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Should the UK remain a member of the EU


Anny Road
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317 members have voted

  1. 1. Should the UK remain a member of the EU

    • Yes
      259
    • No
      58


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11 hours ago, Gnasher said:

Hospitality, wages up. Are they not deemed low paid workers to you? Ditto lorry drivers, fruit pickers and building site workers. You're being disingenuous with that last paragraph.

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-08/u-k-wage-inflation-emerges-with-post-lockdown-staff-shortages

 

 

As above.

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4 hours ago, Gnasher said:

The debate is well and truly over, have yet another example and your last paragraph I'd preposterous.

 

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2021/07/there-s-simple-answer-labour-shortages-pay-workers-more

The last paragraph basically says "some of the links you have been repeatedly posting for the last few years are correct".  Are you now saying they're not?

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3 hours ago, Colonel Kurtz said:

Are you quoting from “Ebony and Ivory”

26E790E9-6F46-4E35-A247-AF8C6C729C6F.jpeg

Or maybe Bill Shankly.  But mostly I'm paraphrasing the generation of post-war statesmen who realised that war (at least, when it's fought on your own turf - some of them were ardent imperialists) is a bit shit and best avoided.

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4 hours ago, Gnasher said:

Eu expansion was certainly great news for the top 10%, not so good for the other 90 though,

 

https://www.poverty.ac.uk/report-europe-income-distribution-inequality-international-comparisons/rising-income-inequality

 

Did you read that report? I don't just mean the highlights on the link; I mean the report. It's worth reading.

 

It's clear that the biggest driver of EU inequality since the mid-Eighties has been increases in in-country inequality, as more and more Member States have chosen to follow neoliberal policies. The impact of the expansions was that EU aggregate inequality was exacerbated by the addition of countries that were poorer and more unequal than the existing EU; this effect has been mitigated, a bit (but not enough), by a process of "catching up" that the expansion states have been through. 

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4 hours ago, Gnasher said:

"Work better together"

 

Between country inequality rose 4% throughout Europe during the pandemic. 

 

The pandemic has been in Europe for 18 months. 

The EEC/EU has been around for 64 years.

 

Find me any other 64-year period in Western European history in which states weren't going to war with each other, murdering ethnic/religious minorities or leaving large numbers of the population to starve.

 

Nations work better when they work together. 

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53 minutes ago, Gnasher said:

Capitalists and Conservatives will always brag up inflation as a bogeyman against wage rises, almost as bad as when they say we're 'maxing out the credit card' 

 

 

Inflation is good news for those who are fixated on lowering the national debt. It's not good news for those fixated on feeding their families.

 

As welcome as the current wage increases are in some sectors, they're unlikely to be the main driver of the economy-wide inflation that's affecting everyone.  Also, they are unlikely to become "the new normal" because the worst of the capitalists and Conservatives have complete, unrestrained power in this country. It's twats like us who will end up paying.  Again.

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2 hours ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

None of which contradicts a word of what I posted.

If you click on the plus sign (+) next to the Quote button for each of Gnasher's posts you want to reply to

 

1 hour ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Literally nobody says that. 

you can put all your replies in one post.

 

1 hour ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Did you read that report? I don't just mean the highlights on the link; I mean the report. It's worth reading.

 

It's clear that the biggest driver of EU inequality since the mid-Eighties has been increases in in-country inequality, as more and more Member States have chosen to follow neoliberal policies. The impact of the expansions was that EU aggregate inequality was exacerbated by the addition of countries that were poorer and more unequal than the existing EU; this effect has been mitigated, a bit (but not enough), by a process of "catching up" that the expansion states have been through. 

 

Just click on the "quote one post" drop-down that appears on the right.

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56 minutes ago, Colonel Kurtz said:

Since we’ve been in the EU, we’ve been to war with Iraq and Argentina plus interventions in Bosnia, Afghanistan and Kuwait. The idea that the EU has led to peace is just propaganda. 
 

No.  The claim that anyone says that EU Member States haven't been to war is a lie put out by *checks notes* you and Gnash.

 

The fact that no two Member States have been to war with each other - because, in practical terms, they can't - is, well, a fact.  A not unimportant one.

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1 hour ago, Colonel Kurtz said:

This is ludicrously reductionist. EU member states don’t go to war with each other behave they are democracies and democracies don’t go to war with each other. Nothing to do with the EU. Do you think that now we have left we’re about to start a war with France ? 

Re-read that last sentence and ask yourself who is being ludicrous. 

