It's almost like these Brits have no faith in their 1000 year old country surviving on its own as a sovereign state again. That's incredibly sad.
Being more like euroland is like having the car in reverse. UK might have just saved itself by trying to be more like America (i.e. with the gear shift in forward drive). Just look at how the bulwark of euroland has been doing - Germany, dying, practically shrinking, finally repudiating its zero-emission boondoggle, which hobbled it for past couple of decades, selling its soul for gas from Russia while at same time skeeving its "partners" slimier than a schiff by underfunding and failing in promises in its anti-russia "alliance."
Geez, hadn't realized how bad it was doing - German "DAX" over past several years - it's practically standing still. UK dodged a bullet with BREXIT, thanks to Merkel, and then Farage. Want some negative interest rates, anyone? What are people doing with their money, or are they all becoming too poor? YEAR ..................AVERAGE CLOSING PRICE ............YEAR OPEN ..................YEAR HIGH 2020 ..................13,322.49.................................... 13,385.93 ....................................13,495.06 2019 ..................12,109.96 ....................................10,580.19 ....................................13,407.66 2018 ..................12,267.00 ....................................12,871.39 ....................................13,559.60 2017 ..................12,434.31 ....................................11,598.33 ....................................13,478.86
With good reason. We're a backwater with very little active manufacturing base yet are still the world's sixth largest economy. We haven't done that on our own merits, we've done it by negotiating from an inflated position of strength as members of an economic bloc. We've also just enjoyed the longest unbroken period of peace between the states which make up the EU in history, not in the 300 year time frame you guys tend to think of, but since Roman times. The importance of that stability cannot be overstated. We prospered as a sovereign state because we had the world's most powerful naval force bar none, we exploited, invaded and raped other countries. We brutalised populations and left a legacy of misery round the globe which is still being felt today. We're no longer in a position to do that, nor do we have viable alternatives apart from a banking sector which can only employ a finite portion of the population and is facing drastic reduction as banks weigh up their attractiveness of other places to base their headquarters. We are reliant for huge amounts of our food on imports from the continent, imports which cannot come from elsewhere and will soon carry heavy tarrifs. Our main alternative is to trade under WTO regulations which in no way compare favourably with the conditions we already had and making deals with superpowers who have no reason to consider our best interest and based on current events may even act in a punitive manner should we get too cosy with their rivals. So what, exactly, should I be celebrating? Well, I've got a safe position within the public sector so yay me!
This is kind of ironic, actually, coming from an American. The whole principle of America is that the states banded together in a union (they even called it that) because they didn't think they could survive on their own as sovereign states. What's wrong with "E pluribus unim", anyway?
Lol.. just a colony then? Seriously, sorry you're unhappy with this outcome. See how it goes. It may surprise you. Now go suck down a few pints!
It might. I think a lot of people are expecting it to, but I can't get a single coherent rationale for that expectation which doesn't boil down to racism, misinformation or nostalgia for something which never really existed. The word "sovereignty" comes up a lot with no clear explanation for what people mean by that or why they feel we lost it. The arguments against, however, are all too compellingly logical and realistic and it's hard to see how we could possibly in a better position on the world stage than we currently are. The fact is from an objective standpoint we have been propped up by the EU for many years and people seem to imagine that having bee "last man standing" in the war (yes I've heard that phrase more than once) somehow makes us rightful heirs to the world, that losing the empire was just a temporary blip which can now be rectified. I appreciate your comments but see little to be optimistic about once this year is out of the way and the details are finalised.
The individual states didn't have 1000 years of history as world power before uniting into one nation. Apples and Ashtrays.
As @GhostEcho points out, it's a very different situation. It took the Federal government in the U.S. 80 years and a civil war to dominate the member states. The EU is doing it much, much faster. Identity politics renders that unsuitable as a starting position.
You probably also don't see the EU as an unrepresentative, bloated bureaucracy. If UK has something euroland wants, even with their antiquated "CAP" regs and byzantine trade barriers, you'll find a way to sell it to them. Maybe The City needs to innovate a bit more than in past, to keep your financial sector vital and dominant. Moving your country forward might be scary, but it's better than reverse, or stagnation when hitched to sclerotic leadership only to achieve 'middle of the pack.' Fortunately Britain still has some conservatives and worker bees, so you could easily still win out, the whole country isn't as pessimistic as sentiments expressed by you and UK's negative nancies.
The whole European project is to get rid of nationalist identity politics, because the prior 400 years of that contained over 300 years of war*, including the two world wars. E pluribus unum is the goal. *strictly, the first 100 of those were religious, not nationalist, identity politics, but that's even worse, with all 100 of those years at war.
I don't think a homogenized superstate is necessary to prevent war. But, whether or not I'm right, it seems pretty clear that any homogenizing project is going to run afoul of nationalist passions. What gives way then? The project? Or democracy?
The project goes on hold until the idiots die off. Unfortunately you might get a war in the meantime, that the idiots won’t have to fight in :|
The "idiots" may have dealt a hefty blow to the project. Other nations--Denmark, perhaps?--may get the urge to exit. I think there's very little danger of England going to war against the EU.
I'd be less discouraged if someone could nail down for me exactly what we have that the EU would want so much. If someone would actually lay out a clear strategy as to how we are going to improve matters (which are by and large pretty good already) in concrete and quantifiable terms I'd feel a lot less like we were driving off a cliff cheerfully waving flags. As it stands not one person has done so, not on TV, in the news, during the referendum campaign or in day to day conversation, All we hear is sovereignty and emoting about British pride, how we can now wave the Union Flag again. Until Scotland leave, and Northern Ireland, not why we should expect to go from punching above our economic weight to punching further above it rather then lose the progress which brought us back from the brink of post war national bankruptcy. Yes you guys loaned us vast sums but we had to pay it back somehow and being part of a trading bloc made that not only possible but easy. I also can't overstate the importance (to my mind) of the fact that the countries which make up the EU have co existed in various forms for at least a thousand years, depending on how far you're willing to stretch that definition. In that time, that ten plus centuries, there has never once been a period where we have all been at peace. Not until the EU, during which exactly the opposite is the case. There has, since it's inception, been precisely zero armed conflict between member states. That's a hell of an anomaly to write off as coincidence, especially when the rest of the continent have merrily carried on killing each other.
By that logic, US and Russia must never get rid of nuke weapons. Peace throughout the EU has only ever existed while the US and Russia had thousands of nuke warheads. Or Palestinians must never be recognized as a state - peace throughout the EU has only ever existed when there was no Palestinian state. Meanwhile, the US had much trade in 1860 between regions and No and So states, and yet that didn't prevent our worst war. I can't even see the hook on which you've hung your hat - were you among those that mocked a comment I made a year or more back, that democracies don't declare war on each other? [when pushed, my detractors couldn't cite a single example that disputed my premise.] I think democratic rule is more likely responsible for the absence of war than an intricate protectionist trade pact. Maybe the only time you should fear war within the EU is if one of your larger (fomer) counterparts sees the rise of autocracy? Or maybe you should start worrying only if Germany decides to start building a military again. Perhaps the 3/4 century of "peace" amidst the EU has been solely attributable to a demilitarized Germany.
