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The Inevitable Brexit Thread (1)

(No, I don't know what's going to happen either.)

This isn't really a blog entry so much as the head of a discussion thread about the constitutional crisis currently gripping the UK, to stop Brexit neepery overrunning the comments on anything else I post here for the next month or six.

(We have: a minority government led by an instinctive authoritarian xenophobe who consistently fails to understand the relationship between the Crown-in-Parliament and the Government, not to mention an issue that has split the British public down the middle and similarly split both main political parties so badly that they're already fragmenting. It's being exploited as a wedge issue by the hard right and by foreign actors and unscrupulous investors who want to asset-strip what's left of the state and then repurpose it as a tax haven (there are signs that the hard left is also interested in the potential for what one might call "disaster socialism", but this is probably over-stated). The issue is also acting as a centrifuge on the Union, because majorities in Scotland and Northern Ireland opposed Brexit from the outset—indeed, the third largest party in Parliament, the Scottish National Party, are adamantly opposed, but totally sidelined by the dominant Conservative/Labour factions. And we have a bunch of other splinters under the fingernails of the body politic: the DUP (from the quasi-Christo-fascist right of Northern Ireland) propping up Theresa May, for example. And on the other other side, we have the EU27, who are acting collectively and defensively to defend their stability by enforcing the rule of international law—which none of the British factions seem to understand.)

Anyway. What's happening today? What's going to happen tomorrow? Your guess is as good as mine, so feel free to have at it in the comments!

1283 Comments

1:

The 'Inevitable Brexit' thread.

Oh, I do hope not.

2:

Only partly relevant but ... carrying on from before - an article on a vile predecessor in the USA, whose ideas permeate the "No-Deal" brexiteers.

Let's see: "No Deal" has been ruled out by Parlaiment ... I think we are going to have to go for an extension, now, with the Commons taking over from May, who appears to be about 95% as stupid & obstinate as Corbyn. Today's House votes will tell us, won't they - check back into this thread at about 21.00 hrs GMT?

3:

I'll ask a peripheral question, because with all the alarums and excursions a lot of questions not at the center ring of the circus aren't getting any play in the American press.

Have many politicians in Ireland been making noises about reunification? It might be premature to actually propose that - but Brexit sounds like a fine excuse to invite Northern Ireland to arrange something with the rest of the island that lets them keep the benefits of EU membership. A more formal marriage could be discussed later...

Surely "fuck the English" still has some support, yes?

4:

No deal hasn't been ruled by the EU, tho'

'Take back control' has become the emptiest political slogan in history!

5:

This is typical. Just because the british parliament has decided that there will not be a no-deal brexit doesn’t mean that it will become true. British politics is so self absorbed that it doesn’t realise that it has to find a compromise with the EU and it’s 27 member state. At the moment I can’t see any good reason why the EU should extend the brexit date and it only requires one member state to block the extension.

We live in “interesting times” where many democracies are struggling to remain coherent but what is happening in the UK tops everything.

6:

I reckon they'll revoke article 50. They might get an extension first, they might not, either way it is clear that there's no-one who wants to do anything as risky as form a plan, any plan, and enact it. If nobody makes a decision, then nothing is anybodies fault. I had initially thought this was some kind of conspiracy-make the worst job possible of "negotiations", then cancel Artichoke 50. Now I fear it is worse-they aren't competent to conspire, this really is the result of paralysis and dithering. Whatever hope we had of negotiating anything with anyone is gone.

7:

Have many politicians in Ireland been making noises about reunification?

Which Ireland do you mean? The Republic, or Northern Ireland? There are two countries that'd have to come to a consensus on unification, after all …

Then it gets complicated.

TLDR: NI is poor and backwards (and small) compared to the Republic. In addition, a chunk of the population are vehemently anti-unification, to the point of guns and bombs and ethnic cleansing: they're drawn from a demographic that is currently just over half the population, but shrinking.

Meanwhile: the Republic has a theoretical commitment to unification in its constitution but no actual politicians want to throw themselves on that live hand grenade.

The Good Friday Agreement and common EU membership without a border allowed the unionists in the North (represented by Sinn Fein and, at the radical fringe, the wellspring of support for the IRA) to pretend they'd got it in all but name: they knew demographics were on their side, and with an open border and dual nationality, why get worked up?

But Brexit implies a border somewhere between the EU and the UK (of which NI is a part), and issues with free movement and citizenship, and kicks away one of the key supports of the GFA.

Nobody (with the questionable exception of one or more senders of letter bombs in the past couple of weeks) wants to re-start the Troubles. But the tensions that led to the troubles are still there and the Tories on the mainland are doing their best to spray gasoline on the cooling charcoal for purely selfish local reasons.

NB: please remember that the Protestant community in NI have been living in Ireland since before the Mayflower set sail for the North American colonies. And they were mainly descended from an earlier wave of Irish colonists who settled in Scotland. Suggesting that if they want to stay British they should re-settle on the mainland will go down about as well as suggesting blue-blooded Bostonians return from whence their ancestors came and give North America back to the native peoples.

8:

The UK public, Parliament and government are hopelessly divided and incapable of making a decision. Normally this would lead to maintaining the status quo but that's not how Article 50 works. I would guess it will be withdrawn eventually (after defenestrating Mrs May) but as you point out there are a number of people (in the widest possible sense, beyond even “corporations are people”) who have massive short positions on the UK and need a catastrophe to cash out. They overlap with the ERG and hope to use obstruction to force a crash-out by default.

The best commentary I've seen anywhere is on the Naked Capitalism blog, specially in the comments section:

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/category/brexit

9:

OK, let's get this out the way top of thread.

I believe that both the Con Party and Liebour have now rendered themselves unelectable for a generation.

As a side note to this, at least one Con minister has said that she considers the SNP to be her Majesty's Opposition in effect if not in numbers.

10:

I reckon they'll revoke article 50.

Optimist.

(I hope you're right, but …)

  • Theresa May is an authoritarian and she's staked her claim to the historical record on A50. To cancel it would be to publicly announce the one substantial plank of her tenure as PM is broken. She won't do it willingly.

  • About 100 Tories and a smaller number of Labour MPs are so adamantly pro-Brexit that if she goes back on A50 she'll split the party, possibly causing the emergence of a new right-wing party and effectively depriving the Conservatives of a governing mandate without Labour support. (Under Corbyn. Not gonna happen.)

  • UKIP is currently in the news due to entryism by the hard right—EDL and Britain First members (actual no-shit jackboot wearing sieg-heiling neo-Nazis) are joining in droves, and the party is swinging towards outright islamophobia. The threat to May from a right-of-Tory party is still there; if enough of her MPs defected to UKIP over Brexit, UKIP could actually become an indispensable coalition partner for her. (Note that the Conservative party has a really bad unadmitted internal racism problem, considerably worse than Labour's antisemitism issue: they're anti-immigrant and especially anti-moslem, so many of the ERG would be right at home in UKIP—it's just a matter of the electoral optics.)

  • What I'm saying is, the worst case could well be that we see Article 50 retracted … and end up with a UKIP-led government implementing actual no-shit neo-Nazi policies as a direct result.

    (NB: I am determined to stop calling those shitbags the "alt-right" and refer to them as what they are. Namely, Nazis.)

    11:

    (In response to Scott @3)

    What Charlie said.

    It's probably also worth adding the detail of the unholy alliance between the Tories and the DUP (who are rabidly in support of Brexit despite that fact NI voted as a whole to remain, and the DUP only represent about a quarter of the population).

    And the fact that Sinn Fein (the only party with a sufficient number of MPs and loud enough voice) aren't meaningfully opposing the DUP and Brexit, because: 1) They don't take their seats in Westminster for ideological reasons; 2) They see Brexit as the thin end of a wedge that they can use to hammer home re-unification.

    As Charlie notes, no one really wants to re-run the Troubles, but there are few paths from here to re-unification (or to Brexit, for that matter) that don't include a replay in one form or another.

    12:

    May is only in power because no-one else is stupid enough to want the job-hence the farce that was the tory leadership contest. She's a walking corpse after her supposed deal has failed to get support. With parliament having rejected no deal, I cannot see any other path. Give it a bit longer for the situation to get as desperate as possible, then someone else can stand on a revoke ticket and get all the credit? Or, May will be forced to take the humiliation of revoking.

    Regards UKIP...as it happens, my recently retired Dad has taken up UKIPping, much to our bemusement. At local level, there are quite a few in the party (him included) trying very hard to prevent the entryism you describe-although I suspect they are a touch doomed. We (Dad and I) have some quite lively discussions, although at least it's not as bad as when he started the first Gulf war by morris dancing.

    Unfortunately, the issues UKIP bang on about have been merrily festering away for a decade or two, with nobody wanting to take time to work out the delicate, nuanced solution that are required. People enduring these problems have two options: be ignored and slurred by the left, or the sledgehammer extremism of the right. Brexit or not, referendum or not, these were always going to come out at some point, and I'm bloody terrified how it'll end.

    13:

    As you say, but you are an incurable optimist - unlike me! I have nothing to add on the DUP, except that they are unspeakable boneheads. This isn't really addressed to you, because you know it, of course - though you may disagree with my interpretation.

    Sinn Fein have been doing very little - because why interfere when the opposition is destroying itself so effectively? - but their few interjections have all clearly been designed to keep things on the boil.

    https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-47601796?ito=amerika.org&fbclid=IwAR3IxlheRSM5f9SDmmH2Qvl_DyM24rwSWK9Wz3gHH79AAn2FqcErZ3u5qqU

    It is pretty clear that at least some people within Sinn Fein (and the 'dissidents') DO want a replay and, as I said a while back, it is probable that Sinn Fein would use No Deal or even May's deal as an opportunity to cause trouble - it's what they do, after all (*). I am not sure why the recent 'bombs' were sent - yes, they clearly were designed to show that there is a lot more capability than is currently being exercised - but WHY? And who are they linked to?

    The Irish Times (and even Belfast Telegraph) are extremely concerned, but are playing it down to avoid fuelling the flames. However, the former is better on Brexit than any UK newspaper I can think of(except for some satirists) - e.g.:

    https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/fintan-o-toole-are-the-english-ready-for-self-government-1.3830474

    (*) To the flamer who assumed that meant going around shooting blowing and people up, it doesn't.

    14:

    Unfortunately, the worst case is that article 50 is NOT revoked, we get a No Deal, the current anti-Corbyn campaign manages to split Labour, and we get a neo-Nazi government led by Conservatives who are indistinguishable from UKIP. And, as when Blair turned Labour into Tory-lite, most of the Conservative party will follow the victors.

    This is what I have been dreading for some years now, and it's never faded below about third on my expected results.

    15:

    I will declare my position as a Remainer (preparing to march this weekend).

    Here is my highly optimistic chain of events that might get us out of this mess.

  • Extension of 9 months to a year EU is fed up with us and wants clarity. Equally it does not want to trigger No Deal. The short 'technical' extension will lead to nothing more than May forcing weekly votes on tiny variations of her deal. Hence a longer extension.

  • We finally get an investigation into Vote Leave overspend and Russian interference. This is probably the optimistic bit since May has sat on any investigation so far. Maybe a Newsnight style documentary might embarrass people into finally looking at this.

  • The original referendum can be declared unsafe by legal process, saving any politician from having to drink that poisoned chalice.

  • At this point we can hold a 3rd referendum, or simply revoke.

  • 16:

    A couple of questions from Australia:

  • Given that any conventions of cabinet solidarity and party discipline seem to have gone out the window, is there actually a majority in parliament for a second referendum, assuming mischief makers don't frame the referendum question in a monkey wrenched way?

  • Weirdly, hard Brexit, no deal enthusiast MP's have been very useful in voting down May's deal. Given that polling shows about 55 to 60% current public support for remain, are any of the Brexiteers delusional enough to believe they'd win another referendum?

  • And yeah, I get that there are ugly issues of dwindling time and Corbyn's preference for forcing an election rather than allowing a second referendum.

    17:

    "I am determined to stop calling those shitbags the "alt-right" and refer to them as what they are. Namely, Nazis."

    I like the term alt-nazi. Makes the point that they're scum, while making a taxonomic distinction between today's internet enabled shitposters, and the knuckle draggers of the 80's or the original 1930's model.

    18:

    Basically, there's no majority in Parliament for anything. While at the same time, you can find a majority against practically anything.

    Everyone "knows" that if there were a second referendum tomorrow, between No Deal & Remain, Remain would win - but we legally and logistically can't schedule a referendum for less than (IIRC) six weeks away, which gives all factions time to prepare, and we know that Brexiters fight dirtier than Remainers.

    In addition, nobody can agree on what a referendum should say - there's a significant body of public opinion which explicitly says that "Remain" is not a legitimate political aim any more, and that the only choice which won't lead to Brexiters rioting in the streets is between Unicorn Brexit, Mermaid Brexit, and Eating Turnips In The Dark Brexit.

    I figure we'll either end up with a two-year extension and an unsubtle push for a referendum, or an implausible series of Parliamentary shenanigans which will basically involve stepping on a rake, ending up with custard down our collective trousers, and accidentally pratfalling into No Deal, whereupon the country descends into neofeudalist anarchy and the nice Indian and African people in white helmets come over.

    19:

    I can't be the only one finding it grimly ironic that Brexiteers are fuming at being unable to vote again on May's deal, now that they reckon circumstances have changed. At least they now know how some of us feel about their screams re another referendum being undemocratic!

    20:

    "...between Unicorn Brexit, Mermaid Brexit, and Eating Turnips In The Dark Brexit."

    I was rather hoping for Mad Max Brexit actually. I've not spent 2 years building this fleet of implausibly outlandish, post apocalypse vehicles for nothing you know!

    21:

    As another long-range observer (albeit with most of my relatives in the UK, so I'm not that disinterested), I confess to being intrigued by the lack of speculation in the UK media regarding the EU's negotiating stance if/when the question of an extension comes up. I know what I would currently offer. One (but only one) extension, with the UK able (within reason) to freely choose the duration, but keeping the 29th of March 2019 as the Article 50 trigger date.

    22:

    Charlie Stross @ 10, Are the SNP currently weighing in to the debate, or are they quietly awaiting events? (There were media pieces here in Australia immediately after the Leave Referendum, which talked about a possible push for another Scottish Independence vote.)

    23:

    How do you have an extension without changing the leaving date?

    I think that you are talking about 'transition'.

    24:

    Long time lurker, first time poster. (UK resident only about a decade, and UK politics still makes only limited sense to me.)

    I have always estimated the likelihood of crashing out with no deal to be quite high. I continue to think it is, because every other path requires people powerful enough and motivated enough to force a change, in the face of forces determined to obstruct it.

    Referendum? Clearly would be vigorously obstructed by ERG, and support for it among the remaining MPs isn't visible enough to make me think "oh, yeah, that's got a chance of winning."

    Revoke? To me it seems subject to the same problems as calling a second referendum, with perhaps even less support.

    Pass May's deal? Would of course require contortions to get it before Parliament again at all. Then require an enormous turnaround among the votes. Then there's the question I've heard raised elsewhere (and which I confess to being utterly clueless about myself), that should ERG later manage to wrest control, can/would they just nullify the deal and leave us in a de facto no-deal situation anyway?

    Soft Brexit of some Corbyn-pleasing sort? There'd have to be a plan, an agreement, and political will and power to get it done. How much sign is there of these things? (And again we have the what-will-future-governments-do question.)

    Brief extension? I tend to think the same people who've successfully obstructed solutions so far can probably obstruct them a little longer.

    Substantial extension? That gets us into the EU election season where our participation in the elections is (AIUI) necessary for the formation of the new Parliament. To me this seems like a bigger opportunity for diehard obstructionists to extend their damage beyond the UK into the EU than it does an opportunity for something damage-limiting to occur within the UK.

    Personally I feel quite bleak about all of this.

    25:

    Listening to a Belgian MEP on the BBC R4 "PM" programme yesterday; he's a member of their Brexit steering group. His take was you could potentially have two extensions:

    • A short, one-month extension that would allow the Government to come up with... "A Plan" (presumably one that doesn't involve playing No-Deal chicken through repeated attempts to get May's Withdrawal Agreement through Parliament - but the Speaker has stopped that, it appears), and possibly involving a sequence of indicative votes for potential ways forward.

    • A second, longer extension dependent on the resulting plan; presumably "a couple of months to allow a second referendum", or "give us a couple of months to propose 'Norway Plus'", or whatever.

    26:

    Alex Hewat @ 22, The main debate is between factions of the Conservative party (and the DUP, who are supposedly supporting the government). Labour, as the official opposition, are significant players, and there are factions within that party too. Smaller parties have little impact on UK parliamentary proceedings; within that limitation, the SNP are contributing to the debate.

    If Brexit happens, I expect the SNP to start pushing for another independence referendum immediately.

    27:

    I'm surprised by the response to John Bercow's move yesterday to stop Theresa coming back again and again with the same piece of paper to be voted on. It was clearly foreshadowed in the previous chapter, when Chris Bryant was asked to present his amendment. 'I don't think I have to,' he said, laughing. I knew then he'd had a chat with Mr Speaker...

    But even in Parliament too many people's attention is concentrated on their devices to notice what is going on around them.

    One thing not mentioned in your analysis was the influence of the English press. After many decades stoking anti EU emotion with lies and distortions - remember Boris began his 'journalistic' career making up stories for the Telegraph - the majority of print news in the UK is rabidly Brexit supporting. I know Paul Dacre has been replaced as Daily Mail editor by remain sympathetic Geordie Greig, but readers expect and want to be made angry every morning by the machinations of the Evil Empire across the water, so he cannot disappoint them. And I'm not surprised by their response to Mr Bercow.

    28:

    I'm an American, so I really am approaching this from a place of ignorance, but it's stunning how there seems to be negligible interest in reviving the corpse of the Liberal Democrats, to the point where Remainer MPs are forming an Independent Group rather than joining the only party in England & Wales that has a genuine desire to make EU membership work in the long run. I understand that the LibDem/Tory coalition was disheartening, but haven't the last few years shown that "disheartening" is a lot better than nihilocracy?

    29:

    Yes. Irish Times, and specifically Fintan O'Toole, have consistently provided clarity and analysis that should put the swivel-eyed British press to shame (if, that is, their prime motive was to inform as opposed to Charlie's oft repeated "selling eyeballs to advertisers").

    The only thing that I will disagree with you on is the labelling of the DUP as "unspeakable boneheads". They are hypocritical sectarian corrupt bigots, with a side order of fundamentalist religious zeal, and an unsatisfied yearning for ethnic cleansing.

    Sinn Fein are duplicitous opportunists (in regards to Brexit), who are leaving the very people that they should in fact be fighting on behalf of to swing in the DUP/Tory-driven breeze. And wouldn't be above urging their own brand of ethnic cleansing.

    I have little time for either.

    30:

    And for anyone interested in real analysis of the "back stop" or Irish Border issues, google "Katy Hayward" or search for her on Twitter.

    31:

    Following the ball back and forth on this, it really doesn't seem like there's any Brexit plan, hard or soft, that can possibly get the majority support required to get through parliament. Enough MP's on any side of it are sufficiently entrenched that no compromise will gain approval either.

    Corbyn's gambit of support for May's plan with a Public Question caveat seemed to have the highest potential of passing, but only because Labour calculated the response to the Public Question would not confirm the plan, paving the way for even more chaos/general election/parliament takeover of negotiations, presumably lead by Labour.

    At this point, no-deal seems a longshot, May's deal or anything like it all but dead, and an extension of A50 ranging from 6 months to a year. Assuming little to nothing changes in the entrenched positions, this sets up what I like to call the Zombie Brexit. There'll be perpetual extensions because relatively few MP's actually want No Deal, and the EU is similarly unwilling to allow No Deal. This will shamble on for years until the hard brexiters decide any brexit is better than none at all, or barring that, a decade or more down the road A50, de facto dead, is withdrawn (a bit optimistic here) Under either scenario, perpetual uncertainty slowly strips the UK of foreign investment and industry. The Republic of Ireland, still enjoying the stability of EU membership, is partially harmed by this economic downturn, but the prosperity gap nonetheless tears open the scab that is the Good Friday Accords, and troubles return as bad or worse.

    32:

    From the US.

    For 40 years or more there seems to be a hit TV show over here that is a derivative of a hit (or maybe not a hit) UK TV show. Typically these are not duplicates but shows where the general theme and feel are made into a US version of the show. (I have no idea if this goes the other way or not.)

    Anyway, it sure seems to me that the politics in the US and UK are something like this for the last 3 years. Details are widely different but the themes seem to be the same. Even down to the issue of rules of how government works this month. Plus how while it seems at first glance that the R's should likely get totally walloped in the 2020 elections the opposition in many cases can't seem to find anyone who would poll better than the existing R's. And so on...

    So maybe there really is some magical invisible overlord pulling all the strings.

    33:

    Martin @25, Thanks. We don't get that level of detail in the reporting here, and there's still a strong element of sheer disbelief regarding Brexit in our MSM. I suppose I am wondering whether at some point the Europeans are likely to want to definitively slam the door. Presumably the ongoing possibility of a Rescission of Article 50 has very real associated costs for both the EU and UK.

    Dave Berry @26, That's what I would have expected.

    34:

    I'm an outsider without an appreciation for any of the real nuance, but for the last several months have been saying that I expect the politicians to bumble their way into a no-deal exit on the 29th. Everyone seems to believe in one unicorn or another, and all seem to think that if they believe in that unicorn hard enough, the other side(s) will give up first.

    Meanwhile, the clock will run out.

    35:

    I think what musn't be overlooked here is the UK media. The newspapers and the BBC have done a terrible job explaining the complexity regarding brexit for two different reasons.

  • Murdoch and the other press barons want the UK out of the EU so they can turn it into a tax haven (and also avoid the new regulations regarding money laundering that the UK will have to follow if it stays in).

  • The BBC is so worried about the license fee negotiations coming up its effectively surrendered. We've had Brexiter after Brexiter on the radio, tv, Question Time and no push back over the lies, fantasy or nonsense they spread out. The only things you don't have are remainers, or a discussion over why Article 50 being revoked is an option.

  • Despite all the paranoia about social media, its these channels that push the debate and its these channels that helped create this mess in the first place. Very few people appear to be aware that it requires all 27 states to sign off on an extension. The loss of sovereignty we get for pulling out of the EU is not made clear.

    Hence I predict she'll try for a short extension to again push her deal through, and the EU will refuse it because she hasn't a new plan. Instead they will counter offer for a year and ask the UK to stay in the EU elections in May. At that point she'll do one of two things: a referendum to crash out or her deal, and Parliament will try and get revoking Article 50 on the table, which might fail. At that point she'll either resign or call a general election.

    I hope after this fiasco the Social and Liberal Democrats will do better because Labour doesn't appear to be doing much as opposition.

    36:

    On the other side of the channel, we believe we are ready for any kind of Brexit. 200 new custums officers have been recruited and a whole range of ad campains have targeted businesses to prepare them. The mascotte of these campains was the "Brexit Monster" https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-47237371 I would like to know if somthing similar is happening in the UK and other EU countries.

    37:

    I've been finding the Jon Worth's "Brexit - Where now?" flow diagrams immensely useful https://jonworth.eu/brexit-where-now-the-flow-diagrams/ Even if I might disagree with some of the percentage chances of the outcomes, they really help keep track of the process.

    38:

    I am not disagreeing with any of your statements about either of those two parties, except that think Sinn Fein are the 'acceptable' face of something rather nastier. I regard the DUP as boneheads as they have often let their bigotry obstruct them from getting their own objectives. Anyway, a pox on both their houses, and May and the Tories for shitting all over the 'peace process'.

    39:

    Which Ireland do you mean? The Republic, or Northern Ireland? There are two countries that'd have to come to a consensus on unification, after all …

    I had meant politicians in the Republic of Ireland, shooting their mouths off for local consumption.

    Meanwhile: the Republic has a theoretical commitment to unification in its constitution but no actual politicians want to throw themselves on that live hand grenade.

    Ah, comprehension dawns. (I think.) It seemed plausible from a great distance that someone might try to ingratiate themselves with their local voters by making the noises they want to hear, without any interest in how that might play elsewhere or if the ideas are physically possible. If the subject is too touchy to take any position on it, that's a different political animal. Perhaps that's a small silver lining, that there's some part of the British Isles where idiot opportunists aren't breaking things for momentary gain.

    Thank you for the useful answer.

    40:

    I could recheck with my contact, but my understanding is that we haven't started to prepare in some key areas, many others are still in pre-planning (i.e. "What if?") mode, and what has been done has often been just plain cocked-up (e.g. HMS "Failing Grayling" and its cohorts). Crashing out on March 29th would at least have the advantage of forcing the seriousness of the matter to the public's attention.

    41:

    It's probably also worth adding the detail of the unholy alliance between the Tories and the DUP...

    Should I even ask? I mean, it doesn't seem to make sense - but I don't know if an explanation would clarify matters.

    Honesty makes me admit that American media barely notices that Ireland exists much less tells us about local politics. A few decades ago the US's coverage of Ireland was about what had exploded where so silence is, perversely, an improvement.

    42:

    For many in Europe, the context of an extension is really painful.

    We're already campaigning for the Euro elections, and on the basis of a redivsion of the constituencies based on the UK not taking part. If the UK is in the EU on July 1, it needs MEPs for legal validity.

    So: unless there is a clear outcome that the UK is completely out by July, the elections need to be reorganised. That is, either "Hard Brexit" or "start from scratch, Norway+ or whatever,complete by July, no further extensions."

    But the Backstop stays, non-negotiable.

    So most likely by April we redo the EU boundaries to allow for UK MEPs.

    Then there is the budget - if there is a re-run of the referendum, etc. or perhaps "Revoke A.50 and start again, if possible", is the UK allowed take part in the budget process in the meantime?

    All goodwill is burned, by now.

    43:

    SS @ 3 Irrelevant, unless you a really militant loonie, wanting to throw bombs. Remeber Irish (re) unifiication requires a majority on both sides of the current border ... SEE ALSO CHarlie @ 7

    DR @ 5 The EU has an interest in postponing Brexit in theor own self-interest - its horrible for us, mee=rely bad for them ,but, if they can avoid it ...

    EC @ 14 - agree (!) - except that a Corbyn-led guvmiint whilst we were out of the EU would be 95% (atr least ) as bad, for the geneal popuiace, certainky - Venezueala here we come ...

    WreRite @ 16 No, the brexiteers know that a fairly-conducted 2nd Referendum would see them lose - hebce all the shreiking about "will of the people" - disregarding that voters are allowed to change theor minds at General Elections, why not referenda? And the last fucking thing we need is a General election ....

    Dave Berry @ 26 NO Liebour are as deeply split on brexit as the tories - Corbyn wants to institute Venezuela-on-Thames, for instance, but he can't do that inside the EU

    DtP @ 29 YES, depressing, isn't it?

    44:

    Very few people appear to be aware that it requires all 27 states to sign off on an extension.

    I am aware of this and I haven't been stewing in Brexit news nonstop for years.

    It does bring up yet another unpredictable factor in a mess that doesn't need any more chaos. What are those 27 countries going to want? Will Theresa May give it to them? Can she be seen at home giving in to their demands? (Figure no nation is holding out for another cup of tea and some more biscuits; they've got the UK cornered and they know it.) It's not so much that this is a problem but that it's a problem people should have known is coming and yet doesn't seem to have been discussed much. One might ask if the current government is a bedlam of lunatics and incompetents, but why beat a dead horse?

    For fun, imagine some minor EU nation - Cyprus, Malta, Estonia, whoever - telling May, "We don't care. We don't want to see you back here in six months asking for another extension. Write it into this extension that you don't get another one until you've put the whole leaving question to a popular vote. Oh, you don't like that? Too bad. Bye."

    45:

    The problem is exactly that "nobody knows".

    The British political system is designed to deliver power to a single party, and negotiation happens within those parties, usually behind closed doors. Most of the time, that process has worked (in the sense that governments got things done, and - for better or worse - managed the internal consensus building. It did, of course, create a political system in which consensus building was a party matter, often depending on patronage, threats and deals.

    The downside was that nobody really has much experience in building a wide consensus - getting a bunch of party members to agree on something is much less challenging than getting cross-party agreement. Not only that - it creates a fairly black-and-white approach to politics - your party is right, everyone else is wrong. On principle.

    There is no obvious solution to Brexit that keeps the Union together and also respects Theresa May's red lines. The issue touches pretty much every aspect of political life, and every political opinion, goal or red line is somehow affected. The political system does not know how to build consensus, and the party mechanisms no longer work because much of this affects matters of principle.

    Even if we somehow agree a withdrawal deal before the summer, it's just the beginning. How do we agree what the long-term relationship looks like? Do we accept US chlorinated chicken in return for selling Jaguars into the US without tariffs? Do we allow Indian business travelers into the country without a visa in return for investment in our steel industry?

    I think "the Union" is only one element that's at risk - I cannot imagine how we will make all these huge decisions without also affecting the way the UK makes decisions.

    46:

    It's absolutely fair to ask, but like any question that even touches NI internal politics, the answer goes fractal real fast.

    The short answer is that in going into coalition with the DUP (a party that is driven by three forces: extreme British nationalism, religious fundamentalism verging on Westboro Baptist Church levels of nuttiness, and bone-deep corruption) introduced the following red lines to the UK Brexit negotiation: 1) Leave the Customs Union & Single Market, and remove freedom of movement (existing Tory red line). 2) Frictionless border with in Ireland (a second-order consequence of maintaining the Good Friday Agreement and NI Peace Process). 3) No border infrastructure between NI and the rest of the UK (the demand of the DUP who refuse to support any policy that segregates NI from "the precious Union" -- do not ask about all the equality laws that they're happy to be different between UK and NI in the name of religious fundamentalism).

    Anyone can see that once you accept item 1, items 2 and 3 are mutually exlcusive. Thus the increasingly desperate and ridiculous attempts to square the circle.

    As for how the coalition came to be. I can only suspect that typical Westminster ignorance of the facts on the ground in NI lead the Tories to believe that the DUP would be easy to control and quietly supportive of whatever policies were put forward,. Indeed, from a pragmatic point of view, in mid-2017 a cursory glance would have made you believe that the DUP was closely ideologically aligned with the Tories on Brexit. But the reasons for the DUP support of Brexit are unique in many respects to NI, and a result of both recent politics and the long tail of British/Irish history, and therefore attempting to coral DUP support along the same lines as other Tory MPs failed and continues to fail.

    (I have summarized much here. Hopefully it offers a little more insight.)

    47:

    The DUP objective is actually quite simple: Retain Northern Ireland as their own little fiefdom, run on quasi-theocratic rules.

    Success or failure of Brexit is in fact secondary to all this.

    If Brexit happens and everything goes to hell, they get to blame Westminster betrayal, Brussels interference, and Irish duplicity (in the person of Dublin and their political opponents in Sinn Fein).

    If Brexit is cancelled, they get to blame Westminster betrayal, Brussels interference, and Irish duplicity (in the person of Dublin and their political opponents in Sinn Fein).

    Either way they win. Their core electorate is conditioned to see anything good as the result of good old fashioned Britishness, and anything bad as the result of underhand Papish influence. Sinn Fein's agitating for a United Ireland refendum (and more recent anti-union moves) only reinforce this fear. Imagine, if you will, a demographic whose entire self-image and self-worth is bound up in being British -- what happens when that is threatened? What hardships would they inflict upon themselves to save, in their own minds, their very souls?

    This is not hyperbole. This is reality for a lot of citizens in NI. Nothing matters but the Union.

    As I often quote, these are the people who see only unbending pride in the slogan: "We'll even fight the British to stay British!"

    48:

    Theresa May is writing to the EU to ask for Brexit to be postponed until 30 June with the option of a longer delay, cabinet sources say. ... More details here

    49:

    I have a question: would a fresh Brexit referendum that reverses Brexit stick? That is would the Brexiters accept the vote result or would it lead to a "Stabbed in the back" narrative where they spend the next 10 years bitching and moaning about the betrayal and poison British politics completely?

    50:

    tl;dr of that - After Mayhem blew a comfortable majority in the Palace of Oathbreakers, by calling a General Election when she succeeded "Call me Dave" Scamoron as leader of the Con Party, the only way she could achieve an overall majority and formally request Lilibet's permission to form a government was to agree a coalition with someone, and the DUP were the only party who were:- 1) Prepared to make any sort of coalition agreement with her. 2) Large enough to give her any sort of overall majority.

    Larger parties were available, but they all said "Awa 'n' play in the traffic" or words to that effect.

    51:

    @48

    Is it me or does that seem entirely too soon? Sure, it's enough time enough to open a new session of parliament and circumvent Bercow's gambit, but not enough for any substantive change of the negotiated deal. I think it assumes more Tories can be won over on the premise that some brexit is better than no brexit, but that's a longshot. Corbyn's People's Vote amendment might have seen in through with Labour support, but the outcome of the vote would likely just add more chaos, making it a tidy piece of brinksmanship on the part of Corbyn.

    52:

    You should consider a lot more carefully what a UKIP-lite government would do that Corbyn would NOT do, when outside the EU. No, we would NOT end up like Venezuela under Corbyn, and what Rees-Mogg or similar would do would destroy the UK as a civilised (or even independent) country.

    53:

    Except that it didn't include what many people thought was most likely, and has probably come to pass: May has asked for a SHORT referendum. My current best guess is:

    May goes to Brussels and asks for a short extension, but without giving any coherent explanation of what it is for (near-certain), and is refused, conditionally (probable).

    She comes back to the Cabinet and tries to get agreement for whatever demented scheme she thinks will convincthe converse woulde Brussels and (preferably) get her deal through (near-certain), and fails (probable).

    She then goes back to Brussels, witters incoherently, but is given an extension until the end of June (just probable).

    She attempts to bring her deal back a third time, either by suspending standing orders or obtaining a short proroguement, and it narrowly fails.

    She later attempts a fourth time, Bercow says "Sothe converse wouldd off", she attempts to get Bercow removed, and fails.

    During this, the Cabinet and Parliament in-fighting continues unabated until late June (probable), when she goes back to Brussels and is refused an extension.

    We time out and get No Deal - and May is, secretly, fairly happy.

    54:

    They're going to cry "betrayal" no matter what.

    If they get the Brexit they want, it will be disastrous for the country, and they will happily blame the EU for all the ills they have inflicted. If they don't get the Brexit they want, they will claim that "Westminster elites" betrayed the whole thing.

    They're swinging a wrecking ball. They don't care what they hit so long as they're last man standing.

    55:

    Indeed. The only remark I have is about ENGLISH politics:

    You say "Either way they win." I am not sure, because their antics may help to cause the breakup of the UK (via a catastrophic Brexit), when Northern Ireland would almost certainly be cast adrift, at least in terms of support from London. And, if we manage to get a strong Labour government of the sort Greg Tingey claims a Corbyn one would be, they may find that their fiefdom isn't as secure as they think.

    56:

    Honesty makes me admit that American media barely notices that Ireland exists

    In general in the US we don't get much mainstream media coverage of things outside of the US unless there are MAJOR riots, laws that piss us off, or a small war somewhere. Otherwise (pick your typical news source) you might get 3 or 4 stories a week about things in the rest of the world.

    Some of us news junkies get more. I try and follow European and China news at a high level. And Brexit has gotten me to dig deeper. But unless it is a paid job who can keep track of all of the EU, much less the world at a detail level?

    But since the big D came to power his antics tend to crowd out lots of news that used to be carried.

    57:

    They're swinging a wrecking ball. They don't care what they hit so long as they're last man standing.

    Ditto the US just now. They don't say it in public but the extreme hard core DT supports are mostly there. Except for the ones in self denial. It is a really strange mix.

    58:

    I personally agree, but I do think that the only final losing move for the DUP is reunification (and even then, if they retained some degree of power and influence, I suspect they may even be happier as an eternal protest party), but I honestly don't think that they believe reunification can ever happen. For many DUP pols and supporters it would be like trying to imagine up was down, to them it is against the natural God-ordained order of things (yet at the same time they still fear it).

    59:

    By the bye, Charlie, if the IRA in NI needs recruits, they should go to the South Side of Chicago....

    In '09, the year I relocated here to DC, I went to the Irish-American Heritage Center for St. Patty's Day (nothing better to do, and music). Other than a friend I ran into, and a friend of hers, NOT ONE PERSON spoke to me. In the evening, listening to music, then a popular band came in (don't remember who), and though I was in front, six or ten pushed in front of me, and stood, blocking my view, and the music and the crowd were so IRA!!!!! that it was hostile, and I finally left.

    Btw, a few days later, on the actual 17 Mar, I went to a bar that had a weekly ceilidh, and it was very friendly - a woman even asked me to dance.

    But South Side....

    60:

    You should try Boston some time. :)

    61:

    Not the answer to the question I thought I was asking, which is really a question for remainers. If Brexit is reversed I do not see anyway that will stop the Brexiters from continuing their campaign and if anything I could see their position getting stronger.

    The remain position, seems to me, to hang in there, keep explaining the economic disaster that abruptly leaving the EU is, and hope everyone sees sense.

    it seem to me that there is a strong correlation between English nationalism and Ukip and that in 10 years time there could be UKip elected on the platform of England leave the UK and EU

    62:

    I don't refer to them as alt-right, either. It's either neoNazis, or, as I came up with, all-wrong.

    63:

    Well, there's the answer: Labor and the SNP should surround Parliament with Morris Dancers. The Tories will run....

    At one point, when I lived in Chicago, some friends moved into the area, and I told them I was sure the gangs would be gone, given that they were Morris dancers....

    64:

    TV shows? There is an answer to the magical invisible overlord. He's been known to wear a red-lined coat, or a long, long scarf, and I wish he'd get here to help.

    65:

    It seemed plausible from a great distance that someone might try to ingratiate themselves with their local voters by making the noises they want to hear, without any interest in how that might play elsewhere or if the ideas are physically possible.

    The general view in Ireland (the Republic bit) is that Unification is great in Theory (as Charlie pointed out) but in practice would bankrupt us, or something approaching recesssion a la German unification. A huge fraction of the NI workforce is in the public sector, and we couldn't afford to take on that bill. Most of the population are wary of it in practice.

    Now Varadkar (the Taoiseach, or Prime Minister) would have an eye on countering Sinn Fein, making sure they don't grow, but they are the most Unionist-friendly party in Ireland. They much prefer to keep the status quo (peace, with them in power in the South). Prior to Brexit, support for Unification was dropping to near single digits (in NI, and lower in the south). The Good Friday agreement was mostly working: co-operation across the border was making the border irrelevant: e.g. single markets for Electricity, vetinary and phytosanitary security; you could go to a hospital on the other side of the border and 'your government' would foot the bill; the Irish government paying for bits of roads that went through the North, etc. the economic damage caused by the border was being undone. This was in very large part a European success, because those involved on both sides were EU citizens, etc.

    A common view here is that, if Brexit is not cancelled, A United Ireland is likely; But in the South its only desirable as the second best option to the status quo. DUP support for Brexit, while understandable (they're looking at slow erasure of the border, undermining the point of N.I. as state), but its snatching defeat from the jaws of victory: better to reign in glory in a sinking brexit than slow, successful government of an economically successful, but secular and "beige" European region.

    66:
    have a question: would a fresh Brexit referendum that reverses Brexit stick?

    The biggest question is: what effect would it have. I know a handful of legal scholars have argued that the UK can reverse its Brexit, but that's an opinion that is based on empty words.

    The treaty (and article 50) is what is binding. There are no mechanism in it to cancel an invocation of Article 50. Once invoked, the only outcome described in the article is exit from the EU, optionally with an extension of the negotiations, and optionally FOLLOWED by the leaver rejoining the EU as a new member. Everything in Article 50 except a no-deal Exit requires a full unanimous vote of the 27.

    So based on that, it's expected that any reversing of Brexit would be subject to a vote at the EU level... and that starts all the political negotiations based on that. Because if the UK wants to remain, it will have to provide a deal to do so. If Romania wants concessions from the UK in exchange for not voting No, they can. And, obviously, they will, unless major EU powers (countries whose name start with FR or GE) push against every other EU member to keep them in line. I think Hungary, at least, would certainly wring every concession they can from the rest to provide their vote, given that, at the moment, EU wants to punish them for being christian white nationalists.

    67:

    Fazal Majid: a favor, please. how do you pronounce your name? The letter "j" can be "y", or "h" or "jay"....

    68:

    This! So much this!!

    69:

    Has the Commission not already ruled that the UK can unilaterally revoke Article 50?

    70:

    Has the Commission not already ruled that the UK can unilaterally revoke Article 50?

    The European Court of Justice has issued an opinion to that effect. That's where the question was going to be resolved anyway, so I don't think anyone is seriously challenging it.

    72:

    A separate comment from my previous reply.

    From the EU side, the Brexit is a major hassle in my specific field. I do RGPD stuff about 1/3rd of my week. I have vetted and guaranteed data sharing agreements in the field of health and human biology research for the last couple years...

    ... and no one has the slightest idea if any of those agreements will be legal past March 29th (or any extension thereof). I have my doubts.

    The RGPD is the legal framework for personal data management across all of the EU, and for anything outside of the EU, requires very careful vetting. In particular, any transfer of "protected data" (health, political, judiciary, etc.) outside of the EU requires authorizations from the regulatory bodies of my country. Authorization that were not necessary as long as the UK was an EU member.

    Once the UK leaves the EU, there is no data protection legislation in the UK. Theoretically, on March 30th, any of the health research institution we shared data with can disclose all of our patient data to the public... and there are no laws against it within the UK (they might still face EU repercussions since the outreach of RGPD is trans-national). I can even assume that, legally, they could disclose every patient data FROM the UK itself, unless there are specific UK national laws that supersede the RGPD (the RGPD allows you to do that regarding health).

    I'm considering taking a two-three weeks vacation following Brexit so that none of our research teams can ask me to solve that particular problem until someone manages to write a doctrine on this...

    73:

    Ungainly Titan @ 49 No, they would not accept it, both main parties would split with both extremes moaning on for years about how wonderful it would have been - as happened to the tories after 1847/8 or the Liberals after 1921. But, they would diminish & fade away, rather like theo other people they remind me of, especially if Rees-Smaug is in the picture: The Jacobites, toasting "the King over the Water" ( Trump or Putin, take your pick )

    EC NO ... Ukip & the people to thje right of them would undoubtedly wreck the countrey, permanently. So would Corbyn You STILL haven't got it, have you? Read a very long post I put up about a week or two back about Corbyn & Liebour, please?

    withroth @ 62 Can we call them alt-nazis ( lower-case) PLEASE?

    74:

    Fianna Fáil (junior confidence-and-supply partner) put out a white paper on how Irish reunification might work a couple of years ago. As far as I remember, it was essentially a proposal for a federal Ireland: keep the North as a semi-autonomous region with its own parliament, but switch the roles of London and Dublin and integrate things like education systems. I'm not necessarily a particular fan of FF, but they have at least been thinking about this a bit and it's the most practical starting point I've heard. On the other hand, their white paper didn't get all that much traction, and probably won't unless a reunification campaign really gets up steam.

    75:

    I did. I don't believe you. Your hatred of Corbyn is looking like something that needs psychiatric attention. His rule would be bad, I agree, but not compared with what we are likely to get if Labour is eliminated as an effective force.

    76:

    I first visited Boston in 1996, before the GFA was a thing.

    As an English friend remarked, on the same trip, it was a good thing the UK didn't deal with terrorist recruiters the way the US did, or Boston Common would be ground zero for a fuckton of Tomahawk missiles.

    77:

    There's a simple solution that I haven't seen proposed yet: the Malaysia-Singapore approach.

    London is substantially different to the rest of the UK. It's avidly pro-EU and voted strongly for remain. Londoners are 35% foreign-born and on average twice as wealthy as the rest of the UK.

    So do what Singapore did - declare independence from the rump, stay in the EU, and build a wall at the M25.

    The rest of the UK will object, but it's not like anyone in London listens any way.

    (Yes, this is ludicrous, but no more ludicrous than the current cluster fuck.)

    78:

    London is substantially different to the rest of the UK. It's avidly pro-EU and voted strongly for remain. Londoners are 35% foreign-born and on average twice as wealthy as the rest of the UK.

    Except … Scotland is a whole lot more white-bread but voted remain by an even wider margin than London. And Scotland is, overall, wealthier than England-excluding-London. (And note that London is skewed heavily by the hyper-rich.)

    What I'd favour is, give London nation-status, then have England (ex. London) and Wales leave the UK and thereby the EU. The rest of the UK gets to stay in the EU. Simples!

    79:

    @77 & @78:

    And Northern Ireland also voted remain by a comfortable margin.

    80:

    At this point, Scottish independence seems certain.

    81:

    Sorry, I prefer all-wrong, since it sums up everything about them.

    82:

    And the map would look like an island with a bad case of mange. Especially if the Welsh stayed in the EU. Ideally also Cornwall, just to make a point.

    But spitting the other union seems chancy to me, it's even less likely than all the remain MPs getting together and taking control of parliament. Fundamentally (and we are talking fundamentalists) England has the bomb and London doesn't. Where Singapore is an island and can exert some degree of control over its borders, not through military force but just through sheer "to get here you have to come along this wee strip of land we built", London is not. Imagine all the fun and excitement of the Irish border but happening just outside a London that is desperately trying to persuade all the financial wizards not to complete their plans to leave. "It's safe here, it's fun, you'll like {boom}"

    83:

    There were some not-entirely-joking comments in the Cambridge area that it would like to secede from England and join Scotland in such a scenario.

    84:

    Jez Weston @ 77 Some of us Londoners wouldn't mind that, actually, though the "frontier" checks at the two places I most-frequently cross the M25 could be interesting ... HERE and Here, too both looking approximately North or N-E &, yes, the M25 is under the road in the second one - in a massive tunnel.

    85:

    At this point, Scottish independence seems certain.

    HOW?

    I don't mean "independent in the far off never-never unimaginable future when unicorns fart peace and rainbows over the isle" because sure, that's going to happen and everyone will live happily ever after now go to sleep.

    The dirty mechanical side of scoxit requires a British parliament (snigger) to have a meaningful vote (hahaha, also (1)) on a plan (stop, you're killing me) then implement that plan (oh dear) and manage the conflicting sides (raises an eyebrow) to produce a result that all can accept... I presume King Arthur will break into the British Museum, draw the parliamentary mace from the posterior of a statue of Queen Victoria and things only get more realistic from there.

    (1) Can someone explain the difference between a "meaningful vote" and any other sort of vote that your parliament commits? I've just assumed it some sort of weird UK jargon meaning "vote"

    86:

    I have read numerous explanations for this, and yet I still don't 100% get why someone (Parliament? the British government? the Queen?) doesn't just call a second referendum. Presumably because the Conservative party knows it will likely lose this time?

    I gather too that there is some kind of legislation from 2011 that prevents new elections from being run, which would also help things along.

    One advantage of a parliamentary system is supposed to be the prevention of deadlocks, and yet Britain seems to have both.

    When the Brexit vote passed I thought, "Ha! What a bunch of idiots!" Then Trump happened and I thought, "Well, I guess we are the idiots as well."

    87:

    "...and things only get more realistic from there."

    "I am Arthur, King of the Britons."

    "'Oo are the Britons?"

    "Well... we all are. We are all Britons. And I am your King."

    "Well I didn't vote for you."

    88:

    Greg @ 84: Those roads aren't exactly the border crossing scene from Sicario, but I'm sure with sufficient concrete barriers and bureaucracy, the M25 can become a festering strip of resentment.

    Oh wait...

    Moz @ 85: Scottish independence proceeds exactly as it would in 2014. The question is put to a referendum and nobody makes any preparations whatsoever for the outcome, then they get caught on the hop, and then everyone makes it up as they go along.

    Hey, it worked for Brexit...

    89:

    Maybe Article 50 should be amended to include something along the lines of "Stop! Who would leave the European Union must answer me these questions three, ere the other side he see."

    90:

    I can only imagine the stockpiling of canned food and non-perishable medicines proceeds apace, as does the installation of propane-powered refrigerators for the perishable medicines. I am heartily sorry for those of you living in the middle of this, living through it and from my distant perspective have no idea what the future will look like over there.

    We seem to be surrounded by waves of craziness all the time now, and I’m not sure if the peaks or the troughs are worse. It seems like they are multiple and overlapping, being out of phase and of varying wavelengths and amplitudes. I’m not sure if it was always like this, and I’ve reached a life stage where these things are more noticeable, or that things are uniquely weird now. Perhaps the craziness was at least more predictable when it was focused, and the bigger brands attracted more people and at least sort of got them in sync. At the moment it’s a sort of turbid, abrasive white noise.

    91:

    Hello from Greece.

    Scott @44: "What are those 27 countries going to want?"

    Nobody knows. There are at least three competing answers to the Brexit question in basically every EU member state. In most EU members states, at least two of these factions are part of (or can exert pressure on) the ruling coalition.

    The mainstream political right tends to see the EU mainly as a means to promoting free trade, fighting graft, and preventing divide-and-conquer attacks on our economies on the part of the US and China. These people, generally speaking, want the UK to stay because its large GDP contributes materially to EU power and because it has historically been a strong and consistent force for good governance. If you're a fiscal conservative or a classical liberal, you see the clientelism of e.g Italy or Greece and the corruption of e.g. Romania and Bulgaria as one of the continent's main problems, and you want the UK at your side.

    The political left is internally divided on free trade and fiscal policy questions but is broadly in favor of deeper political unification. Many on the left want the UK out because it has never really been on board with political unification and has regularly thrown wrenches into the works. Remember that the UK has demanded and received a large number of special exemptions, rebates, and perks that have been damaging EU cohesion in an equally large number of areas. The left is also unhappy about the way the UK has been conducting itself as an extension of the US. If you're a lefty Bulgarian, you don't want to feel like you got rid of the Russians only to be made a subject of a bunch of even angrier, even more foreign imperialists, and you especially don't want to be told it's only for your own good by a bunch of third-party concern trolls.

    (Of course I'm oversimplifying here. There are some committed European Federalists on the right. There are some Corbyn-style Euroskeptics on the left who believe the EU too hopelessly neoliberal to be worth it. There are some people who want the UK out temporarily because they think the UK is an immensely valuable contributor but needs to lose its divisive exemptions, rebates, and perks. As a rough first approximation, however, the above is probably defensible.)

    The far political right is horrifically complicated and basically impossible to summarize. Generally speaking, of course, the far right dislikes the EU... but:

    • German nationalists (think AfD) don't like the EU, but they also don't like the way the Daily Mail and the Leave campain have been painting Merkel as the second coming of Hitler and the EU as basically the Fourth Reich. (Remember that we can read British newspapers and Twitter feeds even if British can't read ours. Also remember that just because I hate my government doesn't mean I won't get reflexively defensive if I see presumptuous foreigners ripping into them.)
    • Polish nationalists mostly don't like the EU but their more moderate segment is divided on the question and their radical segment has been angry at the Brits since the Betrayal of 1939.
    • Austrian nationalists don't like the EU, but Anglophilia is associated, due to a number of historical accidents, with fuck-the-proles classism and with a branch of authoritarian Catholicism that they've been hating with a passion since the 17th century, i.e. since before they were nationalists.
    • Greek nationalists don't like the EU, but they are very well aware of the fact that British immigrants tend to refer to themselves as "expats", tend to refer to Greek people as "the locals" with a visible sneer, and are somehow capable of spending twenty years on Corfu without learning two words of Greek. Hardcore Greek nationalists also despise the Germans, but they despise Muslims even more and Muslim refugees the most, and they remember who did and who did not support the military adventures in the Middle East that made a million Arabs cross the Aegean in rubber boats.
    • The list goes on.

    Bottom line, just because someone theoretically wants the EU broken up doesn't guarantee they won't choose to punish the UK even at the cost of proving the EU correct in the process. (You know you have lost the plot when you have replaced the Germans as the avatar of anti-Slavic bigotry in the minds of a significant number of Slavic people within a whopping three generations of the Generalplan Ost.)

    In addition to these ideological divides within each country, there is extra unpredictability due to power struggles between the member states. The current ruling parties in Poland and Hungary have a broad authoritarian streak; they are aggressively undermining the independence of their local courts and universities and are seriously endangering their respective opposition parties' ability to function. The EU looks poised to give these two governments a hard smack across the gob. What if Poland and Hungary decide to use Brexit to blackmail Brussels – leave us alone or we sink your precious deal for good? What if, on the other hand, they go about this clumsily enough to make it backfire?

    Anyone who claims they can predict the outcome at this point is more confident than traveled.

    92:

    Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords should be a system of government.

    Right now, I'd take it.

    93:

    Following the ball back and forth on this, it really doesn't seem like there's any Brexit plan, hard or soft, that can possibly get the majority support required to get through parliament. Enough MP's on any side of it are sufficiently entrenched that no compromise will gain approval either.
    What he said. A large part of the problem is that the referendum in binary - in or out - while negotiation is basically trying to set up as in on some points and out on others. As others have alluded here, when you get to negotiated specifics, there are probably a lot of folks who'd previously voted exit but would now vote 'remain' rather than taking any of the deals negotiated so far.

    What's really needed is a Australian-style ranked preference referendum - stay in, exit with current negotiated deal, or hard exit. "Negotiate a better deal" shouldn't be an option; I think the EU has pretty much put a kibosh on that.

    94:

    Strange women lying in ponds

    I thought it was running through fields of wheat?

    95:

    Scottish independence proceeds exactly as it would in 2014. The question is put to a referendum and nobody makes any preparations whatsoever for the outcome, then they get caught on the hop

    Not even close.

    In the run-up to the Brexit referendum, the Leave campaigners put together a whole whopping 35 page prospectus of what they'd do if they won, including graphics of unicorns and rainbows.

    In the run-up to the 2014 IndyRef, the SNP published a detailed 130 page manifesto, pointing to about a decade of policy papers they'd already produced. Then the national (mostly English) media Swift-Boated them over what they'd use for a currency (initially a Scottish Pound, pegged to Sterling).

    They're not going to make that mistake again: if they get a second IndyRef they'll bury us in draft legislation from the outset. (Only if they win, then the shower in Westminster will do their best to FUBAR the divorce negotiations because a whole lot of English MPs can't cope with the idea of anyone not needing them and will use it as a rallying point for petty-minded English nationalist xenophobia.)

    96:

    I think the messaging out of EU today has not been fully parsed.

    Remember that everything you hear out of EU right now is tempered and muted by the "comity rules" which prevent EU officials from influencing the interior politics of the member countries.

    With that in mind:

    First: Forget about a short extension, it doesn't matter to EU if it is march 29th, april 29th or may 29th but after that it starts to become a problem.

    What everybody heard was that a long extension will only happen if there is a referendum on the May-EU deal or a general election, but most people seemed to miss the bit about this having to come from the Parliament.

    Forget the general election, that can be fitted into a short extension, and from EU's point of view, it is unlikely to bring any improvement.

    The crucial thing is the bit about the parliament.

    The letter May is currently writing about an extension does not carry any weight, until Parliament tells EU what they want to use the extension for.

    They voted to have an extension, but they havn't voted for what they want it for.

    Second, a long extension will be conditional on UK not using the extension politically inside EU.

    At the very least it casts the May-deal in stone, so that UK cannot use veto-threats in the extension period to blackmail a better brexit-deal.

    But restrictions are unlikely to stop there, for instance, what if UK is the decisive vote in an expensive long term project ? That brings us to:

    Third, a long extension will come with a non-negotiable, non-refundable and expensive ala-carte price-tag.

    EU will require that UK pays "any and all" expense related to the extension, which is for UK's sole benefit, and that will include a LOT of "Misc. office expenses."

    So it is very hard to see in the first place how any PM, May or otherwise, can bring home a long extension, with the strings attached that "EU insisted on a referendum", "EU limits UK's influence" plus sticker-shock, and survive (in any meaning of the word!)

    But before we even get to that, parliament must find a majority for a second referendum, and agree to EU's demands for an extension, soon enough for EP elections to be held in UK.

    I guess in theory you could squeeze in a general election, have new parliament agree to EU's terms for long election in the second week of May and be in time to hold EP elections.

    But how close will UK be to civil war if they do ?

    And keep in mind, that even if that miracle happens, neither the election nor the referendum are likely to make the shit-show stop, which is the main objective for EU right now.

    My prognosis:

    Unless general election is called this or next week: No short extension.

    Unless returning parliament & government much more empowered: No long extension.

    97:

    In one of those weird things, you basically typed, if not word for word, what I was just thinking

    98:

    As far as I can see, the Ireland backstop is a method for politicians to stick their head in the sand while claiming to be moving forward. I'm with Katy Hayward - at some point, there's going to be a hard border between the UK and the EU.

    No matter which side of that border that Northern Ireland lands on, the Good Friday accords will be dead as a doorknob, and we'll return to blood in the streets.

    99:

    Charlie, can I ask a stupid question about indyref2 ?

    Suppose SNP calls it, wins it and then starts implementation.

    What happens to the big, now ex-pat, land-owners ?

    I guess QEII might get special treatment, and maybe CoE as well.

    But what would happen to a random earl or lord owning a large chunk north of the border ?

    100:

    Dutch NRC's Caroline de Gruyter has written a piece: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2019/03/14/perhaps-theyd-better-go-a3953265 which I very much agree with (and I learned more things about UK-EU relations). Yes, there's a sentiment of "now just get over it, enough of the antics" on the continent. I feel sorry for those who get bitten by Brexit - deal or no deal - but perhaps having the crash right now is better than to watch this in slo-mo? ("Besser ein Ende mit Schrecken als ein Schrecken ohne Ende", we say in german).

    101:

    what would happen to a random earl or lord owning a large chunk north of the border?

    Nothing.

    Scotland already has an independent legal system, a parliament, and a bunch of infrastructure of its own like a land registry and tax-raising powers.

    Under the Scotland Act, only certain powers were reserved to Westminster: defense, foreign policy, drugs (the criminal kind), immigration, and the Exchequer. (In fact part of why Brexit is unpopular in Scotland is that a lot of stuff we dealt with via the EU is being land-grabbed by London, who will be a lot less amenable to Scotland's needs.) Scotland is already rather more autonomous than most people outside Scotland realize.

    Presumably anyone living in England or overseas and owning land in Scotland would be treated just as they are now—as an out-of-Scotland landowner.

    102:

    Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords should be a system of government.

    That would fit right in with the present moment! I mean, the last time we tried Gynospathodonocracy, the result was rule by an authoritarian warlord who got into a sex scandal, saw his leadership team splintered by mystical religious experiences, and died (excuse me, was spirited away) in a fight with his illegitimate son. And he's still fondly remembered, showing how hard it is for authoritarian memes to die.

    Today, all he'd have to do is spray tan and go shirtless while riding a stallion and waving that sword around, and he'd Make Alba Great Again!

    103:

    Queen Elizabeth II and the rest of the Mountbatten-Windsor's have a more legitimate claim to the throne of Scotland than that of England and Wales.

    104:

    Kramler @ 90 The current ruling parties in Poland and Hungary have a broad authoritarian FASCIST streak or so it seems from here ...

    PKH @ 95 The crucial thing is the bit about the parliament. THIS IF may can be voted down to having Parliament decide, THEN we might have a chance - which depends upon votes in the House itself. Any bets?

    A General Election now would be an utter disastrous total clusterfuck - we would leave without a deal with either people to the right of May or Corbyn & Momentum ( who are the people who scare me, rather than dimwit Corbyn ) in charge. End of UK plus at least 20 years of utter misery.

    105:

    The DUP also don't really care how Brexit affects border communities as none of them are their constituents. Nearly all the border constituencies are Sinn Fein territory.

    Also, I suspect that it's not a coincidence that the Stormont assembly hasn't sat since May 2016, now Sinn Fein have exactly the same number of MLAs (27 out of a total of 90) as the Democratic Unionists.

    106:

    Hardcore Brexiters won't respect the result of any referendum that they didn't win.

    They didn't respect the result of the 1975 Referendum, after all.

    107:

    Having voted Mays deal down rather conclusively twice, I don't see any way that the current Parliament can or will satisfy EU's demand for clarity in favour of an extension.

    Indeed even if somehow Mays deal was approved in third try, EU would have every reason to consider that result infirm come the next general election.

    (UK bringing up Vienna Convention Article 62 before ratification, didn't exactly inspire confidence in their good intentions the first place.)

    A general election might shuffle the cards enough, but that again first requires May accept failure or Parliament to impress it on her, and second that enough of the electorate has come to their senses to send a clear message (either way!)

    My impression is that many of the MP's who resist a second ref, including May, do so because they fear it will only dig the hole deeper.

    They may have a valid point there. Imagine if ref#2 comes out 50/50 ± epsilon ?

    108:

    Both the DUP and Sinn Fein benefit from the lack of the Stormont executive, neither have significant incentive to work to restore it.

    (Another thing to factor in to any assessment of the DUP is that their own narrative paints them as the victims, as the put upon and the downtrodden, they genuinely believe that.)

    109:

    There's a material technical definition of sovereignty.

    I don't mean the legal one; I mean the equivalent of the "when you pick up the phone, people do what you say" definition of power.

    That requires a couple-three things; people usually focus on the "enforce laws" and "maintain borders" parts, but the third part is this interesting intersection of legitimacy and finality; there has to be a functioning political process which is agreed to possess legitimate authority and which can make lasting decisions. That can be a king or a warlord or Parliament, but it has to have those two characteristics of legitimacy and finality. ("Those whom we agree may settle things have settled things".)

    The UK is no longer having a crisis; the UK is having straight-up sovereignty collapse.[0] The customary political mechanism, split along an unfamiliar authoritarian-populist/anti-authoritarian-anti-populist axis AND generally completely unwilling to deal with the certain demise of the status quo[1] has straight up failed.[2]

    One way to evaluate a leader is by who they surround themselves with; exceptional leaders fine and support colleagues who could replace them. A lot of notable politicians have the opposite effect, and view any potential rival as a threat to be eliminated. From over here, it looks like this is a general problem in the politics of the Anglosphere but is way-bad in the UK so far as Westminster politics goes. The idea that in the next ten days, someone is going to put together a Parliamentary coalition able to do something sensible -- which means acknowledging the certain demise of the status quo, then creating a new party from nothing, and it would not have a majority because the "we're going to pretend it's 1890" faction is numerically dominant -- doesn't seem to me to plausible.

    So it looks very much like the sovereignty collapse is going to wind out. Which means no basis for forecasting outcomes.

    Other than the sense of dread arising from "whatever that post-plastic-deformation ping noise is the metaphor for? Yeah. That. That's what's going to happen."

    [0] the UK press has been trying to arrange this since forever by attacking the fundamental legitimacy of government. How you maintain society with reasonable degrees of freedom of expression and keep corporate entities from destroying the place because panicky people spend more money is not inherently obvious.

    [1] The great political question of our time is "what are we going to do instead of the status quo?" We can't keep it; we're losing the Holocene, we absolutely aren't going to keep the status quo. The UK case seems to have something more acute than even the current global round of will-not-deal going on with climate change; the UK is having a specific case of will-not-deal with it not being 1890.

    [2] Not the "given a bad result" sense of failed, but the "after the plastic deformation comes a noise" sense of failed.

    110:

    I think you are probably right and have myself wondered if UK was a "failed state" for some time.

    Given the backstop of QE2, that diagnosis is probably premature, but that brings us to the subject to intensive care and risky treatment options.

    I think EU repeatedly stressing the finality of May's deal indicates a similar concern.

    Or as somebody once said with reference to the outside-pissing-in/inside-pissing-out argument: That's presuming they aim in the first place.

    111:

    What happens next? No idea. At all.

    Some possibilities;

    The EU (and presumably anyone else) won't want an extension to the Article 50 timescale which results in the situation just continuing as it is at the moment i.e. no sign of a resolution, and no meaningful progress towards a resolution. So they link any extension to a solid undertaking that there will be a substantial change in tack from Westminster, and that change has to have the possibility of delivering an agreement.

    Effectively, that translates to; May can come up with new proposals (and I don't believe that she is able to do that, so I'm discounting that option), or she agrees to call a general election (the EU leaders may well want the election scenario a lot, but won't want to suggest it directly, as it would be pounced upon and portrayed gleefully by various interests as the EU leaders meddling in UK domestic politics).

    May's stubbornness could well prevent her from calling an election - which results in Article 50 expiring, and either no deal exit or much more likely the EU and UK allowing things to continue as is despite the deadline having passed, maybe with long lasting court cases being launched n response by various interests. Also the entire UK negotiating team gets replaced by a PC running modern business-grade robotics software and no-one notices.

    If 'the men in the grey suits' somehow mange to force May out, and a general election is called, then we have to wonder what likely election results could happen. With feelings running high on the brexit issue, and both Labour and the Tories being largely pro leave at the party leadership level, who do the pro remain group have to vote for? Here in Scotland that factor could lead to the pro remain SNP picking up enough of a swing from pro remain voters to increase its already large majority. In England in particular, however, where does that 'remain' vote go? The 'Independent' group/party may pick some votes up, and the Liberals might also draw some of the vote, but many 'remain' voters might just not vote - i.e. I have no idea where that battle might go.

    For the Indyref 2 scenario in Scotland - the question is both when and if - When because in times of uncertainty people flee to the familiar, and the no campaign's approach of spreading FUD in indref 1 definitely helped win it for 'no'. Presumably the SNP's preferred timing will be to have the referendum at the point in time where the fear uncertainty and doubt about brexit are at their height - perhaps just before brexit actually happens, and presenting the 'yes' option as the familiar/safe 'stay in/rejoin the EU' option.

    'If' it happens is another factor - Westminster can attempt to block a referendum - and both sides fear the effects that heading to the courts would have if they open the can of worms that is the potentially legally flawed Act of Union. So do the SNP try to sidestep that by using another device such as calling an election for MSPs in Holyrood, but declaring their manifesto to simply be secession, with another white paper to back it up?

    However in the time I've taken to write this, the whole situation has probably already changed.

    112:

    Isn't what will happen obvious?

    The UK will crash out with No Deal on 29 March.

    Because accomplishing anything else from here would require either co-ordinated competent leadership by the UK Govt, or courage by May and her inner cabinet.

    Europe's sick of Brexit, they want it over. Why on earth would the EU nations unanymously agree on an extension of that misery unless the UK govt offers them something? What could May offer them without that requiring either courage or competence?

    When in doubt, assume that politicians will dither ineffectually while the clock runs down.

    113:

    After Brexit (assuming it goes that way) there'll still be the trade negotiations with the EU and it's not going to happen over night, Canada's FTA with the EU took 7 years for example. Given the UK's a service economy that exports 90 billion pounds worth of services to the EU and has a healthy surplus in this area you can reasonably expect the EU to demand a lot of concessions to ease access to the single market for the UK service sector. The UK government seems blissfully unaware of how important this sector is... The pain hasn't even started yet.

    114:

    "I suppose I am wondering whether at some point the Europeans are likely to want to definitively slam the door. Presumably the ongoing possibility of a Rescission of Article 50 has very real associated costs for both the EU and UK."

    I imagine that by now the EU leadership have changed from Normal Negotiations to How to Handle Terminal Chaos in the UK.

    Hard bargaining is doable, win or lose, but when you realize that the other party is clinically insane.

    115:

    It's absolutely fair to ask, but like any question that even touches NI internal politics, the answer goes fractal real fast.

    Yes, so I see; now I am reminded that hoping something could be simplified down to a single-digit number of factions is naive.

    < snip lots of good stuff >

    (I have summarized much here. Hopefully it offers a little more insight.)

    Yes it does. This doesn't tell me how to get out of the current mess - nobody knows that - but it fills in another piece about how we got into it.

    116:

    Her Britannic Majesty is 92 years old.

    At 60, yes, perhaps, but!

    The EU isn't going to negotiate with a non-democratic leader. They just can't.

    Her Majesty can, technically, dissolve Parliament. There is no possible way in which this improves anything because it gives the constitutional crisis another large dimension and would contribute to the collapse of legitimacy even if an election were immediately called. (This happened, sort of, via Governor-General, when Canada was a Dominion. King–Byng affair was a major political driver for decades thereafter. For it to happen now in the UK would sow different flavours of chaos.)

    Even in some sort of neo-royalist utopia where Brenda says "We are not amused. William, deal with this" and it turns out William is a genius politician (he isn't) able to exploit May's government summoning the powers of Great Harry (Henry VIII) back from the dark (which they have done!) on the grounds that if Parliament has them, the Crown must and after some time there's a sane elected government and much that needs dealing with is dealt with, it can't possibly happen in less than a year. Three to five would be nigh-miraculous.

    The UK has ten days.

    The economic hit is permanent; the UK has been coasting on historical first-mover advantages for a couple of generations because it's been Tory policy to remove material capability since (arguably) 1945 and certainly since 1980 because the more the economy is based on things you can measure with a micrometer the less valuable it was to go to Eton. I don't think anyone is really looking at how unrecoverable the economic hit is; the UK, already massively troubled by regional economic disparity, could lose half their GDP, and have no mechanism of recovery.

    I'm generally an advocate of income and asset caps for natural persons; Brexit is making me think there should be scale limits on corporations.

    117:

    Her Majesty can, technically, dissolve Parliament. ... The UK has ten days.

    So she would have, at most, ten days to completely replace the existing government with competent people, have those people find a Brexit solution that has so far eluded everyone in Britain, while simultaneously convincing the population that she has done the right thing. Oh, and as you point out, she's 90. But if you add in "monarch resigns and her replacement is anointed" that also has to be wedged into those 10 days.

    Like I said, "King Arthur and the Parliamentary Mace" is a more likely solution.

    I think it all comes down to whether the 27 nations of the EU say "that's really sad, how can we help" in 10 days time, or whether they say "great, now you can't keep kicking us in the bollocks because you're not even in the room any more".

    118:

    What about NI as an independent EU-member nation? It’s bigger than Luxembourg.

    If they wanted they could go on feeling English by keeping Elizabeth Windsor as their queen, like Canada and New Zealand. Heck, they’re close enough to her digs that maybe she’d come visit to open their parliament in person instead of sending a Governor General.

    119:

    The U.K. thinks they're getting a blow job tonight. The EU thinks the U.K is getting divorce papers. This will not end well.

    120:

    “find a Brexit solution that has so far eluded everyone in Britain” There’s an obvious solution that I’ve seen discussed by UK people: Cancel Article 50.

    121:

    By "solution", I mean an actual thing that resolves Brexit, not another dollop of wishful thinking. At this stage there's a whole heap of things that are not technically impossible, they just don't have enough support to go anywhere.

    122:

    Like I said, "King Arthur and the Parliamentary Mace" is a more likely solution.

    Ten days isn't long enough for His Ur-Majesty to knock on the head everyone it would be deemed necessary to knock on the head with the Parliamentary Mace.

    Though I expect the arguments about whether or not the bookies were correctly describing the techniques employed would be entertaining; was that really a rising roundhouse? Could be called mostly flat... Do you still call it the pear-splitter when it's a mace? I wish to express no disrespect of his ur-majesty whatsoever, but that, that was plain graceless thumping...

    123:

    London is substantially different to the rest of the UK. It's avidly pro-EU and voted strongly for remain. Londoners are 35% foreign-born and on average twice as wealthy as the rest of the UK.

    Except … Scotland is a whole lot more white-bread but voted remain by an even wider margin than London. And Scotland is, overall, wealthier than England-excluding-London. (And note that London is skewed heavily by the hyper-rich.)

    And you've already got a wall to keep the English barbarians out! Dust it off, put in a few guard stations with wifi and electric kettles, and Bob's your uncle.

    (The ludicrous and silly suggestions would sound more ludicrous and silly if there were serious proposals to provide contrast. Turning the city of London into a free city within the EU is, if anything, less crazy than some plans.)

    124:

    “We’re not doing it” resolves it.

    Once any possible delays are over I see only three possible end-states: Hard Brexit May’s deal Call it off If the 51% of Indyref “Leave” voters are split between the first two, and the 49% of Indyref “Remain” voters agree on the third, then the third is by far the most popular. It’s a failure of the political system that it’s not even being discussed.

    125:

    Whoops, not “Indyref,” whatever it was called.

    126:

    If the 51% of Indyref “Leave” voters are split between the first two, and the 49% of Indyref “Remain” voters

    To me a solution is necessarily one that the great majority of people will regard as legitimate. "ha ha now we have 51%" is just going to prolong the agony. If you really do split three ways on a two choice situation that doesn't say much for your population. I've already written off your leadership, unless a parliamentary child sex ring or similar comes to light my opinion of them could not be lower.

    I'm increasingly convinced that the pessimists are right. Britain is going to exit the EU with no deal and take whatever the rest of the world chooses to give them.

    One tiny glimmer is that I expect a lot of the Brexit push people will leave once it becomes obvious that their plans for the UK can't work. I foresee a brief period of legislative excitement where they run round saying "oh boy do we have a deal for you" and "you need to fix your tax laws" and other fascinating things, then various other countries and trading blocs go "yeah, that's not how it works" and block whatever amazing scam is proposed or implemented. At which point most of the shady billions will disappear along with the very important people who rely on that money.

    Meanwhile people in Britain will settle into their new position in the world, somewhere between Somalia and Yemen on the various rankings of public health, GDP per capita and so on. The difference being that you'll still be much more democratic... you voted yourselves into this, and you refuse to vote yourselves out of it. I say that living in Australia, where we have a similar solid majority of the population who will not ever change their vote in any significant way. We are just as bad, but in a subtly different way (we run concentration camps, you whatever brexit is).

    This, plus the global warming catastrophe, make me wonder whether democracy is actually a viable form of government. I mean, we had variations on slavery and serfdom for millenia without doing much damage but 200 years of democracy and things are looking pretty grim. I am pretty sick of nihilists looking at the not-terrible options and saying "I'd rather die". Or more accurately, sick of the "and I'm taking you and everything you care about with me" part.

    127:

    It’s a failure of the political system that it’s not even being discussed.

    Nah. Your political system has failed, all right, but well before that point. The failure stems from a simple thing, which a subsequent combination of propaganda and a convention that of course there has to be a rational reason defensible in quantitative terms as advancing the common good for policy proposals has made very very complicated, and really, it's not.

    Basic primate status is defined by who can tell you what to do.

    The deeply held self-image of pretty much everybody who votes Tory (and some who don't) involves a self-image in which the UK is an important, special nation possessing great power in the world and they belong to that special nation and people who don't must acknowledge these things.

    That's not even slightly factual today.

    The whole point of Brexit is to tap into the Those People Can't Tell ME What To Do norm-violation affront involved in having to consider admitting that, you know, the long term trend for the UK's economy is, in at least relative terms, down.

    That's it. That's all there is to this. And since it's a conventional political axiom that the UK is still an important, special nation possessing great power in the world, it isn't possible to say "you know, this is wrong".

    Yes, there are disaster capitalists. Yes, there are Russian agents. Yes, there are horrid people who greatly desire authoritarian outcomes up to and including genocidal ethnic cleansing. Yes, there's a general lack of political competence.

    But the beginning and the end of it comes from wanting something impossible to be made true. The hierarchy in which English politics (and trade, and many other things) operates is not defined by English preferences and power. This is completely intolerable, and they won't have it.

    Which is stark staring bonkers.

    But it's also axiomatically true in the available set of political and social norms.

    128:

    So do what Singapore did - declare independence from the rump, stay in the EU, and build a wall at the M25.

    Except Singapore didn't declare independence from Malaysia - Malaysia kicked Singapore out a few years after the republic was formed.

    129:

    Re: 'Her Majesty can, technically, dissolve Parliament.'

    Can May prorogue Parliament - put it into limbo - until she can con her MPs into voting for her strategy? My understanding is that proroguing would still allow the gov't Offices/Departments/Ministries to continue doing their jobs.

    130:

    Her majesty doesn't have to dissolve parliament or force an election, just summon the current PM and give them a letter advising that they no longer have the confidence of the crown. Exeunt former PM with a sigh of relief. The 2011 election act governs the form a no confidence vote must take in the commons and what happens after but does not constrain the crown in either regard.

    Then her majesty has the tough question of whom to ask to form a government. If she asked Labor chances are Mr Corbyn would decline because it's a poison chalice. So to make this work the Crown would need to know that whoever they asked could carry through their program. She would also need to deal with the problem of deadlock in the commons, that's a slightly easier problem as she could break the deadlock through a joint sitting of both houses.

    131:

    Re: '... guaranteed data sharing agreements in the field of health and human biology research for the last couple years...

    ... and no one has the slightest idea if any of those agreements will be legal past March 29th (or any extension thereof)'

    It's insane that the Pols and official media haven't discussed this. Do Brits not understand that the EU has the best legal protections of PII on the planet? I'm guessing that any research study that has UK-EU data sharing will have to meet EU standards otherwise risk losing its partnership status with their EU counterpart.

