Thread by @alexhallhall

My earlier tweets were really just limbering up for today's 🧵, dissecting Penny Mordaunt's speech at the Carter Centre in Atlanta yesterday...it's a bit all over the place, frankly, and I am afraid this is not my best effort either, but here goes... ...gov.uk/government/spe…

First: location: the Carter Center founded by Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter has a "fundamental commitment to human rights and the alleviation of human suffering; seeks to prevent and resolve conflicts, enhance freedom and democracy, and improve health"

Mordaunt makes barely a passing reference to the Carters or their work; instead focusing almost entirely on the UK & Brexit, pitching it as "a massive opportunity to anyone who believes in democracy and the power of trade as a force for good in the world."

Tone: Devoid of self-awareness: "The UK decided that it wished to leave a trading bloc with whom it had been enjoying near frictionless trade in goods for 43 years. The political dramas and negotiations were nothing compared to the massive effort needed from our civil servants..

...to reinvent our border, transpose the statute book and get every business in the land prepared for several eventualities. What sort of country does that? Why upset the status quo? Why risk upsetting friends and neighbours?"

What sort of country indeed? Glossing over any of the costs of doing this, that we have actually upset quite a lot of people, here and overseas; let alone the implications for issues you'd expect the Carter Center to hold quite dear, like the peace process in Northern Ireland.

[I note in passing a speech in 2007, when Pres Carter said "The Irish Government is one of our major allies, and has become the pre-eminent voice for human rights in the EU"]

Turns out that Mordaunt believes leaving the EU is a heroic blow for freedom, a kind of escape from tyranny. The EU, whose preamble calls for pooling resources" to preserve and strengthen liberty and peace; and who is a partner for the Carter Center.

Hyperbolic - Mordaunt continues: "What sort of people believe so much in the individual and the democratic system to risk everything, even at some moments in history to die for it...What sort of country values freedom above all else? We do. Britain And America."

"There’s a reason that Magna Carta and the Decl'n of Independence sit side by side in W'tn. It shows that first America followed Britain in reinventing its human rights. 200 years later, Britain has returned the compliment." Seriously? Brexit = US War of Independence?

Conceited: "This is a major geo-political event and it calls for an US response that recognises this moment and the opportunity that comes with it." UK has "made itself a player on the global chessboard, and the US needs to understand and recognise the UKs new position."

Lacking Irony "In these efforts we have many partners and allies. We are deepening those partnerships, with trade at the heart of our engagement." [As we leave the largest trading bloc in the world and fracture relations with our closest allies.]

And utterly exaggerating our own significance to the US "But perhaps the most critical partner for us is the US. For the US to wait to seize this opportunity would be to all our detriment, but also to its own. It's in its own interest to step up its trade policy and negotiations"

Pretentious: "We have made ourselves a player on the global chessboard and presented you with an unprecedented opportunity. Let future generations of Americans not say in the moment of choosing you failed to grasp that opportunity." [Mordaunt trying to channel Kennedy?]

I'm all for Batting for Britain, lobbying for trade, strengthening UK-US relationship. Some of her arguments are not bad - opening up markets can have a liberalizing and stabilizing effect; I'm not opposed to (sensible) deregulation. I do agree the EU model has some problems.

But my real problem with her speech, apart from its self-importance, is the false argument that somehow we could not be a driving force for liberalization while in the EU; that it was a zero-sum choice between staying in the EU, and working for "freedom" with the US.

My view remains that we had more power, more authority, more respect, and more influence, with both the US and the EU, and on the wider international stage, before Brexit. We have our work cut out to restore our standing. This speech will not have done it.