PMs change and lol we're all gonna die (but brexit will never end)

Day of Reckoning is Mon/Tues next week where these ppl have to actually do something. Vonc won't happen, it's more like a legislative change of the sort discussed on Newsnight last night.

And then that could get Johnson into a people Vs parliament GE. Which is what I'd like.

Anyone remotely serious needs to put a fucking vonc on it.

I notice that the serious ex-Labour moderates are not included in this. Good old Islamophobe Nora agonising over hypotheticals when there’s a very real situation tells you yet again how seriously anyone should be taking these people.

For anyone labouring under the misapprehension that the hard left wouldn't prorogue parliament in a heartbeat if they were in charge and wanted to pursue an agenda that wouldn't pass in parliament, watch this. 👇 My God, @Conservatives, what a terrible precedent you have set. https://t.co/ictrlsTYmZ

— Nora Mulready (@NoraMulready) August 30, 2019

the old "go shit in your hat" junior soprano line couldn't be more appropriate

in a situation where the government somehow agreed a revised WA that doesn't feature the word "backstop" but will obviously have some mechanism that is functionally the same, could they get it voted thru? i assume "no way"

This Parliament will not vote for a re-worded WA but a future one with different numbers might.

Can’t see the dup or hardliners doing anything regarding this.

i ponder this only because i wonder what Johnson can even claim to be trying to renegotiate, or why anybody (read journalists) is taking the idea of a renegotiation remotely seriously

The reports that I saw were "we'll both try to solve this before the backstop kicks in, but if we don't then we'll commit to continuing to try to solve this, what do you say?"

some people have said that johnson could sell a very slightly altered WA in the way you describe as a great victory and a frightened, tired parliament would vote it through.

it seems possible. you'd probably get some labour votes, maybe enough to beat ERG and DUP. what xyzzzz__ says is likeliest though.

I don't get the impression the EU are up for any sort of re-negotiation that would be substantially different to what's already been agreed, unless it's a reduction in red lines.

yeah i've seen the ahem proposals but the point is it wouldn't shift the arithmetic at all so it's not even a good pretence at action

wavering Labour MPs was my thought as to a possible route, too

i mean essentially the next couple of months makes the Phoney War look like Stalingrad

If Johnson announces a GE is he then free to ditch the DUP (i.e. if Parliament is effectively dissolved does it matter if you collapse the confidence arrangement?) and shift the hard border to the sea but keep the rest of the WA? Which might get the ERG onside and a few "just want a deal" waverers. Or not.

I mean I don't think he's going to do this because as far as I have currently realised it isn't a terrible option - I mean, it's not a great one either but maybe the least bad now possible, if it is even possible - and I think we're strictly in the "terrible options" quadrant of Cummings' famous branching futures

(also I think even passing the WA unchanged would involve more parliamentary debate and Whitehall prep than there is currently time for)

ERG more than happy to be outraged on behalf of the DUP, iirc.

if johnson announces a GE parliament is dissolved and all deals with other parties dissolve with it

xp hmm, they have been to date but they don't actually care about where the border is

however they don't want a deal, they seem not to want anything in particular except chaos and grievance-airing and a little disaster capitalism on the side, so yes, happy to be outraged about things they don't care about just for the sake of being outraged and shouting NO some more (ah, they do have something in common with the DUP after all), true

I have read five million tweets with incompatible 5D chess theories about who really wants what and what's actually going to happen, many prefixed with "it is now clear that" except it obviously isn't now clear or some of these five million tweets might agree with each other, and am so, so tired

(also the cat decided to shout at me about its own inscrutable grievances at half-hourly intervals from 3am onwards, which isn't helping)

xp Nah, the ERG got tattoos, I'm pretty sure.

It's the Conservative and UNIONIST Party, not the Conservative and FUNionist Party.

thanks mark, I guess he can ditch the DUP if he calls an election but that gives no way to make any lasting arrangements (can't do it after dissolving parliament, have v limited time to do anything underhand beforehand before someone works out that they're being screwed)

back to the wall of post-it notes and pieces of string

or why anybody (read journalists) is taking the idea of a renegotiation remotely seriously

He can't call a pre-Brexit election, because the Brexit Party will stand against him for resisting the allure of No Deal and they'll be fucked. He has to have an election forced upon him, which is still a plausible explanation for the current shitshow.

it is. tho as bush said trying to work out whether they’re lying or crazy, with the preferable one being lying, is hard.

has there been any follow-up* on cummings sacking sajid javid's aide last night?