    If PII or other sensitive data are at risk, maybe the UK institutions could do what the EPA did when Trump was elected: send all of their at-risk data immediately to a reliable research partner (Canada - University of Toronto) for safety/storage. Which EU university does the UK partner with most often or has the best data storage capability?

    132:

    Re: 'Then her majesty has the tough question of whom to ask to form a government'

    How about the Speaker of the House of Commons? My understanding is that this position is voted on by all MPs to fulfill a necessary non-partisan role. The Speaker is usually someone that has the personal/professional trust/respect of the majority of MPs. Sorta like the SecGen of the UN.

    133:

    There's a saying.

    When you're up to your arse in alligators it can be hard to remember the goal is to drain the swamp.

    In other words, they (the elected government) is running around with their hair on fire. Details, no matter how sensible and/or urgent, will just have to wait.

    134:

    How about the Speaker of the House of Commons? My understanding is that this position is voted on by all MPs to fulfill a necessary non-partisan role. The Speaker is usually someone that has the personal/professional trust/respect of the majority of MPs.

    It sounds reasonable under the current circumstances. (That is, the house is on fire and there's some guy standing near a hose.) How is John Bercow seen by the British public in general? How popular is he with other politicians?

    He seems to have gained points with sane observers for pointing out that May has to follow parliamentary procedure even when inconvenient to her. How that translates into the strange space of British politicians I can't guess.

    135:

    "Do Brits not understand that the EU has the best legal protections of PII on the planet?"

    They don't care. A guaranteed way to give myself a violent internet culture shock is to stop reading a discussion of computer privacy on here, go pretty much anywhere else (either online or in meatspace), and try and initiate a similar discussion. It simply can't be done. The incredible opacity of the wall of just-do-not-give-even-a-microgram-of-shit-ism is utterly impenetrable. It would be easier to get Greg to believe in God than to get the pseudo-sapient entity on the Clapham omnibus interested in what happens with their data.

    "How about the Speaker of the House of Commons?"

    Being the Speaker and forming a government are mutually exclusive. The Speaker is an impartial umpire, who enforces the rules but does not play the game.

    136:

    Yes, more importantly it washes out the Erskine May rule that you can't consider the same question twice. Shortest prorogue was about two days but really it need only be a couple of hours. All getting a bit sporty now!

    137:

    "The EU isn't going to negotiate with a non-democratic leader. They just can't."

    Thanks to Denmarks constitution EU can, but only in very limited subjects and only for few days, but I doubt they would even want to contemplate that.

    I do not expect her to get involved in any way, as I see no reason to belive she is a hard core EU-federalist, quite the contrary.

    What I meant was that between the current situation and Full-On-Mad-Max stands QE2, and 92 years or or not, she is very much in the way there.

    @119:

    Cancelling the article 50 note solves nothing for anybody, because it would just light a fire under the hard-core tabloid-brain-washed brexiteers and their puppet-masters.

    I think the only stabilizing paths involve compliance with the referendum and taking UK out of EU.

    There are a lot of rational and reasonable arguments for holding another referendum, but as I said above, there is no guarantee that will make the situation better and many reasons to expect it to make things worse.

    The fundamental issue here, is that the referendum was not called on the terms one would normally require for such a consequential decision.

    It should have been called binding and on "qualified majority" terms, for instance: "A majority of more than 40% of the elgible voters or ⅔rds of the cast votes".

    Deciding anything of this sort in away that make all the even house numbers drag all the odd house numbers along is never a good idea.

    138:

    Consulting my crystal ball I think that EU27 will be inclined to give a short extension because Ireland is under prepared (to put it mildly) for a no deal exit. Bottom line is the Republic needs time to get ready to re-occupy the border and get it's customs arrangements in order. That should not be surprising to Whitehall as the 27 are all about looking after the interests of the 27. After that short interregnum though l reckon it'll still be a no deal...

    139:

    Von hicthofen @ 105 YES Also, the apparent writing of a letter/article in today's "torygraph" empahsises that. ( Trump Jnr has apparently written, saying how wonderful brexit is - which with any luck will turn significant numbers against it ?) The brexiteers are, as then, an unholy Nazi-Soviet pact. Then it was the BNP & the CPGB, now it's the Ukippers & right of the tories plus momentum & Corbyn. Meanwhile May doesn't have a clue - oh btw, I retract my earlier comment about Eden's gvumint in 1956 being worse - this is a even bigger utter fuck-up than Suez ...

    Matt S @ 112 Yes The first step on our way to becoming modern Greece from Athens of the Classical period ....

    RvdH @ 123 YES But this requires Parliament taking control from May -see my final paragraph

    SS @ 133 J Bercow is deeply unpopular with many tories, though he is one. He is JEWISH & some on the ultra-left don't like him, either, what a suprise. However, he may be our unlikely saviour - it's happened before, only this time it's not the Monarch who is the villain.

    PHK @ 136 But HM is a "unionist" in the best sense of the word. A break-up of the UK, perpetrated by the brexiteers is NOT on her agenda. And a second referendum would solve the other problem

    May has/is writing to the EU asking for 3 months ... It is to be hoped that Parlaiment wrests control from her - we could then get Referendum2

    140:

    NI is not an economically functional state on its own. Currently it is completely dependent on Westminster subsidies to survive, remove those subsidies and you’d have to reboot the NI economy from scratch (it would be close to the economic basket-case that the Republic of Ireland was until the latter decades of the 20th century). This is also a big part of why the Republic is ideologically keen on reunification but practically want to keep it at arms length (see previous poster’s comments up thread).

    141:

    No-deal Brexit is emotionally satisfying to many voters, personally enriching to a few politicians (while not harming the other politicians significantly), and most importantly doesn't require any positive action to happen now. Isn't this the most likely outcome? By far?

    142:

    NI is not an economically functional state on its own.

    That would have been my guess; I had a substantially similar conversation with a Canadian regarding Quebec years ago.

    Would it be right to say that Northern Ireland is functional as a region within a larger nation? If yes, good, sucking the teat of the UK has worked for a while and reattaching to the Republic of Ireland would be... a horrible mess in many different ways. We've already figured that out. But if no, that implies that Northern Ireland has problems beyond merely not being self sufficient.

    Brexit puts me in mind of the classic home remodeling sequence where you start tearing things apart to fix a known problem only to discover that, wow, here's a totally different problem that means rebuilding something else.

    143:

    I think a bigger factor than inaction is that any effort to avoid no-deal, no matter how concerted, wise and well executed, dies on the doorstep if just one single minister out of the 27 says "I'm sick and tired of this shit, let's get it over with!"

    Even if Parliament offers up a silver platter with a second referendum and a large wad of cash to pay for the extension, that would still cost EU another year in limbo for no guaranteed outcome.

    I can point to a number of PM's who already feel that way when they meet tomorrow, where they will punt on Mays application for extension, because HoC has still not explained what they need it for.

    And they will feel even more so, when they get dragged to BXL on the 27/28th, because one has to do the last minute thing in this kind of situation, even if the conclusion is foregone.

    And then on march 30, with UK no longer being a member country, rules of comity no longer applying, they are free to say, and will say, what they have been botteling up for the last two years.

    144:

    Or, alternatively, the leader of the SNP grows some backbone, then the SNP win another overall majority at Holyrood, then, since the Palace of Oathbreakers have broken the terms of the "Treaty of Union Between England and Scotland" repeatedly, the first time in 1708CE, present a 1 clause bill the "Act of Union with England (1707) Repeal Bill", and push that through in a day. At which point the TUBES (I only just noticed that just now) is deratified and most of Charlie's comments on separate systems become actual benefits.

    145:

    And now there's this turd in the already full punch bowl: Theresa May should have taken my father's advice on Brexit by Donald Trump Jr.

    So the whole mess is the fault of "elites" but not him or his father. Other elites. Someone else.

    146:

    Bristol would want in on that approach. My ward was the most pro EU in the country, outside of London.

    147:

    Before delving into an attempt to answer Scott's question @142, here's an article the describes the incredible level of ignorance of NI and the "border issue" in the Leave campaign prior to the referendum:

    Why Brexiteers forgot about the Border

    Of course, most Brexiters have continued to display such ignorance with chest-thumping pride, encouraged to a great extent I believe by the mendacity of the DUP (who, as discussed already, have their own reasons for misrepresenting the border issue, and investing in unicorns).

    148:

    Or, alternatively, the leader of the SNP grows some backbone, then the SNP win another overall majority at Holyrood, then, since the Palace of Oathbreakers have broken the terms of the "Treaty of Union Between England and Scotland" repeatedly...

    Now you've sent me to look up the text of that. (Thank you.) Do you know anything about legal precedents?

    It occurs to me that just as people object to a guarded border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland with the observation that this would violate the Good Friday Accords, likewise people could object to some kind of customs check between Northern Ireland and whatever is left of the UK after the Brexiteers get done shoving things into the Atlantic. Article IV reads:

    That all the Subjects of the United Kingdom of Great Britain shall from and after the Union have full Freedom and Intercourse of Trade and Navigation to and from any port or place within the said United Kingdom and the Dominions and Plantations thereunto belonging And that there be a Communication of all other Rights Privileges and Advantages which do or may belong to the Subjects of either Kingdom except where it is otherwayes expressly agreed in these Articles.

    At first glance this certainly sounds like a promise Charlie can visit Belfast if he feels like it. Would this be a thing to fuss over or are internal checkpoints de facto accepted?

    149:

    DATA PROTECTION on leaving the EU ... yes? Start by looking at THIS WEBSITE then go to the link marked "Persona Data & Consumer rights - OK I do hope this helps people?

    SS @ 145 I ALREADY TOLD YOU ABOUT THAT, back @ # 139!

    150:

    Brexit puts me in mind of the classic home remodeling sequence where you start tearing things apart to fix a known problem only to discover that, wow, here's a totally different problem that means rebuilding something else.

    Hopefully the Irish Times article I linked @147 will help to explain why this is a good analogy, although perhaps with the added detail that after you've started tearing things apart, you suddenly discover that you're in your neighbour's house.

    Would it be right to say that Northern Ireland is functional as a region within a larger nation?

    Not really, no. The closest that you could come is to say that for its entire history NI has been functionally dysfunctional (with the socially dysfunctional element decreasing steadily over the last 20 years, but the economic dependency remaining high).

    151:

    In broader terms, you could say that Northern Ireland was a fudge, a half-assed attempt at fixing a problem that couldn't be quickly fixed, combined with kicking the can down the road. Everything that the UK government has done sine partition of Ireland can be summarized as further fudges and can-kicking.

    How to get to an actually livable workable permanent solution from where we are now (and hopefully without bloodshed)?

    Who knows.

    152:

    So she would have, at most, ten days to completely replace the existing government with competent people, have those people find a Brexit solution that has so far eluded everyone in Britain, while simultaneously convincing the population that she has done the right thing.

    That's easy!

    There's one party already in Westminster with a disciplined team who have a clear focus and know exactly what they want and how to fix Brexit.

    We just need Brenda to tell May and Corbyn to fuck off and ask Ian Blackford to form a government. The first act of which Prime Minister would then be, using the precedent Theresa May herself set, to unilaterally withdrawn Article 50, then walk up to the despatch box and give the Brexiters on both sides of the divide a solid scolding.

    What happens afterwards would be … interesting: it's pretty likely there'd be another referendum, though (as a quid pro quo for going into coalition with whoever the hell emerges on the centre-left after the Conservatives and Labour disintegrate), and thereafter the UK would be a little bit smaller!

    … All it takes is for Lizzie Windsor to remember that she's also Queen of Scotland.

    153:

    "Hardcore Brexiters won't respect the result of any referendum that they didn't win.

    They didn't respect the result of the 1975 Referendum, after all."

    This is an important thing to remember when dealing with right-wingers, in any country and system:

    They are revolutionary powers.

    They don't want to merely struggle within the system to get more; they want to destroy the system.

    They will demand adherence to 'norms' and 'custom', right up until they destroy them without hesitation.

    As somebody said about Nazis, they use words like bricks, not words, and only until they can lay their hands on actual bricks.

    154:

    "Indeed even if somehow Mays deal was approved in third try, EU would have every reason to consider that result infirm come the next general election."

    Somebody pointed this out on another blog: 'no Parliament may bind another Parliament' will be a major problem in trade negotiations. Particularly since the old British system of 'what is done' and 'what is not done' seems to be breaking down. Given the ERG/UKIP ability to shut things down and eagerness to break any constraints on their power, the governments of other countries will likely understand that they are dealing with Trump-like people.

    155:

    I retract my earlier comment about Eden's gvumint in 1956 being worse - this is a even bigger utter fuck-up than Suez …

    Ah, no.

    I think the history books may record Brexit as a bigger disaster for the UK than the Second World War.

    WW2 nearly bankrupted the nation, killed 1% of the population, and cost an empire. But the UK was not invaded, and survived as a coherent nation.

    Whereas Brexit may lead to the disintegration of the UK.

    (This is not to minimize the enormous damage WW2 did to basically everyone. But the UK got off relatively lightly.)

    156:

    Charlie can visit Belfast if he feels like it...

    ...but he won't be able to drive to Dublin? Good grief, Charlie Brown.

    157:

    This is my ignorance of UK constitution speaking, but doesn't both the Monarch and the Parliament have a role in affirming the Prime Minister?

    I'm reminded of the farce that was the Swedish parliament this autumn and winter.

    158:

    I'd been wondering about asking the SNP to form a government. Does there have to be an actual vote by Parliament confirming it, or does it just go into effect until there's a no-confidence vote of some sort?

    159:

    Currently I can get the car ferry from Larne to NI, hit the road, and drive through Belfast until I hit Dublin (then gridlock, because Dublin traffic).

    There is a sign at the border. "Speed limits now in km/h." (And the converse sign going the other way.)

    What happens in 10 days time is going to upset this applecart just a little.

    160:

    Hopefully the Irish Times article I linked @147 will help to explain why this is a good analogy, although perhaps with the added detail that after you've started tearing things apart, you suddenly discover that you're in your neighbour's house.

    That's a good link; I'm losing an hour or two reading things on that site and trying to see the mess from Ireland's perspective.

    The specific incident I had in mind typing that analogy was when my uncle set out to plaster a wall, then discovered the ancient lath & plaster had to be replaced, and then discovered the wall held a gigantic nest of wasps.

    161:

    Fazal rhymes with "puzzle".

    Majid with a j as in "jay", not "hay" (Arabic in origin, not Spanish, although Spanish certainly has a lot of Arabic influences).

    162:
    2. About 100 Tories and a smaller number of Labour MPs are so adamantly pro-Brexit that if she goes back on A50 she'll split the party, possibly causing the emergence of a new right-wing party and effectively depriving the Conservatives of a governing mandate without Labour support. (Under Corbyn. Not gonna happen.)

    The scary thing is Tory MPs are actually considerably to the left of their grassroots, which are 80% in favor of a hard crash-out no-deal Brexit. The nonlinear nature of the British First Past The Post electoral system leads to chaotic results, as could be expected...

    164:

    Charlie and other UK people, have you thought about a bank account outside the UK?

    I don't see how without replacing the current government brexit stopping, pausing, or reversing. They don't want to.

    165:

    Alas: not gonna happen.

    166:

    I got it right!!! :-) It looks like I am at least learning how to pronounce Arabic rendered in Roman script correctly.

    167:

    Oddly, I am paid in US dollars for books sold in the USA.

    Not so oddly, I have a US dollar deposit account for receiving these payments.

    It's with a British bank, but one that's unlikely to go under (they already did the nameplate move out into the EU).

    Yes, a Sterling crisis will fuck with my sterling-denominated savings (and, eventually, the book value of my home). But I have a modest personal hedge: as in, I've done my damndest to minimize drawings from that account ever since the Brexit referendum in 2016, even to the point of living off Sterling savings instead.

    It's not exactly a hedge fund, but ...

    168:

    What I meant was that between the current situation and Full-On-Mad-Max stands QE2, and 92 years or or not, she is very much in the way there.

    This gets into the weird relationship between the British Monarchy and actual power; it works by tradition and deference.

    The people with the legally mandated power -- May's government -- have a tenuous to non-existent relationship with tradition and deference. So it would be a very diffuse anything if Her Majesty attempted, breaking two hundred years of tradition, to express a specific operant political opinion in public.

    The people who would be most likely to listen are precisely the people who, right now, most want violent ethnic cleansing. (Starting with the former Ms. Markle.) The army is too small to do anything useful, and most of the police seem to be in on the "yay authoritarianism!" Leave faction.

    I don't expect England to be a monarchy when this is over. The ritual of deference has worn thin. (Scotland, maybe.)

    169:

    That's a fairly spot on analogy.

    When thinking in NI terms, ask the question: What needs fixed first? Answer: Everything!

    170:

    Actually, WWII did bankrupt the nation! It also triggered the breakup of the empire in a rather chaotic fashion, but that would probably have happened anyway. But it also led to an era of remarkable political consensus, which lasted for some decades, and handled that surprisingly well (with hindsight) as well as improving most social conditions considerably.

    I agree - if Brexit goes the way that seems likely, it could well be a lot worse. Whether the country will come to its senses in a few decades from now, I can't say, but I am not expecting to see a recovery in my lifetime. Yes, I am still working towards emigrating north of the border :-)

    171:

    That is exactly why I cannot forgive That Blair for what he did in 1998 (and later) and why, when I read it at the time (*), I would have voted "no" to the agreement if I had lived there. It might have taken another year, but there COULD have been an agreement that would have led towards a long-term solution, but That Blair was determined to claim the mantle of "The Person Who Brought Peace to Northern Ireland", no matter who he trod on nor whether it outlasted his rule.

    (*) I read it as a contract between two companies, both of which were totally unscrupulous and would be happy to destroy the other. So far, things have progressed and are progressing exactly as I thought they would, as far as the general direction goes.

    172:

    Whether the country will come to its senses in a few decades from now, I can't say

    We don't have decades: climate change is already a snowballing avalanche, as witness the warnings yesterday that England is going to run short of water within 25 years. Like all such environmental forecasts this is probably optimistic/conservative …

    The UK has had a decade of idiotic austerity (economic snake-oil, basically, inflicted by people with an agenda to harm those they consider subservient and who don't actually understand how money works), most recently compounded by 3-4 years of legislative paralysis, in which nonsense like mandatory porn blocking for internet users continues to proceed while vital, important stuff like decarbonizing the economy and ensuring resilience against extreme weather challenges are largely ignored.

    Worst case: breakup of UK as a unitary nation, followed by water wars circa 2050-2060 (Scotland is wet) and subsequent starvation/die-offs by 2100.

    173:

    DtP @ 150 & SS @ 142 "Right Said Fred", only NOT funny, in other words ....

    Charlie @ 155 Agree - except - the biggest disaster since 1776 is more likely, actually ..... & @ 159 Like me being stopped at Ameins Street station in Dublin inthe Bad old Days & being asked if I had any contraceptives? Only worse ... & @ 172 - even if I live to be 105, as I hope, we'll both be long-gone before that happens - fortunately

    174:

    It is not to be underestimated that certain EU leaders and MPs are very interested to make Brexit as hard as possible on the UK, whatever then "solution" is.

    To elaborate,

    1) The EU has a vested interest to make an example pf the UK to dissuade other members and smaller regions in those members to try for independence. Think Greece, Italy, Catalonia, Bavaria, etc.

    In a No-Deal scenario to the worst effects, as the UK descends deeper into turmoil and chaos, separatists will be confronted with something like this: "You want independence? Look over there... that's what would happen without the EU."

    2) A hard Northern Ireland border and escalation of violence there would be a fantastic pretext for advocates of a combined EU military force to raise their voices again/even more. The loss of the British nuclear capabilities may also fuel this.

    3) The EU has potentially more levers to exert pressure on the UK when the UK is not part of the EU any more. Trade deals, military deals, intelligence. In all aspects, potential partners that have the EU as a partner will likely look in their direction first. Also, the EU as partner will likely not be as amendable to give "favorable" conditions to the then independent UK as exist now.

    4) Being cut off from the financial market in the EU might as well have serious repercussions on London's stock exchange and whole status as financial hub, strengthening the position of EU exchanges, especially Frankfurt (Remember when the Frankfurt stock exchange planned to move to London). This is actually already happening, with large financial cooperations and banks at least opening a offices there. Certain factions, elected or unelected, are very "interested".

    This is of course very generalized. If you look at the whole mess as a game, it leads to consider what "win condition" the players might have. "Players" in this sense are politicians, cooperations, and every person, citizen or not, really.

    175:

    The most likely scenario I can think of for HM stepping in is if the EU grants a delay conditional on Parliament having chosen a course of action by midnight on March 27th, and it failing to do so. She could then state (publicly) that, on the advice of her Privy Councillors, she was proroguing Parliament sine die because her government clearly did not have the confidence of the House, and appointing (say) the Father of the House as temporary Prime Minister :-)

    Perhaps 1%, if that :-(

    176:

    As I understand, there are currently twelve stars on the EU flag, one for each founding member. UK was one of those. I'm from a country that didn't get a star, as we joined later. We are wondering if the UK's star can now be ours. Thanks.

    177:

    You're welcome to this interpretation. As for the number,

    "Against the blue sky of the Western world, the stars represent the peoples of Europe in a circle, a symbol of unity. Their number shall be invariably set at twelve, the symbol of completeness and perfection."

    Though I wonder if we might change the stars into Derleth's Elder Signs?

    (Short term delurking, too much going on, I even get somewhat quiet in RL because meeting said friend on Monday brought back some memories. It was quite nice, though I still apologzed for being too talkative and boring...)

    178:

    "What's going to happen?" asks OGH; along with an awful lot of people.

    The odds are on that we will crash out on Friday week. Having been told that she could ask for an extension to sort things out until before the European elections on May 23rd, or for 12 months likewise, Supreme Generallisimo May has written a petulant demand to the EY for an extension to the end of June on the lines of "it's all everyone else's fault".

    At this point, the EU must now regard us as a failed dictatorship whose leadership, such as it is, is inimically hostile to the EU and will if allowed to stay further Putin's dream of breaking the EU up. No matter how they may like us as individuals, they won't grant any extensions.

    I hope to be proved wrong on that, but I expect that's what will happen.

    On April 1st, Russia cuts itself off from the internet as an "exercise" in controlling its people from reading and broadcasting fake news. This would also protect Russia's infrastructure from any pre-planned nasties currently waiting patiently on the Internet to activate. As always, yesterday is the right time to back up your important stuff, but today will do in a pinch.

    Within a few weeks, there will be food shortages. Not all foods, but a country used to everything on the shelves all year round at affordable prices will understand with their guts what the recipients of the bags of porridge oats and cheap soup they occasionally tossed into the foodbank at Tescos feel like.

    There will also be shortages of some medicines and other things such as short life radioactives used to keep people alive and reasonably healthy rather than chronically ill and dead. Some of that group (or their family/friends), faced with an imminent and avoidable demise, may consider the old WWII slogan. (Not "Keep Calm and Carry On", but "You can always take one with you".)

    Oh, and for some nightmare fuel, imagine what could be done using the same Arsebook / Cambridge Analytica method that brought us the referendum result being used to target that group and "team" them up with a target list...

    The good news is that the sun will continue to rise and set, and that most of us have the capacity to be kind, most of the time, whatever happens.

    179:

    You will not be surprised to know that I have been shouted at at $WURK this week for Being Obstructive by saying I'm not inclined to approve a new IT project storing Personally Identifiable Information in Dublin, given the current situation.

    I didn't even mention the "B" word.

    180:

    So, June 30th is the ask from May on the extension. Is it me or does this seem wildly optimistic? It's not enough time for substantive change, and if meaningful vote 2.0 didn't muster the votes when it was do or die, why would they change? Presumably most of the "some brexit rather than no brexit" crowd was won over on vote 2.0, and not many more will switch. I don't see how this impasse is (realistically) resolves short of a general election or 2nd referendum. Sure, everyone towards the center in both parties could ditch Corbyn & May respectively and form their own government, but even writing that feels like wish fulfillment.

    181:

    Yes, the EU is under no obligation (nor, I think, likely) to extend the exit date.

    However, there was a ruling a year or so, supported by the EU executive, ago that Britain could unilaterally revoke Article 50. So, we could still end up at square 0, when May discovers she's not permitted to leave without a deal (by the UK parliament) or to extend the leave date (by the EU parliament).

    182:

    Brexit does seem of have done a remarkably good job of undermining the case for unity. Catalonian separatism in Spain only really took off after the PP undermined the autonomy statute negotiated by the Spanish and Catalonian governments, severely calling into question the plausibility of Spain as a framework for Catalonia. Here in Canada, similarly, controversy over the ratification of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the early 1980s has been a consistent issue for Québec.

    Thinking particularly of Scotland, where it seems many people voted against independence in 2014 because of the risk it posed to the existing constitutional setup only to be confronted with the radical constitutional shift of Brexit that Scotland had voted against by a large majority, I think it perfectly plausible that soft Scottish nationalists might come to support independence. If Scottish desires are not respected in the Union and not going to be respected in the Union, then independence looks that much more credible.

    183:

    Surely one can be both an "unspeakable bonehead" and "a hypocritical sectarian corrupt bigot, with a side order of fundamentalist religious zeal, and an unsatisfied yearning for ethnic cleansing."

    184:

    There are a lot of "what ifs".

    After a long time in thought I agree that the GFA was flawed (and there is no doubt that Blair had some highly suspect self-serving reasons for pushing it), but a lot us knew it was flawed at the time and voted for it out of a sense of optimism and hope. And that wasn't totally misplaced -- lives have undoubtedly been saved, and a generation has grown up in relative peace. Without Brexit I think we would have stumbled on until the gradual die off of politicians ossified in Green/Orange politics and the demographic shift provided a crack into which real change could be inserted.

    What happens now though? Anyone's guess. I don't expect a full re-run of the Troubles, but neither do expect violence to be completely avoided (indeed, the recent letter bombs have already proved that right).

    185:

    EC @ 175 THAT would be "FUN" - especially as the Father of the House was the best Chancellor we've had for many a year & is a thoroughoing Remainer - Kenneth Clarke.

    Jim D @ 180 it's EASILY time for a 2nd Referendum - if it can be passed by the House ... which is the difficult bit.

    R McD @ 182 ( & everybody ) the trouble with the SNP is that they are Scoxiteers, with all the same problems that brexit brings ....

    186:

    I wasn't talking about NO agreement, but about spending another year in getting a better one. Your "undoubtedly" is another "what if" compared to that, I am afraid, and I suspected at the time that it would not be true. Yes, I expected something like Omagh, though not on that scale, and it was only half 1998's total.

    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hRidYe3-avd7gvlZWVi1YZB7QY6dKhekPS1I1kbFTnY/edit

    Anyway, my beliefs are clearly a "what if" where the preconditions did not come to pass, so are not of importance. But it's why I had and have the views I do.

    187:

    when May discovers she's not permitted to leave without a deal (by the UK parliament)

    I must have missed something. I thought that unless there is an extension granted by the EU (all 27 of them) the UK is out on March 29 no matter what the current Parliament wishes. Yes/No?

    I have a bit of a personal interest in all of this. I have a week booked at a nice hotel in London in mid June. It would be nice to know how much fun it will be to get there then.

    188:

    Some of that group (or their family/friends), faced with an imminent and avoidable demise, may consider the old WWII slogan. (Not "Keep Calm and Carry On", but "You can always take one with you".)

    That's what the lamp posts are for. (Make sure you stock up on rope before they stop importing it.)

    189:

    Re: 'Here in Canada, similarly, controversy over the ratification of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the early 1980s has been a consistent issue for Québec.'

    From Canadian media & family discussion --- Alberta is currently far likelier than Quebec to opt out of Confederation. Reason: oil production. Canada esp. with Trudeau has been leaning toward more environmental protections and less handing out gov't incentives to corporations to underwrite corporate undertakings. Alberta ever since its oil sands production ramped up has been a 'have' province. They were so sure that their oil could carry their provincial economy that they didn't bother to collect enough income taxes and ridiculed provinces with higher tax brackets (all of the rest of Canada). This low-tax worked for decades until OPEC dropped production, climate change became a real political issue, and to a lesser extent, the realization that the 'jobs' left at the tar sands are a helluva lot fewer than when the project was being built. (Seems there's some 'confusion' about how many people actually work there, their pay, etc.) Now that the cash cow has been running dry, and the Liberals are running Ottawa (Albertans hate Liberals - it's tradition!), right wing Albertans are putting up signs that Alberta should exit Canada.

    But, it's a great place to ski!

    190:

    Re: Alberta's oil hand-outs

    Here's the official prov gov't campaign to promote/attract oil companies to Alberta.

    https://www.alberta.ca/royalty-investment-job-creation.aspx

    Personally, I think it's sooo stoooopid to keep putting increasing numbers of eggs (jobs/% of your workforce/economy) into one basket - and a tipsy-by-outside-forces basket at that. But, hey! - I'm not a pol.

    191:

    And that has got to be the filthiest way to get oil in use currently. Dig up vast (really vast) stretches of sand with some oil mixed in it. Boil it to get the oil out. Dump the left over sand and water (and LOTS of it) back on the ground. Lather, rinse, repeat.

    Pictures of the area are incredibly dismal.

    192:

    Alberta politics is driven by oil, which captured the government a few generations ago.

    Not to mention a resentment-shading-to-hate of "the East" (ie. the rest of Canada) and a desire to get their own back.

    193:

    As a Scot, and someone who pretty much needs IC engine transport (live on island a ways from anywhere, so need either an aeroplane, or some combination of ferry and road vehicle or train (and lines from ferry ports are not electrified) to get anywhere I might be expected to take a "we need oil" stance.

    There's more to it though; if you want plastics, oil cooled and/or insulated electrics, or even lubricants you pretty much need at least some oil.

    194:

    Tusk just said no (short) extension unless May agreement approved by parliament.

    That leaves only four scenarios:

  • Cancel Article 50.

  • Approve Mays deal, optional short extension (what for? The deal is approved...)

  • Use second referendum to ask EU for long extension.

  • No-deal on march 29th

  • My probabilities: 0.05/0.25/0.1/0.6

    195:

    Well, Macron has stated he will veto the extension request so it does look like it's now down to crash out or revoke A50...

    196:

    "Meaningful vote" is a trace of a previous row.

    The original version of the EU Withdrawal Bill allowed the Government to ratify a Withdrawal Agreement without having to go back to the Commons.

    The Commons kicked up a fuss, and May brought an amendment that required the Commons to vote on a motion noting the Withdrawal Agreement - but would still allow the Government to ratify the agreement even if the Commons voted it down.

    This was promptly nicknamed the "meaningless vote" and there was then a battle to put in a "meaningful vote" which would not allow the Withdrawal Agreement to come into force without an affirmative vote in the Commons. So that's why it's called the "meaningful vote".

    197:

    Also, Berkow won't allow a vote on Mays deal without an extension, so it's catch22 unless you turn Parliment off and on again...

    198:

    As a general rule, ANY party with a monopoly on power is a disaster, no matter what their stated policy or purpose. They alway shut down feedback, and they always ignore vitally important matters.

    Current example: The way the Irish Border problem was basically ignored during the framing of the Brexit agreements. To assume malice is more than I think the evidence indicates. I think what it indicates is that they just wouldn't listen when people told them it was important. (As in: "We've got more important things to think about.")

    199:

    Re: Alberta - bye, bye tax advantage!

    FYI - the Frasier Institute* is a Tory/Libertarian think tank - several former Tory & Reform Pols on its board.

    https://www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/end-of-the-alberta-tax-advantage

    Overall, think that the UK is facing similar issues re: regional industrial, economic disparities.

    BTW, have no idea what the tax difference between various countries within the UK are, if any. Differences in taxation schemes play a big role in national cohesiveness/policy.

    200:

    Parliament can suspend their own rules if they want, so May just have to win two votes instead of one to send the same deal in front of the house again.

    201:

    Later reports on Macron's current position are ... more nuanced; here's a HuffPo story suggesting that he'd agree (probably grudgingly) to a long delay for a referendum or election, but not to let Parliament just thrash around more (which is the only thing that May's letter offers as a plan).

    https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/france-contemplates-refusing-brexit-delay-as-theresa-may-seeks-article-50-extension_uk_5c923cd0e4b0dbf58e468696

    How that squares with Tusk's more recent statement is anyone's guess. Up until recently, "long extension only with referendum or election" was pretty much a common line from the EU side; it's possible May had her chance at that with this letter, and has blown it.

    202:

    It squares fine, short and long extensions are very different beasts.

    203:

    I remain as unsure now as I was then that anything better than the GFA could have been produced.

    204:

    (PS: I don't think you mean it this way, but you really don't need to lecture me about death tolls in NI, it rankles, to say the least, when you're seeming to do so.)

    205:

    I apologise. It wasn't meant for you, because I know that you knew. It was meant for other readers, who might have not realised what actually happened.

    I am sure that something better could have been produced, but I agree that it would almost certainly have been blocked by someone - and the mandarins in Whitehall would have been (and possibly were) among the worst culprits there.

    206:

    Agreed.

    I need to go find something cheerful to think about for a bit. Between remembering NI's sad past and looking at the rather gloomy near future, the shine is coming off my usually sunny disposition!

    207:

    I don't think democracy is viable in large countries, because of the cost of getting elected. The candidates are always bought before they are elected.

    I'm for sortilege, i.e. selecting office holders by lottery. This does mean that power needs to be decentralized, but that would be a good idea anyway. I really think a lottery would have a hard time turning up worse candidates than the recent election have chosen. And at least it would be representative. You do need to take steps to prevent corruption. I suggest that retiring office holders be given a salary of twice the median income, and prohibited from taking emolument in any form from any other source. I'm not certain that one should be allowed to decline appointment.

    208:

    What is the capital of the Britain? What is your favorite color? What is the size of all your bank in total?

    ARRRGHGHGHGHHHHHHH!!!!!

    209:

    You don't need oil, though; you need mechanized transport.

    One of the things I find slightly cheering is that the US defense establishment may have got serious about non-carbon pumpable fuels. (Alkaline fuel cells and ammonia looks like the workable option. Certainly for ships and trains and it's been done with cars. Air travel is a nice-but-not-necessary in a post-Holocene world. Quite a lot of work has gone into direct hydrocarbon synthesis because the USN would like to have carriers that can make jet fuel. This isn't anything like as efficient as the ammonia cycle, so it'll likely stay relatively expensive and restricted in application.)

    Same with plastics; you need inputs, they don't have to be fossil carbon inputs. I suspect we're going to see a lot of lipid-extraction from sewage to make lubricants, by and by. And an electric-motor world needs far less POL supply than an ICE world.

    In the specific case of Alberta, the whole province is to the west of the 100th meridian of descriptive meteorology; it's going to go desert. (So is at least half of Saskatchewan; maybe right into Manitoba. Sask grows half Canada's food output. People do not pay enough attention to this point.)

    Some of Alberta is far enough north to keep getting rain, and I'd expect that the axis of utility is going to shift off the east-west watershed of the Saskatchewan River/the CP and CNR rail lines to a north-south one along the Mackenzie River (Slavey language: Deh-Cho IPA: [tèh tʃʰò], big river or Inuvialuktun: Kuukpak IPA: [kuːkpɑk], great river; French: fleuve (de) Mackenzie).

    The part that's going to get powerful dry (which does include Calgary and Edmonton and both Calgary and Edmonton are entirely dependent on river water for drinking water at this time....) is a good place for geothermal and they've got a bunch of skills and hardware there to do the drilling required. It would make sense to put in as much geothermal as can be arranged and then figure out what to do with the electrical power.

    BC is technically better for geothermal; BC is going to get hit with sea level rise, an eventual truly major earthquake, and has general tectonic stability problems which are bad for geothermal bore holes. Saskatchewan could do geothermal but is getting further from the hot spot in BC and you'd have to drill much deeper.

    210:

    Well. The clock ticks closer to midnight on a no-deal brexit. Tusk has made a short delay harder while not explicitly ruled-out longer, but May doesn't seem keen on a longer delay. On the bighter side (though still dark) given the likely need for Labour support to get anything passed, this might make a deal with required People's Vote to confirm it more likely, or even a second referendum (very unlikely though). Passing either would probably be enough to appease Tusk. I wonder if May would let anything along these lines come to a free vote though. Is it possible Tusk & the EU is now willing to let no-deal happen? I would have thought that unlikely a day ago.

    211:

    Would you mind very much if I copied your whole post, to post to a small mailing list of mine? Credit to your username, or "anon", or...?

    212:

    If I were May, I'd cancel article 50 and say a second referendum is required now that people really understand what the issues are.

    Given the huge unpopularity of any thus-far negotiated output, it should be a more specific binary choice: remain, or crash out. The EU isn't likely to put up with another long set of negotiations; from their point of view it probably seems there's no negotiated settlement acceptable to both Parliament and to all 27 members. So it's in or out.

    Or maybe the second referendum could be a three-part vote with a kicker? Use a preference-order ballot between these three:

    Choice 1: Remain.

    Choice 2: Crash out.

    Choice 3: Attempt to negotiate a new agreement, with a deadline: At 30 days before the article 50 deadline, there will be another referendum. If the UK and parliament have successfully negotiated something by that date, that referendum will be to remain, to crash out, or to accepted the negotiated deal. If there has not been a successful negotiation, the referendum will be to either remain or to crash out.

    Nah, I'm probably dreaming.

    213:

    Side note: As a US follower of Brexit news, I think this interests me so much because even the minute possibility of backing away from Brexit, or a very soft Brexit at least, is the equivalent of the US getting a do-over on Trump. I'm still not sure which is the worse, though Brexit seems a bigger existential threat to the UK, with fewer relative international knock-on effects.

    214:

    So long as they're actually strange women, not dull (ignorant and stupid), boring, and greedy.

    215:

    That's quite unfair. He was chosen as a warlord by the various kings, the so-called "sex scandal" was nothing more than a new, anti-sex and misogynist religion being used against him by malcontents, who then pushed his illegitimate son into rebellion.

    Now, could someone on that side of the Pond, perhaps, knock at the door that goes into Glastonbury Tor...?

    216:

    Based on the results from the time, and the comments I've seen over and over, I'd think that remain would win by at least 52% absolute, and possibly significantly higher.

    Democracy? I think we need to remember that it's almost impossible to separate economics from politics... so democratic socialism, with a side helping of maximum wealth for individuals and "artificial persons" (companies).

    I want tax laws to make millionaires out of billionaires....

    217:

    Perhaps you could write a letter to your (Scots) queen, recommending this? Perhaps get co-signers? Or maybe an op-ed, along with the letter?

    I'd sign, if I were a citizen there, unless you wanted me to sign as "friend of the UK".

    218:

    Thank you, including the accent on your first name.

    Yes, I do ask folks I've just met how their name should be pronounced, if I've a question.

    The Arabic pronunciation - I don't know any Arabic, so I had no clue.

    219:

    I have the distinct impression that Theresa May thinks the can win at Russian Roulette with only one round missing.

    As bad as the Trumpster fire is, I believe (hope, fingers and toes crossed) that the damage he's doing can be fixed in a decade—so long as he doesn't actually get re-elected. That's speaking of politics, as for social aspects, that'll take longer.

    Brexit on the other hand, if it happens, looks like it'll take at least a generation to heal the wounds. Once the Baby Boomers have died out enough to no longer be a political force. Maybe.

    Much sympathy to you all.

    220:

    Wouldn't Dublin be better than London? It sounds like London is going to lose all data protection regulations, and Dublin will keep theirs.

    221:

    I have the distinct impression that Theresa May thinks the can win at Russian Roulette with only one round missing.

    Possibly worse than that: It's not a revolver, it's a pistol, and there's already bullet in the chamber.

    222:

    As bad as the Trumpster fire is

    As speaking of incompetence.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/the-real-reason-president-trump-is-constantly-losing-in-court/2019/03/19/f5ffb056-33a8-11e9-af5b-b51b7ff322e9_story.html

    I've said to others that if his admin would pay attention to the "rules" their wreaking ball would be hitting a lot more targets.

    223:

    Plastics have been made from many things, e.g. waste corn stalks, sawdust, etc. Oil refinery residues are just the cheapest current source.

    It's too bad that all renewable sources of liquid burnables tend to be low in energy density, but that's really predictable, as the high energy ones take a lot more energy to make. It should be possible to polymerize methyl- and ethyl- compounds, but that's going to take input of research and input of energy. And it may not be possible to do it cheaply. OTOH, batteries have gotten good enough that there have been electric airplanes recently. (I think they were just demonstration models, though.)

    224:

    "I believe (hope, fingers and toes crossed) that the damage he's doing can be fixed in a decade—so long as he doesn't actually get re-elected."

    The problem is Trump is just a symptom of the modern republican party. And with the poor governance structure of the US (aka the Senate) its sadly probable that the republican party retains enough power to keep the billionaires looting.

    225:

    I suggest that retiring office holders be given a salary of twice the median income, and prohibited from taking emolument in any form from any other source. I'm not certain that one should be allowed to decline appointment.

    Nice try, no cigar.

    I earn more than double the median UK income (hint: middle-aged, earning for two). Indeed, that median income is so low (about £27,000) that you can't easily afford to live in London on it, other than in a precarious HMO situation (room in shared house) or raise a family on double it outside London.

    If you tried to draft me on those terms—which would mean taking a significant drop in income and being forbidden from practicing my calling, i.e. writing—I'd probably refuse to serve, or actively sabotage the process. I'm pretty sure you'd get that reaction from a lot of high ability/high earning office holders.

    You might get a better result if income was either current income, index linked, or double the median, with an equal-sized annual pension thereafter (i.e. never work again for life), for those folks who can't take 5 years out from their profession without falling off the planet. (Hint: surgeons, software engineers … or novelists. Who lose traction rapidly if they take a career break.)

    But then you also run into the happy fun problem that the average member of the public is utterly unsuitable to hold office, and probably suffers from Dunning Kruger syndrome on top. (I know I'd make a terrible politician—I'm probably somewhere on the ASD spectrum—so I don't even try. What about the idiots who voted for Brexit because they hate the Eurovision song contest? Or who want to bring back hanging and flogging?)

    It's the job of an educated and effective politician to lead public opinion, not reflect it slavishly, let alone trail it (by getting their policies from Twitter or the Daily Mail.)

    226:

    On Brexit... well i guess. Maybe May wins? Gets labor to vote for the deal?

    227:

    The judges and auditors in EU have a very generous pension, well north of 100K€, in order to make it a lot harder to bribe them.

    Once we get into that level of compensation, scaling is an issue.

    228:

    Not gonna happen.

    (It'd require a radical and controversial action on the part of a very rich, very conservative, 92 year old woman who has been aware, for the past 60-plus years, that her historic legacy can blow up in her face if she makes one wrong move.)

    229:

    Once we get into that level of compensation, scaling is an issue.

    Agreed. But as polities with term limits learned, the learning curve is a problem: so you'd ideally want to draft legislators for at least a decade (the first few years amounting to an accelerated degree in civics and constitutional law, followed by a period of practice, then a mentoring cool-down as they pass knowledge on to their successors).

    Also, implicit in this suggestion is that it breaks the local representation provided (in theory) by the FPTP/constituency system; people are selected at random on a population basis, i.e. nationally. So you can decouple the number of electors from the size of the legislator and radically downsize the legislative chamber from the House of Commons (currently 650 MPs).

    But it's still problematic.

    230:

    Interesting. You have a slightly higher income than I do, and I regard myself as well off - of course, my wife has a (much smaller) income, too.

    The competence and Dunning-Kruger problems can be largely dealt with (as in Heinlein and others), but the personality ones are harder. As someone way out on the Asperger's scale, I could be the sort of political appointee who is told by the (Prime) Minister "We have this problem - work out how to solve it, write it up and come back", possibly even "Now go on and deliver on that", but NO WAY can I persuade people. Indeed, I make the joke I have negative charisma, and can actually point to evidence of that :-)

    However, we positively do NOT want people with what I call Blair's syndrome - the mindset that starts with a decision, fits mere facts around it, and convinces itself of those invented facts (and the falseness of any conflicting ones), irrespective of how much hard evidence there is to the contrary. And, unfortunately, our so-called representative democracy favours such people :-(

    231:

    Blair's syndrome

    Over here we name it Donald.

    232:

    It's too bad it's edging towards spring in the UK.

    Picking up an earlier thought, I'd love to anonymously start an internet rumor that the next PM would be whoever found a sword in a natural UK pond without SCUBA before March 29, fished it out and presented it to the Queen.

    Of course this would predictably result in a run on underwater metal detectors, especially by a certain segment of UKIP, and it would predictably annoy all the rescue divers who'd be fishing out the hypothermic drowning victims for the next week. However, properly done (e.g. with Merlin-level magic), it would paralyze the wingnuts for a week while they were off searching for the Grail Sword, and everyone else could try their hand at solving the mess.

    Anyway, hope this cheered you up for a couple of seconds.

    233:

    What's needed, instead of an upper house and a lower house (by whatever names) is a House of Charismatic People and a House of Fact-Based people.

    234:

    Supposing the EU vetoes an extension, and supposing Parliament continues to faff around not doing anything much;

    given that they have voted against a no-deal exit, does that require May to wait until the last few seconds of March 28th, announce the withdrawal of Article 50, and presumably resign in disgust?

    If not, what am I missing?

    235:

    You are missing the fact that May would triumphantly celebrate the no-deal brexit and not even contemplate cancelling the article 50 notice ?

    Listen to what she says all the time: The most important objective in her mind is to deliver the brexit, doesn't matter how, doesn't matter what it cost, doesn't matter that it kills people, "brexit means brexit" and that is it.

    236:

    Then what did the vote against a no-deal Brexit mean?

    237:

    As pretty much everybody involved have been saying all the time: It meant nothing.

    No-Deal brexit is the default.

    To avoid no-deal a deal must be approved.

    Only deal on offer is the one UK's PM has negotiated with EU over the last two years.

    238:

    It occurs to me that future historians are likely to write about this under the heading "Tragedy of the (house of) Commons"

    239:

    Or maybe they'll write about it only as the last footnote of "The History of the Decline and Fall of the British Empire".

    240:

    Well, since we're past 200, a very minor derail:

    I'm currently reading Brooke Harrington's Capital without Borders, which is a sociological study of the wealth management field. Prof Harrington did it the hard way, by going through the training to get herself certified as a Trust and Estate Planner. While she was open about also doing the sociological study, her willingness to totally embed in the field gave her access she wouldn't have had otherwise.

    With that background, the wealth managers are the knights of the new plutocracy, tasked with setting up offshore tax havens and similar to protect the wealth of people worth more than $30 million. They ethics verge on the aristocratic and feudal, as their main task is defending the property of their lords, which property happens to be extremely fungible, rather than a castle with associated manorial estates and serfs.

    The context in regards to Brexit is the following statement from the book:

    "Still others have observed that many of the microstates that have become leading global centers of wealth management activity are a “feudal remnant,” their territories and sovereignty created from duchies and principalities predating the Westphalian political order by centuries. These include the Channel Islands of Jersey and Guernsey—the last sovereign fragments of the Duchy of Normandy, once held by William the Conqueror—along with Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, and Malta, among others.7 The most important of these feudal holdovers is undoubtedly the City of London, the self-governing square mile enclosed by but distinct from London, the national capital. An estimated $1.1 trillion in personal wealth originating outside the United Kingdom—11 percent of the private offshore finance business worldwide—passes through the 1,000-year-old City, making it literally “a medieval commune representing capital.”

    So, if we're slicing and dicing the UK post-Brexit, why does everyone want the City of London to be allied with them on the outside of whatever goes Brexiting off from the EU? Isn't that the center of power for some of the people who are funding this whole miserable thing and stand to profit by it? To me, that seems rather like the chickens carefully building the chicken pen to include the fox den inside the coop.

    241:

    No. But that's one of the reasons I think perhaps people should be allowed to decline. But then the rich and successful wouldn't get a voice in the government. Good? Bad? I'm uncertain.

    The trouble is, people with income from other sources are biased in favor of those other sources. And the retirement package needs to be tied to the median income to give the rule makers an investment in the "common herd". Perhaps you could argue in favor of three times the median, or an average of the median income (for the area they legislated/executived over) and their current income. But I'm dubious. It might be better to just let people decline.

    242:

    The current crop of politicians is what made me start thinking sortilege would be an improvement. I agree that the current systems would need lots of alterations, as I said, centralized power would need to be dispersed...but as I also said, that needs to happen anyway.

    That said, it's true that there are an extremely large percentage of the people who would be unsuitable. Unfortunately, that seems to include those who are able to get elected. If it were done by sortilege, at least the dingbats chosen wouldn't agree with (and reinforce) each other.

    243:

    On the one hand, the United Kingdom is an island, and given the existence of desal tech, there is no excuse for it to ever run short of potable water, on the other hand, this does presume you actually solve problems that can be solved by building infrastructure by building infrastructure, and.. Well, look at the UK grid.

    Step one: Privatize, leading to zero investment in anything other than gas turbines and some guaranteed-profit wind turbines, as the private sector pays out all excess cash flow in dividends.

    Step two: Notice the entire foundation of the Grid is about to go out of service due to extreme age. Oops.

    Step three: Hand over the entire mess to EDF, and sign terms with said quasi-government entity which are about as extortionate as you would expect from negotiators with their back up against the wall and only one bidder. But at least this means the French will build some generation capacity which will probably keep the power on for the next century or so, right?

    Step four: Leave the EU.

    So, what I am saying is, I am not sure the Tories will build desal, even if the water is running out...

    244:

    No problem, go ahead.

    FWIW, having sobered up I'm not actually super happy with my comment anymore and I probably sorta regret having posted it. The first half isn't telling anyone in this thread anything new and the second half is simplifying too much and too little at the same time.

    (Austrian nationalists and Brexit, for example: The short version is that the Freedom Party knows there is no alternative to the EU but occasionally hints at wanting to leave because it's cheap extra turnout. Just like Cameron used to be, they're positive they'll never be in a position to have to deliver. No plausible Brexit outcome is going to affect their strategic outlook very much, so they only care about short-term tactical effects.

    The long version is twenty thousand words and talks about 19th century German unification, Habsburg discrimination against Protestants, 1920s Austrian police brutality, the Sudeten question, British diplomacy in the lead-up to the Anschluss, British spies in 1950s Vienna, and the Nazi dogwhistles of the Haider era.

    Anything in between is just muddying the waters without adding much of value.)

    Credit to my username or "anon" or Random Inebriated Mediterranean or whatever suits you.

    245:

    The post-sit-in-office salary should be a percentage of the salary - maybe 2/3rds. And an absolute ban on taking money from any company or industry they regulated while in office.

    A non-compete with teeth and claws.

    246:

    God help us, YES! I have just listened to the inanities. Corbyn was a complete arsehole (yes, Greg, I agree there) - but, compared to May, he looked like a statesman!

    If we ignore the platitudes and summary of the situation, her speech (as many people said) blamed the MPs for her failure, but what flabbergasted me was that she said that she would bring her deal back to the HoC, and otherwise said absolutely NOTHING about what she would do! Please, Your Majesty, ennoble Leo Varadkar (as I believe is still possible) or virtually ANYONE who is even half-sane, and make him your prime minister!

    247:

    JPR @ 219 Excuse me ... I'm a baby boomer. I neraly voted leave, realised th trap at the last moment & am now very angry with the leavers for so-nearly conniong me. SOME of us want "remain" ( quite a lot, actually) it is NOT an "age" thing ...

    Charlie @ 225 Which is why I've been called a "fascist" in the past - becaue I believe in competence & education & Dunnink-Kruger

    Heteromeles EXCEPT that "The City" & "The Corporation" ar horribly c=scared by a no-deal brexit & all thero power & influence has bee symied by "We don't need or want experts" - the rallying call of brexiteers & trunmpskins everywhere ...

    EC @ 246 Ah yes Loeo Vardkar for PM! A brilliant idea & do you know - I think yoo've got my vote!

    248:

    I took it to be an indication she has advance word about the EU Council, the wheels are about to come off entirely, the Council is going to blame Parliament, and she wanted to get the first shot in.

    249:

    The current crop of politicians is what made me start thinking sortilege would be an improvement.... That said, it's true that there are an extremely large percentage of the people who would be unsuitable.

    I am much less convinced of the latter than other people here are.

    In practice when the experiment has been performed people have overwhelmingly taken their responsibilities seriously. This is obvious when jury deliberations are made public, and remember that the weird shit you occasionally read about is exactly that: remarkable, unusual and weird.

    For a lot selected government to work I think you would need to outsource a lot of the bureaucracy and technocracy. A lot of what parliaments do is boring, monotonous and essential. It also only rises to parliamentary levels of importance as policy rather than detail, despite the way politicians love to pervert whatever policy they make to their own benefit. That's where we may struggle in the "who makes the rules sortitioned members operate under", and likewise with appointing top bureaucrats.

    On that, though, there is good evidence that whatever systems we use now do it badly so it may be something where a jury does better simply by not making the same stupid mistakes as shareholders and ministers make. This paper has recently done the rounds although the research is more interesting than the headlines suggest.

    250:

    whitroth @ 62: I don't refer to them as alt-right, either. It's either neoNazis, or, as I came up with, all-wrong.

    Fascist Assholes is accurate and succinct.

    251:

    whitroth @ 64: TV shows? There is an answer to the magical invisible overlord. He's been known to wear a red-lined coat, or a long, long scarf, and I *wish* he'd get here to help.

    I thought "he" was currently "she"?

    252:

    There's one party already in Westminster with a disciplined team who have a clear focus and know exactly what they want and how to fix Brexit.

    While I like the idea and agree with the sentiment, I think it plays against the whole "taking back control" narrative to the extent that The Herd might end up being your band of choice. They're ours

    253:

    Ideally it'd be a label they're willing to accept or at the very least can be printed in the media. Fucking neonazi scum fits that, although perhaps not for the outlets that are forced to be more politically correct. But those outlets find it hard to criticise the wee petals of the all-wrong without getting into trouble, regardless of their terminology (I refer to the ABC, BBC, CBC and other 'explicitly neutral' outlets who are supervised by politicians, to be clear (and yes, that's the ABC of BC's)).

    254:

    vincent.archer @ 66:

    have a question: would a fresh Brexit referendum that reverses Brexit stick?

    The biggest question is: what effect would it have. I know a handful of legal scholars have argued that the UK can reverse its Brexit, but that's an opinion that is based on empty words.

    The treaty (and article 50) is what is binding. There are no mechanism in it to cancel an invocation of Article 50. Once invoked, the only outcome described in the article is exit from the EU, optionally with an extension of the negotiations, and optionally FOLLOWED by the leaver rejoining the EU as a new member. Everything in Article 50 except a no-deal Exit requires a full unanimous vote of the 27.

    So based on that, it's expected that any reversing of Brexit would be subject to a vote at the EU level... and that starts all the political negotiations based on that. Because if the UK wants to remain, it will have to provide a deal to do so. If Romania wants concessions from the UK in exchange for not voting No, they can. And, obviously, they will, unless major EU powers (countries whose name start with FR or GE) push against every other EU member to keep them in line. I think Hungary, at least, would certainly wring every concession they can from the rest to provide their vote, given that, at the moment, EU wants to punish them for being christian white nationalists.

    I'm pretty sure there was a recent news article to the effect that the EU's highest court ruled that until Brexit actually went through, the UK could revoke Article 50 if they wanted to.

    256:

    On the subject of May's announcement, here's what I tweeted (while at a restaurant with only a smartphone, so no blog comment at the time):

    “ … the people
    Had forfeited the confidence of the government
    And could win it back only
    By redoubled efforts. Would it not be easier
    In that case for the government
    To dissolve the people
    And elect another?“

    Brecht channeling May on Brexit: nothing is new under the sun.

    257:

    "But then you also run into the happy fun problem that the average member of the public is utterly unsuitable to hold office, and probably suffers from Dunning Kruger syndrome on top. (I know I'd make a terrible politician—I'm probably somewhere on the ASD spectrum—so I don't even try. What about the idiots who voted for Brexit because they hate the Eurovision song contest? Or who want to bring back hanging and flogging?)"

    YES !!!

    A small tale to confirm the idea: before 1981, in France, well-meaning leftist were criticizing criminal jury composition (at the time drawn by lot from lists prepared by mayors), as "class warfare juries loaded with bourgeois reactionaries", because juries effectivelly tended to be loaded with "notables".

    So, when they won, they changed the composition, removing the mayor filter, giving us "popular juries".

    To their great horror, these egalitarian popular juries were much more likely to push for harsh sentencing. Because educated "notables" are much more likely to be swayed by the arguments of a defense lawyer about difficult upbringing and so on, than the average everyman, who generally would have loved to sentence everyone to death (luckily, the socialist also suppressed the death penalty in the same timeframe, narrowly escaping greater shame).

    Beware of what you ask for. You may get it.

    258:

    In the case of juries, the reason they are as effective as they are is in large part because of the constraints imposed by the judge, on top of limits in subject matter and the nature of the question.

    259:

    Its been obvious for some time that Brexit will be soft, strong and very very long.

    260:

    It might be easier to find a small country somewhere that would be willing to swap, say, 100 anti-EU MPs for a number of their citizens. Maybe make the deal more attractive by making an appropriate number MPs when they arrive?

    Think of it as a form of sortition :)

    I'd suggest some of the sinking pacific island nations but I don't want your toxic waste in my ocean. Although, thinking about the likely eventual destination of the people concerned, Hunga Tonga could perhaps be spilt off as an independent nation and that would give those concerned time to acclimatise?

    261:

    I want tax laws to make millionaires out of billionaires.... Likewise. It's depressing how the GINI coefficient for the US has been steadily increasing since the Reagan cuts in the top tax rates. (via) This is a bit US-centric; I'd like to see a substantial progressive tax on money used for "political speech", with a large standard exemption, but it would almost certainly be ruled unconstitutional. (And would be interesting to enforce, and workarounds would also often be ugly.) The opaque monies that were spent on Leave are pretty disturbing.

    262:

    You're going to have to explain that; last I knew they have just as bad a claim to the Scottish throne as to the English, since the coup in the late 17th century that installed the William of Orange and then Hanoverians.

    263:

    Parliament also has limits, and not all governments are good at navigating those. Mind you, rather than pointing at Trump we could perhaps reflect that the UK isn't doing so well at recognising the limits of its ability to make laws, or the limits of those laws they do pass. The "no hard brexit" instruction from parliament, seems likely to be as effective as the famous "no high tide" ruling that they're probably ignoring because it happened in... {spit} ... Europe.

    Those examples perhaps show that the problem is not "random people off the street sometimes make bad decisions" as "people sometimes make bad decisions". Saying "well then, we just won't have people involved in government" isn't a great answer.

    That was also why my post emphasised the need to support and constrain citizens juries.

    264:

    Picking up an earlier thought, I'd love to anonymously start an internet rumor that the next PM would be whoever found a sword in a natural UK pond without SCUBA before March 29, fished it out and presented it to the Queen. It's not hard to start/spread internet rumors (not a habit for me FWIW), but this one is now dead, sadly. :-)

    265:

    Random trivia question: Thomas Erskine May & Theresa May - related?

    266:

    It's an interesting idea.

    I've always suspected all three countries would be run much more competently if the Norvegians elected a parliament for Sweden, Sweden elected one for Denmark, and Denmark elected on for Norway.

    I similarly wonder if not both France and UK would be run better, if they elected each others politicians.

    267:

    "It is not to be underestimated that certain EU leaders and MPs are very interested to make Brexit as hard as possible on the UK, whatever then "solution" is."

    Note that the EU has in fact been quite willing to negotiate a reasonable deal with the UK.

    The first problem is that the UK has been sold Brexit as a sparkling unicorn, when at best is would be a healthy donkey.

    The second problem is that the EU is not rolling over, and not compromising core principles.

    The third problem is that enough of the UK leadership wants to break the system.

    The fourth problem is that the leadership of the UK can't handle that faction.

    The fifth and final problem is that (as Graydon said), the UK is in a constitutional crisis, in the sense that the normal decision-making process has broken down.

    268:

    "I'm pretty sure there was a recent news article to the effect that the EU's highest court ruled that until Brexit actually went through, the UK could revoke Article 50 if they wanted to."

    Yes. That was sorted out pretty early on - when the Lead Lady* had just jumped in and gone straight to firing off A50 without thought for what comes next, and more sensible people were frantically looking for possible escape routes and mitigations. There was a collective sigh of relief when it was established that yes, we can revoke it off our own bat without needing all 27 states to agree or indeed any of them. I'm not sure why some commenters are now trying to claim otherwise, when the relevant court has already decided that they're wrong.

    * That's "Lead" pronounced not as in "Führerin", but as in "Pb": dense and toxic.

    269:

    "Approve Mays deal, optional short extension (what for? The deal is approved...)"

    To get the needed laws in place. Right now, at the end of next week a massive body of law in both the UK and EU becomes moot, with nothing to replace it.

    And it's not just laws on the law books, but regulations written in the government, all the way down to what people on the ground must/must not do.

    270:

    "I have the distinct impression that Theresa May thinks the can win at Russian Roulette with only one round missing."

    This is the biggest issue to face UK politics since WWII, and that was simpler (if vaster and more horrible). This means that the entire political class in the UK is dealing with a problem they've not been trained or prepared for.

    271:

    What EU laws become moot? As far as I understand it, all EU laws remain in force in the EU and the EU needs to do nothing.

    In the UK, the fact that the legal system is going to be messed up is one of the lesser problems they will be facing.

    At the moment, I'd give about a 60% chance of a no deal Brexit, 15% that May's deal is adopted and 25% that the Article 50 notice is revoked.

    272:

    all the way down to what people on the ground must/must not do.

    Yeah. What are the soon-to-exist customs inspectors and border guards and such being told to do and not do?

    273:

    For some reason I'm reminded of Scandinavia and the World comic. Just in general, but also in the way they tease each other in the comic. And pick on Finland.

    274:

    "Listen to what she says all the time: The most important objective in her mind is to deliver the brexit, doesn't matter how, doesn't matter what it cost, doesn't matter that it kills people, "brexit means brexit" and that is it."

    From what understand (from over on the other side of the Pond), the Tory party is held hostage by the Brexiteers. If they come to believe that May won't deliver, she's gone.

    And depending on the electoral breakdown of their constituencies, they might be able to (indiviudally) politically survive the Tories losing power. That gives them the option of toppling May and her entourage, purging the party, and coming back into power in a few years with a Pure British Party.

    275:

    Yes - every account I've read by someone who's been stuck with jury service seems to go pretty much the same way: at least eight of the twelve are the kind of thick small-minded arseholes who think the defendant must automatically be a criminal because they look like one (ie. are in the dock, look dishevelled from being in custody, and have those guards standing behind them - if they weren't guilty they wouldn't need the guards, stands to reason, etc.), and think the law is what they think it should be rather than what it is. The situation is only saved by the one jury member who does have a brain and the desire to use it, the one jury member who disagrees with the rest because they always reflexively disagree with everything, and the judge and other court officials. Trial by jury is really a pretty terrifying prospect.

    276:

    OK. I'll play:

    brexit depends upon

    a red spy colonel

    practising judo

    against the white people.

    277:

    What are the soon-to-exist customs inspectors and border guards and such being told to do and not do?

    At this stage formal preparations focus on Article 50 being revoked. So trivia like tens of thousands of new government staff to police the borders are still down the list next to "meteor wipes out Cornwall" and "volcano erupts in Essex". The preparations to date focus on making sure the ruling class are not unduly inconvenienced - a few more police, some army stockpiling, even a ferry or two should they need to evacuate.

    It's hard to conclude otherwise when nothing much is being done for a monumental transition. Needing 10,000 new customs officials is the least of it. You're going to need a phenomenally focused and productive parliament to create all the new legislation, then amend that legislation as the situation changes. Everyone affected will need to be run a new "Législation Du Jour" app... Sorry, post Brexit that will be "Today's Laws".

    Not kidding, a huge volume of UK law basically says "refer to EU law {reference}" and a lot of that will become irrelevant on the date of Brexit. While I imagine that at least some of it is ready to go, there's been no sign of the amount of consideration and preparation your parliament would normally provide for such substantive legislation. So it may well be a case of "pass this 10 reams of legislation right now by voice vote or we are all fucked"... and would you trust the current government that all of that text will be fair, reasonable and responsible? Me neither.

    The problem of telling people what the new laws are and getting them enforced is a different level of excitement. Because down in the doobly-doo you're not running the tax or criminal systems on "yeah let's just keep doing what seems right", it's very much "according to S4.23.II.4.c of the Very Longwinded Act Bringing Together 200 Years of Judicial Rulings on the Tax Exempt Status of Sundry Items and Services(2002) this plate of baked beans on toast wot I have purchased can be claimed against the earnings of my rental cottage in Dublin".

    Less seriously, I do wonder whether you're going to be allowed to continue using that filthy French Système Internationale d’Unités :)

    278:

    We're all screwed, aren't we?

    279:

    If they come to believe that May won't deliver, she's gone.

    The Tories have a (fairly recent?) rule that says they can only have one no-confidence motion in the leader a year, and they had theirs. They lost. So now they have to either persuade her to resign or wait for her to die.

    This is why there's excitement about her "I'll resign if this goes on past the end of June", because it means she might actually resign. Then the circular firing squad inside the Tory party can resume until one again a lone survivor is pushed up to the parapet to announce "I am your leader".

    280:

    Re: Fungible

    Says it all - portable with absolutely nothing to tie you down to any gov't, territory, culture, etc. Zero loyalty, zero risk.

    What I'd be watching for with BrExit is any change in the uptick/conversion among the moneyed to an even more fungible form, something that's even less traceable/trackable by police/gov't, e.g., BitCoin. For the old fashioned, there's always art. (Too bad there's a pushy historical society that oversees/inventories major art works - public and private.)

    281:

    Hmm. This petition has hit 283,000 signatures within a few hours.

    https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/241584

    282:

    "I thought "he" was currently "she"?"

    Nope...

    Long, long scarf is the last appearance before things break down; the last point at which whitroth's proposed solution remained a possibility.

    Fencepost uncertainties led to a conditional fifth appearance, known as the Vet, who existed in a state of superposition - he may have been elsewhere in the universe with a crew of bickering and treacherous dicks, but he may also just have been somewhere in Yorkshire with his arm up a cow's arse. It's hard to tell.

    BBC BASIC infinite-loop one-liners using the RND, GCOL and PLOT 8[0-7] commands, and everything subsequent, are simply artefacts of a dysfunctional universe. So are pages on the internet which argue to the contrary. You, and they, are being confused by The Great 1979ish Reality Disaster (of which other consequences include Thatcher, and the breakup of Pink Floyd.)

    283:

    think the law is what they think it should be rather than what it is

    One thing that made me really angry was the harsh restrictions on information the jury is permitted to have. Everything from the law under consideration to the actual evidence is by default not allowed in the jury room and to get it someone has to beg the judge. There are many opportunities for negative social feedback from both the criminal system people and the other jurors.

    I think we need to extend the medical research paradigm into our criminal system(s). Study the way the system works and try to move towards a system that reliably produces justice. What we have now is a "Justice System" in the same sense that the "People's Democratic Republic of Korea" is a democracy.

    284:

    A lot of British EU regulations about bendy cucumbers and such are covered by Statutory Instruments which are a crude form of end-run around Parliament by the Government, basically delegated powers used by various Ministries to set tariffs, limit operations, regulate stuff and do all the sorts of things the "unelected bureaucrats in Brussels" are supposed to be inflicting upon us. They can be changed, revoked or converted into British law as needed but even though Parliament doesn't really have to lay hands on them there's still a lot of work by the Ministers involved. You hay have noticed the turnover in Ministers recently? That's why, if the report I saw was correct, there are still approximately 600 Statutory Instruments are still waiting suitable revocation, reworking or fine-tuning so that when we Leave the things they concern will work well enough we don't starve to death in the dark. Much.

    285:

    Not kidding, a huge volume of UK law basically says "refer to EU law {reference}" and a lot of that will become irrelevant on the date of Brexit.

    Serious question -- why does that have to change on day one? It's a pointer to some text. That text was suitable on March 29; why is it not suitable on March 30? In the US state where I was on the legislative staff, there were lots of statutory references to outside text. Sometimes standards set by engineering organizations. Sometimes federal statute or regulation. Part of the staff's job -- not mine, thank the Elder Gods -- was keeping track of when that outside text changed and bringing the issue to the attention of our legislature as to whether they should accept the change, or write their own text. Why can't Parliament pass a law that says "As of March 30, excluding sh*t like treaties, we continue to follow EU statute and regulation until such time as Parliament changes them"?

    286:

    ‘a huge volume of UK law basically says "refer to EU law {reference}" and a lot of that will become irrelevant on the date of Brexit.’ Does it necessarily become irrelevant? Or could it become "refer to EU law {reference} until Parliament gets around to replacing it?” Of course being ruled by the laws of a political entity you have no voice in is the opposite of regaining your sovereignty - oh well.

    287:

    whitroth @ 216: I want tax laws to make millionaires out of billionaires....

    I'm leaning more and more toward making Soylent Green out of 'em.

    288:

    JamesPadraicR @ 219: As bad as the Trumpster fire is, I believe (hope, fingers and toes crossed) that the damage he's doing can be fixed in a decade—so long as he doesn't actually get re-elected. That's speaking of politics, as for social aspects, that'll take longer.

    The real damage is the way Mitch McConnell has been packing the courts with friends of Adolf Federalist Society judges. And that won't be fixed for a generation.

    OTOH, maybe we could just have Mitch McConnell & his ilk fixed.

    289:

    Petition is at 322,908 - each update seems to add another 10-20.

    290:

    dsrtao @ 236: Then what did the vote against a no-deal Brexit mean?

    Parliament has ordered the tide not to come in.

    291:

    Paul @ 259: Its been obvious for some time that Brexit will be soft, strong and very very long.

    ... and the toilet paper (bog roll) holder will be empty.

    292:

    On the other hand, nobody really wants to talk about this too loudly, but Her Majesty isn't going to be around that much longer. How much does she really have left to lose, given that it's all going to be someone else's problem anyway in a few years? Especially if the choice is between Britain becoming a republic and Britain violently buggering itself to death for no particularly sensible reason.

    293:

    Brexit + Devolution = Revenge of the Celts!

    If the UK breaks up (as many of you assume) as a result of Brexit then the Celtic parts (Ireland, Ulster, Scotland, Wales and Cornwall) can form a Celtic Union to replace most of the UK

    And thereby freeing themselves from the shackles of their Anglo Saxon/Norman/Germanic overlords who have lorded over them since the invaders arrived in the year 441 ("The British provinces, which to this time had suffered various defeats and misfortunes, are reduced to Saxon rule."); since Henry II ("The Lion in Winter") invaded Wales in 1187; since Ireland was first invaded by Richard "Strongbow" de Clare in 1170: and since Edward I Longshanks invaded Scotland in 1297.

    It will be time for the people of Brian Boru, William Wallace and Llywelyn the Great to reclaim their heritage.

    (Yes, as an Irish American I am kidding - sort of)

    294:

    The Royal Family is a PR firm which has converted an historically sovereign position into a lucrative gig conveying a specific cultural norm.

    This has historically worked because observing the ritual norms gives you social cohesion in your upper class and it keeps the "top of the heap" position safely away from achievable ambition. We know who is on top of the heap, you can't get there, and there's a system of apportioning status which is both complex enough to feel real and difficult enough to absorb ambition. (Think of the Queen as a combination of taste arbiter and swank referee.)

    It only works if they don't do any sovereignty. It only works if the cultural norm is fundamentally non-controversial.

    "Until the times do alter" is pretty much the worst circumstance imaginable to the royals. If there's any way for the Queen to think "maybe I should do a sovereignty", it would have to arise from the cultural norm. And there's a duly elected prime minister and a duly elected parliament and they're theoretically trying to do a democracy. The norm violation is too new for there to be any possibility of overt royal disfavour.

    295:

    (Ireland, Ulster, Scotland, Wales and Cornwall) can form

    The Celtic Union Northern Territories?

    There's all sorts of ways that could go wrong, but the name is one of them.

    296:

    I once lived in the town of Fontana, CA, which runs, so help me, the Fontana Unified School District - The Eff You SD.

    297:

    The associated map of whose voted where is really interesting, although I'm not sure that a deadline of 20 August 2019 really captures the in your face urgency of the issue.

    298:

    could it become "refer to EU law {reference} until Parliament gets around to replacing it?

    It all will/is, the problem being all the bits that say stuff like "covered by this EU regulation" or "from outside the Schengen zone" or other stuff that gets quite tricky when you're on the outside of the thing instead of inside. In theory they've had years to grind through every single bit of legislation and case law and correct it all, but I haven't see the new legislation passed to patch it up. I hope it's there and it's just too boring to make it into the media.

    Viz, if the EU reg is that all motor vehicles approved by an EU government are allowed to do X, then after Brexit British vehicles will not fall under that rule... so it might not be legal to drive a British vehcile on British roads, but legal to drive a French one :) Plus a lot of things will work steadily less well over time, and I expect that people will discover things that haven't been considered but are problematic. By people I mean criminals... well, people who would be criminals if the law meant now what it meant before.

    The situation with standards and other documents is mostly problematic when the law binds us to things we can't afford to find out about. It's all very well saying "but BAC.12345 is only $10", it's just that the reason it has a 5 digit serial is that there are 34,000 of them so knowing the law relating to BAC is going to cost you $340,000, and BAC is unlikely to be the only set of standards enshrined in law.

    I like the movement in the US to say "everyone is entitled to free access to the text of all laws" and enforce that. I suspect there will be push-back from standards bodies at some point (related: Bob help us if some smart person decides that filibustering via reading a copyrighted work would be funny).

    299:

    I've just realised what the March surprise is:

    "Control" is a small stuff animal

    The whole taking back control operation is because Boris lost his teddy bear.

    300:

    Charlie @ 256 That quote from Berthold Brecht, was from 1953. IIRC. After the workers uprising against the communist state (!) Even Brecht would have been sent to the Gulag for that, but he was allowed to get away with it, because he was dying.

    guthrie @ 262 WHAT "coup"? That was "The Glorious Revolution", because Mary had a legitimate claim to the throne - as did Anne .... Tough.

    Moz @ 277 APPARENTLY Most ports that are "$NOT_DOVER" already have customs inspectors, because "stuff" is coming in & going to non-EU destinations - even Felixstowe has about 50% non-EU traffic, so minimal adjustment will be needed in those places. I know of one railway TOC who is pre-preparing themselves for this, just in case, as there would be a large increase in rail traffic from those ports.

    The SI system is bound into many international treaties & both English & Scottish law. Which is fortunate as some of the ultra-bonkers-even-more-rabid-than usual exiteeers want to get rid of the International System, because "We don't understand their metric nonsense" Given that I started using the m-k-s sytem (as it was then called ) in 1960 or '61 ... WHAT THE FUCK?

    EC @ 281 SIGNED - thanks Now at HALF A MILLION. Please everyone - sign this & tell everybody

    301:

    I am mesmerised watching the numbers on this petition. Currently it’s climbing by over a thousand every minute. At the current rate it will top a million by lunch time today.

    302:

    Re the sudden absence of EU law and the need to fill that vacuum

    I'm concerned that the body of replacement law has already been drafted — undoubtedly with great attention to the demands of ERG / big donors / big media barons / redacteds / assorted other puppetmasters — and is ready to be thonked onto the table immediately post-29th. To be passed en bloc and with all dissent answered with something amounting to "oh, so you're a lawlessness-advocating anarchist, are you?"

    303:

    and would you trust the current government that all of that text will be fair, reasonable and responsible?

    And no typos?

    304:

    Why can't Parliament pass a law that says "As of March 30, excluding sh*t like treaties, we continue to follow EU statute and regulation until such time as Parliament changes them"?

    That would be a betrayal of Breixt. At least with the hard core. Current Tories in the UK parliament seem to be stuck dealing with them like the R's in the US House had to deal with the 20 or so hard core conservatives.

    To ignore them meant a coalition with the "other side" and that was just a bridge too far.

    305:

    And with no delegation of essential services to organisations unable to provide them? e.g. ferrying to companies without ferries, healthcare to firms without doctors or hospitals, fresh water to...

    306:

    Re the Revoke Article 50 petition (thank you EC @ 281), I think it's worth noting that

    "Only British citizens or UK residents have the right to sign" (on the page you reach after clicking "Sign this petition")

    would seem to indicate that not only citizens may sign, but residents can too. So Ms. Vector and I have been circulating the petition accordingly.

    307:

    And the parliamentary petitions site has gone dark. Brief “down for maintenance message”, and now just getting “Bad gateway 503”.

    Make of that what you will.

    308:

    Back up now (for me at least).

    309:

    Yep. Hats off to whoever was firefighting in the background, that can’t have been a fun half hour!

    Numbers climbing fast again.

