Brexit slowly becoming a Farce.

[G51]

26 minutes ago, SandyCromarty said:

You've got to wonder at a newspaper printing that, what is the point when we all know that Boris and his cohorts are to blame for what's happening in Belfast, they agreed to the deal and to make out it's nothing to do with westminster or Boris but all the fault of the big bad EU is fuckin ludicrous.

But as you say that is what the Brexiteer's want to believe and Boris will take that on board and elaborate by saying the EU held a gun to his head forcing him to sign.

They knew from day one that the Irish Border would be a problem.

The whole Brexit campaign was based on lies, spin and the truth distorted to suit.

You reap what you sow.

my friend, have you ever heard of "the ulster plantation"

[Theroadlesstravelled]

The **** love a bit of NI violence.

 

[SandyCromarty]

16 hours ago, G51 said:

my friend, have you ever heard of "the ulster plantation"

Dear Friend, Are you aware of Government atrocities in your own country Scotland, maybe not so I'll enlighten you.

Right after the Battle of Culloden George the Second's son the Duke of Cumberland gave the order that all Jacobite wounded must be killed, this barbarous act was not normal practice after a battle.

There then followed a "scorched earth policy of burning, pillage and clearance", (Tam Devine's accurate description), throughout the Highlands,  this entailed brutal murdering by Government forces, crofts and houses razed to the ground, all livestock slaughtered or removed and sold, the same with grain so that the homeless men women and children starved. This continued for a year as Cumberlands intention was to teach the highlanders a lesson by having large forces, supported by the royal navy, march through the highlands slaughtering as they went, no mercy was shown.

To give you an example, one day, Morvern, a small community on Moidart, woke up to two government royal navy warships immediately offshore, initially they pummeled the area with cannon and then sent sailors ashore and within two hours those sailors had burned twenty crofts down and slaughtered the livestock and burned the grain, the local population had to take to the hills with only what they had on their backs.

Fast Forward now and maybe you've heard of the Highland Clearances where whole families were driven from their homes and transported on ships to the Carolinas plantations where many were iindentured to work on the plantations. The conditions on those ships was absolutely terrible and many adults and children died and were thrown overboard.

Now here is the stinger, even with all that atrocities committed the Highlanders do not have an annual flag waving march through towns and villages with marching bands at the front.

What does happen is that we have a dignified service at the Culloden Battlefield every 16th of April, Clans are represented by flag bearers, at the end of the service we all disperse and go back to our homes, we bear no animosity to those past oppressors but we do not forget!

Charity begins at Home.

[G51]

That is great, Sandy. Yes, believe it or not I am familiar with my own history!

However, there is a very distinct difference between what happened in the Highlands and what happened in Ulster.

What happened in the Highlands effectively depopulated the region, with loads of people emigrating, but also loads of people moving to the Central Belt. The parts of our culture that didn’t fit (or weren’t permitted) within modern Scottish society (clans etc) were consigned to history, while the parts that did are still prominent features of Scottish culture today. Nowadays, the Highlands and the Lowlands/rUK live in harmony, with a shared identity, beliefs and culture (at least until the Highland Revolutionary Army takes hold).

That is massively different to parachuting hundreds of thousands of Scots and Englishmen into a province of a country that absolutely hates them (with that feeling being reciprocated) and the two sides being in constant conflict for 400 years with each other over their conflicting identities! The cessation of hostilities is a fairly new thing in Ulster and progress isn’t always linear!

There isn’t really any comparison to be made between the erosion of Jacobitism and the Clearances in the Highlands and the Ulster plantation and all that followed it. 

[Dunning1874]

20 hours ago, Detournement said:

The Sofagate incident continues to be hilarious.

Because President of the Council of Europe Michel got a chair and President of the European Commission Von Der Leyden didn't Italian PM Draghi has called Erdogan a dictator. That's despite the only one of those four people who even stood for election nevermind actually winning one is Erdogan. Definitely seems like a dog whistle.

 

I'm as happy to bash technocrats as anyone else, but I'm perfectly comfortable with calling Erdogan a dictator.

[Detournement]

4 hours ago, Dunning1874 said:

I'm as happy to bash technocrats as anyone else, but I'm perfectly comfortable with calling Erdogan a dictator.

