1. Its aimed at media - its not govt language 2. Its to prepare way to invoke art. 16 3. Gove has never publicly accepted the Good Friday Agreement 4. Ultimate aim is to feed 🇬🇧nationalism - & friction in 🇮🇪 & 🇪🇺
The letter is final comfirmation - if any still needed - that the EU is dealing with a "bad faith actor".
Up till now EU has tried to deal with the UK a bit like an applicant country in reverse. Attempting to grow a strong trade relationship that could lead to closer ties.
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While - as in many trade talks - there's been frictions, the idea was that once deal signed the EU & UK could move on based on an incentive to build trust in areas where they share interests.
Now increasingly likely the relationship will resemble something like a cold war.
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By cold war I don't mean armed conflict, but more a constant mistrust where one party attempts to test every single percived weakness and an obsession with zero-sum games.
There is now zero trust.
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States signing trade deals with EU usually undertake trust building measure as they get closer relationship.
This seems improbable now with UK.
The EU would be advised to have absolutely everything written down & fully lawyered-through.
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I know this is boring as I've been saying this for years now.
Brexit has become a proxy for patriotism. The anti-europeanism is both its point & only reward.
So don't kid yourselves they'll be a 2nd referendum anytime soon.
The way back is only thru alignment & competent govt.
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Dealing with remainers who consider such talk traitorous is weary but neccessary.
The faster you get to competence, the quicker you get to alignment - which is the ONLY way back.
The Rejoin campaign thus can't really be - publicly - about Rejoin for the next couple of years.
This thread has engendered some term confusion, so:
“The patriot is proud of his country for what it does, the nationalist is proud of his country no matter what it does; the first creates a feeling of responsibility, the second a feeling of blind arrogance that leads to war.”
EU & US do deal to open up EU financial markets to US banks.
As UK banks have only time limited access to EU financial markets it is likely that without a deal UK clearing banks will lose out to EU & US banks putting at risk London’s role as dominant financial centre.
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Understand that the agreement requires US banks to adhere to EU risk management requirements - something that the UK wanted to avoid due to “sovereignty issues”.
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EU concerned with avoiding another financial turbulence like the 2007 global crisis and in maintaining EU banks competing advantage - so the EU-US agreement is considered a key part of this plan.
It took me years in academia to realise that many “average Universities” are often actually better than elite Unis.
Elite unis business model is, in many subjects, effectively a “CV branding” process for a specific minority of intelligent children of highly privileged top 5%.
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It’s why you see a far greater focus on humanities among this particular cohort at elite unis than elsewhere. It’s also why states which have this elite uni model - US & UK - rely on foreign students in sciences at elite unis than elsewhere.
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I can’t be the only academic to notice that at the average uni where I am the privileged students all seem to be ahead of the rest of the class in the 1st year but regress to the mean by the end.
As I understand it the actions of both West Bromwich Albion & West Ham regarding the Snodgrass *should* result in both a fine & points deduction for each team.
It is essentially colluding on team selection to the detriment of others and thus comes under match fixing regulations.
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Legally the only get out I can see is if Sam Alladyce claims to have got it wrong and the boards of both clubs back him up.
This will of course be views as obviously a lie but could be enough.
Problem is West Ham won which could enable other clubs to sue.
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Effectively a club below West Ham could argue West Ham offered a “bribe” for West Brom to field a weakened team as part of a transfer deal.
As such West Ham, at the very least, should forfeit the 3 points.
The number of Tory held marginals where the combined opposition vote vastly outweighs the Conservative one is both huge given Wales relative size - and easy fruit for an even relatively discreet electoral alliance.
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However the conservative vote in Wales is likely to hold up due to the higher number of English - often retired - voters compared with Scotland.
Without an electoral pact a large number of seats would essentially be won by English voters voting for an English centered party.
..and one of its chief architects decides to leave Britain.
Douglas Carswell, former Tory & at one time only UKIP MP, has decided to forgo the delight of seeing the glorious Brexit era he helped usher in..
..he’s moved to Mississippi in the US Deep South.
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For disappointed “Carswell fans” don’t worry!
..you can still catch up with the latest Carswell news via the Mississippi Centre for Public Policy - a right wing lobby organisation that Douglas now heads.
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The Mississippi Center supports the “privatization of medical services around the world”, which seems a little strange as Carswell...
...did of course champion the £350 million a week extra Govt spending on NHS “Brexit bonus”.