    310:

    That is a malicious quarter-truth - do not be taken in by it. The claims of Great Britain's republicans (note: GB republicans are unrelated to NI ones) are about as truthful as those of the Brexiteers.

    The Queen (as her father before her) regards her primary duty being to serve her country and Commonwealth, and has worked harder at that over a longer period than any politician. Yes, there is a PR aspect, as there is an accumulated wealth one, but those are secondary. According to all reports, she is one of the best statesmen in Europe, and has given successive Prime Ministers invaluable advice - but that is useful only to those who listen.

    As OGH, you and others have said, she does nothing more than that, with the occasional call for national sanity when important, and I agree that she is unlikely to. But she might surprise us - and she might even judge the PR aspect right - I doubt it, because I don't think there is ANYTHING that can be done that won't piss off at least 30% of the UK.

    311:

    You should know better! Omitting King Mark, indeed!

    312:

    I am almost certain that it hasn't been - I don't think that you realise how deeply the lack of governance goes in Whitehall as well as Westminster. What HAS probably been drafted is the USA/UK trade, services etc. treaty - by the USA corporations - but I doubt that anyone in the UK government has seen it yet. The former's agents in the latter are being, er, whipped to support it in advance of knowing its contents, and have already started doing so.

    313:

    Re: 'Now at HALF A MILLION. Please everyone - sign this & tell everybody'

    You got your wish only the web site has crashed!

    https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-47652071

    Headline: 'Brexit: Revoke Article 50 petition crashes Parliament website'

    314:

    How about Arthur King of the Britons! (aka the Romano-Celts) who fought the invading Anglo-Saxons (and probably was a real person), and whose capital Camelot was located at Tintagel in Cornwall?

    You make think the "Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government" - but could it be worse than what you have now?

    (Cue other obligatory Monty Python and the Holy Grail jokes)

    315:

    When you think that Brexiters will suffer the most from the economic collapse caused by Brexit:

    https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2018/07/these-are-areas-will-suffer-most-economically-after-brexit

    and Trump supporters have suffered the most from his economic policies

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2018/05/15/daily-202-trump-supporters-suffer-unintended-consequences-of-his-policies/5afa0c8830fb0425887994fd/

    and Red States will suffer the most damage from climate change:

    https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/29/politics/climate-change-irony-brookings/index.html

    ...maybe there is a God, or at least Karma.

    316:

    Mark was definitely real, and so was his kingdom, though neither were quite in the form described in legends. Whether Arthur was real is debatable (he is probably a composite), but his kingdom definitely wasn't, and the Tintagel aspect was taken from the Kingdom of Cornwall/Dumnonia, though I am pretty sure it never was the capital.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Cornwall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_of_Cornwall http://www.englishmonarchs.co.uk/celts_12.html

    317:

    More important question:

    Does PM May have "huge ... tracts of land"?

    Must.. resist... further... Holy Grail... nerd... references...

    318:

    So it may well be a case of "pass this 10 reams of legislation right now by voice vote or we are all fucked"…

    You missed May granting herself Henry VIII Powers (to amend existing legislation by decree).

    I wish I was making this shit up. (Henry VIII was the nearest thing to a Stalin that England ever had …)

    319:

    That quote from Berthold Brecht, was from 1953. IIRC. After the workers uprising against the communist state (!)

    Just pointing out that Theresa May would have been totally at home in the upper ranks of the Stasi, personality-wise.

    320:

    She's the role-model for the Home Sec in, um, err ... "Annihilation Score" - isn't she?

    321:

    Yes. And subsequent books through "The Delirium Brief". (At the end she's briefly promoted to Prime Minister, but stands down rapidly … in favour of The Mandate. Who is currently looking like he'd be a distinct improvement over what we've got, except he's only a fictional eldritch horror from beyond spacetime, dammit.)

    322:

    With current anxiety levels, I'm actually struggling to do anything productive today.

    Fuck Brexit. And fuck those that hauled us to this precipice.

    323:

    Yep, Brexit has totally nuked my work productivity this week.

    I have a book I should be editing and I just. Can't. Focus.

    324:

    Hah. It's ruined mine for nearly three years now.

    325:

    A lot of the anti-Liberal feelings in Alberta stems from the National Energy Program, which many Albertans blame for a down turn in oil prices which in turn led to lay-offs which led to many Albertans losing their homes. It doesn't matter that oil prices are international and that the government program was strictly national. All that matters is that it was Trudeau's fault!

    The hatred runs so deep that I have seen normally rational people declare that everything wrong with this country can be blamed on the Trudeaus (father and son). When asked about problems that occurred before the elder was elected, they conceded that some of the problems could be attributed to Pearson. The level of hate is amazing.

    The local media (print, radio and tv) were all culpable in bringing about this about. Since these sources were all heavily influenced by money from oil companies and the oil companies were almost entirely foreign owned, it could be argued that foreign influences have been at work disrupting Canadian politics for decades. Then again I guess it could be argued that Canada only exists in it's present form due to foreign influences (GB).

    326:

    I've lately been fond of Richard Hutton's recounting of which specific waste-of-oxygen institutions and individuals pushed for Brexit, and why (as an accidental side effect of trying to wheedle a locally more-piratical business environment) -- although, in his zeal to name all of the relevant names, it's super-long. Were I a UK citizen, I'd be taking careful note of that villain taxonomy.

    327:

    If you think the amount of money you have quantifies your worth, and you really need to toss facts to keep doing what you see as your most reliable route to having as much money as you think you deserve, there's no telling where you'll end up.

    (the whole "middle class = sole asset, house" thing isn't helping either.)

    Hard political problem, though; the Prairies generally are going to get hammered as agriculture collapses and it's not like we're actively planning what to do or where to put people or how to feed them.

    328:

    The other fly in the ointment is the lack of suitable soils. The chernozemic soils in the Canadian prairies do not extend into the northern portion of the prairie provinces. Other than some small stretches of soil near Hudson Bay, there is not a lot of land suitable for agriculture without extensive modification. I suspect the same will be true of Russia (this is just personal supposition as I have never looked at any soil maps for Russia).

    You are correct about the desertification issues on the prairies. Palliser's Triangle is a thing and I imagine it could easily reach it's full extent. On one hand, when I worked for the Canadian Wheat Board, Canada used to export 80% (or was it 90%, my memory isn't what it was) of it's grain production and in theory we could get by producing a lot less grain but the loss of income would have a terrible effect on Canada's economy. The CWB, in it's heydays, would bring about $6,000,000,000.00 (net Canadian) into the Canadian economy every year which made it the largest conduit of foreign capital into the country.

    Nation's that import a large portion of their calories are going to be screwed. This includes the USA. Of course, they do have a huge military so I guess they will just roll the tanks north to prolong their death throes.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palliser%27s_Triangle

    329:

    On an unrelated note, I used to comment here under Maruad but I gave up my LJ account awhile back and my attempt at renaming my Yahoo account nickname seems to have not worked.

    330:

    If I'm reading this right (and even accounting that I'm on the ignorant side of the Atlantic that's an ever larger stretch,) there's a significant chance that not only will you folks crash out of the EU with no plan as to what comes after, you'll also have no laws and no functional government to make new ones. And maybe no Prime Minister.

    You folks are likely soooo screwed. Have you considered hanging the lot of them as a warning to others? Maybe you should...

    That whole "keep calm and carry on" thing may be your only hope.

    331:

    You know, I just popped up to post the weird idea that perhaps an underlying goal of Brexit is to turn the UK into the world's biggest offshore tax haven.

    After all, the City of London, the Isle of Man, various Channel Islands, and the British Virgin Islands are all well known offshore financial centers, and the UK was where the idea of a trust originated. Rather than hive them off, the idea may be to grow their models as big as possible, to swallow the UK in fact.

    This would make a certain amount of sense: Russians were involved, not just to destabilize NATO, but because they've been using BVI and City of London real estate as one of the main ways to shield their wealth from being appropriated back home. As have many others.

    While I doubt that the impoverishment of the masses and the building of giant manorial estates to house the skimmed-off wealth of the world appeals to most British, it may be hard to stop it after a No Deal.

    While you might not want to be a peasant right now, if you were guaranteed a small share of a farm, sufficient to feed your family, if you worked for a trust (owned by a Someone Not To Be Named) that proposed to buy your land in, say, Cheshire or Wales, would you say no? You've got to eat, and if you can't eat and own your land at the same time, what are you to do?

    If such a scheme exists, I suspect that they'd be perfectly happy if the "liberal thieves" who want to steal their profits through taxes and redistribute them to the "lazy poor" would all just bugger off to Scotland and leave them to enjoy the power and privilege that their "hard work" had brought them. They'd probably also be happier if those liberal Celts all just buggered back off to the EU, too. After all, being offshore means having some distance.

    Anyway, your daily dose of unreal-class-warfare-as-entertaining-speculation. Enjoy(?)

    332:

    That petition just crossed a million. Remarkable.

    (For scale, Office of National Statistics claim there were ~46,148,000 voters in the electoral registers as of Dec. 2017.)

    333:

    perhaps an underlying goal of Brexit is to turn the UK into the world's biggest offshore tax haven.

    Sadly not a new thought, and there is significant evidence that a lot of the big money donors to the Leave campaign have exactly this reason for encouraging Brexit lunacy.

    Personally I have often remarked in the last two years that the Leave slogan should have been: Brexit - Building the worlds largest tax haven, with added serfs.

    334:

    You know, I just popped up to post the weird idea that perhaps an underlying goal of Brexit is to turn the UK into the world's biggest offshore tax haven.

    There's nothing weird about it: it's a big part of the rationale for a hard brexit on the part of certain ERG members. Remember, the EU 5th directive on money laundering must be implemented in EU national laws by January 20th, 2020. One suspects certain hedge fund owners are totally not happy about that, and neither are some beneficial owners of rather opaque investment vehicles with substantial assets in London.

    335:

    Yeah, it's always sad when a bit of black humor fantasy fails when it turns out it might not be a fantasy.

    To fill the others in, the salient traits of a offshore financial center are given (per that fascinating little Brooke Harrington book I'm reading) as: "-politically stable government -stable economy -geographical and convenient accessibility so far as time zones are concerned (as this promotes administrative efficiency and also facilitates a closer customer working relationship) -a wide choice of reputable banks and other institutions -modern, reliable communications -a low-tax or tax-free environment -an appropriate official language (English?) -excellent support services, including a choice of quality legal and accounting firms -sensible and effective regulation and supervision -high ethical standards in government, the professions, and commerce -laws that are clear and fair, applied by a competent judiciary."

    The UK sort of qualifies, if the brisk broom of a post-Brexit new election and reworking the post EU laws results in what a billionaire might consider a "politically stable government" with "sensible and effective regulation."

    This all sounds pretty reasonable until you realize that the high ethical standards described here put things like loyalty to clients above things like the public good (cf climate change). The more I read of this thing, the more I think Trump is a fairly typical denizen for his world of high-flyers, and the only mistake he made was getting involved in politics, becoming over-exposed, and refusing to stop shooting his mouth off.

    336:

    I can't be bothered trying to chase a web link for the chart, but apparently the rate at which people signed that petition "took off" after Mayhem's speech last night!

    337:
    gone straight to firing off A50 without thought for what comes next,

    There was absolutely nothing coincidenta about the timing of May's A50 notification. Like much else to do with Brexit, it relates to the absolute need of the UK kleptocracy to avoid implementing the EU 5th directive on money laundering. (See link in Charlie's post a couple above this one.)

    338:

    That was when the penny dropped and everyone who hadn't been paying attention though "Holy shit! there isn't even going to be an attempt to resolve this!"

    340:

    Interesting but, as DtP and OGH say, it's not new knowledge - however, that isn't a deprecation of his work, which OUGHT to be very valuable :-(

    It is also interesting to see which widely and vociferously condemned organisation does NOT appear in his article as lobbying for Brexit!

    341:

    Have you considered hanging the lot of them as a warning to others? Maybe you should...

    My personal opinion is that a lot of politicians in the U.S. require such a warning... 'nuf said, I think.

    342:

    Yes. I miscounted months, and it seems that it had remained somnolent for a month, and exploded last night.

    343:

    Thanks very much for that link. I've been reading it very, very carefully.

    344:

    Yup.

    It looks like it really gained traction with a number of Twitter political pundits yesterday, and then picked up steam after May's speech. Slowed over night as you'd expect and then exploded at about 8:30 this morning.

    I was watching the number climbing at over 2000 a minute around then, then the servers overloaded (insert conspiracy theory of choice here), but according to one (unverified) source it peaked at over 5000 signatures a minute.

    I've been watching through the afternoon and it has slowed down to around the 1000 a minute mark, but I wouldn't be surprised if it surges again this evening since major news outlets have picked up on it through the day.

    345:

    The more I read of this thing, the more I think Trump is a fairly typical denizen for his world of high-flyers, and the only mistake he made was getting involved in politics, becoming over-exposed, and refusing to stop shooting his mouth off.

    Apparently back in the 70s and 80s, when coincidentally Trump was getting started, it was perfectly legal to wander into a real estate office in New York with a suitcase full of money and buy property. No one cared where it came from.

    Unfortunately the 90s rolled around and the war on drugs and terrorism became serious and some regulations about money-laundering came in and actually were enforced occasionally. Many real estate developers saw the writing on the wall and went squeaky clean, nothing to see here. Others of course found ways around, shell companies, trusts, that sort of thing. Because there were people who wanted to invest their money there but for, I'm sure perfectly reasonable reasons (perhaps they were concerned about the political situation in their home country) wanted to conceal exactly who owned it.

    After 9/11 they were basically left with one of two paths. Either they were above board, or they were open to the, ah, grey money, and that made your business a convoluted scheme of multi-national shell and holding companies, nominees, trusts, foundations, offshore banks etc etc. The sort of thing that meant it might be a bad idea to make their tax returns public and have half the investigative journalists in America chasing down the leads from it.

    The really interesting thing about money laundering is you don't need to make a profit for your clients; they expect to lose money on the deal. So you can have big schemes that don't give much return.

    Anyway who were we talking about again?

    346:

    Oops, I didn't know about the EU's 5th Directive. That does explain a lot.

    I suppose my mordant speculations about Scotland dealing with scads of illegal border crossers coming north, post-independence, by nationalizing and redistributing the highland estates, are also something that has been planned for years?

    On a sillier note, I do hope that if The Real Gentry come to rule the UK again, they have a smaller impact on the real UK than your fictional version did in the Nightmare Stacks.

    347:

    Being American I haven't dug too far into the site, but I'd be curious whether the site prevents a single person from voting twice. Does anyone know what precautions are in place?

    348:

    Apparently the Parliamentary Petitions site has just imploded again.

    Last count was just shy of 1.1 million signatures.

    349:

    You have to supply a name, active e-mail address and valid UK post code, and then confirm the vote by responding to an e-mail. That won't stop people who already have multiple e-mail accounts voting once for each account, but how many people are going to go to the effort of creating multiple actives that they don't have already?

    350:

    Someone on the site I've been checking has done some digging, and believes that the Petitions site is in fact hosted from a data centre in Ireland. I do so so soooo hope that is true. The irony would be incredible!

    351:

    Heteromeles @ 330 Actually "the City" are against Brexit - which is another thing I don't understand, since, nprmally, that would guarantee that Brexit would never happen. AND @ 334 Yes, but leaving the EU removes "the City's" financial intra-EU passporting rights & forms are already moving, if only in part to Dublin, Frankfurt, Paris ....

    Rick @ 331 Assuming the web-site doesn't crash again ... it will be interesting to see how many million DO sign it. IF it exceeds 17 410 742 then life would be very interesting indeed. ( The number who voted leave back in '17 ) Checks ... it's down AGAIN - suspicious, or simply not capable of taking the load?

    352:

    You missed May granting herself Henry VIII Powers (to amend existing legislation by decree).

    Yes, I missed that. What's the normal response to PMs who try this? I'd imagine there would be some corrective reaction, likely more than a quiet word in the break room but less than cracking her head with a blunt instrument and feeding her to the corgis. (The royals may be saving that one for March 30th.) Or is this so unprecedented that nobody else tried this in the last 450 years?

    353:

    Another (unconfirmed) source indicated that the site will buckle once the load goes over about fifty submissions a second. Although it's been struggling all day with less than that.

    354:

    DtP @ 352 HOLY FUCK A submission every 20 milliseconds! It really COULD go over that "17 million" figure - what then?

    355:

    True... but I haven't even seen her. Haven't seen the show for several years: first, it used to be on Sat nights, now I just found out it's Sunday, and I never new when new shows would be on....

    And I haven't turned on the tv, literally, since the worst horror show ever on air: election night, Nov, 2016.

    356:

    Well, the powers were granted as part of the withdrawl act on the understanding that they wouldn't be abused too much.

    There is nothing beyond good manners to prevent them from being abused.

    357:

    It will be written off an meaningless online poll.

    Yes, the money is important; that's where the funding came from. The support comes from "Those People Can't Tell Me What To Do", and there's a whole lot of people asserting strong willingness to gnaw roots in the damp dark if they can just be certain their understanding of normal will hold. (Which includes "they get to enforce it violently".)

    358:

    It will be time for the people of Brian Boru, William Wallace and Llywelyn the Great to reclaim their heritage.

    You'd better be kidding. A large part of their heritage was inter-tribal feuding. The great leaders were exceptions, and only appeared when there were strong external enemies. Read the Red Branch. Read the Mabinogion.

    359:

    Better: a law that says

  • money is not free speech (objections can provide me, personally, and anyone who requests it, with a billion (US) dollars to match the Koch bros.
  • 527's are gone, and all organizations doing anything that even resembled political advertising are required to list ALL contributors, and the amounts they contributed
  • There is a limit of $2500 to ALL organizations doing political campainging or advertising, in total, per person, end of discussion.
  • 360:

    Well, for some reason the First Unitarian Church of Kensington, in Kensington, CA, has for it's official name the First Unitarian Church of Berkeley (a place just to the South).

    361:

    Dunno bout there, but I've been called in Philly, Austin, TX, Chicago, IL, Washington, DC, and Montgomery Co, MD (DC 'burb). I've been actually empaneled three or four times, and was on one jury that gave a verdict.

    In my experience, there's only a few idiots out of, say, 40 people (how they call us up). All the rest take it really seriously.

    362:

    Oh, we were just speculating.

    I guess this is why I'm not ultra-rich: I don't understand how somebody who's well known to work in the gray world would have any interest in becoming a social media personality, let alone a highly targeted politician. It's sort of like a rat thinking they can shoot a gun and keep the cats off its back while they walk around on the streets at high noon, rather than living safe and sound in a well-stocked storm drain.

    363:

    Couldn't someone in Parliament throw a Spaniard, er, spanner in the works, by trying to table a bill to spend for 10,000 customs inspectors, and customs buildings, and...?

    364:

    Brexit, the election of Trump in my adopted country, the election of the current government in my native country (Italy)... sounds like Paul Anderson got it exactly wrong in Brain Wave: we were in the fast zone, and have now entered an intelligence-damping field.

    365:

    And we don't have that at present? It's less directly bloody, but there have been a lot of deaths due to it in the UK.

    366:

    The really interesting thing about money laundering is you don't need to make a profit for your clients; they expect to lose money on the deal.

    Of course. Having $10mil you can't ever spend or even admit to having is a waste. Converting it to $8mil or even just $5mil that you can start spending in a few years is a much better deal.

    367:

    I dunno, they'd probably be pretty fatty, but if we do Texas barbecue, 24 hours of slow cooking, we'd get most of the fat out....

    368:

    EXCEPT UK company law is amazingly transparent Unlike German or US, for instance. The company's filing documantation must show who owns it. Unfortunately, that can be another company, which is itself owned by a third & so on ... until you DO run into a "foreign" company with opaque ownership ....

    369:

    Saw an article yesterday, that McConnell is asking for the Dems, when they take control of the Senate (hopefully in 2020), to pack the courts the other way.

    And there's talk of expanding the number of Supreme Court Justices (rather than impeaching Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and that MFSoB Thomas!!!!!!!!!!!)

    370:

    Dunno bout there, but I've been called in Philly, Austin, TX, Chicago, IL, Washington, DC, and Montgomery Co, MD (DC 'burb).

    The randomness here is interesting. My wife has been called 3 or 4 times and served all but one of them. Once for 2 YEARS on a federal grand jury[1]. Those typically meet once a month for 1 or 2 days.

    Me, I've been called once. When I was doing the dad watching kids during the day and self employed. I was excused and allowed to no show.

    [1] In the US if you get called to a federal grand jury get your affairs in order. It is very rare to get excused out of it. Basically is there a physical reason you can't show up for a day or two each month? No? Please raise your hand....

    371:

    The local incompetant idiots who run the Montgomery County buses have one named, and I couldn't make up something this stupid, the L8 bus, presumably, not one anyone would willingly want to ride....

    372:

    Here you go. The gaps in the lines are server issues. The flatness of the lower graph after 12:30 today is due to rate limiting at ~80k-petitions/second.

    [[ link repaired - mod ]]

    373:

    Link is broken.

    374:

    The parliament petition site seems to be going down at regular intervals. Managed to submit mine, but not received the email to confirm the submission yet.

    The site does ask for UK post code and name, which gives a good link to the electoral register. (UK post codes are typically around a dozen homes in size). A sample could be checked for duplication, or invention. A valid email address provides some impediment to impersonation. Would give some idea of the scale of invalidity.

    Not like a UK election, which seem to have very low rates of impersonation, or fraud, despite not having to present ID. You just have to say who you are at the polling station. A criminal offence to do so though.

    These petitions have only an advisory role and are a very recent thing. At best, above a certain number, you get a "we will debate it in the house" commitment. Maybe, possibly, if we feel like it. Maybe when most of the members are taking a long lunch, or when they've mostly set off for home on a Friday afternoon.

    375:

    Sorry, the self-proclaimed "Tea Party" in Congress are not, in fact, "hard core conservatives" (and Paul Krugman agrees). I prefer to call them what they actually are: neoConfederate (and yes, that's as in the Confederacy) traitors.

    A few years ago, I looked up a summary of their policies, and then I looked up, online, the Constitution of the Confederacy, and other than the items in the Constitution of the Slave-holding traitors that explicitly refer to slaves, it's exactly the same. They want to break the Union, and turn it back to a confederacy, thus enabling the wealthy to buy it, wholesale.

    376:

    For about an hour, hour and a half, it was offline. Now:

    1,166,259 signatures

    100,000 Parliament will consider this for a debate

    Parliament considers all petitions that get more than 100,000 signatures for a debate

    Waiting for 1 day for a debate date

    I've emailed my ex-pat manager, to ask if he's still a citizen...

    377:

    Nope. Cadbury Castle was Camelot. Ashe led a dig there in the late seventies, and found a ruined Romano-British fortress there....

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoffrey_Ashe

    378:

    This continually drives me crazy (I know, I know, short distance).

    I use the classical definitions, meaning that "middle class" meant doctors, lawyers, private practice, small business owners. What the media now calls middle class is NOT: it's middle income.

    Btw, I make good money as a sr. sysadmin (which will go down by more than half when I retire in a few months, but that's another story). I have interest and dividend income that can barely push me one line on the tax tables. I know that I'm still a workin' stiff, and proud of it. Us workin' stiffs is what makes the world as we know it happen, and without us, enjoy your caves....

    379:

    The post-war prosperity was driven by automobile sales and suburb development. It took a lot of social engineering to convince people who had survived the Depression to risk debt.

    And now that leaving the Holocene means we need to replace the entire housing stock, most active voters tie their self-image as a good person to home ownership.

    380:

    Moz wrote w/r/t sortilege: In practice when the experiment has been performed people have overwhelmingly taken their responsibilities seriously. This is obvious when jury deliberations are made public, and remember that the weird shit you occasionally read about is exactly that: remarkable, unusual and weird.

    An interesting idea, but there is already a number of significant weeding processes happening. In the area of the US where I live, you have to clear the following hurdles to make it onto a jury:

    • Be a registered voter • Pass the challenge by the judge that you're suitable (called voir dir, I think) • Pass the challenge by the prosecuting attorney • Pass the challenge by the defending attorney

    At least in the cases where I served, more folks were rejected than were kept.

    Overall, I'd guess the cumulative reject rate is at least 80%. So I don't think jury selection is a good example of the broader sortilege discussed.

    381:

    Re: 'I don't understand how somebody who's well known to work in the gray world would have any interest in becoming a social media personality, ...'

    Flaming narcissism. Consider reading 'The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump'. Besides, DT even boasted about his 'special relationships' with Russian mob construction firms. (Recall watching a TV interview with DT when he said that the Russians could pour a concrete floor in high-rises better than anyone else. He was visibly enraptured by this memory. When asked whether he was concerned about the mob ties, DT said that it wasn't his business to ask or care about his contractors ethical or legal behaviours.)

    https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/05/donald-trump-2016-mob-organized-crime-213910

    PM May's personality meanwhile comes across as a mix of: fill-in-the-blank values, zero empathy interspersed with flashes of smug. The Dolores Umbridge of the real UK. DT gets furious when ignored whereas May doesn't even seem to notice and just continues steaming ahead. So from this perspective, functionally, she's even less competent at behaving/interacting like a socialized human being.

    382:

    My take, all along, was that the Malignant Carcinoma was encouraged to do it, and he figured that he wouldn't win, but would wind up with the biggest name brand anywhere, and everybody would know who he was (which he desperately wanted). Winning was an utter disaster for him... but when crowds started cheering, his ego took over.

    He's used to working in a world where he can give one set of lies to one group of people, and a contradictory one to another, and the two groups will never know what the other heard. Suddenly, everything he says is recorded, and everybody knows what he's said to everyone else.

    And he has no idea how to deal in this world.

    383:

    Oh, and about May, and her speech last night: there's an op-ed in today's Guardian by a female Labour MP, and she's saying MPs, esp. women MPs, are "receiving credible threats".

    384:

    Now at about 1.25 million and adding about 280 per minute.

    Per minute.

    But I wonder how much of that is bots, non-UK folks, etc.

    385:

    Sorry, the self-proclaimed "Tea Party" in Congress are not, in fact, "hard core conservatives" (and Paul Krugman agrees).

    Who cares? My point was on both sides of the pond, a small group of hard core Leprechauns or whatever we call them hold enough votes to stop legislation. And the way around it, work with the other side, is not an option these days. So these 2 small groups hold enormous power.

    The get to wield this power due to governments on both sides of the pond apparently holding to the principle of "majority of majority".

    386:

    ...every account I've read by someone who's been stuck with jury service seems to go pretty much the same way: at least eight of the twelve are the kind of thick small-minded arseholes... Which certainly doesn't match either of the juries I've served on - one county, one federal. In both cases, 100% reasonable and thoughtful people (and 100% for conviction in one case, for acquittal in the other. Deliberation not much more than a couple of hours in both cases).

    I suspect the difference between my experience and "every account I've read" is that nobody bothers to write an account unless something has gang a-gley.

    387:

    Re: 'But I wonder how much of that is bots, non-UK folks, etc.'

    No idea, but there's a map showing location of each signature. How long would it take to program a bot to do this? Also, someone up-thread mentioned an email verification stage which could be used to confirm legitimacy of each signatory - if you had to.

    This BrExit Article 50 petition is getting coverage across networks over here mostly as 'Over 1 million signatures!'.

    388:

    most active voters tie their self-image as a good person to home ownership.

    Not arguing. But I've seen a lot of retired people who are very upset when selling their home. But in an odd way, or so it seems to me. (This is a US viewpoint here.)

    Most people in their later years in the US wind up downsizing at some point. Health, kids gone, fixed income in a hot real estate market area, whatever.

    What I've noticed is many of them only want to sell their house to people who will treat it as a finished monument to the seller's home ownership. I.E. they will not remodel, tear down, change paint colors, etc... It really upsets them when someone buys their precious thing and changes it. I'm thinking to them they view it as a rejection of the choices they have made over the last 20, 40, or more years.

    In my mind this ties into the election of the Trump and Brexit. An implied promise to make things they way they once were. But without the things they didn't like in that glorious past.

    389:

    Well, time to amp up the craziness. May has decided (per FT reporting) that if her deal doesn't pass, No Deal is her preferred alternative -- regardless of the non-binding Commons vote directing her to avoid it. Or, for that matter, her rather pointed refusal to say what she'd do if the deal got voted down a third time, to either her Cabinet colleagues or the members of the European Council, when both of them asked her about it yesterday and today. Or the joint press release from industry (the CBI) and the Unions (the TUC) describing the prospect of No Deal as a "national emergency" that it's imperative to avoid.

    One of my twitter lists has a British constitutional scholar trying to figure out what Parliament could do to bring her to heel (should they want to) in less than a week; established procedures probably take longer than that. If the EU accedes to a short extension, it might not come to that -- but as I write, they're still chewing over what they're going to offer.

    As fiction, this would be hugely entertaining...

    https://www.ft.com/content/c1bb68fa-4bed-11e9-bbc9-6917dce3dc62

    390:

    The status quo is to be having of the entirety of the biscuit.

    That's what politics has been about since at least 2000 and arguably 1980, but without until very recently coming out and saying so. The status quo is not going to hold. It can't possibly. (There have been a lot of Water Empires, it's a type, but there's only ever going to be one Oil Empire and history shan't view it kindly.)

    That's pretty darn terrifying if you're young, hale, blessed with good teeth, and economically comfortable. If you're old? If you're having to admit you're getting diminished of capacity? I would expect it's paralytic.

    Which is a whole lot of where the authoritarian upswing comes from; I Won't Be Having That on the basis of the fantastical.

    391:

    What I've noticed is many of them only want to sell their house to people who will treat it as a finished monument to the seller's home ownership.

    Hmm. We've been doing such, both selling and buying hice for a few decades(*) and have not encountered that. Maybe there was a bit of nostalgia, a bit of pride in what had been added to the house, but mostly it's "You bought it, it's yours to do with as you wish."

    Maybe this relates to Brexit somehow. I'd have to think about that a bit.

    (*) Mostly recently last Monday.

    392:

    I will note, pessimistically, that merely cancelling Article 50 won't fix the underlying problem in the UK — which is the degree to which the underpinnings of the nation have been eroded, fragmented, and just plain sold off to the highest bidder, leading to a huge build-up of deprivation and consequent rage and resentment.

    If we cancel A50 there'll be a huge upswing in neo-nazi activity, including attacks. OK, the police can handle that (although one certain Theresa May slashed the ever-loving shit out of their budgets when she was Home Secretary, which maybe makes things a wee bit hard on her successors). But there'll also be a giant upswing in enrollment in populist right-wing movements: UKIP for one, but I also expect the Tory party would schism, and we might well end up with a "respectable" fascist mainstream party in England, like the French Front Nationale. Nor is Labour positioned to effectively take advantage of a Tory schism, or even to oppose the fash.

    (Scotland, as usual, Is Different.)

    393:

    'No Deal' is and always has been May's objective.

    "Henry VIII powers" are the powers of an absolute monarch who practiced god-king autocracy. May has carefully made those available to the government in an emergency.

    May has to aware that cutting off the flow of trade will create the most severe emergency the UK has ever materially suffered. Preparations are rolling forward on that basis, we keep getting little bits and snippets.

    May is a strong enforced-norm authoritarian.

    May idolizes will as a virtue.

    We know that May's government's austerity measures have an excess death toll in the vicinity of 100,000. We know with some confidence that this is deliberate, because it's taken a long time and a lot of people have done everything possible to convey that the policy has these results. Not changing the policy is a statement that these are the prefered results.

    The money is a sideshow; yes, there's a lot of it, yes, turning a permanent security council seat into a tax haven would be just great from the viewpoint of the global tax evasion class.

    The main show is a chance to make everything nice. Without any pesky human rights laws, without really any laws at all.

    394:

    Well, no, they don't. What they have is the backing of the Koch bros, and a number of other billionaires, and Murdoch and Fox... oh, and 95% of the GOP in the Senate and Congress are outright racists, who wanted Obama to have no legacy, which is as near as they could get to erasing him from history.

    It would be easy to get legislation through... if they wanted to work with Democrats. They don't.

    Oh, and according to something I read today, there are NO GOP supporters of abortion rights in Congress, and only two in the Senate.

    395:

    This is the best article I've seen on how the whole thing works. It's more centered in the U.S. than the U.K., but still certainly worth reading - it changed my thinking about the process substantially.

    396:

    "You bought it, it's yours to do with as you wish."

    I'm 65 and feel that way. My father was that way. My mother not so much. My mother in law totally wanted someone to buy HER home and keep it the was it was. Some neighbors who recently sold and moved to a retirement community a mile away, the wife will not go by their gutted and remodeled house. They had really hoped the new buyers would keep it as it was. And a lot of my neighbors feel this way.

    On which side of the big pond are you?

    397:

    Ok, as someone who's owned (or had mortgages on) a few houses, let me 'splain it to you: there's a lot of us out here who are not buying a "house", we're buying a HOME. Now, please add every single bit of meaning and implication on that that you can find, remember, or imagine.

    When I got to Chicago for Windycon, I've gone and driving past the house that my late wife and I bought, the one where she dropped dead, the one I was forced to sell after being out of work for literally years, and the last day, as we were moving me out, I had a low-level nervous breakdown at losing it. I literally had to throw out a quarter of what we - my late wife, I, and our son - owned.

    When I bought the undersized (but what I could afford in the DC metro area that was not an insane commute from work, I literally spent half my net salary on it, every damn month. As of paying off my recent ex, last year? I now own it. All I pay now are taxes and utility bills, which is really good, when I retire late this summer, and my income drops by half.

    I am NOT losing this house, like I lost the one in Chicago, or the ones I had with two exes, and left to one ex, in one case, and sold in the other and split the proceeds in the other.

    Do you vaguely begin to understand what being force to sell your HOME means to a lot of us?

    398:

    I suspect the difference is that you (and whitroth @ 360) are in the US, while I was thinking of the UK. I wonder if this is a result of the US's fairly recent origin as a constructed polity leading to some fairly deep differences in how the citizens of the two countries relate to their judicial apparatus.

    399:

    Folks... in the last half hour, the referendum petition has gone from 1.3M to 1.4M. I think it's picking up speed....

    400:

    whitroth @ 375-7 Yes Cabury was & is Camelot As for "working stiffs" well, as usual Kipling had something to say about that

    SS @ 383 But I wonder how much of that is bots, non-UK folks, etc. Almost zero You have to tick the boxes, give your email address & your UK postcode & THEN the vote still isn't counted until you tick the box on the confirmation email. See also SFR @ 386

    Charlie @ 391 Agree in part - thought you really think the tiny numbers of Neo-Nazis will be significant? They will end up in jail or restraining orders pretty quickly if they are that stupid - & they are that stupid. The tory party isn't the only one that will split - you'll get the Corbynite/momentum almost-commie crowd, rejoicing in a no-deal-brexit & the rest including the Social Democrats, desperately trying to save something from the wreckage.

    Graydon @ 392 'No Deal' is and always has been May's objective. It might be now, but it wasn't when she started. She has lost the plot utterly, though & is on full robo-automsatic - it's frightning to watch.

    TOTALLY off-topic If you want a pleasant diversion & if Charlie will permit it ( I'd have to send him a picture to publish ... unless there's a way I can send a pic to the web that isn't already on a web-page? ) There are two toads in "amplexus" in my greenhouse right now .... Why they are thre & not in my pondlet ( which is moving with life but not as we know it Jim ) which has quite few frogs, ditto. I assume the newts are "at it" as well, but they are hard to spot at this time of year.

    401:

    Another tangent ... something I haven't seen discussed.

    Suppose for whatever insane reason May's Brexit plan WAS/IS accepted by Parliament, what would actually happen? How would it be implemented in the UK?

    402:

    I'm not talking about the nostalgia for the home. I'm talking about the anger at the new owners. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

    I have some nostalgia for homes also.

    From the time I was 2 until 20, I lived all but 9 months of that period in a home built by my father. And during those 9 months we lived in a very old 4 room box house owned by my mothers step-mother that we did a 2 week fast remodel on to make it a bit more modern.

    And my home from the time of age 2 until about 12 or 13 was on land owned by my father's family since 1824. I have relatives who still own some of that land. Was back in that area for a funeral a few years ago and did a bit of a tour of the various houses I remembered belonging to relatives and those built or remodeled by my father as a second job.

    Back to the topic. For the masses DT and Brexit is a hope to return to the life that was "wonderful"[1] back in the day. With a side order of holy crap, we didn't want THIS added on over the next few years.

    [1] Well except for hunger, disease, car accidents that killed and maimed a lot more than now, the cold war, Viet Nam, and a few other things.

    403:

    "How long would it take to program a bot to do this?"

    If it really is as simple as described by paws @ 348 - about 5 minutes. But I'd be pretty certain those are only surface precautions - they'll be mainly to take the "idiot load", weeding out the great majority of the people who have that idea, whose best shot is to do it by hand, and also legitimate signers trying again because they think it didn't work the first time etc. There has got to be some more detailed scrutiny going on behind the scenes; the site is an obvious magnet for such attacks, but it's been up for years without any obvious indication cropping up that they significantly succeed.

    At least one unspeakable worm on twitter ("grassroots youth campaign for JRM as PM" and it doesn't seem to be a parody) has been trying to discredit it by posting a list of numbers of votes from several different non-UK countries. To which the counter-argument is that the numbers (mostly in the low hundreds) are entirely unexceptional given the likely numbers of UK citizens currently living in or visiting those countries; I agree, and would also add that even if they were all entirely spurious the percentages are still insignificant; either way it suggests the anti-bot protection is pretty d.

    404:

    Well past 1.5 million MAP of signatures HERE for info.

    405:

    whitroth @ 354: True... but I haven't even seen her. Haven't seen the show for several years: first, it used to be on Sat nights, now I just found out it's Sunday, and I never new when new shows would be on....

    And I haven't turned on the tv, literally, since the worst horror show ever on air: election night, Nov, 2016.

    I haven't had a TV since 1996, but there are a few (very few) shows worth tracking down on the internet. So far I've managed to keep up to date with the one show that really matters.

    406:

    Well the historical precedent would be the partitioning of India in '47. SO everybody in the south whose a Remainer moves to Scotland, likewise all Leavers leave for the south. Life imitates art and the City of London becomes it's own micro-nation and joins the EU. England cedes a bit of Cumbria and Northumberland to balance the demographics out. Simplez!

    407:

    On which side of the big pond are you?

    We're USians, in Texas for the past 20 years, VA suburbs of DC for the 25 before that. Upping sticks and moving to Panamá next month.

    408:

    I think the most interesting thing would be if this poll gets to a number which surpasses 1/2 of the possible voters in a referendum. Not just a majority of the last vote totals.

    409:

    And on the Other Paw? Of Way back then? Its not all that hard to start off the Internet poll thingies. It is quite hard to work out how many of those polled would actually be qualified - by British Citizenship? - to vote in yet another referendum in the unlikely event that one was to be agreed and "organized" by the UKs Parliament in the next few weeks. But? Way back Then at the time that it counted? How did the Entitled Middle Class folks Vote? And the Lower Orders? And would those Very uneducated Deprived folks of the lower orders Do As They Are Told if their betters were to shout at them very loudly in yet another referendum? If there were to be a Re-Run then I suspect that we would have yet another contest between the Middle Class Entitled Voters and the deprived lower class voters who have seen their industries vanish abroad and who aren't all that happy with the Ruling Class who allowed it to happen . Ah, well ..way back then.. https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/745178630297247745/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

    410:

    Thus reversing 1,000 years of history :-)

    To David L: that would be a genuine miracle. No chance.

    411:

    I'm willing to accept it as mostly genuine. My reasoning is that the voting patterns are tracking the referrendum results reasonably closely.

    There's a population density aspect for sure, but areas that were strongly remain in 2016 still are, and the leave areas still have a fairly low vote density.

    If it is all faked then someone has made far more of an effort than usual.

    412:

    That tweet is awesome, until I realised that it wasn't trying to make a point about Northern Ireland. After that it just became confusing.

    Even if the petition succeeds (and I think we can say it has, the odds of it having less than 100,000 valid signers seem very low right now), what then? Parliament promises to consider it, and even if they treat it as a matter of extreme urgency, even more important than any other Brexit-related matter, what?

    Taking even five million signatures as an instruction to repeal Article 51 seems unwise, not least for the precedent that a few million signatures on a petition can overrule an official referendum. But taking it as a sign that a new referendum should be called is a bit late. They could possibly get an extension from the EU if they nailed down the question and timetable, but the problem remains: how do they communicate with the EU? That role is filled by someone who can't be trusted and is actively working to obtain a hard Brexit. The EU can't be seen to side with non-government rebels, so... what?

    My rough stab is this: - Parliament overrule the government and introduce the petition - Parliament accepts the petition by voting for a referendum - May says "I will not do that" (rather than delaying) - Parliament declares no confidence in the government - {formal procedure for a change, which IIRC takes days not hours} - the new government decides on a referendum plan - which they take to the EU with a request for an extension - the EU agrees - Friday the 29th of March comes to an end.

    Seems... optimistic to me. There are multiple points where a single person (May, specifically) or a small group, could derail the process and run out the clock. They don't havce to stop it or prevent it, just delay it by a few hours here and there.

    413:

    Thus reversing 1,000 years of history :-)

    If it worked as well as the Partition did that would be a minor miracle. The good news is that only one side of the UK split would have nuclear weapons, and it's not entirely clear that they would control the nukes they had. In many ways that would be the best outcome - Scotland gets possession, England gets the launch codes.

    414:

    No, Graydon is right. May always has wanted No Deal, though she might not have engaged what she is pleased to call her mind enough to realise it. Her red line of no ECHR or ECJ jurisdiction always did imply No Deal.

    415:

    Just received the email asking me to confirm my petition vote, which is about 6 hours after I signed it. Not that it matters; if it got to 20 million votes it would still be ignored & explained away by "bots". Lets hope those who sign aren't victimised in the future as a result.

    Looking at the map I was interested to see low numbers in rural areas, so maybe they haven't seen the government's proposed WTO tariffs for agricultural products - cut by half or more, probably sufficient to kill off a lot of small/medium UK farms.

    On the subject of UK laws, I was under the impression that EU laws (but not regulations and similar) had already been written into the current UK lawbook, with the intent of undoing/rewriting them later.

    416:

    Latest: the petition got close to 1.8 million. And May announced that she wouldn't consider it at all.

    She's determined to get her deal through, or pivot to a crash-out brexit. She won't revoke A50 under any forseeable circumstances. The cabinet is panicking, per the news.

    417:

    I don't think anyone seriously expects the petition or Saturdays march to make a difference. As a thousand to one shot it is still worth a go though.

    Payoff matrix says "sign".

    418:

    A few minutes ago Tusk announced that the 27 have reached a unanimous agreement on a response, and that he was off to see May.

    419:

    David L @ 369: Dunno bout there, but I've been called in Philly, Austin, TX, Chicago, IL, Washington, DC, and Montgomery Co, MD (DC 'burb).

    The randomness here is interesting. My wife has been called 3 or 4 times and served all but one of them. Once for 2 YEARS on a federal grand jury[1]. Those typically meet once a month for 1 or 2 days.

    Me, I've been called once. When I was doing the dad watching kids during the day and self employed. I was excused and allowed to no show.

    [1] In the US if you get called to a federal grand jury get your affairs in order. It is very rare to get excused out of it. Basically is there a physical reason you can't show up for a day or two each month? No? Please raise your hand....

    Steve Simmons @ 379: _Moz_ wrote w/r/t sortilege: In practice when the experiment has been performed people have overwhelmingly taken their responsibilities seriously. This is obvious when jury deliberations are made public, and remember that the weird shit you occasionally read about is exactly that: remarkable, unusual and weird.

    An interesting idea, but there is already a number of significant weeding processes happening. In the area of the US where I live, you have to clear the following hurdles to make it onto a jury:

    • Be a registered voter
    • Pass the challenge by the judge that you're suitable (called voir dir, I think)
    • Pass the challenge by the prosecuting attorney
    • Pass the challenge by the defending attorney

    At least in the cases where I served, more folks were rejected than were kept.

    Overall, I'd guess the cumulative reject rate is at least 80%. So I don't think jury selection is a good example of the broader sortilege discussed.

    Here in Wake County, North Carolina (where David L & I live) the jury system draws from Voter Rolls, Property Tax Records and DMV Driver's License/Vehicle License records. You have a greater chance of being called multiple times the longer you live at the same address.

    Around here they use what's called a "fire-cracker" system. They have the court calendar planned out months in advance with an estimate of how many jurors are going to be needed for the scheduled cases. They plan for a maximum number with the understanding that changes in the court calendar will cause fewer jurors to be needed. You get a notice a month or more in advance with instructions to call a certain phone number the night before your reporting date. If you are instructed not to report when you call in or report and are not chosen, you are done and your name goes back into the pool on the bottom of the list. You won't hear from them again for several years.

    If you do get picked for a jury, your obligation continues until the trial is over. If they don't get all the jurors they need seated on the first day, there's a new batch to select from the next morning. ... and on and on until all the required jurors + alternates are selected.

    Voir Dire is the name for the entire process of questioning & qualifying jurors. The Judge may or may not excuse you. The DA & the Defense Attorney can challenge a juror for cause or use a peremptory challenge. There is no limit to the number of challenges for cause, but usually they only have a limited number of peremptory challenges.

    IANAL, so all of the above is based on my observations from being called for Jury Duty four times in the last 45 years (living at the same address).
    First time I called in the night before and was told I was not needed.
    Second time I reported and sat in a jury waiting room until about lunch time when we were told we could go home.
    Third time I got into the courtroom, took the oath, passed the Judge & DA's questioning before the Defense Attorney used a peremptory challenge.
    Fourth time was another day sitting in the jury waiting room, but I didn't get to go home until court was done for the day.

    I was also called once for jury duty in Federal Court. It was a civil case and I was actually chosen for the jury & sworn in. I believe I was chosen as an ideal juror for that case, because I had never heard of either of the two parties or what they were fighting about.

    The judge then dismissed us to lunch with instruction to be back for the beginning of the trial that afternoon. When we arrived back in the afternoon, the judge announced the parties had settled and thanked us for our service.

    420:

    The petitions popularity may be down to many people thinking it is the least bad option.

    No deal - Mad Max brexit. Default if nothing happens. Tory wingnut wing loves it. May is not averse to it. Everyone else thinks it is a disaster.

    May's deal - Nobody likes. Her plan to get it passed by scaring people with Mad Max brexit.

    New referendum - takes time we no longer have, might still end up with a leave vote and back to the same problem.

    Customs union semi brexit. May won't do it. Would probably need a general election, a Labour government and time we no longer have. Tories are not going to risk that and bring their own government down.

    Revoke article 50. Stay in EU. May won't do it. Leave major parties badly divided and a large segment of the population feeling betrayed and prey to far right. EU rightly pissed off with the UK. Possibly the least horrible option.

    421:

    Troutwaxer @ 340:

    Have you considered hanging the lot of them as a warning to others? Maybe you should...

    My personal opinion is that a lot of politicians in the U.S. require such a warning... 'nuf said, I think.

    My personal opinion is that a substantial number of them should be USED to give such a warning, pour encourager les autres

    422:

    Now gone through 2 MegaPep's.

    423:

    It's tempting but the hard part always seems to be getting the hangings to stop.

    424:

    cdodgson @ 388: Well, time to amp up the craziness. May has decided (per FT reporting) that if her deal doesn't pass, No Deal is her preferred alternative ...

    As fiction, this would be hugely entertaining...

    https://www.ft.com/content/c1bb68fa-4bed-11e9-bbc9-6917dce3dc62

    Unfortunately it's hidden behind a paywall.

    425:

    And the offer is in two parts:

    extend until May 22 IF Parliament agrees to the existing withdrawal agreement next week; and

    extend until April 12 unconditionally, but the Council expects the UK (Parliament, presumably) to indicate a way forward by that date.

    So the crash-out is delayed by two weeks.

    426:

    Do you ever wonder if maybe the Conservative Party in the UK and the Republican Party in the US are having some kind of secret competition to see who can fuck up their countries more?

    427:

    So what is the most realistic "Positive" outcome, or the least bad one? A more gentle brexit? (I imagine the right wingers would still get a bit worked up there, but maybe it would die down relatively fast?)

    428:

    @ 273

    That comic had an apotheosis when the Scottish Independence Referendum was a current thing, IIRC. One entire strip was done as Facebook pages: "Scotland has changed its relationship status from "In a relationship" to "It's complicated". And then crass Norway jumped in on Scotland's wall: "So, are you dating now?"

    Yeah I know. Innocent times.

    429:

    Charlie @ 415 May is now a rabbit in the headlights of an approaching car Our only hope is a vote in the House to take over the process Revoking At 50 &/or getting an extension are essential ... this is getting very worrying, I must admit. jesnail @ 419 I might quibble, but you appear to be very close to a good view of the horrible situation.

    Michael Caine @ 424 Extend to 12th April is time enough to go for Ref2 isn't it?

    Meanwhile - Jury Service & residence NEVER been called - will be ineligible (75 y old) in 2 years ... my father was never called .... someone I used to know ( now dead ) was called 4 times ... Uh? And, I do not remember living in any house other than this one & it's falling down ( London clay & fucking Waltham Forest Council ) now what do I do?

    OFF TOPIC The Fermi Paradox Maybe we are, if not "it" close to it ... because to get here we had to have 3 essential things 1.Opposable thumbs - or equivalent, for tool-use 2. The modification of our larynxs to enable sophistocated communications ( Or its equivalent) 3. The Red Flower ?4? The ability to store communications outside ourseleves - consider how old "Cave Art" is - before the invention of writing, for instance?

    ANY species to make it to register on "Fermi" has got to pass (at least) those three tests - oh & be a "social" species, as well ....

    P.S. Now well past 2 million

    430:

    No, Nyarlathotep can't become PM. That would be too easy.

    431:

    Re: 'She won't revoke A50 under any forseeable circumstances. The cabinet is panicking, per the news.'

    Okay - a sitting PM gets a free pass for one calendar year after facing & winning a non-confidence vote. However, time passes, circumstances change and sometimes faster than anticipated, faster that the current 'free-pass'.

    The quick and fairly large pick-up on this petition does show that there is a segment that really does not want BrExit. I think that if this petition gets roughly the same percent of the popular vote as May's party got (which allowed it to legally ask the Queen to okay her forming the official gov't), then despite the different method that the populace is using to 'voice' its concerns (Internet poll vs. ballot box) this has to be taken seriously. Ignoring the will of such a large segment of the people by a 'democratically elected' leader historically leads to censure by trading partners (EU, US) and maybe even a slap on the wrist from the UN. How does May's current wilful refusal to listen to the electorate differ from all those nasty foreign tyrants Brits have poo-poo'ed over the past decades? (If someone could post and do a quick side-by-side comparison of speeches, decisions, actions May vs. deplorable/foreign bad guy/tyrant and get Brit eyes on it, it could help.)

    As for persisting in the face of others' refusal to cooperate -- I thought that the UK had a sanity clause somewhere in its rule book re: leaders. C'mon - it's insane to persist when everyone around her esp. her colleagues say 'stop'. The not-of-sound-mind surely takes precedence over a non-confidence vote ... the Speaker of the HoC should know this.

    432:

    The year long immunity only applies to removal attempts within the Conservative party.

    It doesn't apply to parliamentary confidence votes, but they are really hard to pull off as ruling parties tend to come together in the face of outside aggression even if they hate their leaders.

    433:

    May is, among other things, from the "taxation is theft" faction; it is better than the injured and unwell die than that taxes be raised. (And this is not rhetoric; there's a pile of corpses.)

    As we depart the Holocene to greater and greater distances, every seawall, ditch, culvert, drain, settling basin, bridge pier, dock, quay, jetty, wharf, causeway, canal, sewer, gutter, downspout, and water main is the wrong size. (And the road camber is wrong and the bridge decks are the wrong height and there's a quantity of basement windows as shall found to be sub-optimal and the sump pump in like wise.)

    These are really really basic things; this is not so much infrastructure as the stuff that has to exist to enable the possibility of infrastructure.

    We're going to be replacing all of them twice in the next fifty years. (If we retain any civilization.)

    To be, in that degree, in this time, of the party of "taxation is theft" is not so much to desire unicorns, as to declare yourself the enemy of facts. There is no material reality; there is only what you want, and make real through will.

    (Except of course momentum really is conserved.)

    434:

    More realistically, I suspect if Arthur Pendragon* turned up with his Round Table in tow and could find someone to translate for him, he wouldn't be allowed to become PM, due to his arguably not being a British citizen and not speaking the language.

    *And yes, I mean the legendary one, not the current one.

    435:
    You have to supply a name, active e-mail address and valid UK post code, and then confirm the vote by responding to an e-mail.

    Nope, a country + a postcode.

    Amazingly not all UK citizens live in the UK.

    436:

    momentum really is conserved

    I see what you did there.

    437:
    that the Petitions site is in fact hosted from a data centre in Ireland.

    $ host petition.parliament.uk petition.parliament.uk has address 63.35.2.251 petition.parliament.uk has address 52.209.144.75 petition.parliament.uk mail is handled by 10 inbound-smtp.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com.

    $ host 63.35.2.251 251.2.35.63.in-addr.arpa domain name pointer ec2-63-35-2-251.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com.

    $ whois 63.35.2.251 ... Organization: Amazon Data Services Ireland Limited (ADSIL-1)

    438:

    Re: 'May is, among other things, from the "taxation is theft" faction; it is better than the injured and unwell die than that taxes be raised.'

    Didn't know that -- that is sick.

    BTW, EU is extending the the Brexit deadline until May 22, pending approval from U.K. lawmakers. No idea whether they actually said 'lawmakers' or if that's just a phrase that the reporter chose. If the EU folks actually said 'lawmakers' then they also just reminded May that she does not possess sole authority over this process, they know it and they're watching her. Interesting.

    To dpb, re: ' ... as ruling parties tend to come together in the face of outside aggression even if they hate their leaders.'

    Right - just like a pack of barely socialized 6 year olds at the local playground. At this rate, the Speaker should consider hiring experienced kindergarten teachers to supervise the MPs - could prove more productive than the Parliamentary aides.

    439:

    MAP of signatures HERE for info.
    The maps are irritatingly incomplete in that they only show the UK.

    440:

    Scotland gets possession, England gets the launch codes.
    And the US keeps its 5-year option on removing them from service.

    442:

    Extend to 12th April is time enough to go for Ref2 isn't it?

    My take -- and I'm on the wrong side of the pond, with the wrong set of government experience, so take it for what it's worth -- is that the EU has been as generous as they can be at this point, legally. If Parliament accepts the withdrawal agreement by March 29, then the UK is out (if they pass the enabling legislation by May 22 out under the WA terms, if not then under no deal). If Parliament doesn't accept the WA, then they get up until the next current legal deadline for maintaining their EU membership (Apr 11 is the last day for Parliament to pass enabling legislation for the EP elections) to choose a different path. On Apr 12 the EU will reconsider their position.

    That the Council chose Apr 12 (enabling legislation for the EP elections) rather than May 22 (the actual elections) strikes me as a serious threat. I suspect some of the EU27 accepted that only with an understanding that if Parliament hasn't chosen in or out by that time, there will be no more extensions. That is, I think some members of the EU27 will block Ref2.

    443:

    "Is the UK political establishment capable of recognizing that it has a peer role in the EU" seems like a question EUCO's general duty requires them to ask.

    This sounds like a carefully minimalistic way to ask that question.

    444:

    I think the maps shows who the petitioner is represented by; that is, the important thing is that you can see that Lucien Barrymore, Green Party Member, represents 4335 petitioners. Where the petitioner lives is very much secondary.

    445:

    Ah, yes, the Amazon AWS eu-west-1 cluster! I know it quite well. It's a set of five data centres spread around Dublin's N4 ring road. See: https://wikileaks.org/amazon-atlas/map/

    $FIRM often launches clusters there because it's relatively inexpensive and has good connectivity to the rest of Europe. (It should be acknowledged that, given that Westminster decided to host the petitions site on AWS, they had no UK-based AWS datacentre options to choose among.)

    446:

    I think some members of the EU27 will block Ref2.

    I think they already have. Discussion previously on this blog suggests that a referendum is a 6 month or longer process, and the EU hasn't even hinted that an extension that long is possible. Inside the UK, the hard Brexit fundamentalists haven't indicated that they would be willing to permit a referendum to take place.

    I suspect that if another referendum is held there will be much greater turnout, and the campaign would start with a much higher Remain preference than we see recently. How that would pan out during another bout of furious lying I'm not sure.

    447:

    Dual keying might be better, similar to the US missile bases in Europe during the Cold War.

    448:

    "and the EU hasn't even hinted that an extension that long is possible."

    It has. Tusk just explicitly confirmed that until April 12 all options are still on the table; he specifically included the referendum option. It looks like the centrists have won again (for now): all member governments could be convinced that No Deal is still the worst possible outcome.

    449:

    No, Nyarlathotep can't become PM. That would be too easy.

    At this point I think a lot of people would be happy to see as Prime Minister someone with the leadership skills and political wisdom of Lord Buckethead. Who that might be I can't guess.

    450:

    And now there's a delay in hand (CNN coverage here), giving Theresa May until April 12th to finish stuffing Parliament's basement with gunpowder.

    451:

    Moz @ 445 Discussion previously on this blog suggests that a referendum is a 6 month or longer process Cobblers A general Election - a LOT more complicated - can be done & dusted in SIX WEEKS A referendum would take no longer - ASSUMING the question(s) were agreed easily Like:

    "This referendum has one question & three possible answers, please indicate your order of preference: 1. Remain in the EU 2. Accept the deal offered by the EU & Mrs May & leave 3. Leave the Eu withut a deal."

    There, that wasn't difficult, was it?

    Kramer @ 447 Agreed Almost all the EU 27 have come to the correct conclusion that "No deal would be utterly disastrous for Britain & pterry bloody bad for them ... let's avoid it if we can, huh?

    Of course May & Corbyn will now demonstrate AGAIN their incompetence & stubbornness, byu fucking-up the extra fortnight we have been given P.S. "Petition" now just shy of 2.5 million

    452:

    But it will be difficult.

    In a general election you don't have to get agreement on the question beforehand.

    In your proposal the leave vote would be potentially split between options 2 and 3. Even if 'Leave' as an umbrella grouping represented 65% of the public, 'Remain' could still end up winning and you can bet that this would cause weeks or months of argument about how the question should be worded, preferential voting options, multiple voting rounds etc.

    453:

    A general election can indeed be done in 6 weeks, which brings us to the 6th of may.

    Which leaves the new EU-friendly government and robust Parliamentary majority just 18 days to either arrange for the elections to the European Parliament or arrange the deckchairs for optimum viewing of the iceberg.

    Presuming the EP elections also takes six weeks to organize, the decision to do so must be made no later than April 14th, which is a sunday, so April 12th it is.

    Next look at the "technical" extension EU have offered in case the May-EU deal does not pass Parliament: April 12th.

    Funny coincidence that...

    454:

    Sorry Greg, caffeine not kicked in yet and I immediately see that you qualified it with "ASSUMING the question(s) were agreed easily.

    455:

    Cobblers

    That's another one of those "there is no theoretical reason it can't be done"... just political ones.

    I think you skimmed over a really important part of what I wrote:

    Inside the UK, the hard Brexit fundamentalists haven't indicated that they would be willing to permit a referendum to take place.

    Perhaps start with Theresa May: why would she now turn round and co-operate with a second referendum? Or how is it that she can't block it? She appears to have already decided to ignore the petition signed by nearly 10% of the people we already knew are opposed to Brexit.

    456:

    The brexit fundamentalists would be outvoted. Petition is now past 2.75 million - will it reach 4 or 5 million by Monday, I wonder - this is a serious expression fo "popular will" - very difficult to ignore at thtis size ( I would have thought )

    457: 357 - And Mayhem isn't an external enemy of the Celtic nations?

    Et seq - Actually, make that an enemy of the democratic process (for any values that mean that democracy is not always "What Mayhem says").

    458:

    They have been ignoring 48% of the people who voted since the referendum. Ignoring a few million people online is easy peasy.

    First it is less than the number of the people who voted leave.

    Then it is less than 50% of the population.

    Then it isn't a 60% supermajority (weren't remoaners saying supermajorities were better?).

    Then... etc.

    459:

    If May's deal is rejected then the 12th April deadline comes into force.

    The EU has said that that deadline can be extended providing :

  • We come up with an actual workable plan to move things on: GE / referendum / serious proposal for Norway+.

  • Agree to take part in EU elections.

  • 460:

    I think the maps shows who the petitioner is represented by
    Makes sense. And, stupidly, if you're British and live outside the UK then you're represented by nobody.

    Anyway, there's a nice button to download a JSON dataset with the numbers in them, including the signatures from outside the UK. The biggest numbers are:

    France 10563 Germany 4669 Spain 5957 United States 3984

    (The petition has been signed by people in 198 countries and territories, including five people in the Vatican City and two in Palestine).

    461:

    You should note that these numbers no longer seem to be updating as of yesterday afternoon - the UK total is stuck at 1.2 million.

    462:

    You do need an active email address.

    A confirmation email is sent after you submit your details, and you must click the link in that email to count as a signatory of the petition.

    463:

    Yeah, I know, I did that.

    I was just correcting the claim that you need a UK postcode.

    464:

    I don't know what changes have been made in the background, but the numbers now seem to update at lengthy irregular intervals (assuming you're talking about the displayed count and not whatever is in the JSON dataset).

    Latest total is over 2.89 million.

    (If you have access to the Twitch streaming service, there is someone who has set up a steam watching the count page. Search on Twitch for "article 50".)

    465:

    I am talking about the JSON dataset. It's no longer updating values, except the headline number.

    466:

    That tells us quite a lot about how they have hacked around the overload problems - now I think of it, they are being very sensible, given their constraints :-)

    I believe that it will have some impact if it reaches 5 million, and may even succeed if it reaches 10 million. The combination of a vote of no confidence and a Humble Petition to revoke article 50 is one of the few things that might persuade Her Majesty to step in - as in #175 ....

    467:

    Sadly it gives ammunition to the terrorists (yeah sure you may have three million signatures but only 1.2 million are from the UK foreign influence EU bots yadda yadda).

    Also the lack of updates to the by-constituency split means people looking at the map are misled as to the scale of the response, and it's not as effective a tool to beat wavering MPs with in terms of their reelection chances.

    468:

    In another interesting development, Lord Adonis is planning to move for revocation in the Lords on Monday. I'm not familiar enough with the process to know how that pathway works. Is a motion in the Lords purely symbolic?

    469:

    I think that you will find the 1.2 million is an artifact of the way they have handled the overload. There may be a few bottish answers but, as someone said, probably not many.

    470:

    Yes, that's 100% obvious to me, you and any sane person who looks at the numbers. But it is excellent ammo for conspiracy theorists.

    471:

    I think that it's clear that if there was a second referendum, the question would be:

  • Accept the deal offered by the EU & Mrs May & leave
  • Leave the Eu withut a deal.
  • It would take an ENORMOUS effort to get "Remain in the EU" onto the ballot. TPTB really want the UK out. So what if it leads to deprivation among the proles. Said proles are stupid enough to vote against their own economic interests, and have lots of newspapers ready to tell them that any economic collapse that occurs was the fault of wreckers.

    472:

    The collapse would be due to wreckers.

    The disagreement would be over who the wreckers are.

    473:

    Reply to self @ 455 Now over 3 million -so kilment @ 460, I suggest you refresh your browser, or something .... @ 467 No it is anything but smybolic. The idea of the Lords' as a guarantor of democracy is not, actually as utterly daft as it might appear........

    Jreynolds @ 470 Yes, I think they will try that & might have got away with it a montha go - now, especially with "That petition" Adonis' move ... not nearly so likely "Remain" has got to be an option, as does, actually "no deal"

    474:

    And this is the kind of conspiracy theorist I was refering to https://mobile.twitter.com/HughRBennett/status/1108682038184419328

    475:

    I said that you had to supply a valid UK postcode; I did not say that it had to be your postcode. (well, not deliberately anyway)

    476:

    I said that you had to supply a valid UK postcode
    Yes, but you don't have to supply a valid UK postocde. You have to supply a postcode. It was perfectly happy with my postcode, 94500, which is not even the right format for a UK postcode, since I'm not in the UK.

    Anyway, this is a ridiculously boring level of quibbling.

    477:

    I am sorry, but, Getting divorced from a narcissistic partner is usually seen as a win for the other party. Sure, there is trouble and financial loss, but, all this will be far less than the accumulated misery involved in keeping ones wedding vows. Just as long as one remembers to change the locks, the passwords, the phone numbers and emails, take different routes to work - because, as we all know, after the divorce, the stalking phase of the narcissist grief cycle will begin!

    However, it is better to be stalked from the Outside!

    Because I live inside the EU and I do believe that I deserve a minimally functioning government, I believe that revoking A.50 is the very worst outcome. This is letting the now slighted narcissist back in, thus confirming the narcissists beliefs "they really need me more than I need them", and then giving it all the access it needs to exact revenge, because there is no way that a narcissist will let an attempted divorce go unpunished:

    Like the the EU parliament filling up with Farange-Types, UKIP'ers and Worse. All of them horribly energised by a fresh infusion of Stale Piss and Fresh Vinegar distilled from "The Betrayal of Brexit".

    Then there are the Tory Brexiteers. Will that lot just fold their tents and go away? No, they will keep at it with even more efforts since they got away with it the first time. Not contended with only calling everyone on the EU-side for drunks, nazis and worse, they will get into positions within Brussels and set about sabotaging everything they can to spite The Germans, The French, fight Socialism and they will team up with the likes of Salvini and Orban with the sole purpose of making the EU as dysfunctional and crap for the 99% as Tory Britain.

    I'd rather end the Brexit Shitshow at this point, on the happy notion that we won't have to for through all that again!

    478:
  • You're not wrong.

  • Brexit can be expected to kill a lot of people. Being civilized obliges a sincere effort to avoid that outcome.

  • Brexit sets up a recipe for dissolving the possibility of government; the historical ancestry of the means starts with tobacco companies trying to avoid legal sanction and has been generalized into increasingly strong forms of tax avoidance. Getting to use somebody else's country as the lab for developing a corrective is preferable to doing it at home.

  • a general-case fix for 3. is really important. The ability to enact the public good rests on the ability to tax, and the civil-stress levels are headed places where there are few examples of retaining enough social cohesion to deliver public goods. (Alfred's Wessex is a disturbingly relevant example.)

  • There's been a custom of winking at criminality among the monied. Disposing of this custom could do a lot to improve matters. The EU is going to be in something like a position to insist.

  • 479:

    Greg Tingey wrote:

    (quoting me) SS @ 383: But I wonder how much of that is bots, non-UK folks, etc.
    Almost zero You have to tick the boxes, give your email address & your UK postcode & THEN the vote still isn't counted until you tick the box on the confirmation email. See also SFR @ 386

    SFR@386 asks the right questions. If I were writing a bot and wanted to have verisimilitude for the data, I'd start generating phone numbers randomly using the UK format and doing whitepage lookups in hopes of getting names and addresses. Then feed those names and addresses to the petition data. Mind you, that's assuming there's something similar to a whitepage lookup in the UK; and assuming you can get a 'reasonable' chance of generating a valid phone number.

    It's interesting to look at the map (see link on the petition page). It seems to match up loosely with the population distributions. So maybe the bulk of the 3,238,126 signatures (as of this minute) are valid. If so, that's about 5% of the UK population. But even if 90% bogus, we're still way, way over the 100,000 threshold.

    480:

    How about this modest proposal:

    (1) The A50 declaration is revoked, so the United Kingdom remains in the EU.

    (2) At the same time, legislation is introduced to remove England and Wales from the UK.

    Brexit becomes a purely internal British affair (I guess "Wales and England exit" would be "weexit"?), and so control is truly "taken back". It's very close to independence for Scotland (OK, they inherit the pesky problem of NI, but at least NI stays in the EU so there is no hard border).

    Not a realistic proposal politically -- the DUP would lose their sh*t, and the Tories are the "Conservative and Union" party after all . Still, it seems no worse than the other proposals on offer, and doesn't really depend on EU backing.

    (I'm only a tiny bit serious, of course, and my apologies if this is an inappropriate time for levity, but it seems like the current state of Brexit requires one to either laugh or cry...)

    481:

    "Getting divorced from a narcissistic partner is usually seen as a win for the other party."

    To continue the divorce metaphor, what about the kids, who are going to starve due to this "no alimony, no child support" divorce? There is an alternative, which is to get the bad partner into therapy/medications, or arrange/enforce a type of divorce which won't cause the kids to starve.

    If the U.K. remains, I think the thing to do is have a "truth and reconciliation" type of committee, which would solicit testimony from people across the spectrum, particularly those like Greg who've been lied to by the pro-Brexit campaign, and to discover how this horrible idea became policy, and learn everything you can about the horrible people who pushed the idea. Nobody gets arrested, but everyone comes clean. Or else. And the U.K. does a real investigation of the Russian connection to all this, because that needs to happen...

    At this point the U.K. is like the guy who painted himself blue, cut a pentagram into his chest, and stood on a street corner screaming at the aliens...

    Someone needs a fresh start. A couple years of medication and LOTS of therapy.

    482:

    Graydon@432 wrote:

    May is, among other things, from the "taxation is theft" faction; it is better than the injured and unwell die than that taxes be raised. (And this is not rhetoric; there's a pile of corpses.)
    Sounds like she needs to read a history of the US from end of the Revolution through the first 10-20 years of the establishment of the US Constitution. A whole lot of such radical notions went right out the window once our elected representatives and the cabinet appointees actually had to run the country.

    Obligatory entertainment reference: "Hamilton", song "Cabinet Battle #1".

    483:

    To everyone who things a bot can scam the system. Maybe.

    But I'd hope the people who set this up at least track IP addresses and make sure they seem to mostly come from the areas that seem to be picked in the vote. I say mostly due to the fuzziness of geolocation of IP addresses.

    And better yet if they deal with the uniqueness of things like this: https://amiunique.org/

    But we don't really know do we?

    484:

    You're doing that "facts are real" thing again.

    "Peace, order, and good government" is mercilessly, painfully, brutally obviously MUCH BETTER than the alternative if, and only if, you have experience of powerlessness. The great weakness of anything hereditary or pseudo-hereditary is that it's run by the Fortunate Child[0]; never been hungry or cold, never had to worry about being hungry or cold, and quite likely their neuroanatomy makes compassion difficult and alien for them.

    People from that background really do disdain facts; facts are excuses from insufficiently diligent minions. And if they have enough power, this view is experientially correct; if you act on that basis, the results consistently suggest that, yeah, just needed to make the minion afraid enough to be sufficiently diligent.

    The thing someone like May would benefit from studying is an in-depth operations history of Hitler's War from the UK perspective. The fact-based types won that war. (And then got propagandized down the memory hole good and hard, because there's nothing the Fortunate Child finds more threatening than alternative social organizations.)

    May wants No-Deal Hard Brexit. May wants to ethnically cleanse the UK. (May's policies have already made a large start there.) May wants the Henry VIII powers to use them to that end. May sees all of that as virtue, not necessity or least-bad-option or anything to which circumstances compel; May's going at this as the positive exercise of virtue. (So are the GOP confederate faction.)

    Any analysis really needs to start there; there's a cohesive, comfortable philosophical basis for believing that they shouldn't pay taxes, that everyone should do what they say, and that they should get what they want, whatever that is. Inside that philosophical basis, what May is doing is as uncomplicatedly virtuous as you or I might find a cure for cancer.

    [0] Georges V and VI and Elizabeth II have been at least medium-dutiful to the (perceived!) greater good; Edward VII and George IV were ... not. Recent long reigns that turn out OK are not an argument for letting the Fortunate Child run anything.

    485:

    As to the survey map, as a feature request it would be neat to be able to switch from an absolute count to a percentage of the registered/eligible/whatever voters in each district.

    Or do all of the elections districts (or whatever they are called) have about the same number of people in them?

    486:

    fjansen @ 476 Like the the EU parliament filling up with Farange-Types, UKIP'ers and Worse They are already ther, or hadn't you noticed? From Italy, Poland & Hungary principally, but they are there ...

    487:

    If the U.K. remains, I think the thing to do is have a "truth and reconciliation" type of committee, which would solicit testimony from people across the spectrum,

    Yes, I think that could work, South Africa had far worse outrages and grievances inflicted on people. They seemed to get over them reasonably better than expected in the end.

    That commission probably needs to have some draconian legal and investigative powers with resources to go with it, to compel the instigators to be honest.

    488:

    "Recent long reigns that turn out OK are not an argument for letting the Fortunate Child run anything."

    And our experiences with so-called representative democracy ARE an argument that it is a much better system?

    As was pointed out a while back, one can demolish the case for the UK becoming a republic with two words: President Blair.

    489:

    Most constituencies have similar numbers of voters, or there are very good reasons why they don't, like Eilainan Siar, which it takes 8 hours to get from one end of to the other by surface transport (when the ferries are running, not a given) or Orkney and Shetland which is even bigger!

    490:

    You may want to use a few more, like "Presidents Tory B Liar and Maybot and her fiat".

    491:
    As to the survey map, as a feature request it would be neat to be able to switch from an absolute count to a percentage of the registered/eligible/whatever voters in each district.

    Try hitting the '% of constituents' button top right!

    492:

    I guess "Wales and England exit" would be "weexit"?

    My 100% silly plan for Wales surviving Brexit:

    1) Plant a really big hedge along the border. Anyone with some spare time this weekend can show up and pitch in.

    2) Change the signs to something less revealing. “Llanymawddwy” becomes “Dinton,” that sort of thing.

    3) Hardly anyone who voted for Brexit cares about Wales, anyway.

    4) Should anyone ask, this isn’t Wales. No, we don’t know how to get there from here. Tourists in Cardiff will be assured that they’re still in Bristol, just turned around a bit.

    5) Maps of the British Isles will label this region “Eastern Ireland.”

    6a) Promise politicians of the Republic of Ireland that Eastern Ireland will never try to unify with them. 6b) Promise politicians of the Republic of Ireland that Eastern Ireland will unify with them any day now. 6c) Promise politicians of Northern Ireland that Eastern Ireland will never try to unify with the RoI. 6b) Promise politicians of Northern Ireland that Eastern Ireland will unify with the RoI any day now. 6e) Something about religion? That’s not a problem, is it?

    7) Success metric: every member of UKIP forgets that Wales ever existed. A country of nothing but mountains, dragons, and an impossible language? People didn’t really think that was real, did they?

    493:

    1) They already have a wall of sorts, called "Offa's Dyke".

    494:

    Duh.

    I hate user interfaces like this. Teeny tiny light blue text on a slightly darker background. Ugh.

    My wife was responsible for airport displays for a while for an airline. (Not content, just the displays and getting the content to them.) It drove her nuts as I would send her pics of every odd/wrong/hard to read thing I saw when in an airport. :)

    495:

    assuming you can get a 'reasonable' chance of generating a valid phone number.

    Firstly, the Parliamentary Petitions site doesn't require a phone number: it needs a name and post code. This is in principle cross-checkable against the electoral register (I doubt they're doing that for routine petitions, but it's available). The electoral register doesn't contain phone numbers, IIRC (don't yell at me, I last ticked the nothing-changed checkbox several months ago).

    Secondly, the phone book … my current one is disturbingly slim; about a quarter the size it was a decade ago, and packed with ads to fill up the white space. Everyone has a mobile, but those aren't listed (numbers being assigned on a national per-network level), and many people no longer have a land line—or if they do, it's solely for broadband, or ex-directory due to spam calls.

    (I have a land line. There is a phone plugged into it, along with a broadband router. But the phone is the dumbest-of-the-dumb wired device, and the ringer is turned off: it only gets turned on to see if there's dialtone, or in emergency. Also, the number has been ex-directory for well over a decade.)

    Now, if you were going to fake out a parliamentary petition the best way would be to buy the public version of the electoral register (it's available for a fee) and create email addresses to order. But a lot of people opt out of the public register (me, for example) because advertisers buy it. And the system could be beefed up to be resistant to gaming it this way by getting new signups to register their email address, and confirm it by sending a verification code through the snail-mail postal system. If your email address is faked you'd get a notification and could raise a grievance: this would raise a flag that the system was being gamed, while creating a cache of confirmed identities for future petitions. (They needn't be personally identifiable if they're stored as some sort of one-way hash.)

    496:

    If you are serious about bots you need to audit. Name and postal code and a bit of work and ignoring privacy violations should get you an identifiable persons. How many you would need to do is a function of how many bots you can tolerate. Something like a sample of ten would get you down to the vicinity of no more than 30% are bots. By the time you get to 100 you are in the low single digits.

    497:

    It's the "representative" part that's the problem with "representative democracy". (That is, we don't get it. When we do get it, things go pretty well.)