He won a majority of votes in the last Presidential election. It's also a weird dictatorship where his party regularly lose municipal elections.

He's got a far higher level of support in Turkey than any leader in western Europe has in their own country. The public response to the coup attempt was proof he is a popular leader.

It's the same thing with Maduro, Correa, Morales. If you go against NATO or the IMF you are a dictator. Egypt, Thailand and Bahrain are examples of democratic disasters but you never hear a peep about them from western leaders because they go with the western zeitgest.

Edited April 10, 2021 by Detournement

[SandyCromarty]

3 hours ago, G51 said:

That is great, Sandy. Yes, believe it or not I am familiar with my own history!

However, there is a very distinct difference between what happened in the Highlands and what happened in Ulster.

What happened in the Highlands effectively depopulated the region, with loads of people emigrating, but also loads of people moving to the Central Belt. The parts of our culture that didn’t fit (or weren’t permitted) within modern Scottish society (clans etc) were consigned to history, while the parts that did are still prominent features of Scottish culture today. Nowadays, the Highlands and the Lowlands/rUK live in harmony, with a shared identity, beliefs and culture (at least until the Highland Revolutionary Army takes hold).

That is massively different to parachuting hundreds of thousands of Scots and Englishmen into a province of a country that absolutely hates them (with that feeling being reciprocated) and the two sides being in constant conflict for 400 years with each other over their conflicting identities! The cessation of hostilities is a fairly new thing in Ulster and progress isn’t always linear!

There isn’t really any comparison to be made between the erosion of Jacobitism and the Clearances in the Highlands and the Ulster plantation and all that followed it. 

I take you were born and raised in Scotland not Northern Ireland.

You quite rightly mention that there has been conflict between sides, however that pales in comparison to the genocide that happened here in the Highlands.

There's a vast difference between people warring and innocent people being slaughtered needlessly.

And the Highlanders did not emigrate of their own free will, they were forced onto those ships, as for Highlanders moving to the Central Belt that came much later towards the end of the 19th century when Glasgow became an industrial and commercial powerhouse and work was available in the likes of the shipyards.

I note your concern but ask why, maybe you are a very caring person so with it you must also be distressed over the injustices being carried out in Myanmar.

Edited April 10, 2021 by SandyCromarty

[SandyCromarty]

30 minutes ago, Detournement said:

He won a majority of votes in the last Presidential election. It's also a weird dictatorship where his party regularly lose municipal elections.

He's got a far higher level of support in Turkey than leader in western Europe has in their own country. The public response to the coup attempt was proof he is a popular leader.

It's the same thing with Maduro, Correa, Morales. If you go against NATO or the IMF you are a dictator. Egypt, Thailand and Bahrain are examples of democratic disasters but you never hear a peep about them from western leaders because they go with the western zeitgest.

Not quite right, Turkey is massively allied with the USA who have two large military bases there, this alliance all began in the 1950's during the cold war when the USA built an Nuclear attack Early Warning Systems round Russia consisting of many large radar stations one of which was based in Turkey, and another was sited on the top of Aberdeenshire's Mormond Hill, with the advent of satellites these became obsolete.

The USA has been a firm advocate for Turkey's acceptance into teh European Union.

As for Nato, Turkey gave Nato access to build a missile defense system radar station in the Turkish interior around 2010.

Not all is at it seems.

[Detournement]

21 minutes ago, Pato said:

I'm confused I thought voting was meaningless and was a fraud smokescreen to protect those with real power?

Erdogan obviously primarily represents Turkish capitalists but his politics are still too independent for the West. 

Voting in zombie advanced economies nations like the UK is pointless 9/10 times but there are many countries with less developed bourgeoisie and electoral systems that are a site of class conflict.

Edited April 10, 2021 by Detournement

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

The NATO member with the second largest military gets a hard time for being unaligned with the West? 

[Detournement]

20 minutes ago, Genuine Hibs Fan said:

The NATO member with the second largest military gets a hard time for being unaligned with the West? 

They are a NATO member for geographical/historical reasons. 

You don't see Denmark, Poland, Italy etc running their own aggressive foreign policy independent of the USA in one country never mind half a dozen.  

