I'm thinking about all the talk of a 'free Britain' from folks like Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson, and, of course, Donald Trump.
But there are some who insist that this is a great moment for Freedom From Elites. Sure, because Boris Johnson, the racist, anti Muslim former London Mayor most likely to be the next UK PM is not an elite.
My good friend and long time reader Greg thinks this is a good thing.
I actually think Brexit was the right vote. I won't oppose something just because many on the right support it as well.
If you want full control of your country you need to be out from under the Brussels technocrats.
As it is currently set up the EU is unsustainable and needs to collapse AFA I am concerned. It is a neoliberal nightmare that was conceived by Chicago school economists years ago; "
https://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/a-historic-day-alright-for-permanent.html?showComment=1466772767520#c7444112161638344007
I emphasize that he's my good friend. I need to right now as he's basically celebrating an event that has screwed me personally to the tune of 12 percent of my current net wealth. As I explained in my last piece:
"Meanwhile, if I may get personal for a moment, I am actually one of those who currently have savings in the UK. I'm a whole lot poorer today, as well, and for me it was not self-inflicted."
"If the pound gets pounded too badly, maybe moving back to the UK becomes an option-I was born there and so will always be a citizen."
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/i-feel-your-pain-though-its-totally.html
It's be easier for me to entertain this big victory of 'technocrats' if it wasn't bringing considerable economic pain to me personally. I don't know if Greg missed my allusion to that-or if this doesn't have any impact on his feelings about Brexit.
By the way, as for not opposing an idea just because the Right supports it, how far does this go? I mean if Hitler supported something strongly, wouldn't you at least question your assumptions a little?
But it's all the aspiring Hitlers like Trump-who literally keeps his speeches by his bedside-who are loving this today. Why? Is it because they believe in Freedom?
Trump is the guy who once cheered the Tinanmen Square Massacre. I don't think he's for Freedom.
All I see is a lot of negative effects for this, without any gains beyond the satisfaction that some clearly get from doing the opposite of what 'elites' want. Because 'elites' say A is a bad idea, it's a good idea.
Meanwhile. Britain's Bernie-Jeremy Corbyn-is totally against this. Now we're hearing that he's one of the 'elites' who are going to suffer as a result of this.
In addition, if this is such a great idea, why do those 18-24 so overwhelmingly oppose Brexit?
They may love Bernie in the US, but in the UK they wanted no part of Brexit. So they don't think Brexit is Freedom.
It's the older folks who voted Brexit.
https://twitter.com/wmyeoh/status/746150360318763008
You have to feel for the kids.
"I'm genuinely close to tears. I'm 20. This is my future. We shouldn't be doing this. I hope so much we can turn this around #EURefResults"
https://twitter.com/asmamk/status/746185153505013760
What's amazing is that the older you are, the more likely you voted for this. Those over 65 voted by 58-33 to Brexit.
Those 50 to 64 voted for it by 49-35. So those who live on savings and linked pensions voted overwhelmingly for a plus 10 percent haircut.
Jeremy Weate:
"Feel sorry for Brits relying on savings & linked pensions. You just became 10%+ poorer. But if you voted Brexit, its entirely your fault."
https://twitter.com/jeremyweate/status/746184471913840640
I didn't vote for this and yet I just got the shaft. Unlike those old Brits crowing about how free they are now-worth the 10 percent haircut-I didn't choose Freedom, yet I'm its victim.
Now you have the freedom of having to get a visa to travel around Europe.
"Having to get a visa just to go to Europe. How depressing"
https://twitter.com/jeremyweate/status/746272705025015808
Meanwhile, Nigel Farage already admits to the first big lie of the Brexiters.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/nigel-farage-admits-wont-extra-8271594
The NIH is screwed.
"Quite how the NHS will be staffed post Brexit is anyones guess. Feel so sorry for all the Europeans who had made Britain their home"
https://twitter.com/jeremyweate/status/746257352916148224
What price Freedom?
I think that Greg is confounding two things.
1. The euro system has been a disaster. He says it was a Monetarist scheme, though Milton Friedman rightly opposed it-as did Krugman and most decent economists. See, just because elites opposed it, didn't make it a great idea.
If the British had voted to get off the euro last night, I'd agree that was a great day for Britain.
2. But they were not on the euro. They had the best of both worlds. And for purely psychosomatic reasons, they spit in their own food.
So Britain's Trump-Boris Johnson-looks set to succeed David Cameron.
