Decades ago, a German word entered the English language. The word was Schadenfreude. Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure, joy, and self-satisfaction that comes from learning of or witnessing the troubles, failures, and humiliation of another. Yet, this German word has no direct translation. Some might argue that people might feel Schadenfreude about Brexit – when the UK left the[Read More…]
How Great Britain fell for a confidence trick In the 1960s, when Great Britain twice sought entry into then the EEC/EC, the historian Sir Arthur Bryant issued an unheeded warning: “Once in the common market, we shall be a minority in an organization in which the decisions of the majority will have the power to bind the minority, not only[Read More…]
Written by Thomas Klikauer and Norman Simms It is Saturday morning in Dagenham, East London and for truck driver Johan Most Brexit means waiting. It was the Saturday after Britain had left the EU. Lorry driver Most is feeling the dire consequences. He has been on the road for six days. Actually, he wanted to stop in Dagenham only briefly[Read More…]
Warring over fish in the twenty-first century might seem an unlikely proposition. But the deployment of four Royal Navy ships to deter European fishing vessels from encroaching on British waters in the event of a no-deal Brexit has tongues wagging. The prospects of a trade pact between the EU and UK by the end of this month are becoming cold[Read More…]
In a mistaken version of Trump’s catch-cry “Make America Great Again” Make America Great Again, some British voters might have been led to believe that Brexit will Make Britain Great Again. They were convinced that the – never really – good old days of the British Empire would return by voting for Brexit. This is not to be. Capitalism and[Read More…]
While the European family seems to be having its internal spats – populist sparks within threatening to light the powder keg – the marshals and deputies, for the most part, are attempting to contain the British contagion. Britain is still scheduled to leave on October 31 without a deal with the European Union. The divorce papers remain unimplemented, and the[Read More…]
There was something richly amusing in the move: three judges, sitting in Scotland’s highest court of appeal, had little time for the notion that Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s suspension, or proroguing, of parliament till October 14, had been lawful. Some 78 parliamentarians had taken issue with the Conservative leader’s limitation on Parliamentary activity, designed to prevent any hiccups prior to[Read More…]
BREXIT deadline is 31 October 2019. On 23 June 2016, the British people voted 52% against 48% to leave the European Union. In England alone, the margin was somewhat higher, 53.4% for leaving the EU, against 46.6% for staying. In the meantime we know, that this result was influenced by Cambridge Analytica, the same as the Trump Presidency was apparently[Read More…]
Britain’s Boris Johnson is driving his country to the cliff face, along the way mouthing and spouting all manner of populist reassurances. Still fresh in the job, he declared that UK preparations for a no-deal Brexit on October 31, when Britain would leave the European Union, would receive a boost – a “turbocharge”, no less. Michael Gove, now chancellor of[Read More…]
If a tragedy is watching disaster unfold and being powerless to stop it, then such is Brexit — a conundrum wrapped in an enigma as the saying goes. The UK parliament has voted on eight alternatives to the prime minister’s deal after voting it down. These have all failed to get a majority. They have voted twice more on the[Read More…]
Does anyone remember Nigel Farage? He led the UK Independence Party and the ‘leave’ EU vote — along with his last minute ally Boris Johnson who hoped to push himself up to prime minister. Farage is still around as a Member of the European Parliament representing south-east England, a job soon to be redundant when Britain leaves the EU. Boris[Read More…]
Angela Ferrao is a cartoonist. https://www.facebook.com/Ferraodesigns
Co-Written by Robert Stevens and Chris Marsden Theresa May’s government survived a no-confidence vote Wednesday night brought by Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn. MPs voted by 325 to 306 with all 314 MPs of her divided Conservative Party voting to keep the government in office. They were joined by the 10 MPs of the Democratic Unionist Party and an independent[Read More…]
Co-Written by By Robert Stevens and Chris Marsden MPs voted by a massive majority Tuesday evening against Prime Minister Theresa May’s proposed deal with the European Union (EU) on the terms of Britain’s exit from the bloc. May was defeated by a majority of 230, with 432 MPs against the deal and just 202 for in the biggest vote against[Read More…]
It is attrition, suffocation and contortion. While Theresa May’s Brexit program, weak, compromising and cobbled as it is, endures that bit longer, her opponents from within and without government have been essentially undercutting her on various fronts. Foppish and solutions-free Boris Johnson does so from the perspective that the May program as it has been agreed to with the EU[Read More…]
The Boris Johnson storm, beating away at the British Prime Minister’s doors with an ancient fury, has been stayed for the moment in the wake of the Conservative Party Conference held at Birmingham last week. While the potential usurper batters away on the domestic front with red faced enthusiasm, Theresa May faces the impossible sell: convincing the European Union that[Read More…]
The next blow in Boris Johnson’s chapter of political suicide has been made: a piece in the Mail on Sunday which supplied him ample room to take yet another shot at the ghostly British prime minister, Theresa May. There was nothing new in it; everybody knew what Johnson’s views were, and the position he had taken since hyperventilating over July’s[Read More…]