[btb]

I see JD Sports owner & ex-UKIP supporter Mick Ashley is bemoaning the cost of Brexit to his company while simultaneously opening a warehouse in Dublin to ease shipping to the EU.

Meanwhile in a depressing juxtaposition the next triumph of the gammons will undoubtedly be Hartlepool next month.... 

[Dawson Park Boy]

25 minutes ago, btb said:

I see JD Sports owner & ex-UKIP supporter Mick Ashley is bemoaning the cost of Brexit to his company while simultaneously opening a warehouse in Dublin to ease shipping to the EU.

Meanwhile in a depressing juxtaposition the next triumph of the gammons will undoubtedly be Hartlepool next month.... 

Very easy to pick out examples that suit your case but exports to the EU have rebounded quite strongly in contrast to Imports which have increased that a slower rate.

The true picture will not ne known till the Covid restrictions have been removed.

Certainly not the disaster that many predicted.

I see Goldman Sachs is building a new office in Birmingham.

[btb]

53 minutes ago, Dawson Park Boy said:

Very easy to pick out examples that suit your case but exports to the EU have rebounded quite strongly in contrast to Imports which have increased that a slower rate.

The true picture will not ne known till the Covid restrictions have been removed.

Certainly not the disaster that many predicted.

I see Goldman Sachs is building a new office in Birmingham.

The JD Sports story caught my eye because I remember Ashley being wheeled out by the LEAVE campaign on a few occasions and introduced as "a man who knows what he's talking about"... 

Can there be any doubt his support for Brexit is part of his general disdain for workers rights?

[bendan]

3 minutes ago, btb said:

The JD Sports story caught my eye because I remember Ashley being wheeled out by the LEAVE campaign on a few occasions and introduced as "a man who knows what he's talking about"... 

Can there be any doubt his support for Brexit is part of his general disdain for workers rights?

Does Mike Ashley own JD Sports? 

[lichtgilphead]

59 minutes ago, Dawson Park Boy said:

Very easy to pick out examples that suit your case but exports to the EU have rebounded quite strongly in contrast to Imports which have increased that a slower rate.

The true picture will not ne known till the Covid restrictions have been removed.

Certainly not the disaster that many predicted.

I see Goldman Sachs is building a new office in Birmingham.

I thought that you claimed to be an accountant?

You do realise that a 42% drop from £13.6bn is a much larger number that a 46.6% increase from £7,9bn?

The overall export figure is down £2bn. That's not good. Even though imports are rising at a slightly lower percentage rate, brexit is still having a negative effect on the overall balance of trade figures, no matter how the government report percentage figures in their press releases. 

[Dawson Park Boy]

22 minutes ago, lichtgilphead said:

I thought that you claimed to be an accountant?

You do realise that a 42% drop from £13.6bn is a much larger number that a 46.6% increase from £7,9bn?

The overall export figure is down £2bn. That's not good. Even though imports are rising at a slightly lower percentage rate, brexit is still having a negative effect on the overall balance of trade figures, no matter how the government report percentage figures in their press releases. 

It’s far too early to judge.

The stock market is doing just fine.

Ill go with that.

Take a look at your pension valuation.

[jakedee]

It’s far too early to judge.
The stock market is doing just fine.
Ill go with that.
Take a look at your pension valuation.

My ISA value dropped 15% since 2016 - 2020.
This year it has stayed static.
Not doing just fine.

[Dawson Park Boy]

4 minutes ago, jakedee said:

My ISA value dropped 15% since 2016 - 2020.
This year it has stayed static.
Not doing just fine.

You can’t have been invested in international equities then.

Uk equities are starting to recover now.

Maybe you’ve been in bonds?

Who knows?

[Glen Sannox]

1 hour ago, Dawson Park Boy said:

Very easy to pick out examples that suit your case but exports to the EU have rebounded quite strongly in contrast to Imports which have increased that a slower rate.

The true picture will not ne known till the Covid restrictions have been removed.

Certainly not the disaster that many predicted.

I see Goldman Sachs is building a new office in Birmingham.

The Brexit bed wetters will not like this Dawson.

Leave a light on for us!