death by a thousand edicts from Brussels. The second is that the Euro has been shown to be a deeply flawed, even irrational mistake that can only be fixed be either abandoning it or moving to complete political unity with everyone adopting German rules and work ethics. The third is out-of-control waves of immigrants and especially refugees that mainstream EU governments of all persuasions have been unable to regulate and manage despite repeated promises to do so. All three of these have had very real consequences, especially for the bottom half of the socio-economic ladder. It’s those who are blind to what these issues mean for many and just talk with soaring rhetoric about unity and cooperation that are succumbing to emotion.

  10. Peter says:

    This is a disaster, for those of us who believe in unity, cooperation and tolerance.

    That’s not unfair, but when those who profess to believe in those values stop trying to inspire and motivate and just dismiss anyone who questions their perspective ever more shrilly with ever more derogatory epithets, they will find their audience blocking their ears.

    The tragedy of Europe is its repeated zeal for “the big idea” that turns into a runaway train. Christendom, the Holy Roman Empire, Napoleon, Marxism, even the Nazis in Eastern Europe and now the EU. All held out a promise of ending petty, atavistic, local frictions and wars by unifying the continent in peace and cooperation. All became corrupted and magnets for popular opposition.

  11. Stephanie Powers says:

    So let me understand – Scotland wants sovereignty from the UK, an imperfect union but one in which it can vote for members and has a tremendous amount of influence, and then turn around and surrender that newly achieved sovereignty to a government based in Brussels that they have much less influence over. Makes sense…

    The EU over-reached; had it simply remained a free-trade bloc with the capacity for labour and goods to move freely within its members this would never have happened and the original goal of the EU, post WW-II, of a more integrated Europe to prevent future military conflicts would have been achieved. But no, it decided to pursue a pan-European government, a one-size fits all pan-European currency, and saddle the continent with a largely unaccountable bureaucracy that nobody really cared for.

    The Leave campaign, aside from some elements, is hardly “isolationist”. They’re argument is that the UK is being prevented from negotiating free trade deals with the US, Canada, Asia et al by it’s ties to the continent which has been experiencing near zero growth for the past decade. That’s not anti-trade or isolationist, it’s a valid belief that the economic grass is indeed greener on the other side.

    Congrats to the British.

    • Cory says:

      Bingo. That’s it exactly.

      The other side is avoiding that discussion and seems to just be focusing on fear and accusations of racism.

      • Warren says:

        And what would you call the effusive support of Trump, Le Pen and every neo-Nazi on the planet? A coincidence?

        • Cory says:

          People support it for different reasons. Some see the EU as part of a global conspiracy, but because some do does not mean all do.

          What will likely happen IMO, is the UK will either renegotiate their inclusion in the EU under new conditions, or they’ll leave and a free trade deal with the EU will be reached.

          The rest of the world and EU aren’t stupid, they will want to cooperate economically with the UK.

          We can’t be reflexively against something because we don’t like some of the people who are in support of it.

          • Cory says:

            How would their negotiation hand have been stronger if the vote had been to remain?

            What motivation would the EU have to open negotiations if the UK people had just voted for the status-quo?

        • Ronald O'Dowd says:

          Warren,

          You are bang on here. The British will be fine — until the next election. If this has a cascading effect at the polls, bye, bye, Merkel, Hollande, etc. That’s when it becomes very dangerous — with Putin pushing for closer ties with the EU — so he can dominate it. That’s how Germany loses its place as the EU’s main power.

  12. bobsdf says:

    Sorry, just had to point out this inconsistency, “Currencies (particularly, and unsurprisingly, the British one) are worth less than they did just 24 hours ago.” Currencies as a whole can not be worth less. Yes, sterling is lower. But it is lower vis-à-vis other currencies. Cad$, US$, EUR, JPY, CHF, etc. are all up against the pound.

    And as for equity markets, the TSX60 @ 13,966 is currently down 1.17%. To put that in perspective, it was at the same level about 5 days ago and is 7% higher than the start of 2016. Could it go lower, yes, but so far it’s not even close to the disaster you make it out to be. Take a deep breath, the world hasn’t ended, yet.

  13. Joel Robinson says:

    Hi Warren,
    I’m an engineer who grew up and lived in Ontario until recently. We moved from Canada to the UK over a year ago due to an awesome work opportunity. The family is loving it so far.

