Thread by @atatimelikethis

Folks we need to talk about the world of the 1970s,

The time before the EEC or the EU.

It sounds like I'm being trite, taking a shot at Brexiter nostalgia.

I'm not.

It's crucial. And it points at the real problem

It'll need a lots of tweets to explain.

First off you need to dump any Remainer predjudice. For now, assume the Leave vote is principled and informed, made by patriotic people who believe they're doing the right thing.

Focus on the people not the politicians. It helps.

Their evaluation is different to you

They no more wish to see the UK harmed than you do, and they believe that Brexit will create a better future.

Many believe it is a do or die issue to free us from a corruption based in Brussels.

And many think Remainers are traitors for attempting to prevent that.

We've spent a lot of time arguing with them about why their interpretation and economics are wrong

We've failed to understand the emotional desire to leave and that means we haven't helped them understand how they're making things worse.

Not in our terms but in theirs.

Have some Leaver empathy (really). I would like to trade independently, set my own laws, regardless of any other country and choose who comes across your borders.

Who could object?

Maybe I'd give up freedom of movement for that too if it gave me extra NHS funding.

We say it won't, they say it will and the whole thing is chaos.

But that's because of a deeply nefarious trick that those in the ERG, who really want to take advantage of Brexit, played at the start of this game and we've all been suckered by it.

We've spent a long time arguing1 the reasons for leaving the EU. We've spent almost no time wondering why Leavers are so convinced the EU is the problem, that leaving it will make things better and that it's worth doing that even under no deal.

We need to separate this.

Our fatal error is to assume that the motivations of all the politicians leading leave are the same.

We should have some empathy for those who really want to leave.

Our anger should be towards those who don't care if we leave or not.

To understand we need to go back in time

The 1970s were not a great time for the UK.

But, crucially, it was a world of very few rules.

You could control who came to your country.
You could trade with who you wanted.
Pretty much every leave motive we have today was satisfied then.

And people remember.

Into that world of comparative freedom came the EEC, which many people didn't want to join.

And then that EEC seemed to many to have become a super state as the EU which none of them voted for.

And over that time the freedoms they had valued became eroded

I can see how the EU becomes both target and solution.

The world before the EU was freedom. The world after it was rules and so leaving it means returning to a world of freedoms, away from EU slavery.

No matter the sacrifice.

Really. No matter the sacrifice.

We should have stopped there.

Someone should have taken out a pen and instead of making Leave a benefit in and of itself, they should have asked what it was people were looking for.

And then we should have tried to find those thinvs and figured out if leaving the EU helped

But we didn't.

Well some tried, but the country as a whole did not and the people funding both sides really had no interest in the debate.

They were Leave and Remain

Where was the "Better" camp firguring out the solution for everyone.

Because, any solution could be possible for the UK, maybe leaving the EU and joining the North American or China blocks is right for us for the long term benefit of our people?

We certainly should have debated where we were going and how long it would take if we left...

But we didnt.
For remainers opposing a calamatous decision was the goal
For leavers, while there were many goals, independence and freedom to make choices were the noble driving forces

Because they could return to a world where those were possible.

I've lost count how many times on social media I've seen "we survived before, we'll survive again". Jokes about the blitz have become casual insults.

But as we laughed at what we thought were naive positions, we failed to see how much they were desired.

There's a lot vested in continuing to tell people that the EU is the problem and leaving it is the answer.

Maybe some politicians even believe it.

Because to me it looks like they're taking actions that show they don't know what's due to the EU and what's due to the world.

Let's take the poster child NO DEAL.

For Leavers it's the ultimate sacrifice to show how important freedom is.

For Remainers it's calamatous, from food, to planes to cancer.

But you don't prevent someone from making a sacrifice by saying how large it is.

You encourage them.

No one seems to have told leavers how pointless is their sacrifice. No deal, we're out right? Not at all.

That's nasty. And it makes me wonder how we let the ERG get away with such a bold lie

Because surely we should all know that no deal simply means in the EU without control

You know no deal is an intentional ERG deception because it's bad for the US trade talks they love.