There is a certain haunting similarity between the President of the United States and the now former foreign secretary of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson. This does not merely extend to mad, oddly positioned hair, and misshaped mullets. Both share a philosophy of upending the order and permanent disruption, impossible for those on their putative side of politics to measure,[Read More…]
It was meant to be an away day at Chequers in total hermetic isolation, an effort on the part of UK Prime Minister Theresa May to sketch some common ground in a cabinet that has struggled to agree on much regarding the imminent departure of Britain from the European Union. The clock is ticking, for many ominously, with the departure[Read More…]
As the Sunday news vine began getting heavy, that sole topic of all-consuming, toxic interest – Brexit – threatened to claim the casualty of the British Prime Minister herself, Theresa May. Interest centred on a possible troika that had busied itself on harrying May. In any context, this troika would have seemed a compilation for pure comic effect: buffoonish Boris[Read More…]
The parties had been groping (appropriate, given the daily revelations about harassment) for some common ground. There had been discussions about having further discussions, hedging, ducking and weaving. In a dysfunctional relationship, options tend to shrink rather than expand. And so it turned out in the latest round of Brexit negotiations between the May government and officials of the European[Read More…]
The Times was none too pleased, riled and concerned. Contributors to The Spectator were wondering whether an imminent implosion was about to take place. Who would profit from this act of suicide, this ritual of Tory party cannibalism? The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, naturally. The Tories, Britain’s drivers of Brexit, have gone from trouble to potential disaster. It all came[Read More…]
It took little time for political leaders in the European Union to start dangling the carrot in front of a wounded British Prime Minister. Theresa May’s defeated victory in the British general elections had barely sunk it, and the comments, even invitations, were being issued by various European leaders. This all lies in the interpretation of the British election result. [Read More…]
Painful moves and painful movements have been underway in Brexiting Britain. Prime Minister Theresa May of the UK initiated the Brexit bluster via letter, and March 29, 2017 may well go down in the annals of the European project as more than a mere bruising farewell. The letter has the sense of having cake and munching on it too. There[Read More…]
London: What role Parliament? Edmund Burke put forth his known idea before the electors of Bristol on November 3, 1774. An ideal, and therefore refutable notion, was advanced: “Certainly, gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents.”[1] The role[Read More…]
It was predicted, it was warned against, and it happened: Prime Minister Theresa May’s government cannot commence the official process for leaving the European Union without parliamentary approval. In upholding the decision of the lower court Parliament, deemed the sovereign voice of the UK, was again affirmed as ultimate arbiter, the historical figure of force that cannot be bypassed. This[Read More…]
London: Populism has a much needed place in political arrangements, the necessary, disruptive gust that keeps the complacent from losing touch. For one, it often threatens to destroy those arrangements altogether, or at the very least provide a blustery challenge. This, however, comes with its costs, notably in the modern State. For one, it promises a mixture of bloodletting and indifference[Read More…]
London: The pile of detritus in Tooting had been growing ahead of the New Year’s Eve gatherings. The pubs were initiating their usual trick of closure and charging for tickets in the hope of getting some ruddy cash ahead of 2017. In parts of London, an air of dark pessimism lingered like a cold fog. Ominously, bad weather threatened Heathrow at[Read More…]
Co-Written by Helena Norberg-Hodge and Rupert Read The election of Donald Trump was a rude awakening from which many people in the US have still not recovered. Their shock is similar to that felt by UK progressives, Greens, and those on the Left following the Brexit referendum. In both cases, the visceral reaction was heightened by the barely-disguised racist and[Read More…]
Parliamentary supremacy in British law and politics is akin to the fetish of the union in the United States. Challenge it at your peril; question it to your misfortune. The point was tested, with rumbling consequences, by the May government in its latest Brexit stumble dealing with Britain’s painful and at times confused response to exiting the European Union. The[Read More…]
While British Prime Minister, Theresa May, keeps insisting that Brexit pathway will be a smooth, relatively painless process filled without dramatic compromise to lifestyle and outlook, the traders, stockbrokers and wolves of the City have gone about their own business. They, the suggestion goes, knew better, whereas the idiotic Brexiteer ventured to the ballot in total ignorance. Central to the[Read More…]
What is the purpose of the European Union? This question has been of the minds of everyone following the UK vote in favor of Brexit. Yet in the mad scramble to make sense of the United Kingdom’s rejection of the EU, little lucid commentary has been made. European leaders, the fawning media, and UK citizens alike portrayed the vote as[Read More…]
“There is a rich thesaurus of things I have said that have, one way or the other, I don’t know, that has been misconstrued.” Boris Johnson, Jul 19, 2016 It might have been seen as a form of expressive penal servitude. The UK Foreign Secretary’s position is usually one of the more prestigious ones. Even with Britain being a faded power,[Read More…]
The Brexit crisis was being used as an excuse to fascistify things, regardless what other outcome it might have. Even an essentially progressive vote of the public, to free their nation from the dictatorship in Brussels (the EU), was thus turned into an excuse for the nation to veer far to the right.