    My observations are that the Remain side did not sufficiently communicate to the great unwashed the benefits of remaining in the EU, they just pounded the negatives of leaving. The negatives were so great that a lot of people started to tune them out because they either didn’t trust the sources (Cameron, et al), or didn’t care because they have little to lose.

    Most of the people I work with were shocked this morning, but they kind of understand why the vote went the way it did. Cameron ran a really poor campaign. Corbyn was a no-show, where we were expecting him to pick up and run with the Remain vote. There was even talk about Cameron disingenuously acting as the Remain leader in order to make Corbyn take pause with the Remain camp. But I’m sure that’s not possible.

    All in all, people are kind of in shock, but they are stoic people, and so I watched them all take it in stride at our weekly meeting.

    • Cory says:

      I think that’s a good point. When the head of the EU said Brexit would be “the end of western civilization” it was so over the top that people tuned-out all the negative fear-mongering.

  14. Michael Bluth says:

    Not sure how ‘you and I’ are losers in this case.

    The TSX is off a bit, a little more than it gained yesterday on false optimism about a remain win.

    Plummeting is similar to the hyperbole the Remain camp used in their poor campaign.

    The Brexiteers didn’t perform exceptionally well either. Just happened that the ‘elites’ chose Remain as their side. Yet another anti-elite vote.

      • Michael Bluth says:

        As of 11:52 EDT the S&P TSX is down 1.36% today. That a plummet does not make.

        Was there really need for the personal insult?

          • Michael Bluth says:

            It his hurting the global markets.

            Canada has done pretty well out of it. More than half of today’s loss on the TSX is gains from yesterday.

            Assuming most of your readers are Canadian they should be happy that the TSX is outperforming world markets.

        • Kelly says:

          Only an unwise person would put all their money in the Canadian market. One diversifies as a way to manage risk. What older ignorant voters in mainly rural England with limited futures did was greatly increase the risk faced by their children and grand children. It’s tragic. And when Scotland leaves, as it surely will, taking the UKs oil with it, the risks will increase further. Mostly though, today Britain is greatly diminished on the world stage. She’s weaker. She is at the back of the queue as Obama put it.

          • Michael Bluth says:

            An ‘economically literate’ person knows that it is entirely possible to build a balanced portfolio all within the confines of the TSX. You can buy bonds directly or bond funds. There are mutual funds and ETFs that mirror the S&P, MSCI, etc. The funds are hedged for currency fluctuations. Which is likely why the impact of Brexit was relatively mild on the TSX.

            Diversification can be achieved without dealing with the hassles of managing the nightmares of forex and dealing with withholding taxes from other jurisdictions.

            This is yet another illustration of how the elites truly have misjudged the electorate. Looking down their nose at the unwashed masses daring to question the dictate from on high.

            ‘older ignorant’ voters? Really? I thought the European ideal and progressive elites looked at all citizens as equal and believe in the free market place of ideas.

            I guess the hypocrisy is shown when people dare to vote against the way progressive elites tell them to. If you dare to vote a different way you are open to attacks on your age, skin colour, attacked as being a racist with no other foundation or called economically illiterate by people who read economic headlines supporting their point of view without much market knowledge.

          • bluegreenblogger says:

            LOL, Bluth above says we are all tickety boo because we are ‘hedged’. Newsflash! Increased Market risk impacts costs of hedging exponentially! Black and Scholes can show you the formulae. Newsflash 2: NOT all funds are hedged according to your risk appetite! So yes, a wise investor DOES in fact want to know who is hedging against what, and at what cost? And that same wise investor will hold his or her assets in different currencies and markets, because SYSTEMIC risks are very hard to hedge accurately without deep pockets and big computers. So yes, a major drop in asset values anywhere has an impact everywhere.

      • bobsdf says:

        From your link:

        S&P TSX
        13,950.22
        -1.28%
        11:46 EDT

        Not sure how that supports your claim that honesty isn’t his strong suit. I think most would agree with the view that a 1.28% change is of small significance when related to financial markets (or housing. I’m interested to hear what adjectives you’d apply there, lol.) Or, are you suggesting that he actually veiws 1.28% as being a lot and is lying about it?

        • Michael Bluth says:

          Thanks bob.

          The markets, and British bookies, both put far too much weight on a 2% leave in the polls for Remain. Ladbroke’s had Brexit at 7 to 1 when voting opened yesterday.