But they can only get away with it because of the reasons here.

So many things have changed since the 70s and the ERG are desparate to make them due to the EU.

Trade Blocks - this sounds boring but it's at the heart of the ERGs deception on all of us, Leave and Remain.

If we'd had an honest debate about No Deal, it would have gone something like this.

Before the EU you could trade with anyone around the world as you wished.

In the time since the EU lots of rules have been made to govern World trade. You may have heard about WTO or GATT?

To make an informed decision someone should have told you just 3 simple things

1. The rules are mostly for good reasons - similar paperwork, safety controls.

2. Everyone uses these rules, no single country gets to make up their own, much like we don't make our own mobile phone systems that can't talk to each other.

3. The rules are standardised in blocks. You adopt the rules of the block and that gives you access to others.

That's it
That's all you have to know.

Leave or remain you're now gonna say "which blocks'

You'll learn there are 8 major ones, and lots of smaller ones but only 3 the UK could ally with.

If you're leave the word ally is suspicious but you bring back your mobile phone analogy to explain why, unless you're North Korea, you have to play using a system everyone else understands.

You could try to speak a new language but it'd take a long time for others to learn it

Everyone now wants to know which 3, and you answer

The EU
The United States
China

And that alone is probably enough for the wool to be pulled from your eyes on No Deal.

Because now you know you need to be in a trade block, it's not a choice.

Let's say you're still really driven to leave the EU come hell or high water.

OK, you can. Easily. We just pick either the United States or China trading regimes and operate under their rules instead.

And we take 10-20 years adapting our trading systems to deal with that.

10 years is unreasonable, say leavers. yes. We know. But think, imagine you want to change the meat and livestock transit agreements and procedures for every farm in the country?

Just educating everyone will take years, and then they'll make mistakes and... that's just one thing

If you truly want to leave the EU, from just this little information, you know it is a complete change for our economy that will take decades or longer

But it can be done and if it's right for the country you should plan it, get it right, do a deal with the US and change.

And you also know No Deal is a manipulation. One that will remove you from your EU deal but leave you just as stuck in their block.

You can sign your own deals sure. And they will all be on EU terms. Your trading partners will insist on it. And with no deal there nada you can do

Now imagine you don't want to leave the EU, you just want to make money from the chaos. Or you want to free yourself from some stuff that annoys you, like tax avoidance laws. You don't give a damn about anyone else.

Would you tell everyone that it's going to take 10 years?

Nah, they'd never do it.
So instead you go to great lengths to brush over the realities of how the world had changed, focus on the EU as a way to cut the chord knowing full well it will not cut the chord at all.

This is the deception that has been pushed on leavers and remainers

They know no deal simply cuts our headline deal with the EU. It does nothing to free us from the EU trading block, without decades to adjust to another.

But it helps them to make more money from Brexit.

So they don't tell you you'll be stuck with EU terms and no leverage.

The depth of this deception is profound, but the fact that all of us allow it to happen is a responsibility shared by the media, politicians and regular leavers and remainers.

By not educating ourselves about the world, and allowing the EU to become the target we are at fault.

They have played on the nostalgia of Leavers to pursue projects that they can make money from.

But they've manipulated Remainers just as badly, turning us against those who voted leave, ensuring we were distracted from the real problems.

A house divided?

Who is this nefarious THEY. Well truth is, while many wish to blame the ERG, they may be honourable men and women. Others will look for the evidence required.

But we do know that the ERG came up with No Deal. And we know that's either incompetence, or intentionally bad advice.

None of us should want the future strategy of our country influenced by deception or incompetence.

It's time to pause and reflect.

Leavers have concerns
We should listen and find answers

But those answers should work. They should not be deceptions played for votes and profit.

And if Brexit is so important, to leavers and to remainers then it's important enough to do properly, with a result. Not with bluff.

When the shysters come along with easy solutions that solve everything, normal people stop to check their wallets.

Time we all did the same.