British politics has seen it before: a good deal of political bloodletting in a dramatic Cabinet reshuffle. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan did so on July 13, 1962 in what became known as Britain’s own variant of the much cruder and bloodier German event of 1934. Similarly, the new Prime Minister Theresa May, was intent on going a bit deeper than[Read More…]
The Brexit earthquake, possibly the biggest since the 2008 financial collapse, provides another opportunity to question the economic and political structures that cause such quakes. I’ve heard only a handful of voices amidst the high-pitched cacophony of the Brexit debate that have gone beyond the the narrow and racist nationalism of the dominant ‘leave’ voices, and the free-trade nationalism of[Read More…]
When I woke up on June 24th and checked the news, I cried. Along with millions of people around the world. I’m a diehard believer in independence, freedom, democracy, and strong local economies. For some, the Brexit result represented those things. If that had been the reality, I would’ve supported it too. But like every other choice offered in the[Read More…]
The EU is a precarious subject these days. Both backers and detractors are subject to harsh criticism, and those wanting to leave the EU are habitually considered populists or nationalists. However, this Europe, with its undeniable capitalist and neoliberal penchants, isn’t MY Europe, or at least not the Europe I once pictured it to be. That is why, as it[Read More…]
The Brexit verdict brings out the weakness of the concept of European Union. It raises questions whether integration based on the concept of common markets and free flow of capital and goods, services and people can be transformative for all the social classes. Whether integration based on supremacy of finance capital and markets and designed at promoting their profitability at[Read More…]
What role the womb? Politically, it is exploited by the conservative creed as the indispensable mechanism for reproduction. To not add offspring to the ledger of life is not doing the good work of some sky god or inner instinctive voice. Not being able to do so somehow renders the political figure barren in a more than figurative sense. Such[Read More…]
Oh that poor old United Kingdom! Armies of political commentators based on all continents are now feverishly trying to define to what extent the Brits got fooled, or how severely they will soon get punished for their ‘bold move’. All over Europe, the neo-Nazis and other right-wingers are celebrating, while most of ‘liberals’ are panic-stricken, running around like a[Read More…]
In another attempt to kick the leader of the British Labour down and out, a campaign has been hatched with a now commonplace virulence. A report into anti-Semitism within Labour party circles authored by Shami Chakrabarti was to be released with little fanfare, filled with the pieties that come at a time when language is a matter of moral policing[Read More…]
Brexit (British exit from the European Union) would be a ferocious kidney-blow to the international aristocracy, the people (and their agents) who own controlling blocs of stock in international corporations, and who control politicians in every country (except Russia and perhaps China), and who especially control international organizations such as the executive body of the EU, which is the European Commission (or “EC”). The EC,[Read More…]
After months of anticipation, the United Kingdom has decided to leave the European Union (EU). Although, the results were fairly close – 51.9% voted to ‘Leave’ vs. 48.1% elected to ‘Remain’ – the consequences of the decision will be far-reaching. Not only will the Brits negotiate their exit from the EU (thus, the term ‘Brexit’) within the next two years,[Read More…]
Fully 81 percent of the parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) supported Tuesday’s motion of no-confidence in leader Jeremy Corbyn. Just 40 Labour MPs voted against the motion, with 172 in favour. Thirteen did not vote at all and there were four spoilt ballots. The extraordinary scale of the right-wing coup, which had already seen Corbyn lose most of his shadow[Read More…]
The British working class, millions of other ordinary Brits and a swathe of British nationalists have voted for Brexit, the exit of Britain from the EU, with immigration and national self-determination being major issues. The British political Establishment, the political elites, Mainstream media, EU officials and the Americans view Brexit as irresponsible and damaging, and the Brexit supporters have[Read More…]
Jeremy Corbyn, the grand hope of the Labour Party in Britain, is being politically assassinated. The process has been a gradual one, coming in the form of poison administered over a series of months and thinly veiled promises. But now, the issue has become even more violent. The anti-Corbyn clique is now brandishing its weapons in the open. The Brexit[Read More…]
The fretting in the financial markets after Great Britain’s voters narrowly decided to leave the European Union (EU), a move dubbed Brexit, was less about immediate effects–there aren’t any since it would take Britain up to two years to withdraw–and more about a foreboding that other countries will want out, too. In addition, some think it likely that Scottish independence[Read More…]
The enraged liberal reaction to the Brexit vote is in full flood. The anger is pathological – and helps to shed light on why a majority of Britons voted for leaving the European Union, just as earlier a majority of Labour party members voted for Jeremy Corbyn as leader. A few years ago the American writer Chris Hedges wrote[Read More…]
The majority vote by Britons to leave the European Union was an act of raw democracy. Millions of ordinary people refused to be bullied, intimidated and dismissed with open contempt by their presumed betters in the major parties, the leaders of the business and banking oligarchy and the media.