If Trump wins here then there will be no where to hide. Trump in the US and Trump in the UK.
I always looked at my dual citizenship as giving me an extra option. If the worst case scenario continues to happen, then maybe it will end up choose your poison.
I'll finally know what the Berners are talking about when they say 'The lesser of evils is still evil.'
But there are some who insist that this is a great moment for Freedom From Elites. Sure, because Boris Johnson, the racist, anti Muslim former London Mayor most likely to be the next UK PM is not an elite.
My good friend and long time reader Greg thinks this is a good thing.
I actually think Brexit was the right vote. I won't oppose something just because many on the right support it as well.
If you want full control of your country you need to be out from under the Brussels technocrats.
As it is currently set up the EU is unsustainable and needs to collapse AFA I am concerned. It is a neoliberal nightmare that was conceived by Chicago school economists years ago; "
https://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/a-historic-day-alright-for-permanent.html?showComment=1466772767520#c7444112161638344007
I emphasize that he's my good friend. I need to right now as he's basically celebrating an event that has screwed me personally to the tune of 12 percent of my current net wealth. As I explained in my last piece:
"Meanwhile, if I may get personal for a moment, I am actually one of those who currently have savings in the UK. I'm a whole lot poorer today, as well, and for me it was not self-inflicted."
"If the pound gets pounded too badly, maybe moving back to the UK becomes an option-I was born there and so will always be a citizen."
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/i-feel-your-pain-though-its-totally.html
It's be easier for me to entertain this big victory of 'technocrats' if it wasn't bringing considerable economic pain to me personally. I don't know if Greg missed my allusion to that-or if this doesn't have any impact on his feelings about Brexit.
By the way, as for not opposing an idea just because the Right supports it, how far does this go? I mean if Hitler supported something strongly, wouldn't you at least question your assumptions a little?
But it's all the aspiring Hitlers like Trump-who literally keeps his speeches by his bedside-who are loving this today. Why? Is it because they believe in Freedom?
Trump is the guy who once cheered the Tinanmen Square Massacre. I don't think he's for Freedom.
All I see is a lot of negative effects for this, without any gains beyond the satisfaction that some clearly get from doing the opposite of what 'elites' want. Because 'elites' say A is a bad idea, it's a good idea.
Meanwhile. Britain's Bernie-Jeremy Corbyn-is totally against this. Now we're hearing that he's one of the 'elites' who are going to suffer as a result of this.
In addition, if this is such a great idea, why do those 18-24 so overwhelmingly oppose Brexit?
They may love Bernie in the US, but in the UK they wanted no part of Brexit. So they don't think Brexit is Freedom.
It's the older folks who voted Brexit.
https://twitter.com/wmyeoh/status/746150360318763008
You have to feel for the kids.
"I'm genuinely close to tears. I'm 20. This is my future. We shouldn't be doing this. I hope so much we can turn this around #EURefResults"
https://twitter.com/asmamk/status/746185153505013760
What's amazing is that the older you are, the more likely you voted for this. Those over 65 voted by 58-33 to Brexit.
Those 50 to 64 voted for it by 49-35. So those who live on savings and linked pensions voted overwhelmingly for a plus 10 percent haircut.
Jeremy Weate:
"Feel sorry for Brits relying on savings & linked pensions. You just became 10%+ poorer. But if you voted Brexit, its entirely your fault."
https://twitter.com/jeremyweate/status/746184471913840640
I didn't vote for this and yet I just got the shaft. Unlike those old Brits crowing about how free they are now-worth the 10 percent haircut-I didn't choose Freedom, yet I'm its victim.
Now you have the freedom of having to get a visa to travel around Europe.
"Having to get a visa just to go to Europe. How depressing"
https://twitter.com/jeremyweate/status/746272705025015808
Meanwhile, Nigel Farage already admits to the first big lie of the Brexiters.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/nigel-farage-admits-wont-extra-8271594
The NIH is screwed.
"Quite how the NHS will be staffed post Brexit is anyones guess. Feel so sorry for all the Europeans who had made Britain their home"
https://twitter.com/jeremyweate/status/746257352916148224
What price Freedom?
I think that Greg is confounding two things.
1. The euro system has been a disaster. He says it was a Monetarist scheme, though Milton Friedman rightly opposed it-as did Krugman and most decent economists. See, just because elites opposed it, didn't make it a great idea.
If the British had voted to get off the euro last night, I'd agree that was a great day for Britain.