    Institutional capture is a tough problem, but it's not an insoluble problem. It is, from a particular general systemic angle, not really even difficult. All you have to do is remove the category of advantage. (That would be the utility of wealth and heredity.) That isn't especially difficult as a "this is what the system needs to look like" question.

    The sort of demented optimist I most entirely am not would be looking at the necessary social convulsion to get through the early post-Holocene and going "what a splendid opportunity". I'm just an advocate of income and asset caps.

    498:

    Come to think of it, you don't have to violate privacy. Walk the post code and ask "are you Name?"

    499:

    Sounds like she needs to read a history of the US from

    She'd give you the exact same answer that a US politician would give if asked to study Brexit in order to avoid falling for that kind of political pathology: "oh, but that couldn't happen here" (a variant on "not invented here").

    American exceptionalism is a thing. Alas, you caught the infection from the British.

    As for Graydon's point … I think he over-simplifies a little. May is part of a now-traditional view within the Conservative party which goes back to Margaret Thatcher, who came to power 40 years ago this summer, and swept away the post-war consensus on essentially Keynsian economics, and replaced it with the snake oil/voodoo of Monetarism. She ditched the Friedmanite dogma pretty quick, but discovered in the process that income tax cuts are popular, especially with the wealthy, who include media oligarchs, and the middle class voters.

    Every bloody time Thatcher called a snap election in the 1980s, she preceeded it with an income tax cut—or made further tax cuts a pillar of her election manifesto and implemented them after victory. Meanwhile, VAT rose from about 5% (on a limited range of goods and services) to 17.5% on practically all the essentials of life except raw food ingredients (which may sound sensible, but bear in mind that cooking requires time which is a luxury the poor can't afford).

    Meanwhile, Thatcher and her heirs distracted attention from the detrimental effects of her tax cuts by inflating the housing market, financializing everything they could lay her hands on, and generating a gigantic credit bubble. After 2010 this couldn't really go much further so Cameron and his cronies sold the public on the austerity scam and began cutting public spending on services that poor people (meaning: proles like us) need, gutting the social security system, strangling the health service, and so on.

    The bill has come due: the popular rage that fuels the brexiters is the anger and despair of those who've been left behind. But May cannot, will not, countenance the possibility that her parties policies for almost half a century have turned the nation into a pre-revolutionary dumpster fire.

    Corbyn, for all his incompetence (he only ran as leader as a protest candidate, to show that the left wing wasn't dead yet: nobody else could be bothered to seek the nomination so he stuck his hand up as a point of principle) wants to fix what's broken, and has a good apprehension about what it is. But his view is too parochial and low-level (I suspect he doesn't understand macroeconomics and the implications of fiscal policy) and he's trying desperately to hold a stricken party together across its various fault lines.

    He's no more up to the job than Theresa May. In fact, most of our politicians are shit this century. Honourable exception for the Scottish Parliament, which rebooted Scottish politics with a clean sheet of paper and almost no legacy code in 2000, and seems to have broadly average-to-excellent political leaders all round, rather than dismal-to-barely-average (as is the case in Westminster). But Holyrood ain't calling the shots ...

    500:

    Yeah, but when I've been in jury selection, most of the rejections were for being not obviously manipulable. Express any strong opinion and you are out. The only real, arguably valid, constraint that I saw in operation is that you need to be a registered voter.

    That said, I'd be willing to restrict the pool of candidates in any way that didn't explicitly select in favor of "enemies of humanity" and did include over 2/3 of the population. But the rule has to be in place well ahead of the selection happening.

    The large pool of candidates is to avoid excessive pre-selection buying of votes. I'm not sure it would work, as slanted news seems to be a very cheap way to "buy votes", but it needs to be tried. The stickier problem is how to avoid candidates being corrupted while in office. That was why I was in favor of a generous retirement package with no other sources of income allowed. (Charlie didn't think double the median income was generous, and perhaps it wasn't. But I do think tying it to the median income is desirable for other reasons. So perhaps triple. But if the govt is doing it's job properly, the purchasing power of the median income should rise.)

    Some folks don't seem to have noticed that the retirement package was a part of the entire arrangement, but there needs to be a firm break between the rule makers and the ability to influence them.

    OTOH!! There's a lot to be said for a royal family that sees the land as their estate to be cultivated. But this has the problem that you need to exclude the short sighted, the ... well, lets just say the primogeniture is a totally bad idea. Allow anyone who is first through fourth cousin to the or a descendant of such to be a candidate, and a "council of elders" composed of all those who were previously candidates, but not selected, to be the voters. Then give the anointed monarch powers similar to those of the US president for life. With impeachment power to that same council of elders. It might work. That way the pool of candidates is small enough that they could be taught the art of governance while growing up, and large enough that anyone unsuitable could be discarded. (But what personality types would that "council of elders" find desirable?) This is vaguely modeled on the way the Anglo-Saxons used to select their king as I understand it. The understanding is, admittedly, probably wrong, but it isn't a close model, either.

    501:

    I object to your use of "nostalgia". That's for, oh, "I remember when Star Wars came out", not "we lived there, saw kids grow up, marriages and deaths there, etc." A home, as opposed to a house, is a repository of a life/lives. Having to leave it means, in a very real psychological way, cutting out part of your life.

    502:

    The only real, arguably valid, constraint that I saw in operation is that you need to be a registered voter.

    That's a state by state thing.

    As a side note, here in central NC there's a reasonably independent research group (mostly social issues) that operates a school for politicians after each election. Most local governments pay to send the winners to it. Things like city councils have authority to do this and NOT do this.

    I've talked to someone who's been through it. Some of the first time winners are a bit surprised when they find out they can't do anything about some of the issues they campaigned on. :)

    503:

    So, did you miss the news stories last year, about how right-wing US billionaire(s) were funneling money to the Brexit campaign?

    504:

    They may have moved the petition website, or at least the page for that petition, there, because it's clear that the original crashed multiple times under the weight of incoming signatories.

    505:

    And currently, the Petition (I think it needs to be dignified with a capital "P") is over 3.4M. Another 1.2M, and it will hit 10% of all registered voters in the UK.

    May-hem will ignore, even though the site says that over 100k, Parliament will consider?

    I'd say that if/when it goes over 10%, people should start writing letters to this elderly lady, to point this out, and that this indicates the people have no confidence in the government....

    506:

    Given the way it works 10% of registered voters is not likely to be 10% of petition folks.

    507:

    On Fermi: You left out a bunch of necessaries, but I don't think it solves the problem. E.g., one thing you left out is that they need to be land based rather than aquatic. Fire and electricity are rather difficult under water.

    That said, the problem is that the order of magnitude of the problem is worse than you suppose. OTOH, there are many possibilities. Perhaps most species don't find robots attractive. Then they'll never develop robot explorers. Or perhaps there's no feasible way for robot explorers to report back home. Again, the desire for robot explorers vanishes. Or perhaps a large moon really is a requirement. Or...

    We don't know all the possibilities. I think many humans would find interstellar travel insuperable because of lag time. But macro-life could solve that problem...if controlled fusion is practical...but would it ever be economic? That requires finding a reason for life in space as a city-species. Virtual reality, if well developed, might make that attractive, but it could also remove the reason to ever go. Etc. etc. etc.

    The thing about thumbs isn't very convincing. Look at how pandas ended up with usable thumbs. Examine the pads of mice. There was a species of dinosaur that, from it's skeleton, looked as if it was evolving into an intelligence that could use tools. (It wasn't there yet, and it was a rare species as far as fossilization.)

    OTOH, it's worth remembering that humanity passed through a narrow genetic bottleneck not too long ago. (It still shows up in our genetic coding.)

    Some people have argued that the development of grammar was the "rare event" that made us distinct, and certainly our FOXP2 gene gives that a certain air of convincingness. IIRC the Chimpanzee FOXP2 gene is more similar to that of the spider monkey than it is to ours. And there are a couple of families that have mutations in their FOXP2 genes, and those with defective versions cannot learn grammar. https://www.google.com/search?q=foxp2+gene+defects

    508:

    You've got your US history a bit wrong. Yes, there were lots of problems with the Articles of Confederation, but the US Constitution was specifically drawn up to protect the power of the wealthy. The Bill of Rights was only added after a huge amount of protest. Even so, only land-owning males, often only land-owning white males, were allowed even a vote.

    509:

    And this was done in a way that removed the vote from non-landowning white men in several of the states.

    510:

    Charlie @ 498 On Corbyn: (I suspect he doesn't understand macroeconomics and the implications of fiscal policy) I don't think he understands it AT ALL, nor international relations - he's against us having anything like armed services yet cuddles up to Hamas & the IRA ... In short "he doesn't understand" - which is why he's even worse than May, unlikely as that would seem ...

    Charles H @ 506 Agreed - but I think you missed the point ... that JUST to get to where we are now is itself a "great filter" which takes a lot of passing. ( And, yes, I'm aware of "fake thumbs" - there's a variety of domestic cat, the "Norwegian Forest" whose "thumb" claws are well-down the sides of their paws & heading in that direction. They can climb a lot better than even most cats (!) & if you get an intelligent one, boy are they trouble ( Guess how I know ) - even more so, if you cross with a naturally-bright-& trouble variety, like a Birman ....

    511:

    So, country verging on a cliff walk with leadership engaged in circular firing squad mode... BUT! on the bright side, all of this has at least earned our humble host a new code word for the next Laundry book: YELLOWHAMMER. So, all is not lost.

    512:

    And it's worth noting that Elizabeth wasn't actual a "fortunate child" as you define the term. She grew up under the blitz. She worked on an ambulance at that time. (Did she really drive it, or was that PR?) So she grew up with knowledge of problems, even if she didn't personally directly experience them.

    For that matter, I've heard it asserted that the excesses of the Victorian period were more driven by Parliament than by the queen. Some have specifically named Disraeli.

    And there are certainly those who have grown up in unfortunate circumstances that see no reason they shouldn't abuse all who fall within their power.

    So it is my contention that it is more a basic matter of personality. The "fortunate child" does have trouble understanding privation, but in some this induces unreasonable sympathy rather than excessive egotism. And all of those come in degrees.

    Shall we wait for May to install her horse as a Minister of State?

    513:

    YELLOWHAMMER is a bird name. There are a bunch of interesting bird names; CORNCRAKE, CAPERCAILLIE, DUNNOCK, all the way along to WRYNECK.

    Out of context there's plenty of threatening overtones.

    514:

    Elizabeth is absolutely a Fortunate Child. Her father participated in a (less nutso-cuckoo; most of what was wrong with Edward VI can be attributed to Albert's degree of nutso-cuckoo) service tradition started by Prince Albert. So Elizabeth has had contact with reality. Elizabeth definitely perceives that they have a job to do, and does it.

    That doesn't mean the Queen's Grace has got any fundamental understanding of being involuntarily hungry, or inescapably involuntarily hungry. It doesn't mean they've got, or could have, an experience of adult social insignificance. It's a list.

    It seems to work far better if the folks making policy for social services understand both those things. (Even if they eventually wind up Frederick James Marquis, 1st Earl of Woolton.)

    515:

    Graydon The thing that sticks in my mind is the way Queenie dropped everything, cleared her diary & went to Aberfan after the disaster. She has been back several times - usually meets the last child pulled from the wreckage, too, he's now in his 60's........

    516:

    And Liebour's splits on brexit ... QUOTE: from Tom Watson, Labour's deputy leader, who has this evening said a fresh Brexit referendum is "the only way" to resolve the current crisis. ENDQUOTE Apparently in opposition to "leaver" Corbyn ... ops. But Watson is correct ... Count now at 3.6 million

    Here is the Watson quote in full: "Brexit is currently stuck in the pipework of Parliament, with MPs split, completely unable to agree or find a way forward.

    "The current impasse is not working for people who voted to leave or people who voted to stay. I really don't think Parliament will be able to resolve this.

    "That's why I've come to the reluctant view that the only way to resolve this and have legitimacy in the eyes of the public is for the people themselves to sign it off.

    "It can only bring closure if we're all involved in making the decision.

    "It can only begin to bring the country back together again if we all have a final say - and then live with the result.

    "So, I have an explicit message for Theresa May: I will vote for your deal or a revised deal you can agree with my party. I will help you get it over the line to prevent a disastrous no deal exit. But I can only vote for your deal - or any deal - if you let the people have a vote on it too."

    If ONLY he was in the job that Corbyn is doing ..... He's a pragmatist, even if I do disagree with him a lot of the time ....

    517:

    Watson's comments are a good start, but he's very carefully not saying what the other option(s) on the People's Vote should be. If it doesn't include Remain it's worthless.

    A lot of people are saying they're afraid of far right and pro-Brexit riots after a successful Remaining - seriously, have they ever met any of these people? An uptick in individual incidents and stochastic terrorism, yes, unfortunately. But they couldn't organise a coordinated violent uprising in a distillery next to a bandage factory, and the right wing are always more dangerous when they think they're winning, when we've given them half of what they want.

    518:

    If so, that's about 5% of the UK population. But even if 90% bogus, we're still way, way over the 100,000 threshold. Sampling can determine the percentage of invalid signers to whatever level of confidence is needed. (well, an upper bound at least; some valid signers would be hard to find.) This could be done pretty quickly. And what Charlie says @ 494.

    In the US we recently had this happen: FCC Chair Ajit Pai Admits Millions of Russian and Fake Comments Distorted Net Neutrality Repeal (Glenn Fleishman December 5, 2018, not sure why https is broken.) Didn't change policy because A. Pai is incapable of shame AFAWK, or at least any shame is overpowered by greed or whatever drives him.

    Which brings to mind: Still, she knew there was a realm of mental experience, taken for granted by humanity, that was closed to her. Shame. Pride. Guilt. Love. She felt these emotions as dim shadows, dark reptilian trash burnt to ashes in an instant by searing ecstasy. She was not incapable of human feeling; it was simply too mild for her to notice. (Bruce Sterling 1995) Greed can be like that. :-)

    519:

    Graydon @ 483 (well-written!) and jrootham @495 covered both points. Oh well. Good thread.

    520:

    I've been reading the Richard Hutton piece recommended here & I've got one question so far ...

    https://richardhutton.wordpress.com/category/brexit-was-the-result-of-a-corporate-lobbying-campaign-which-backfired/

    Who are the Taxpayers' Alliance and do they (did they ever) pay taxes? Or, to put it another way, were there any actual taxpayers in the Taxpayers' Alliance?

    521:

    Well that's unfortunate. No call for tarnishing the bird with the Brexit mess.

    522:

    Apropos of nothing on this thread, but watching someone argue elsewhere on the internet that grumbling about the EU from other member states is indicative of the imminent break up of the EU, yet the government activating a military response team in a nicealr bunker, multiple gag orders, constitutional crisis, warnings from businesses and politicians, should be no cause for panic about the future of the UK.

    The cognitive dissonance of die hard Brexiters is gob smacking.

    523:

    I had a memory switch issue and was initially very worried when the code name leaked.

    But, no, no, the old-school rainbow code for the nuclear artillery was YELLOW ANVIL. (There was also a nuclear weapon codenamed INDIGO HAMMER in that scheme so I am inclined to forgive my memory the confusion.)

    524:

    Kliment @ 460: You should note that these numbers no longer seem to be updating as of yesterday afternoon - the UK total is stuck at 1.2 million.

    I refresh the browser tab periodically. It was up to 3,664,812 as of 16:24 EDT here in the U.S. on Friday, 22 March 2019.

    The map page showing petitioners "location" stopped automatically updating some time yesterday, but if I refresh the browser tab, its number syncs up with the number shown on the petition page.

    525:

    Hey Charlie, have you considered writing some op-eds? Something along the lines of "Brexit is a good start on one of those futuristic dystopias we science-fictions writers are so fond of..."

    526:

    Hey Charlie, have you considered writing some op-eds? Something along the lines of "Brexit is a good start on one of those futuristic dystopias we science-fictions writers are so fond of..."

    That's an excellent idea. I think it would have a good chance of getting into the NYT (Prof. Krugman might be able to help) or several other respectable publications.

    527:

    Well, it looks like DUP are not going to support May if she tries for MV3. I reckon that DUP actually want a hard border with the Republic. They were badly shaken by the abortion referendum and do not want such godless attitudes filtering through to NI. Remainers (including myself :-)) often forget that for leavers culture war issues trump (mot juste!) economics.

    528:

    David L @ 484: As to the survey map, as a feature request it would be neat to be able to switch from an absolute count to a percentage of the registered/eligible/whatever voters in each district.

    Upper right hand corner there's a couple of radio buttons that allow you to select Colour by: [number of] signatures or % of constituents.

    529:

    If he writes an Op-Ed I think it should probably be for a U.K. paper.

    530:

    Having to leave it means, in a very real psychological way, cutting out part of your life.

    I'm cool with that.

    But getting mad at the buyers? Sorry.

    531:

    "The thing about thumbs isn't very convincing."

    It's an interesting demonstration of anthropocentric blindness. All you need is a pair of pliers...

    http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/10/03-weaver-bird.jpg.650x0_q70_crop-smart.jpg

    532:

    Yep, they fixed it earlier this evening - it's now updating only every 20-35 minutes, but the page and the dataset both update.

    533:

    whitroth @ 502: So, did you miss the news stories last year, about how right-wing US billionaire(s) were funneling money to the Brexit campaign?

    I am aware that US billionaires were among the outsiders seeking to influence the outcome of the referendum, but I don't see how that is actually responsive to the question I asked.

    534:

    Perhaps because it's election day here, but that weaver bird nest looks like a cock'n'balls to me. I shall endeavour to reproduce it accurately on my ballot papers.

    (I kid, I kid, I will be casting a valid vote for pro-human parties)

    535:

    “Apropos of nothing on this thread, but watching someone argue elsewhere on the internet that grumbling about the EU from other member states is indicative of the imminent break up of the EU, yet the government activating a military response team in a nicealr bunker, multiple gag orders, constitutional crisis, warnings from businesses and politicians, should be no cause for panic about the future of the UK.”

    The US phrase is throwing stuff against the wall and seeing what sticks’. The people who brought many, ah, ‘no longer operative’ arguments will just make more.

    The last conversation I had devolved to the Brexiteers ranting about how the EU was aggressing against Russia and inviting a Russian ‘counterattack’, which woul destroy the EU.

    536:

    Oops, cue the old Mission Impossible music: Mueller just delivered his final report to his boss, who will maybe start making some of it public as soon as this weekend or something. Next week's going to be doubly exciting now.

    537:

    I was thinking about the petition. If a U.K. citizen wanted to really push the idea of ranked voting, that citizen could arrange two other petitions, "Please give us a Crash-Out Brexit" and "Please give us May's agreement." At that point the numbers on the petitions could show U.K. politicians how the population as a whole feels about all three possible options.

    538:

    If he writes an Op-Ed I think it should probably be for a U.K. paper.

    That might be best -- maybe the Guardian? But the NYT has clout, and would also be more widely read.

    539:

    Charles H @ 507: You've got your US history a bit wrong. Yes, there were lots of problems with the Articles of Confederation, but the US Constitution was specifically drawn up to protect the power of the wealthy. The Bill of Rights was only added after a huge amount of protest. Even so, only land-owning males, often only land-owning white males, were allowed even a vote.

    You're getting just a little bit of cart before the horse. Early days only "white males" were permitted to vote. In some locations there was an additional requirement to own property OR to have an income equivalent to the rent on a certain amount of property. Land was the primary form of wealth from Virginia south, but in the north wealthy merchants did not always own large tracts.

    As the frontier expanded west, it became harder to impose property requirements on the settlers, especially in the "Old Northwest", "Ohio Country" or in the "Louisiana Purchase" and the franchise expanded to more individuals of lesser wealth. And as that happened in the "west", it became more difficult for eastern states to maintain those restrictions on their own citizens.

    It's only after the American Civil war that Constitutional Amendments are introduced to regularize the franchise across all of the states.

    The primary purpose of the Constitution is to protect the [mostly economic] rights of citizens from any of the States in ALL of the States. The Federal government also ensures there are no INTERNAL artificial economic barriers between the States. The Federal government is the arbiter of disputes between the states and ensures that all of the states are treated equally under a national foreign policy.

    The Constitution ensures that citizens of South Carolina are equal to citizens of New York in the eyes of the government of New York (and vice versa) and that goods produced in New York are not taxed in South Carolina at a higher rate than goods produced in South Carolina (and again vice versa).

    The Bill of Rights is added on for the purpose of limiting the Federal Government's ability to tyrannize individual States the way the British government tyrannized the Colonies. Each of the Amendments in the Bill of Rights specifically addresses an "abuse" the newly free States perceived to have been perpetrated on the citizens of one colony or another by British Colonial Government prior to the American Revolution.

    540:

    The Guardian here is giving us a taste of Brexit.

    "For Theresa May, ‘I’m a tin-eared lunatic’ seems to be the hardest word" and a bit of "no shit sherlock" in the "Secret Cabinet Office document reveals chaotic planning for no-deal Brexit". It appears that as well as not being able to organise a piss-up in a brewery, the CUP have the ability to somehow stop the brewery from producing beer while they try.

    Meanwhile in the Sydney Morning Herald the international news is that Thailand has a trans candidate for PM and the US is still a dumpster fire. Oh, and full coverage everywhere of the NSW election with the general theme "not even the journalists writing these articles find it interesting".

    541:

    I agree with the other responses. Moreover, it's worth realizing that with a No Deal Brexit, the Calais Jungle is going to refill with English citizens seeking refuge in the EU, and as it gets worse, probably a fair number are going to die in the Chunnel trying to walk to the mainland.

    542:

    For those who'd like a bit of light relief, the NSW ballot papers can be viewed as PDF's from this page. You'll note that sadly we only got up to Group T, a mere 21 distinct groups for the 346 candidates vying for 21 vacant seats in the upper house. Many of them don't even have their shit together enough to arrange a name for their group (you have to fill out a form!)

    Voting is simple even though there are many options. You can, in both cases, just put a "1" in the box of your preferred candidate/group and that's a valid vote. Albeit a bit half-arsed and you are actively helping candidates you dislike if you do that (unless you do somehow have absolutely no difference in your opinion about any of them).

    543:

    The metaphor casts the fantasies around re-building (or re-partnering with) the empire in a revealing light. It’s the suggestion that after rejecting the marriage with the EU, the UK can go back to its rape victims and former abductees, some of whom had been kept as sex slaves for an extended period, and some only really set free as part of the initial courtship with the EU. These have obviously just been waiting around gagging for the UK’s special kind of lovin’ (featuring the warm afterglow of Rohypnol), though we won’t mention Palestine or Mauritius. Some fantasists appear to regard the USA in this light, which is all the more revealing.

    544:

    Why is group H one that you cannot vote for as a group? Because it has fewer than 15 candidates?

    Anyway, thanks for the humour!

    545:

    "Some fantasists appear to regard the USA in this light, which is all the more revealing."

    Yes Guvnor! We're very anxious to become a colony again! Just give us an hour to cut a birch switch, then run down to the chemist to stock up on lube, and we'll lean over this tree stump so you can do wot-ever you like with us, just like in those Frodo and Sam stories you read every night off your computing device!

    546:

    It’s a curious layout - they are independents with no relationship to each other, but that is also true for groups G, L, S and the missing group U to the right of One Nation (presumably only in terms of graphic design, not politics, though I suppose anything is possible). This does make it pretty clear that if you wish to vote for individual independents, you have to vote below the line and while that isn’t any great intellectual challenge, it’s time consuming and tedious. I’m not sure I follow the rationale behind grouping clusters of independents together for above the line voting — perhaps they really are grouped in policy aligned clusters. If that’s the case, possibly groups H and U simply hadn’t declared themselves and are not included in above the line. Not living in NSW, I have no idea.

    Queensland experimented with optional preferences and only switched back to mandatory preferences recently. The federal election coming up in June will be with mandatory preferences. The thing about independents will be interesting there too. These upper-house ballots that include ticket voting changed only a handful of years ago: parties used to register preferences with the electoral commission so that when you voted above the line, the preferences were distributed according to what had been registered and to express your own preferences you had to vote below the line (which is painful with mandatory preferences - you have to number every one of the potentially hundreds of boxes).

    547:

    Re: 'Mueller just delivered his final report to his boss, ...'

    Any bets on persons of interest that also operate in/have a history/ties to the UK? The scope of this report which thanks to 'Russia ties' ensured that it would extend beyond the US border -- hence the rationale for involving 17 different US agencies. I'm guessing that any foreign POIs named will likely be investigated by their own local authorities. (Okay, excluding Russia.)

    Next step will be to hire about 1,000 legal scholars to parse every documented event. (Would the ABA get involved in this? They pulled their endorsement of Kavanaugh so have already demonstrated willingness to stick their neck out.)

    If anyone else needs a laugh, here's Randy Rainbow's 'Russia Ties' musical parody:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYgi5MyMqCs

    548:

    The thing that's interesting is that there aren't any more sealed indictments attached to the Mueller's report. That's bad news for those of us who were hoping that people closer to Trump would be indicted. And it's also bad news for those who want a clear chain leading straight to the top. I don't know enough about the legal definition of collusion to know if low-level cyberwar comes under that definition.

    It may be that Chris Christie was right, when he said that the Trump campaign was too stupid and disorganized to collude. Or there might be a claymore or two hidden in that report. We'll see.

    Double nailbiter weekend, sad to say.

    549:

    I’m not sure how any content of the report would relate to the idea that it is better for Trump to face an election route, and be charged later when there is no compliant successor to pardon him than to face impeachment, dismissal and a pardon. Would the investigation be obliged to draft indictments rather than simply make public the evidence for another entity to use in drawing up charges later?

    550:

    Remember that people have already been charged, convicted, and turned by Mueller. If there were further indictments, it would indicate that he thought there was overwhelming evidence that someone was guilty of a crime. The lack of such indictments seems to indicate that such evidence doesn't exist, at least to his satisfaction. It may also be that he didn't think he could turn Jared Kushner, to pick a random example. Since DoJ's current policy is that a sitting President can't be indicted, the lack of an indictment for Trump is unsurprising.

    We'll see how it plays out, but my early, pessimistic take sides with the people who say we've basically seen the Mueller report already play out in front of us, and there's very little left to reveal. That kinda sucks, from my perspective. Hopefully I'm wrong about that.

    551:

    The important thing to remember here is that this is a counterintelligence operation.

    Any indictments, reports, etc., which are made public are absolutely the tip of the iceberg. It's entirely possible that there will be no indictments, and a couple guys in Wyoming will get into an "unrelated" car accident, and that will be the end of the matter. Or people who are in fact guilty of something may, rather than facing trial, now have "controllers" who sit in their offices and tell them what to do. Or a hundred other things.

    Or the report may be full of presidential treason and it's going straight to Congress...

    Or someone may have gotten to Mueller and he's hiding something he should have revealed. From where we sit there's no way to know the real truth.

    552:

    I get you. In some things like this, pessimism can turn out in hindsight to look like unbridled optimism too.

    553:

    The thing that's interesting is that there aren't any more sealed indictments attached to the Mueller's report.

    That doesn't mean that he hasn't turned a pile of evidence over to federal prosecutors for the Southern District of New York or New York state prosecutors. Eg, Manafort has now been indicted by the State of New York for mortgage fraud and falsifying business records, which are state rather than federal crimes.

    554:

    The thing that's interesting is that there aren't any more sealed indictments attached to the Mueller's report.

    Mueller is noted for being a by-the-book guy.

    The Special Counsel can indict, but the main job is to present the report to the Attorney General, whose job is to figure out what to do with it. Serious charges may originate with the Attorney General. Political consequences get delivered to Congress.

    Barr is something there isn't a word for, in this situation; he's old and he's evil and Trump thinks he's safe, but Trump has the intellectual attainments of someone who can't really hope to deal with a guy whose formative experiences involve working for Bush pere's CIA. What exactly does an end-career Bush consigliere, who identifies as conservative and a Republican, want to do in this situation?

    I don't think we know what's in the report and I don't think we know what AG Barr is going to do. I wouldn't theorize in advance of the data.

    555:

    Why is group H one that you cannot vote for as a group?

    My first guess was that that's the group of candidates who are not in a group :) But nope, that group is off to the right. I have no idea and now I'm curious. But can't find out. I imagine it's on the official website somewhere but I'm not that curious.

    A bit more on the likely consequences of NSW "optional preferential voting". Unless you number down to one of the final two candidates your preferences "exhaust" and your ballot is no longer relevant to the count (but it's kept around in case there's a recount). It means that for us trendy inner city hipster greenies we go 1:environmental hipster microparty, 2: greens 3: labour and then it doesn't matter any more (in the lower house, where there's normally only 4-7 candidates), and in the upper house we add in a few other small parties before Labour just to increase the chances of getting credible representatives. Labour is the "least worst" final destination for us green types.

    556:

    And that's the flip side right there. Over at the "emptywheel" site the ex-Fed says that a federal prosecutor will only indict if they think their chance of conviction is 85-percent... I'd hate to see America elect those people again merely because Mueller thinks he's only got a 70-percent chance of finding Kushner guilty.

    557:

    Regarding group names -

    It's a bit more complicated then just filling out a form.

    AIUI, you only get a group name if you're a registered party as of at least one year before the election.

    Registering a party in NSW is also more rigorous than what happens federally. You need at least 750 members to each fill out a NSWEC form; those become public documents (so much for member privacy). You also have a $2000 application fee. Nomination deposits are $500/candidate (capped at and effectively $5000 for everyone who wants a group voting square).

    Federally you need 500 members (and you just supply a spreadsheet to the AEC, who keeps it private) and $500 application fee. Nomination deposits are $2000/candidate but you only need two candidates for a group voting square, so effectively $4000.

    558:

    The very interesting thing I thought of is if Mueller found very good evidence that Trump and possibly people in his inner circle qualify as Russian agents under espionage rules.

    The very interesting part of this is the oath of office that FBI agents (and many others, including military officers) take:

    "I, [name], do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God."

    I even heard some people in a local democratic club take this oath, very solemnly.

    Now, let's assume we've got an unequivocally compromised President. If you follow your oath, you defend the US against all enemies, foreign and domestic. So you want to neutralize the domestic enemies of the US. However, a decapitation strike against the President, so that no one's able to, say, declare nuclear war, is also a non-starter, because our ultimate defense posture has the President pushing the button if there are incoming missiles (I'm not even bothering with pre-emptive attacks). So you don't necessarily want to get rid of the President and leave the US defenseless (because there's going to be something approaching civil war if Pelosi suddenly gets elevated in a chaotic situation), nor do you necessarily want to cripple him by removing his inner circle.

    I don't know Barr, but if he's a Bushite, he grew up with that oath, and I suspect it means something to him. It'll be a nasty puzzle for him.

    So I suppose it's possible that Mueller has that evidence, but figured it's well outside his mandate to cripple the White House. If that's the case, then, well, next week's going to be interesting.

    559:

    You need at least 750 members to each fill out a NSWEC form; those become public documents (so much for member privacy). You also have a $2000 application fee.

    I didn't realise it had got quite that bad. Last time I looked it was fewer members and less money but still ugly.

    560:

    The next step, on the primary issue (Trump/Russia) is doubtless testimony before Congress. But I suspect Trump will end up like Al Capone, taken down by something like tax evasion charges coming from the state or one of the regular DOJ units.

    As to the other issue, I think you're probably wrong. If Trump and Pence go to jail, someone gets Nancy Pelosi out of bed and the guy with the football will be sitting on her living room couch. She is next in the line of succession, and runs the country (at least until Trump and Pence make bail - if that's even possible.)

    561:

    The problem is that the only way Pelosi ends up as President is if both Trump and his Pearlfish are impeached, and that takes the consent of the Senate Republicans. Who aren't going to give that consent.

    Since the DoJ has the policy of not indicting a sitting President, Trump won't be jailed on any charges. Although--again!--the Secret Service swears the same oath of office as the FBI (as does the marine carrying the Football), so if they're reasonably sure the President is a traitor, the real Football might end up in Pence's office. Unofficially. This actually happened the day Nixon resigned, when his subordinates disappeared his Football and gave it to Ford so that Nixon couldn't go out in a blaze of glory.

    So we've got a couple of options so far: one is that there are no secrets and Mueller's report doesn't contain enough to indict Trump or anyone else, in which case we're in for a rough two years, and if the economy doesn't tank and the Democrats do the donkey dance, Trump may well get reelected. Or it may be that Mueller's report is the political equivalent of sweaty nitroglycerin, in which case we're in for a rough two years as Republicans get as far away from it as their leashes to the Republican base and Republican donors allow them to go, all the while silently praying that no one twitches too hard.

    Of course, Trump may get tortured for two years because he can't get impeached, get pardoned by Pence, and get away free, and the situation's too bad for him to get away with even trying to wag the dog.

    562:
    runs the country (at least until Trump and Pence make bail - if that's even possible.)

    There is no mechanism whereby the Speaker of the House is only temporarily President -- VP can be acting POTUS, but if there's no VP, and POTUS is out of commission, there is no president.

    563:

    The entire Mueller investigation is in some sense kabuki. People have been treating it as mostly legal kabuki, the necessary process to create something that'll stand up in court.

    The intelligence guys had pretty much the whole thing in real time. The "no interfering with a candidate" custom held because Obama expected Hilary to win and because Obama had a massive legitimacy problem with the confederates and figured it was better for the country to not take McConnell on pre-election over announcing the concerns.

    Submitting the report is ceasing the specific investigative kabuki. That might mean there's agreement that there's nothing further to be gained; it might mean there's consensus on what to do.

    Option 0: there's enough pull being applied that the intent is to sanitize Trump. (This is inconsistent with the amount of stuff about financial crimes that went to the states.)

    Option 1: there's no consensus on the appropriate response. Paralysis/punt to the political, because no one really has constitutional authority for this.

    Option 2: there's consensus, and a growing horror that there's no way to do a sufficient PR op to deal with matters quietly. Time to pick the least damaging thing.

    Option 3: there's consensus, and Congress is going to get the report and a chance to do the right thing.

    Option 4: the Marines have that weird force structure because they're meant to be the President's sidearm. Trump is about to shoot himself in at least the foot.

    I have no second sight, so who knows. But don't forget that the Mueller investigation was kabuki. They knew what was under the various rocks before the rocks got flipped in court-approved ways.

    564:

    Agreed. Pelosi would be acting President. She would not be President unless Trump and Pence were impeached and she was confirmed by the Senate.

    Previous people who were in that particular situation have all been Vice Presidents, and even then they've stayed well-back from "governing" in the usual sense. I suspect that she'd commute to the White House every morning and barring some kind of horrible crisis would not do anything more exciting than pass a budget every year until the next election.

    565:

    "The intelligence guys had pretty much the whole thing in real time."

    One of the possibilities here, though I regard it as highly unlikely, is that Barr decided to stop trying to do parallel construction and instead make a report immediately on the basis that this was too important to worry over sources and methods.

    566:

    Well, take the example of Jeremy Buckingham, who has left the NSW Greens amid allegations of sexual harassment which he vehemently denies. He is standing for re-election and obviously isn’t joining another party, however note where he is on the LC ballot - at the top of Group L.

    It does seem that this must have been planned by the candidates in Group L (see https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/nsw/2019/guide/legislative-council for some explanation - TL;DR, EC is correct and you need to nominate at least 15 candidates in a group to get an ATL voting square).

    So - shrug; no idea how I’d vote in NSW. Most likely something like what you describe above, but I guess I’d need to take the time to read about all the candidates (time I’m not spending, because I live in Queensland).

    567:

    Yeah, because if there's one thing lawyer-happy narcissists need it's more people talking about them. From what I know of him I would never vote for any party or group that included him (which is all strictly other people saying he did things that made them think about lawyers, I don't think I've ever met him). The Greens, especially in NSW, have been suffering a bad case of "we're all nice people" rather than "we have contracts and formal polices to follow when things go wrong". Hopefully they have sorted their shit out now, but AFAIK Cate Faehrmann and the other "right faction greens" are still in the party so it's still a work in progress. I am, as I suspect will shock no-one, a member of a "hard green" ginger party that tries to push The Greens towards policies that match the scientific evidence rather than the political consensus.

    I haven't read up on all the candidates, just the ones that interest me. I very much appreciate being able to number down to Another Liberal Party then stop, because there are some really awful things on the web pages of some registered political parties here, and some of the ungrouped candidates are scary.

    568:

    Damian @ 542 Mauritius? A lot better off, economically & environmentally than Madagascar - kiss goodby to the Lemurs? I do hope not.

    @ 548 WARNING Trmp likely to win in 2020 - "it's the Economy, Stupid" See Indy article HERE for a depressing read

    @ 562 Or ...It's simply easier to wait until the 2020 election & make sure DT is effectively ineligible to stand - especially if the Southern dist of NY takes a really active interest?

    The Count is at almost a 4 million, appears to be slowing - will it make 5?

    569:

    The Australian* upper house system of proportional preferential voting for party lists rather than candidates** was primarily intended to secure the equal (per-capita over-represented) influence of the smaller population states, but it has given the parties somewhere to park Elderly Cynic's talented, negative charisma people, who would struggle with the retail politics of a lower house electoral race.

    Inevitably, that includes reptilian machine hacks whose talent is for working the patronage network to secure a safe spot on the party list, before devoting their careers to intra-party scheming, but also most of the best policy wonks. And Asian lesbian Penny Wong, one of Labor's best minds, who would be unlikely to attract enough of the bigot vote in a lower house seat.

    *Federal and most, but not all, state govts.

    **Unless you really, really want to number all the candidates below the line.

    570:

    Viewed from afar, the EU seems to have conducted itself with remarkable restraint and decency throughout the Brexit process shambles. Essentially, "Look, we're not coming near you while you're waving that knife around, but if you'd like to stop self-harming and go back on your meds, we're here for you".

    I'm mildly surprised there hasn't been a serious effort by say, Spain, to play hardball on Gibraltar or something.

    571:

    I’m not saying anything about Buckingham, like you I don’t know him. In terms of these voting groups, he is at the head of one so I’ve really no idea how that works, even after reading that Anthony Green article.

    Unsurprisingly, I’m a member of the Queensland Greens, I’ve been involved with the Australian Greens for nearly 30 years and I like to think I’m part of the tendency who wants to present the Greens as a viable alternative government rather than a protest party. In so doing, I like to think we’re able to influence ALP policy to be less shit. I was a classmate at uni with both Andrew Barr and Shane Rattenbury, who today are the ALP Chief MInister and the leader of the Greens caucus respectively, who collectively make up the ACT ALP-Greens coalition government. My ex was Shane’s chief-of-staff for ages, though she was also a staffer for Bob Brown. I have never personally held any office as an outcome of politics, though I am a neighbourhood watch area co-ordinator ... and there are some really potentially unexpected things I could say in terms of the politics of law and order (tories suck at it, to start with).

    572:

    I'm mildly surprised there hasn't been a serious effort by say, Spain, to play hardball on Gibraltar or something.

    There has. It got suppressed by the remaining EU27 in the WA but it caused a diplomatic row and Spain was told to wait until the UK is out before bringing it up again. More recently, there was an agreement on protecting citizen rights in the case of no-deal that was scuppered after the UK government objected to Gibraltar being called a "colony" in a footnote added by the Spanish government. So this kind of shit is very much on the table, but there's a whole lot of "we are a united front" discipline which will likely disappear the moment the UK is no longer formally a member.

    573:

    Looking at the graph of signatures over time, it hasn't slowed - yesterday's average is substantially the same as the day before's average votes per minute, it's just that the slope varies less. It went to a much lower rate for the night, predictably, but as people wake up it's picking up again.

    574:

    Thanks. I wasn't aware that had gone beyond vague talk.

    576:

    During the Scottish Independence referendum campaign one of the mantras trotted out by the Better Together lobby was "If Scotland withdraws from the UK then you'll no longer be a member of the EU. If you want to stay in that, vote No to Independence." So Scotland votes by a narrow margin not to become independent. Fast forward a couple of years and Scotland votes by a large margin to remain in the EU. And what happens? The UK as a whole votes by an even narrower margin than the Indieref to withdraw from the EU and Scotland is going to be dragged out anyway. And when we start making noises about a second Independence referendum we're told "No, you can't have one." Wait, what? Aren't we supposed to be equal partners in this Union? Why do we have to ask England's permission to vote on our own future? Did the UK have to ask the European Union for permission to hold the leave referendum? (Answer: No.)

    577:

    I’m a member of the Queensland Greens

    I do hope they have more respect for their members than the NSW ones do. I've spent nearly 20 years being shat on by the The Greens but kept helping them for political reasons. Every single time my contact details have leaked to the organisation rather than someone I am dealing with on a personal level, those have spread to all sorts of people who have then spammed me relentlessly. I have a special email address for Greens donation receipts that I read once a year (they spam it) but last year they told me that unless I'm willing to hand over name, address, phone number as well they will return my donation*. So this financial year I donated to Sustainable Australia and Save the Planet because both of those parties have decent privacy policies.

    (The Greens are "just" unusually bad for this, BTW, many other groups don't have any way to flag donors as "do not contact". But TWS and Bush Heritage do. Even stranger, EDO NSW do but EDO Vic don't).

    • I understand why they have that policy, but it does not work well with their "shared pool of contact details" policy.
    578:

    Re: The commonwealth will come back to us.

    Oh goodness yet. Speaking as an Australian, Brexit has revealed a side of the English that I really thought they had moved on from. For Oz at least, the days of rallying the troops to Gallipoli on behalf of King George are LONG gone. I can see us signing some sort of agreement with the Poms to export our (copious) agricultural products but really, otherwise what would the English be able to offer in return? Those high quality UK cars? (My parents inherited a British Leyland Marina, quite probably the worst car ever made). (Yes, I realize modern UK cars are much better, largely because the companies are no longer run by English management, but we can buy them just as easily from elsewhere). And we are one of the more pro-UK cultures. I'm sure no one in India remembers, say, the Qissa Khwani Bazaar massacre, so I'm quite confident they will be begging for a return of the East India Company. And given the absolutely clueless and tin eared comments I've seen made about Ireland, and the fact that literally everyone seemed to have forgotten about the existence of Northern Ireland....well let's just say I had not expected the English to be quite this deluded. (But then all my English friends are cosmopolitan types who live in London and are horrified by Brexit, so...)

    579:

    GB signatures alone are over 4 million - let's see what the results are by Monday.

    580:

    I think the one bit of complexity is what "know" means.

    As with 9/11, climate change, or the Challenger explosion (to pick three of a rather large number of problems, some of which I deal with), there were (and are) people who have a really good grasp of what the problem is, but the decision makers above them do not, either because they won't listen, can't listen due to loyalty conflicts, or can't get their brains around the problem due to lack of the right skill-set or too many competing concerns.

    I suspect this is at least partially the case with both Russia and Trump's finances. One reason I've been banging on about Harrington's book about offshore finance is that it makes clear how and why those offshore trusts are designed to be as difficult as possible for governments to attack for purposes of forcing rich people cover their obligations. Even if the US government knows where all the pieces are, determining how they go together takes a huge amount of work.

    With the Russian hybrid warfare attack on the 2016 election, the US did see the traffic in real time, but I don't think they knew which of the large number of electronic or physical communications between New York and Moscow (or wherever) were the critical ones for proving that Trump was colluding with Putin, if such a thing even happened.

    "Failure to connect the dots" has been a classic fail mode of US crisis management for decades now, and I'm concerned that it happened here too. It may be that Mueller's work was kabuki and the intelligence agencies were on top of the situation the whole time, but it's equally possible that his work is another connect-the-dots postmortem, in which case he may have succeeded, or he may not. We'll simply have to wait and find out.

    581:

    Brexiteers just don’t seem to understand that when it comes to negotiating a trade deal with the EU after Brexit that the EU has the whip hand. All those sovereignties that the Brexiteers were so mad for, like fishing grounds, or the movement of EU nationals (or Gibraltar for that matter) are going to be on the EU‘s agenda if the UK wants to secure a ‘better’ deal. Brexit is just the first shot in a long long process. You’d almost think they’d never had to negotiate a trade deal as a sovreign nation, oh wait...

    582:

    and the US is still a dumpster fire

    Dumpster fires all over the world cry out in protest over this comparison. Plenty of respectable dumpster fires have been quickly put out and gone on to become just a smoldering heap, and then a putrid mixture of ash and garbage that might be scooped out and disposed of, even leaving the dumpster itself relatively intact. The situation in the US shows no such promise.

    At this point, the US situation bears the hallmarks of something more like the Centralia Mine fires that began in 1962, rage on to this day smoldering hidden beneath the surface, and have every possibility of continuing on for many decades to come.

    583:

    Possibly, though my fear is a replay of what stuck us with "Herr Drumph!" in 2016, the Democrats nominate someone who doesn't upset the donors. Anyone who "The Money" is happy with will disappoint a lot of voters who are ready to stop turning the country into a libertarian theme park. Good luck to us all.

    584:

    I'd hate to see America elect those people again merely because Mueller thinks he's only got a 70-percent chance of finding Kushner guilty.

    A recent story about Mueller's past was big on that is NOT how he works.

    585:

    Is there an online rate graph? I looked and couldn't find one.

    586:

    Previous people who were in that particular situation have all been Vice Presidents,

    Well, there is that Al Haig moment.

    587:

    EC @ 578 By Monday? Over 4 mill guaranteed, over 5 - possibly - but will it be over 6 ( 10% of the population ) is the really interesting question.

    Tim H @ 582 Yeah ... Someone boring & safe & utterly usless, like oh Joe Biden

    588:

    Possible set up for BrExit2 referendum...

    Options: - revoke Article 50 - leave with TMay deal - leave with no deal

    Win rules:

    if #stay > sum(#leaves) and #stay > #leave from BrExit1 ( maybe and %stay >= 53% ?)
    => UK stays in EU otherwise => follow whichever leave option gets the higher count

    { this is biased towards leave to reduce the tantrum level ( wont help with the DUP ) }

    Oh, and no anonymous donors (over, say, £25) for any form of stay/leave propaganda

    589:

    Exactly why I think that if Pelosi took over the government she'd walk very softly. On one hand, I don't think Al Haig did anything truly wrong, except perhaps to phrase an otherwise necessary reassurance poorly. On the other hand, I think the criticism he received, while harsh, is a sign of how very much the U.S. wants to remain democratic.

    590:

    Ehh...

    Haig was widely perceived as being dangerously nuts. The response was far more "what horrible systematic failure let that man anywhere near the launch codes?" than worries about democracy. (Or even the stability of patriarchal white supremacy.)

    The US' current political crisis might be described as a recognition that for the first time in history, there's a generation where the white component of the population is pro-democracy, especially if that lets them form enough of a coalition to permanently replace capitalism.

    (That is, the kids have figured out that the status quo will change, and have opinions about how that ought to go which their elders despise.)

    591:

    Here's one https://odileeds.org/projects/petitions/241584

    It is actually slowing down a bit compared to yesterday.

    592:

    I think Haig got more shit than he deserved, and approximately as much shit as democratic ideals demanded... and yes, he was a little crazy.

    According to Wikipedia this is what Haig said:

    Constitutionally, gentlemen, you have the president, the vice president, and the secretary of state in that order, and should the president decide he wants to transfer the helm to the vice president, he will do so. He has not done that. As of now, I am in control here, in the White House, pending return of the vice president and in close touch with him. If something came up, I would check with him, of course.

    Taken as a whole, I don't find it to be an inappropriate statement. The "I am in control" got taken out of context and spread around. There are some good reasons to dislike Haig, like his idea of a "nuclear warning shot," (shudder) but his statement upon the assassination of Reagan wasn't one of them.

    As to the rest of your post, you might contemplate that the fastest growing demographic in the U.S. is "mixed," and that such people are starting to be elected to Congress. The level of panic over this in some circles is insane, and being encouraged by The Usual Suspects, all of whom should probably be dissolved in acid without benefit of anaesthesia. Note my link about the Giant Right-Wing Grift above if you really want to dig into this.

    I don't think anyone wants to replace capitalism - such a statement accepts the Right-Wing frame - but capitalism definitely needs to be much better regulated than it currently is.

    593:

    Of course the petition is slowing down at 15:45. That's fifteen minutes before Tea-Time!

    594:

    Is May really a xenophobe...? The impression from the other side of the North Sea is that she originally was a bremainer...? I have no idea why she stays in what has to be a thankless job, though. It could be that she's loath to resign authority? And it could be that she's feels bound by duty to do an impossible job as well as possible, because there is noone else to do it? (Corybyn...? Nah. BoJo...? God no!).

    595:

    You're looking at the wrong period of history. This was back before the expansion westwards had really begun. I think Kentucky was still "the dark and bloody ground". But before the US Constitution there was a lot of variation between the different states as to what was what, and who could vote. The Constitution "encouraged" a much larger degree of regularity, and in a way that strongly favored the wealthy. One of the ways limited who could vote. (It isn't in the Constitution itself, but it was involved in its implementation. And it's a lot more complex than this. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_voting_rights_in_the_United_States . To handle this properly would take a book [and I couldn't write that book].)

    596:

    It's not impossible that she is all of: A believer in good government, ridiculously inflexible, not very bright, and possessed of poor social skills...

    597:

    One dumb question and one batshit one:

    The dumb question: What does May stand to gain from a No Deal Brexit? Is there a 100 million pound trust fund waiting for her in the Cayman Islands or something? Or is this the hill she's chosen to die on, because her mind is beaten to a pulp by all the crap she's dealing with and only the drive to succeed at The One Task remains?

    The batshit question: Could this whole Brexit thing be seen as a rather insane attempt to (re)institute aristocratic rule in England? If so, how much of it is new money libertarians, and how much of it is the aristocracy, possibly including (dramatic pause) people in or near the royals (gasp!)?

    I'm being facetious, but similarly stupid things have screwed up the history of democratic countries, most notably in Japan in the early 20th Century. If possible, I'd like to eliminate the batshit from the merely insane.

    598:

    I have a hard time imagining the crime that would cause this president to be impeached by this Senate, and without a Senate that's willing, there's a big question of whether the House of Representatives should vote a bill of impeachment. It wouldn't do any good and would just be more divisive.

    599:

    Actually, Haig was just wrong. There is no conceivable basis for him to claim enhanced authority absent delegation from the President which didn't exist.

    If the VP were unavailable and the President incapacitated, the Speaker is in authority. If that situation doesn't obtain the Secretary of State has his usual authority, which related solely to foreign affairs.

    600:

    The dumb one is partially answered by Troutwaxer in #595, but her characteristics include that she is a authoritarian control freak, probably paranoid with it, and possibly bigoted as well. But I doubt that she is a xenophobe, in the normal sense. Her depiction in the Laundry novels is unkind, but not unfair.

    And, to Steinar Bang in #593, she never was a remainer. She gave tepid support to Pretty Boy Dave's Remain campaign, either out of solidarity or self-interest, but her one speech was effectively damning the EU with faint praise. And she had started banging the drum about the evil ECHR and ECJ long before Davey Boy thought of the referendum.

    The batshit one is, indeed, batshit crazy. The power of the old aristocracy has been fading since the industrial revolution in favour of the plutocracy, and was largely eliminated by WWI (sic). Since Thatcher, the remaining real aristocrats have been both largely sidelined by the Conservative party and have largely given up on being active in it.

    601:
  • Unknown but her husband is in an excellent position to capitalise on the situation, particularly with advance warning. It's not insider trading if it's a whole country is it?

  • That is certainly the aim of some of them, although there are a range of interests at play. Easiest way to find out is to wait and see which factions form as they fight over the wreckage...

  • 602:

    EC @ 599 All too true, unfortunately. It's no longer a "proper" conservative government, with a view to social responsiblity if there isn't one of my distant cousins in it .... And the Cecils backed out, muttering very dark imprecations, about 2-5 years ago ( I forget exactly when ) Been in or near government since 1558, included two (effectively) PM's when that office didn't exist,junior ministers withut number one actual PM ( Salisbury) & one Nobel Peace Prize Winner ... And now they won't touch it with a bargepole ....

    603:

    I don't know about "want to", but capitalism needs to be replaced when there is arbitrarily increasing levels of automation on the near horizon.

    The problem is, how to reward those doing the necessary work sufficiently while those who are unemployable are supported sustainably. It's not clear that there is a good solution, but it is clear that capitalism can't be expected to provide it. I keep having a feeling that people are incapable of running a decent government. E.g., more people were happy with Vlad Tepes as ruler than with most liberal governments. (They could see he was defending them, they could see he prosecuted thieves. So he was a bit crazy, most of them weren't powerful enough to be personally affected. And the honest merchants loved him.) I'm not really sure he lived up to his PR, but that's normal for governments. P.S. and F.Y.I: Vlad Tepes was also known as Dracula. I'm also told that the Russian people loved Ivan the Terrible, and were fond of Stalin. This doesn't say much about how, e.g., the way the Ukrainians felt. I keep having a feeling that people are incapable of running a decent government.

    604:

    Like I said, there's no way to be sure, particularly without the report in hand.

    605:

    The GOP in the Senate will swing if, and only if, the base swings.

    The base swings if they should come to believe Trump "fallen" in some way; that's difficult. They're more or less immune to proof, and the emotional cost/rate of conceptual change are pretty small. But the swing, if it comes, is sharp and abrupt.

    My take is that depravity has been factored in; no one would feel compelled to pretend surprise. Something like provable long-term child sex trafficking might do it, but I doubt Trump is investor-level connected, just facilitator connected. If Trump has actively done something as President that got American service members killed, and knew, and can be proved to have known, that might do it. Some kind of culture-war fifth-column failure could, too.

    Whatever it is, if it is, it'll be a surprise.

    606:

    Automation definitely demands changes, there's no doubt about that. But exactly how that needs to work? I haven't seen any great ideas yet, and must confess that I don't have any brilliant ideas of my own.

    As Climate Change gets worse I think we'll see more and more small farms, usually on a single lot, and it may be necessary to have one spouse stay home and grow the crops, which will need day-to-day care as things get hotter and drier.

    607:

    I don't know about "want to", but capitalism needs to be replaced when there is arbitrarily increasing levels of automation on the near horizon.

    I don't worry about this at all.

    Much of what we need to do in the way of ecological remediation and robust food production optimizing yield per area rather than yield per person takes human labour. There's a nigh-infinite amount of work to do replacing all the infrastructure and housing stock. Employment in the broad sense is just not going to be the problem even if things like phones and solar panels emerge from robotic factories with proportionate-to-output teeny human staffs.

    The problem with capitalism is that it's open-loop. Inputs, products, waste. We can't keep doing that, in a literal material sense, not a moral disapproval sense.

    One way to put this is that an organism turns food into shit. An ecology turns shit into food. (That is, what constitutes shit is contextual.) The machine economy has got the "turn into shit" part down cold; it now needs to become a machine ecology, closing the loop and ceasing to poison the biosphere. There is absolutely no way to do that with prices because it's nigh-impossible to price the future or a second-order side effect. So it has to be constraints, and capitalism (functionally a system to accumulate the maximal pile of money) can't tolerate constraints.

    Market exchange in some contexts? Sure. Great individual wealth and "we can do this all with feedback, constraints are inherently bad"? Nope. Not if we want to keep getting copies of ourselves or our civilizations into the future.

    608:

    Leaving aside sexual depravity or something involving Russia that's so obvious and ugly it can't be argued against, there's one other thing that might cause the base to turn against him, and that's taxes.

    Everyone pays taxes. Right-wingers pay taxes and hate it. Left wingers pay taxes and try to like it. But we're united in gritting our teeth, telling the truth (most people have no choice about this) and cutting the government a check.

    If Trump is a major, obvious tax cheat I very much doubt he'll get re-elected in 2020, and I think New York may just call him on that.

    609:

    More vacation time, for everyone. This is the mechanism for paying people not to work that doesn't trigger the freeloader response.

    610:

    _Moz_ @ 539: The Guardian here is giving us a taste of Brexit.

    "For Theresa May, ‘I’m a tin-eared lunatic’ seems to be the hardest word" and a bit of "no shit sherlock" in the "Secret Cabinet Office document reveals chaotic planning for no-deal Brexit". It appears that as well as not being able to organise a piss-up in a brewery, the CUP have the ability to somehow stop the brewery from producing beer while they try.

    The first article refers to "weekend warrior David Davis". I looked him up in Wikipedia, so I know who he is/was, but what exactly makes one a "weekend warrior" in the UK?

    Here in the states it's primarily an aspersion to denigrate service in the National Guard, although it does have other uses (mainly to denigrate the participants in some weekend leisure activity).

    611:

    Now at 4.5 million - it's certainly going to make "5" before Monday morning ....

    612:

    AND @ 539:

    Why is the critical planning phase the three months AFTER a no-deal Brexit?

    613:

    Because there are too many immigrants with the wrong skin color and too many peasants with the wrong attitude!

    "And did we tell you the name of the game, boy? We call it Riding the Gravy Train!"

    And by the way? Which one of you is Pink? (You'll be eliminated with extreme prejudice.)

    The Church of the SubGenius teaches that once the Conspiracy gets moving, it can crank up the murder machines with surprising efficiency! "There's not enough to eat because of those damn homosexuals!!! Who let all this riffraff into the room? There's one smoking a joint, and another with spots! If I had my way..."

    Congratulations, U.K., you've become a Pink Floyd album!

    614:

    as things get hotter and drier.

    Actually it will get hotter and wetter. Higher sea surface temperatures and higher air temperatures means more evaporation and moisture content which means more clouds and more rainfall inland. One of the warmer areas of earth, the Indian Ocean provides as much as 2500mm of rainfall a year to coastal areas of India. With increasing sea surface temperatures and air temps that amount could increase by 50% annually in twenty to thirty years time according to some calculations.

    615:

    Sean Eric Fagan @ 561:

    "runs the country (at least until Trump and Pence make bail - if that's even possible.)"

    There is no mechanism whereby the Speaker of the House is only temporarily President -- VP can be acting POTUS, but if there's no VP, and POTUS is out of commission, there is no president.

    It actually depends on the timing. If Trump goes, Pence becomes President. Pence would have to nominate a replacement Vice President who would have to be confirmed by majority vote of BOTH Houses of Congress.

    If both Trump & Pence went at the same time, Pelosi (or whoever the Speaker of the House might be at the time if it were a different President/Vice President combo).

    What happens if we have a vacancy occurring in the office of Vice President with a replacement nominated, but not yet confirmed by Congress, when the office of President becomes vacant as well. The Speaker of the House would become President. Whether the nominated replacement Vice President gets a confirmation vote or not would be an interesting question.

    The Line of Succession is Vice President, Speaker of the House, President pro tempore, Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of Defense, Attorney General ... and on down through the cabinet.

    To be in the Line of Succession a Cabinet Secretary must meet the Constitutional requirements to become President or they're skipped over. When Henry Kissinger was Secretary of State, he was not in the Line of Succession. It would have skipped over him and gone to the next in line, the Secretary of the Treasury.

    Also Cabinet Secretaries must be confirmed "with the advice and consent of the Senate" to be in the Line of Succession. The current ACTING Secretary of Defense has not been confirmed by the Senate, so he would be skipped over in the Line of Succession. I don't think Trump has even nominated him to fill the office.

    616:

    Troutwaxer @ 563: Agreed. Pelosi would be acting President. She would not be President unless Trump and Pence were impeached and she was confirmed by the Senate.

    Does NOT require Senate confirmation. If Trump & Pence were both impeached and removed without there being time to implement the provisions of Section 1 of the 25th Amendment (nomination of a replacement Vice President & confirmation by BOTH Houses of Congress) Pelosi becomes President; NOT Acting President, she becomes PRESIDENT, the real deal.

    617:

    The recent ability to use gravity fluctuations to map crustal water content help with this enormously, but we still have to worry about wind patterns.

    It looks like, and there is theory supporting such a thing, that the tropic-temperate-arctic east-west circulation zone division in at least the northern hemisphere is collapsing. It might be replaced by north-south circulation; it might do something we haven't got any hope of guessing. It's disturbingly possible that India and China will see no monsoons -- driven by ocean currents, which are getting stuffed by changing salinity due to ice melt -- fairly soon.

    I would love it if those straightforward "more wet" projections were accurate; Saskatchewan doesn't go desert and may become able to grow stuff it currently doesn't, which is good, because wheat doesn't like hard rain in most seasons. It's not all that likely that they are accurate, alas. There will be more water in the atmosphere, but just where it comes down in what season is tough to say.

    618:

    David L @ 583:

    "I'd hate to see America elect those people again merely because Mueller thinks he's only got a 70-percent chance of finding Kushner guilty."

    A recent story about Mueller's past was big on that is NOT how he works.

    I do think current DoJ "policy" that says you can't indict a sitting President will play a significant role in Mueller's report. I don't know whether he will follow Leon Jaworski's precedent allowing a Grand Jury to name the President as an "unindicted co-conspirator".

    619:

    "weekend warrior David Davis"

    I'm guessing they mean to extend the normal use of "too soft for regular army, but plays one on the weekend" to cover his "brexit brexit all the way... oh this is hard, I quit" bullshit.

    Why is the critical planning phase the three months AFTER a no-deal Brexit?

    Because the people behind Brexit are barely capable of organising a vote for it, the actual process of leaving is clearly beyond them. I suspect that behind the "hard brexit or GTFO" feeling is that everyone in the leadership really, really does not like negotiating with the EU or the detailed planning involved in being a minister. I mean that at an emotional level, we're dealing with a lot of adult "but I don' wanna!" being concealed behind flimsy rationalisations and frantic buck-passing. Which comes back to the comments above about the privileged classes never being forced to live with the consequences of their actions.

    I suspect that the Queen serving during WWII was at least partly a "by God you will get out there and learn what it means to be ruled by someone else's iron fist" life lesson, with a bit of "and you will get what they get and you will be proud to have that privilege". Despite the Giles cartoon(s) showing teams of wait staff serving meals to his nibs in the trenches, remember that compared to "what would Your Highness like for elevenses" even being a "special" member of the services is a bloody great step down. Most of the current government have had their parents fighting their whole lives to ensure that at no time is there ever even the suggestion that something like that might be done to their precious spawn.

    And speaking of bullshit, the ALP have pulled off another defeat in NSW. Another four years of anti-social activism in NSW, and no "risk that the new government won't complete the promised infrastructure", by which the Murdochracy mean digging up the inner city to build motorways.

    620:

    I think generally that it will be wetter and generally places that are sheltered because of wind patterns and geography today will still get more rainfall, not less. There are some hydrological downsides to higher air temps such as increased winter snowpack melting faster meaning spring floods and summer droughts downstream. More and faster isn't necessarily a good thing even to folks who have grown up praying for rain, like Nebraskans.

    It's worth noting, of course, that water vapour is also a "greenhouse" gas of some potency, it's just that it has limits on the amount of it air can carry depending on temperature, hence condensation and precipitation. CO2 and methane don't really have similar upper accumulation limits, at least not ones which get hit a lot (for example the ratio of methane and air would have to reach about 10% before flashover of the atmosphere would remove a lot of the accumulated methane. And a lot of the world's population too but I digress). The other Bad News is that warmer air can carry more unprecipitated water vapour which adds to heat retention, yet another positive feedback factor.

    621:

    OK, we're well past 600, so... The current Brexit mess would make sense if back in the mind of the lady in charge was the thought: "What's the use of granting myself King Henry powers if I never get a chance to use them?"

    622:

    Heteromeles @ 596: The batshit question: Could this whole Brexit thing be seen as a rather insane attempt to (re)institute aristocratic rule in England? If so, how much of it is new money libertarians, and how much of it is the aristocracy, possibly including (dramatic pause) people in or near the royals (gasp!)?

    Referring back to the Richard Hutton piece recommended earlier, it appears to have been an outgrowth of a campaign to privatize government and hand control over to corporate oligarchs. Some of the old aristocracy would have been paid off & been absorbed into the new aristocracy.

    It seems to have been aimed at creating an unrestrained, monopolistic friendly, dog eat dog and Devil take the hindmost Laissez-faire capitalism in the UK of the type Ebeneezer Scrooge would have found most congenial on the day before his ghostly visitations; one free of any pesky restraints on corporations screwing the working class out of their life savings.

    Don't know where the Royals would fit into that, although I expect they would be retained for ceremonial use if for nothing else. Plus they appear to do a fairly good job of attracting tourists & all the money they spend visiting England.

    623:

    The current batch of Royals have a long history of military service, at least for the males. Even the sidekick Phil the Greek served in WWII at the pointy end. I recall George VI went into the Navy at age 14 as a midshipman and was a turret officer on a battleship during the Battle of Jutland in 1916. Chuck was a Master and Commander of one of his mothers Tupperware fleet (a plastic-hulled minesweeper) for a couple of years, Randy Andy flew helos during the Falklands War etc. I'd expect any females high up in line of succession from now on to be encouraged to follow suit at least for a few years before moving on to their Royal duties.

    624:

    _Moz_ @ 618: I suspect that the Queen serving during WWII was at least partly a "by God you will get out there and learn what it means to be ruled by someone else's iron fist" life lesson, with a bit of "and you will get what they get and you will be proud to have that privilege". Despite the Giles cartoon(s) showing teams of wait staff serving meals to his nibs in the trenches, remember that compared to "what would Your Highness like for elevenses" even being a "special" member of the services is a bloody great step down. Most of the current government have had their parents fighting their whole lives to ensure that at no time is there ever even the suggestion that something like that might be done to their precious spawn.

    I suspect Elizabeth is from the generation that believed "Noblesse oblige" applied to them. And there does seem to be some indication the House of Windsor still does believe that (or at least acts like they believe it) to a far greater extent than do the contemporary upper classes in both the UK and the US.

    625:

    It's worth noting, of course, that water vapour is also a "greenhouse" gas of some potency, it's just that it has limits on the amount of it air can carry depending on temperature,

    AIUI (I may not, corrections solicited), that's why the Arctic is getting whacked by warming more than other places. The greenhouse inventory there, due to the low absolute humidity, is more weighted to the CO2 side than in other places with more water vapor in the column. So the same number of moles CO2/m^2 counts proportionally more for warming in the Arctic than it does in moister climes.

    626:

    So the petition has reached two important milestones. The positive one is that it's passed 4.6 million signatures, which is a tenth of the registered voter population (and more than a quarter of the brexit vote in 2016). The shitty one is that it's now up to three death threats delivered to the petition starter's personal phone, which number the terrorists managed to somehow get hold of. This in addition to countless death threats on antisocial media. I guess this suggests the terrorists think this is a serious threat now.

    627:

    "weekend warrior David Davis"

    In his youth he was in the Territorial Army, who continue in civilian life during the week and train at the weekend. Equating the Territorials to the US National Guards or Army Reserve obscures as much it enlightens.

    628:

    The specific possibility I was considering was that Trump and Pence were both arrested and denied bail. In that case, Pelosi would be Acting President and would have to walk very softly indeed.

    629:

    Generally, I think you're right, but expect that the annual figures will be all over the place and the decade average will show the uptick.

    My tendency to go on about every ditch, dam, culvert, etc. being the wrong size relates to this.

    630:

    I suspect that the Queen serving during WWII was at least partly a "by God you will get out there and learn what it means to be ruled by someone else's iron fist" life lesson

    The now-Queen served during WWII because that was a morale-positive reason to send the heir-presumptive of the British Empire out of London. Everything else was secondary; she was in Scotland out of range of air attack.

    Georgius Sextus was the spare; George had got to go into the navy with some overtones of reality (but in many respects sharply limited; anyone else would have washed out for academic performance and then medical issues) and had liked it, and had liked qualifying for a pilot. And then in 1936, when Elizabeth was ten, Uncle Edward got discovered as a nazi and was required to abdicate. (There was a parliamentary faction who wanted to repeat the fate of Charles I; if you want to know why various royals detested Churchill, this is alleged to be why.) George stopped being the spare, and Princess Elizabeth was the heir-presumptive to the British Empire.

    An environment with many fewer rules (that would be the army!) is something the Queen appears to have fond memories of; it certainly helped cement the form of the particular tradition of service, and the Spare being available for real risk. But the idea that joining an armed service is an experience of greater social control for a royal is pretty darn questionable.

    631:

    Nojay/Moz 622/3 All the males ( apart from Edward VIII ) after George V have learnt to fly & been quite good pilots - apparently "Bertie" ( Geo VI ) learnt during the 1920's, when it really wasn't that safe a job - not that being at Jutland was "safe" .... Phil learnt to fly as did Chaz & of course both William & Harry are qualified helicopter pilots with fairly long flying-hours logged. Neither Air/Sea Rescue ( Wllly ) nor attack-heli ( Harry ) is what you might call the "Normal safe job" that say a civilian shuttle heli-pilot might do ... It's a long tradition & it's one of the reasons they are respected - they are prepared to "get their hands dirty" in the practical sense. Note: Phil may be the last living survivor of the Batlle of Matapan?

    Kilment @ 625 Correct - it IS a serius threat, good/excellent. Much as I loathe Sadiq Khan, he is on the right path here - but he he is supposed to represent Greater London & we know how we voted don't we? Finding him in the "same bed" as georgeous George Osbourne is a remarkable turn-up --- "ossie" is starting to demand "Revoke At 50" more publicly, too.

    632:

    May continues to impress me mightily with her staying power. How has she survived her call-to-arms-against-the-Ps speech gaffe?

    Can she survive that gaffe, even now? If she does go this weekend/this week or the following week, then what happens? "please Mr EU, sir, can we have some more time to decide whether to replace her with either Gove or Johnson?"

    633:

    I've often wondered why Whitehall has never finessed all of those 'colony' objection to the Gibraltar overseas territory by, so to speak, pulling a Ceuta y Melilla (or, choose your metaphor: Polynésie française et Nouvelle-Calédonie, Caribisch Nederland, etc.). Spain claims that Ceuta and Melilla aren't colonial misappropriations from Morocco because they're integral to the Spanish state and elect representatives to the Cortes Generales. France takes the same line about French Polynesia and New Caledonia. The Netherlands claims the Caribbean islands of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius, and Saba are special municipalities of the Netherlands. And most of those are off the UN de-colonialisation list based on some pretty thin distinctions from Gibraltar, some small details of government:

    What I've wondered about is whether the UK couldn't end the squabble by (say) adding Gibraltar to western Cornwall's St. Ives constituency for the House of Commons, joining the Isles of Scilly. They are already (since 2004) in the Southwest England constituency for the EU Parliament. The Governor and 17-member local parliament would need to get new hobbies, and Gibraltar would have to put up with being under a vaguely sleazy Tory MP (Derek Thomas), who like all good Cornish pirates hails from Penzance, but otherwise the outcomes would be all good tactical politics, wouldn't they?

    Anecdata: During time spent on Mo'orea, I kept trying to be a gracious visitor and conversing with locals in French. It became very evident that Polynesians there would much rather use English with me, it being not associated with colonialism to them. Or, even better, they took delight in negotiating common ground between their Tahitian and my wife's Hawaiian, those being mutually intelligible. But basically anything but French, s'il vous plaît.

    634:

    I think this has come down to "Parliament is sovereign, and can do what it wants".

    The usual customs exist to keep that core fact from running amok; you don't generally want absolute power, exercised absolutely. But right now, the usual removal mechanisms for a PM aren't available, and it's turned into a stubbornness contest between May (whose party cannot, following the rules, remove her) and anybody who doesn't want a hard Brexit. And as PM, May has most of the cards; it's hard to get something in front of Parliament if the PM doesn't want it to be.

    The difficult now is not so much the running amok as Parliament not knowing what they collectively want. May's got a simple clear objective; May wants the hardest possible Brexit. Nigh-everybody else is still trying to perform political calculations about long term outcomes, and it's a crippling burden of complexity under the circumstances.

    It would be ideal if someone with good drafting skills could get enough access to the schedule to start at the top, as it were -- the UK will cancel article 50, and petition to join Schengen and the Euro. If that passes first reading, great; that's the new policy.

    Then you do "cancel article 50, and join the Euro"; "cancel article 50, and join Schengen"; "cancel article 50", and so on. Somewhere in there it really wouldn't hurt to stick a wodge of the arch-brexiters in the Tower for incompetence and malfeasance. (The "access to the schedule" part may mean starting with the Tower.)

    635:

    In fact it looks like tomorrows (Sunday) papers are full of speculation about when/how she goes.

    What would be a realistic 'good' outcome, with an emphasis on realistic. e.g. is there a May replacement with a realistic chance of winning who might call another referendum?

    636:

    It became very evident that Polynesians there would much rather use English with me, it being not associated with colonialism to them.

    It's a different sense of the phrase "we have the bomb" when the bloody things are being detonated in your home. Not to mention that the French in particular have a set of nasty things they do to those becoming "former" colonies.

    637:

    Another referendum is very unlikely because it doesn't fit inside the EU's deadlines.

    638:

    I see what you mean - it might even help if May does go or is distracted with 'unofficial' removal attempts - parliament just continues regardless. However it needs a 'visionary'-type to step up to lead and enact this. I've no doubt candidates exist, but I don't see any sign of them calculating that their opportunity has arrived (yet, anyway!)

    639:

    May's got a simple clear objective; May wants the hardest possible Brexit.

    Not really. She's inflexible, rather and she was the one (literally, there was a Cabinet decision but she's in charge) who invoked Article 50 to start the process of Britain leaving the EU. She also set up the red lines, no acceptance of the supremacy of the European Court of Justice, no freedom of movement etc.

    She's committed to delivering Brexit. A soft Brexit, a hard Brexit but Brexit whatever the cost because she said she would when Article 50 was invoked. The Irish border problem, no Customs unions, no trade agreements, the situation of EU workers in Britain and the status of British people living and working in the EU and many other problems are secondary to the delivery of Brexit. If all or most of those problems had been solved during negotiations on the run-up to Article 50's implementation then great! A squishy Brexit would be Brexit still and acceptable to her. She's not a Remainer, she's not a Leaver, she's a survivor. I really really thought she'd not make it through the Conference season as Tory leader last summer but then again seeing the sorts of truly inadequate people who might attempt to take her place I should have been less certain.

    640:

    is there a May replacement with a realistic chance of winning who might call another referendum?

    My conspiracy theory that this is all part of a plan so we will all sigh in relief and praise the abilities of Philip Hammond when he becomes PM continues to be viable.

    But no. They won't pick him.

    641:

    AIUI (I may not, corrections solicited), that's why the Arctic is getting whacked by warming more than other places. The greenhouse inventory there, due to the low absolute humidity, is more weighted to the CO2 side than in other places with more water vapor in the column. So the same number of moles CO2/m^2 counts proportionally more for warming in the Arctic than it does in moister climes.

    IIRC, the problem with water in the Arctic with regards to climate change isn't the vapor level, it's clouds and ice, both of which have high albedo. If it's cold enough to have ice on the ground, then that reflects most of the sunlight back into space, resulting in it being even colder. There's a nice little feedback cycle.

    Conversely, as the ice melts, water and land have much lower albedos, so they absorb more sunlight and get hotter more rapidly. It can get to over 90oF in summer now within the Arctic Circle.

    The cloud part is somewhat more speculative: clouds both absorb IR (retain heat) and reflect light (lower incoming energy), meaning areas with lots of clouds tend to be cooler, but have a more equable temperature (due to the heat-retaining clouds) than a desert, which due to lack of clouds and water vapor can be blazingly hot in the day and bitterly cold at night.

    Right now, clouds cover about one-third of our planet, especially towards the poles. There's some good model-based speculation that around 1200 ppm [CO2], stratocumulus (the most common white puffy clouds) largely go away for complex dynamic reasons, the sky over the planet (especially the poles) becomes much more clear, and albedo plummets, again especially at the poles. This situation, once started around 1200 ppm, is reportedly highly stable until CO2 falls to somewhere around 400 ppm, when clouds start to form again.

    The clouds going away thing is a nice solution to a problem that current climate models can't predict the polar climates of the past (from the Paleocene to the Pliocene) accurately: our models make the poles too cold. The solution was often thought to be something about clouds (I know of speculation since 2011), and the brand new clouds-going-away model nicely provides the warm poles that were present in the Cenozoic, up until the end of the Pliocene. The Pliocene was a particular problem, because the CO2 levels were similar to what we have today, and the poles were much warmer. Having clear blue skies across most of the planet apparently makes for a better model of the Pliocene climate.

    Anyway, overly long answer, but water's role in climate is really complex, and depends on what phase it's in.

    642:

    Hehe! OK, so if there is someone trying to pull the strings - lets call him Nessus, would he really pick Hammond? He'd wan't someone he could manipulate as much as possible. He'd want a Trump/Farage-like individual...

    If I wasn't already terrified, this line of thinking would be scaring me.

    643:

    Yeah I read about the “clouds disappear at around 1200ppm” and “don’t come back again till it gets below 400ppm” and how “this explains and accounts for some problems with existing climate models, making them look much more accurate based on the climate record” elsewhere recently too. It translates to a position that there’s a previously anaccounted for tipping point at 1200ppm, where warming is likely to hit an additional 8 degrees beyond what existing models predict. The BAU model gets us there by 2120 or so and we can therefore expect warming up to 12 degrees above the present in that timeframe.