*informational or kremlinological

nothing i’ve seen. i mean i assume its for the yellowhammer leak.

this is good on why vonc isn’t likely to be the best approach:

Opponents of the Prime Minister’s Brexit plan have been exploring two avenues of challenge. The first is through a statutory vote of no confidence, as stipulated in the 2011 Fixed-Term Parliaments Act. The Leader of the Opposition would have to table a motion, and the following day MPs would vote on whether “This House has confidence in Her Majesty’s Government.” If successful, a 14 calendar day period would then begin, where an alternative candidate must demonstrate support of at least 320 MPs, be appointed Prime Minister and then win a statutory vote of confidence. If no candidate, or the original PM, cannot regain confidence, then an election would follow.

Opposition MPs are now reluctant to follow this for two reasons – firstly that neither Jeremy Corbyn, nor any other candidate seems likely to win a vote of confidence. Secondly, that an election after the 14 day period has elapsed would probably be held after 31st October.

The second route being explored is to pass legislation, in a similar manner to the Cooper-Letwin Bill in March, which orders the Government to seek an extension from the EU. The previously successful legislation took five days to pass the Commons and the Lords, so with time looking even shorter in early September, opponents of a no-deal Brexit cannot afford any delay. They must also look to the Speaker of the Commons to bend Standing Orders to allow a substantive motion to capture time off the Government, which currently controls all business in the Commons.

bercow’s response to proroguing suggests that he would enable this. tho lord’s fillibustering can’t be ruled out.

Story I heard was they were told to delete old social media postings that might make them seem like hypocrites; Javid's SPAD refused presumably because of Streisand effect, was sacked.

The posts were deleted and suddenly twitter explodes with receipts of Javid's hypocrisy. xp

agree Corbyn would struggle to win a VONC, but am certain this is because parliament is full of cunts

the legislative approach feels like little more than another stalemate and there will be Lords who definitely filibuster

Cumberbatch will be already thinking about the scene where he ruthlessly turfs the insubordinate Hammond mole out onto the street.

This is Sonia Khan, once of the Taxpayer's Alliance, so, you know, cry me a river.

Sorry if that sounds harsh.

Not harsh at all, wouldn't care if she was dropped into a shark tank!

i don’t think anyone cares, it’s just...

*what’s going on in there?*

and the answer is of course very strict messaging, very strict control and don’t put any of those idiot fuckers anywhere near tv. which works fine until a GE.

seems good? bad news for the Territorial Alliance?

OMG!!!
A v small ray of sunshine in ongoing national shitshow..but @BBC has introduced a new policy on think tanks! That includes info on "funding"!!
*faints*
Look! And it only took all of us going on & on for years (& a strategic ambush of the director general at a public event) pic.twitter.com/ZYCSydRHbF

— Carole Cadwalladr (@carolecadwalla) August 30, 2019

It doesn't seem all that significant unless they're going to stop allowing think tanks with opaque funding on shows.

I haven't noticed Kate Andrews on the beeb for ages, but sadly she's still alive.

these people are like the "historians" who turn up on every "did the Templars fake the moon landing?" and "hey guys let's have another look at the Nazis" documentary - they cite their countless TV appearances on their websites as proof of credibility and then get invited onto loads more TV shows because hey clearly they're experts

*bizarro and me falling over one another to note that YES the templars DID fake the moon landing, wake up sheeple*

this has an example of that, and as an extra added bonus, the "academic" in question is from our old friends Spiked https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-49435041

that's just terrible writing from the Beeb isn't it? "Author and academic", no credentials, no sense of their standing within their own unnamed academic field, any one of us could turn up as an author and academic on those terms and say whatever we felt like

Yeah, unforgivably poor. Her credentials seem to be that she has written some books along the lines of "universities eh, what's that all about?", and that along with being friends with Brendan O'Neill is enough to make her an "expert". It's illustrative of the BBC's problems with "balance": balance is seen to be off-setting some perfectly reasonable initiative or POV with someone who has nothing to offer or is actively acting in bad faith, as in this example.

i've seen Claire Fox being present on shows as the nominal left wing balance a few times. it's beyond a joke.

that's Claire Fox MEP to you, buddy

Use her full title, Claire “The Bosnian genocide never happened” Fox MEP

Didn't her sister write a similar piece about the Rwandan genocide? I could check but on the phone rn

*bizarro and me falling over one another to note that YES the templars DID fake the moon landing, wake up sheeple*

xps to myself

yep Fiona Fox wrote a toxic piece for LM called "Massacring the truth in Rwanda" which described the use of the word genocide as an "emotional overreaction".

The fox sisters and Nora mulready worthy nominations for the continuing awful contributions of the Irish diaspora to public life

Just linking this excellent Rory Stewart content for xyzzzzzzz & mark s

chuckling at the filename of this photo of Rory Stewart pic.twitter.com/2h9rcv0fLj

— Henry Dyer (@Direthoughts) August 30, 2019