  15. PJH says:

    Here is the speech by George Galloway(not exactly a darling of the right, or left for that matter) that convinced me that Brexit was right for Britain……https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8cF93B58Vw

  16. Ronald O'Dowd says:

    Warren,

    Cameron has done the right thing. The vote must be respected and acted upon.

    It makes me think about the other Elizabeth vs. the Spanish Armada.

  17. BillBC says:

    I repeat what Peter commented on your previous post, where he criticized “privileged bien-pensants who dismiss the electorate as stupid, self-destructive and xenophobic.” Something to keep in mind when discussing this issue….

    • Warren says:

      Nobody is calling the electorate that here.

      We are calling Le Pen, Trump, neo-Nazis, etc. that. Do you feel compelled to defend those people?

      • Peter says:

        I can understand and share somewhat your fears about European neo-fascist movements aligning with mainstream anti-EU sentiment, but why would the legitimacy of the votes of most 17.5 million Leave supporters be tainted by association with them? Golden Dawn is an appalling piece of xenophobic thuggery in Greece and is violently anti-EU, but I don’t see how that taints the votes of the Athenian pensioner whose pension was slashed by EU hard-balling or the Greek islander overwhelmed by illegal refugees. It reminds me of the HDS crowd insisting on the close connections between ugly, marginal white supremacists and anyone who voted for Harper.

        Neo-Nazis and National front types are not anywhere near close to positions of power in Britain any more than Your Ward News is close to seizing control of the Press Council. Boris Johnson is not a Hitler or even a LePen. Neither, by the way, is Trump and I really hope the Dems aren’t going to make the mistake of flinging the F word at him indiscriminately for five months. Fascist, I mean, not the other F word. Haven’t you heard–he’s not a fascist, he’s an asshole!

  18. Francis says:

    Wow, Warren summed up my thoughts on the Brexit almost verbatim.

    But let me just expand on it anyway.

    Jason Kenney: A racist asshole who doesn’t have the balls to own up to his own bigotry. Complete dumbass whose incompetence surpasses his eligibility for any kind of leadership.

    52% of the UK electorate: Incredibly ill-informed.

    Boris Johnson: Just put a knife in the political career of David Cameron (I almost feel bad for David Cameron). If this guy is the heir-apparent for British PM, then the UK is royally screwed.

    Nigel Farage: The Jason Kenney of the UK.

    Americans against Trump: Fucked.

    Trump: To dumb to comprehend what just happened.

    The world: Slowly turning time back to the 1920s, where nationalism and authoritarianism are all the rage.

    • Francis says:

      I forgot to add…

      Jeremy Corbyn also finished. If there is a major split in the Tory caucus then there is at least a similar, minor one in the Labour caucus. Many Labour MPs are apparently beside themselves with Jeremy. Those Labour MPs for Leave think he was completely inconsistent with his past rhetoric on EU and failed to support them, while Labour MPs for Stay think he was basically invisible through the referendum and failed to combat the xenophobic undertones of the Leave campaign.

      All in all, massive upheaval in the United Kingdom right now. No telling what the future holds, both economically and politically.

    • PJH says:

      I never thought I would see the day that I would defend Jason Kenney…..He is many things, but a racist he is not. As Minister for Multiculturalism, “The Minister for Curry in a Hurry” was almost solely responsible for the Conservative Party finally making inroads with Canadian ethnic communities, specifically the South Asian and Asian communities. I hardly think that someone who was truly a racist would have approached this job with such zeal, and dedication. In return, he became very well respected within those communities…..

      • Francis says:

        Oh, please allow me to deconstruct the myth of Jason Kenney’s supposed loving relationship with “ethnic communities”.

        First of all, courting ethnic communities with the intention of securing large voting blocks is far, far from altruistic inclusiveness. Any party/politician that approaches an ethnic community with the sole intention of locking up votes, without sincerity of involving those communities in the infrastructure of their party/government don’t get a pat on the back for “reaching out”.

        Second of all, referring to Kenney as the Minister for “Curry in a Hurry” in inherently (and un-fucking-believably) condescending, if not a bit racist. If this is how Jason Kenney and his colleagues saw the outreach to Asian/South Asian communities, then they were evidently just commodities for them to be won.

        Third of all, I don’t know how long you’ve been following Canadian politics because you either are unaware, or are intentionally ignoring the several instances of Jason Kenney’s implicitly xenophobic comments and language. Of which, many bordered on the downright racist.