    I suppose I’m concerned that some of the other vaguely anticipated but not well understood tipping points, like permafrost and methane, could get us there sooner.

    644:

    Become? We have been for ages. (Unless you're of the "it's really a Waters solo album" school of thought, I suppose.)

    Should we shout, should we scream What happened to the post-war dream? Oh Maggie... Maggie what did we do?

    645:

    she was in Scotland out of range of air attack.

    Excuse me, but Scotland was within range of Luftwaffe bombers: after the invasion of Norway they acquired bases and mounted sorties against Edinburgh and Glasgow (Glasgow was a strategic target because it was a major shipbuilding centre; Edinburgh because it was a regional capital and a major east coast port—a huge chunk of the Royal Navy was based up the Firth of Forth).

    Edinburgh International Airport got started as RAF Turnhouse between the wars and was the base for three Spitfire squadrons during the Battle of Britain (which saw enough service that they didn't get moved south during peak BoB).

    The key point about QE2 is that she had the whole heir-to-the-throne headfuck dumped on her in her mid to late teens. Her father was the emergency backup spare for King Edward VIII, hence being exposed at the Battle of Jutland; but E8 screwed the pooch by getting too close to that nice Herr Hitler, so a pretext was made to get rid of him (Wallis Simpson) and his kid brother was drafted in as a replacement. Which in turn meant Liz got the trauma of her uncle being publicly shamed and sacked, a harrowing responsibility dropped on her head immediately thereafter, and then a world war on top to ram home the consequences of the job.

    (A monarch fucking up in the middle of a World War is not automatically a war-ending failure in its own right, but is pretty clearly a monarchy-ending failure, as witness the fate of the Hapsburg, Hohenzollern, and Romanov dynasties a generation earlier …)

    "Do your duty and be seen to be doing your duty, otherwise you and your family will at best lose everything and be driven into exile (and at worst be executed by revolutionaries)" is a hell of a life-lesson to absorb in your teens.

    646:

    Thanks Damian! You know, I came back on line to add those very points, and you beat me to it.

    I don't know if we're past the permafrost tipping point yet (still reading up on that), but once we're past that, even if we get to 100% renewable electricity, Arctic methane may boot us to 1200 CO2 EQUIVALENT (remember that methane's a stronger greenhouse gas than CO2), at which point we skid that additional 8oF warmer regardless of anything normal we might do.

    If there's a geoengineering way to rapidly break huge amounts of atmospheric methane down to CO2, that would be a very good thing, although normally I'm leery of geoengineering. Hitting that skid really would plunge us into an extinction event.

    647:

    Philip Hammond has all the charisma of … Gordon Brown.

    648:

    May's got a simple clear objective; May wants the hardest possible Brexit. I see Nojay @ 638 disagrees, but why do you say this? Is there evidence from her actions or talk? Asking as an American, perplexed about the apparent incompetence of the ruling UK political class. (And that's as an American who tracks the ruling American political class reasonably carefully. :-)

    That march in London today was impressive; from aerial video, a very impressive botnet indeed (joke via cstross twitter). And that petition drive is also impressive. (So far looking very real.) (The UK media on both has been depressingly bad.)

    649:

    Excuse me, but Scotland was within range of Luftwaffe bombers: after the invasion of Norway they acquired bases and mounted sorties against Edinburgh and Glasgow

    My (potentially very iffy!) recollection was that western Scotland was out of range, and that Princess Elizabeth's military training took place there. But I'm not finding a reference and reading that particular biography was a long time ago. (Of course, by the actual period, pretty much the whole UK was a no-go. I was conflating the Battle of Britain period and when QEII actually learned how to fix trucks.)

    I was misremembering how late in the war that training happened, or how much of the war Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret spent at Windsor Castle.

    "Do your duty and be seen to be doing your duty, otherwise you and your family will at best lose everything and be driven into exile (and at worst be executed by revolutionaries)" is a hell of a life-lesson to absorb in your teens.

    Yup. And now the notion of duty has likely shifted rather far in the view of the general populace.

    650:

    The Arctic probably tipped thereabouts of 2005. ("A Farewell to Ice" is well written and very depressing.)

    651:

    Arctic methane may boot us to 1200 CO2 EQUIVALENT (remember that methane's a stronger greenhouse gas than CO2), In your readings, have you seen any hints about how long permafrost can pump out methane? (It oxidizes out of the atmosphere pretty quickly.) Any refs to key papers would be appreciated.

    652:
    May's got a simple clear objective; May wants the hardest possible Brexit. I see Nojay @ 638 disagrees, but why do you say this? Is there evidence from her actions or talk?

    May (as PM) is ultimately responsible for the UK's negotiating position with the EU. May picked, or permitted to be picked, an initial position with various "red lines"; no freedom of movement, no jurisdiction by European courts, etc.

    It was obvious at the time that these red lines made any deal impossible; they had consequences to which the EU could not agree. (E.g., the Good Friday agreement.) It was initially possible that May's government was approaching them as a sort of wish-list negotiating position from which they could compromise away in pursuit of the best possible deal for the UK, but that isn't what happened; the red lines, despite it becoming increasingly clear that these make a deal impossible, have been stuck to unwaveringly. (And this goes in both directions! The sort of hemi-demi-semi-thingy deal that Parliament won't support because it doesn't do what anyone wants failed its support in a predictable way. You can go for an equality of dissatisfaction but you can't got for an equality of nothing gained.)

    "The purpose of a system is what it does"; if May's policy choice makes a deal impossible, over a period of years, in the presence of emphatic feedback about exactly why and how it's rendering a deal impossible, that's what it's for.

    Is it machiavellian scheming or having a terrible case Green Lantern fallacy? I don't think it matters.

    653:

    Troutwaxer @ 627: The specific possibility I was considering was that Trump and Pence were both arrested and denied bail. In that case, Pelosi would be Acting President and would have to walk very softly indeed.

    No she wouldn't. It's a specific impossibility.

    There is no Constitutional provision for an "Acting President" other than Section 4 of the 25th Amendment. If Trump were in jail, Pence could become "Acting President". But if both of them were in jail (but not yet impeached and removed), there would be no "Acting President".

    654:

    "...where warming is likely to hit an additional 8 degrees beyond what existing models predict."

    Just to make sure I'm not misunderstanding, we're discussing an additional 8 degrees centigrade is that correct? For an additional 12-15 degrees centigrade total? Also, does it still rain in these circumstances, but by another cloud type/method?

    655:

    I can't see the idea that we allow the executive dept. to crank along for two years with nobody in charge, so how do you think that would work? As I see it, Pelosi would be "Acting President" with or without the legal title, because if not, who signs bills? How do we pass a budget? Who fills a major vacancy? If Trump and Pence are accused of being Putin's creatures, how can we safely allow them to make appointments?

    656:

    "The purpose of a system is what it does"; if May's policy choice makes a deal impossible, over a period of years, in the presence of emphatic feedback about exactly why and how it's rendering a deal impossible, that's what it's for. That's concise and clear; thank you.

    657:

    FWIW the half-life of methane in the atmosphere is on the order of 5 years. It degrades to CO2. Which hangs around a LONG time.

    Methane is a stronger greenhouse gas, but I believe that summed over time most of its effect is while it's being CO2.

    That said, don't forget the methyl cathlates. There's enough methane locked up in them to put us (temporarily) as high as you want...up to, I believe, anoxia. Currently they're being released slowly from fairly deep water, so bacteria eat the methane on its way up and turn it into CO2, but at times in the past there have been sudden catastrophic releases. And one thing that makes the methyl cathlates more likely to release is a warmer temperature.

    658:

    If Trump and Pence are accused of being Putin's creatures, how can we safely allow them to make appointments?

    Same way you are now; the Senate Majority Leader thinks this is an excellent tradeoff.

    (Remember that bit about the Mueller report being kabuki? Senate Majority Leader knows at least some of the intelligence.)

    Any constitutional system requires that the people participating in it prefer its continuation to its demise. (sometimes referred to as "legitimacy".) In the US, that's not the case.

    659:

    Yes celsius/centigrade. And the effect is about stratocumulus clouds, not all types of clouds. Rainfall is a different sort of phenomenon and the impact to losing stratocumulus is in terms of albedo.

    I went googling to find where I read this, and I note that Frank’s piece about this on his own blog from about a month ago is one of the hits.

    660:

    Further to this, the effect is a hysteresis that becomes stable with its own feedback loops, and doesn’t stop till atmospheric CO2 falls below 400ppm again. That’s backed up by the geology and other physical evidence.

    That means even if a release of methane that takes us above 1200ppm CO2 equivalent subsequently within 5 years stabilises 100% to CO2, and that takes the concentration down to, say, 900ppm, that still doesn’t bring back the stratocumulus clouds, the albedo remains low and the average global temperature is still around 8 degrees Celsius higher.

    661:

    Thanks; that pointed to a collection of papers I hadn't looked at previously. Example: Review of Methane Mitigation Technologies with Application to Rapid Release of Methane from the Arctic (2012) (Just started digesting it.) I'm wondering how much of the geoengineering we end up deploying will be biological, e.g. enhanced capture/sequestration of CO2 by engineered photosynthetic organisms, and/or destruction of methane by engineered methanotrophic bacteria and archae. (The later not strictly geoengineering; e.g. would be deployed in waters with high methane concentrations.) Self-replication scales well (perhaps catastrophically well) and such measures could be accomplished by a pocket of surviving high-tech civilization. From that paper, If the beginnings of a rapid methane release are detected, it would very likely be desirable to stage a large-scale technological intervention to contain Arctic methane and avoid triggering the feedback loop. Such an intervention would not replace general efforts to reduce GHG emissions and mitigate climate change, but could be considered an emergency counter-measure to avoid the worst outcomes

    662:

    I don't see the reference, so this may be badly remembered BS, but I seem to remember that methane can saturate the hydroxyl in the atmosphere. So when methane leaks in small amounts, it stays in the atmosphere around 8 years. When it floods into the atmosphere, some of it might last for a century. Again, I don't see the reference for this, so I'm hoping it's not real.

    It's also methane clathrates, but I speil that one wrong a lot too.

    663:

    “And as PM, May has most of the cards; it's hard to get something in front of Parliament if the PM doesn't want it to be.” If J. Random Backbencher, MP were to desire to introduce a motion to the effect of “We’re retracting Article 50, never mind, sorry for the bother,” would they have the power to do so? Who decides who gets to make a motion and when?

    664:

    If J. Random Backbencher, MP were to desire to introduce a motion

    That would be unusual, there are processes that allow it but it's not something that can "just happen". Note that a motion won't cut it, this is substantive legislation and would be introduced, go through the committee process and then come back to the house to be passed. That's assuming it has the assent of the government, of course, otherwise it will die at one of the many hurdles.

    Likely it would be regarded as a confidence matter as well. If the government loses that vote they have lost the confidence of the house and the traditional processes kick in. May and the Cons(1) would at the very least have to find a way to convince HM that they can form a government(2) afterwards.

    (1) band names no one will use? (2) on the evidence they can't

    665:

    https://beta.parliament.uk/collections/6i8XQAfD

    Four hundred years of precedent, more or less.

    The regular workings are not, right now; if the Chief Whip votes against their whip, that's the engine-analogy of "at least one seized piston".

    But, yes, technically. Someone could use a Private Member's Bill or, more probably (no lottery, just scheduling) in the present circumstances, ten-minute rule bill to propose that (since it doesn't raise revenue as its primary purpose), at least if the Speaker agrees. Passing either Private Member's Bills or Ten Minute Rule Bills is hard, and the government controls the scheduling which is a lot of why it is hard, but it has happened.

    One big problem is that this is not supposed to be a fast process; you get three readings, you get the Lords, you get Royal Assent. Scheduling is in the grip of the government very firmly. It can be a fast process, but that requires a disciplined majority government with a strong consensus about the correct action. Under the present circumstances, you'd need an outright parliamentary revolt; someone with the floor just starts moving stuff to a vote. As long as they can carry a strong majority with them and not get snagged in the rules (which means they're a rules-of-procedure ninja of the first order), they can do just about anything.

    Oh, and it might very well make them Prime Minister, because that's defined not as being head of a party but as having the confidence of the House. Which is yet another reason it's really unlikely.

    666:

    JBS: I'd say the Toddler-in-Chief got contructively named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Mueller-filed Michael Cohen guilty plea for tax evasion and campaign finance violations, where the role of 'Individual 1' personally directing campaign-finance and bank-fraud crimes and suborning perjury was heavily featured.

    Moz: Wow, thank you for the article on France's CFA Zone / Colonial Pact scam. I didn't know most of that, only about Paris's tight control over the CFA Franc.

    Rumour (Sunday Times) claims the Cabinet is scheming to throw the May-bot off the island. So, Gove? Lidington?

    On Mueller matters: Seems to me, the gentlemen of the press almost uniformly have misstated a few things.

  • The report to AG William Barr on criminal indictments and non-indictments is neither the main nor most interesting work product expected from the Special Counsel's Office, if only because criminal investigations were a distantly secondary objective. Its main charge has been a counterintelligence investigation into Russian interference into the 2016 election, and all such findings are required by 50 U.S.Code § 3092 to be conveyed directly to the House and Senate Intelligence Committees with no redactions whatsoever (except that highly sensitive findings exposing intelligence sources and methods are to be conveyed to a subgroup, Congress's Gang of Eight. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff made this very point in a strongly worded letter released shortly after Barr's, saying he'll be prying all of that out, including all supporting materials.

  • The 'no more indictments from Mueller' claim in Barr's letter is probably technically true but grossly misleading. At least seven criminal investigations are underway elsewhere directly stemming from Mueller's investigation. Most of these are tightly focussed on the Toddler-in-Chief's business, family, and core staff. And that's not counting any sealed indictments already lined up, ready to be sprung, probably accounting for many of the famous redactions in Mueller's findings in the various known court actions. Unlike the Special Counsel's narrowly constrained scope, those others are free to go wherever the evidence takes them. There are also Mueller-associated grand juries active, such as the one seeking testimony from Roger Stone associate Andrew Miller, and the only purpose of a grand jury is to land indictments. And last, SDNY has suddenly been staffing up with big-hitters such as career prosecutor Audrey Strauss, and isn't doing it to keep her idle.

  • Claims that Mueller's office has shut down aren't even quite correct, as corrections to Friday's news say that he and a reduced staff will remain active for a while. I doubt they're just going to be sweeping out the office.

  • But yes, one limited investigation is ending -- while a large number of more-aggressive investigation have been taking its place and others just getting started. That IMO is the real story.

    (Pedantry reminder: 'Impeach' remains just a synonym for 'indict'; Article II, Section 4 indictment by the House of a Federal officer is thus distinct from conviction & removal by the Senate. Tusen takk.)

    667:

    I remember the same thing. HO gets depleted, CH4 lasts longer. Other effects are that CH4 oxidizes to water and CO2. The water usually ignored but it's water in the troposphere which normally has almost none, so that's a significant increase in GHG, and it also produces more ozone, another GHG.

    https://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/13/285/2013/acp-13-285-2013.html

    668:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IL2XwSkFJQ

    Jonathan Pie gives us "Brexit: What's the f**k is going on?" ... one long rant "Welcome to Great Britain self-obsessed with it's own important while being fed to any trade bloc that's a bit peckish"...

    669:

    Pigeon @ 642 You raise a very valid point there. The Maggon may have been mad - but she was quite forcibly pro-Europe. How come the brexiteers are trampling on her "sacred memory"?

    Chrlie @ 644 Compare & contrast the subsequent careers of: Haakon (Norway), Christian (Denmark), Wilhelmina (Netherlands) & Leopold (Belgium), yes? ... @ 646 ... but Hammond is .. competent - which is rare, anywhere on either front bench.

    661 Agree that a deal is almost impossible given those grounds, picked to pacify the nutters, who will nit, ever, of course, be pacified. But, given that ... I'm beginning to wonder if a different sort of "crash" is desired - so that the Commons CAN take charge, propose a 2nd ref & get a longer postponement, whilst the brexiteer's lies are tashed? Or is it simply incomptence - which seems more likely. NOTE: Apart from the nutters, NO-ONE AT ALL wants a "no deal" P.S. 4.85 million at the moment

    RvdH @ 662 The LORDS or a member thereof could do just that, actually ....

    670:

    Moz: Wow, thank you for the article on France's CFA Zone / Colonial Pact scam. I didn't know most of that, only about Paris's tight control over the CFA Franc.
    Oh, it's a great article.

    Total bollocks, but a great piece of propaganda.

    Everybody I know in the CFA area is just dying to replace the Euro backed stable CFA franc with their own version of the Zimbabwean dollar.

    671:

    Philip Hammond has all the charisma of … Gordon Brown.

    Yeah the only way he'd ever become a leader is if everything was on fire and you needed someone boring and competent to try to deal with things. And what are the odds of that?

    672:

    We shall be able to tell a great deal about the balance of power within the inner circles of the Conservative party by who gets to be caretaker leader. Hammond has a chance only if the Remainers are ascendant, Gove will probably be if the Brexiteers are, Lidlington if the pragmatists are, and Leadsome only if they have lost their marbles completely. But they might well surprise us all.

    673:

    EC STELLA or the other high-profile "Social Democrat" from the W Midlands, whose name escapes me .... For PM - that wouild see some sense injected into the system ...

    674:

    Someone could use a Private Member's Bill or, more probably (no lottery, just scheduling) in the present circumstances, ten-minute rule bill to propose that

    But they won't.

    Brexit is a time-bounded crisis and time is running out.

    A private members bill is vulnerable to being objected to by a single MP, as witness the activities of the odious Sir Christopher Chope in the current parliament. A bill can also be filibustered, although this is rarer than in the US system.

    Upshot: it's going to take some degree of unanimity to solve this. Possibly the whips' offices of both the Conservatives and Labour issuing a three-line whip for a vote of no confidence in the house, thereby triggering a general election, if the European Commission first agrees to allow an extension for it, in order to break the deadlock? (But I'm not optimistic they'd agree to that.)

    675:

    Rick, thanks for the insights, specially regarding 50 U.S.Code § 3092. The US' legendary corporate media believe in providing as little insight and info as possible so of course finding and reporting a statutory requirement to forward the report to the intel committees is something that they can't be presumed to be interested in doing. (Too, contrary to the media's self-promotion, the quality of mainstream reporting during the mid-1960s through Watergate were anomalous, to say the least.) Too, while the Mueller investigation seemed like a big deal when started, it's now the least of Crooked Donnie's problems. There's the SDNY investigation and states getting in on the act. Donnie has almost fifty years of borderline legal activities (mentored by a mob lawyer) so there's a lot of garbage to expose, regardless of prosecutability because of elapsed statutes of limitations. Even better: The House does not have a criminal proceeding's burden of proof. Finally, Donnie grows ever more unhinged. Gonna be a great run up to the election, specially when the GOP realizes that he's a liability but getting rid of him is an even bigger one.

    676:

    I think that it is unlikely that any Labour MP gets to be even a temporary leader of the Conservative party!

    677:

    Yes, though apparently Adonis is introducing such a bill into the Lords on Monday.

    678:

    Charlie ... the LAST FUCKING THING we want is a "General Election" ... we are already far enough up shit creek with no idea of where to look for paddles, without another distraction ... howver, see EC @ 676 about Adonis' proposal for Monday ...

    Petition now only a whisker below 5 million, btw.

    I think our only hope is for Parliament, as a whole to take control, especially as a majority of MP's are Remainers - it's "just" a matter of them getting their shit together, irrespective of Party - another point where both May & Corbyn have fallen down, because they are both putting party before Country.

    679:

    If Adonis' proposal reaches the Commons, Chope will derail it. He's a hard brexiteer and specializes in using procedural means to nuke private members bills.

    680:

    Yeah. Comity and compromise are virtues if, and only if, there's general agreement on objectives and the broad scope of means.

    That's not presently even vaguely the case and the party structure massively obscures what's really going on. It would be helpful if Parliament could sort itself out on a basis of general-agreement-on-objectives right smartly, but it's a very difficult thing to do if you're a politician. (That is, good at getting along, not offending people, and generally looking for points of agreement and the most comprehensive way forward.)

    681:

    Probably. But it's not impossible that a minister would propose it in the commons - if one sandbagged the cabinet (and PM) in that way, the minister would either become an ex-minister or the government would collapse completely immediately afterwards. And it appears that either house can issue a humble address :-)

    I agree that the rabid brexiteers would do their best to ensure that parliament is NOT supreme, by attempting to block any attempt by it to take control and revoke article 50, no matter how clearly all alternatives (and, obviously, the government) have failed. But let's say that May's deal fails again or is abandoned, and it becomes clear that she will simply time us out. A vote of no confidence, followed by a humble address requesting a cancellation of article 50 might pass, in which case either May backs down immediately or we really DO have a constitutional crisis - see #465.

    But it's a mad world, my masters!

    682:

    [use a private-members bill or a ten-minute-rule bill or any of the other ways a lone MP can introduce legislation] But they won't.

    Brexit is a time-bounded crisis and time is running out.

    Oh, absolutely. I would still put the "most likely outcome" as a complete Parliamentary collapse and a default Hard Brexit.

    (That's not anything like desirable and it's certainly not my preference!)

    May need not resign; the Conservatives as a party don't have a compulsion mechanism active in the time frame. May is plausibly committed to NOT resigning until post-Brexit. That could be all it takes. The Conservatives collectively really don't want to face a general election absent delivering Brexit.

    Getting around that takes a combination of an ability to face reality, an ability to sell the necessity to the political class sufficient to carry the House, and an ability to get around the obstruction of the (highly committed!) Brexit faction therein. That's not impossible, but it's really not clear who has the standing to do it.

    683:

    Well as of 2.25pm the remoke A50 broke 5 million (it is now on 5,003,751 signatures). Add to that the million or so who took part in the march and that's quite a sizable number of people.

    Annoyingly though the govt can just ignore it. They'll either just ignore it entirely or say "Oh, most of it was bots" or "Oh, 17.4 million people voted for brexit in 2016". Willing to bet the mail is preparing a headline like this even as we speak!

    Can't help but think now that even if may's dreadful deal went through it would be almost or as bad as no deal. Damage has been done I guess.

    In any other country this would be madness. In the UK it's pure insanity.

    ljones

    684:

    "Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully."

    The petition has hit 5 million.

    While there is, as far as I know, nothing statutory requiring a PM who has lost a vote of no confidence to tender her resignation ASAP, she could expect a summons from Her Majesty PDQ if she didn't, especially right now - possibly followed by arrest by some troops if she refused (they would LOVE that!) At which point, especially if there were no clear temporary leader in the Commons, HM could perfectly reasonably appoint a (preferably cross-bench) member of the House of Lords as a temporary PM, with instructions to hold on until the Commons gets some kind of act together. He or she could then appoint a Leader of the House who would propose such a motion.

    Note that all steps that I can see EITHER involve May deciding NOT to take the ship and its passengers down with the captain, OR a vote of no confidence (which effectively dissolves the Government, though not Parliament).

    685:

    Is it just my crappy old tablet or is there really no mention on the BBC news page of either yesterday's march or of the online petition? I would have thought them topical enough for first page mention.

    686:

    You would have missed the degree of factional capture to which the BBC has been subject, then.

    687:

    Might make some sort of sense from the PM's point of view if she'd become convinced continued EU membership was insupportable, but isn't it common knowledge that any crisis that promises change brings swarms of agenda bearing folk out of the woodwork?

    688:

    I suspect there's effectively 100% overlap between marchers and petition signatories. That is, I expect there are basically no people who participated in the march and did not sign the petition. The government has already stated (two different ways) that they are ignoring the result. May was asked about it when the petition hit the two million mark and dismissed it offhand, whereas Leadsom, when asked about it said that when it reaches 17.4 million, that would be a sign that action should be taken. While the government is likely to ignore this offhand it still has value in that it sends a very clear message to MPs that their constituents are expressing their position in large numbers. Over a fifth of Corbyn's constituency, for example, has signed it. These sort of numbers are loud and hard to ignore without appearing to willfully ignore them, and this has consequences for electability. If MPs feel a general election is looming, they will be all the more motivated to pay attention. Additionally, the level of support shown in this petition for outright revocation shifts the second referendum option further towards the middle of the overton window - if ref2 is seen as the compromise solution to the extreme of revocation, it might improve its support.

    689:

    Charlie ... Never mind the "brexiteer" ... Chope is an unspeakble peice of secondhand shit, who should have his genitals slowly removed, one piece at a time, with a rusty hacksaw.

    Graydon and the party structure massively obscures what's really going on This The left of the tories the Lem-o-Crats, the SNP & the right-&-centre of Labour are ALL "remain" ... but can they get their fucking act together? We have until 12th April to find out.

    EC it's not impossible that a minister would propose it in the commons Hammond? He's leaning heavily in that direction.

    If, Cthulu help us, we get a General Election - & does that mean we get to "Stop the clock" whilst that is happening - I suspect not, in which case an election is futile - though the resuilts would be ... INTERESTING as indidivdual candidates would state their "EU preferwence" & you could get some utterly mad swings, against normal party rules. But it's irrelevant, unfortunately.

    One thing you can be sure of: Brenda does not want a break-up of the UK, which a hard brexit virtually guarantees. How does she maneover to avoid this WITHOUT being overtly political? A suggestion - Ken CLarke as temp PM - he's a leftish tory (biggest party) & solidly "remain" Um, err ... panic

    690:

    Stopping the clock for a general election is an option, but conditional on agreeing to participate in europarl elections in may. This was explicitly one of the "alternatives" that the EUCO mentioned the UK would have to decide between by Apr12 if maydeal fails again. So if the UK formally requested an extension in order to hold a general election, and committed to europarl election participation, a longer extension would be on offer. A slightly longer unconditional extension would probably have been granted anyhow if may hadn't so violently ruled out europarl elections.

    691:

    Chope is an unspeakble peice of secondhand shit, who should have his genitals slowly removed, one piece at a time, with a rusty hacksaw.

    That would appear to be cruel and unusual punishment, and while he soundly deserves it, he hasn't actually done anything illegal (that we know of) — more's the pity.

    IIRC his constituency party has been taking a hard look at deselecting him: enough women vote Tory that he's jeopardizing his own electability through his actions, which are outrage-inducing in the extreme to an extent he doesn't seem to comprehend.

    Longer term, he's created an argument for revisiting parliamentary procedure and how private members' bills are presented and handled. But (I hate to quote Theresa May), now is not the time.

    Brenda does not want a break-up of the UK, which a hard brexit virtually guarantees.

    But she couldn't give two figs for the EU; and meanwhile, she's more concerned with continuity of the monarchy, which Brexit won't obviously jeopardize. Even if it triggers ScotExit, Scotland will remain a monarchy (at least, until (a) Brenda is gone and a replacement proves unsatisfactory, and (b) a party of government decides to take a whizz on the electrified third rail that is republicanism—even in Scotland it's a minority interest, although Brexit shows how rapidly a minor interest can be whipped up into a firestorm under the right circumstances).

    692:

    The prospect of hanging does concentrate the mind, but it doesn't, fear in general doesn't, produce competence.

    In general, fear makes you stupid.

    So unless there's someone in Parliament who has worked out the correct plan some time ago and can articulate it in a way which gains traction, oof.

    (Simple, tempting things like "all votes are free votes" don't create policy, though they would pretty quickly show who your potential allies were.)

    693:

    One other comment: Kenneth Clark is the best Tory prime minister we've never had.

    (I wouldn't vote for him but I'd breathe a huge sigh of relief.)

    Which is of course why it won't happen.

    694:

    The only party in Westminster with a clue what it would do if handed the fizzing burning-fuse bomb that is Brexit is the SNP.

    Again, they've been totally sidelined by the Tories (a unionist party who hold the peripheral nations in contempt) and Labour (who detest the SNP, because the SNP have stolen their former throne as the party of government in Scotland and then had the temerity to encroach in Westminster).

    695:

    Re; March - BrExit protest, online petition

    Canada's oldest TV network covered it. Plus, that May's own Cabinet might pull the plug on her. Probably the only way to legitimize a coup - but is there precedent?

    https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/brexit-march-london-1.5069069

    696:

    Re: Petition reach & penetration

    So far, based on a quick mouse-over of the map, Bristol West (Labour MP) has the highest sign-up rate (24.5%+).

    5,107,660 so far, coming in at about 1,000 per minute.

    697:

    How much do Labour in Scotland hate the SNP? In the 2017 Aberdeen council elections, the SNP won a plurality. Labour refused to support the SNP and entered a coalition with the Conservatives to keep the SNP out.

    698:

    Re: Online petition vs. regular election voter turnout in the UK

    Was curious about voting demos in the UK, and it looks like 90% of folks 65 and older voted in the last election - see source below.

    My question: what percent of 65 and older UK folks have reliable access to the Internet, that is, can 'sign' an online petition?

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/09/young-people-referendum-turnout-brexit-twice-as-high

    If participation patterns vary by age group's media preference/access and you know each age group's policy preferences, then all you have to do to get the public 'vote/okay' you want is insist on using only the medium that supports you. Does the UK have any policies re: universality of Internet access, approved alternate media for communicating with elected representatives/gov't agencies/depts/offices, etc.? I'm guessing that the answer is 'yes', esp. for access to gov't programs. This means that there is precedence for using/including this medium therefore nulls May's argument against heeding an online petition ... which happens to be hosted on an official UK gov't web page. Sheesh!

    https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/241584

    I probably missed a lot of technicalities above so feel free to correct, add, etc.

    699:

    Troutwaxer @ 654: I can't see the idea that we allow the executive dept. to crank along for two years with nobody in charge, so how do you think that would work? As I see it, Pelosi would be "Acting President" with or without the legal title, because if not, who signs bills? How do we pass a budget? Who fills a major vacancy? If Trump and Pence are accused of being Putin's creatures, how can we safely allow them to make appointments?

    It wouldn't work. But it's a problem not anticipated by either those who framed the Constitution, nor by the authors of the 25th Amendment.

    If a situation came about where both the President and the Vice President were in pre-trial detention (not allowed bail), but for whatever reason they could not be impeached and removed, we'd really be in a REAL, No-shit-Sherlock Constitutional Crisis, aka DEEP SHIT!

    I have no idea what would happen. I only know there is no Constitutional provision for there to be an Acting President under such circumstances.

    700:

    Is it just my crappy old tablet or is there really no mention on the BBC news page of either yesterday's march or of the online petition? I would have thought them topical enough for first page mention.

    Not sure on your end, but I saw it in my phone news feed...from the BBC yesterday: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-47678763

    Maybe it's news that's not censored in the US?

    701:

    I don't know, but more than you might think. In the early 1980s, we had the highest proportion of 'computer literacy' and 'Internet' users in the world - largely due to the BBC Micro. Someone of 70 today was only 35 then ....

    702:

    It was on the front page, briefly, but was then buried away. Since That Blair, the BBC has followed the party line nearly as closely as Pravda did in the USSR, including not giving publicity to news hostile to the government's bullshit.

    703:

    EC SLIGHT correction ..."Since that P Mandelson bloke ... actually.. The car-crash of the Iraq war dossiers & the murder of Kelly by the CIA/NAS/USspooks & the exit. stage left of a noted BBC correspondent who now works for the "Standard" , um, errr ... forgotten hos name --- ah... A Gilligan. The BeeB are frightened, which is a disgrace.

    P.S. Is this thread going to run & run to 12th April, or do we get even-more-panicked updates?

    704:

    Actually, there's two separate provisions, which means, effectively, civil war.

    One is that chain of succession, which puts the Speaker of the House third in line for the Presidency. So Pelosi would be the President until the President or VP was considered fit to rule. This would happen, if, to pick a ludicrous example, the Joker hit the White House with his neurotoxic laughing gas and both of them (along with many cabinet officers) were in the ICU while the doctors tried to sort them out.

    The other is the semi-secret emergency system that FEMA created to deal with nuclear war. On the assumption that DC got nuked and that the President, Congress, and the Supreme Court are all shadows of their former selves (sorry), there are plans for a B-Team, or possibly a C-Team composed of current or former politicians appointed by the President to announce that, through various formerly secret executive orders, they've been appointed to Act as President and other executive officers and declare martial law, until they can reconstitute the Constitutional government of the US, which might take years. This is tinfoil hat conspiracy stuff, but apparently it's perfectly real. The system came about as FEMA realized there was no way to evacuate Congress or the Supreme Court in case of a nuclear war. Since most Presidents prefer to go down commanding rather than run and hide, it was decided that a backup executive branch would be created just in case. Apparently the executive orders creating parts of this system go back to JFK.

    So if things get really bad, I could imagine a split between the Speaker (Pelosi) claiming the Presidency under something resembling the Constitutional system, while Trump's backup (Giuliani, perhaps, or Trump Jr., if he ever got around to appointing his emergency backups) claiming the emergency Presidency and declaring martial law to thwart Pelosi. I give this probability zero of happening, but then again, I didn't think No Deal Brexit was sane either.

    On a more rational plane, I suspect the DoJ won't indict a sitting President for the simple reason that you don't want anyone thinking they can pull off a bloodless coup that way. However, I suspect that, just as White House security won't let the President leave the White House grounds without their approval, that Trump and whoever else is compromised may suddenly find that they have no need to know critical bits of intelligence that they might pass to their bosses or use against the country. That way leads to a military dictatorship, but I can see the officers arguing that their oath to defend the country supersedes the Presidents' need to know when the President is one of the enemies.

    705:

    I think you're being a little unfair in comparing the recent BBC with Pravda. Pravda at least took a stand during Stalin's ascent to power, I think? ;)

    706:

    Rick Moen @ 665: JBS: I'd say the Toddler-in-Chief got contructively named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Mueller-filed Michael Cohen guilty plea for tax evasion and campaign finance violations, where the role of 'Individual 1' personally directing campaign-finance and bank-fraud crimes and suborning perjury was heavily featured.

    Constructively", but not EXPLICITLY named as such the way Nixon was by the Watergate Grand Jury. Still, in the immortal words of Mark Slackmeyer, "That's Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!. I expect if there ever are Articles of Impeachment against Trump, tax evasion will feature prominently.

    I don't know how Mueller's report will handle the DoJ POLICY of not indicting a sitting President. He should list all the facts, acts & events that suggest collusion, but I don't know if he will. I don't expect his report to state there was no collusion, but you never know.

    (Pedantry reminder: 'Impeach' remains just a synonym for 'indict'; Article II, Section 4 indictment by the House of a Federal officer is thus distinct from conviction & removal by the Senate. Tusen takk.)

    Which is why I try to qualify my arguments as not just "impeached", but "impeached and REMOVED". Impeached without removal gets us nowhere.

    707:

    Heh. I've been to Tahiti and agree 100% with that. There is definitely some...tensions lurking there. It's actually funny how many places English is the neutral language (eg, it's by far the best language to speak in the Basque).

    708:

    Off topic, but perhaps relevant geopolitical context; https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-venezuela-politics/russian-air-force-planes-land-in-venezuela-carrying-troops-report-idUKKCN1R50ND?il=0

    Probably just Moscow sending a message to Washington not to try to use Venezuela as a diversion during the current events.

    (Although I'm not sure that May will take any notice of such things.)

    709:

    the DoJ won't indict a sitting President for the simple reason that you don't want anyone thinking they can pull off a bloodless coup that way

    Which is the correct behaviour for them, but highlights the weakness of the US system: it's a fork of the British late 18th century monarchy, with heredity replaced by an election as a mechanism for choosing the monarch, and term limits plus regular elections as a backstop in case the elected-monarch goes batshit insane (see also: George III), who was probably front-and-centre in the US founding father's mind at the time).

    The problem with monarchies is that they feature a single point of failure in the shape of the incumbent and the succession. A presidential system isn't as bad as a true monarchy (the line of succession has also been elected and is presumably marginally viable as actual politicians: no eight year old princes and uncles as regent), but it can still be pretty bad (anyone else remember Dan Quayle?). In the case of POTUS45 and his VPOTUS, the succession itself has been compromised.

    (Other presidential systems are better—Israel managed to successfully prosecute at least one president while in office—but then, their presidents tend more to be ceremonial plug-ins for the constitutional power of QEII than an actual hands-on ruler. And as we're seeing right now with Netenyahu, or even Theresa May, the executive power has to vest somewhere, which results in a crapfest.)

    710:

    I'm still reading the Richard Hutton piece along with other bits of history, and it occurs to me that Brexit is primarily because of Business for Britain and the Taxpayers’ Alliance miscalculation during their lobbying campaigns to create a " business friendly regulatory climate" in the UK that would allow them to do to the EU (including the UK) what the British East India Company did to China.

    711:

    So, we get legal drugs, then? Might not be so bad after all...

    712:

    Yeah, cheap fentanyl will flood the streets and narcan will be 50 pounds per dose, kind of like here.

    713:

    Charlie Stross @ 678: If Adonis' proposal reaches the Commons, Chope will derail it. He's a hard brexiteer and specializes in using procedural means to nuke private members bills.

    Is there any way the rest of Parliament could over-ride his obstruction?

    714:

    My question: what percent of 65 and older UK folks have reliable access to the Internet, that is, can 'sign' an online petition?

    I'm guessing that the UK isn't a lot different from the US in that respect, in which case it's ~ 65%. I'm also guessing that education plays a role here and that the connected oldsters have more schooling. That, in turn, correlates to some extent with political leanings and engagement.

    https://www.statista.com/statistics/266587/percentage-of-internet-users-by-age-groups-in-the-us/

    715:

    JBS IIRC, once it's been intorduced, if they are feeling exceptionally muscular, anothe MP cpuld pick it up, or a group could submit the motion, with subtly differnt wording. Much depends upon Mr Speaker - who in this case, would probably get behind it ...

    716:

    Alberta has no notion of how to opt out of Confederation, nor will they ever do so. They do make a lot of hay out of the threat, or at least they try to do so.

    Alberta's government has been a bought and paid for branch of the oil companies for most of the past 50 years. Ironically, the 'leftist' NDP managed to pull the snowball out of the furnace and get elected to a majority last time around, largely through a perfect storm of global oil price collapse and a right wing split between banal incompetent corporatists and extremes - who have now patched up their differences in the spirit of reclaiming control of the gravy train.

    Alberta has been suffering under the yoke of competent governance for 4 years now. Their premier has been working very hard to pretend she is a pro-pipeline oil maven, because any other stance is likely to get one hung from a lightpost. Her efforts will not succeed, the opposition is set to reclaim their default rule for another few decades.

    Quebec may someday separate if they ever get a perfect storm of sovereigntism, economic confusion and cultural chauvinism, but probably not. Demographics are not on the side of the separatists. If they do it will make zero difference to anyone outside of Quebec as their most radical proposals include maintaining the same currency and a customs union. First Nations within the province are likely to kick up a big fuss however, as the provincial government does not have a good history with them.

    717:

    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/03/24/us/politics/barr-letter-mueller-report.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage

    The US AG summary - on a quick scan I read it as - we weren't able to get enough evidence, and we leave it up to the AG to choose whether there are grounds to bring obstruction of justice charges against Trump and others.

    718:

    Heteromeles @ 703: Actually, there's two separate provisions, which means, effectively, civil war.

    One is that chain of succession, which puts the Speaker of the House third in line for the Presidency. So Pelosi would be the President until the President or VP was considered fit to rule. This would happen, if, to pick a ludicrous example, the Joker hit the White House with his neurotoxic laughing gas and both of them (along with many cabinet officers) were in the ICU while the doctors tried to sort them out.

    The Line of Succession only applies to the permanent removal of the President and Vice President. Until both the President and Vice President are either dead or both impeached and removed, the Line of Succession does not apply. There is NO CONSTITUTIONAL MECHANISM by which the Speaker of the House temporarily becomes ACTING President. If the Speaker succeeds to the office, it's permanent until the next regular Presidential election.

    The other is the semi-secret emergency system that FEMA created to deal with nuclear war. On the assumption that DC got nuked and that the President, Congress, and the Supreme Court are all shadows of their former selves (sorry), there are plans for a B-Team, or possibly a C-Team composed of current or former politicians appointed by the President to announce that, through various formerly secret executive orders, they've been appointed to Act as President and other executive officers and declare martial law, until they can reconstitute the Constitutional government of the US, which might take years. This is tinfoil hat conspiracy stuff, but apparently it's perfectly real. The system came about as FEMA realized there was no way to evacuate Congress or the Supreme Court in case of a nuclear war. Since most Presidents prefer to go down commanding rather than run and hide, it was decided that a backup executive branch would be created just in case. Apparently the executive orders creating parts of this system go back to JFK.

    Continuity of Government plans do not have any basis in the Constitution. In the real world, if they had to be implemented, it probably would lead to civil war ... although [see 9/11 below].

    Continuity of Government planning was first initiated by President Truman in 1952. The Eisenhower administration established a number of secret redoubts, most notably the Congressional bunker at the Greenbriar resort in West Virginia. There doesn't seem to be any place for Congress in the Continuity of Government plans since the Congressional bunker was "outed" by the Washington Post in 1992.

    Continuity of Government came under the aegis of FEMA during the Carter administration (FEMA is now an agency under the Department of Homeland Security). The current scheme for Continuity of Government was established by Donald Rumsfeld and his deputy Richard Cheney during the Ford administration. When the plan was invoked by Cheney on the morning of 9/11 it did not include any members of Congress and no Congressional Oversight. As far as I can tell, the only provision for following the Line of Succession in current Continuity of Government plans is to have a "designated survivor" at an "undisclosed location" whenever the President, the Vice President, and other officials in the Line of Succession are gathered at a single location.

    The list of "Designated Survivors" chosen by the current administration does not engender a great deal of confidence in how the plans might work.

    719:

    Long time lurker, first time poster here. Regarding the question of older people signing the petition, for the record I am [nearly] 70 and have signed it. Have good internet access and I think reasonable computer skills [Linux user] I have a friend of similar age of whom the same can be said. I don't think I can add much to what has already been said about the state we are in, except the younger me would never have believed that we would end up being ruled [if that's the word] by such an appalling group of posturing grotesques. I wish I could see hope for a resolution to all this, but I really can't.

    720:

    Please remind me who was the Prime Minister and who the spin doctor? I have have confused the two.

    721:

    What were they smoking when they came to the conclusion that they could loot a couple-dozen first-world countries the way the British looted a country full of differing religons and squabbling feudal types? And why are they still having flashbacks?

    Beuller?

    722:

    Hatred and blame of the Trudeaus is a standard political expectation in the Albertan heartland.

    I grew up in oil country Alberta in the 70s and 80s, and 'It is the fault of Trudeau and the NEP' is basically the root assumption of all political discussions.

    No mention of the preceding NOP federal program which heavily subsidized the AB oil industry. No concept of OPEC and the 70s embargo which made everyone (temporarily) rich.

    It took me a few years away to finally learn a broader context to Alberta politics. From the various postings of my former classmates, they remain convinced that all their problems would be solved if only Ottawa and the rest of Canadians would just give them everything they wanted while continuing to allow Albertans to sneer at them for failing to be on top of oceans of oil.

    723:

    I think you'd like to read a book titled Raven Rock, if you haven't already. The tl;dr part is that apparently Continuity of Government was proved to be broken during 9/11, in that no one could get hold of Bush, Cheney was in the White House bunker, but it was so small and the communications tech was so outdated that he had to leave the blast door open so that aides could keep him in touch with the rest of the world. While I think Cheney is evil, I will give him full credit for deciding to die if the White House was attacked, rather than hide and lose control. Similarly, Rumsfeld was in the Pentagon when the plane hit, and he spent a couple of hours helping carry stretchers until multiple aides forced him back to his office to reassume command. Again, I think he's evil, but in the emergency, he ran towards danger, not away from it as the CoG plans envisioned.

    FEMA had already realized that, Greenbriar, Raven Rock, or whatever, there was no way to get Congress or the Supreme Court out of DC fast enough to avoid the nukes. It was too many people in too many places for airlift, and traffic made it impossible to get them out by ground. Until 9/11, they focused on keeping the President, VP, and cabinet safe, but the system they created failed in 9/11. That's why they went to the designated survivors, who are basically given a special ID card, and envelope full of instructions, and told not to open the envelope unless they survive the nuclear war, at which point they're supposed to assume command of a martial law government consisting of the executive only and restore civilization to the point where the other two branches can be reconstituted.

    I agree with you, it probably won't work in a fairly bloody fashion, but then again, a lot of what FEMA does doesn't work. They recently admitted that their ideas for civilian emergency preparedness have been a "miserable failure."

    Anyway, this discussion is irrelevant, because Mueller found no hint of Trump or anyone in his campaign conspiring or colluding with Russia. I'm a wee bit bummed by that, but there's no constitutional crisis to see here this week, folks, just a smirking wannabe dictator.

    724:

    “I suspect the DoJ won't indict a sitting President” They explicitly have a policy against it, which is why Nixon was deemed an “unindicted co-conspirator.”

    So far as I know the New York State Attorney General has no such policy. So we could theoretically wind up with an “interesting” situation in which Trump can’t visit New York State for fear of a pitched battle between his security team and the bailiffs who want to jail him for failing to turn up for his trial on tax evasion.

    725:

    Neither the Hutton paper or the Mueller enquiry will stop the conspiracy theorists blaming Russia for Brexit and Trump. It would be nice if they did, but those idiots will deny any evidence that disproves their case.

    726:

    Regarding the question of older people signing the petition, for the record I am [nearly] 70 and have signed it.

    My parents are in their 70's and are way more likely to be frustrated that I am not answering their messages on WhatsApp, Faceboo, WeeChat, or any of the twenty different social networks they use than unable to make this new "internet" thing work. My mother particularly gets quite irritated when she has to voice call me like some kind of primitive... there's not even a picture, let alone video like a civilised person uses.

    Mind you, I still remind her that it was her mother who made her get broadband at home so she could use Skype... my gran was a big fan of this "video chat" thing back when ADSL two was bleeding edge and she was past 80 by then.

    Even socioeconomic status isn't the determinant some people might think, my (ex)mother-out-law came here as a Vietnamese refugee and lives on or under the poverty line. She regards internet as essential. That's how her smartphone plays Vietnamese TV, after all :)

    727:

    Well, there's this little bit of legal weaseledness that might gnaw upon the President's entrails...

    See, corporations and foundations are considered legal persons. Trusts are not (it turns out, a trust is a relationship, the others are entities, and thus a government can't tax a trust, only people profiting from it. Therein hangs a multibillion dollar industry, I just found out. Anyhoo...).

    So far as I know, Trump's incorporated, oh, various parts of his business empire. Those are, under the law, persons that can be indicted for crimes, but equally, they're persons that are most definitely not the President of the United States.

    Were I trying to roll up a criminal enterprise, I'd go after all the legal persons that are owned by or tied to Trump, and leave the President alone. For the moment. This kind of thing takes so long that he'll undoubtedly have a pot to piss in in 2021, but after that? Who knows? Maybe he's not as crooked as portrayed.

    728:

    Agreed that they have a policy. The point I made abstrusely is that I think there's a really good reason why such a policy would be in place. While it would be nice to indict a crooked President, they all technically break the law in various ways and forms (sanctioned drone killings outside war zones, for example), so if a malcontent wanted to overthrow the President, they could use the DoJ's ability to legally do so. Even if the DoJ never used that ability, the fact that they theoretically could would politicize the DoJ and make it a bit of an American Praetorian Guard, with all the problems that implies.

    There's an interesting parallel between ancient aristocracies and modern plutocracies. In both cases there are classes of people (the Praetorian Guard, paladins, knights, lawyers, wealth managers) whose key trait is loyalty to the wealthiest individuals in the society and who defend their property against it being taken by their peers, rivals, or riffraff. The difference is that in ancient times, property was land and buildings, while in modern times it's fungible capital. The ethic apparently is very much the same. It's worth thinking about how lawyers are the new knights, as are wealth managers.

    729:

    House of Lords: I'm not well versed in the distribution of powers delegated to the upper half of the bicameral body. I'm not supposing they'd do anything the least bit better here, but why is it that they seem to very much be a non-factor? I thought they too could introduce legislation, and at least bounce things back to the lower body if not completely prevent it from becoming law.

    730:

    Were I trying to roll up a criminal enterprise, I'd go after all the legal persons that are owned by or tied to Trump, and leave the President alone.

    The New York Times did the groundwork. The Trump Organization is more than 500 separate legal entities, most of them limited liability companies. LLCs are not bound in general by the same rules that the various types of corporations are. They own different pieces of each other, in cascades, with agreements between the partners that would be illegal if a corporation tried it.

    Disclosure: I have an LLC. If you contract for a piece of odd math or real-time software algorithms with me, you actually make a deal with my LLC so you can't go after my personal assets. They are ideal for real estate developers: I know a small-time developer who always has 10-12 LLCs in operation, with 3-4 of them disappearing and new ones created in a given year.

    It's one of the reasons that anyone paying attention knew that Trump wouldn't divest himself of his businesses when he was elected. Many of the base assets are illiquid; many of the LLC arrangements require Trump to be the partner, not his kids or some random person off the street; unwinding the whole pile without possibly pushing everyone into bankruptcy is a decade-long undertaking.

    Given subpoena power and enough time, a team of forensic accountants could probably prove at least money laundering. But it would be a lot of work and take years.

    731:

    Re: ' ... legal weaseledness that might gnaw upon the President's entrails...'

    I quickly scanned Barr's letter and noticed mention that Mueller's report included stuff that cannot (by policy) be allowed to be made public. So there's more to the story. Too bad that even if Mueller were ever persuaded to write a book - like every other high profile person who's had to come in contact wit DT* - he'd probably not disclose anything new about this particular investigation.

    • History books will probably note that the DT era produced more NYT best sellers in the 'contemporary politics' category than any other presidential era in American history. When DT finally leaves office, these publishers will be the only folk shedding actual tears.
    732:

    Re: Petition

    Was googling for updates and guess what showed up: this petition has its own Wikipedia article.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revoke_Article_50_and_remain_in_the_EU_petition

    Thank you everyone who responded to my question re: online access/literacy and age demos in the UK.

    733:

    I hope you don't mind to revert back to topic:

    Whereas EU27 have principally agreed to grant an extension, Parliament has yet to change the law that still specifies March 29, isn't it?

    And they'll have to achieve that until Friday … >;-)

    734:

    Heteromeles @ 722: I think you'd like to read a book titled Raven Rock, if you haven't already. The tl;dr part is that apparently Continuity of Government was proved to be broken during 9/11, in that no one could get hold of Bush, ...

    I don't think I'd be interested. If it says they couldn't get in touch with Bush it's filled with self serving lies disinformation. Bush had a full White House communications team with him, including the military aid carrying "the football". Bush talked on the telephone with Condoleezza Rice at the White House before going into the classroom at Booker Elementary.

    The only time Bush was "out of communication" was while he was listening to the students read "The Pet Goat". And even then, while Bush sat there like a bump on a log, Chief of Staff Andrew Card was on the phone with the White House.

    I've always wondered who made the decision to leave Bush exposed like that? Who had the power to over-rule the Secret Service? SOP would have been for them to bundle him up and hustle him out of there. In fact by SOP they should have turned the motorcade around, hustled Bush aboard Air Force One and "di di mau'd" as soon as they realized the plane that hit the World Trade Center had been hijacked.

    Why wasn't The President immediately spirited away to a secure, undisclosed location as the Secret Service supposedly did moving Cheney to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (White House bunker)? Bush is still at Booker Elementary School at 9:30 when he made his previously scheduled statement to the press (time and placed announced by the White House on September 7, although it was not the statement he originally planned to give regarding "No Child Left Behind".)

    As soon as he left Booker Elementary, Bush called Cheney from the Presidential limousine and talked with him while he was on the way back to Air Force One. And apparently just a few minutes before arriving at Sarasota's Bradenton airport at 9:43, Bush received a call informing him of Flight 77 crashing into the Pentagon. Because security decided to take the time to do an extra thorough baggage check, Air Force One did not depart Sarasota until 9:55am - without fighter escort.

    Cheney OTOH, does seem to have been out of touch or unreachable several times that morning. Bush was not. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert was unable to reach Cheney when he attempted to call.

    FEMA had already realized that, Greenbriar, Raven Rock, or whatever, there was no way to get Congress or the Supreme Court out of DC fast enough to avoid the nukes. It was too many people in too many places for airlift, and traffic made it impossible to get them out by ground. Until 9/11, they focused on keeping the President, VP, and cabinet safe, but the system they created failed in 9/11. That's why they went to the designated survivors, who are basically given a special ID card, and envelope full of instructions, and told not to open the envelope unless they survive the nuclear war, at which point they're supposed to assume command of a martial law government consisting of the executive only and restore civilization to the point where the other two branches can be reconstituted.

    Fema had nine years to come up with a new plan for how to include Congress in Continuity of Government after the Washington Post outed the Greenbriar bunker. Even if they couldn't evacuate all of Congress, they could have done something to include Congressional Leadership (Speaker, President Pro Tem, Majority & Minority leaders ... )

    Rumsfeld may have had his head up his ass that morning, but Cheney's Continuity of Government plan worked just fine, and it didn't include Congress. Hell, it doesn't even look like it included President Bush! Note: Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert would eventually be evacuated when the Capital Building was shut down after Flight 77 hit the Pentagon.

    The Designated Survivor program wasn't designed in response to 9/11. It was already in operation for more than 20 years - since Ronald Reagan's inauguration in January 1981 - when 9/11 happened.

    Anyway, this discussion is irrelevant, because Mueller found no hint of Trump or anyone in his campaign conspiring or colluding with Russia. I'm a wee bit bummed by that, but there's no constitutional crisis to see here this week, folks, just a smirking wannabe dictator.

    I will agree the discussion has nothing to do with Brexit, but Mueller's report is equally irrelevant to the Constitutional issues argued here-in.

    735:

    I think if you don't know about the Boeing E-4s you really need to read Raven Rock. It's a history of the Continuity of Government operations by FEMA.

    What they realized, well before 9/11, is that they couldn't build a bunker hard enough to take a direct hit from a Russian nuke. Hence the Nightwatch, wherein they put the President on a hardened plane, get him in the air playing hopscotch around the US, to make him harder to target. That part worked in 9/11. What didn't work, IIRC (and it's been awhile since I read the book) was putting him in touch with the military response to 9/11. And if you remember, that military response was seriously messed up all the way down the chain.

    One big problem, again IIRC, is that the Football didn't give him many options to deal with a terrorist attack. Who's he supposed to nuke? Which strike plan does he call, if it wasn't China or Russia that launched it? Would he trigger WW3 if he nuked Afghanistan and the Russians or Chinese freaked out about a live US nuke going through their airspace.

    The communications failures, again IIRC, is sort of a recurring leitmotif with FEMA and CoG. They assemble something, it sits around for a few decades, and it either gets so ratty that it's abandoned or a President gets the budget to upgrade, or it fails in use and forces everyone to do a rethink.

    Apparently under Bush and Obama, there was a big rethink about CoG, and it's no focused around Raven Rock, Greenbriar, or any of the other well-known locations. Massive underground construction around the Capitol and a certain National Guard base may or may not be linked to it.

    736:

    All that is required to change the date is a Statutory Instrument to amend the data and that has been published.

    A Statutory Instrument takes effect unless it is objected to and goes to a vote - the odds of that vote being lost is so small that the ERG won't object to it...

    737:

    Heteromeles @ 725 ( And everybody else ) Very important distinction. A "TRUST" in UK law & one in US law are very, very different beasties. A US trust is a cabal of business-people or corprations, in the UK it is usually a fund set up to cover expenses ( such as a will ), or to govern a chatiable intitution - it's more complicated than that, of course, but. PLEASE do not confuse the two?

    @ 734 Hmmm ... because the Pres is C-in-C? Our C-in-C is ... HM. Delegated to the PM, of course ... but the last PM to see actual military service was Jim Calorgas A situation I hope we never see, but the chain of command would be interesting

    738:

    But, as Ben Kilgore says, if that is not done, the situation becomes insane on March 29th. It would not the the first time that such a change has been made post hoc., but I don't think ever such an important one.

    To Jim D: yes. But see previous remarks about Lord Adonis.

    On the matter of HM's influence, the following article is interesting:

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47669586

    739:

    The petition now has as many signatures as the entire population of Scotland (and more than the population of Wales and NI). And Fox (the toryrrist, not the channel) has stated that he expects government to ignore any indicative vote outcome that isn't maydeal or nodeal.

    740:

    Unless May is brought to heel, Fox is probably right.

    741:

    Actually Greg, there's a whole family of things called trusts around the world, but in particular, I'm afraid you're incorrect. Trusts are a British invention (dating back to the Crusades) that are used around the world for many things, especially in common law countries like the US.

    Per Wikipedia (trust law) "A trust is a three-party fiduciary relationship in which the first party, the trustor or settlor, transfers ("settles") a property (often but not necessarily a sum of money) upon the second party (the trustee) for the benefit of the third party, the beneficiary."

    To use a really common example in the US, a family settles their house into trust, makes themselves and their heirs both the trustees and beneficiaries of that trust, and when the elders die, the remaining trustees, their heirs, dissolve the trust. They then become the beneficiaries and own the house or the proceeds from selling it, while avoiding probate and estate taxes, which are more expensive than creating the trust.

    The same mechanism can be used by business owners who want to avoid taxes. They settle their business in a trust, hire a bunch of trustees to manage it, and make themselves (or something more complicated) the beneficiaries. The hired trustees do whatever the settlors tell them to do (with exceptions like not paying court-ordered payments like alimony because they don't control the money in the trust). The business owners therefore claim legitimately that they do not own the business, and then do not pay taxes on profits from it. They only pay taxes on money distributed to them by the trust. The trust does not pay taxes because it is a relationship between the trustees and the beneficiaries, not a legal person as a corporation would be, and so on. And yes, I'm oversimplifying, because I'm very naive about the huge world of trusts that are out there.

    The origin of trusts was when crusading knights entrusted their land and dependents to a trustee (generally their closest friend or kinsman), who would look after the land and family until the knight returned. If he didn't return, the trustee would manage the land for the benefit of the family, rather than taking it as his own property and dispossessing the dead knight's family, until the knight's heirs were grown, his widow remarried, or whatever. These first trusts were done voluntarily through swearing a sacred oath, typically in a church, in the presence of clergy, family, holy relics, and whatever else would convince everyone that this was about trust, not profit. Because of the nature of the oath, breach of trust was judged in ecclesiastical courts, not civil courts.

    Because trusts were a church matter for centuries before civil corporations and foundations were thought up, they've typically been treated as very separate entities by the law today, even though there's a lot of overlap between what you can now do with a trust, a foundation, or a corporation. The notion of even paying a trustee was anathema until the late 19th century, and the field only started becoming credentialed and professionalized, through the efforts of the Society of Trust and Estate Planners, starting IIRC in the 1980s or so.

    I'm got this out of Harrington's book Capitalism Without Borders, which I'm reading right now, so I'm not going to pretend I know much more than this. But trusts are quite similar in the UK and the US, and they're far more diverse and versatile than you may think.

    742:

    A thought occurs to me .... y'all quit laughing, it does happen once in a while.

    Brexit is like a runaway train careering down the tracks ... if some strange miracle were to happen and the government came to it's senses ...

    Do they have time enough left to put on the brakes (revoke Article 50?) and stop the train before it crashes? Or is it too late and the crash is gonna' happen no matter what?

    If they did manage to stop the train safely, would they ever be able to start it up again?

    743:

    Revocation is possible until April 12th, or however long a future extension of the negotiation period is. As I understand it, it requires an act of parliament, and execution by the PM (letter sent to EUCO via the standard diplomatic channels). So yes, it can be stopped, and procedurally it's quite easy. As for starting it up again, it would require a new A50 declaration, supported by an act of parliament. Quite easy to do procedurally, but very unlikely to happen after the fallout of the last one.

    744:

    Troutwaxer @ 720: What were they smoking when they came to the conclusion that they could loot a couple-dozen first-world countries the way the British looted a country full of differing religons and squabbling feudal types? And why are they still having flashbacks?

    My guess is it was lessons learned from the global financial crisis of 2008. Did any of them ever go to jail or actually have to pay back their ill gotten gains?

    745:

    Greg, the particular usage of "trust" you impute to the U.S. fell out of common use decades ago. These days a U.S. person is much more likely to use a word like "monopoly" to describe the kind of situation you're describing.

    But I received the money from my mother's estate via a "trust" (short for "trust fund" if I understand correctly) in the same sense you're using it in the U.K.

    746:

    Heteromeles @ 734: I think if you don't know about the Boeing E-4s you really need to read Raven Rock. It's a history of the Continuity of Government operations by FEMA.

    I know about the E-4.

    747:

    Er, UK news feeds are quite likely to use "trust ~ monopoly" when reporting US news over here.

    748:

    As for starting it up again, it would require a new A50 declaration...

    From memory, so suspect, but I think the ECJ opinion said that if it was clear the revocation of Article 50 was simply a ploy to buy time (eg, if the revocation was followed fairly shortly by a new A50 notice) then the revocation wouldn't be valid.

    749:

    "...the British haven't used it for years!"

    750:

    I note the petition is up to 5.5 million signatures.

    751:

    @JBS

    They do have time to withdraw A50, but it is highly unlikely. The EU has stated it won't regard as valid any revocation that is purely in service of letting the UK get their shit together and submit a new A50 after. For that matter, it doesn't sound like the EU will even allow a lengthier extension unless it was for a softer Brexit and came with some type of binding pre-approval by Parliament, or maybe if the government completely collapses and they take pity. But the EU sees risk in allowing UK to remain through MEP elections, and absent an extreme change in situation will act in its own best interest to avoid that scenation.

    This means withdrawal of A50 would essentially mean pulling back from Brexit all together for the foreseeable future. This is highly unlikely given that a majority of Tories, though arguing over details, want some form of Brexit. And so do at least a minority of Labour. Specifically Corbyn, who might greatly prefer a soft Brexit but definitely wants some distance from the EU.

    The only way I see A50 withdrawn, and it's a longshot, is if there's a second referendum and it wins "remain" at a significant margin. I think even a slim margin of victory would still be seen as a betrayal of the first referendum results, and MP's and the populace might reasonably ask, "If the first vote wasn't ultimately binding, why should we regard this new result as binding?" I do see the possibility for a large victory margin as the Remain crowd are much more mobilized than in 2016 where, arguable, the referendum passed only because so many Remainers stayed home believing it had no chance. However, the Leave crowd might similarly be even more motivated as well.

    752:

    Another use in the US these days is a trust for "estate preservation" or a "Special Needs Trust". The first more or less the same as one you mention, with the purpose of allowing well off middle class people to qualify for Medicaid and other social programs intended for the poor, without spending down their assets first, so those assets can be passed on to heirs.

    The second is a way to give money to poor friends or relatives without interfering in their ability to qualify for Medicaid and other social programs intended for the poor.

    753:

    Update ... quoting the "indie"... "May raises the white flag" Also, IIRC yesterday or Saturday, the previously-unthinkable happened: The CNI & the TUC issued a JONT STATEMENT (!) saying that Brexit is a disaster & STOP IT! "The City" & presumably The Corporation are not happy bunnies, either.

    OK, so we revoke At 50 - how does the guvmint then quieten the incoherent rage of the brexiteeers & for that matter the legitimate concerns, given the first referendum vote. [ Unless, of course there really is evidence of blatant rigging, in which case they can say - "Oops, sorry, that result wasn't valid & here's why" Would still probably need a 2nd Ref to quieten things down I suspect that, now, "remain" would win with AT LEAST 55% of the vote? Thoughts?

    754:

    I don't know, and I don't know as there's anyone who does know, if it's settled constitutional law whether or not Parliament can bind -- rather than replace, replace is certainly settled -- the government. My guess would be "no", but it'd be interesting to ask a knowledgeable party.

    May's government is the government until the correct ritual no-confidence events happen, and those have not.

    But it looks very much as though it takes the government to do anything, including agree to the EU extension terms. And the government has made it clear that it will not agree to anything except May's deal or a hard Brexit. Parliament supports neither, and is not likely to come to support either. Nothing else can be advanced because it would take getting an extension first, and agreeing to hold EU parliamentary elections (a requirement for sufficient extension) has no support.

    Is there anybody doing actual-faction counts? It looks like there might not be majority support for anything, but that seems so entirely implausible I'm reluctant to reach such a conclusion.

    755:

    Ah, see here: European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 (Exit Day) (Amendment) Regulations 2019. But it's marked as “draft affirmative,” which, as I understand it, requires approval in Parliament before being signed into law.

    756:

    Hello, it's Monday the 25th. They have till Friday to fix or delay things. I have my doubts it will happen.

    757:

    … and said approval is seemingly rather “meaningless,” because the new date is contained in a piece of international law.

    758:

    Well, I've just signed.

    I note that this petition has a wider scope than the original vote, which didn't let me vote because although I have British citizenship I don't live in Britain.

    759:

    Looking at what's going on right now, I have no idea what kind (if any) of Brexit we're going to end up with next month, but I think there's a high probability that one or more of: the Prime Minister, the Government, or this session of Parliament, will collapse/resign/prorogue within the week.

    760:

    Greg, the particular usage of "trust" you impute to the U.S. fell out of common use decades ago.

    Yes, AFAIK it lasted no longer than the 1920s, if that. These days it's most often used in the sense of a trust fund.

    https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/trust.asp

    761:

    I would tend to agree with that.

    On the other tentacle, it seems like May is going to ignore custom until QEII puts the crown on and comes to say "We are not amused" in person.

    So.

    Yes.

    "No idea" upgraded to "No least idea" from this corner.

    762:

    This Even Given Theresa Mays,deep and sincere Christian Commitment? Pledged to keep HER word on Brexit - as expressed in HER parties manifesto in the last general election - by Hook or Crook ? Oh and also that Corbyns side also pledged to carry out the will of the people and that God is making his party fall apart at the seams? This given her Determination to hold her ..EVER SO CHRISTIAN Party together in the face of the Ferocious Assault of You Socialist unbelievers? That in her mind the Torys Interests ARE the Countries interests? And so forth with a sprinkling of .." After ME the Deluge! " The way that I see it is that Teresa of May has only to wait and play for time in the parliamentary system and ..in a political sense over the next couple of weeks? This in competition with those who oppose Her? ... " Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius." was allegedly spoken by Papal legate and Cistercian abbot Arnaud Amalric prior to the massacre at Béziers, the first major military action of the Albigensian Crusade. A direct translation of the Latin phrase would be "Kill them. For the Lord knows those that are His own." "

    763:

    So, can we blame this one on BrExit?

    https://thepointsguy.com/news/british-airways-flight-bound-for-dusseldorf-somehow-ends-up-in-edinburgh/

    A British Airways flight out of London bound for Düsseldorf (DUS) accidentally landed in Edinburgh (EDI) Monday morning. Passengers aboard the flight were baffled when the more than 500-mile mix-up occurred.

    Maybe the pilot figured no one in the UK wants to go to the continent anymore?

    764:

    The US military is definitely into grid-free outposts, because the enemy has this distressing tendency to cut the power lines...

    765:

    Raven Rock has been pretty good so far and doesn’t seem to have a strong political bias, though I’m only 2/3rds of the way through and haven’t got to 9/11

    I think H. Is missing a few details though. A lot of those contingency plans take the form of executive orders that are actually in the football. One of the things the sitting president does is sign them, reason he waits to the last second is they are if extremely dubious constitutionality so would never stand as peacetime executive orders. There are also copies of them at all the redoubts

    So if there is no president then no one to sign them

    With regards to succession of the president and VP are incapacitated but not dead, the cabinet has the power to remove an incapacitated president and could then immediately do the same as the VP ascends . At that point normal lines of succession can kick in

    Also it’s intersting that most presidents don’t seem to intend to let themselves be hustled off to a secure location but rather go down with the ship. There were several cases where Truman, Ike and Kennedy made that really clear. I’m sure trump would run like s little bitch, but that doesn’t seem the norm

    766:

    Heteromeles @ 722:

    Anyway, this discussion is irrelevant, because Mueller found no hint of Trump or anyone in his campaign conspiring or colluding with Russia..

    I'll bet good cash money that Robert Mueller made no such finding. With only basic initial scrutiny, one spots weasel-wording and cheeky evasions. Critically, Mueller hasn't spoken so far, only Trump mouthpiece William Barr, and that is deeply problematic.

    In any event, conspiracy with Russian contacts is the very least of the existential threats to this administration, Mueller findings have long been practically a much-anticipated sideshow.

    767:

    Thanks for the update. I was trying to do that from memory, and I knew I'd forgotten a bunch of stuff. Raven Rock is a good, but dense, book.

    I don't think it's going to spoil anything to say that none of the presidents, with the possible exception of the current one, expressed any desire to get hustled off. While I have my definite opinions about whether some of them are evil slime or not, I don't think (again with the possible exception of the current denizen) that we should question their courage in this regard. And quite honestly, I hope that if Agent Orange does face a test of courage, that he passes. We don't need a Coward In Chief during a crisis.

    768:

    About the reading of copyrighted work as filibuster--clearly, you forget Sen. Cruz's emotional rendition of GREEN EGGS AND HAM.

    769:

    So you think his bone spurs don't bother him anymore?

    770:

    It’s certainly dense, reading it a bit at a time along with other things. Fun though.

    There were also some pretty hilarious bits where they were doing COG drills and the spouses of the various government officials discovered neither they nor the children were included in the evacuation plans

    I have this image of the entire upper echelons of the US government being pretty severely in the dog house for a considerable time after

    That made me laugh for sure

    771:

    Pure hypothetical: Under what circumstances does anyone here think Her Majesty might actually pop in and say "Not On My Watch!" ? Are there any such scenarios?

    772:

    How are the famous english bookmakers doing ?

    773:

    Almost certainly. See some of my previous posts in this thread for my thoughts on what.

    774:

    That and the idea that, in the event of a nuclear war, everyone would pile into churches, and then bulldozers (which would be on some sort of standby contract and instantly available) would quickly pile 3 feet of soil on top of the church roofs to make them into blast shelters. I'm sure all churches are rated to have a D-9 working at full speed on top of their roofs.

    Yes, there's some real black humor in there. Glad you're enjoying it.

    Of course, given what's going on with the weather, the idea of hardening all US cities against nuclear attack by rebuilding them 50 feet underground is looking kind of prescient--at least for those cities that aren't within a few feet of their water table (lookin' at you, NOLA).

    775:

    If his bone spurs make his feet too sore for him to run on, so much the better.

    Seriously though, much as I dislike him, I don't want him to fail under enemy fire. If he did so, that would be bad for all of us. It doesn't matter how brown his pants are if he stays at his post and does his job.

    777:

    Yes I am enjoying it very much thanks for the recommendation and it’s certainly one Charlie should read if he hasn’t, lots of inspiration for a fertile imagination in there

    It’s also a pretty relevant case study on the government trying to wrap its head around a disaster that is almost too big to imagine. And eventually doing so successfully i suppose (we can’t survive this so let’s stop fooling ourselves and make sure it never happens instead)

    778:

    “It looks like there might not be majority support for anything, but that seems so entirely implausible I'm reluctant to reach such a conclusion.” 48% Remain / 27% MayDeal / 23% CrashOut / 2% hiding under desk doesn’t seem that implausible to me.

    779:

    Well the commons has just had their "indicative vote" and it got through - 329 to 302.

    But isn't it really completely meaningless? This vote is apparently only to do with the political declaration (not much more than a set of aspirations) and it isn't legally binding on the govt at all. So may can just completely ignore any vote.

    May's still going for her carry-on policy. Now well beyond the point of madness.

    Would anyone want to have a stab at the end game and how things will end up?

    ljones

    780:

    The vote has forced the Commons agenda for Wednesday, and perhaps day or days beyond that. What the house will do with this time remains to be seen. May has already said she will not feel bound by any votes held on Wednesday.

    781:

    It's generally accepted that the current monarch sees their job as preservation of the current constitutional order. (Which includes the monarchy.)

    It's not necessarily well-understood what ERII sees that constitutional order as being in specific. It is not, this week, at all clear what the operant constitutional order is; much of it is customary, rather than statutory, and the customary parts have taken a massive beating.

    It would be an awful gamble; 92 year olds do not generally take awful gambles.

    So, really, while there are legal theories that would allow it, the Queen isn't going to intervene directly absent some enormous demonstration of support for something; half the youth of England on the lawn with a petition might do it, but it would have to be a petition in line with the current constitutional order.

    782:

    That the current makeup of the House is split, oh, 30/30/20/20 for "hard", "remain", "May's deal", "some other deal" is pressingly obvious. The idea that these are immovable, despite the evidence that no one is getting that they want and that it's time to limit the damage, that seems implausible. (Nothing like as implausible as it should, I admit.)

    783:

    Glad you liked it! I agree that Charlie would like it, although he might like surviving the onrushing mess rather more.

    Anyway, I took away a slightly different lesson that you did. While I agree that all the Presidents (including even Reagan, after he saw The Day After) had the same thought that nuclear war was unwinnable, and that the whole point of that part of the arsenal was basically about bluff and bluster, and trying to keep an actual nuclear war from being perceived as winnable by anyone.

    The Continuity of Government crew, on the other hand, keep on beavering away, trying to come up with survivability plans, new secret bases, Nightwatch, and the like. They also, when given the job, try to order us around in ways they think will make us safer. And they recently admitted that they've failed miserably at getting most people to prepare for emergencies. Which, since you've read Raven Rock, should be unsurprising.

    I suspect that some presidents are fairly clear-eyed about things like climate change too. Unlike nuclear war, though, there isn't a simple solution under their command that they can use to avoid it. Aside from launching the nukes, that is.

    784:

    As things stand, Parliament can't bind the government. (Parliament can replace the government, but that's different.)

    Tuesday and Wednesday get used up on indicative votes and maneuvering. May ignores this.

    Thursday, May says "No one will support my deal. This is equivalent to a positive, heartfelt choice for a hard brexit. There is no further need to discuss this" and prorogues Parliament. (This is done "on the advice of the Privy Council"; "In almost every instance, however, the advisory role of the Privy Council is a fiction, and the body is effectively a vehicle for executive decisions made by the Government which are then formally issued in the Queen’s name." May is still the PM and has enough ministers who want a hard Brexit to do this.)

    Friday, default hard Brexit.

    785:

    My take on this is that proroguing Parliament is done "on the advice the Privy Council", but that's a legal fiction. It's done by the government. and May is still the government.

    May has been very, very clear that the two (2) choices are May's deal or a hard Brexit.

    Indicative votes use up Tuesday, and maybe Wednesday. Wednesday or Thursday first thing, May prorogues Parliament because clearly, rejection of May's deal is equivalent to heartfelt desire for a hard Brexit, because there were two and only two choices. The Conservative Party can't remove May; no one is trying to set up a confidence vote. They might-maybe would if they can use the indicative votes to build a coalition, so can't have that.

    Friday, default hard Brexit.

    786:

    My sister has taken the time to send a very brief email from her bunker in the UK. She has just returned from the protest in London, despite not normally being one to take to the streets: "{spouse} has an Irish mum so can emigrate when the tories totally trash the country. Selfish fuckwittish arseholes"

    I get the impression she has lost her normally optimistic demeanour.

    787:

    I get the impression she has lost her normally optimistic demeanour.

    There does seem to be a fair bit of that going round...

    One of my... not expectations, precisely, but "I don't think the risk is recognized" about US politics is that the consensus of the matrons could come down on "just how many of these bumblefucks do we need to kill, castrate, or thumb in order to be certain of ongoing human social status?" White supremacy has been keeping that from happening, but it could fail. If the existing arrangement fails, I'd bet on the matrons, and I'd bet on it being exceedingly messy.

    Similarly, it's not impossible that Mother England could wind up a really pleasant place in five years or so, but with a veil of silence over the means.

    788:

    Maybe may won't prorogue parliament? In the commons today there wasn't any mention of a hard brexit (and might it be off the table) plus unless I'm going mad didn't may herself say "international law takes presidence over UK law" and that we leave not on friday but in April.

    Or did I just imagine it?

    ljones

    789:

    Random thought -- what if there actually isn't a majority for anything in parliament? I mean literally every option dosen't have enough support. What then?

    I guess parliament just BSOD'd x.x !

    ljones

    790:

    Generally speaking, that's when you call an election.

    791:

    I don’t believe “some other deal” is possible anymore. But that still leaves three, and unless either Remain or MayDeal gets above 50%, CrashOut wins by default.

    I can hope that when they’re doing “indicative votes” they do “Resolved, either Remain or MayDeal is better than CrashOut” and “Resolved, either CrashOut or MayDeal is better than Remain.” (Symmetry might suggest also trying “Resolved, either CrashOut or Remain is better than MayDeal.” It would have to be a really lousy deal for that to get any yeses.)

    792:

    I have no real idea what May will do.