2. But they were not on the euro. They had the best of both worlds. And for purely psychosomatic reasons, they spit in their own food.
So Britain's Trump-Boris Johnson-looks set to succeed David Cameron.
If Trump wins here then there will be no where to hide. Trump in the US and Trump in the UK.
I always looked at my dual citizenship as giving me an extra option. If the worst case scenario continues to happen, then maybe it will end up choose your poison.
I'll finally know what the Berners are talking about when they say 'The lesser of evils is still evil.'
Trump and his ilk don't want freedom, they want chaos. Chaos makes "The answer is simple! The answer is I know the answers! Be strong" sound like a good plan, and that's the stupid simple minded, meant-to-appeal-to-a-tent-full-of-desperate-people-at-a-faith-healing-meeting message that Trump and his ilk are selling.
ReplyDeleteI was proud of Austria for rejecting that message this year, but the majority of older Brits bought it. The people who sold them that message will be busy ramping up the scapegoat demagoguery now that the chaos they wanted so desperately appears to be starting to happen.
Trump and his ilk feed like parasites off of fear, instability, ignorance, rumors, conspiracy theories, and cultural anxiety. So anything that whips that up allows them to grow like a cancer. Stability, incrementalism and trust in institutions is their enemy. They need a revolution and chaos.
"So those who live on savings and linked pensions voted overwhelmingly for a plus 10 percent haircut."
ReplyDeleteHere's how that will be spun by the pro-Brexit people:
"Yeah, look what those damn immigrants did to us! Time to round them up. Be afraid, very afraid... but don't worry, a revolution headed by us may sound harsh, but it will fix all your problems! Plus it will make you feel sooooooooo good! It's all about your feelings! Of hate."
Either that or:
"Don't believe your lying eyes when you look at your retirement fund statement! Those are eyes poisoned by globalist chem-trails! Get your aluminum caps and hunker down. Go to www.aluminumcap.com and get the best supply of fresh Trump brand caps for only $75 / week! (you need fresh ones, and we only accept hard currency). Act now while supplies last!"
Mike I realize the Trump-supported-pro-Brexit forces will be madly attempting to spin the Trump-supported-Brexit caused chaos to their advantage, but I'm just curious what would happen if they took another poll right now.
ReplyDeleteDo you suppose maybe, just maybe, the old people in Northern England would look at their retirement money haircut and say "Wow, I guess the tabloids were wrong and the elitist economists were right. Who could have predicted that???? Maybe I'll change my mind"
I wonder how a poll today would turn out. Or are they willing to trade 10% of their net worth just to make sure immigration stops? They weren't planning to travel to the continent anyway, so who cares?
In a way the 10% haircut (or is it 12% now?) plays right into the fear-mongers hands. Keep people at home and insular. Keep them afraid.
Same would happen here if we did something incredibly stupid like a Trump economic plan: the resulting chaos feeds right into the parallel scapegoating and destabilization effort Trump needs to sell his appeals-to-the-brain-dead message.
This makes me sick:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/nigel-farage-claims-hes-won-8271149
Tell that to Jo Cox's family.
O/T: Mike it appears that Ben Carson actually may have said something smart:
ReplyDeletehttp://theresurgent.com/watch-ben-carson-lets-put-second-amendment-on-the-table/
Of course Steve Berman hates him for it. Good on both accounts!
Mike, Simon Wren-Lewis has a great post on this today:
ReplyDeletehttps://mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2016/06/the-triumph-of-tabloids.html
In 2015 I argued that mediamacro had won it for Cameron and Osborne, and pretty well no one took this seriously. Just a year later, the united voice of economists has been successfully dismissed as Project Fear. Not by the people, but by politicians working together with most of the tabloid press, and a broadcast media obsessed with 'balance'. The tabloid press has groomed its readers for Brexit. If any good is to come out of this, it will involve defeating most of the tabloid press, and then forever reducing their influence. And given the power of that media, this can only be done by a united opposition that is prepared to cooperate in an effort to beat Johnson and Farage.
RedState is confused. Erickson himself (at TheResurgent) is pro-Brexit, but I'm not sure about the rest. I liked this quote though about Trump's presser in Scotland:
ReplyDeleteTo be fair, as a huckster, con, charlatan, mountebank, and utter fraud, that’s really all Trump has in his wheelhouse. Self-promotion. I don’t think anybody was under any illusion that once he opened his mouth, pearls of wit and deep, introspective prose, in regards to the significance of the day would tumble forth.