        Fourth of all, the fundamental basis of Jason Kenney and the CPC’s approach to the ethnic communities was and has been that these communities are predominately more socially conservatives than other Canadians. Which is why Kenney was tasked with courting the South Asian community in the first place — not because he gave a damn, but because he was pretty much the Ted Cruz of the CPC.

        Fifth of all, you’re assertion of Kenney being respectable within those communities is comical. Everything that Jason Kenney had supposedly worked for of the past years was completely thrown out of the window during last years election when Harper opted for a more dog-whistle kind of political campaign; all that good-will capital that may have been is gone. So while the Kellie Leitch was off announcing the “snitch on your brown neighbours” hotline, Jason Kenney was going into these communities feigning some sort of faux-friendship.

        Lastly: Jason Kenney is a good politician; that I will fully credit him with. He is a man with a depth of policy knowledge that is respectable. However, politically campaigning in ethnic communities while simultaneously advocating opinions and language that marginalize them is highly inconsistent with the “he’s not a racist” narrative. Which is why I wish he would own up to his own values and beliefs rather than dance around them and try to defend them.

        • PJH says:

          You make very valid points all…….I have been critical of Jason Kenney in the past, on this forum, and elsewhere. It was simply an opinion. I simply felt that someone who appeared to enjoy himself so at events for the Asian and South Asian communities couldn’t really, truly. be a racist, but you obviously have the situation sussed.
          As for the “Minister of Curry in a Hurry” remark….it wasn’t coined by me, but had appeared in numerous articles about the man, over the years.

  19. godot10 says:

    Brexit was a vote for freedom and liberty and democracy and self-government. The EU was/is opposed to all of those things.

    If Scotland and Northern Ireland choose to be ruled by the dictators in Brussels…let them, but they would be well advised to note the jackboot Brussels took to Cyprus and Greece.

    England has always done better throwing off and resisting the yoke of an imperial Europe.

  20. Kelly says:

    Exactly. British workers hate the fact that the EU forced them to accept legally mandated paid time off, paid overtime and a minimum wage …none of which existed in the UK before the EU mandated in in the 1990s.

  21. Mike Adamson says:

    The fact that those under 50 voted to Stay while those over 50 voted to leave doesn’t bode well for the future.

  22. Brian says:

    Oh stop! Just stop!

    Reading between the lines here, I must say, Warren, you’re coming off as a little bit of a Commie. You’re suggesting that the majority that voted are wrong and arel bigots, racists and anti Jew. (First time in my 50 years and first time in 88 years that my uncle –who escaped prison camp after prison camp in Germany—has ever heard that the word “banker” is code for Jew. Pretty nasty rhetoric, I must say.

    Scotland wanted to separate… So let them. They don’t owe England a damn thing. So, who cares? They’ll figure it out.

    Anti-traders?!!!! Seriously???!! People are fine with free trade as long as it’s FAIR TRADE. If it ain’t fair, screw it and bring back tariffs. The world was a better place when people had to pay to play in another countries sandbox. Geezus, if we still had the Auto Pact, our jobs wouldn’t be shipped out of country to Mexico for crying out loud. Free Trade kills national identities and living in an homogenized society is more dangerous than leaving the EU, any day.

    Separatists???!!! Good Lord, they left the EU, not the Commonwealth. Seems like shameless pandering to suggest that Quebec is suddenly going to separation crazy again. This isn’t an FLQ crisis. Britain left a trade organisation. Who cares? get over it.

    As for Jason Kenny… Yesterday’s news and he can say what he wants. Free speech and all that… I kinda think it’s important.

    As for the losers???

    Labour and Cameron’s Conservatives: Good riddance to both. Labour broke the word economy with lies about the Iraq war and David Cameron… The man was witnessed sticking hi penis into the mouth of a cooked pig. Sounds like a comeuppance and an ironic one at that.

    Obama, Merkel Trudeau: Obama? Lame duck. Who cares. Trudeau?? Does he really matter? Seriously? Merkel: She’s been shafted time and again. She’s on her last legs as a leader.

    Hillary?! Really?! She’s steps away from an indictment. Likely one of the most corrupt politicians on the planet. She just has killer PR. (And she’s gonna lose to Trump.)