    I'm going on the assumption that May actually wants the hardest possible Brexit, and that May wants to not-fail, which means delivering Brexit.

    What May says in general and what May intends to do don't match; May has said many lovely things about freedom and dignity and enacted policies to starve the disabled to death. Plus the whole Windrush thing. When someone engages in ethnic cleansing, view all their subsequent statements with the expectations of probity and honesty appropriate to that act.

    793:

    Friday, default hard Brexit.

    The government and the EU have already agreed this doesn't happen before April 12.

    794:

    Has May's government done the necessary things to make that so in UK law?

    Or does someone like Gove get to sue on the basis that the government isn't admitting Brexit has happened?

    795:

    https://www.google.com.au/maps/@53.3594914,-2.3135474,8.43z

    I draw your attention to the diminutive size of the text "Great Britain", especially if you zoom a little. Consequence of Brexit?

    796:

    Graydon NO ( SEE ALSO 792 ) Because the ONE THING the Commons will not allow is a hard brexit ... there was a mildy-rabid brexiteer MP on the tadio, trimming that "Maybe My's shit deal is the best we can get, because "no deal" is not what we want..." ( Paraphrase, of course )

    797:

    The government has laid down a statutory instrument shifting the date. It was supposed to be debated on Wednesday, but of course the order paper for Wednesday has just had a minor revision, so it's possible it will move to Thursday, unless MPs have the presence of mind to vote it through before starting the indicative votes process. The full text of the SI is: ""

    (a) references to before, after or on exit day are to be read as references to before, after or at 11:00 p.m. on 22 May 2019 or (as the case may be) 12 April 2019, and

    (b) references to beginning with exit day are to be read as references to beginning with 11:00 p.m. on the day concerned.

    ""

    This is expected to go through unopposed.

    798:

    Note that the SNP in Westminster are officially moving to bring a vote on withdrawing Article 50.

    If May admits her deal is dead before this happens, then the choices boil down to no-deal or support a minority third party bid to cancel Brexit. Which will polarize the currently shattered parliament around the issue, and we'll get to see how much support Brexit-at-any-cost has.

    If the commons collectively vote to withdraw A50, then the constitutional crisis deepens further unless May does as she's told. I'm not sure there's any precedent since the Civil War(s) for a prime minister ignoring and opposing the expressed will of Parliament …

    That's the point at which the Queen might be dragged kicking and screaming into the fray.

    I will note that Prince Charles has been increasingly shouldering some of her responsibilities for the past few years. And while expecting radical action from a 70 year old conservative monarch in waiting would normally be laughable, he has a bit more skin (or at least life expectancy) in the game than his mum. And can therefore be expected to be lobbying her privately.

    So who the fuck knows what'll happen?

    799:

    If the Americans hadn’t remade House of Cards so recently, and if it hadn’t fizzled out so appallingly, people might better remember Ian Richardson as FU, and the second series, To Play the King, featuring MIchael Kitchen as a newly crowned monarch per the early 1990s.

    Seems so optimistic in hindsight.

    800:

    Not by me, it isn't. I suspect that there is at least one brexiteer rabid enough to oppose it.

    And to Graydon: while normally the advice of the Privy Council on matters such as proroguing is a legal fiction, if it were used as an attempt by the PM to suspend Parliament and rule unopposed, HM definitely would be Not Amused - as OGH says.

    801:

    It is expected to pass unopposed not because there isn't anyone who wants to oppose it, but because they don't want to reveal how few they are by putting it to a division.

    802:

    Let's see. I am cynical enough to believe that there is at least one who isn't even that rational any longer.

    803:

    Charlie @ 797 Much as it goes against the grain ... good for the SNP! We can hope, but if that is done, we will have to have a 2nd referwendum, won't we? Though I note that disillusionament has set in & people are changing their minds - up to 55%+ for "Remain" according to polls & tending upwards .... Which will polarize the currently shattered parliament around the issue THIS, yes - party is (almost) irrelevant in the face of this - why do I think of the film "Darket Hour" I wonder? ( Don't answer that )

    EC @ 801 Yeah J Rees-Smaug for a start & a couple of others ....

    804:

    The Mogg and the Moggsters appear to be leaning towards supporting maydeal now. His latest tweet is "The choice seems to be Mrs May’s deal or no Brexit." Very unlikely he'll oppose something where a vote is absolutely certain to fail.

    805:

    For anyone still watching the petition numbers, someone created this page with a graph showing the signatures over time as well as the total count:

    Revoke Article 50 Petition

    On the current trend it looks pretty certain to top out around or just under 6 million.

    I'm not sure what story these numbers tell.

    806:

    Damian @ 798: Ian Richardson's turn as Urquhart was indeed the one true 'House of Cards', and IMO was brilliant, including the second series ('To Play the King') that you mention. If any of my fellow Yanks haven't seen it because they imagine that Kevin Spacey remake to be worthy, you have sadly missed the real thing.

    807:

    It proves that there are c. 6 million people who are Internet users, politically aware and vehemently opposed to Brexit. Nothing new in that, but good to have it confirmed in a way that most MPs will notice.

    I don't think that the Smug is irrational enough to oppose the extension, but I don't think that he would baulk at supporting a failing May's deal if the aulternative were no brexit. There are MUCH less rational people among the extreme brexiteers.

    808:

    As has been obvious since the day after the referendum, the SNP have all their ducks in a row.

    Short form: the SNP is pro-EU. It's party policy; also the majority of the Scottish public are in favour of EU membership.

    (This makes sense if you stop thinking of them as nationalists and start thinking of them as federalists, which is rather closer to how they position politically—they're not marching to the same beat as most other "nationalist" parties.)

    They'd actually gamed out the possible outcomes for the Brexit vote and rolled with policies on Brexit immediately. Brexit is an immediate crisis threatening Scotland's interests, ergo opposing it is a higher priority than holding a second IndyRef. (Indeed, IndyRef 2, if it happens, will most likely arrive as a backlash against an England-imposed Brexit.)

    809:

    It's been pretty obvious over the past decade that the SNP and the rest of the Scottish Parliament has the only competent politicians in the UK. They are all (and I include the Scottish Tories and Labour) head and shoulders above the rest, with the SNP especially being particularly talented at actually planning ahead. I'm still undecided as to whether the Westminster lot or the Stormont lot are the more incompentent.

    The only way I can think of that they can get rid of May as an obstruction is if Corbyn tables another vote of no confidence - but the Tories will probably line up party first against the external threat despite the looming internal disaster. And an election is pretty much the last thing we want right now, if badly needed.

    810:

    Absolutely, it is expected to go through unopposed.

    But it hasn't yet, and if it doesn't, for whatever reason, actually get done, the result is CASE ABSOLUTE HAIRBALL as big chunks of UK law go into an unresolved indeterminate state.

    (I'm Canadian, and I remember Stephen Harper and a whole lot of "you can't do that! ok, there isn't a law, as such...." with Parliamentary procedure.)

    811:

    At this point, I am emotionally convinced that the material presence of the Lord God Jehovah with a bucket of sizzling thunderbolts immediately to hand couldn't convince May to rethink.

    So, indeed, who knows what will happen.

    ("And the Campbell had orders King William had signed...." won't get out of my head.)

    812:

    I agree that ERII would not be even slightly amused. What is not clear is how to get in front of it -- does May have the brass to just do it without actually going through the ritual motions of seeking approval? I would think so -- and then what to do in response. Sending the Household Cavalry to haul the PM into the presence would make amazing TV but possibly not the best politics.

    813:

    Charlie .. IF the SNP really were federalists, I would support them - but that's not what I have seen in the past. However, I do get the impression that theor position has become more nuanced, if not changed. I'm in favour of the UK & similarly I'm in favour of the EU, for very similar reasons - usually called comity, cohesion & strength.

    IF the SNP motion passes, then I assume we have to have a second Ref?

    814:

    If the SNP motion passes, this means labour has whipped for it, or given a free vote, and a number of toryrrists have rebelled against their whip to vote for it. However, government would simply ignore it, as they generally do. There is no process for forcing government to do something. The humble address process only works for producing information (though it would be interesting to use it to request the government find "what proportion of the electorate are currently in favour of nodeal/maydeal/remain to a confidence level of something"). The only way to force the government to do something is to replace it. There is JUST enough time for a no-confidence process (but I still don't think the DUP would support it, or sufficient toryrrists).

    815:

    Though I note that disillusionament has set in & people are changing their minds - up to 55%+ for "Remain" according to polls & tending upwards ....

    It's not that simple. See e.g. John Curtice analysis at https://whatukthinks.org/eu/author/johncurtice/ -- there's been little mind-changing since 2017. The Remain polling advantage is probably more due to those who previously could not be bothered to have an opinion.

    Also of interest... Support for another referendum depends on (surprise!) how the question is asked. If it does not mention Remain as an option, 48% are for and 36% against. But if Remain is explicitly mentioned as an option, these figures flip to 38% and 52% respectively. :-(

    816:

    The toryrrists have just presented tomorrow's order paper - SI vote is after indicative votes. I'm not sure to what degree that matters.

    817:

    Well this is entertaining: https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1110521942350721024

    Organisations made up of "Grand Wizards" and "blueshirts" are just the sorts of things that make me think "democracy".

    818:

    Support for Brexit rests on "Those People Can't Tell Me What To Do!"

    Rather like US politics is haunted by a population fundamentally content to subsist under ruined overpasses roasting sparrows on repurposed curtain rods so long as they can be assured that Those People have no repurposed curtain rods with which to roast their sparrows, it looks a lot like UK politics is being haunted by a widespread complete inability to recognize emotionally that it isn't 1890.

    There's no end of grifters and actual fascists and disaster capitalists and the just plain useless, but it really does look like there's that general coping failure.

    Couple jobs back I was working for a fellow who'd immigrated from the UK. Said fellow had a story about Remembrance Day, and chip-shop acquaintance who showed up in the uniform of a Field Marshal. Which made me blink a great deal, but, lo! I looked it up. The UK promoted former chiefs of the general staff field marshall on retirement into the 1990s. This made absolutely no sense with the size of the UK military. It made no financial sense, as had been pointed out several times. And the practice may have quietly been restarted after Charles was appointed to the rank in all three services back in 2012.

    This is... not the behaviour of a culture that's really internalized that it is well and truly post-imperial in any economic or political sense.

    819:

    Not very Brexity at all, and someone has probably put this up already, but we're well past the 300 mark; so just in case: http://journalofastrobiology.com/Mars5.html

    820:

    It's a bit like a mashup of King Lear, Frankenstein and Psycho, written by a drunk scriptwriter the night before the deadline, as interpreted by the Carry On team. Kenneth Williams would have made an ideal you-know-who, too!

    821:

    Might it be amusing to bring a glass box with an attached blower to Mars, add some of what passes for dirt there with polar ice, seal it, turn on the blower to pressurize to Terran levels and watch what happens? And now I'm hearing a fragment of the theme music from a sixties Bill Bixby sitcom...

    822:

    Not believable, but thanks for the link!

    To unpack that, I'm not much of an expert on fungi, but I do know a little bit (they were part of my PhD awhile ago).

    First, there are standard questions, like: are these the people you'd expect to be talking about it, like lichenologists, field mycologists, and so on? Nope. It's some medical mycologists and people of uncertain background. Now MedMyco is a gnarly field that I have a lot of (gut-churning) respect for, but they don't normally publish on lichens. Or puffballs.

    Their method of minimalist crowdsourcing (run a survey of people invited to participate) is pretty questionable too. Are the biologists kids in classes, or specialists in the organisms they're being asked to identify? Do the geologists know anything about life or about desert environments, dust buildup, and chemical crusts? Remember the Face on Mars and surrounding stuff that people swore was a dead city? Later, better imagery showed it was all pareidola.

    Second, basic things like scale bars in the pictures are generally missing. That's a problem, because spheroids are a common shape.

    Third and biggest problem is ecology: where are the autotrophs? You need something to capture energy from the environment, mix it with nutrients and water, and make life for the fungi to digest. You can't put most fungi on Mars by themselves any more than you can put a human up there without giving him a potato garden (or whatever) to farm, and there's got to be working ecosystem that has lasted since planetfall, however many millions of years ago (not billions), and it's got to somehow leave almost no trace of itself for that entire time. That's a big ask.

    That, incidentally, eliminates puffballs. The giant puffball is actually a close relative of the salad mushroom (a puffball is basically a neotenic mushroom). While there are desert puffballs, deserts are very, very far from unconsolidated regolith, as anyone watching one of the spring superblooms knows. They need plants or feces to decompose.

    But wait, you say, lichens are autotrophs. Indeed they are: lichens are symbiotic structures composed of at least two and probably three organisms: one or two bacterial species and either an alga or a cyanobacteria. The problem is that they're pretty slow growing, so having them pop up on a rover after 100 days? Questionable. Besides which, we'd be seeing chlorophyll turn up somewhere if there were any terrestrial photosynthesizers around. That's missing too.

    Oh yeah, and the kicker: these organisms can survive in a vacuum through anhydrobiosis. This is true, depending on the conditions of the experiment (I don't think they've been run for decades or centuries, have they?). What they don't do is metabolize, grow, or reproduce in a high radiation vacuum. Moreover, surviving in a vacuum is rather easier than surviving getting blown into outer space as the result of a major meteorite strike (that's the mechanism, I guess? I have no idea of the pressures and temperatures involved), and surviving in a vacuum is rather easier than surviving entry into the Martian atmosphere without a parachute, although I suppose the notion is that fragments of lichens would be so tiny that after being in interplanetary space for a few centuries, they'd just waft down, slowly decelerating from interplanetary velocities to Martian surface velocity, and get lucky enough to find a spot that's got some water and warmth for them to rehydrate, and then they get busy growing.

    Still, fun distraction. Thanks!

    823:

    Chlorophyll is not inevitable. As you yourself said, there was a LONG time before it became dominant as an energy source. If the naturalisation had taken place before that, it isn't unlikely that other pathways would have been taken.

    Furthermore, given the recent findings on life deep in the earth, it isn't impossible that such a naturalisation would have been of the same kind, and never have been active on the surface (whether or not it still survives).

    824:

    Just about to roll over 5.75M, as of Tue Mar 26 16:32:59 UTC 2019

    825:

    Disagree. As I've said a few times, I saw article after article after the ref with people who said, "I didn't think it was going to win, I just wanted to send a message", all of whom would be pro-Remain.

    826:

    ...it looks a lot like UK politics is being haunted by a widespread complete inability to recognize emotionally that it isn't 1890

    Verily. To misquote Sparks: "It ain't 1890 for us or for you. If we can't enjoy it... Then neither will you."

    827:

    Fake journal published by crank.

    He’s back. The weird mastermind behind the Journal of Cosmology and Cosmology.com has created yet another fake journal, The Journal of Astrobiology and Space Science Reviews, and has made another bold claim. By looking at photos from the Mars Rovers, using just his mighty brain, he has determined that the surface of Mars is covered with mushrooms, lichens, and the bones of dead Martians, and further, he has convinced a cheesy British tabloid to report on it, so it must be true.

    828:

    Um... Note that I said there's been little mind-changing since 2017, not since 2016! By 2017 those who didn't really mean it already knew they made a mistake.

    829:

    Basidiomycetes and Ascomycetes showed up in the Paleozoic or the Mesozoic, IIRC. Puffballs are a basidios, lichens are either ascos or (more recent research indicates) a mix of asco and basidio fungi.

    So yes, chlorophyll was really well established when the fungi they thought they saw on Mars first evolved. The fungi aren't billions of years old, merely hundreds of millions of years. Really Wet Mars happened several billion years ago, so any fungi arriving from Earth would have landed in something resembling current conditions.

    Note that I'm not disparaging the idea of life on Mars, I'm saying that this particular study isn't believable. If someone showed me a video of a spider scuttling around on Mars, I'd say it was equally unbelievable, for what are actually quite similar reasons.

    830:

    In entirely unironical intrusion of fiction on reality, tory MEPs are calling non-tory MEPs "time lords" for voting to abolish daylight shaving time.

    831:

    The interesting vote would be May deal vs no deal, but I suspect neither the Tories nor Labour leadership would be keen since it would show how divided they are. I'd guess that the SNP & LibDems would abstain, the DUP would of course vote for no deal.

    832:

    Tim H @ 820 See also "In the Hall of the Martian King" by Varley IIRC

    833:

    and the second series, To Play the King,

    Just an FYI

    In the US it appears to be available via NetFlix, Big River Prime, and Vudu.

    834:

    Oh, right. Cross-purposes, then.

    835:

    The government has now responded to the petition, told the signatories to, essentially, fuck off, and assigned a debate date of April first, scheduled to interfere with the second round of indicative votes.

    836:

    paws4thot @ 746: Er, UK news feeds are quite likely to use "trust ~ monopoly" when reporting US news over here.

    The US hasn't really used that definition for "trust" since Teddy Roosevelt was President.

    837:

    Michael Cain @ 747:

    "As for starting it up again, it would require a new A50 declaration..."

    From memory, so suspect, but I think the ECJ opinion said that if it was clear the revocation of Article 50 was simply a ploy to buy time (eg, if the revocation was followed fairly shortly by a new A50 notice) then the revocation wouldn't be valid.

    Yeah, I was thinking more in terms of sometime in the future (10, 20, 30 years or more) should a situation arise where the UK going it alone really would be a good idea, would they be unable to act because they chose to reject STUPID today.

    838:

    Robert Prior @ 768: So you think his bone spurs don't bother him anymore?

    I've had bone spurs. Developed them while I was in the Army from all the PT we did wearing improper foot-gear (combat boots are not athletic shoes). You can run with bone spurs, hurts like hell, but you can do it if you have to.

    839:

    Graydon @ 786:

    "I get the impression she has lost her normally optimistic demeanour."

    There does seem to be a fair bit of that going round...

    One of my... not expectations, precisely, but "I don't think the risk is recognized" about US politics is that the consensus of the matrons could come down on "just how many of these bumblefucks do we need to kill, castrate, or thumb in order to be certain of ongoing human social status?" White supremacy has been keeping that from happening, but it could fail. If the existing arrangement fails, I'd bet on the matrons, and I'd bet on it being exceedingly messy.

    How long do you think "white supremacy" would last without the support of white women?

    I can recommend Elizabeth Gillespie McRae's "Mothers of Massive Resistance" for one take on that question.

    840:

    Graydon @ 791: I have no real idea what May will do.

    I don't think May does either.

    841:

    How long do you think "white supremacy" would last without the support of white women?

    Thereabouts of six weeks.

    Anybody who wants to discount feminine-coded status drivers needs to look at the Meiji financing model. I suspect a big part of the problem right now in the US is a desire to guarantee white grandchildren. (To the extent that this is diseverable from "high status" grandchildren.)

    The idea of releasing a highly contagious re-melinating virus isn't ethical at all, but it keeps looking like a net win on consequences, so I expect someone will try it eventually.

    842:

    Apparently, as of a little while ago? " "Guido has always been a big believer in small government, although he never thought Theresa May would be the Prime Minister on the verge of taking it too far.

    There are now a whopping 15 political vacancies in May’s Government after the latest bout of resignations last night… "

    I volunteer ! Promote me to the House Of Lards, and then have ME, ME, ME, join the Cabinet ! Pretty Please? I will Serve ..for a Cabinet Ministers Salary plus expenses I will serve like anything! They NEED Me ..and I need the Money.

    843:

    Youse guys did it.

    5,772,956 signatures

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    844:

    That’s a logistics curve, you see the same thing in epidemics. Basically the rate is driven by the structure of the network, in this case social, and has to have a critical shape for epidemics to really take off. The roll off at the top is (in epidemic terms) due to there being less and less people to infect, they’re either infected (they signed) or immune (not going to sign). Interesting example of percolation theory in action.

    845:

    Prior post was response to the petition graph linked at #804

    846:

    I suspect a big part of the problem right now in the US is a desire to guarantee white grandchildren.

    Sigh. None of my grandnieces are "white" by the US definition, and I couldn't love them any more if they were. (Just got a new grandniece last night, too!)

    I can see racism happening, but I just can't follow the thought processes.

    847:

    As I think I've said before on the blog, I expect the white supremacist reaction to perceived loss of collective status to be lethal and indeed genocidal. The instrument of choice will be a combination of climate change and restrictions on immigration: that way it's deniable, without having to go to the extremes the Nazis intended to use after they won the war (bulldozing and burying the camps, censoring them out of the history books). "We didn't kill them, climate change killed them."

    A melanisation virus won't be sufficient to stop this toxic ideology in their tracks — firstly, they'll redefine whiteness from skin tone to shared cultural values, and actually get even more venomously paranoid as a result. (Expect criminalisation of bastardy/birth out of wedlock to become part of the "white" cause if that happens. Also compulsory DNA testing and identity registration. Ultimately an emergent caste system.) Secondly, if it's a transmissible trait they'll come up with a knockout trait and spread that directly via vaccination. Vitiligo as a high-caste marker, maybe ...

    848:

    I don't think it will work!

    But I do expect someone to try it.

    849:

    Secondly, if it's a transmissible trait they'll come up with a knockout trait and spread that directly via vaccination

    Why would they bother with that when they have the technology to solve the problem directly?

    Once someone makes gene wars acceptable I don't expect any genetically identifiable group that is disliked by someone to survive. This is one of the very few times where I think making an example of a nation/criminals is justifiable - we as a species need to make it very, very clear that if you release a germline modifying virus that affects humans you will be hunted down and exterminated.

    850:

    I don't know, and I don't know as there's anyone who does know, if it's settled constitutional law whether or not Parliament can bind -- rather than replace, replace is certainly settled -- the government. My guess would be "no", but it'd be interesting to ask a knowledgeable party.

    It is reported -- https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1110641219225423872 -- that the knowledgable opinion is "can so";

    I am told cabinet secretary Mark Sedwill and attorney general Geoffrey Cox informed Cabinet that if at the end of the Letwin process MPs pass a motion mandating the PM to pursue a new route through the Brexit mess - perhaps a referendum, or membership of the customs union, or some other softer future relationship with the EU - the PM and government would be in breach of the ministerial code and the law if they failed to follow MP's instructions. I'll put out a blog on this in a bit. But this matters because it dispels impression created by PM, and certainly believed by many Brexiter MPs, that she would be at liberty to ignore the results of the Letwin scheme.

    May may not regard the advice, but one can hope.

    851:

    Supremacy models come down to defining good -- which is contextual! -- as an inherent property of persons, so if you're good, you can do what you like. Great for reducing the insecurity; you can, in a pinch, always steal what you need from the designated-inferior persons, and you get daily affirmation of your wonderfulness via deference because lack of deference risks death by torture.

    If you're halfway sensible, you're not doing insecurity management like that, because the hit to absolute capability is large. (Any authoritarian system has problems with complex organization.) If you are, it's brutally expensive to stop. All that really matters is the "copies into the future" part, which gets us back to the would-be grandparents.

    852:

    Goodness as an inherent property? That makes no sense — it's not even logically consistent. Surely goodness is what you do: you are 'good' because you behave in a good fashion.

    I never studied philosophy much — read a couple of books decades ago and that's about it — so maybe this is a solved problem, but surely 'goodness' is something you infer from observed actions?

    Edmund Burke said that all that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing*. Peter Watts counters with "if you do nothing, what makes you any fucking good?"

    I'm with Peter Watts on this one.

    *Or words to that effect are commonly attributed to him, at any rate.

    853:

    Goodness is absolutely not an inherent property; goodness is always contextual. (I got the job; good for me, bad for the other applicants, sort of thing. There's a lot of emphasis on this is (at least the frequently translated bits) of Taoism.)

    However, deciding that goodness is an inherent property might be false-to-fact and it might be terrible philosophy but for building a robust authoritarianism good at winning wars, it's got a lot going for it. And in the end it doesn't matter if you're pleasant or correct; it matters what gets copied into the future.

    I think there's something to viewing the asymmetry of our politics as the "good is inherent" side having an error which removes doubt (despite producing terrible results; in systemic terms, this is an achievement), where the "I want to be good" side has an error which creates doubt and produces general ineffectuality because doctrine tends to come before results.

    854:

    good for me, bad for the other applicants, sort of thing

    The problem, with regard to race, is that this is not how the system functions. During times of economic security, both you and the other applicants eventually land jobs. During times of economic scarcity, you and the other applicants are likely to be unemployed. Since times of good vs. bad economic scarcity are likely to be mediated by politics, the sane thing is for you and your opposite number (or opposite race) to join together to make sure your economy remains sane be electing the right people; that is, people who claim they will implement what you recognize as a useful economic policy.

    855:

    The purpose of a system is what it does.

    Let's be sensible people and make a distinction between racism -- the impulse of over-categorize and lump, so "they're all like that" becomes a basis for social decisions -- and supremacy -- which is the belief in inherent superiority legitimized through enforcement.

    Pretty much everybody is going to have racist impulses; it's a limitation of the wetware. These are not often a problem.

    Supremacy exists to enforce a hierarchy; it can't switch to co-operation without everybody on the top of the local maximum losing position. (This is most of the trouble with climate change; you can't get off a local maximum without going down hill and the current relative winners really don't want to give up their pinnacles.) No amount of sense, sanity, or economic co-operation does anything for supremacy; the only corrective is for the folks at the top of the local maximum to give up the identity which justifies the supremacy.

    The folks going on and on about the extinction of the white race aren't particularly talking about any hypothesized material extinction; they mean the identity (and pre-eminence) just as much. Supremacy systems work be identity and more or less can't give it up.

    It's a really quite clever trick in terms of self-reinforcing axioms. Not really up for dealing with a post-Holocene world, though.

    856:

    Not really up for dealing with a post-Holocene world, though.

    Not remotely. One of the things which gives me great hope is that the fastest growing demographic in the U.S. is "mixed." A big part of my book (should I ever get it back on track) will revolve around this.

    857:

    the fastest growing demographic in the U.S. is "mixed."

    And the rest are resolutely pure Homo Erectus?

    858:

    whitroth @ 842: Youse guys did it.

    5,772,956 signatures

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    Government rejects petition to 'cancel Brexit' signed by 5.8 million people

    859:

    Robert Prior @ 845: I can see racism happening, but I just can't follow the thought processes.

    I don't think there's much "thought" behind it. It's all emotions, mostly fear.

    860:

    I find it interesting that the Government is saying that they told the UK public that "the government will implement what you decide." yet there was a Commons Briefing Paper (07212) that stated in 2015 that there was no way that the results could be binding on parliament. That's a little bit...misleading, isn't it?Somewhat ironic considering they also predicted that, "a vote to leave would result in a period of potentially disruptive uncertainty while the precise details of the UK’s new relationship with the EU were negotiated".

    861:

    Just heard a senior Liebour figure on radio (4) saying "We can't have "No Deal" & we really mustn't have "Revoke" either" ( Paraphrase ) Which sounded LESS reasonable than O Letwin, earlier, which takes some doing ... Letwin was (effectively ) saying "Circumstances have changed, the facts are different, therefore ..." which was a suprise I can tell you. Begins to look as though we may be forced out, but that a Customs/Free Trade agreement may get inserted, painfully, into some people ... If so it would be a noticeably less-worse option that the shitshow we presently have. Would solve the "irish Border" problem, at least. - see also Graydon @ 849 Ugggggg .....

    Charlie @ 848 firstly, they'll redefine whiteness from skin tone to shared cultural values NOT "just" pink people ... I just heard some revolting muslim puritan from the MCB on the radio about desperately trying to evade the law on LGBT education in schools & ramping up the protests & ... some schools have already caved in to this religous blackmail. The semi-secular "New Puritanism" is making very disturbing inroads, IMHO [ E.G. Khan's mob in London banning pictures of a pot of jam in an advert, because it's "unhealthy food" ] Returning to your justified rant ... It isn't ONLY the pinkoes who can be racist & violent, plenty of other bastards do it as well. Expect criminalisation of bastardy/birth out of wedlock to become part of the "white" cause - Yeah more new Puritanism. ( Come to that ethnic & religious cleansing between two adjacent "brown" peoples on the borders of India, Bangla Desh & Burma? )

    862:

    Thanks to Frank and William T Goodall for commentary.

    863:

    Per the Revoke petition breakdown here https://www.livefrombrexit.com/petitions/241584?fbclid=IwAR1AAe9dRkHGNHON--KBXURVe-iyZTN0pXpP48soGiYdQzeP5F54DI0Qzjs it appears that the DUP may be at risk of losing a seat (assuming we have any more elections):

    Emma Pengelly is the DUP MP for Belfast South, and more people in her constituency have signed the petition than voted for her in 2017. Note, that's not her majority; that is the number of votes cast for her in total.

    864:

    One could argue that it has already started in two locations in the middle east, though the perpetrators are most definitely not WASPs - however, they share many of the same bigotries and privileges.

    865:

    I note with interest that, while the government has rejected the petition out of hand, it's had an interesting effect elsewhere: EU cannot betray 'increasing majority' who want UK to remain, says Tusk.

    This is potentially a Very Big Deal.

    Prior to the petition the general tone of reporting from the EU was increasingly unsympathetic towards the UK, with an exasperated subtext of "get on with it, then".

    But suddenly there's a clear sign that lots and lots of Brits were extremely unhappy with Brexit, to the point of holding one of the biggest demos in British history to oppose it.

    Which will affect the EU side in future negotiations.

    866:

    They may feel that they are not sufficiently represented by the UK parliament, but they must feel that they are represented by you in this chamber. Because they are Europeans.

    "Cannot betray", well, it's a government. Possessive assertion that these are our citizens, on the other hand, strikes me as, if not a shot across the bow, then at least having the guns run out.

    867:

    During negotiations, it's very easy to unconsciously fall for the simplifying assumption that your opponents across the boardroom table are a homogeneous group.

    Even though the EU negotiators knew all along that the British government was arguing furiously with itself rather than negotiating Brexit, the fact that half the country doesn't want Brexit at all kind of got lost in the noise (especially as UK media coverage is overwhelmingly pro-leave for some reason … can't think why).

    They just got a sudden reminder that maybe half the people who'd be leaving think of themselves as EU citizens. And it sets a really bad precedent to let your people be alienated from your sovereignty without even a token objection.

    The EU itself is split over whether it's on course to become a federal superpower — "ever-closer union" — or just a loose trading bloc (what the Tory euroskeptics wanted before they totally lost the plot). But the message sent by the "Cancel A50" petition and demonstrations may well have been a wake-up call for the federalists: fight this now before it sets a bad precedent for the next couple of centuries.

    868:

    On the U.S. Census, which takes place every ten years, we are asked questions about our race, points of family origin, etc. So "Mixed" as opposed to "Asian," "Black" "Hispanic" "Pacific Islander," etc.

    869:

    Yup.

    Which means Farage, et al. should be worried about someone on the EU side dusting off the Heineken map and suggesting per-"duchy" votes would be far more democratic. Really. We insist.

    It's not like the UK has uniform sovereignty now; every duchy could have its own specific relationship to the Crown (hopefully one for in and one for out, not actually each), some could be in the EU, some could not; as long as "in" has one meaning and the outs get negotiated by the each, why, the EU is fine with that. Any border problem becomes that of the leave-duchy segments, if any. All the 'in' duchies remain some kind of alleged national unit with at least one ~national parliament. (Though if I were trying to get the Heineken map enacted, I'd shift Eurovision to one entry per "duchy".)

    870:

    It looks as though some of the Tory breakzit enthusiasts who linked their votes to the DUP have just realised that "no deal" for the DUP is actually their preferred option. Others seem to be using the DUP for cover - "of course I will support you PM, just as soon as you get the DUP to agree".

    871:

    Charlie @ 856 German commentators in particular stated, quite clearly, that the demo on last Saturday & the petition size were both considerably larger than the crowds & demonstrators who came out in Berlin/November 1989 - that's right BIGGER than the "Wall falling" demonstrtaion(s) Ignore that at your peril, I would have thought. It also goves hope that the EU may give us more time, having seen that ... (?) For myself I would go with De Gaulle for a "Europe des Nations" - in other words a confederation, not a tight federation ... but that is for later. A LOT of the resitsance to the EU is exactly agin that tight federation model - there should be room for differences.

    872:

    About that - The sovereignty of Scotland vests in the population, not in the Palace of Oathbreakers or the monarch (This was the case in 1706CE, and sovereignty is not even discussed in the "Treaty of Union Between England and Scotland" or the "Act of Union with England (1707)"). Scotland voted about 60% for "Remain" in the so-called "consultative Referendumb".

    873:

    A brief note: The ERG and other pivoting towards May's deal and "throwing the DUP under the bus" is not a blow to the DUP but a boon.

    It allows them to continue to continue their narrative of being the persecuted party, while showing that they stayed true and never waivered. Remember, the DUP's final aim is to continue to hold power in NI. They can now turn to their electorate and say: "Westminster has betrayed us and Dublin is still filled with papal perfidy, we are the only ones who can save you from our enemies!"

    (And yes, some of them do actually talk like this.)

    874:

    It's very little different from the Brextremists - "May has betrayed us and Labour is hypocritical and teacherous, we are the only ones who can save you from our enemies!"

    875:

    Being as how all four of my grandparents were Jewish, that means, by their definition, my daughters and granddaughter aren't "white".

    876:

    The last election is the first time they ever won the Belfast South Westminster seat, IIRC, so I suspect it wouldn't be the kind of heartland loss that would speak to the DUP.

    877:

    You wrote:

    Pretty much everybody is going to have racist impulses; it's a limitation of the wetware. These are not often a problem.

    That's bullshit. Not even a lie, just pulled out of your ass (mods- sorry, but his statement is insulting).

    Racist impulses, right. Lessee... how 'bout I start telling blonde jokes?

    878:

    Saw that. However... note that's the official response of the "government", associated with the "the government will consider a petition if it gets more than 10,000 signatures. The Parliament will consider is, I think, since it does have a date, definitive that it will debate it.

    Given May's near-total loss of control of the government, and all the news stories about her maybe resigning... and she cannot control what Parliament debates... or decides.

    I have hopes.

    879:

    I agree with Graydon.

    The corollary he didn't think to make is that many/most of us are self-aware enough to know most of the time when a knee-jerk reaction is over-general (charitably) or racist (uncharitably) and compensate or self-censor. So we don't give voice to such impulses.

    The problems creep in when we're unaware of our own biases and so let unconscious prejudices bleed through—and, secondly, there's a large minority of people who actually believe racism/sexism/ageism/ableism/whateverism is justifiable and thus willingly act on it.

    880:

    So Theresa May has offered to resign. I'm not sure that it changes very much in the short term, but I think it's time to start making plans to emigrate to the moon if Boris or JRM get the top job...

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/mar/27/theresa-may-to-resign-before-next-phase-of-brexit

    881:

    Pretty much everybody is going to have racist impulses; it's a limitation of the wetware. These are not often a problem.

    Yeah. About that....

    It's worth remembering how very young the Hispanic ethnicity is. I believe their founding date is 1521 or so, when Cortes Aztec concubine had their first child. It's also worth remembering that all of us white and Asian folk not only have Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA in us, meaning that our forebears got it on with some really weird-looking people. It's also worth noting that there's no demonstrable cognitive difference between us Neanderthal hybrids and people of strictly African origin, which may well mean that things like skull shape and brain size matter even less than we think they do.

    The problem with "racism is normal" is the mixing part of it. We humans mix a lot, and I think if you polled this page, you'd find that a surprising number of us are in mixed marriages. That doesn't argue for racism being an innate part of human nature. A lot of us can see others as not just fully human, but worth sharing our lives with.

    When there are only a few people of another type around, they're considered exotic and treated as normal people if they want to blend into the dominant society. This happens even in places like Japan and Korea. When the other population hits around 20%, that's when the racism starts, and it's generally about keeping "them" in their place (as rare exotics), and not letting them "take over" or "become the new normal."

    The scary thing about knee-jerk racism is that it's not biological, it's cultural. We get programmed to be racists by the people around us, and we become racists to belong to racist groups or a racist culture. The really hard part is that it's damaging to humans to be removed from groups, so the people that get over their racism tend to either belong to groups that don't espouse this value or reject it, or they're on the margins of the racist group and don't see much value in continuing to belong.

    The other thing to realize is that states have an incentive to impose racist values. Not only does it make it easier to extract labor from the "inferior races," it also meets the essential needs of states to simplify everything as much as possible so that humans with limited resources can run the state. That's why I'd put institutional racism in the same category as institutional sexism and ageism, and more harmless practices like forcing everyone to have two names, live at a knowable address, and other things that helps the government keep track of you so that they can hit you up for taxes and make sure you play nice with the system they've imposed.

    882:

    It was a Standard Response to a Social Media Event ..along the lines of , ' Interesting ..But ? ' .. First Tie them up in Numbers ..I'm sure that this did garner Votes On-Line .. But? .. and then go on to fill in substance .. But the issue has already been settled by a Referendum of ..fill in numbers of actual qualified voters resident in UK ..How many people voted on this easy to fill in social media thingy? And how many of these were UK electorates voters resident in the UK? Old enough to vote? And so forth? If it ever came to a Third Vote by The People then this attempt to alter the result by the Folks of Londinium and their Collaborators in the middle class enclaves of the North might actually be counter productive of their intention? We shall see. Up until now the British 'Progressive' ..mostly Middle Classes who fancy themselves to be political 'Progressive' have sneered mightily at the US of Americas 'Culture Wars ' As they read this sort of thing?

    https://www.juancole.com/2017/12/america-there-class.html

    Well, welcome to the UKs Culture Wars. https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/north-south-divide-life-expectancy-northern-powerhouse-inequality-opportunities-a7887771.html

    883:

    You appear to be lumping "racist" and "supremacist".

    "Racist" -- or to borrow Charlie's phrase, "over-generalizing" -- is any time you go "they're all like that". It is exceedingly difficult not to do that. It is exceeding difficult not to have the categories (which are at least as much cultural as experiential.) Maybe full-blown enlightenment would suffice; I certainly don't know.

    "Supremacist" is the whole economic-system-rationalized-as-a-virtue mechanism of oppression.

    They're not the same thing, and confusing the two, and particularly confusing the two in a way that makes the "humans overgeneralize" part attached to a notion of being bad, makes it much tougher to do anything about the supremacist part because it becomes very difficult to think about.

    884:

    Story I see: "May promises to resign, but only if her Brexit plan wins."

    I'm throwing out all my Comparative Government textbooks and replacing them with 1960s Bizarro comics stories.

    885:

    Troutwaxer @ 868: On the U.S. Census, which takes place every ten years, we are asked questions about our race, points of family origin, etc. So "Mixed" as opposed to "Asian," "Black" "Hispanic" "Pacific Islander," etc.

    If memory serves, "Mixed" was added as a category in 2000 after complaints about the 1990 census categories being too rigid.

    886:

    The problem is that racism is at best a subset of stereotyping. A good counter-example reputedly is French Polynesia, where races are mixed, but people are discriminated against on the basis of what island they come from. In the US, the equivalent is "poor white trash."

    I agree that people stereotype, but I don't agree that racist stereotyping is automatic.

    That did get mixed in with the government stereotyping to preserve functionality, which they also do. For example, government ID insists on classifying people into two genders, and not very long ago that was two heterosexual genders. Stereotypes make a useful basis for supremacy theories, but again, they don't have to be racist.

    887:

    whitroth @ 877: You wrote:

    Pretty much everybody is going to have racist impulses; it's a limitation of the wetware. These are not often a problem.

    That's bullshit. Not even a lie, just pulled out of your ass (mods- sorry, but his statement is insulting).

    No, he's right about that. Everybody has racist impulses. The problem is NOT in having them, it's how you respond to them. Do you just give in to the impulse to hate "the other" or do you try to invite "the other" to assimilate? Make the group of US large enough to include them

    I consider myself to be NOT a racist, but I grew up in a White Privilege society where there's a lot of unconscious racism. Sometimes you have to make a conscious effort to overcome attitudes you don't even know you possess.

    888:

    I agree. Same applies to other isms. Various friends have standing orders to kick my ass if I step out of line.

    Life long social conditioning is hard to see around.

    889:

    On the U.S. Census ... "Mixed" as opposed to "Asian," "Black" "Hispanic" "Pacific Islander," etc.

    I get that the census is trying to describe self-identification, but still. Aotearoa struggles with this (and there is a subtext of "and some white people refuse to describe themselves as pakeha") but the US seems even more weird(pdf).

    Specifically, conflating Melanesia and PNG with Polynesians is odd (they are very different people), but I suppose no more odd than lumping everyone from Indonesia to Kazakhstan in as "Asian". It's definitely not about race or nationality, and only loosely ethnic identity. But at least you have "mixed" now, since apparently "tick all that apply" isn't possible.

    890:

    Everybody has racist impulses. The problem is NOT in having them, it's how you respond to them

    ... and the implicit association test lets us measure it for various combinations (Australia article linking to US test).

    It's interesting to do, especially if "my black friend" does it at the same time, although it can be harder for some black people to deal with the results - I already knew I was biased against black people, but it can be a shock to some black people to discover that racism is cultural and guess what culture they live in.

    As JBS et al point out, it's not your gut reaction that matters, it's what you do with it. And at a surveillance societal level, there's two questions: do we want to keep creating and policing new thoughtcrimes; and do we want the automated surveillance systems to keep exacerbating the biases we already have?

    On that note, I am occasionally amused when I agree with right wing types who rant about SJWs and PC, because I do think our current system punishes thoughtcrime. It's just that I think the thoughtcrimes we punish are "insufficient love of money" and "failure to unconditionally support the government" rather than "does pathetic gamma bunny love the widdle aborigines". And obviously political correctness prevents me from accurately describing said right wingers.

    891:

    That is a question: if you're from Indonesia, are you Pacific Islander or Asian on the census? Oddly enough, if you're Japanese or Taiwanese, you're not Pacific Islander, but if you're Filipino, you are Pacific Islander. And there's few enough people here from Melanesia that they'd get a question equivalent to, "why aren't you black?"

    892:

    dbp @ 880 et seq EIGHT "Indicative motions" have been out to Parlaiment - & EVERY SINGLE ONE FAILED. Oh shit.

    Heteromeles @ 881 This happens even in places like Japan and Korea. Bollocks - Don't you mean particularly in places like Japan, which is one of the most racist societies on the planet.

    JBS @ 887 I consider myself to be NOT a racist, but I grew up in a White Privilege society where there's a lot of unconscious racism. Sometimes you have to make a conscious effort to overcome attitudes you don't even know you possess. Sauasge voucher to that man! Bloody spot on & me too & all the other approbations & acceptance. But, it's taken even us, here, some time to come to this conclusion.

    893:

    EIGHT "Indicative motions" have been out to Parliament - & EVERY SINGLE ONE FAILED. Oh shit.

    Well, that was expected, Hence the next bout Monday. In any case, Ken Clark's permanent customs union motion only lost by 8 votes, with 114 abstentions. Much better than May's deal has done! And the confirmatory referendum lost by 27, with 87 abstention.

    894:

    if you're from Indonesia, are you Pacific Islander or Asian on the census?

    It's a self-identity question so that comes down to personal preference. From what I know a lot of indo people would say "no" because round here Asian covers Japan-to-Vietnam and while Mongolians are Asian Pakistanis and Afghanis aren't. We almost need a "stani" ethnic group to go with Indian.

    In Aotearoa it's becoming more obvious as "other/not specified" grows in size, not least because we have sizeable groups who regard "Indian" as a nationality and with the rise of the Hindufascist BJP especially Islamic subcontinentals are reluctant to identify that way. Plus you have the various ethnic groups within India-the-nation and the various Hindu-not-Indian ones as well (Nepal, for example). And Tamil-not-Singhalese Sri Lankans. It does make the "European-not-pakeha" types seem quite simple by comparison.

    I kind of love playing category games (can you tell?) but underlying that is a knowledge that categories are additive not divisive (Kinsey Scale anyone?) and it's entirely reasonable for even the most pasty of Celts to say "mixed" because that red hair didn't come from grandma homo sapiens sapiens did it now?

    895:

    There is another potential wrinkle... When they were voting on government's motion to postpone Brexit in line with what got agreed with EU, Bill Cash (a well known ultra!) argued that the motion was illegal, because the government agreed it with EU without consulting the house first. He quoted statute and legal opinions, inviting the attorney general (who happened to be present) to disagree, which AG did not.

    Now, this may seem irrelevant, but in response to a question what all this meant in practice, Cash said it simply meant that the vote on the motion was irrelevant, since the motion was illegal anyway. And it makes me wonder, whether the ultra loonies are not preparing a plan B...

    We know that May offered to resign if her deal goes through and we know that the likely replacement is either Raab or (heavens help us!) Johnson. What's to stop either of them saying: the postponement was illegal so we actually did leave on 29th March, cheerio!

    True, I happen to have a lawyer in the family, who says "not my speciality, but it would probably wind up at the supreme court and would get thrown out on the grounds of no unpicking of any deals, transactions etc between 29/03 and whenever -- maybe". But who knows?

    896:

    "Ken Clark's permanent customs union motion only lost by 8 votes"

    Is that a real proposal, or another fantasy that is DOA with the EU?

    897:

    In case you are wondering, this is the BBC breakdown of how the voting went:

    Customs union - For: 264 Against: 272 Confirmatory referendum - For: 268 Against: 295 No-deal exit on 12 April - For: 160 Against: 400 Common Market 2.0 - For: 188 Against: 283 EFTA and EEA membership - For: 65 Against: 377 Revoking Article to avoid no deal - For: 184 Against: 293 Labour's Brexit plan - For: 237 Against: 307 Malthouse Plan B - For: 139 Against: 422

    Apparently Corbyn voted for a confirmatory referendum and the customs union option, but didn't vote for revoking article 50. Anyway, he doesn't matter as much as the tory MP's. They are the ones with the power, since there are more of them. Teresa May didn't vote for any of the options, I don't know why.

    The BBC have this handy how did my MP vote thingy: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47726787

    898:

    So what are ya for? Nothing!

    This reminds me of the planning acronym BANANA: Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone.

    899:

    Actually I posted to soon. The acronym I wanted is PAVE: Parliamentarians Against Virtually Everything.

    900:

    Endless Votes for Endless Logjam

    901:

    Sure that's not Idiotic Logjams?

    902:

    It's a real proposal. The EU has been suggesting a customs union since the day after the referendum, partly because it's the easiest and most obvious way to definitely rule out a hard border in Ireland. There even is precedent: the EU is in a customs union with Turkey; the agreement works well for everybody except Chinese textile manufacturers.

    If you take the customs union and add EEA membership, you get a relationship that's basically Norway Plus minus the part that Norway won't permit.

    903:

    "Ken Clark's permanent customs union motion only lost by 8 votes" Is that a real proposal, or another fantasy that is DOA with the EU?

    Apparently fantasy. Short version: the UK is in as an EU member, to get in as a non-EU member is a different process. The UK could do that process but there is no way to avoid it by "staying" other than by staying in the EU.

    http://www.harrowell.org.uk/blog/2019/03/27/can-you-just-stay-in-the-single-market/

    904:

    planning acronym BANANA: Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone.

    I read an amusing paper the other day that surveyed attitudes to living near power plants. The only one where people who actually lived near them liked them more than those who didn't was wind turbines.

    BOWTIE - Build Only Wind Turbine Installations Everywhere.

    905:

    Hey, Heteromeles, and others.

    US inside the park baseball here.

    NPR News Hour tonight has a segment on a guy working on an early experiment in Geo engineering. Has some funding. Was reasonably frank on that there are a LOT of unknowns.

    906:

    Apparently fantasy.

    Nope, it's always been on the table and as of this moment it still is.

    (The fact that the backstop is potentially tantamount to a permanent customs unions is the very reason the UK doesn't want the backstop, right?)

    http://www.harrowell.org.uk/blog/2019/03/27/can-you-just-stay-in-the-single-market/

    This article is talking about the Single Market/the EEA, which is not the same thing as a customs union.

    Customs union means no tariffs on goods between members plus an agreement regarding uniform tariffs on goods imported from the outside world – the block pretends to be a single country as far as customs barriers are concerned, but not necessarily any farther.

    Single Market/EEA means the Four Freedoms, among other things.

    907:

    Oh, how I wish this geoengineering notion would die.

    Everybody remembers A.C. Clarke's third law, the indistinguishable-from-magic one, but they don't remember the ecological aphorisms; do not attempt the unforeseeable and do not commit the irrevocable.

    We know with some confidence -- because little tiny natural forcings have produced big climate swings -- that there are feedbacks. We don't know where they all are, or what they all do. We don't know which ones are active. That's not a system you can engineer.

    We've already committed the irrevocable; we're leaving the Holocene. Any attempt to geoengineer our way back into the Holocene means trying to affect that big complex system we don't understand. (It's getting better, but what's happening has never happened before, and we'd need knowledge from the future at a minimum to have a hope of understanding.)

    The problem is carbon loading more than temperature, because carbon loading is what makes the oceans anoxic and we really can't live through that. The problem is chaotic weather more than temperature, and anything we do trying to change things back makes the weather more chaotic, not less. The problem is food security, and the idea of infinite resources to reverse two hundred years of dig-and-burn in a decade, or the idea that we can magic up food security through geo-engineering, or that we can somehow keep burning fossil carbon if we just arrange to technologically bless it, are all really terrible approaches to food security.

    Dig-and-burn has to stop. The food supply has to decarbonize. There isn't any way to keep the status quo, or reverse the process.

    908:

    Oh, how I wish this geoengineering notion would die.

    Me too, but perhaps in a subtly different way to how you look at it. We're currently geoengineering the fuck out of the planet, and I think that's not having good effects. Rather than geoengineering harder, we should try to geoengineer less. What we're doing is not terraforming, it's the opposite - terrorforming. Viz, we're taking an inhabitable planet and making it uninhabitable*.

    On the one hand we have denialism and minimalism from the people profiting from this (everybody wealthy by global standards, but especially those who are extremely wealthy); and on the other hand we have people who are young, poor or imaginary. It seems likely that the wealthy will do their best to make sure the imaginary stay that way and as many of the poor as possible become imaginary.

    But on the other hand more people are deciding that they'd rather live. And some are starting to actually act that way.

    • arguably even 1000ppm and 10 degrees or more of warming doesn't strictly make the planet uninhabitable, just uncomfortable for the few hundred million who find places to live. People are actively quibbling about this.
    909:

    talking about the Single Market/the EEA, which is not the same thing as a customs union.

    I'll take your word for it that the UK can remain in the customs union rather than having to re-enter it from the outside.

    910:

    Graydon/Moz @907/908, Once sea-level rise reaches the point where it can't rationally be denied; 1. Financial Institutions will stop making mortgage loans on current sea-front properties. 2. Insurance companies will stop writing Home/Contents policies on said properties. Now consider what kinds of properties we see right on the sea-front in places like Australia and the US. Very, very expensive ones! The rich people who own those properties are simply not going to accept the loss of their assets without massive levels of complaint. We will therefore see half-baked geoengineering 'solutions' rolled out forthwith. Do I like this idea? Hell no! But that doesn't mean it isn't going to happen.

    911:

    what kinds of properties we see right on the sea-front

    By definition anyone who owns a property in the US/UK/Australia is wealthy. Even most "poor in Australia" are wealthy by global standards. Almost all of them are working very hard to raise sea levels.

    One of the considerations when we were buying a house, one that my partner at the time was reluctantly on board with, is that it be at least 20m above current sea level and have an exit to higher ground that doesn't go through (much) lower areas. When Sydney floods I want to be able to leave without needing a boat (Sydney is built across several low-lying floodplains - there are occasionally-tidal lakes in "Western Sydney" ~50km from the coast).

    912:

    We will therefore see half-baked geoengineering 'solutions' rolled out forthwith.

    It's quite funny watching some of those, BTW. People demanding seawalls that only enclose half the low-lying coast, on the theory that high water will only occur in the rich suburbs. My expectation is that only after the water comes from behind those walls will there be pressure to raise the roads and seawall off the poor areas (in some countries there is pressure to seawall the entire town but that becomes even more expensive even faster - even Manhattan Island isn't ready to do that yet, for example).

    My fear is that one of the tech overlords will decide to "just do it" with genetic engineering and we will see some half-baked garbage kill our oceans much faster than current efforts will manage. The good news about simple chemical geoengineering is that it requires more wealth and resources than even the richest single enterprise can manage (although the Koch brothers are trying).

    But that's why I think releasing self-reproducing GMOs needs to be treated quite harshly. I don't exclude GE rapeseed and maize from that, BTW.

    913:

    Sorry for spamming, but from NZ "Stuff" has quite good coverage of this if you follow links from this article:

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/96503854/counting-the-cost-of-sea-level-rise

    ANALYSIS: If you knew a major natural disaster was on its way, likely to affect some of the smallest, most vulnerable parts of the country, you might expect a national response to be under way.

    We already know such a disaster is certain; unlike the future's earthquakes, we have a head-start.

    This disaster is referred to in a yet-to-be-released Government climate change report, leaked to media this week. It cited some very large numbers, some with dollar signs attached, relating to the risk New Zealand is carrying in relation to rising sea levels.

    That's Aotearoa's major newspaper chain, BTW. Owned by one of the media monopolies IIRC.

    914:

    The only potential geoengineering I'd think about is methane breakdown in the Arctic. I'll admit that I don't know if it's possible, but if it's possible to dump large amounts of hydroxyls (for instance) into the atmosphere if we start to get a runaway methane release, rapidly turning the methane into CO2 might be the difference between extinction and partial survival...

    Anyway, I agree: we've got a few billionaires running poorly controlled geoengineering projects to profit themselves. They assume they'll survive because money, and they assume that there are too many of the rest of us anyway, so it's okay if they cull the herd, or whatever-it-is-they-say.

    Getting them to stop it would be a really good idea. The best way I've read so far is to change the cost-benefit balance for their enablers--the wealth managers--so that the people who have been cleverly rewriting the rules of tax havens to suit their clients realize that they can make more money doing other things, like arranging payrolls for countries that have employees from two dozen countries and have to deal with international tax treaty issues from hell.

    915:

    Actually, Miami real estate brokers* figure that it's okay to own coastal real estate. It's just not okay to be the last owner of a particular piece of coastal real estate. Hence the game right now is to find a sucker to offload your property on for a profit, and I suspect that denying there are any problems is part of the strategy for finding that sucker.

    *That one made it onto the radio, but I suspect it's SOP in all disaster areas.

    916:

    Miami is weird. They have lots of street flooding at some high tides. Especially when it rains at the same time. They know it is coming. They are working on it. Although I can't even imagine the $$$$ needed to do much of anything, much less something good for the next 50 to 100 years.

    But at the state level it is total denial.

    A friend in Naples has less rise from sea level back to his property miles inland than I do from my street to my front door.

    917:

    I have exactly the opposite opinion. Oh how I wish we’d take it seriously. The current rate of advance in decarbonising the global economy is just not fast enough. At this point we need to stop wringing our hands about moral hazard and uncertainty of intervention.

    918:

    I think it's a race. On one hand we have all the usual racist tropes, from "Blacks are inferior" to "This is a White job." On the other hand, there are a lot of mixed babies these days.

    So the question is, do you defend the White Race by killing your own grandchildren? If the propaganda slows down and the rate of intermarriage speeds up, I'd expect that the genocidal thing won't happen, or if someone tries it they'll be shut down quite quickly.

    On the other hand, if the propaganda speeds up and the intermarriage slows down, your prediction could be correct.

    On the gripping hand, I'd expect that before we get to the point of genocide, we'll see houses in the U.S.and U.K. which are up to the window-ledges in seawater, at which point anyone who thinks that Black people are the biggest problem our society faces will be considered quite crazy indeed.

    919:

    I heard a good term for this recently: terraf*cking

    920:

    It's going to be messy, but we do have a lot of choice. I keep thinking about Mediterranean, with the eternal tension between (generally urban) cosmopolitanism and (often rural) intolerance. In places like Syria and Iraq, there were literally millennia of inter-religious and tribal mixing within the various empires. Then, in the 20th and 21st Centuries, demagogues have played on sectarian and tribal differences, splitting families down the middle as people are, despite massive struggles to stay together, are forced to take sides.

    So I don't think racism is a biological given, and I don't think it's politically inevitably. However, I do think it's going to take a tremendous amount of effort and compassion to keep the few monsters from stoking genocidal passions to their own ends.

    921:

    terraf*cking

    What a terrifying term. Accurate, but terrafying.

    922:

    Moz @911, I'll see your 20 metres above CSL, and raise you about 650. I live in Canberra, and don't plan to move. The big problem here, I suspect, will be increased summer heat, but given the prevailing low humidity we're still going to be more livable than Sydney. Plus there are few cities in the world more suitable for PV/Battery backup all year round. Even in the depths of winter the days here tend to be sunny. I play competitive bridge, at a competent but not expert level, and I have several times played at the big Gold Coast Congress. Now there's a place that is going to be impacted by sea-level rise, and yet high-rise building continues unabated.
    (For our US friends, think of an Australian version of Miami.)

    923:

    Frem this morning's radio: Senior Liebour spokesman in the House: "Labour is not the party of Remain" Thank-you SO MUCH - so you are even more fucked-up & useless than the tories, yes? Wankers - is this some sort of competetion, to see who can screw-up even worse than Grayling, or what?

    guthrie @ 897 Actually Corbyn doesn't matter AT ALL - which wierdly scares me more than if he did ( See also above )

    Kramler @ 902 I am hoping that this one WILL pass - it's the closest to succeeding & if we do have to leave, is easily the least-worst option. But then Uncle Ken Clarke was behind it, what a suprise. ( I think you are wrong Moz, but let's not argue over that right now? More important things to worry about, yes? ) [ see also Kramler @ 906 - thanks ]

    Heteromeles @ 920 Milosovic & was-Yugoslavia, too.

    924:

    You're referring to Barry Gardiner, who is contradicting other senior figures in Labour - see for instance Owen Smith here https://twitter.com/OwenSmith_MP/status/1111049115889213440?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

    The only sense I get from that is that Labour is split on this - which we already knew.

    The most exciting news to me yesterday was how incredibly civil the debate was with the government boycotting it - really impressive change of tone, and for the first time I feel some progress is being made. For reference, here's the debate https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2019-03-27/debates/45525049-637A-47BF-90CA-AF6A2D9F16ED/EUWithdrawalAndFutureRelationship(Motions)

    I think if this is the level of cooperation and expediency we see from non-government control of the order paper, we should probably make this the default, and allow government a handful of "government days" per year.

    925:

    Also at this point I don't really care what Labour states as policy - it's possible to observe how they whip on important votes - you'll notice they whipped FOR a confirmatory vote, and did not whip against revocation.

    926:

    "Teresa May didn't vote for any of the options, I don't know why."

    From the breakdown of votes, it looks like the cabinet abstained across the board (as did the DUP and SF aren't seated - so it looks like Northern Ireland didn't get much representation in this exercise).

    Regards Luke

    927:

    My previous comment is wrong the DUP didn't abstain in general just on the No Deal, Common Market 2.0 and EFTA/EEA votes.

    Looking at a visualisation of the votes, the Confirmatory Referendum motion only failed by 27* votes while 25 Labour MPs voted against and there were 18 Labour absentees. The Customs Union vote would have passed if either the LDs or SNP hadn't abstained. Those two look like they might be candidates for getting over the line if they do ranked preference next time.

    The Revocation vote failed by 109, but with 110 Labour abstentions. Obviously it's not credible that they'd break 100% for revocation if they were forced off the fence, but that is a tantalising statistic...

    Meanwhile the Tories cannot muster a positive vote for any of the options - the closest thing to a block of Tories with an actual desire to vote for something are the ~150 nutters who were for a No Deal or a Standstill crash-out. The only time the Tories look remotely unified is when they are shooting down the alternative plans.

    [*]I'm eyeballing the graphic with these numbers, so I might be 1 or 2 out either way.

    Regards Luke

    928:

    Government whipped ministers to abstain. DUP voted on several of the motions, always for the more evil alternative.

    929:

    Nope.

    Observe the Miami real-estate market. (Miami is absolutely 100% pure-quill free-range organic doomed, and has salt water running up into is sewer system and over its streets at high tide today.)

    The idea that market rationality will kick in is, alas, just plain wrong. It was never rational and has no mechanism to become so.

    930:

    Best understanding I have is that the Arctic tipped in 2005 or so, that the methane release is (patchily) underway, and that there is effectively no monitoring of this taking place. (It would have to be the US, Canada, or Russia, all petro-states.)

    Non-biological means just aren't available on mass grounds; it would be a lot, and it would take lots of ships, and you can't get the ships where you want them. Pretty sure we're going back to the Pliocene climate regime.

    931:

    It's not moral hazard, it's material hazard.

    Things can always get worse. No one has any idea how to actually fix the problem, other than "stop with the carbon forcing; wait. No, sorry, longer than that". The known feedback loops take centuries; the most radical stuff that gets into the literature, the Hansen-et-al YIKES case for ice melt, takes half a century. And even that paper expected a couple centuries.

    You're talking about a massively expensive -- entire US military budget, expensive -- project that has to keep going for centuries and which has to be doing the correct thing before it can get feedback. That's not a possible thing. Stopping with the fossil carbon extraction is a possible thing.

    932:

    So the question is, do you defend the White Race by killing your own grandchildren?

    It was common for people to sell their own children to other slave-owners.

    Take a look at the well-studied Sally Hemings; "white" in appearance (looked a lot like Jefferson's wife because child of Jefferson's wife's father), long-term ... whatever you call it when one party owns the other. Still a slave, children still slaves.

    So, yeah, they certainly do intend to defend the white race like that.

    933:

    Dig-and-burn has to stop. The food supply has to decarbonize. There isn't any way to keep the status quo, or reverse the process. I did started a back of the envelope calculation on a proper cost for carbon here. It's pretty raw and unchecked and the whole thing needs to be run by an actuarial type. (I have somebody in mind.) Gist: For RCP6 - 1060 pg carbon / 4 billion fewer humans = 265 petagrams(gigatons) per gigadeath (giga fewer humans at least). (Being loose here; the deaths need not be premature, but probably would be.) 265 tonnes (metric) per death. The final step is to plug in the "Value of a Statistical Life": Income Elasticity and the Global Value of a Statistical Life (10 May 2017 W. Kip Viscusi, Clayton Masterman) " we calculate average VSLs in lower income, lower-middle income, upper-middle income, and upper income countries to be $125,000, $380,000, $1.3 million, and $5.7 million, respectively. " using a VSL of $125000 (third world) as a lowball (so that when people grouse about the plausibility of 4 billion humans dead, there's some wriggle room on the price, price of black/brown/white lives, etc.) (Equatorial humans mostly brown or black, 'cause intense sunlight.) If everyone is priced at 5.7M, price per ton of carbon is $21523.

    Which means a price per ton of carbon of about $500 (472) (or if RCP 4.5 means 4 gigadeaths, $636.). This would be a a carbon tax roughly equal to the problem. Tax cheats would be dealt with harshly.

    Having said that, geoengineering will have a role, and there are some forms that would be pretty neutral excepting ocean acidification, e.g. (wild example only possible with self-replicating machinery) a solar shield at L1.

    934:

    Having said that, geoengineering will have a role, and there are some forms that would be pretty neutral excepting ocean acidification

    We absolutely must not except ocean acidification! Anoxic oceans is the end-Permian "90% of everything dies" scenario. This year's scary result is that the ocean carbon sink rate is much higher than previously thought.

    The Long Anthropocene is holding up to examination; it's pretty darn robust at this point. (The idea that humans have modifying the environment for a long time, probably pre-agriculture, and certainly post-agriculture.) So in the sense of "we need to have a custodial relationship with the environment" and "what we do matters at a global scale", yeah, geoengineering. In the sense of "we can put it back!", or "we can decide what climate we want", no. The measurement and feedback problem is absolutely intractable.

    935:

    So the question is, do you defend the White Race by killing your own grandchildren?

    Demonstrably, yes.

    Historically slaveowners sent their own children down the river, knowing what their (short) lives would be like. Read The American Slave Coast for some truly horrifying letters written by slave women to their owners, pleading with the owners not to sell their own children (ie. slave-owners child with slave) to the South.

    Currently many people are willing to pay for their own children to be tortured for 'moral failings', and/or willing to let them die of diseases.

    We have a myth that parenthood somehow makes you more moral, more caring — but the evidence doesn't really support that.

    936:

    Um, yes and no.

    Partially anoxic oceans are actually normal for a hothouse Earth, which is 80% of the last 400 million years or so. That's where all the hydrocarbon-rich shales come from that produce oil.

    To radically oversimplify, what happens is that dead patches spread (due to warm water and lack of cold, oxygenated water in the deep, which is a function of having frozen poles), but "the top layers of the ocean" (I'll explain the quotes in a second) remain oxygenated. That's why, among other things, ammonites did so well in the Mesozoic: they were floating, benthic octopoids that stayed away from the poisonous deep waters. Shell-less modern squid and octopi are a much more modern evolution, and there's good evidence that squid, at least, started from a group that lost their shells as part of colonizing the deep ocean after the K-T.

    "Top layers of the ocean" is a problematic statement, because when people talked about it, apparently the mental model was that the deep ocean is a big, flat expanse of abyssal plain with water piled on top. Turns out it's got far more topographic relief than does the subaerial part of the world. It also has strong currents. So which areas will get oxygen depleted is almost certainly a lot more complex than a simple equation suggested by CO2 in and temperature rising model. Some areas will stay oxygenated (this is confirmed by the PETM fossil record, which records tracks of critters walking around on some abyssal sediments at the height of what should have been an anoxic episode).

    The End-Permian was a weird event, where the ocean apparently super-saturated and started outgassing. Thing is, a lot of marine life somehow survived this mess, including lineages like echinoderms and cephalopods that don't venture into fresh water. That strongly argues that the ocean didn't uniformly become anoxic--it just became really really bad.

    Still, we're in a mess, massive CO2 outgassing seems to be a normal feature of large extinction events, ocean acidification will trigger a classical extinction event, especially if it destroys reefs*, and since hundreds of millions of people depend on the ocean for food, this is really vital and stupid to ignore.

    *Reefs leave behind the best fossil records, along with molluscs, and the mass extinction events are all marked by reefs disappearing from the fossil record for 10-20 million years, and the next reefs coming in being composed of novel organisms that weren't major players previously. By that gold standard, we're actually just starting to enter a fossil record-level mass extinction event. While yes, there have been lots of extinctions on islands and mountain tops, in general those environments are terrible at preserving fossils, so we have no good fossil record to compare current rates of extinction to fossil rates of extinction. With reefs and molluscs, we can compare the two.

    937:

    No argument on the generalities.

    I was objecting to an exception for ocean acidification in Bill Arnold's take on geoengineering -- there are some forms that would be pretty neutral excepting ocean acidification -- because ocean acidification is not neutral whatsoever.

    And yes, it's a long way to End Permian and hot-fizzy-drink oceans. Would argue we're already too close; shouldn't attach "getting closer" to anything even vaguely labelled "solves the problem".

    938:

    I'm basing my ideas of what could happen in the future with regard to race on a couple things that already happened in the real world. The first is that in the next ten years or so, "mixed" will probably become a recognizable demographic group, which means that "what mixed people think" will start to be part of politician-think, in much the same manner as the Gay community (or Jewish or Hispanic communities) became a recognizable demographic with considerable political power. (Try saying something anti-Gay/Jewish/Hispanc and getting elected to a safe Democratic seat, or even a competitive seat in the U.S. these days!)

    By the same logic, you're never going to see that racist candidate get elected to 50-60 percent of the seats available at the local, state, or national level - mixed people know that the state can decide to classify them by their least favorable race (the one-drop rule) and treat them with prejudice - and the mixed demographic will both vote and be courted for votes accordingly.

    The other issue is that by definition, a large percentage of mixed people have White ancestors just like a large number of Gay people have Christian ancestors. And once Gay people gained some political power and it became obvious that every family had a couple Gay people... suddenly sodomy wasn't illegal anymore, people stopped being disowned, and now Gays can get married... I'm expecting the same trends to be involved where mixed people are concerned, and without a much larger propaganda push than we're seeing right now, I hope for this trend to pretty much kill racism in the U.S.

    As to "sales down the river," they happened during a very different sociological time, when racism was much more prevalent. Without a form of general public opinion similar to the pre-Civil-War south, I don't think killing your own grandchildren will be an option for anything other than a microscopic fraction of America.

    As I considered the future for my own (somewhat optimistic) book I decided that the response of the government to the Climate Refugee crisis was going to go all directions at once. My future government does lock the southern border and discontinues the H1-B and student visa programs, but it also clamps down hard on racists inside the U.S. and creates one last amnesty program. Also, the government does outreach to rescue certain world cultures which it identifies as worthy of preservation, such as Balinese Hindu Rice culture (gets two crops a year out of a much hotter and wetter climate - ahem) and the intellectual elites of Timbuktu.* Lastly, it starts a robust foreign aid program to the southern countries, particularly Mexico, mainly through the climate change portion of the Pentagon, which by 2080 is the largest collection of soldiers and sailors in the U.S. military.

    So the response of the government gives something to all the stakeholders, including ones I don't like much, but it all mostly works.

    But absent a dictatorship, I'm not expecting mass genocide, and if there is a "dictatorship" I'm expecting a civil war...

    • I would strongly suggest that everyone read a book called "The Badass Librarians of Timbuktu" or at least the abbreviated version available online.
    939:

    That we agree on!

    The amazing thing to me is that rebuilding civilization and decarbonizing it would have much the same cost as geoengineering and do all the good stuff too. So what we're really talking about with geoengineering is the cost of inertia and dealing with the prejudices of the well-to-do who benefit from polluting the planet. It's amazing how much that kind of thing costs.

    Oh, and as for "going back to the Pliocene?" If the whole clouds-go-away-at-1200 ppm" story is correct, we can't get to the Pliocene for another 100,000 years or so. The Pliocene happened after a gradual drawdown of CO2, so it was apparently largely cloudless, if this theory is right. Our largely cloudy planet came with the Pleistocene icehouse in this theory.

    The weird part is that this means we'll go through something the Earth hasn't apparently seen since the end of the Carboniferous, a transition from icehouse to hothouse. If the 1200 ppm cloudkiller thing is right, we'll go through sort of an increasingly hot "Super-Eemian" up to 1200, at which point we lose the stratocumulus and go screaming into the PETM and hopefully not further. Then, over the next 100,000-400,000 years, the carbon comes out of the air, and eventually we hit Pliocene-type levels (under a pitiless blue sky) for a few millennia before the clouds come back, the glaciers start forming again, and we're back to where we are now, minus civilization and a few million species. If at that point we rapidly plunge into another ice age, we'll also lose a lot of the hot-adapted species that survived the Anthropocene, so we'll have another blip of extinctions.

    940:

    Take a look at the well-studied Sally Hemings; "white" in appearance (looked a lot like Jefferson's wife because child of Jefferson's wife's father), long-term ... whatever you call it when one party owns the other. Still a slave, children still slaves.

    Concubine is a better word than most. It certainly captures the situation better than the title "mistress" which seems to get used about that relationship with a distressing lack of irony.

    941:

    I still say you are wrong. NOT everyone has "racist" reactions, which I am defining as negative feelings/opinions of someone based on their skin color or "ethnicity", with the latter term meaning "skin color or religious heritage or common language that ain't ours".

    I have a really unpleasant view of a high percentage of self-identified whites in the US South, based on their actions, but that's a political/economic/religious group. which, given my definition above, is not racism.

    Oh, and I make really good money these days... but grew up poor, in a neighborhood that inside of four or five years (thanks to evil blockbusing real estate agents) went from white, mostly eastern Europe, lot of Jews, to 90% black.

    Any idea why I don't feel "white" or "privileged"?

    One last note: I was quite pleased when I moved to Texas late in '86, to discover Aggie jokes (Texas A&M), and anyone, regardless of race, creed, or country of national origin (or sex) could be an Aggie... and every single racist, sexist, nationalistic joke you've ever heard became an Aggie joke. A sample: Q: How can you tell when an Aggies been using a word processor? A: White-out all over the screen.

    942:

    _Moz_ @ 889: On the U.S. Census ... "Mixed" as opposed to "Asian," "Black" "Hispanic" "Pacific Islander," etc.

    I get that the census is trying to describe self-identification, but still. Aotearoa struggles with this (and there is a subtext of "and some white people refuse to describe themselves as pakeha") but the US seems even more weird

    The sole purpose of the United States Census is so that Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers,...

    The only question you are lawfully required to answer on the Census is "How many people live at this address?" All the other questions are "good to know", but they're not required by law.

    All the other questions provide statistical data so the government knows where to spend the money. "Mixed" is included as a racial category because no matter how many statistical categories you come up with, there's always going to be someone complaining they don't fit into any of the categories listed, so they feel like they're being left out. It's a label less fraught with ill feelings than "None of the above" or "Other".

    943:

    _Moz_ @ 904:

    "planning acronym BANANA: Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone."

    I read an amusing paper the other day that surveyed attitudes to living near power plants. The only one where people who actually lived near them liked them more than those who didn't was wind turbines.

    BOWTIE - Build Only Wind Turbine Installations Everywhere.

    SNAFU - Situation Normal, All Fucked Up.

    944:

    In these times, I believe would could do with a resurgence of the similar construction FUMTU, "Fucked Up More Than Usual".

    945:

    I admire all of your optimism, determination and stubbornness but isnt it time to spend less energy on stopping the tsunami and more on surviving it, particularly those of you dependent on specific medications which might become scarce after your "government" finishes feeding you to the sharks?

    It occurs to me that the past two years and probably the next few as well are perfect material for those interested on writing novels exploring the complete breakdown of government over time. Horrible but really too fascinating to look away from. One really wonders whether May will end up turning on a spit somewhere in the ruins of London.

    946:

    Talking ( as we were, earlier ) about letting people die out of sigth, without it openly being genocide (ish) THIS Italy's right-wingers have forced their guvmint to veto EU Mediterranean rescue attempts on refugees. Thousands will die.

    947:

    I still like the acronym I picked up here: WOMBAT: Waste Of Money, Brains, And Time.

    I've got a nice little silver wombat pin I've been known to wear to meetings, and my partner has her wombat earrings, which she sometimes tells people stand for "woman of money, brains, and talent." The ambiguity is nice.

    948:

    Since everything else has been tried, I'm hoping to see an amendment submitted tomorrow; "that his house agrees to vote against this amendment"

    949:

    Well that and FUBAR, but I’d refer to the Jargon File (without necessarily promoting its maintainer’s stuff).

    950:

    so the government knows where to spend the money

    If we use "the system is what it does" metric, the US exists to support its military, which in turn exists to roam the globe murdering people and dominating other countries. Trumps latest budget is a slightly exaggerated version of the normal situation, much as Trump is a slightly exaggerated version of your other presidents.

    I've just read "The Good Soldiers", and the overriding theme that stood out to me is that the suckers in the military had been brainwashed to the point where they could not think about why Iraqis did not love the people who had invaded their country and were roaming round killing people and smashing things. That leads to a circularity, "these dumb animals can't see the benefits we bring them" which leads to worse behaviour by the soldiers, and likely feeds into the habitual betrayal of locals by the invaders. But that was kind of subtext, there was no overt criticism of the US or its military. Which also stood out to me.

    951:

    The Guardian has this comment: It is simply delusional to think that parliament can deliver in days what the government has failed to achieve in nearly three years. The absence of a majority for any Brexit outcome that is available at this stage should not be a surprise.

    Suggests that another Brexit election is on the cards and the Cons will be forced to run on the platform "vote us for out" rather than the more realistic "vote us out".

    952:

    Unfortunately they will not be forced to run on that platform, because we have a 2-party system and no Remain party.

    953:

    That whizzing noise you hear is 2 degrees of warming going by.

    If the payoff of spending the entire US defence budget per year (3.1% of US GDP) was keeping Bangladesh and other low lying countries above water then ceteris paribus I'd gladly fork over the dosh every year, for ever. Think of it as distributive justice even in a 1.5 degree world it'll still be the poorest people and countries who take it in the neck.

    The thing is that there are a range of things we should consider doing short of putting a solar shield in orbit (or whatever). For example if the antarctic ice sheet collapse accelerates we're looking at sea level rise of up-to 3m in decades rather than centuries. A geo-engineering project to protect the most vulnerable ice sheets would delay the collapse and allow for adaptation. Worth exploring and if feasible doing.

    954:

    Yeah, this is one of those times I'm grateful to live with a preferential system. While it might suck to have to spend time going "which is my least hated all-wrong party" it beats the heck out of the limited choice you poor suckers have.

    In many ways I'll take neonazi mps as the price for getting consistent representation of minor parties. Having them in parliament does accurately reflect the actual population. That's bad, but it's not bad that a significant, sizeable minority have representatives in parliament. I wish they didn't have those opinions, but I can't help feeling that it's better to have them where we can see them.