By pushing austerity and commodification of public services, people are now more economically insecure with less wealth and lower incomes. The response of many is anger. Some protest austerity, others blame people of a different skin color, heritage or ethnicity. The surprise vote in the UK to leave the European Union is the latest, and perhaps the biggest, example of the blowback economic and political elites are getting for their actions.
There remains a conspicuous fear in the US Republic that civilization must be a centralising endeavour. Smaller states only matter if they are wedged into a series of agreements and arrangements with an overseeing hegemon. The hegemon dictates the measures to be taken, even if they may be cushioned by promises of good relations and a false sense of autonomy.
Twenty-four hour news networks are both terrible and worthy sites to gauge herd-like assumptions. A gaze at CNN over the coverage of the Brexit over the course of Friday suggested the dismay, growing into outrage that the infallible market had somehow failed to detect the Leave voters on its all divine radar.
This vote is expected to trigger a wide range of far-reaching social, economic and geo-political ramifications at the domestic, European and international levels. Many of these effects would be long-term and are yet to be fully comprehended. Even though the Leave vote was largely influenced by the immigration issue but other important concerns have not been given adequate attention.
Instead of accelerating further integration, the member states should reclaim more sovereignty from Brussels. The EU nomenclature is out of touch with the real world. They do not serve the interest of the peoples but rather corporate interests such as the TTIP negotiations show that are held in camera. If the EU doesn’t change track, it will fall apart.
The policy makers of the developing countries must not fall prey to such deceptive arguments, instead, they must formulate policies which suit the interests of their working classes. The only trouble is that the governments of the Third World are dependent on foreign investment and the global loan sharks, that’s why, they cannot adopt an independent economic and trade policy.
The exit EU referendum needs to be seen in the perspective of the use of EU as a political tool by US. The US has controlled the European continent by NATO; EU which was the result of intra continental economic forces after the Second World War has been now used by USA for its geostrategic gains, when EU ventured into Ukraine not to the liking of the Russia. EU after the vote needs to understand that its illogical arguments against Russian interests have weakened it in final way.
The Vote Leave chief executive Matthew Elliot was wishing to get voters out for the cause, circulating a message that, “There is a very real chance that voters in London and Scotland will vote to keep us in the EU today despite the heartlands of the country voting to leave.” The circulated email also sported a picture from a “leafy”[Read More…]
While the Brexit debate has become a matter of colliding blocs of speculators and crystal ball gazers, a glaring aspect has come to the fore. Virtually nothing has been said about the role played by human rights, Britain’s role in building it up and inspiration in the European Convention of Human Rights, or the issue about citizenship. In that sense,[Read More…]
Europe is about to faces a series of difficult decisions that will affect its future for years to come. The social contradictions of keeping an expanding globalized economy running, which at the same time disenfranchises millions of workers, are now too obvious to turn a blind eye to. Many efforts towards making a livable European community are in disarray, and most of the benefits accrue to the core EU states of Germany, the UK (for now), and France.
There are some who would believe that collaboration at the pan-European level could facilitate a path to genuine economic decentralization. Others are convinced that those steps to localize can best be taken by first leaving the EU. Still others don’t favor either of these paths. We are not trying to tell UK readers how (or even whether) to vote; we are asking you to help us shed light on and bring sanity to this volatile situation. Whichever way you vote, please reject the glaringly stupid rhetoric in the media. Speak out, let your voice be heard for ecological and economic sanity, for a fundamental turnaround
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Our beloved K.P.Sasi is no more. Filmmaker, cartoonist, writer, mentor, friend and above all tireless activist championing the cause of every underdog, Sasi breathed his last, mid-afternoon this Christmas day – after battling a medical condition for months. I remember the last time I met him, almost exactly a month before he passed away, at the ayurvedic healing center in[Read More…]