    You and me?! Nope. My money is safe. I took all my savings and put them into physical gold and silver. Anyone stupid enough to invest in the markets when we face a crash every six years, is their own worst enemy. With the American Glass Steigal bill constantly being ripped apart, what moron would risk the market? Oh wait…

    When 10,000 EU employees earn more the David Cameron, it’s a corrupt system. Good riddance. NAFTA next. And if you think Quebec is gonna get all uppity and try and separate, then I’ll move to Quebec and join them. I love democracy and freedom of choice and speech and this BREXIT thing is a perfect example of power in the hands of the people. Now stop whining and be happy for our Commonwealth brothers and sisters.

  23. Robert Saxon says:

    Keep Calm and Brexit On

    Why Leave was victorious is well explained by a Change.org petition: “Mayor Sadiq, wouldn’t you prefer to be President Sadiq?” 46,000 people have thus far signed up for London to leave England. Of course, multicultural London, the sole region in all of England to vote remain, has been quite happy with the Merkelite conspiracy to extend the EU’s open borders to the rest of the world. (Africa + Asia = 75% world population, the United Kingdom, 0.89%) For the rest of England, the horrors of Rotherham, mirrored in events like Cologne’s New Year’s rape festival, made Leave an existential matter. Then Paris.

    Doug Saunders, Canada’s Walter Duranty, blames the “extreme right… UKIP Leader Nigel Farage’s scare stories of sexual predation,” somehow wilfully blind of Rotherham, Oxford, Cologne, Sweden. Saunders makes the astonishing claim: “Refugees from Syria and alarming hordes camped out in Calais have nothing to do with the EU.” In reality, the EU’s Internationalist open border policy is nothing less than ethnic cleansing of the native populations of Europe engineered by Euro-Marxists.

    A twitter gem from Jodi kaye @spokenELLE: “When you were daydreaming about Jamaican reparations and England’s economy tanks”. Indeed, the whole EU project devolved to a gargantuan exercise in wealth redistribution under a truly byzantine and extortionate system worthy of the GDR. Eastern Europeans, many never fully disabused of a Communist mindset, expect the British state to do everything; the aspirational class more the welfare comparison shopping class. Likewise, the economic disasters of Greece, Spain, Portugal, really all of southern Europe, where staying in school until 30 and retiring in the 40s – on credit – is viewed as unremarkable. Now, with millions-upon-millions of economic migrants pouring into the EU from Asia and Africa, as per the Jodi Kayes, the UK was to be offered up as a national piñata to the whole world to address bottomless “my struggle” historical grievances.

    The United Kingdom has never taken the easy road. When all of Continental Europe had fallen to National Socialism, when America and Russia still sat on their hands, when Ireland, Switzerland et al. remained neutral, only she would not bow to Hitler’s debauched and Satanic utopian vision. Now, the utopian fantasists of Globalism and Internationalism hunger to devour small nations whole. A majority of people in the United Kingdom have rejected this suicidal course. They must redouble their efforts to take their survival and destiny fully into their own hands. We wish them Godspeed and every success.

  24. Shawn says:

    In the 4.6 billion years of this worlds existents two things are always constant, every thing begins and every thing ends. Nothing last for ever except time. Every thing we humans build will always come crashing down. So to will the One World Order.

  25. monkey says:

    I’ve travelled to 23 of the 28 member states, are a strong supporter of Canada’s welcoming immigration policies, and I am pro free trade, yet I would have supported a brexit. It’s unfortunate it had to come to this and had the EU listened to earlier rejections such as Denmark rejecting the Maastricht Treaty, France (a founding member) only narrowly approving it, Ireland rejecting both the Nice and Lisbon Treaties on first try, and the Dutch and French rejections of the EU constitution this could have been avoided. I despise people like LePen, Trump, and Geert Wilders and its unfortunate they’ve become the face of Euroscepticism, but I believe having a cooperative relationships between sovereign countries like we have in North America not having a super national entity that can override national laws like the EU is the way to go. Lets remember the only change in immigration that might happen depending on the deal is EU citizens will lose the automatic right to come to Britain, but the rules for non-EU citizens have always been under national jurisdiction and can be changed in or out of the EU thus unless UKIP wins outright, likely won’t change. In fact this might actually help in the long-run dampen the far right parties as while no doubt some of their supporters are hardcore racists who will always exists, some are simply people who believe in the idea of sovereign nations so if some sovereignty is returned to EU member states this won’t eliminate the far right parties, but hopefully will push them back to fringe parties where they belong. Lets remember if the EU hadn’t adopted the Scheghen Agreement (which Britain isn’t part of), the migrant crisis likely would have not been nearly as bad. Also the free mobility of labour can only work if countries have comparable standards of living thus before 2004 it was a non-issue, but once the Eastern European countries joined it didn’t as rather than being a two way street, it was a one way street. If someday (which I hope happens) Eastern Europe enjoys the same standard of living as Western Europe, then this will be a non-issue, but that has happened yet. Also because English is the most commonly spoken second language, a disproportionate number went to Britain. I don’t think most on the leave side have any problem with a Polish doctor, engineer, professor, teacher or any other skilled one coming to Britain. What they don’t like is the idea all EU citizens have the automatic right to settle in Britain regardless of skills. Even in NAFTA we don’t go this far as Americans and Mexicans do not have the automatic right to live and work in Canada.