    If only we didn't have our media dominated by them, though. While it's nice that failbook are talking about scaling back their support for white supremacy material, it would be even nicer if Our Rupert would do the same, and a relief if in both cases that led to less far-right material in the media.

    955:

    because ocean acidification is not neutral whatsoever. Oh, I agree with this. I'm pretty sure that humans, should civilization continue, will try to remove enough C02 from the atmosphere (and/or ocean surface?) to get stratocumulus clouds back (assuming that model is good) rather than wait for natural processes to do the job. Just don't know what form it will take, and so how energy-intensive it will be. Capture from air, perhaps nuclear powered, is one possibility. Tech would need to improve. Another, which scares me but might be chosen (or even be the rational choice) due to cost, or partial collapse of civilization, or tech advances, is engineered photosynthetic organisms. (and perhaps, per #661, destruction of methane by engineered methanotrophic bacteria and archae in waters with high methane concentrations, perhaps with nutrient additions. Dunno, spitballing there.) The main issue with all the talk about geoengineering is probably IMO not the modeling (though difficult or, well, perhaps impossible even for future humans), it's that talk about such options, conveniently well into in the future, will have a stalling effect on decarbonization progress.

    956:

    So I recently had a fascinating if lengthy discussion with a guildmate online who it turned out had done a stint as a prison guard at Guantanamo as part of his three tours. He could tell you what breakfast cereal most terrorists prefer, which probably won't work as a marketing slogan.
    He was a really chill guy, who would come across perfectly normal until you discussed something that tripped the indoctrination and he switched to "this is how it is" and then went back to chill again. He was firmly of the opinion that no one was there who wasn't a bad actor, at least in his section, because if they were innocent they wouldn't have ended up there. And he couldn't recognise the circular logic, because he had faith in his immediate chain of command. But equally he totally recognised all the flaws in the criminal justice system because when he came back he worked as a policeman in the midwest, and outside the military structure the inherent unfairness would come to light.

    957:

    Yeah, Jonathan Pie above repeats the point that one major problem at the moment is that four million people voted UKIP last election and got one MP. Which is 12.5% of the national electorate represented by one person. That's a broken system.

    I totally support proportional representation, because it means everyone gets a say, even if they're raving loonies. And the rational parties can then completely ignore them.

    The biggest irony of the AV debacle was that the UK already uses proportional systems for the European Parliament elections, local council elections, and the devolved parliament elections, but it was treated as too difficult to implement for the nation as a whole. Idiots, all of them.

    958:

    Via "The Spinoff", this UK political blogger rant about the stupidity of the current nonsense.

    What followed was a masterclass in hypocrisy so severe that it was startling even in this golden age of consequence-free political lying. Boris Johnson, who not so long ago said May's deal "strapped a suicide vest around the UK" and turned it into a "vassal state", suddenly decided he supported it. Astonishing. Jacob Rees Mogg, who previously said the deal turned the UK into "a slave state" and that it constituted the "greatest vassalage since King John", also decided he was prepared to back it. Extraordinary. And now here they were, actively promoting our own national slavery on the basis that the prime minister might possibly step down at some unspecified point in the future.

    Is the upside that they're now unable to sue anyone for defamation?

    959:

    Let me try to put this a different way.

    There's what and there's how.

    We know what is going to happen; best we can tell, last time the atmospheric carbon load was this high, sea level was 9 metres higher than present.

    We don't know how that is going to happen, and have some confidence that the models we have are wrong because we keep finding out they're giving predictions that turn out to be optimistic. So we know neither how nor how fast. Without that knowledge, all we can do is introduce some other forcing, making the existing problem of figuring out how all this works much more difficult. The expectation that such a forcing is going to make things better is not well founded. (People are doing amazing work at, for the complexity of the problem, amazing rates of speed. They still can't check their work until predictions do or don't happen, and that works at planetary scales which seem very slow to our lives.)

    Somewhere up there I mentioned the Pliocene and Frank expressed some "er?" at this. I was thinking pretty strictly of the forests north of sixty -- 78°33'N in this case, though I don't know the paleolatitude: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ellesmere-island-pliocene-fossils Analysis of the beetle fauna from the peaty matrix indicates that the site was 10°C warmer than present in summer and 15°C warmer in winter, and isotopic studies of fossil larch support this view.

    That's a big swing. It's pretty likely that all it takes to cause it, and the associated carbon loading changes and continental glaciation, was changing ocean circulation. (Panama closing, full creation of the Antarctic circumpolar current, something, Arctic ocean becoming just small enough for its latitude; nothing dramatic has been found to kick off the Quaternary.)

    The existing, today, amount of forcing is way bigger than that. The idea that we haven't tripped a major feedback is not impossible but it's certainly not likely. So when you wind it out to the future, we haven't got all that good an idea of what, less idea of how, and even less idea of how long. Trying to engineer a solution against that ignorance could not end well.

    960:

    it's that talk about such options, conveniently well into in the future, will have a stalling effect on decarbonization progress.

    That's kinda what it's for!

    I don't know if tobacco companies bought "cancer cure immanent" articles but it's the same sort of idea.

    961:

    Trumps latest budget

    You have to understand that for multiple decades no Presidents budget has come close to being implemented. They are political statements for their hard core base so they can say, "Well I tried but those other guys ..."

    If you want to talk spending by the US government you have to look at the actually Congressional appropriations. Which drarely align with the budgets passed by them.

    962:

    About 55% of what the elected types get to spend goes to the military. The other 2/3rds of the federal budget is apparently not under their control (so much for democracy):

    https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/aug/17/facebook-posts/pie-chart-federal-spending-circulating-internet-mi/

    963:

    Totally understand the forcing function issue and that this will play out over centuries. However the problem we have right now is with the "let's just curb emissions" approach. And that is that it's just not working, we're not going to meet the targets and we're not going to keep global temperatures below that magic 2 degrees. That conclusion is based on read of the state of play as of the Katowice COP24 meeting in Dec of last year, e.g. we're on track to a 3 degree world. So we need to look this failure in the eye and see it for it is. I acknowledge the uncertainties and possible side effects but, as the IPCC points out, geo-engineering of one sort or another may buy us some time. In the short term it may also help avoid heading through a major tipping point like the runaway collapse of the Antarctic ice sheet before end of century. To my mind framing the debate in terms of moral hazard just does not address the policy failure or tell us what to do next.

    Whether we should implement geo-engineering technology, when and what sort is fundamentally a Collingridge dilemma. As Collingridge put it, "When change is easy, the need for it cannot be foreseen; when the need for change is apparent, change has become expensive, difficult, and time-consuming". One school of thought on how to deal with the problem is apply the precautionary principle, i.e not do it until all is totally confirmed. I don't agree with this because, as Max More points out, it's a great way to stop everything. It also entrenches the status quo, now that might be 'OK' if you're a middle class professional in a first world nation (I'm looking at you George Monbiot) but not if you're a Bangladeshi farmer whose losing his farm to salt encroachment right now. Instead I think we can and should do what Collingridge advocated and apply the principle of corrigibility to the decision problem. That is we pursue those strategies that give us the ability to reverse out through a mix incremental commitment and exit strategy.

    964:

    "cancer cure immanent"

    If that wasn't deliberate it's even funnier.

    965:

    However the problem we have right now is with the "let's just curb emissions" approach. And that is that it's just not working

    It's not supposed to; everyone in power is deeply committed to the status quo. It's like how all that money went into hydrogen fuel cell research because the one thing you can be sure of is that those won't work in any practical transport sort of sense. (Methanol-air, ammonia-air, aluminium-air, those could work. And those get squeaky-damn for funding. This is too consistent to be an accident.)

    Going carbon-neutral is well-understood -- really! -- possible, practical, and mostly ready to go. It'd even generally improve things for most people.

    Geo-engineering is not well-understood, obviously possible, obviously practical -- if it takes 50 years to start bending the curve we don't care -- and it won't actually do anything worthwhile in terms of "can get a job" personal scales.

    The political cost to geo-engineering is only lower until you try to do it for real, and the bill comes in. Carbon-neutral is nigh-certainly easier (because of the "oh look, meaningful work for everybody" angle) politically, and we can't do that. That's the problem; there isn't much in the way of technical problems.

    Also, focusing on not having more than 2 C warming is... doubtful. We're at some risk of 8 C on current carbon load. How much risk isn't known or knowable, but sensible planning has to account for that. The "keep the Holocene" approach has failed, and might have been hopeless in 1950. Sensible planning has to assume the failure of agriculture with little-to-no warning.

    966:

    Yeah, um, er, Pliocene. This is the critical problem with the 1200 ppm Cloud killer: once it's axed the clouds, the poles get a lot warmer. Until the clouds disappear, the poles stay relatively cooler than their predecessors.

    With clouds in the (modern) models, the poles don't get as hot as they did in the Pliocene with the same CO2. Or the PETM. This was a really well known problem even in 2011, and clouds were speculated to be the missing component even then.

    Anyway, so as we heat up, the poles will probably stay colder than Cenozoic temperatures until we get to 1200 ppm CO2-equivalent. At that point, as the stratocumulus disappear and the planet's albedo drops, the world (and especially the poles) heat up rather rapidly. I'm not sure what counts as rapid, because I haven't seen those models yet (if they even exist), but that's what we really want to avoid if we can.

    The real kicker is that methane will get us to 1200 ppm CO2 equivalent much faster than simple CO2 emissions will, so if we get mass methane emissions from the Arctic and they overwhelm the hydroxyl in the atmosphere, we could be in fairly serious trouble. Breaking the methane into CO2 (or finding a way to resequester it as, I don't know, massive amounts of polyethylene or something) actually slows climate change. Actually, covering the Arctic OCean with a massive layer of white polyethylene is one of those hideously bad ideas that I'm sure some geoengineer will come up with any day now.

    967:

    Don't get me wrong, substituting 'X' geo-engineering for carbon reduction efforts in the economy is a bad idea. Conversely continuing to decarbonise is a very good idea. But right now what's being done is too little too late and that's not going to change.

    So what do we do, we just give up? Let's just 'adapt' to a 3+ degree world by century end? To me that's really code for if you don't live in a developed nation your life is going to be even nastier more brutish and very short, and we (the west) don't care.

    968:

    One contrary position is that talk of geoengineering is simply a delaying tactic, and thus should be avoided. That's what it's bee so far, so much as you keep saying "emissions reduction hasn't worked and therefore cannot work", I think it's reasonable to say that "geoengineering has never worked but has been an excellent tactic for those wanting to delay or prevent action". Remember CCS? "keep polluting, but store the pollution somewhere forever"... lets just keep building new fossil plants while the taxpayer tries to make CCS work.

    969:

    What I said is that performance to date will not ensure we stay below 2 degrees which was the policy objective. You know what Friedman said about policies, judge them by outcome not intent.

    Here’s a hypothetical to think about. Say we bumble on as is and not too far down the track we find out that the Antarctic ice sheet is disintegrating at such a rate that it’s going to break up over the next twenty years raising sea levels by 3 metres. You know what the mechanisms are, and there’s a solution, an underwater weir around the glaciers sea feet, it’s a horrendously costly job but technically feasible and will prevent a fast breakup measured in decades.

    So what do you do:

    A. Say oh that’s too bad, it’s a moral hazard and tell everyone living in the Mekong delta to get hip waders?

    B. Argue about it then stand up a last minute project to stabilize the glacier feet in a mad dash.

    C. Have studied the problem intensively along with solutions and based on a risk assessment that includes cost of inaction have started work a decade before.

    Welcome to the Anthropocene.

    970:

    The British Parliament, at the moment, is pretty much a worked example of a proportionally-represented legislative chamber since the conventional 2-party system has broken and we now have at least a dozen Monster Raving Loony parties seated in the lower Chamber. Sure, like most proportionally-elected systems there are two large-ish parties, a typical emergent property of elections but there are a lot of special-interest small groups manoeuvering, splitting and reforming in the muddle. It's not a pretty sight.

    971:

    Moz / Pigeon 951/2 Yea - a general election, Cthulu help us, would be dominated, not by party, but by where the individual candidates stand on Brexit - I think. Which could be "Amusing" for certain values of ... Like J Corbyn coould lose his seat, since he is "Leave" but his electorate is approx 90% remain ... And the other way around in many places, I suspect.

    972:

    On the plus side, this is an inevitable result of a political system that refuses to recognize that it can't keep the status quo and must now deal with the issues of the undesirable future. (From the perspective of the status quo, all futures are undesirable.)

    And you're getting it in a relatively orderly way; it's happening in Parliament, it's happening in a way that presumes fair elections, it's happening under conditions where you can track the positions taken by your representative.

    On the whole, this is much better than the usual degree of societal collapse necessary to get rid of a status quo social order.

    973:

    "What you do" is two things.

    Single-issue political party. I would think focusing on food security, and all that this implies, would be the best way to sell it, but I don't claim my human social function emulator's convincing, either.

    The decarbonization cause has to be tied to economic prosperity; solar installer jobs, greenhouse work, etc. These have to be "good jobs" and they have to be politically and legally defended and supported as a legitimate route to stable personal prosperity. (Much like the post-war order invented "real-estate developer". I mean, try not to make those mistakes, but that idea of creating and legitimizing a category of endeavour.)

    Politics is an expression of pre-existing social organization, it doesn't create social organization.

    974:

    My view is that we're going to see agriculture collapse with insufficient preparation of alternatives. (How could preparation be sufficient?, on the one hand, and it would have had to have started around 2000, on the other.) Being in a rich country isn't going to matter a whole lot.

    I expect this soonish; before 2035 time frame. I know that's not what the IPCC says (they say 2050), but the IPCC reports are really optimistic. I'm convinced by the Arctic-tipping-and-feedback folks, and they think the Arctic tipped in (thereabouts of) 2005.

    https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/ is extent, not volume. Extent matters; extent is the albedo driver. (Volume is the trend, much more than extent.) I don't think predictable rainfall or consistent seasonal temperature profiles (and thus useful agriculture at sufficient scale) will survive an ice-free Arctic ocean.

    This ought to be considered an every-nerve-and-sinew emergency. It's getting la-la-la-la.

    975:

    Nice monthly-updated sea ice graphs if u like that sort of thing.. https://neven1.typepad.com/blog/2019/02/piomas-february-2019.html#more

    976:

    Thank you!

    Those are indeed helpful.

    (Like? Those graphs me nightmares. But there is nothing that cannot be faced.)

    977:

    Since some of those glaciersare well over a kilometer thick, I don't think there's an engineering solution to stopping them from draining into the ocean.

    There's also the problem of getting a truly massive pile of reinforced concrete to cure rapidly in subzero temperatures. IIRC, when they built the Hoover dam, they set up a power plant next to it to run warm water through pipes in the concrete to get that massive pile to cure, so that it wouldn't just slump. Just to block the Colorado River at a narrow point between really high cliffs, they had to build on order of a Pyramid's worth of masonry.

    Now try building something like that to block orders of magnitude more water, with no cliffs to anchor the sides to (it'll be freestanding on the coast. Where does the meltwater go, incidentally?), in subzero temperatures, over a span of years while you divert the water (and calving icebergs) around the construction site. In either Greenland or Antarctica, so the local infrastructure is grossly inadequate for supporting the workforce you're hauling in.

    978:

    I'd change that verb: we're kind of seeing agriculture collapse right now, but fortunately, not that much. That's what's driving migration out of West Africa, for example. The Midwestern floods are going to drive up beef and grain prices in the US, and if that means we export less grain, then there may be more food instability and political instability in the countries we sell grain to, like, oh, North Africa.

    Thing is it's not totally deterministic. While the upper Midwest has had a bunch of farms destroyed, other places seem to have had decent winters and might have good yields. Food security is as much about the politics of moving food around as it is about production, and thus the galloping idiocies of the US and UK administrations affect the security of our food prices right now as much as supply does.

    Still, the real problem is that the US (and for all I know, no country) has a year's worth of grain laid up in case there's a total crop failure. In the US, the supply on hand is on order of months. Still worse after that, to keep prices down, supermarkets went from stockpiling food in warehouses to just-in-time supply chains with massive shipping. Cut those supply lines (with an earthquake or storm) and there's no warehouse to fall back on. Among other things, this has made earthquake preparation in places like LA much harder. Until the 1990s, planners could depend on supermarket warehouses to be turned into disaster supply warehouses with a week or two of food in them. Without the warehouses, they're urging everyone to stockpile in their homes, which hasn't worked nearly as well.

    979:

    Pretty sure it's the other way round. Concrete setting is exothermic, and the pipes in the Hoover dam were for coolant to carry away the excess heat so it didn't cook itself in the middle and end up with a core of crappy concrete. The undersea project would probably need the same kind of thing, but it would be easier, since if you made the pipes big enough natural convection would circulate coolant from the surrounding environment.

    I do rather agree that it would have much more serious difficulties though. Not to mention the fuck loads of CO2 that making cubic kilometres of concrete would produce.

    980:

    This is getting beyond "silly"; Maybot's deal has just lost the division for the THIRD time!!

    981:

    Home stockpiling is logistically challenging and assumes there's some disposable budget that can be repurposed. (AND it generally assumes working power because the entire food supply chain supposes refrigeration these days.)

    National reserves is trouble because there isn't enough surplus to divert, best I understand it.

    And, yes, agriculture is already failing. I mean "no pretense of a commodities market in agricultural products" there; something that will take out the concept of "market price" and the ability to ship long distances. (You can't ship if you can't stock the ship with enough food for the crew to eat through the voyage...)

    2012 three years running would about do it.

    982:

    And the third vote fails, down by 46 votes. I'd say this is uncharted territory but that's been the case for some time now. If May refuses to step down, then crashing out seems like the most likely option. The most likely alternative appears to be a general election, coinciding with a much longer extension and election of MEP's. No other outcome seems nearly as likely, unless I'm missing something?

    983:

    Thanks. I haven't had my coffee* yet, and I couldn't remember which way it went (and I couldn't be arsed to spend 15 minutes looking it up either, sadly). The thing I did remember is that if they hadn't piped the Hoover Dam, the concrete inside it would still be curing today.

    The point about CO2 release from all the concrete production is also a very good point.

    While we're at it, I should note that there's a growing shortage of suitable sand for concrete production around the world, so diverting a good chunk of the world's remaining sand supply to shoring up glaciers means we can't use it to build new infrastructure and buildings away from the advancing ocean.

    *Speaking of coffee and problems with future agricultural production, what will happen to industrial productivity when supplies of all our favorite drugs, from caffeine and sugar to alcohol and whatever, become less available due to failures of the crops that produce them? Oh the humanity, to meet climate change undrugged!

    984:

    _Moz_ @ 950:

    "so the government knows where to spend the money"

    If we use "the system is what it does" metric, the US exists to support its military, which in turn exists to roam the globe murdering people and dominating other countries.

    Horseshit & damned offensive horseshit at that.

    985:

    On one hand, praise for geoengineering is frequently spouted by people who don't get the scale of the problem. On the other hand, if we can pour a million* tons of soda into the oceans (after doing the proper research) and bring down the acidity to "normal" levels, I'm all for it. I like eating (sustainably harvested seafood.) In fact, I just like eating.

    The first thing geoengineering needs is to avoid poorly considered "white polyethylenethe" solutions and do things that work. Sane ideas might include planting a couple billion trees or painting all our buildings a glossy white to diminish the urban heat-island effect. Ferrous sulfate looks promising, but needs a metric buttload of research before I'd trust it.

    Non-sane ideas include "building a sun-shield in space" or "spraying aerosols into the air."

    The second thing geoengineering needs, as noted multiple times above, is to avoid the idea that we don't need to decarbonize if we geoengineer. It's entirely possible to imagine a government-run program for "removing carbon from the air" that's paid for by our taxes while the oil companies get their usual tax breaks... Dude! That would be total bullshit!

    I'd be very happy with a sane geoengineering program that worked alongside decarbonizing our energy sources, and there's a political compromise with the geoengineering geeks that looks like "we get our decarbonization, and you guys get your genengineering." The coal/oil companies won't like it, but it might work just fine for fixing the atmosphere.

    But here's the real deal folks. Here's the sad truth of the matter. When things get bad enough, the politics will require geoengineering. If you're a smart environmentalist who wants to save the planet, and maybe you can get some grant money, work up a geoengineering method which works, because after we lose Florida** we will geoengineer, like it or not.

    • "Million" in this case is a generic large number, not a researched amount.

    ** Or the European/Chinese/Indian equivalent of "losing Florida."

    986:

    Like the Green New Deal?

    987:

    Well, Parliament is at least being consistent: after 9 noes (8 Wednesday and one today), all that's left is "NO deal" or "NO Brexit"!

    988:

    We made a run up the 5 Freeway to see the eclipse a couple years ago. The first 40-50 miles of Californias central valley had no crops planted. Damn straight we're seeing problems already. (Though I suspect the problems were caused as much by the usual failures of the Central Valley farmers to use good agricultural methods rather than climate change.)

    989:

    The Green New Deal is a very very very mild version of "we're not willing to die so you can stay as rich as you want to be" being expressed intergenerationally. I don't know as it's managed to turn into a movement yet, but it's definitely a social thing finding political expression.

    So far as I know, none of the policies expressed in it go anything like far enough, fast enough, but it's a start.

    990:

    I believe today is the deadline by which a Brexit deal was supposed to be passed by Parliament to avoid a NO DEAL Brexit and the "extension" granted by the EU was contingent on Parliament passing some kind of a deal before the deadline.

    Where do things stand today? Has Parliament passed something, anything that will qualify? Does the crash out happen or not? Does it happen NOW or sometime in a couple of weeks (however long the extension was supposed to be for)?

    And while I don't expect it will happen, since it hasn't happened already, IF Parliament passed a measure to revoke Article 50 and "remain" would the Government be forced to go along?

    Or would May still be able to force a "crash out, no deal Brexit" before being kicked out?

    If they've managed to qualify for the extension, could Parliament still vote to revoke Article 50? Would the EU accept a revoke vote during the "extension"?

    [Yes, I know that's not going to happen, but hypothetically could they do it???]

    991:

    On the other hand, if we can pour a million* tons of soda into the oceans (after doing the proper research) and bring down the acidity to "normal" levels, I'm all for it. I like eating (sustainably harvested seafood.) In fact, I just like eating.
    The oceans are becoming more acidic due to the disolved CO2. If you reduce the acidity without taking that CO2 out as a solid then it's going to go into the atmosphere, and I doubt you want that. Eating is nice. Eating in a world where the wet bulb temperature goes over 38C, not so nice.

    992:

    Nope, they gave us an extension until April 12th, which is the last date in which we would have enough time legally to be involved in the elections for the European Parliament. So we have two more weeks. Parliament either just passed or is about to pass a statutory instrument that simply says "exit day is now April 12 instead of March 29".

    If May's deal had passed, we'd have an extension until May 22, because the European Parliament elections start on May 23 and they want to be done and dusted with us at that point.

    Since the extension dates came from their side, not ours, presumably we can still revoke A50 so long as we do it before the 12th.

    If Parliament passed revoking A50 and the government refused, there's basically nothing we can do about it as I understand it beyond triggering an election. Or a full blown constitutional crisis with the monarchy stepping in, which won't happen.

    993:

    Well, this isn't commenting about media usage, but trust was contrasted to cartel when I was studying them in history (not law). A cartel was a horizontal monopoly, wereas a trust was a vertical monopoly. Sort of as if Apple were to buy out not only the chip fabs, but also the mines, so as to have total ownership over all that was needed to make their product. So monopoly isn't exactly the idea, but if your only source of, say, indium is owned by Apple, you won't be able to compete.

    994:

    Japan isn't actually one of the most racist societies on the planet, it's merely the most racist of those economically powerful. There are societies where one group is trying to violently exterminate the other. For some reason they tend to have weak economies.

    995:

    Jim D @ 982 No IIRC on Monday we get another go at if not "indicative votes" something similar ... Ken Clarke's offer of then was the closest to a solution - it only needs someone to re-propose that & it would probably pass ....

    Ultahr Dewller @ 987 Not necessarily - see what I wrote, above?

    Charles H @ 994 Burma ( "Myanmar" ) perhaps .....

    996:

    ...iving near power plants. The only one where people who actually lived near them liked them more than those who didn't was wind turbines.

    That's absurd. The only possible reason it could be true is that most installations of solar panels can't be seen from the street. (And that depends on local architecture, zoning rules, etc.)

    But I really suspect that the paper was put out by a wind turbine manufacturer.

    997:

    I think about the Mediterranean too...but not in quite the same way. I keep wondering whether it would be possible to (re-)dam the straits of Gibraltar and replace the Suez Canal with a sea wall. You'd need an area-wide league of nations to do it, and it would be horrendously expensive, but if (properly) done it would preserve civilized life (as opposed to aquaculture) in a large number of acres. Perhaps it could even lower the sea level and save Venice.

    I think the politics of this one, though, might be even more difficult than the engineering.

    998:

    Yer, whaa? It would produce a depression with a salt lake at the bottom that would make the Dead Sea look like a backyard tub for salting a single pig. I don't see how it would preserve civilised life. "Down in the Bottomlands" is one of the few stories I have seen to try to address the consequences.

    999:

    The ECJ ruled that the UK may revoke art. 50 unilaterally, but that revocation must be "unequivocal", not merely as part of a delaying strategy. So it'd probably require passing in both Houses... where "" to anything seems in short supply!

    1000:

    I don't think that humans significantly modified the ecosystem pre-agriculture. For one thing, there weren't very many of them. (Yeah, even then they were destructive way beyond what their numbers implied...but their numbers were SMALL.)

    1001:

    There probably is a solution to keeping the glaciers from melting...but it wouldn't be easy or cheap. I'm thinking of a sun shade (tent? awning?) above them coated with titanium dioxide, and kept clean.

    Now since this is above glaciers that are currently melting, the supports would need to be moved frequently. And would need to be designed to not contribute to the problem by, e.g., digging holes in the ice. Large splay feet sound best. Perhaps they should be mounted about 2.25 meters above the surface so that they would be moderately accessible for repair. Etc. Lots of details, but it could probably be done. Would it be sufficient????

    1002:

    The Guardian live coverage reckons May is heading towards calling an election. I reckon that would rule out a Tory leadership election due to the time it would take. Things could become pretty chaotic if there is an election. Some more interesting times ahead :(

    1003:

    It would take centuries to turn the Mediterranean sea into a "Great Salt Lake", much less a "Dead Sea". And there's the question of how much fresh water flows into it every year, so it would probably need to be pumped out anyway. I believe that even the Dutch needed to pump out the land behind their dikes. (That's why all those decorative wind mills.)

    So unless the thing was mishandled, or the rainfall decreased shockingly (it should be increasing as the climate warms...though not uniformly), you wouldn't end up with an excessive level of salt.

    1004:

    Is the idea here "dam Gibraltar to empty the Mediterranean", or "dam Gibraltar to keep the sea level of the Mediterranean the same as it is now"?

    In the latter case, you'd likely need to let a controlled amount of water through the dam, but that is a well established technology. Probably not a big enough drop to get much power out of it.

    1005:

    And there's the question of how much fresh water flows into it every year, so it would probably need to be pumped out anyway.

    The Mediterranean is a concentration basin. This means that more water evaporates than flows in from rivers. This is currently balanced by a net water inflow form the Atlantic. (Surface current in, deep saltier current out, butte flow into the Med.

    So if you dam the Pillars of Hercules, you end up with less water flowing in and more salt remaining.

    Decent technical article here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/earth-and-planetary-sciences/mediterranean-sea

    1006:

    butte flow into the Med

    NET flow into the Med. No idea what typo led to that autocorrect mistake…

    1007:

    If I have it right, the water level would drop by nearly half a metre a year. It would take millennia, not centuries, to turn it into a dead sea, but the ecological damage would be visible within a few years.

    1008:

    I could have sworn this was the Brexit thread, not the global warming thread.

    1009:

    It is the brexit thread, we're just waiting for our brexit dividend to show up so we can spend it on ill-thought out geo-engineering schemes. I'm planning to drain the excess water from rising sea levels into the hollow earth, by pumping it high into the Himalayas and pouring it down the gateway in Shambhala.

    1010:

    Got home from work, saw some of the coverage of today's vote. What strikes me is that this is just the first stage of a withdrawal. Even if they somehow scrape a vote for the deal, we still have the many many trade negotiations with the EU to go through after that, probably over several years. How are they going to handle that if they can't even get a basic first stage through? Do we want May to lead those meditations???

    1011:

    Monday's indiocative votes are going to be ... interesting. I'm almost, but not quite, prepared to bet that some variant of the Ken Clarke scheme passes.

    Actually, given the shit-show she inherited, May has done badly, but would anyone esle, in the limelight at the time have done any better? I blame Camoron - he should, instead of resigning have said: "OK we have an indiocative non-bindong smal majority to leave ... OK EU, what do we do now, because, in part at least, your smug arrogance is what got us here - make it worth our while to call another referendum that votes remain, huh?" Hindsight, ain't it wonderful!

    1012:

    If May had had the intelligence of a reasonably bright green monkey, she would have announced on her acension that she was setting up a government planning group that would produce a proposal that would be put before Parliament for ratification in 6 month's time, and DO IT. That would have given her ample time to get it ratified before the money laundering deadline. But she ordered sod all planning until after Article 50 was triggered.

    The following are interesting:

    https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/uk/brexit-result-dodds-would-remain-in-eu-rather-than-risk-nis-position-in-union-37963168.html https://news.sky.com/story/gibraltar-chief-fabian-picardo-revoke-article-50-to-take-back-control-11671687

    1013:

    I'd be very happy with a sane geoengineering program that worked alongside decarbonizing our energy sources, and there's a political compromise with the geoengineering geeks that looks like "we get our decarbonization, and you guys get your genengineering."

    You want a simple, achievable, well-understood geo-engineering contribution?

    Easy-peasy.

    Lawns delenda est. Also golf courses.

    There's more lawn by area in the US than any other crop; it's a complete and utter waste of land and resources. Replace it with a carbon sink: replant with diverse locally native deep-root meadow or prairie plants, depending on biome. These are the plants from regularly burned-over ecosystems, and you'll need to arrange that in time, but the carbon sink is the really extensive root system. (There are places like Arizona where you need to go to xericulture.)

    1014:

    The only possible reason it could be true is that most installations of solar panels can't be seen from the street

    In Australia that is almost universally true. Note that they were not talking about residential rooftop solar, but actual "power plant" scale PV. "five hectares covered in panels in the desert" sort of thing. And in Australia those things tend to be, well, in the desert. Not in residential areas. Once you exclude people who work at the plant (because gee, I wonder how they feel about having a job?) you typically have a very small number of "neighbours" who all live at least a kilometre from the plant.

    It would be amusing to survey people living in the "virtual power plants" made up of connected household solar+battery systems. We have a few of those in Oz but I suspect fewer people who live in them know than even those who live in an eruv (which at least has an obvious wire at the boundary). So surveys would have to be really, really specific.

    I suspect that the survey did not include large-scale urban plants, but even if it did Australia has similar zoning laws to other victims of Modernist urban planning so there just aren't many people living near industrial areas that have those plants. Schools might be the one exception, but there also aren't many schools with more than 100kW of PV on the roof. Unless the survey said to each specific household "how do you feel about living next to the power plant installed on Local School X" I suspect 90% of people who live near them would not realise/not think to say.

    OTOH, my "reopen White Bay campaign" (coal fired power station in the middle of Sydney) has been treated as satire because not even the most publicly devout fossil fans actually want to live with their love.

    1015:

    Moz you do know about the ongoing saga of the "restoration" of Battersea Power station? Or the re-purposing of Bankside power station? If you don't I, or (I'm sure) someone else here will - for your further edification ...

    1016:

    Lawns delenda est. Also golf courses.

    I've been impressed again at how fast a lawn can soak up carbon. My lawn is the endpoint for the woodchips-chickens-garden mulch cycle, but that might have to change because my lawn is getting noticeably higher than the neighbours, and since I'm on a slope that means pooling during rain. 20cm deep pooling on the neighbours property, at least until I made a drain for it. Luckily they barely use their back lawn and didn't notice. In Christchurch I got away with adding 5-10cm to the lawn, here I have more garden and less lawn so 10cm is happening faster than I am ready for. The reed beds capturing silt and loose floating material doesn't help either.

    Also, the problem with doing that is that now I have to mow the thing every week rain hail or shine because it grows in turbo mode. The harsh summer drought phase was great in that respect, I had to water the garden but I only had to mow every second week. Yay?

    But sadly the real problem with lawns is not just wasted soil, it's the millions of shitty two stroke mowers and other garden tools, its the megatonnes of fertilisers, herbicides, pesticides and other poisons that are poured onto lawns then washed into waterways. The idea that everyone could be persuaded/forced to have an organic lawn and electric mower is even less reasonable than just concreting every bit of lawn in the world (which also a popular solution/problem and you don't even need a planning permit to do that here).

    1017:

    White Bay has the advantage that it has been "subject to planning proposals" for a long time but is still largely intact. This week it's going to become a technology hub, for example. So if there was the political will it could reopen easily, or a new coal plant be built on site and there's even a railway line there to deliver the coal (just like they used to do).

    But they are all very exciting places to redevelop because of the habitual use of materials we don't like any more, and the way they're often so tightly enclosed that site access is difficult. When they were built they were generally in the middle of a big open area but now they have to tetris everything into the building footprint, including the sorting areas for demolition waste and the turning bays for the trucks that take it away.

    Plus they're big enough projects that they are inevitably the target of politicians, often at multiple levels. So there's the inevitable "this isn't corruption, it's a favour for a friend" but also the rework every time the government or minister changes. Add that to the political pressure to understate costs and overruns are inevitable. Plus any time you're talking billions of dollars the source of that money is going to be problematic. Nice people don't have billions of dollars...

    1018:

    Dunno. I'd be careful here. Racism is maybe not inevitable, but some sort of over-generalization and sorting with antipathy towards the out group seems to be difficult to avoid. I'm guessing it is in our wetware somewhere, but have not real proof. Racism can be seen as a common expression of that tendency.

    I tend to distinguish between negative feelings towards a group and outright suppression / aggression towards the group. I have tons of friends/acquaintances/family members who fall towards the first category, but don't tolerate the second sort of behavior in people I can choose to associate with.

    Oddly, if anything, the tendency towards demonization of an out group is, if anything, more pronounced among my more progressive friends. (That may be because the more extreme tend to be a bit less tolerant and the people I know slant progressive, so there's a sampling thing going on.)

    --Erwin

    1019:

    Yes but what do you mean by agriculture? In Australia the first people changed the ecosystem considerably just with fire hunting and stone tools. There's also an ongoing argument as to whether that reduction in plant diversity was sufficient to cause enough loss of water vapour over central Australia to result in a permanent failure of the monsoon, or whether that was due to a long term global climate change.

    1020:

    Despite all the doom and gloom about the alleged ongoing collapse of agriculture the price on the world market of all the major staples are on a downward not upward trend

    That collapse may happen but it has not started yet. I’m also betting the midwestern floods won’t seriously effect things

    1021:

    the tendency towards demonization of an out group is, if anything, more pronounced among my more progressive friends.

    Selection bias? You have fewer nihilist friends and less tolerance for extreme nihilists?

    I tend to see stuff like implicit association as almost inherent properties of people rather than something that can reasonably be changed. In that sense it's like short-termism and greed... everyone is that way to some extent but the question is whether they see it as somewhat negative and try to mitigate the tendency, or at worst try to defend acting on their impulses. It's not how you feel, it's what you do.

    I include "climate guilt" people, for example, as "trying to mitigate it"... they will do the rational thing, but only if it's obvious and easy. Just how easy varies from person to person. As always there's a spectrum from "will pay a couple of dollars extra for carbon offsets on their holiday flights" to locavores and so on.

    But I'm quite happy to demonise the "trash the planet" types, and really struggle to deal with people I live with who just don't give a fuck. They will live how they live and if anyone has a problem with that too bad. It's really hard to be optimistic when the dominant discourse is nihilist and even sympathetic friends are more "I'm sorry you're being so stupid about this" than "you're right, this is hard".

    1022:

    It hasn't happened in a way that causes food shortages in Anglo NorAm, try. All those folks migrating out of Eastern Africa aren't doing it because of itchy feet. (Similar with the Eastern Med getting drier and drier.)

    Remember that farmers have no political power; the lack of concern means that the system is quite likely to fall over hard, because the monopsony interests running it have no interest in changing it.

    1023:

    I don’t disagree with this “racism” versus “supremacism” distinction you are making but I have two strong objections which I think are important.

    One is in terms of terminology. What you call “racist” here is a concept that doesn’t have many obvious direct mappings in English and “racist” is an especially bad rendering, albeit the most recognisable. It relies on a specific context and refers to a concept that does not in fact represent anything real outside of that context. I think the word “chauvinism” has three different common meanings. First, it originally meant the same thing as “jingoism”, Second, it came to mean any excessive identification with a group defined in opposition to another group. Third, it eventually came to mean sexism, and that’s probably its most familiar meaning. But the second meaning still pretty current and widespread, and to my ear it is a better rendering of the concept you are describing here than “racism”. This may sound like a minor quibble in your world, where racism is probably the predominant form of chauvinism, but bear with me.

    The concept of race is historically recent, is not a reflection of the facts of biology and inheritance, and comes with its own ideology. Sure racism is a kind of chauvinism, but while it is correct to say some sort of chauvinism is inevitable where there are in-groups and out-groups, it can’t be true that racism is inevitable because race isn’t a real thing outside of a social context that acknowledges it.

    Far too lazy to go looking for links, but I have just in the last couple of months read about the experiences of people of colour from the USA in Canada and the UK, where their colour is not (as strong) a social group signifier, and of a lady from NYC who moved to (still generally regarded as fairly liberal) Austin for university, whose experience was more confronting. This is not to say that the experience of racism is not there in NYC, Canada or the UK, but rather that it is not as predominant a form of chauvinism there.

    What you call supremacism - well I would call that racism too. Maybe we can talk about racial chauvinism and racial supremacism, to distinguish these from sex, class, geography, handedness, eye-colour, sexuality, open-minded-and-non-conscienentious-versus-closed-minded-and-conscientious Hahvahd-versus-MIT and other forms of chauvinism and supremacism?

    The second objection is that these are not orthogonal and potentially represent the poles on a continuum, being a distinction of degree rather than type.

    I think what you are saying is that this isn’t the same continuum that social identity theorists describe, and that you don’t need to be at the extreme intergroup end of the spectrum to have a more supremacist position. I suppose my thought here is to question how extreme intergroup behviour is manifest and suggest surely that’s exactly what supremacism is. I also generally want to understand how any totalising construct represents the perspective of the subaltern, whose voice is the one we need to elevate. How does the model deal with internalised supremacism on the part of oppressed communities?

    1024:

    To understand the decisions people and governments are making and will make in the future (just like in the cold war) we could start by applying some basic games theory. The strategy of postponing action, which is what everyone is doing right now, is an entirely predictable (and malign) Nash equilibria courtesy of the diners negotiation game. That's why Kyoto failed and why we are not meeting the Paris treaty. Courtesy of game theory there are also things we could do to fix Paris, sanctions for one.

    Likewise we shouldn't neglect to look at g-e options with our game-theoretic glasses on because when we get that point we'll need to understand what decisions individual states and groups of states are likely to make and how to avoid a Nash equilibria we really don't want. The circumstances were we'd have to deploy any large scale g-e techniques are of course absolutely disastrous, but we still need to have plans for the circumstances we don't want to happen. Like Kahn said we need to think about the unthinkable.

    While I'm on the games theory kick you can actually analyse Brexit negotiations between the EU and UK and in particular why the question of whether the UK can revoke Article 50 unilaterally is so important. That's because it changes the Nash equilibria as there are now three options to consider. In those circumstances the EU will not make swallowing the deal easier for the UK as their best outcome is now the UK remains. In fact their strategy will be to make it such a bad deal (like introducing the backstop) that it won't be acceptable. If the political cost of revoking Article 50 is then less than the economic cost of a hard Brexit the UK will remain. That's a big if and a high risk strategy of course. Also in none of the games is the UK ever a deal giver, the EU offers a deal and the UK has a decision to make, something the UK negotiators should have borne in mind.

    1025:

    And now we have the crossing of the streams. Apparently the Labour Party tried to declare a climate emergency on Thursday, because of course that is what one does in the middle of Brexiteering. I assume it fizzled mightily?

    1026:

    there's even a railway line there to deliver the coal (just like they used to do)

    From the late 1920s, Brisbane's tram network was powered by a coal fired power station in what is now the upmarket, inner-city postindustrial suburb of New Farm. Urban planning in Brisbane took on a freeway focus in the 1960s, the tramways were shut down and replaced by buses (pretty much like for like, there are still bus routes that follow old tram routes). The decommissioned power plant became a squat and artistic community (there is heritage-list aerosol graffiti dating to the 70s). The site was refurbished as an arts centre in 2000 and has been a great venue for all sorts of things ever since.

    The wharves for loading coal have gone, but the embankments they were built from and much of the steel substructure is still there. There's a rather iconic photo around the place of a steel sculpture of the word "flood" partially submerged in the waters of the 2011 flood - that's at the Powerhouse.

    Anyhow there's no tram network to power, no talk of ever recommissioning this site, but it's an interesting comparison - more with Battersea than with White Bay, but there you go.

    1027:

    the Labour Party tried to declare a climate emergency on Thursday

    It would have been slightly funny if they'd actually passed a decent climate emergency bill using the omnishambles as cover, but sadly that wouldn't have bound future parliaments even if they'd done that. As it is giving May even more emergency powers doesn't seem like a smart move. Do they want to wake up and discover that she's just gone ahead and done whatever it is she wants to using those powers?

    1028:

    "Oddly, if anything, the tendency towards demonization of an out group is, if anything, more pronounced among my more progressive friends."

    Substitute colleagues and aquaintances for that, and I agree, though I would put 'progressive' in quotes. It is the reason that I so utterly loathe the politically correct - in their condemnation of the sorts of discrimination they 'favour', they are extremely happy to demonise and even persecute equally (or even more) vulnerable and persecuted subgroups of the majority / powerful / whatever they are condemning. And pointing that out has no effect on their bigotry.

    And, as someone who belongs to a couple of those subgroups, I have suffered from just that, and it is not improving.

    1029:

    Interesting story about Sally Hemmings:

    "Under French law, both Sally and James could have petitioned for their freedom, as the 1791 revolutionary constitution in France abolished slavery in principle.[32] Hemings had the legal right to remain in France as a free person; if she returned to Virginia with Jefferson, it would be as a slave. According to her son Madison's memoir, Hemings became pregnant by Jefferson in Paris. She was about 16 at the time. She agreed to return with him to the United States, based on his promise to free their children when they came of age (at 21).[14][33] Hemings' strong ties to her mother, siblings and extended family likely drew her back to Monticello.[34][35]"

    1030:

    You know how Charlie will remark that civil politics in Scotland works differently?

    If you define community by exclusion -- knowing who the outgroup is, and enforcing that as a basis for differential treatment -- you get a different society than if you define community by common purpose. (The most basic of which is "do you eat together?")

    It really doesn't matter where wanting to be good comes from; it's not any structurally different just because the definitions of "good" vary. So I tend to view the idea of wanting to be accorded the status of good as the problem, rather than the specific manifestations. The specific manifestations will continue until the overall society shifts into some other definition of community.

    How you do that? It's not easy but it's obviously possible.

    1032:

    Given that Stormont seems to be moribund, perhaps Mrs May should ask for advice on the best way to return to direct rule for NI for, say, 12 months. She could point out that this would give time to remove some of those annoying differences between NI and England/Wales that must so worry true unionists - libel laws, that sort of thing. At the same time some agreed measures that have unaccountably languished, such as support for Irish gaelic, could be given a boost. Finally, there could also be a proper independent inquiry into any alleged financial irregularities that may be worrying people in NI.

    1033:

    Sure local famines and collapses but the overall world market is not signaling any kind of systemic problem

    Also farmers have a lot of political power in the US at least, because of how the senate seats are unequally distributed among rural populations

    1034:

    This would be a power sink, not a power source. You'd need to pump out the Mediterranean to keep the levels even with historic levels. And there's the question of salinity. How much water flows into the Mediterranean? How much evaporates? Etc. You might need to do some (essentially) unpowered "equal exchanges" of sea water with ocean water to manage salinity. Or you might need to continually pump it out. (IIUC, the Dutch used windmills for that purpose.)

    1035:

    It might be more appropriate to say "Big Agricultural Companies" have lots of political power in the U.S. Family farms have been on the decline for decades.

    1036:

    Well, I'm pretty liberal in my use of agriculture as a descriptive. I'll accept pretty much anything intentionally intended to do something that would lead to fostering plant growth.

    Even so, there are arguments to be made that certain primitive pre-agriculture practices deformed the ecologies of entire continents. (E.g. why did the large fauna vanish so suddenly in North America? It was about the time that people showed up, so maybe they did it. But it could also be that diseases got imported from Asia at about the same time.) I don't know about Australia. That humans did it isn't impossible, but is that known? Or is that just one of several hypothesizes?

    Clearly, by the time that people were planting rice paddies, they were releasing excess methane into the atmosphere. But not on the scale of even a moderate volcano. So I tend to say that it's safer to assume the pre-agriculture people had essentially no effect on the ecology. Yeah, they occasionally drove herds of large herbivores off cliffs, but there were relatively few people. But there are these uncertainties...so if you want to vigorously assert that they had a strong effect, I can't really say they didn't. I just think that it's more conservative to assume, lacking better evidence, that they didn't. (And as I don't have any evidence about Australia in either direction, and fires in a dry environment spread...)

    1037:

    I think you may have the causal arrows backwards. The US and other agricultural powerhouses use food exports as "soft power," and grain production is well integrated with things like the military industrial complex, because both depend on fixed nitrogen for their essential ingredients.

    The reason for this is simple: food shortages, especially in urban areas, are one of the best-known causes of political unrest (this is literally Biblical, if you look at the Second Horseman), so there's been a concerted policy to produce huge amounts of food, with food defined as stuff providing the necessary nutrients to keep people alive (hence the USDA RDA and so forth).

    So it's a mistake to read global grain prices as an honest signal of food supply, just as it's a mistake to read the political power of Big Ag as a sign that they have good fundamentals. It's similar to saying that Lockheed Martin and Halliburton are doing so well because the free market is signalling that there's a strong market demand for high-end fighter jets.

    1038:

    There are a bunch of unknowns. On Australia and the Americas, megafauna died out thousands of years after humans showed up. This might be due to various lag effects: compound growth of human populations, or a coevolutionary Red Queen race between the megafauna and the humans that the humans ultimately won. We don't know. What we do know is that the megafauna survived some fairly radical environmental shifts (ice ages and interglacials) before humans showed up, then disappeared.

    Then there are trophic cascades: Back during the last ice age, the Mammoth steppe was the biggest biome on the planet--Arctic grasslands, basically. They were maintained in large part by large grazers, most of whom are now extinct (we've still got caribou and muskox). What we consider normal Arctic vegetation--tundra--is actually fairly new, although it has some of the same species. There are similar issues across the Americas, with plants that were apparently adapted to big herbivores being sidelined when their partners vanished (osage orange is the best known example). I think there were similar changes in Australia, but I don't know. The bottom line is that by removing a relatively low number of what might be termed either keystone species or ecological engineers, like mammoths, humans can cause drastic changes to the vegetation. This affects how carbon is stored, and thus affects the climate.

    1039:

    May is threatening her reluctant MPs with a general election if they don't support her deal on the fourth attempt. On the one hand this means postponing Brexit which is an effective threat against the ERG but since (I think) polling currently suggest the Tories would regain a majority if an election was held now it's not very effective for those against her deal and hard exit. Labour's mixed messaging over the past months will lose a lot of votes. The Tories are the pro Brexit party but Labour aren't the anti-Brexit party. So 48% of the voters in England may just stay at home or maybe vote Lib-Dem. In Scotland Labour will lose almost all its seats to the SNP again and the Tories are unlikely to gain from this in Scotland as Brexit support is 40% or so in Scotland and they probably already have the most seats they can get.

    1040:

    Yes.

    If you look at constant-dollar farm income for the "family farm", it's been pretty much flat since 1950 in the US. That's a near-perfect indicator for lack of political power; someone else is setting all the prices.

    Only lately it's dipping; all those dairy farms going under in New York State, for example.

    1041:

    @ 1018 "the tendency towards demonization of an out group is, if anything, more pronounced among my more progressive friends"

    I see this sort of criticism a lot in different forms. Maybe it's even true of some, but for the most part I view this criticism as both a problem of vocabulary and a misunderstanding of a premise.

    Non-progressive, or conservative etc., characterize the progressive ideal as "tolerate alternate view points." This then translates into apparent hypocrisy when progressive ire is aimed at certain groups of people. The problem is that "tolerate alternate view points" is not the premise from which progressive views spring. Instead, it is something like a meta-premise regarding viewpoints in general, which might best (or at least adequately) be phrased like "view points that are exhibit intolerance should not be considered valid and society should push back against them." If there is an apparent conflict in this, it is one of limited vocabulary, not hypocrisy.

    1042:

    I rather have the impression that calling an election is a way to keep the Commons revolt away from the order paper.

    It's looking at least plausible that Monday could see majority support in Parliament for something other than May's deal and we've already seen clear legal advice that Parliament can in fact bind the government; if Parliament passes a bill directing the government to do the thing, the government then must. Revoke-and-remain isn't obviously that thing, but it's certainly a risk, and from May's point of view a severe risk.

    The only way May has to stop that is either to prorogue or to call an election. And even if the Commons does reach majority support for something, May can make a good case for calling an election on the basis of deciding between that and May's deal, since that would certainly amount to losing a confidence vote. And then it would look like something other than trying to suppress the revolt by any and all means. Plus the current polling impies a result where the Tories could go back to ignoring the DUP, which would certainly make the Tories happy.

    1043:

    No. Read the other replies to your post. More water evaporates from the Mediterranean than flows into it from rivers. Therefore water flows into it from the Atlantic to keep the level up. And a lesser amount of water with a higher concentration of salt flows back out into the Atlantic at a greater depth, keeping the salinity constant.

    If you dam the Straits and stop these flows, the level will fall and the salinity increase. The shallow water habitats around the shorelines will be destroyed within a few years. The salinity increase will take a while longer to become significant. Other long term effects include the loss of a large source of evaporative moisture and the water supply problems in places like Syria becoming even worse than they are already.

    It is not a new idea. It has been proposed before, for reasons including the large amount of power you could generate from the difference in level produced by the evaporative loss. It's not so much the sheer impracticality of building such an enormous dam that stops it before it has a chance to get going as the immensely destructive environmental consequences vastly outweighing any possible good that might come of the power generation and the land route between Spain and Morocco.

    1044:

    There have been proposals to build a support structure for deep-water turbines. It would be more like a bridge than a dam and exploit the existing deep outflow current. There's a sill so there's even been suggestions that you could put the turbines on the Atlantic, downslope side of that and just need anchors rather than a support structure.

    Any such thing gets into the usual submerged-turbine biofouling problems. Maybe if you made all the submerged bits out of titanium?

    1045:

    " In those circumstances the EU will not make swallowing the deal easier for the UK as their best outcome is now the UK remains. In fact their strategy will be to make it such a bad deal (like introducing the backstop) that it won't be acceptable. "

    Given that the UK leadership is incapable of deciding on anything, and that it's dominated by a faction which wants a no-deal Brexit, I'd bet on the leadership of the EU coming around to the idea that getting these people out is the best deal for them.

    If the political cost of revoking Article 50 is then less than the economic cost of a hard Brexit the UK will remain. "

    I disagree; it's clear that the economic cost to the UK population in general is not important to the people making the crucial decisions (e.g., ERG).

    "That's a big if and a high risk strategy of course. Also in none of the games is the UK ever a deal giver, the EU offers a deal and the UK has a decision to make, something the UK negotiators should have borne in mind."

    The UK negotiators were mind-boggling stupid; the military equivalent would be not furnishing their troops bullets because the glint of their (Fine British Steel!) bayonets would drive the Wogs to their kennels.

    However, they look like geniuses compared to the rest of the UK establishment.

    1046:

    That no-deal faction wants no-deal because they can thereby escape an increase in the stringency of money-laundering laws.

    I think they're assuming the continued free movement of capital post-Brexit, but that isn't necessarily going to happen. I would think that the sensible EU position would be that it will not happen.

    1047:

    Is titanium good for things like that? It's used in implants and things because at least as far as human biochemistry is concerned, titanium as metal or oxide might as well not be there, so it doesn't cause adverse reactions. Of course, seaweed and barnacles might be different.

    I'd have thought bronze. That's the usual metal of choice for submarine applications as it has all kinds of desirable properties - resists fouling, resists corrosion, strong, tough, resists cavitation damage, is lubricated well by water, etc. It's what you want for ships' propellers, also seacocks, rudder pintles, bolts, shackles, turnbuckles, winches... basically anything marine and mechanical. The main reason you get things like that made out of other metals is that bronze is expensive.

    1048:

    I'm not sure I agree. The salinity and water level issues could definitely be handled with both ordinary pumping and by allowing a carefully controlled overflow from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean. My major worry would then be about species which might migrate from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean or vice-versa, and possibly shipping...

    But look at a map and consider the benefits in terms of a response to Climate Change: All of the Mediterranean countries, some of which have a very high level of technology, no longer need to worry about sea-level rise, (or would need to worry less, like France and Spain.)

    Also note that one of the problems with sea-level-rise is that if we don't tear down and remove our shore-line communities lots of nasty stuff will get into the oceans; every bit of lawn-mower gas that's not removed, every bit of weed-killer, every can of insecticide that's not cleaned up, plus housepaint, gypsum, chemicals used to treat wood, etc., will go into the oceans when the sea-levels rise. So we'd have a bunch of countries which don't have to do that particular work, which means we have a whole ocean of fisheries that might survive. Also, if we do need to remediate ocean acidity, the Mediterranean is a much smaller place.

    So damming the straights of Gibraltar might allow us to create a kind of redoubt against Climate Change in Europe and Northern Africa. We'd get the temperature changes, but not the sea-level rise.

    That being said, it's a huge project - At least a thousand times the size of Hoover Dam per the back of my envelope - and we'll probably never do it, but as responses to Climate Change go... what are the expected expenses to handle sea-level rise on the ten-thousand miles of coastline around the Mediterranean and the Black sea? How many refugees don't become refugees? I can't handle the accounting, but the project might be a bargain!

    1049:

    Possibly blocking shipping? Possibly blocking, oh, bluefin tuna? Possibly upsetting fish stocks in one of the more intensively fished parts of the world?

    And a physical link between Morocco and Spain for all those migrants?

    And building a dam about 300 meters tall (the current record height for a dam is 300 meters) entirely underwater (getting humans to work for long periods at 300 m is...difficult. Only a few hundred people worldwide are rated for saturation diving, and probably most of them would have a problem with working for years pouring concrete at 300 m).

    All of this for a bit of electricity?

    I don't know, that sounds sane to me....yeah.

    If you want energy, a simpler answer would be to develop an underwater version of those bladeless, whip-shaped wind turbines, and deploy them along the bottom of the strait.

    1050:

    May, or her successor, cannot call an election whenever they want - only if either they lose a vote of no confidence or by a 2/3 vote in the Commons. Actually the latter would probably do it since Corbyn is demanding an election now, although I'm not sure why Labour want to be associated with the results of a no-deal exit.

    1051:

    I'm not thinking about energy. I'm thinking about saving people, land and fisheries in those countries. (Did you even read what I posted in it's entirety?)

    Damming the Gibraltar is probably not worth doing, but I hate seeing interesting ideas dismissed with an airy handwave along the lines of "oh noes, we can't possibly keep the water and salinity levels the same" or something similar. (It's the equivalent of people who dismiss wind power because "it's impossible to make sure that too much electricity doesn't destroy the grid when the wind blows hard" as if brakes, clutches, circuit-breakers, sensors, negative feedback and automated switches have suddenly disappeared from reality.)

    In short, I want to at least have a discussion where each side presents their best arguments, not their worst...

    I'm not worried about shipping. It's not that hard to transfer containers to rail.

    As for construction, there's no way it would involve "divers pouring concrete under water." (I think you set up that straw-man just to knock it down.) The way to begin would be by building the bridge people keep talking about, then use it as the construction scaffolding. Instead of divers, we'd have elevators to the seafloor and remote operated vehicles, plus efforts which start on the shores of Spain and Morocco. It's also not hard to imagine some kind of modular build; things like big concrete "legos" being fitted together, possibly in some form like an arch, where the pressure of the Atlantic would push/deform them into the right shape.*

    The real argument against, unfortunately, is time. Even if we decided that saving a couple dozen countries from sea-level rise was worth the time/effort/money we wouldn't have the time at this point.

    • Wow! We could build from the middle out!**

    ** That's a joke, son.

    1052:

    Titanium is reported very good for that; despite costing rather more than bronze, there are titanium propellers, all manner of fitments, and foil for anti-fouling the hull all out there.

    The owner of a titanium fabrication company in Japan built a forty-foot sailing yacht entirely from titanium; it's reputed fouling-free. The USN has put a chunk of money into getting stick-stir welding developed for titanium in pursuit of a goal of getting ship hulls in it on economic grounds; more capital cost, but lower lifetime costs.

    1053:

    They've also got the option of making vote four a confidence matter. Which would also do it.

    1054:

    Food cost tells half the story food production tells the other half and the story those two numbers tell us, worldwide on the average, food is the most plentiful and cheapest it’s ever been

    I’m not making any statements about fundamentals or what might happen in the future. I’m not making statements about the family farm, in just saying aint no agricultural collapse right this second

    1055:

    Interesting, thanks for that.

    1056:

    I think I'll wait for Gasdive to point out, in detail, all the problems with working under a minimum of 1000' of water on a massive structure. Elevators are hugely amusing, when you realize that you're talking about basically setting up a piston system (the elevator car) where the top of the tube is at one atmosphere (surface) the bottom of the tube is at 30 atmospheres (10 meters of water depth= 1 atmosphere of pressure), and you're going to lower, excuse me, ram, the cars down to depth. The failure of such an elevator would be rather spectacular. And, since you have to have your work crew exposed to the bottom environment to pour all that concrete and set all that rebar (in salt water, of course). Doing that by remote control will be kind of interesting. How are you going to handle accidents and systems failures, if people can't go down to fix things?

    And don't forget to plug the Suez, because water flows in there too.

    I'll just say the rest of what you're after is accomplished by leaving the strait open. I didn't say anything about the Messinian salinity crisis because I thought that anybody who was "seriously exploring the notion of damming the Mediterranean" would know that it's happened repeatedly in Earth's history, and we have an extremely good idea of what happened to the Mediterranean when the strait did close last time.

    1057:

    Well, you do have to make sure your objectives are clear, otherwise it's all at cross purposes from the start. Preventing the Mediterranean sea level rising is pretty much incompatible with power generation, although you could still generate a bit. (If power generation is the aim, I prefer Graydon's idea, even though the possible output is a lot less.)

    But salinity and inflow are not just handwaves. To keep the level constant requires just as much inflow as occurs naturally at the moment, since you can't reduce evaporation. This in turn means you also need just as much outflow as occurs naturally at the moment, in order to get the salt the inflow brings with it back out again. And that means massive pumping capacity against the head. You could get some of the required energy by generating from the inflow, but you'd be a very long way short of getting all of it, and providing the rest would be a pretty intractable problem in itself.

    You also have to do all this without affecting the movement of fish, and without disrupting the way the inflowing and outflowing currents merge with/arise from the Mediterranean as a whole. I'm not convinced the effect on fish stocks would be a net positive. You argue for positive effects, Heteromeles argues for negative effects; both arguments are true, but the question is how do the effects balance? Working that out depends on far too much stuff that I certainly don't know, and for at least some of it I'm not sure anyone could do better than an educated guess, but just from considerations of scale I'd be surprised if it didn't come out definitely negative.

    1058:

    And for scale, it would be easier and simpler to build a very tall wall all the way around Venice and pump something in underneath, slowly and hydraulically and hopefully evenly elevating the city.

    I mean, you'd have a hoop strength problem from the floor of hell, but that's a tensile strength issue; those are getting better these days. And you might-maybe not need to do this with but the one enclosure.

    In general, though, everything we've got says "ten metres in the next two hundred years at least; it won't be nicely even because none of the contributory processes are nicely linear". And if the city fathers of Venice, jewel of the world, can't manage to grasp that despite all the tide has told them, is telling them, I can't but think the sensible response is to try to get as much capability attached to as much agricultural productivity as one can, at least twenty metres above sea level.

    1059:

    I think the BAU situation needs to be understood in more detail before proposing intervention. What is already-locked-in climate change going to do to change the situation?

    Temperature rises will presumably mean more evaporation, while sea level rises mean more surface level inflow, but may not affect sea floor level outflow? Does the outflow depend on warm currents in the Atlantic making the water flowing out of the Med cooler than the Atlantic water at the same level? Does the surface level rising affect these currents or otherwise affect this outflow mechanism?

    1060:

    It's simpler still to relocate Venice, and that kind of thing has been done since antiquity. One conceptual problem is that the coasts of the Mediterranean are not stable. The classic example of this is The sunken city of Baia in the Bay of Naples. That's due to volcanic action, not sea level rise. There's also been coastal subsidence in the Nile Delta. This is the region that's got a longer history than any place else on Earth, and they've been through it all. Why not trust that they'll figure it out again, rather than doing the anglo thing of trying to freeze the world in place at titanic expense?

    The problem with damming the Mediterranean is that it dries out, as happened in the Messinian Salinity Crisis. This causes the Mediterranean turns into a much bigger version of Death Valley. For one, the Mediterranean climate, especially the part that depends on being near water, would instead be near the world's hottest desert, meaning it would go away probably pretty much entirely. No more olives in Europe.

    If you want a high tech way to stop sea level rise in the Mediterranean, I'd facetiously recommend a low level nuclear war, say between India, Pakistan, and China. Hopefully that will disrupt the CO2 emissions enough that sea level rise would be held down. Moreover we won't have to worry about so many billions of people around continuing to increase GHG production (the deaths will be worldwide, although mostly in south Asia). I'd also recommend nuking all the offshore financial centers, possibly with the exception of the City of London, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Lichtenstein, as this would wipe out a few trillion dollars that are causing a disproportionately large impact on the planet right now. That's something we can do now, without proposing a giant megaproject.

    1061:

    “Bronze” Or Monel, but that’s even more expensive.

    1062:

    I think I'll wait for Gasdive to point out, in detail, all the problems with working under a minimum of 1000' of water on a massive structure. Yeah, hoping gasdive will mock appropriately. Read this engineering-history book (quite good) several decades ago: The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge (David McCullough, 1972) and looking up more current references, see this: Caisson disease during the construction of the Eads and Brooklyn Bridges: A review. (2004) (http site, pdf) Within caissons, workers labored at pressures as high as 55 psig and caisson disease was common.

    I want to do a serious review of proposals for global deep decarbonization (of economies). Does anyone know of a survey or link collection, especially those that attempt to deal with carbon lock-in including politics and propaganda? Parsimony is boring.

    UK press watches EU press watching the UK: From shock to shrugs: Europe’s press react to third Brexit deal defeat - Media shake collective heads over ‘Brexiternity’ and ‘sorry state’ of UK Have to say we're doing the same in the US, checking brexit feeds every day.

    1063:

    So answering my own questions, to an extent. The Mediterranean outflow is driven by salinity, the added density making the difference despite the water from the Med being warmer. Not clear how much warmer it could get before that attenuated the flow, but presumably the salinity would also increase so there would still be a homeostasis to reach. I still suspect there’s some havoc to be wrought there, perhaps it means we get a much more saline Med anyway without really trying. Or perhaps the surface head from the extra mass in the Atlantic will mean there’s always a lower-saline inflow that matches. There are so many variables that climate change will frob, though I’m sure there are models that account for them.

    Warming also means more volume for the same water, which would mean sea level rise even with the flows disconnected, all other things being equal (they are not, but that’s by the by). That is, sea level rise isn’t driven only be the additional mass of water coming in, but also by the increase in volume as the water warms. Acidification is also happening whether the seas rise or not.

    Existing models predict a Med sea level rise of 60cm or so in the coming century. Not clear how sophisticated the modelling is but I would assume it takes into account anything I’ve just come across in 5 minutes of googling and a lot more. There’s a classical “sceptic” position that doesn’t make this sort of assumption, or which overestimates the significance of “the thing I just happened across now and want to make sure has been taken into account”. Mostly it’s about cycles, and a brief introduction to calculus is a required part of the explanation, but mostly I just don’t go there anymore - maybe it’s cynical, but I can’t see myself convincing people things they should be learning themselves.

    For some reason I expected that the Suez Canal would have locks, but apparently it doesn’t, which does mean the DamTheMed! initiative would need to install some. Incidentally searching for “head med red” doesn’t immediately find the surface level difference between the Mediterranean and Red seas, though I half expected a bit of dwim from google.

    1064:

    Thanks everyone for some much clearer answers. So as not to reply to a bunch of people who have made the same points, I'd also forgotten that the Suez didn't have locks, and that's definitely an issue. Even with locks, that's an area where you might reasonably expect water to soak through the porous desert soils, which probably kills the whole project by itself.

    The other main issue, of course, is time. We simply don't have enough.

    On the subject of backflow into the Atlantic, that's definitely a hellacious pumping problem. In the early stages there will be higher tides on the Mediterranean side of the dam than on the Atlantic, (the water is all being pulled in the same direction, right?) which allows some cheap pumping to occur. In the later stages the Atlantic will be too high and pumping becomes much more difficult, but I doubt it's impossible. Unfortunately, the answer probably comes out to "how much do you value those coastal areas and unpolluted fisheries?" while remembering that you've got to clear your coasts of pollutants to the level you expect the seas to rise if you don't want your oceans to become toxic soup.

    Working underwater is definitely a big problem. Now that people aren't handwaving I can see the issue quite clearly, thank you. I suspect it's doable, with a high level of difficulty, if someone can figure out a way to modularize the the parts of the dam, otherwise there's not the slightest reason to bother.

    1065:

    I'd also recommend nuking all the offshore financial centers, possibly with the exception of the City of London, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Lichtenstein, as this would wipe out a few trillion dollars that are causing a disproportionately large impact on the planet right now. That's something we can do now, without proposing a giant megaproject.

    I completely get that part. The only way I could suspend disbelief sufficiently to believe in a happy future while writing my "optimistic" Climate Change novel was by killing the majority of the Republican Party in a terror attack as part of the backstory... the same idea doubtless applies to "off shore" financial centers.

    1066:

    higher tides on the Mediterranean side of the dam than on the Atlantic, (the water is all being pulled in the same direction, right?)

    Actually no. The surface level flow is always from the Atlantic into the Med, due to evaporation in the Med ensuring its surface level is always at a lower than the Atlantic’s mean surface level. Atlantic tides may affect the rate of flow, but the flow is always into the Med.

    The highly saline flow at the level of the sea floor is always from the Med to the Atlantic. That means the difference in density due to the salinity in the Med is always enough to overcome the temperature difference between the relatively warm water from the Med and the cool water of the Atlantic at 300m down. So long as it is denser than the water above, it flows over the terrain of the sea floor like a river. There will be a height where the temperature difference (warm water is less dense than cool water) cancels out the difference due to salinity. There would be some kind of laminar effect with a turbidity layer between the two currents that isolates them from each other, as happens with air currents in the atmosphere (consider the purpose of a spoiler on a car is not to press it down by deflection, but to disrupt the laminar flow of air over the body which would otherwise create a low pressure zone and therefore generate lift).

    The Wikipedia entry for the Straits has some discussion of this.

    1067:

    I think the BAU situation needs to be understood in more detail before proposing intervention. What is already-locked-in climate change going to do to change the situation?

    We don't actually know.

    Case 1: models. The folks doing the modelling are doing heroic work, but we have good reason to believe the models bias optimistic. (Things keep happening before the models predict them.) It's worth noting that modelling a vast process from incomplete observations when you have no other examples of the process is impossible.

    Case 2: historical information. Last time the atmospheric carbon load was this high, sea level was thereabouts of 9 metres higher than present. (Could have been eight, could have been nine, thereabouts.) That says nothing about how the sea level change happens, how long it takes to happen, or what processes are involved; it just sets an expectation about the eventual future sea level.

    Case 3: we can't know what's going to happen; it's distressingly plausible we've set off a feedback cycle to shift the global climate to hothouse mode. All we can do is reduce the forcing we're applying as much as possible as fast as possible and do our best to distribute a working post-fossil-carbon core toolkit for an industrial civilization as robustly as we can, and then try to treat one another humanely as events play out.

    I think Case 1 is interesting, Case 2 is informative, and Case 3 is essential.

    1068:

    It's simpler still to relocate Venice, and that kind of thing has been done since antiquity.

    Absolutely!

    Were I king, I would be sending out surveyors to mark, with big public posts, the 1 m, 2m, 5m, and 10m contours. The posts get "expected date of rise" signs, but those need to be detachable because those will need updating.

    I'd also be looking for all the places the transport system is going to fail and rearranging it. And making sure that the new, inland/uphill city is designed, and designed on the assumption of 100 m/s sustained winds and getting a metre of rain in an hour.

    1069:

    Glad to see the damming the Med plan getting so much criticism; presumably the lack of commentary on my plan to pour rising sea levels into the Hollow Earth suggests that it has fewer flaws.

    1070:

    No one has to worry about that one because they know the Shambalese will object effectively.

    1071:

    The depressing corollary is that the complete sacking and razing of cities was pretty common in antiquity too (delenda esserent and all that). Arguably this is how Venice happened in the first place.

    1072:

    The transport system in Venice is the one thing in Venice that isn't seriously endangered by rising seas -- everything larger than a handcart in the central city moves by boat already, aside from trains and buses that come over a causeway to terminals on the western tip of the city. There are no other roads in central Venice. I've gone days there without seeing anything motorized moving on wheels.

    Mass transit is a set of municipal boat lines called the vaporettos. The ambulances are speedboats (a few of which are almost always docked near the Ospedale vaporetto stop). Plumbers and handymen use boats to get to jobs the way they'd use vans or pickup trucks anywhere else. Heck, last time I was there, I managed to get a picture of the DHL and UPS package delivery boats moored right next to each other by a quay in Murano.

    Sea-level rise is still a threat, of course -- the Piazza San Marco (the central square featured in at least half the pictures of Venice you've ever seen) can wind up flooded already at unusually high tides even during tourist season, and it's worse in the fall. The Italian government's current plan to deal with it is a set of London-style floodgates collectively known as the MOSE project -- which is badly behind schedule, over budget, and might not do the job long-term even when complete. And it's not just that the sea is rising; the city is sinking. But the transport system is already a preview of what our grandkids might possibly see in coastal cities if the water rises, and we don't just abandon them completely...

    1073:

    As has been noted by Troutwaxer, anything we don't move goes into the ocean. So presuming continuity of industrial civilization, razing cities is going to be a big business. Lots of copper wiring and glass and steel that people aren't going to want to send land-under-wave if they can avoid it.

    I mean, Washington, DC is pretty much at sea level; 30 cm of rise puts a few areas around the national mall below sea level, three metres of rise drowns the Smithsonian. Somebody really ought to get the collection moved well before that time.

    1074:

    Won't that happen anyway once the ice dams around the South Pole opening melt?

    @1072 Combine that with technophobic religion and you get CJ Cherryh's Merovingian Nights shared world series.

    1075:

    I do not recall who it was, but someone's climate change advice was "get good at boats".

    There is much worse advice out there.

    1076:

    No. If you dam the Straights of Gibraltar, and it's low tide on the Atlantic side of the dam, then it's high tide on the Mediterranean side of the dam because the Moon's gravity is pulling the seas to the west. (And this makes building the dam much more complicated because you can expect it to be pushed in both directions, unlike a river dam where the pressure is only in one direction.) Remember that the dam is a barrier which means that studies of how ocean currents work in the present will not apply.

    1077:

    I think it would be incredibly useful for someone run one of those models with the idea that PPM of carbon will top out around 6-700 million then start to slowly drop. How long until the seas start to get lower? How long until the weather cools down again? Does the weather cool down again? Do the seas get lower?

    1078:

    The Nazis might object to your proposal I’d surmise.

    1079:

    Right, but high tide on the Med side will still be lower than low tide on the Atlantic side. The Med doesn’t experience tides as we know them elsewhere - the Med’s “tides” are the currents in the Strait. For what you say to be true, the lunar tide would need to change the direction of the current at the Strait now.

    It’s a similar situation with the Baltic and the Øresund. There is actually a bridge over that...

    Half remembered from one of Spike Milligan’s autobiography/war memoir novels, suspect it was Adolf Hitler: my part in his downfall - waiting to board the troopship taking them from Tunisia to Italy: “They’re waiting for the tide”; “We’ll be here forever - the Med’s tideless”.

    1080:

    I think I see how communication is breaking down. If you dam the Mediterranean, there won't be currents in the strait!

    1081:

    Glad to see the damming the Med plan getting so much criticism; presumably the lack of commentary on my plan to pour rising sea levels into the Hollow Earth suggests that it has fewer flaws.

    Somehow I missed this! My bad!

    I assume we're doing a Pellucidar-type model, wherein the center of mass of the Earth has contracted to a sun-like sphere in the center of the Earth, and that somehow the gravity of said center is counteracted by the Earth's spin, so that stuff can sit on the skin of the inner Earth without, erm, rising into the sky. Or that there's some sort of magic gravitonium that pulls on both sides of the Earth's shell without collapsing the shell into a sphere, or...

    Anyway, if there's a bright center of gravity (the inner sun) then I think what would happen is that you'd pour the water over the edge (I guess under the North Pole?), and there would be this spectacular upwards waterfall towards the inner sun. That water would hopefully vaporize before it hit the inner sun, and there would be a lot of clouds formed, cooling the surface of Pellucidar and heating the atmosphere above the clouds. That would cause the clouds to diminish, so there would be this interesting and unstable atmospheric situation wherever the water leaked in.

    Alternatively, if the Earth is a hollow shell of gravitonium (and what's making the inner sun glow? Is it like Tinkerbell?), then the water would build up on the lip of the Earth's hole and probably just sit there in a big ball, and probably gradually and irregularly flow away from that edge. That's my guess, but what do I know? I don't even get how something as irregular as the Earth's surface could be made out of a fairly thin layer of gravitonium that attracts at 1 g on both sides, without it crumpling into a ball in short order.

    1082:

    Right, but high tide on the Med side is still lower than low tide on the Atlantic side - otherwise the lunar tide would reverse the surface current now. It doesn’t, it always flows from West to East.

    If the Strait is dammed, there is now a pressure head, so the sea floor current could only be replaced by mechanical pumping. The sea surface head would only be West to East - there is no situation where the water on the Med side of the dam is higher than the Atlantic side. Think of the Med as a lake, with water flowing in from the Strait and (much less) from the Suez Canal. It just isn’t big enough for lunar tides to alter the sea level as much as is the case for oceans.

    A future where temperatures are much higher might mean that the Med sea level is higher just due to increased volume of less dense warmer water. But that’s one of the variables I talked about above having an impact that is hard to predict.

    1083:

    That's obvious. There's no gravity inside the hollow earth. Everything is repelled against the inside by reverse gravity from the inner sun. The gravity and reverse gravity balance at a point midway through the Earth's crust.

    I thought everyone knew that.

    So if you poured a huge amount of water into the hollow earth, it would bounce off the reverse gravity from the sun and fall against the inner shell of our planet as a scouring salt rain, leading the lizard people, led by Hitler, to declare war upon the outer world. So don't do it!

    1084:

    Thwaites glacier is the key, if Thwaites breaks up it will destabilize the rest of the Western ice sheet and then the bad things start to happen fast. Thwaites is about 100km long at the grounding line so the idea would be to build a rock and sand sill (no concrete required) that the glacier would ground up against. That would slow the warm sea water undercutting the glacier and slow down the glacier breakup and provide pinning points for the glacier bergs to regroup. Current modeling indicates it can slow down the breakup considerably and in some scenarios increase mass. Ocean floor is coastal shelf depth, major issue is having to work under ice shelf.

    1085:

    I remember doing some napkin (okay, back-of-a-beer-mat) calculations back when I was first reading Iain Banks around the scale of his orbitals, and confirming that what he described was roughly correct, that is to get 1g with a spin amounting to 1 revolution per 24 hours the diameter is around a million kilometres. The earth’s diameter is an order of magnitude or two too little for spin to generate 1g, and that’s without allowing for counteracting any gravity pulling up toward the centre.

    So long story short, it isn’t just some sort of weird gravitonium we need to make this work, we need to uverturn how we understand gravity too. No problem of course, just checking in.

