Referendum is a load of crap.!!

[Burningman]

Sorry .. I don't mean to sound like I am gloating, it was rudeness born from frustration. I just see the iceberg that the UK seems intent on hitting and noone is at the wheel. I certainly don't despise home, I am just saddened to see it going this way. I think we are the most inventive and warm hearted peoples in the world and I hope that there are better times ahead?
My family have strong Scots roots and my kids asked a few years ago if I supported the independence vote? I told them I did not because I see a world with fewer borders, not more. Since the invention of jet travel, and more so with planet wide social connectivity, the world is getting stirred up and the black and white is becoming brown. I am not saying this is good or bad.. it just is. This will be further accelerated as we face global problems of climate and sustainability and have to work on borderless solutions with a sapien hive mentality or be crushed under our own weight.
So what to do? Isolate, pull up the drawbridge and disconnect from a changing world or help to influence its direction? This 20 mile strip of salty water has been our saviour for centuries but the island mentality will cost dear as you lose markets as the mighty block of Europe negotiates us into oblivion. The avenues for export will dwindle and massive markets of Asia and the US will also be out of reach because we will have to try and cobble together deals where we can only to be blocked by tariffs and a weak currency to trade with.

I hope i'm wrong.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Burningman...no one knows what is in the future for us....those who are making doom laden prognostications are no wiser than we are.
The motive of the EU is closer political and fiscal alliance...and you have seen what this has done to the economies of Spain, Italy and Greece.
Italy's elected government brought in a budget that the EU has quashed....with the possibility of fiscal penalties if they do not re-do the whole thing.
Please tell me how an unelected cabal can be allowed to do this?
Does it not set alarm bells ringing in your head?
Doesn't it smack of a dictatorship?

I have spent my whole life in this country and it is precious to me.
When we last had a vote about the EEC....I voted not to stay in as I felt that this organisation would morph into a political entity....and it has.
The British people were sold the EEC as a trading partnership....and as such it was beneficial.
As a political entity it is not what we joined....and successive governments have signed treaties(signed away our rights) without us EVER being consulted.
How can that be right.

In the time we have been in the EU.....paying in gooodness knows how many billions, a vote has never gone our way.
The EU has not had a budget signed off by auditors in over two decades.
If this was a business you would not use it.

Our porous borders have allowed people to come into our country who should not be here....they are taking homes, some are taking jobs, some are taking benefits(when they have paid nothing in to the pot).
They have let people in...people we have given sanctuary to from their own war torn lands...and then they have gone on to undertake acts of terrorism, murdering young girls enjoying a music concert....they have used vehicles to mow down innocent pedestrians.

Now, you may see this as me being xenophobic, it is not. I am telling you facts.
During my working life I worked alongside all races and creeds, gave compassion and care to women of all races creeds and religions.

I feel like a stranger in my own country....and I am really quite glad that I am at the bum end of a long and productive life.
I do not want to be part of an organisation which treats us with bullying, insults and then in the next breath tell us that we are valued.
If the EU really valued the UK and what it has to offer, then it would have tried harder to keep us as a member.

I am sorry for such a long post, but felt you needed to know my perspective. If you still think I am a xenophobic village idiot then you have learned nothing about me.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Oh yes...you make the observation that Black and white are becoming brown.
Perhaps you should look up the Coudenhove-Kalergi plan....this is an aim.
To make all people homogenised.....no nationality, no patriotism, no allegiance to colour or country.
No resistance to the elite governing them....the EU was just one piece in the jigsaw of the Coudenhove-Kalergi plan....you will not hear it mentioned because this plan has to be accomplished by stealth so that there can be no outcry, no resistance to it.
As I say....glad I am at the bum end of my life.

[cashman]

People who use the phrase " Xenophobic Village Idiots" to people they do not know and have never met, well that says everything about the kind of person they are in my eyes. that was not gloating at all it was stupidly telling folk the kind of person they are, and for me you can shove your artificial apology.

[Burningman]

Fair enough. I don't doubt your motives or sincerity Margret. I just can't see a good path for this going forwards?

I am an ultra globalist and see sovereignty as a hobble to our progress as a species, an antique idea we need to leave behind and unite as humans to face crushing and urgent problems or perish on a dying planet in black vacuum.

As a young guy I worked for Greenpeace and had been around the world a couple of times before I was 21. I have never felt "away" from anywhere, always " at home" with myself. Maybe this is why it was easy for me to leave?

I hope this works out, I really do.

[Margaret Pilkington]

At the end of the day, it really does not matter much to you....you will visit and leave these shores to view the proceedings from your safe place

We ALL hope it works out.
Sometimes the path is not visible...we just have to put one foot in front of the other....if we stumble...we get up.
We have to trust that it will work out....whatever happens we have to make a fist of it and get on with it.
If we can get through two world wars and rebuild, then we have to believe we can do this too.

No one ever said it would be easy....I did not believe for a nano second that it would be easy....and I knew that it would come at a cost.
But do we only do in life the things that are easy...where success is assured?
No of course we don't.
There are too many people on the 'inside' of the UK who will be happy to talk the Country down....that bad mouth us.
Mark Carney...a Canadian and governor of the Bank of England has been consistent in providing doom laden projections of the economy...he is doing it right now.
What do you think that does to financial markets.
The best of it is....he hasn't got it right once yet....so I guess the law of averages is on his side.
Even a blind pig sometimes finds an apple.