  26. Maps Onburt says:

    Not a good day for anti-separatists anywhere… this is going to hurt us in Canada now too. I see PM Trudeau got booed for speaking 15 seconds of English on this topic today in Quebec City.

  27. Jon A says:

    uRtheTyranny gets his trenchant political insight from a fucking Batman movie? What an asshole.

  28. Al in Cranbrook says:

    As per usual of late, Rex Murphy nails it, brilliantly…

    http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/rex-murphy-results-of-the-brexit-referendum-is-a-rebuke-to-western-elites

    I’ve said it here before, people are getting increasingly fed up with being told how live by so-called “experts”, while the world created around them by said “experts” ever the more descends into utter insanity.

    And they’ve had a GD gutful of being berated at every turn for even the slightest hint of disagreement with said “experts”.

  29. CAnny Scot says:

    Racists and uneducated? My cousins in Scotland all voted to leave the EU because of the myriad of petty regulations coming out of Brussels and they have got PhDs from Oxford and Cambridge. At last count, I think 77 regulations on towels and 350 plus on toothpaste. Every product and service has dozens of regulations stifling small business and.new product development.

  30. Matt says:

    The morning after voting to leave the EU, Google reports massive spike in searches for “What is the EU” coming from Britons.

    Uhh, maybe they should have googled that you know, before voting.

    http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/06/24/480949383/britains-google-searches-for-what-is-the-eu-spike-after-brexit-vote

  31. Joe says:

    I really don’t see this as a victory for ignorance or intolerance but rather the natural outcome from the massive failure of the ruling elite and the breakdown of social democracy. The people who gave us the Magna Carta and exported their ideal of parliamentary democracy have stood up to the un-elected, unaccountable bureaucracy and its leader the (in effect) almost absolute monarch Jean-Claude Juncker together whose edicts have real effects on regular people’s lives. The millions of petty tyrannies add up and eventually the most docile people will say “enough!”. The people were not consulted about becoming EU subjects and now they have thrown off the EU yoke. I am reminded of an esteemed leader once stood up to an absolute tyrant and said “Let my people go”. For the next 40 years those former slaves wandered in the wilderness eking out a living in a dry and barren land and I know that some looked back with yearning over the abundance of food available in their previous state of slavery but the need to be free was greater than the creature comforts of servitude.

  32. Bill says:

    No doubt all you fans of the EU model will want to demonstrate the depth of that commitment by advocating we extend Nafta to include greater integration of North America. You already have your talking points – immediate bump in our GDP, ability to work in the US without a Green Card, and of course, our greater influence internationally as we would be sitting at the table as a member of Nafta.

    But perhaps your support is only because the EU forces the UK to accept a progressive agenda that would never be adopted by an independent Britain. Not likely to happen here, would it?

  33. e.a.f. says:

    The Guardian had an interesting article, “if you got money, you vote in……..if you haven’t got money, you vote out”. If you look at some of the voting stats it wasn’t about economic illeteracy, its was about people not having much of anything and not wanting to share the little they had. Housing is a monopoly of a few corporations, social housing is down the toilet, education and health care ditto. when you have little who wants to see millions arriving on your shores. Had people had more they would have been in a better frame of mind. Never forget that in tough times, you can get half the working class to kill the other half. those in G.B. did not see those arriving as part of their group and so the kill is on. those who benefit, well time will tell.

    As we enter a time of instability, those who promise will be elected and the voters will be fooled. Its all about income inequity.

    On the other hand, G.B. after centuries of invading and inhabiting other countries finally got everyone to come to them. You reap what you sow, some times it just takes a while.

    What can we learn from all of this? At some time there will be a revolt and it started in G.B.

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