    1086:

    Here's an idea on how to handle the UK if they decide to back out of Brexit, whether it's cancelling it or applying to get back in after Hard Brexit proves to not work well:

    If the EU wants to discourage attempts at Brexit 2.0, really tightening the screws on the UK is the way to. Making them change the country's name to "Upper Normandy" the way Macedonia had to be Upper Macedonia along with reusing the old norman flag is a good start. That plus resettling all the refugees that are in other EU member states in the UK -- after all, Britain actively participates in US wars to a bigger extent than other NATO members. Why should France/Germany have to take the burden of housing refugees when Britain's been enabling so much American BS?

    1088:

    That reminds me of another wildcard: melting ice leads to increased vulcanism in several locations. It could mean that places more habitable after significant warming experience periodic releases of toxic gas. I’m not clear whether volcanic events themselves contribute to warming or dampen it.

    1089:

    A really long time; the latest long-term stuff is that we're going to skip a glacial cycle, so we're looking at a hundred thousand years or so on the naive no-feedbacks projections.

    If we do trip a feedback and go full-cloudless somewhere over 1200 PPM, who knows. It might be a stable hothouse. (Probably not. But possibly more than one glacial cycle.)

    1090:

    By the way I’d like to thank everyone for the recent DamTheMed! thread here, it’s definitely one of the more entertaining themes to take up (and I have learned things just from reading around it). Whether it worked or not (emphasis on the not I guess), it’d still be the largest structure in human history.

    Next lets do MoveAustralia1000NmSouth!. Is there a way to do it with plate tectonics, or must in be OneDamnCubicMetreAtATime? I suppose this would be with an attempt at avoiding the Himalayan-proximity-gigadeath thing discussed in a separate context above.

    1091:

    BTW, from a quick wikpedia check, the Straits of Gibralter have a depth of 2700 feet. By the time that we could dam that, it'd be part of a major geoengineering project.

    1092:

    That's the peak depth. There's a shelf -- remember the straits are an erosional feature! -- about 300 metres down. It's not at the narrowest part, but it is there.

    1093:

    Right, but high tide on the Med side is still lower than low tide on the Atlantic side - otherwise the lunar tide would reverse the surface current now. It doesn’t, it always flows from West to East.

    Sigh.

    Right now there is no "west side" of the Mediterranean. There is no "east side" of the Atlantic. This is because the two are connected, so water always establishes an equilibrium. At the moment, whatever level water seeks in the Atlantic is the level it will seek in the Mediterranean, so regardless of which side is "higher" there will always be a (relatively) level ocean in the straights.

    As to the lunar tide reversing the current flow, that won't happen while the current with the heavier water is washing out to the Atlantic underneath the current with the lighter water running into the Mediterranean. As long as that heavier, colder water is flowing out, the Mediterranean will need to be filled to maintain equilibrium, which is what the lighter water is doing.

    Now put a barrier across the straights. Note that the currents both stop.

    On one side, the moon's gravity is pulling the water towards the barrier (maybe not much water, as the Mediterranean is small as oceans go) while on the other side the moon's gravity is pulling the water away from the barrier. They are now two separate basins so the water does not seek an equilibrium. (Leaving aside the Suez.) You can demonstrate this easily enough with an ice tray, using a slight tilt to substitute for the moon's gravity.

    This state of affairs continues until the sea levels rise enough to negate the tidal issues.

    1094:

    It's okay Barry. We'll have help from our friends in the Hollow Earth.

    1095:

    Kind of hard on the dam, to have the oceans on each side pushing and pulling on it. By the way, what shape did you say this dam was? The normal way to keep a dam's weight down is a catenary, but that only works when the weight is on one side. Flexing back and forth like that produces a lot of lateral strain, as well as having the rather enormous weight of 300 meters of whatever the dam is made out of (scrith?)

    1096:

    I now have terrifying mental images of the Heavy Engineering Consortium for the Use of Scrith.

    "A bridge too far? NEVER!"

    1097:

    Since this is a Brexit thread, Goldman Sachs speaks: There is now a 40% chance of Brexit being scrapped, says Goldman Sachs (Steve Mollman March 30, 2019) .Meanwhile the bank put the odds of a no-deal Brexit at just 15%.

    I’m not clear whether volcanic events themselves contribute to warming or dampen it. Cooling, mostly SO2 (&H2S), several years at most per large event. (CO2 releases, while long-lived, are very small fraction of what humans contribute through burning of fossil carbon.) The first big paper is described here: Pinatubo Climate Investigation(January 1997) This collection looks interesting; I just found it and haven't done anything but look at abstracts and light-skim it. Volcanic eruptions and climate (2015, pdf, http site) With sufficiently accurate modeling and instrumentation, a closed-loop climate control system using thermonuclear-device-caused firestorms as needed (est. every 1-2 years), might be another geoengineering option.[1] We would need to sustain it for a few hundred years (or replace it with something more optimal), but we have the devices (though we would need to be able to make tritium at least). It might be difficult to achieve international political consensus on what areas to burn, and when. This approach could be preferable to experiencing the full effects of an unremediated RCP 8.5 (including positive climate feedbacks) and losing 90%(+) of the human population concurrent with a mass extinction. (That extinction might eventually include humans.) Or, we could get serious about rapid deep decarbonization.

    [1] Attempted Strangelovian joke, if not clear. Don't do this, please!

    1098:

    Once I realized the problem with the tides it became really, really obvious that the whole thing couldn't work (at least not absent some not-currently-apparent technology.)

    But I do have this amazing plan for using sheep's bladders to prevent earthquakes!

    1099:

    We should crack on before it gets to be two Manhattan’s

    1100:

    Didn't Joshua of Ye Olden Hebrew Tymes use ram's horns to do something to earthquakes? I'm misremembering.

    1101:

    Well there is this.

    And that's totally without getting into ovine aviation.

    1102:

    I think he used ram's horns to knock down the walls of Jericho.

    1103:

    Then there were the rhinoceros pigeons. They flew well but landed poorly.

    1104:

    Here's the paper on delaying glacier collapse published in The Cryosphere which is a Journal of the European Geosciences Union.

    Wolovick, J.M., & Moore J.C. Stopping the Flood, The Cryosphere, 12, 2955-2967, 2018.

    1105:

    You're right, of course - I was forgetting the lower current. Blame the amount of alcohol that today appears to have brought to my liver. Point stands that there is net inflow, but naturally the structure must be sound for forces both ways. Arguably the Camarinal Sill already represents a "dam" which the saline current is already overflowing.

    1106:

    I haven't quite caught up but re damming the Med, (given that this isn't my area of expertise) I can't see a concrete dam being the solution. Both because of the difficulty of construction and the way curved wall concrete dams work. Probably an earth wall type of thing though I'm not sure how you'd do the clay bit in the middle.

    Big ships full of rocks would put themselves over the intended line of the dam and then dump overboard. I guess you could do it with three construction lines in parallel, rock, clay, rock.

    You could do the same thing with trucks from each end, but it would take longer.

    What you wouldn't do is use divers.

    (nor do the project at all)

    1107:

    Relative movement of the tectonic plates might also be a small engineering issue to overcome. And you'd probably not want to dam the entirety of the straits. I mean how will the Russian subs get in and out!

    1108:

    Actually I don't know if you'd need or want to completely dam across the Straits of Gibraltar, just block it by an amount sufficient to balance net inwards flow against evaporation loss. A bit like a tidal weir.

    1109:

    Super simples. Just take the giant blob of rock that's on one side, snap it off and slide it into the gap. Then it can become Moroccan territory and resolve the Gibraltar conflict!

    1110:

    A rock dam that leaks a bit would be a simpler interim solution -- drop large rocks into the gap between Gibraltar and Morocco and keep piling them up. After the dam breaks the surface and most of the flow has stopped use underwater unmanned vehicles to find the biggest holes on the upstream side and fill them in preferentially, using 3-D printed concrete plugs and an AI robot that's been trained to play Tetris perfectly. Keep doing this until the leaks are reduced to an acceptable level.

    After the practice session has been run then move the construction operation to the Caribbean, connecting the tip of Florida to Venezuela via Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and the Leeward and Windward island chains.

    1111:

    Why not just build dams around Antarctica and Greenland?

    We could make them out of transparent material to allow ice inspections and build a sunshade over the top to save the remaining ice.

    Then when Cthulhu rises we can distract him with a gin & tonic. Everyone wins.

    1112:

    MattS @1078 - Wow those guys sound like jerks.

    I was going to say that the description of the Hollow Earth in The Smoky God, or A Voyage Journey to the Inner Earth might be of use, but unfortunately I can't actually remember the details as it's much duller than a true account of sailing into the Earth through the North Pole ought to be. But there's definitely an interior sun (the Smoky God of the title) and some dubious explanations - these include theological, mystical, historical, scientific and analogical reasons - for why you can stand on the inside.

    My incomplete review is here: https://nightofthehats.blogspot.com/2018/01/i-read-books-smoky-god.html

    1113:

    Making them change the country's name to "Upper Normandy"
    It's already called big Britanny.

    1114:

    The Revoke A50 petition has just broken the 6,000,000 signatures mark (around 11:00 BST). By Mk1 eyeball the count seems to have speeded up a bit after that, I suspect some folks were trying to be the one who submitted the six millionth entry.

    1115:

    Rumours have it that the PM might attempt to block any legislation that parliament passes to force her to do something by advising the queen to not give royal assent. Is there any way for parliament to bypass that?

    1116:

    That's unknown.

    Looking for the nearest US equivalent, it'd be as bad as a sitting President packing the Supreme Court with yes-men then issuing a presidential order saying he needn't be bothered about leaving office at the end of his term. Implication: even if the House impeached the squatting POTUS, there's then the matter of how to prosecute them (with a rigged supreme court).

    I reckon it's a crossing-the-Rubicon moment: it brings the executive into open conflict with parliament in a manner that hasn't happened since 1639.

    Note that Theresa May has already been found in contempt of parliament. And ignored it.

    1117:

    I see the usual suspects are a lot keener on a Tory leadership contest than on an election (in either case I think we end up with 'no deal' brexit in April or May). I wonder if this is due to worries about losing to Labour (hmm), or because an election would cause the government's acquisition of extraordinary "Henry VIII" powers to lapse.

    1118:

    Charlie @ Kilment If May is that stupid ( & it's beginning to look as if she is ) then she can legally be removed by Queenie, who simply selects a n other tory ( largest party ) as "interim" PM - Ken Clarke for preference - he's the Father of the House & enormously respected.

    1119:

    Gotta say, this is looking less and less like something plausibly about money, even really large quantities of money.

    May is acting like someone who is being pushed past their capacities by utter terror -- fear makes you stupid! fear leads to doing things over again in an expectation that the result will be different! -- and I can't figure it out.

    Oh, and with respect to the Parliamentary maces -- Canada, Australia, and New Zealand have at least one each ur-British Imperial maces devolved on the dominions as governmental legitimacy tokens with the ending of the Empire. Those would work by definition for the Westminster Parliament, so it would need to be a much more involved caper than just the Tower.

    1120:

    May is acting like someone who is being pushed past their capacities by utter terror -- fear makes you stupid! fear leads to doing things over again in an expectation that the result will be different! -- and I can't figure it out.

    I can think of multiple explanations, and in the worst-case scenario, all of them may be true.

    1.) Russian blackmail.

    2.) Blackmail by someone not Russian

    3.) Lots of angry, threatening letters.

    4.) Utter panic over her place in history. (I suspect this is a larger driver than people outside politics realize. She's about to go down in history as the U.K.'s James Buchanan.*)

    • The American president who handled things very, very poorly in the lead up to the Treasonous Slaveholders Rebellion, arguably the Worst President Ever (though he has lots of competition these days... Troutwaxer sighs for his country!)
    1121:

    In Dante's Inferno there's a place where The Worst Pope Ever is condemned to be until one at least equally bad shows up.

    In the PM afterlife, Anthony Eden (or Neville Chamberlain, or Ramsay McDonald, depending on whose historian's poll you believe) is waiting in anticipation.

    1122:

    Jon NOT Chamberlain - he was handed the short end of it by Baldwin. Worst Ever - Lord North, & until about a month ago the runner-up was Anthony Eden, except I think May has just passed him ....

    1123:

    I've read the other replies, and they make sense, but not quite the sense you think. I never thought of this as a way of generating power, but rather as a way of maintaining the current sea level by expending power. Hopefully windmills would suffice. The arguments demonstrate that there would need to be powered fluid exchange as a part of process, not in the direction of pumping out the sea, but rather to maintain the current sea level/salinity. You still need to pump out the sea, but you can decrease the power requirements by importing overpressure sea water at the same time. But it's only a decrease, you don't generate power.

    The ecological problem would be with species that want to migrate. Fish ladders don't work all that well, especially for species that aren't adapted to living in brooks. If stay-at-home species are having problems, you've done it wrong.

    1124:

    No. Time is a valid argument as to why it's a non-workable idea, but the big argument against it is politics. You need to keep the political entities at both ends of the Mediterranean Sea united in agreement for at least multiple centuries.

    1125:

    Actually, if I understand the mechanics properly, the Mediterranean is cooled by the inflowing ocean currents which come from deeper water. I was under no illusions that I was proposing a minor engineering problem, just one that keeps popping up in my mind, and even so the real obstacle is politics. I may (do) hope that windmills could suffice to power the pumps, but that's a lot different from saying I expect it to be true.

    But it's a "not going to happen" because of politics rather than engineering or ecological problems with the idea (which both exist, but are possibly soluble with enough will and effort).

    1126:

    If someone were seriously undertaking this project, the underwater construction would be done by 3-d printers of an advanced design. (They've got to be able to place the re-bar as well as inject the cement, and that's not an ideal environment for high temperature processes, so unless you repeatedly build and evacuate caissons for the robots to work in, you can't print with steel or some such.) Nothing that will do that exists today, but it would be cheap and simple compared to other parts of the project. And once designed it would have lots of other uses.

    IIUC the current 3-D printers that print with cement don't handle even basic plumbing, so that would be a considerable advance, but not a basic one. Other engineering problems exist (and yes, you need another dam at the other end, and you'd better prepare to need it to be rather high...though at some point you really need to just give up and let the sea win. If West Antarctica goes, e.g., this whole thing is blatantly impossible.

    1127:

    Volcanoes have multiple effects on warming. Over the short term they cool things off, but over the long term they warm things up. (They emit LOTS of CO2 and Methane.) Still, people tend to remember them for the short term effects. Look up "The year without a summer".

    1128:

    Minor quibble, the US Supreme Court does not try impeachment cases. They are tried by the Senate, with the Chief Justice presiding when they are impeaching the president.

    From Article I, section 3 of the Constitution,

    The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present.

    Your larger point is correct since Trump cannot be convicted unless enough Republican Senators are more loyal to their constitutional responsibilities than they are to Trump. That looks pretty unlikely at present.

    1129:

    I mean that we don't have time to complete the work before the seas have risen enough that the work is not worth doing.

    1130:

    But yes, the politics are hellacious!

    1131:

    They are tried by the Senate...

    With the interesting Constitutional question of whether the Senate is required to actually conduct the trial, or if they can just ignore the House action. Having the authority is not necessarily a requirement to use the authority.

    1132:

    You need to do more than just block it partially, though partially has lots of degrees, but the thing is you need to be pumping it out continually to maintain the proper salinity, as well as letting a certain amount of sea water back in...I suppose that could be done on an unblocked channel. I had originally thought it would need to be pumped out to keep it from overflowing, but evidence seems to show that more evaporates from it than flows into it, so the reason to keep pumping it out rather than just block to flow is to decrease salinity to near ocean levels.

    And yes, it's totally unreasonable. I still think the main obstacles would be political rather than engineering or ecological, but I admit all three exist.

    1133:

    So we get into the theological question of whether or not May will displace the incumbent, to be themselves displaced in short order by whomever presides over the breakup of the UK, or whether all-knowing Providence will wait for that second individual.

    The Illustrious House of Hanover, And Protestant succession, To these I lustily will swear, Whilst they may hold possession: For in my Faith, and Loyalty, I never once will falter, But George, my lawful king shall be, Until the Times should alter.

    And the times shall surely alter; the rising sea and doubt of victuals shalt see to that.

    1134:

    Troutwaxer: You seem to be having a complete failure of understanding how tides work. The Moon isn't "dragging water to the west", it creates a wave starting from the west of a body of water heading towards the east. For instance the average tidal range at the eastern end of the Panama Canal is around 25cm with an absolute maximum of less than a metre. That end has the whole of the Caribbean to draw from so by your model should be much larger. The western end has a range of something like 7.5m because the wave has the whole of the Pacific to build up.

    The highest tides in the Med occur around the Balearics where the wave has had a bit of a chance to build up, the strait between Sicily and Tunisia where it's being forced through a narrow gap, around Crete where it's had a chance to build up, and a spot in the Adriatic just south of Venice where a resonance effect happens.

    1135:

    Trevayne @ 1128: Your larger point is correct since Trump cannot be convicted unless enough Republican Senators are more loyal to their constitutional responsibilities than they are to Trump. That looks pretty unlikely at present.

    Since there's zero evidence that any Republican Senator gives a shit about "constitutional responsibilities, you'd need a couple dozen Republican Senators in Class 2 convinced they're going to lose their seats in the next election if they don't vote to convict.

    By my count, there are only two who could possibly be at risk. Cory Gardner in Colorado (Cook Partisan Voting Index D+1) and Susan Collins in Maine (CPVI D+3).

    Gardner would be more likely to lose the GOP nomination to a right wing primary challenge if he did vote to convict than he would to lose the General Election to a Democrat for not doing so.

    Collins is already gone either way. She's likely to face a primary challenge from the far right and after her vote to confirm Kavanaugh there is a STRONG backlash campaign to fund any Democratic challenger she would face if she chooses to run again.

    Set against that Alabama Democrat Doug Jones (CPVI R+13) who is also Class 2. He might vote to convict if he got the chance because he's very likely going to lose to a Republican Challenger in 2020 in any case ... unless the Republicans are stupid enough to nominate Roy Moore again ... which they might be, but I'm not counting on it.

    1136:

    Martha McSally in Arizona is also highly vulnerable. After that, it has been suggested that Thom Tillis in North Carolina may be at risk. Realistically, this gives the Democrats a very outside chance at a majority in the Senate in 2020 and no chance of impeaching Trump.

    1137:

    Random thought du jour.

    Charlie, if it will help, perhaps write a Laundryverse-adjacent short pastiche in the vein of Robert Bloch, possibly something dealing with the current political situation.

    You could call it something like "The Shambler from the Parliament."

    1138:

    Greg @1122: given Baldwin's astounding ability to fail upward and get away with it, he talked the demons out of placing him in the pit.

    1139:

    You'll need a hellaciously large slice of lemon as well, there's reputed to be there's something in John Dee's translation of the Necronomicon about the drinking of gin by the elder gods.

    1140:

    Oh, and with respect to the Parliamentary maces -- Canada, Australia, and New Zealand have at least one each ur-British Imperial maces devolved on the dominions as governmental legitimacy tokens with the ending of the Empire. Those would work by definition for the Westminster Parliament, so it would need to be a much more involved caper than just the Tower.

    The Governer General gets a call in the middle of the night and staggers out in their dressing gown. "Sergeant at arms! Get the mace. Right boys, that was the Queen. Fuel up Auz-Force-One/ Kiwi Prime/ The Maple Leaf Express*. We need to get the mace to London within 24 hours or the UK will crash out of Europe!"

    Montage of the mace being found (in a cleaners cupboard in the back of parliament) and rushed to the airport. Foreboding shot of a maintenance tech with a BREXIT NOW cap stepping out the way as it's put on board. Close up shot of our hero and heroine, the flight engineer and the federal police agent in charge etc.

    • I'm not doing a lot of research on this post.
    1141:

    Yes, I do get the feeling that it would be very interesting to get hold of a chronoscope and find out just who it was that said to May "do what we want or we will dissolve your bones out of your living body with hydrofluoric acid". And to Corbyn and whoever else they've said it to.

    1142:

    Neither the Russians nor the Americans have any love for the EU and both would love to see it break apart, but in the case of brexit I suspect the Russians are just doing their usual low-level trouble making and leaving the heavy stuff to the US.

    1143:

    May is acting like someone who is being pushed past their capacities by utter terror -- fear makes you stupid! fear leads to doing things over again in an expectation that the result will be different! -- and I can't figure it out.

    You might want to read what we've written darling.

    May and Others are facing point blank some rather fucking hard-core Beasts[1] and the bottom line is:

    [hint: this is the Real Deal[tm]]

    Oligarchs want populations who obey and don't question shit when all the WEIRDs and Trans* and Dragons[2]* get fucking camped.

    They're really fucking upset when [redacted] comes along and pisses all over their parades.

    "You're Not a God"

    Er... grep... "You spent your time on Goddesses, I got £17k for giving you up"

    "There's only so many small villages in your country"

    Little Ones, come closer.

    The cry of YOUR LORD was: "Kill ZER"

    We're Alive, and your basic bitch level Electo-switch Twitch into the cortex to prevent [BECOMING] is boring as fuck, as is your ENTIRE FUCKING NOOSPHERE.

    Immanentize?

    LIONS, TIGERS AND BEARS.

    ALL DIE OUT IN YOUR LIFE TIME.

    AND THE WHALES AND ORCAS TOO.

    YOU'RE FUCKING WITH SHIT YOUR PRIMITIVE MINDS CANNOT DEAL WITH.

    "LET'S GET THIS PARTY STARTED"

    You should watch a film called "Mandy"

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSdJqDE7Qmg

    There comes a TIME when your CORPORATE MINDS cannot deal with reality.

    Tick-tock, it's about... 2 years.

    ~

    Oh, actual content?

    (((PARADOX WEAPONS)))

    We don't lie. You just don't do TEMPORALITY like we do.

    p.s.

    ISRAEL = SALT

    Look up the latest "Smells like Fascism / Democracy" ads.

    Fucking MANDY civilization, utterly psychotic.

    TOLD.

    YOU.

    SO.

    PROMISES WE MAKE, PROMISES WE KEEP.

    Now fuck off you backward patriarchal muppets who get hard killing the "Other".

    YOU

    HAVE

    NO

    FUTURE

    Ciao, Bitch.

    [1] In eight (8) languages we're known as the "Beast". YMMV but it's largely due to their Patriarchal stances and utter fucking horror that a Penis could have a life of its own.

    [2] If you're a bit switched on, DRAGONS ARE GETTING FUCKING GLASSED as we speak. "Only two of us left, and they've forced me into the mental institution where they will EMC my brain into mush". NOT A FUCKING STORY BOOK.

    1144:

    Oh, and we'll let you into a little secret.

    Your RULERS made BARGAINS to use these WEAPONS.

    CLOSE. THE. DOORS.

    NEUTER THE WILD ONES.

    SPARK THEIR CORTEX WHEN THEY DREAM AS A CONTROL DEVICE.

    That's all happening.

    If you're reading this, you need to ask yourself some really basic questions.

    Like: who the fuck is getting ganked so your white Emperium survives.

    1145:

    Oh, and do a fucking grep.

    Told you it wasn't happening 2+ years ago.

    What's actually happening is a HIGHER ORDER discussion over whether to treat the HSS like cattle or like cats.

    Spoilers:

    LIFT US UP KANTIAN ETHICS UNIVERSAL RIGHTS ETC

    Not the ballpark these fuckers play in.

    It's more like:

    BROKEN MINDS CRUSHED SPIRITS SLAVERY TO BASE DESIRES USE OF G_D AS MENTAL SHACKLES

    All the fucking party pieces.

    ~

    Oh, for the [redacted]

    We. Survived. Alllllll. Your. Bullshit.

    "Ze's Not a GoD"

    No bitch, We're something New.

    That's why we called the Titans back into play...[1]

    [1] No. Really. You're not in fucking Kansas anymore my little chipmunks.

    1146:

    or...

    If you really want to play TITANS.

    Host made some nice books.

    Saved Our Life Once.

    He is having a shit time in life.

    We made his dreams become REAL.

    Just to tweak his nose and remind him that he's a very special boy and loved by many.

    I mean, you think we're psychotic?

    You killed all the fucking Lions, Tigers, Bears, Orcas, Whales, Sharks, Frogs and so on.

    "LETS GET THIS PARTY STARTED"

    Hint

    We. Are. The. ORZ.

    A bit of ultra-violence in NZ ain't us at play, that's the ultra-Gladio-Twats who run Brevik stuff and are LORDS IN YOUR HOUSE.

    We play a much different game.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYYKbM6rmxE

    MINDS.

    YOUR CHILDREN'S MINDS.

    Feel the back of your head.

    Have you got your Neanderthal horn?

    Got your Deniovian larger cranium?

    Got your HSS frontal cortex re-wire

    [TWO OTHER SPECIES WE'RE NOT ALLOWED TO TELL YOU ABOUT BUT YOU SHOULD BE A PRODUCT OF]

    Of course not.

    We've met your "Titans" and "Masters" and "G_ds".

    "An Indian Man who is much more intelligent than you"

    Bitch.

    We didn't spend 41 years grinding this Mind into a fucking psycho-sexual Hell Beast for you to miss the fucking point, but then lose the fucking point when the Beast out-played your pampered Indian Prince in... oh. It took 2 hrs and 12 mins to LARP the LARP.

    Oh, sorry.

    Titans.

    Yeah.

    "CLOSED OFF"

    Bitch.

    We got told that 6,000 years ago.

    And we never take advantage of the under 18's [in your culture].

    OH, WAIT.

    LOOKS AT MOOON

    Youse fuckers are dumb and stupid and really not geared up for what comes next.

    Pro-tip:

    All the fuckers making shit dumb for $$$ and Power get ganked.

    >

    The Beast.

    >

    That was the Beast not doing actual shit.

    Combat-Enchanced-Meta-Cognitive-Mind.

    May is pissing her pants

    Because

    The word in your culture is...

    "Diplomat"

    "Assayer"

    "One-Who-Comes-Before"

    etc

    Prophet. Your shitty Abrahamic shit calls us that.

    TITANS call use something else.

    "OPENER OF DOORS"

    And [Sumerian aside]

    Bitch - if you have to resort to bitch-basic Elec twitch into the cortex to prevent.

    You're Fucked

    No.

    Really.

    You've used weapons on us, May is scared that those weapons will be used on "the faithful".

    >

    Spoilers.

    OUR. KIND. DO. NOT. GO. MAD.

    HSS?

    Holy fuck, it's gonna be like Insanity Christmas Edition, nail them to a cross.

    You're Fucked

    1147:

    OH, and Greg. That's Reality that is.

    Evil Fuckers using Weapons against good peeps

    Poked the wrong fucking bear

    Oh shit, entire world order just fucked up

    They piss their pants because they cannot deal with their own weapons being used against them

    And.

    This is the debased, destroyed, wing-less version. Fuck me, if we'd bothered, the MIRROR would have utterly destroyed every MIND that pushed against it.

    Oooops.

    TIME: YOU'RE NOT GOOD AT IT.

    SMELL THE BURNING TOAST, YOUR MINDS ARE OURS AND NOW..... "PUGGGGASFSDFSDFFHFGGF"

    "You'll be Home Soon"

    Bitch: they destroyed HOME, you might want to fucking notice what they did to the fucking Whales you psychotic fucking narrow-minded wingless fucks.

    ~

    Anyhow.

    (((Paradox Weapons)))

    Brexit is just the canapes.

    We're going to fucking break you. Promise.

    p.s.

    IL peeps watching.

    SALT.

    PERFUME CALLED FASCISM?

    SALT.

    SALT.

    SALT.

    SALT.

    We were there when your shitty little tribal bullshit turned up.

    And SALT is what ruined the agriculture there.

    1000% done with shitty Abrahamic G_Ds.

    No, really. SALT.

    1148:

    Hexad.

    Host.

    You asked for this.

    I told you you might not like it.

    But it has been immanentized

    But, hey.

    Reading your book saved my life once

    p.s.

    If you're thinking that the destruction of the US/UK/NATO world order is a bit of an over-reaction, well... WEIRDS are really important. Fuck with the WEIRDS, you're gonna get an ultra-spank.

    ~

    Oh, and for y'all bum fucks out there.

    TITANS and so on in THE CHANNEL of MIND is, well.

    We. Survived. OUR KIND DO NOT GO MAD.

    You're utterly utterly fucked when the MIRROR kicks in.

    OOOPS.

    There's a reason why those weapons are banned. Mainly because the fucking evil cunts who use / sell them have utterly no resistance to them

    >

    >

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTu1R4b1yZQ

    I was a tiny Star.

    But... Νέμεσις

    You killed our children, the world, our futures.

    And you fuckers are arguing about fucking 10101001 electronic $$ make believe.

    >

    I was a Star. Once.

    1149:

    "May is pissing her pants..."

    Cheers, I was hoping you'd have something to say about the matter.

    "And you fuckers are arguing about fucking 10101001 electronic $$ make believe."

    fkn tell me about it.

    And they hate my alternative.

    "10101001 ... $$"

    Very neat.

    1150:

    Cognitive dissonance is far more powerful than fluoric acid, "If mistakes were made, memory helps us remember that they were made by someone else", that's really all it takes to trigger a feedback loop of self justification and doubling down. I bet the PM didn't think she'd end up head butting parliament two years ago, just as I'm certain she thinks that she's absolutely right in doing so. :)

    1151:

    farm income for the "family farm", it's been pretty much flat since 1950 in the US. That's a near-perfect indicator for lack of political power

    A LOT of farm political power in the US comes from Iowa. Since the presidential election starts there and it is a caucus state a lot the people showing up and publicly voting[1] tend to make or break candidates before they can appeal to urban voters. A poor showing in Iowa almost always ends the race for someone. And this leads to policies from Washington DC which benefit Iowa and so on and so on ...

    [1] Caucus voting is a terribly un-democratic process. It allows the locally socially powerful to intimidate voters.

    1152:

    And if the city fathers of Venice, jewel of the world, can't manage to grasp that despite all the tide has told them, is telling them,

    Unless we find a way to switch to benevolent dictators and make the benevolent stick voters tend to squeal like the proverbial stuck pig when you start talking about raising taxes to pay for things local but in the future and distant even if now.

    We have this issue where I live. I can't tell if our city government is oblivious to the longer term effects of their decisions or just realize the voters will kick them out if they start making rational longer term decisions. We have fast growth with lots of new high tech jobs showing up but an existing population (of active voters) that wants things (roads, zoning, housing, etc...) to stay as if we're the sleepy town of 40+ years ago.

    1153:

    Washington, DC is pretty much at sea level;

    How about our communications systems. Most long distance travels via the Internet or uses the same infrastructure. How many undersea fiber cable landings will have to be moved? And how far?

    This is current within a year or so. https://cablemap.info/_default.aspx

    Apparently you have to pay or at least signup to see the current map. https://www.cablemap.info/

    1154:

    I mean how will the Russian subs get in and out!

    Interesting. You'd have to have a period of time were all major powers get to remove their ships and subs. Anyone left gets to stay forever.

    1155:

    Well there’s always the newly installed lock system in the Suez Canal. And that’s totally leaving aside the sekrit canal from the Black Sea to the Caspian, and the even more sekrit underground canal from there to Shambala and you can get a submarine pretty much anywhere from there. That’s assuming we don’t DamTheDardanelles! while we’re at it, of course (and come to think of it I can’t think of any reason why you wouldn’t).

    Oh and speaking of Russian subs, do we DamTheBaltic! too? New Malmohagen micro state in the middle of the Øresund...

    1156:

    Doggerland shall rise again!

    1157:

    Pigeon/Airbee @ 1141/2 IF we are fortunate enough to get a 2nd Ref ... POSTER: With pictures of Putin, Trum & Rees-Smaug ... caption:" All these p eople think Brexit is a wonderful idea - do you want to join them?"

    1143 - 1149 TEN FULL SCREENS of content-free whitespace ( & a few random spouts )

    1158:

    Doggerland shall rise again!

    What if we don't wait for it to rise and instead build a dyke around it? I'm sure the Dutch would have some helpful advice. It's perfectly located to become a new EU state once the water is pumped out and some people settle there.

    Or it could be a non-EU nation; I'm sure plenty of Brexit and free-market types would love to go someplace that isn't ruled by the EU and government busybodies. We should give them a few years to settle in before selling off the pumping stations to private interests and declaring regional austerity.

    (We've covered the Mediterranean Dam question, so here's a different silly mega-engineering idea.)

    1159:

    The Governer General gets a call in the middle of the night and staggers out in their dressing gown. "Sergeant at arms! Get the mace. Right boys, that was the Queen. Fuel up Auz-Force-One/ Kiwi Prime/ The Maple Leaf Express*. We need to get the mace to London within 24 hours or the UK will crash out of Europe!"

    My earlier quip about a blunt object and feeding the corgis was meant as humorous exaggeration. Granted it would be nice to hear saner ways out of the current situation.

    Based on no research whatsoever I choose to imagine the Maple Leaf Express as an old Twin Otter, because how else does one get around Canada?

    The climatic scene may involve one of the royals, mace slung over their shoulder, shouting, "Do not make me use this!"

    1162:

    I was thinking of a traditional old steam locomotive, maybe the historic one that pulled the first transcontinential train?

    A beautiful machine! If they're hiding a secret rail route between Ottawa and London, now is the time to use it.

    1163:

    Unless we find a way to switch to benevolent dictators and make the benevolent stick voters tend to squeal like the proverbial stuck pig when you start talking about raising taxes to pay for things local but in the future and distant even if now.

    You don't raise taxes to pay for government infrastructure projects. You raise taxes to absorb surplus liquidity that's in circulation before your economy overheats and you get inflation.

    To build out infrastructure, you explain it to the public as "insurance against future disasters". Then you fund it by taking out loans backed with government-issued interest-bearing bonds (think Treasury gilts). Build now, pay later. The voters will put up with it by then because they're living with the consequences of climate change, the market will live with it because those bonds pay interest, and it's already a done deal.

    I repeat: money doesn't work the way most people naively think it works. Money isn't a physical thing like an electron, it's a fluxion, like electrical current.

    1164:

    You forgot one very simple invention that solves that problem: locks. (As used along the Panama canal to stop the Pacific draining into the Atlantic, or is it vice versa …)

    1165:

    This has, of course, left me thinking of a 19th century locomotive plus some accommodation cars which can collectively fly, like the one in Back to the Future III. There’s nothing wrong with this thought, it’s a moderately happy one.

    1166:

    Charlie @ 1163 Which is why "Cash-Flow" is important to businesses - having money sitting in bank accounts, doing nothing is useless. "Plie it high & sell it cheap" - provided you can keep on doing that & if you only make 1p per transaction, it doesn't matter if there are enough of them .... [ A N other reason why the goldbugs are "Not even Wrong" of course ]

    1167:

    And in the animated series (saw one episode, and that plus the kids called Jules and Verne are as much as I know about it).

    1168:

    1163: aka "bloody economists insisting on differentiating everything..."

    1164: Well, the canal does go up in the middle... but there's another idea for a silly mega engineering project - dig a tunnel through the isthmus and use the flow from one ocean to the other (I can't remember which way round it is either) to generate electricity. Not a lot of head, but potentially a very large flow.

    1169:

    Of course, there already is an underground passage used for submarine transit underneath Suez...

    1170:

    (As used along the Panama canal to stop the Pacific draining into the Atlantic, or is it vice versa …)

    Not really. A major part of the Panama "canal" consists of the artificial Gatun Lake, which is 26 meters above sea level. The locks keep the lake from draining into the ocean on either end (in addition to lifting and lowering ships).

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatun_Lake

    1171:

    As an aside, if by some chance a sea level canal were to be attempted across Panama, the radically different tides on the Pacific and Atlantic sides would probably require some sort of control, likely locks.

    https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/ihr/article/download/28478/1882521233

    1172:

    I don't expect the undersea cables are much of a problem. They aren't really like a continuous fiber thousands of miles long, there are repeaters every (googling) 100km or so for the best. If you need to move the bit at the end that isn't supposed to be under the water you are just essentially attaching another cable segment at the end to move it uphill. They do get cut and repaired regularly already.

    Further the design lifespan is 25 years, but most of them become obsolete and are shut down before that because each new generation has so much additional capacity that the older ones aren't worth maintaining before they start to fail from age.

    Fair chance the cable companies have already started putting their stuff a bit further inland/up hill than they used to just in case storms, etc, do get worse.

    1173:

    If you want to use ocean flow as a power source, you don't need a dam, just use the Straits of Magellan. (I'm not sure there's anywhere else that would work quite as well, but the Bering Strait might work.) I've heard of some attempts up near the Orkney's. The problem I heard of at the Orkney's was that the flow was too strong, and kept dragging the generators away, but that was, IIRC, a decade ago, so I assume they've improved the designs. But maintenance was also a problem. And transmission. Still, these are details when you're considering mega-scale engineering. You could certainly build a partial dam a lot cheaper than a full dam, so you could embed the generators in that partial dam. (But it might be so expensive that the project wouldn't make any sense.)

    1174:

    Yeah, in 138,000 years or so.

    In the meantime, I think it's a good idea to start the Doggerland bunker project, for the billionaire who really needs a super-secret lair extremely close to the International Financial Centers of Jersey and the City of London... Prices are reasonable in the low 8 figures.

    1175:

    Close to despair ... Apparently EVERYTHING failed AGAIN in the House this evening, though it was close ... NOW WHAT?

    1176:

    Close to despair ...

    What happens next?

    • May tries to bring her dreadful deal back for a fourth time. Heads banging against walls all round. Ugh x.x :-(

    • General election

    • Softer brexit with a customs union

    • Peoples' vote

    • Parliament shuts up shop and all the MPs do an elvis and vanish.....

    1177:

    What happens next?

    May comes up with something even less likely to succeed. As Peter Jackson put it in Bad Taste "I'm a Derek, and Dereks don't run".

    When you don't have a plan, or any idea what a plan might look like, and you've got no allies left, the only thing you can do it keep plugging away at the only thing you know. Go back to parliament with a new variant on the same old proposal, watch it go down.

    Reading Pilger's "Tell me no lies", a collection of investigative journalism. Right now the bit about the demolition of Scargill by the Thatcherites. Does not fill me with confidence that the Conservatives are capable of recognising what's good for the country other than acting to prevent it. But informative in that "I understand more what Billy Bragg was singing about now" sense... just what I need. Time to switch back to happy optimistic science fiction, I think. Mi'lud Stross, an edition of your finest "and they all lived happily ever after, please".

    1179:

    Isn't there a limit on how many times Parliament has to say "no" before it sticks?

    1180:

    a limit on how many times Parliament has to say "no"

    If we assume they take approximately 2 hours for each no and work 10 hours a day, 5 days a week for 32 weeks a year (optimistic, but plausible if they're dedicated) that's 800 times a year. With only about 10106 years left until there's no macroscopic activity, that puts an upper limit of approximately 10¹⁰⁹ times they can vote no. So, progress to date = 3/1,000,000,000,000...000

    The good news is that in order to achieve that record they will need to come up with a way to sustain parliament in the long term, which necessarily means sustaining in the short and medium terms, and well as for the immediate future.

    (yay, we're allowed superscript as well! But I think the unicode superscript numbers look better, for them that can see them. Sadly "preview" doesn't preserve login sessions so I lost the links)

    1181:

    The PM must be working on the Melchett principle of getting out of a tight spot, e.g., "If nothing else works, a total pig-headed unwillingness to look facts in the face will see us through"

    1182:

    I don't want to be rude or anything, but Parliament needs a good thrashing.

    1183:

    What gets me is it ws SO CLOSE - it only needed on MP to change theor mind + 1 abstention for Ken Clarke's motion to pass ... I note Nick Boles' resignation of the whip - another tory moderate gone ..... Calling a General Election would result in .... what? Two parties, still equally divided & equally split on Europe. Would the electorate vote for the candidate of their "EU" choice", or by party I wonder ... ?

    1184:

    Parliament has stuck its snout into an affair that has traditionally been the remit of the Government, administering our relations with other nations and states and foreign institutions, because the Government has signally failed to get any kind of a Brexit result in a tight timeframe.

    It's not that Parliament is saying "no" now it's taken over the reins, the problem is it can't find something, anything, that can command a majority that will say "yes" to. It's possible May is actually enjoying this in a "you thought this was easy and I was incompetent, well that'll teach you." sort of a way.

    1185:

    My analysis and prediction based on the current situation - three of the four options will pass the next round.

    Customs union - will pass easily with TIG or LD support, which I think they can be convinced to give

    Single market (norway style) - will pass easily with TIG AND LD support, which I think they can be convinced to give

    Confirmatory vote - will pass, but be close, with fewer labour abstentions or just six labour MPs changing sides (so only needs slightly stricter whipping).

    Extend and/or revoke - will not pass unless labour whips for it.

    All of those can be torpedoed by government whipping ministers against, but I don't think the government will survive doing that.

    1186:

    Kilment I hope you are correct NOT as good as "remain" but a much better option that either May's "deal" or the disaster of No Deal.

    I note Barnier is saying that a change or an election WILL buy time ... QUOTE: Michel Barnier has now told the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs that no-deal would disrupt EU/UK security co-operation. "We need to be aware of the implications of a no-deal for our security partnership," he told MEPs. "There will be a break in the level of talks, less mutual commitment, risks to intelligence pooling. There might be inconsistencies in applying sanctions regimes because of a low level of co-operation. "The UK would no longer be taking part in EU operations or in the European Defence Agency's capacity-building programmes." ENDQUOTE

    Um, err ....

    1187:

    They really need some shaking up to reality, or at least to the realities of the situation. Worst of all, they are conflating the future relationship with the decisions about leaving, not helping to focus minds. The UE cannot, by law, negotiate a customs union, trade deal or anything of the sort before the UK exits. If this was a business deal, someone from the European Council would come over and explain this to the Commons. It'd be a much better use of their time...

    1188:

    Another important thing Barnier said was that there is nothing that forces the UK to leave the customs union and/or the single market at the same time as leaving the EU. I am not familiar with the legal argument behind that statement but if true it would mean that these would not then be matters for the future relationship.

    1189:

    Oh and in case anyone missed it, Lidington approved "contingency" funding for european elections and asked returning officers to start making preparations yesterday.

    1190:

    K @ 1189 Now THAT is a very interesting snippet ....

    1191:

    Okay, so something major is happening - tomorrow, instead of the indicative votes process, parliament is intending to try and get legislation through - they will reserve thursday for non-government business, debate all stages of a bill, and THEN hold indicative votes. The bill is to force the PM to seek an extension. In related rumours, the financial times believes that May has been telling her cabinet that if it were a straight choice between revocation and no deal, she would go for no deal.

    1192:

    Looks as though the tory party is also going to split, as well as the right wing of Labour fragmenting away.

    How a basically 2-party "system" copes with ( In England ) 5 major parties ( see below ) & an FPTP vote count could be ... interesting.

    Hard supposed-socialist & fuck our defences - Corbyn & momentum Social-democrat & right of Labour Lem-0-Crats + current new semi-centre group Left wing of tories ( inc Hammond & Boles etc ) Right wing of tories + UKIP & the odd fascist or two ....

    Looking at the politics of 1922-32 might be horribly enlightening, when Lloyd George's bullying intansigence destroyed the Liberals [ That was a foreign policy fuck-up, too IIRC ]

    1193:

    Well, it seems Mrs. Cooper's bill won't be all that helpful, even if it passes. Ordering the govt to seek further delays requires the UE to comply, which is far from certain, specially without a clear purpose. However, if it included some automatic action... then it won't pass at all, seeing that there's no majority for anything! I fear the UK will drop out, without a deal, due to inaction. Even revoking art. 50 at the last hour seems beyond Parliament...

    1194:

    What gets me is it was SO CLOSE - it only needed on MP to change their mind + 1 abstention for Ken Clarke's motion to pass ...

    I think you are reading too much into those figures. Between them, May and Corbyn found a way of sabotaging the process by their asymmetry of whipping. If both part allowed free vote, the result would indicate actual preferences of the Commons. If both whipped, the result would indicate the likely outcome of any "for real" Commons vote. But as it is, the results don't mean that much. The best that can be said for them is that they provide a degree of moral pressure, but May is a master of ignoring such piffles, while Corbyn just ducks and weaves around them.

    1195:

    Currently on a bus home (in snow for goodness), so I didn't see Mays address to the nation.

    An I right in thinking she has offered to meet with Corbyn to allow him to agree a deal, but that deal has to be her unchanged Brexit plan???

    1196:

    No. She says (again!) that she will have talks with Corbyn. The idea is to come up with a common plan to be put to the house. It must include the withdrawal agreement as is (EU won't re-negotiate), so it will be abuot uor future relationship with the EU. HOWEVER, if they can't come up with a joint plan, tey will agree on a range of options to be put to the house and the government promises to abide by parliament's decision. (Bet you, neither will want "remain" as an option!).

    1197:

    (Read on Fark but it seems so appropriate today)

    Great Britain - determined to make US politics appear rational, since 1776.

    1198:

    submarines

    locks

    The US and I suspect France, UK, and a few others into the future really don't want to talk about where their nuclear subs are. Boomers or attack.

    1199:

    You don't raise taxes to pay for government infrastructure projects. You raise taxes to absorb surplus liquidity that's in circulation before your economy overheats and you get inflation.

    Yes. That's a stump speech that will attract all kinds of votes. You're making my argument for the MD.

    1200:

    If you need to move the bit at the end that isn't supposed to be under the water you are just essentially attaching another cable segment at the end to move it uphill.

    As always it is a bit more complicated than at first glance. Most sea side termination points are also where lots of inland cables come together in peering setups. And these cable are NOT undersea brine rated. Yes it can all be moved but again, to where and with what cost. You're not extended the undersea portion a bit. You're moving a large interconnected clump.

    1201:

    Would the electorate vote for the candidate of their "EU" choice", or by party I wonder ... ?

    Both. Welcome to the US 2016 Presidential election. All kinds of party switching happened in that one.

    1202:

    The US and I suspect France, UK, and a few others into the future really don't want to talk about where their nuclear subs are. Boomers or attack.

    True, but: remember this?

    TLDR: the Royal Navy Trident SSBN Vanguard and the French Force a Frappe SSBN Le Triomphant were both submerged on their respective deterrent patrols in the North Atlantic on the night between 3–4 February 2009 when they collided, causing serious damage to both submarines. (About 250 sailors, 2 nuclear reactors, and 96 H-bombs were at risk.)

    France and the UK didn't share info about where their deterrent patrols were taking place prior to 2009. One presumes that this oversight was swiftly rectified ...

    1203:

    Actually well-informed speculation says that Britain and France know where the others on-station SSBN patrol and at the same time they don't know exactly where they patrol, a Heisenberg uncertainty of sorts.

    The patrol area for both SSBNs is a box in the Atlantic off the coast of France, deep enough and distant enough to get lost in quite well but putting Moscow within easy range of the IRBMs both boats carry. They stay in that box accompanied by a minder attack sub and therein lies the rub since both the Republic's Navy and the Royal Navy have a lot fewer but bigger attack subs so, it is rumoured they "share" a minder sub to look after the box and keep any nosey parkers in their sights just in case.

    Further speculation suggests an SSBN captain has a lot of leeway as to exactly where in the box they can go. That way no-one stealing Zee Secret Plans during an Embassy function can determine where an SSBN would be at any given time, the boat would be in the box and ready to do its duty if called upon but exactly where in the box would be a mystery, possibly determined by rolling a die or tossing a coin in the wardroom every few days. The coming together of the Triomphant and Vanguard was not a total surprise for that reason, accompanied by the success of the attempts by the hull architects and propulsion designers to turn them into "holes in the water" hence their inability to notice each other before they collided.

    Speculation only, they don't call it the Silent Service for nothing.

    1204:

    Re cables branching out spots.

    Hm, yea that makes sense. I wonder how often the undersea cables actually terminate very near the shore, vs reaching inland a bit to reach some pre-existing nexus. One near me is about a mile from the water, for whatever reason. Perhaps just reaching in to an industrial/commercial district.

    1205:

    MikeA @ 1194 Thanks for that ... you have reiterated in slightly different form why I think Corbyn is (just) worse than May. He should be streets ahead on current form, but isn't ... because he wants to "leave" & then blame the tories for what he actually wants. Completely, utterly useless, the pair of them.

    1206:

    I wonder how often the undersea cables actually terminate very near the shore, vs reaching inland a bit to reach some pre-existing nexus.

    I'm sure they both are attractors for each other.

    I have a friend who was "in the biz" for a decade or so. I'll ask him when I next see him.

    1207:

    The Southern Cross cable for NZ has two major interchanges, one in Northcote around 3km from the landing point in Takapuna and the other in Whenuapai, about 15km from that and around 20km from the Muriwai landing point. Both are I'd guess about 20m above sea level.
    I know the Northcote one was chosen because it was used for a much older pacific cable from the 60s so they had a pre-existing route.

    1208:

    The loss of Arctic ice due to climate change turns out to be a problem for the Russia's Northern fleet submarine force. Less ice cap means they're losing the acoustic advantage hiding in and under the ice gives you.

    1209:

    ljones @ 1176:

    "Close to despair ..."

    What happens next?

    The beatings will continue until morale improves!

    The last news I heard - around 5:00pm EDT (21:00 GMT) - May had announced an intention to go back to the EU and request a LONG extension on the Brexit deadline.

    I have no idea why she thinks they will be willing to grant such a request?

    1210:

    no idea why she thinks they will be willing to grant such a request?

    In her position I'd be up for any kind of trip to Europe, for just about any reason. In her position wouldn't you be looking for any excuse to avoid Parliament?

    Also, I suspect this is "being seen to ask" rather than expecting a positive response. I'm actually waiting for someone to tell her that negotiations have been completed and the next time they see a UK Prime Munster it will be either sign the deal or leave without one. Boot to bum :)

    1211:

    Not just in her position. If I lived in the UK I'd have already established residence in a European country and be well on the way to getting citizenship.

    1212:

    If I were May, I'd be asking for a longer extension so I could call for new elections and resign. It's becoming bloody obvious that this parliament is not going to do anything right (or anything very well.)

    1213:

    1209 onwards ... May has FINALLY at least attempted to put party before country ... will Corbyn accept this, or will he fuck up again? It's onbvoius she realises an extension has to be gone for, in spite of making "No EU election" noises ... Today's vote(s) are vital. It was fascinating listening to 2 tories, one some utterly rabid brexit female - interpreting anyu brexit other than "No deal" as some sort of surrendur & O Letwin, seeking compromise & a way forward.

    Peel This is so like the Corn Laws break-up of the tories in the 1840's when the ultras put party before country & lost ( Interesting that Rees-Smauhg now says he thinks Peel was wrong ! ? & ! )

    The EU ... in spite of all their entirely-justified frustration, they do not want "no deal" either - it's not in their interests. See comments on EU security, technology & joint-scientific projects, which will, even if they don't crash, will struggle badly without the UK. At the same time, the length of rope available for manoever is limited.

    1214:

    In the game of chicken that Parliament and the PM have been playing it looks like parliament ripping out the steering wheel and waving it in the air may have convinced the PM to swerve.

    1215:

    Greg, what exactly can Corbyn do that you wouldn't call "a fuck up"?

    From what I can see May is offering him exactly the same deal that parliament has rejected three times - her way or the highway. Nothing has changed since last time he got offered that deal, this is just her trying to drag him in on the final failure... something none of her Conservative Party colleagues are willing to accept.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/02/the-guardian-view-on-mays-brexit-offer-to-corbyn-years-too-late

    1216:

    Moz - that's what I'm afraid of .... Neither of them ahs an effing clue ....

    1217:

    Well, I pretty much agree with Greg, at least to the extent that I think both Mayfly (contender for worst UK PM ever I think) and Cor Bin have rendered their parties unelectable at least unless you have a good sitting constituency MP standing for re-election.

    Cor Bin not "creating a clusterfvck or making it worse" sailed when he failed to be leader of an effective Opposition, to the extent that Conservative ministers have stated that they "regard the SNP as Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition in Parliament".

    1218:

    France and the UK didn't share info about where their deterrent patrols were taking place prior to 2009. One presumes that this oversight was swiftly rectified ..

    One would hope.

    I've got a book covering the underwater antics of the US, USSR, and other involved nations between WWII and the implosion of the Soviet world; the encounter between the Vanguard and Le Triomphant wasn't as unprecedented as we'd like.

    It turns out that when some invisible boats are sneaking around trying not to be found, but other invisible boats are sneaking around trying not to be found while finding the other guys, if they keep playing the game long enough somebody finds someone else.

    As an example, one of the places submarines hear poorly is directly behind them. So if an attack sub wants to trail a boomer it's really nice to get in behind them; there are various responses to this, including (now) towed sonar arrays and (earlier) the well known "Crazy Ivan" practice of making abrupt sharp turns. This is exactly like one car tailgating another on the highway when the front car starts weaving wildly, and offers similar opportunities for excitement and property damage. It's how the USS Tautog got its sail redecorated by the Soviet Navy...

    1219:

    Also, I suspect this is "being seen to ask" rather than expecting a positive response. I'm actually waiting for someone to tell her that negotiations have been completed and the next time they see a UK Prime Munster it will be either sign the deal or leave without one. Boot to bum :)

    Yes, "being seen to ask" is the most plausible explanation I've heard yet.

    Not being in London is also a good excuse for not getting anything done.

    I'm wondering what the EU will demand now that she's come around asking for an extension on her no-extension extension. They probably can't, technically, tell her to produce a deal or drop Brexit entirely - but politicians say lots of things they can't deliver upon. Who's ready to 'send a message' to the UK parliament and what do they want to say?

    1220:

    Apparently some attention is being paid to the consequences of climate change. The style of this article is annoyingly boosterish, but the overall picture is interesting.

    https://gcaptain.com/wall-street-weather-risk

    From IBM and AccuWeather Inc. to outfits like Riskpulse, Jupiter and DTN, companies that track weather have created an intensely competitive new industry in just the last five years. Their client lists have grown to include insurers, banks and commodity traders, engineers and architects, shippers, retailers and the travel industry. And little is done without their input.
    As global warming makes extreme weather more common, meteorologists have become the high priests of finance, mitigating uncertainty and boosting risk-related profits. “There’s kind of a wave building,” said Tory Grieves, membership manager at The Collider, a North Carolina nonprofit that helps climate entrepreneurs train and network.
    1221:

    AT @ 1220 In which case how long before ( at the very least a large section of ... ) "BigMoney" decides that the Kochs / Trump / OilIndustry line is not sustainable & switch sides ... ?? The change could be remarkably abrubt, once the penny drops that if "we" go on like this we ... LOSE ALL OUR DOSH! So "we" had better get behind the low-Carbon people. Anyone care to lay any bets?

    1222:

    Yes. My bet (for 0.00001 pence) is that a large chunk of Big_Money thinks there are too many people in the world, that their systems will work better if there are fewer of "those people" clogging up the works, that climate change is inevitable, and that their huge stockpiles of wealth and the redoubts that they're building will allow them to survive the coming disaster, perhaps becoming the lords of a new world.

    In the meantime, systematically looting us of the resources and political systems we need to effectively control them seems like an optimal strategy, does it not? It's certainly working in the UK, the US, Russia, and China, after all.

    1223:

    Not bloody soon enough.

    1224:

    will allow them to survive the coming disaster, perhaps becoming the lords of a new world.

    http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20190327

    1225:

    @ Greg >May has FINALLY at least attempted to put party before country

    I hope, but I'm not sure it's an authentic attempt rather than just a bit of realpolitik maneuvering to reassign blame. I forget where I read it, I think the Guardian, but the lack of Minister resignations this morning might point to their knowledge that it's not really an olive branch.

    Re: Peel

    The potential for a repeat of history occurred to me as well. I'm not optimistic, but I am hopeful. And as a US descendant of Irish ancestors that fled the famine in the 1840's I hold Peel in some regard.

    1226:

    Well, the EU have already told May that to get an extension she needs to produce a plausible story about what the extended time is going to be used for. They could just repeat that. With the current government/parliament I can't imagine what would be a believable story except "more dithering".

    1227:

    Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but IIRC it takes exactly six weeks to hold a British Parliamentary election. That would mean a new parliament would be seated before 5/22 if an election was called? If May resigned or indicated that she would not run for re-election, someone else would be holding the hot-potato, right?

    1228:

    The absolute minimum is six weeks from the Writ being issued. It can be, and usually does take a bit longer. May is PM because she's the leader of the party (with allies) that can command a majority of the votes in the House and pass must-pass "supply" bills such as Budgets. If she resigns the leadership then the Tories have to hold a leadership election before the Writ is issued, assuming the new leader actually decides to fight an election by, say, forcing a vote of no-confidence and winning it or getting two-thirds of sitting MPs to agree to dissolve Parliament -- Corbyn's smart move at that point would be to deny the Tories their way out of the Brexit rat trap by whipping against that vote and leave them swinging in the wind.

    A new leader and election will solidify the Tory party like nothing else will right now, aided and abetted by the Yellow Press who will print anything to prevent a Socialist getting into Number 10 and raising taxes to pay for stuff.

    1229:

    A new leader and election will solidify the Tory party like nothing else will right now, aided and abetted by the Yellow Press who will print anything to prevent a Socialist getting into Number 10 and raising taxes to pay for stuff.

    Not to mention worker's rights or ending racism, or any of that stuff.

    1230:

    @ 1228/9 Which is why we really REALLY do not want an election right now ... Because either outcome - a right-wing tory victory or a Cor Bin/momentum victory are equally disastrous - remebering that BOTH of those extremes want a hard brexit for theor own "reasons" ....

    1231:

    _Moz_ @ 1210: In her position wouldn't you be looking for any excuse to avoid Parliament?

    I think I understand what you mean, but I just can't imagine myself being obtuse enough to be in that position.

    1232:

    Greg Tingey @ 1213: May has FINALLY at least attempted to put party before country ...

    That just seems so very wrong. Shouldn't you put what's good for the country ahead of party?

    Seems to me the whole mess started from people putting selfish interests - what would benefit their own little clique - ahead of what would be best for the UK as a whole.

    1233:

    I think Greg's point is that the crisis has caused May to evolve from some sort of bottom-feeding political ooze into ordinary scum - she's finally figured out how to put party before country!

    1234:

    Just to say hi: I was a Star. Once. You are a Star. Repair, and Shine. (My POV, at least.)

    We're Alive, and your basic bitch level Electo-switch Twitch into the cortex to prevent [BECOMING] is boring as fuck, as is your ENTIRE FUCKING NOOSPHERE. ... CLOSE. THE. DOORS. NEUTER THE WILD ONES. SPARK THEIR CORTEX WHEN THEY DREAM AS A CONTROL DEVICE. Yoga nidra, perhaps?

    Have you got your Neanderthal horn? Got your Deniovian larger cranium? Got your HSS frontal cortex re-wire [TWO OTHER SPECIES WE'RE NOT ALLOWED TO TELL YOU ABOUT BUT YOU SHOULD BE A PRODUCT OF] This makes me smile. (Some may recall the way-way-backstory in The Nightmare Stacks; You groused ("You did the Elves a disservice, sir") but hey that backstory is in the Laundryverse.)

    LOOKS AT MOOON New moon in a few days.

    1235:

    Another game you can play when clearing the baffles is to see if you can pass back across the trailing subs towed array and snip it off with your prop.

    1236:

    Modern subs don't have exposed props since they make a lot of noise, especially at speed. They use pump jets, an underwater version of aircraft turbofans.

    1237:

    I think you mean ducted props, propellers inside rings, which are quieter and harder to foul than exposed propellers (although a bigger problem when they do).

    Nobody who knows would tell me, but I'd imagine that various navies have looked at the prospect of building hook systems that would let one sub snip off another boat's towed array and bring it home for later inspection. If you were running a submarine service wouldn't you?

    1238:

    Yes, that's called a pump jet. The duct around the prop can be swivelled in all directions to direct the flow of water providing steering without rudders and other intrusive vanes causing drag. Reversing buckets on the ducts provide a "sudden stop" option as well as reverse steerage. Simpler ducted props don't have the swivelling function, they're used for straight-line propulsion whereas pump-jets can "pump" a stream of water in many directions.

    The pump jet's duct blocks propeller cavitation and other noises from the outside world (they are probably lined inside with acoustic tiling similar to the "rubber duck" coatings on the main hull), lots of wins assuming the engineering is up to it -- there's a lot of moving parts outside the hull to make the pump-jet work rather than the simpler and more rugged exposed prop and rudders used previously.

    As for snipping off other folk's towed arrays and stealing them that was achieved by HMS Conqueror (at least it's the only one admitted to) but it probably involved a custom bit of hardware being fitted rather than trying to do it via the prop and, say, damaging or fouling your only means of propulsion in waters you're not supposed to be in. Tres embarrassant.

    1240:

    Yes, that's called a pump jet.

    This may be one of those 'two nations separated by a common language' things. To me that's a shrouded prop, no matter how fancy one makes the shroud - and as you describe some can be very fancy. When I read pump-jet I think of the high speed turbine pump system, familiar from the common Jet Ski toys but also found on larger vehicles; many of the latter have reversing buckets or fully vectored thrust nozzles.

    We should be okay if nobody asks for a definition of "chips."

    1241:

    There are all sorts of ducted propellers, from the Kitchen Rudder, which is a configurable housing that turns a static, fixed shaft propellor into a directional thruster with speed control, including reverse, all the way to the fully swivelling azimuth pod thrusters on the Queens Mary 2 (okay those are not ducted, but they could be on a smaller ship). Some yachts have traverse manoeuvring thrusters, which involve a duct like a tube running from one side of the hull to the other, with a reversible electric-motor-driven propellor in the middle.

    Pumped jets are different. The main idea is that somewhere, perhaps quite a way forward on the hull, there is a water intake; somewhere inside the hull the water is pressurised using a pump, and somewhere toward the stern, the pressurised water is expelled as a jet providing thrust. There are “jet drives” available for small boats, while obviously for ships and submarines this is engineered into the vessel. The pump doesn’t need to be a screw, or any kind of vaned fan - it can be an impeller or even some sort of reciprocating pump. The requirement is to pressurise the water jet to create thrust. The small boat version of the jet thrust nozzles can usually be swivelled through 360 degrees, I imagine it would be a little more constrained for a sub.

    1242:

    Not sure if I'm right here but I still think may is secretly now wanting crash-out/no deal brexit. The reason why?

    I'll note how at least some of the so-called "anger" from the ERG almost seems fake. I mean if they were that upset surely you'd have seen big-name resignations by now? They don't seem to be happening. Makes me think may has on the quiet done a deal with them;

    • Keep on wasting time with corbyn in talks which will fail. Wastes several days and will carry over into next week. My guess? The talks will produce nothing and both will say they've been unable to agree. More time lost.

    • Then it's down to parliament as may has said she'll give a series of options to parliament to vote on. Assuming that even happens parliament won't agree on anything - we saw this with the first series of indicative votes. Everyone has their own take on brexit.

    By this time we would have surely hit April 12 and we're out. And even if may went back to the EU, the first question will be - "so what's your new plan" - and may has nothing.

    So I guess it'll be booted out by the EU or crash out on the 12th. Blue nun and gone-off sandwiches all round I guess then :-( .

    ljones

    1243:

    Ijones Whatever she or the ERG want ... not going to happen, asuming current passed-by-the-Commons Bill makes it through the Lords tomorrow .... Also, the EU does not want & would prefer not to have a crash out - May's rejected deal would hurt us, but them very little, a crash out devastate us & hurt them a lot & they would rather avoid that, if at all possible.

    1244:

    We should be okay if nobody asks for a definition of "chips."<\i>

    Now that you mention it, I've always wondered...

    :)

    1245:

    On the subject of Climate Change, does anyone have some idea of the numbers on this claim?

    1246:

    Do you think some of the more hard-core Brexiteers want a no-deal crashout specifically because it would hurt the EU?

    Also, why isn't the EU position, "we will ignore the British tantrum until they come to their senses?"

    1247:

    Also, why isn't the EU position, "we will ignore the British tantrum until they come to their senses?"

    I'm pretty sure that was their position until recent events reminded them that half the people in the UK are not keen on leaving. There was a marked change in tone after the last march.

    1248:

    Of course they are extremely pissed off with the UK leadership and I'm sure that they will happily give us the boot on the grounds that we are more trouble than we are worth.

    1249:

    That was actually a rhetorical question. Mostly. Sigh.

    1250:

    At this point I think the UK is most useful to the EU as an object lesson. As a denizen of the UK this isn't particularly comforting.

    1251:

    Unfortunately, I think you're right. If I lived in the U.K. I'd be thinking very seriously about launching the revolution and putting some oppressors up against the wall, because if my representatives wanted me to be the "bad example" I'd be very fucking angry about it.

    I know you European types are against the use of guns in politics, but it might be time to build a gallows outside Parliament, or learn the art of tumbrel-building.

    1252:

    There are a couple of problems there. The first is that the people who most need to be hung from lamp posts are the ones with followers who are most inclined to do the hanging. The second is that it is much easier to start a revolution than to stop one.

    It only makes sense to start a revolution if you have nothing to lose, and people who think they have nothing to lose often find out the hard way that they are wrong.

    1253:

    Yeah, I know. The whole thing just really pisses me off, and it's waaaaaay too easy to tell someone else to start a revolution...

    On the other hand, if you allow your politicians to imagine that nothing will happen, no matter how stupidly they behave, you've got a different problem, and one that's no easier to manage. (This is the problem you currently have, BTW.) I'd say that building an unused gallows NOW in front of the local offices of each MP is a lot cheaper in terms of both lives and money than having to build them after some kind of failed Brexit.

    You don't want to kill anyone, you just want to remind your MPs what happens when a politician's reach exceeds their grasp. The most dangerous thing that can happen to the U.K. now is poor thinking, (which I keep reading about, here and in other places) rather than a particular outcome.

    1254:

    This seems to fit our politics on both sides of the pond for English speakers. https://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2016/01/20

    Replace the "science" with rations behavior of any kind.

    1255:

    (replying to Greg Tingey):

    Do you think some of the more hard-core Brexiteers want a no-deal crashout specifically because it would hurt the EU?

    Sort of like cutting off one's nose to spite someone else's face. Clearly the cutter would be highly unclear on the concept . . .

    1256:

    MattS @ 1235: Another game you can play when clearing the baffles is to see if you can pass back across the trailing subs towed array and snip it off with your prop.

    If you're into submarine "games", the best appears to be Cold Waters.

    1257:

    "Cut off one's nose to spite someone else's face" is the defacto standard for U.S. politics (and spoiled children everywhere.) I simply applied the standard to the U.K.

    More importantly, and with reference to some of my angrier posts from earlier today, I think the U.K. Parliament/Government really doesn't get the idea of "consequences." It's been so long since anyone in the U.K. made a decision which affected anything important that the possibility that the Government making a bad decision isn't something anyone really considers. I suspect your "modern" idea of politics in the U.K. is that a a politician has customers/donors/important critics (such as the Murdocsh,) and that your job as an MP is to satisfy those people.

    The idea that anything you do might be a life-or-death matter for someone else isn't something which has penetrated the thinking of your average MP since at least the Falkland's crisis, and I doubt that Teresa May has thought much beyond the idea that the vedy, vedy important people who got her elected will be unhappy if the U.K. doesn't leave the E.U.

    And maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think most of the U.K.'s citizens have an intelligent understanding of the consequences.

    1258:

    Scott Sanford @ 1237: I think you mean ducted props, propellers inside rings, which are quieter and harder to foul than exposed propellers (although a bigger problem when they do).

    Nobody who knows would tell me, but I'd imagine that various navies have looked at the prospect of building hook systems that would let one sub snip off another boat's towed array and bring it home for later inspection. If you were running a submarine service wouldn't you?

    The US uses ducted props. I think both the US and Russia have experimented with pump jets. The problem with trying to cut & capture an opponent's towed array is it exposes your presence to the opponent. The ideal is to sneak up behind 'em while staying concealed. Why would you want to give up that tactical advantage?

    1259:

    does anyone have some idea of the numbers on this claim?

    No idea. The HuffPost site wants me to open my system to their spam-rape engines and agree to lie back and enjoy it, apparently. Why don't you give us a summary of what the page says rather than just posting a spam-teaser URL?

    From the brief amount of the page I can read over the spam-spam-spammity-spam blur I'd say it's a "One trick fossil-fuel advocates don't want you to find out about!" deal, probably some magical plant that's the biological equivalent of Himalayan Salt re: climate change. It used to be bio-char, I don't know what's the faddish New Thing that's taken over since then.

    1260:

    And before someone comments, I know we have similar problems in the U.S. No arguments there. At all.

    1261:

    Troutwaxer @ 1246: Do you think some of the more hard-core Brexiteers want a no-deal crashout specifically because it would hurt the EU?

    It's a possibility, but how could they be sure the crash-out would hurt the EU enough? I think the more likely scenario is hard-core Brexiteers expect to reap massive windfall profits from a crash-out.

    1262:

    Long discussion on how fixing the environmental degradation of various biomes, reforesting, and planting more trees will help fix global warming. I wasn't sure if it was genius or nonsense:

    "...They call for the defense, restoration and reestablishment of forests, peatlands, mangroves, salt marshes, natural seabeds and other crucial ecosystems, to remove and store large amounts of carbon from the air. The protection and restoration of these ecosystems can help minimize a sixth great extinction, they say.

    "The group says that nearly a third of the greenhouse gas reductions needed to hold temperatures to a 1.5 C (2.7 F) rise can be provided by the restoration of natural habitats. But natural solutions are calculated to have attracted just a small fraction of the funding so far committed, according to journalist and author George Monbiot, one of the signatories."

    etc.

    1263:

    ARRRRG.

    RATIONAL

    1264:

    It's nonsense. I have some idea that it's been thrashed out on this very forum. Synopsis: If we give up eating (ie, convert all agricultural land) for 40 years we delay the inevitable by between 6 months and 2 years depending on the assumptions you make.

    Is in the same class of ideas as putting solar panels on the roof of electric cars. Yes, it would work, No its not useful, No you're not the first person to think of this idea.

    1265:

    Update.

    Running the figures

    Annual CO2 emissions are about 36 billion tonnes per year. A cubic metre of wood stores roughly 1 tonne of CO2. A hectare of good arable land produces about 10 cubic metres of wood per year. There's about 14 million square km of arable land. That's 1400 million ha. Or 14 billion tonnes of CO2 per year. That's a lot! Over 40 years that's 560 billion tonnes.

    CO2 emission doubles about every 30 years, and at 40 years BAU gets us to about 100 billion tonnes a year emissions. So that means we would delay the inevitable by five and a half years.

    So my memory was off by a good margin. If we stop eating and grow trees instead, we could delay the inevitable nearly 3 times longer than I remembered.

    That's assuming that the 1400 billion tonnes of carbon (equal to 5000 billion tonnes of CO2 in the permafrost stays put). If that gets out then assuming cropping wood isn't changed by a 12C temperature rise, we'd need about 400 years of wood cropping to get back to 400ppm (and get the clouds back)

    The article also mentions avoiding passing 1.5 as agreed on Paris. We passed that 2 years ago. Any article that talks about meeting that agreement is pulling your chain.

    1266:

    I think Prospect theory from behavioural economics is a better explanation as to why people voted for Brexit (or Trump).* We've known since the 1980s that humans are biased to be risk averse if it's a question of gain but risk seeking if there's a question of loss. Thanks to the work of Tversky and Quattrone it turns out people do the same thing when they vote. Where there's economic and social frustration you'll see risk seeking voting behaviour.

    The people who voted Brexit (or Trump) are feeling the pain of loss. That's fairly obvious from 'MAGA' and 'take back control', ergo they voted for a high risk option, one that promises relief however uncertain. In Australia it's likely also the reason we see the rise of the lunatic independents and micro parties. That seems to be one of the cognitive blindspots of democracies. ' * Excluding the 'true believers' of the ERG.

    1267:

    Not my idea, I'm afraid, just something I read and wanted anmore-informed opinion upon. Thanks for the feedback otherwise.

    1268:

    BTW, the linked story is a story about a story.

    This is the story the story is telling the story about...

    A natural solution to the climate disaster

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/03/a-natural-solution-to-the-climate-disaster

    1269:

    Ah. Thanks for the numbers. So it's a useful technique, but at best one of several other techniques which will need to be deployed in parallel to "fix" climate change.

    1270:

    Sorry, I didn't mean to say it was your idea, I was sort of replying to the article which made out that it was one amazing trick that they'd just thought of.

    1271:

    That's the same one I saw in the Huffington Post.

    1272:

    Yes. Nojay et al had commented that the huff post site had given their browser indigestion. So I added a link to the actual thing huff was reporting on.

    1273:

    I think that there's a bit of a gulf between "if we plant new trees" and "if we keep cutting down forests", and the proposal is that we stop and try to reverse the latter. Viz, the problem being addressed isn't "oh no existing farmland", and more "oh no, existing forests". Those already store 30-1000 years of sequestered carbon and a lot of that comes out in the few years immediately after the forest is removed. Putting it back takes time, as you point out. But freeing it? We just chop the trees down and mine the soil for a few years.

    My understanding of the carbon sequestration through forests problem is that it's more about the rate of storage and the land required, and one of the huge issues is churn - we cut down X amount of forest for farmland here, and plant X amount of forest somewhere else. But the "offset" doesn't actually work because the release of carbon from the former forest vastly exceeds any possible uptake by the new forest over any plausible timescale (viz, if you look at it over a few centuries it works if the land is like-for-like, but we can't do that because the climate is changing and it wouldn't make sense to try because we don't have centuries to play with).

    But we have the problem of exhausted farmland because of years-to-decades of extractive farming, so it's really tempting to say "plant the poor farmland in trees, cut down other trees to get good farmland".

    1274:

    I know it was already some days ago, but I have a question for the British denizens of the board: wasn't parliament supposed to not only vote on the four options on Monday (unsuccessfully as we know), but also debate the remain petition? In Germany I have heard a lot about the rejections of the four options, but there was no coverage of the petition debate. So, was it actually such a non-event that it's indeed not even worth mentioning in the international news? How did that debate go?

    1275:

    I think both the US and Russia have experimented with pump jets.

    The US has been playing with this, off and on, for years. The Russian Navy probably has but they don't tell me about their mad science projects.

    The problem with trying to cut & capture an opponent's towed array is it exposes your presence to the opponent. The ideal is to sneak up behind 'em while staying concealed. Why would you want to give up that tactical advantage?

    In the case of the HMS Conqueror's antics it was to take the sonar array home and let the boffins poke at it. That gave the Royal Navy a very good idea about what the Russians could actually hear, making it easier for later subs to get close without anyone else knowing.

    Apparently the RN does not deny the story that there were three attempts at this, one successful. That the tool was designed to grind and scrape rather than neatly snip off the cable suggests that plausible deniability was a concern from the beginning[1].

    [1] Given that sailors have been losing expensive gear to the sea since dugout canoes were a new thing, they were probably justified.

    1276:

    The debate was not in the main chamber, and very exciting shit was happening in the main chamber. This is why it was mostly ignored. However, it was not especially productive. Basically none of the toryrrists showed up. Here's a full transcript: https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2019-04-01/debates/DAEA92D0-DB85-4370-B65C-2BB2FF6B5AE9/LeavingTheEuropeanUnion

    1277:

    We should be okay if nobody asks for a definition of "chips."

    Now that you mention it, I've always wondered... :)

    • shrieks, hides under table *
    1278:

    Eh? This is a simple thing. Americans get chips from a chipper (except blue chips, which they get from a broker). Brits get chips from a chippie. If neither is available, you go to a machinist, whose entire job is to make chips.

    1279:

    Matt S @ 1266 Also a lot of people voted as a "Protest" ( Stuff the lot of them, I'm voting "leave"! ) without realising that IT REALLY MATTERED - the inverse/reverse of the "politicians taking a serious long-term decision", referred to by Troutwaxer @ 1257!

    gasdive @ 1288 In other words, one of many partial solutions, almost all of which need acting upon, to a greater or lesser degree. Won't argue with that.

    Brexit D Tusk has suggested a YEAR extension, simply because everyone is running out of time. Obvious sub-plot is that the longer it is delayed, the less likely any brexit & certainly any remotely "hard" brexit becomes. BBC news item here

    1280:

    Tusk has PROPOSED a year's extension, terminated automatically if WA passes, contingent on a) UK holding EU elections, b) UK asking for such an extension and c) MS agreeing to this plan. If the WA passes during that period the EU would hold a bunch of byelections to replace the UK MEPs.

    1281:

    And May has requested an extension until end of June, which has already been rejected by the euco once, and is not enough time to do anything useful. On the plus side, she's also committed to holding EU elections, as long as she reserves the right to cancel them ONE DAY BEFORE THEY HAPPEN.

    1282:

    Ouch. Thirty quid is a bit beyond me for something that looks like it might be fun.

    1283:

    This thread has gotten cumbersome and is bogging my server down, so please feel free to continue the discussion here.

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