The EU is happy with the divisions created....divide and conquer...a divided nation is far easier to control and subdue.
Even in the Tory party, there are people who let the EU know the battle plan.
If, right at the very start, all of these fractious MP's had supported the PM....maybe, just maybe a United front would have ensured a better deal...but I do not think so.
There has been NO negotiation....the only leeway and compromise given has been from the UK side.
The EU want the UK to fail....because it will stop other countries having the guts to leave this undemocratic organisation.

I have also travelled the world....I have not stayed in this sleepy backwater....Sydney, Melbourne, Hong Kong have all been on my itinerary....so while I still live here....I have been to other places

[monkey hanger]

[QUOTE=cashman;1219965]People who use the phrase " Xenophobic Village Idiots" to people they do not know and have never met, well that says everything about the kind of person they are in my eyes. that was not gloating at all it was stupidly telling folk the kind of person they are,

the thing is he lives in the land of the free but there are many of the remainers hold a similar view on those who wanted out in the proper sense of the word.

[Exile on Spencer St]

Originally Posted by Burningman

..... I am an ultra globalist......

There's the rub, Burningman.
The EU is not 'globalist', it is a protectionist, undemocratic organisation.
It closes it's borders to goods and products from most of the rest of the world, which would help raise the economic prospects of many developing countries, in order to maintain inefficient French farms and German industries.
The EU is far, far from the state of global hippy nirvana you seem to attribute to it.

[Margaret Pilkington]

I might have made that comment had I really understood what an 'ultra globalist' was.
I find these modern labels quite off putting....only parcels and medical specimens should be labelled.
But I like the cut of you jib Exile....very well said.

[cashman]

Ultra Globalist is all modern bullshine. the fact he says he worked for Greenpeace also says quite a lot. cos most of them are complete knob heads with a few bob in their pockets. Who also think they are better than mere mortals.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Cashy, while I had those thoughts, I did not post them....but I see where you are coming from.
I was being diplomatic....but I know that you are very direct in your approach.
You always know where you stand with you Cashy.

[Exile on Spencer St]

To be fair to our Californian exile, I think he's just reacting to the misinformation, or no information, that many in North America have received about the EU.
On a recent trip amongst them we were repeatedly quizzed about the EU, with many suggesting, like Burningman, that we British must be mad to vote to leave.
However, I eventually asked them that, before answering their questions, could they tell me what they thought the EU was. Almost without exception, all the Yanks and Canadians replied "a free trade organisation".
And there was the problem.
If only it had stayed as a free trade organisation, I doubted if the UK would ever have voted to leave.

[cashman]

Originally Posted by Exile on Spencer St

To be fair to our Californian exile, I think he's just reacting to the misinformation, or no information, that many in North America have received about the EU.
On a recent trip amongst them we were repeatedly quizzed about the EU, with many suggesting, like Burningman, that we British must be mad to vote to leave.
However, I eventually asked them that, before answering their questions, could they tell me what they thought the EU was. Almost without exception, all the Yanks and Canadians replied "a free trade organisation".
And there was the problem.
If only it had stayed as a free trade organisation, I doubted if the UK would ever have voted to leave.

Well i certainly would not have if that had been the case. We voted way back to join the Common Market but it became literally a dictatorship, if the yanks knew what they were talking about i doubt very much if they would think that way.

[Margaret Pilkington]

That is my issue too.
It is very easy to jump to conclusions about what is good for US when you don't actually live here and see the effects first hand.
It is very easy to view the situation through the monocle of the media....not realising that they are all manipulated by a remainer...or less frequently media that supports what the electorate was asking for.
It is interesting to note that the Daily Mail was fiercely in favour of Brexit....but a recent change of editor(from Paul Dacre to Geordie Grieg....a pro EU editor) has seen this publications stance on leave do an 'about face'.
So it is easy to see why there is confusion abroad.

Even when it was a trading arrangement, it left a lot to be desired.
The Brits follow rules slavishly, the Germans bend the rules to fit their needs and the French ignore totally the rules that they do not like/agree with....so it was never a fair and level playing field.

We are an island race....our borders are the waters this island sits in....so while burningman wants to see a world without borders it is not really going to happen.
There will always be borders of some description...and politicians epitomise this....they think they are the elite, rather than there to serve their electorate and none more so than our own representative.

[DaveinGermany]

Originally Posted by Exile on Spencer St

However, I eventually asked them that, before answering their questions, could they tell me what they thought the EU was. Almost without exception, all the Yanks and Canadians replied "a free trade organisation".

And that, as I've previously mentioned is the mentality we're up against time & time again. Our Colonial cousins lack the insight or knowledge of what is happening in the next state let alone half a world away.


While we British are literally "Little Islanders" due to our geographic location, pretty much most Americans (that tends to include those who've settled in & adopted their host nations attitudes) are practically "Desert Islanders" in their myopic insular "World" view.