 

Being democracies greatly reduces - but doesn’t eliminate - the risk of war between two countries.  Having your economies and legal systems intertwined - and in some cases sharing a currency - does eliminate the risk: if you can't make or pay for the war materiel, you can't go to war. You might not understand that point, but fortunately the post-war statesmen did.

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The irony is the way Gnash & Kurtz in one breath sneer at the facts about the establishment of the EEC/EU being designed to prevent war between Member States as if it's something naive & idealistic, then in the next breath come up with the most airy fairy reasons for the absence of war between Member States. 

 

That post-war generation had a choice: either cross their fingers and trust to luck that European countries wouldn't start bombing each other again; or do something about it  (starting with France & Germany, as they were traditionally the fightiest).

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21 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

The irony is the way Gnash & Kurtz in one breath sneer at the facts about the establishment of the EEC/EU being designed to prevent war between Member States as if it's something naive & idealistic, then in the next breath come up with the most airy fairy reasons for the absence of war between Member States. 

 

That post-war generation had a choice: either cross their fingers and trust to luck that European countries wouldn't start bombing each other again; or do something about it  (starting with France & Germany, as they were traditionally the fightiest).

Germany couldn't bomb anyone after WW2 Angry, part of their surrender agreement  meant they were not allowed an army that exceeded 100,000 men and they were not allowed to re arm, the German police were only granted permission to carry firearms in 1956. You're going into red under the bed type nonsense. No European country wanted war after ww2 and most were incapable if they did. Were all now members of Nato now anyway.

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10 hours ago, Gnasher said:

Germany couldn't bomb anyone after WW2 Angry, part of their surrender agreement  meant they were not allowed an army that exceeded 100,000 men and they were not allowed to re arm, the German police were only granted permission to carry firearms in 1956. You're going into red under the bed type nonsense. No European country wanted war after ww2 and most were incapable if they did. Were all now members of Nato now anyway.

I know that generation didn't want war; that's why they took practical steps to make it impossible for future, stupider generations.

 

The leaders in 1919 didn't want to return to war. They also disarmed Germany. How did that work out?

 

NATO has never been anything more than a tool of US imperialism. It may have made sense until 1990, but since then? Nah.

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I always thought the anti war argument against leaving the EU was facile. Most of these nations are in NATO and have a incredible levels of interoperability and cooperation because of it. To hand wave that away is probably due to lack of understanding about how these countries militaries operate. 

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1 hour ago, Colonel Kurtz said:

It’s not ludicrous, it’s the logical  extension of your argument. If being in the EU reduces the chances of war between member states then if one of those states leaves, the logic of your argument is that the chances of a war between that state and an EU member state must inevitably increase (otherwise being in the EU doesn’t make any difference to the state of peace in Europe). Hence the question, now that we have left the EU do you think it is slightly more likely that we are going to go to war with France, a country we have a long history of going to war against ? Logically you have got to say yes but you know it’s nonsense and the fact that we aren’t is nothing to do with the EU. 

You do struggle with logic, don't you.

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15 minutes ago, Numero Veinticinco said:

I always thought the anti war argument against leaving the EU was facile. Most of these nations are in NATO and have a incredible levels of interoperability and cooperation because of it. To hand wave that away is probably due to lack of understanding about how these countries militaries operate. 

Thing is I don't believe the remain side mentioned going to war. Cunt Boris picked up on an interview with Cunt Cameron and started talking about project Fear now talking about war.

 

I'd have to Google what exactly was said but it's just too much effort in the current heat.

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1 minute ago, skend04 said:

Thing is I don't believe the remain side mentioned going to war. Cunt Boris picked up on an interview with Cunt Cameron and started talking about project Fear now talking about war.

 

I'd have to Google what exactly was said but it's just too much effort in the current heat.

I was more talking about those on here who make it, like angry. Not sure what the actual remain campaign were saying. 

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From 2016

 

In his speech Cameron argued that the EU has helped to “anchor peace and stability across the European continent” by binding the continent together. 

“The European Union has helped reconcile countries which were once at each others’ throats for decades. Britain has a fundamental national interest in maintaining common purpose in Europe to avoid future conflict between European countries,” the prime minister said.

 

A key weakness in Cameron’s argument is that security in western and central Europe, and parts of eastern Europe, is not, for the most part, within the remit of the EU. It is mainly a matter for the US-led transatlantic alliance that has existed since the end of the second world war, Nato.

Nato is a military alliance, with a HQ in Brussels, a central command and control structure, running a huge force of soldiers and equipment from more than 20 countries. They conduct major training exercises annually throughout the region. The EU has no army, no common defence policy and no common foreign policy. 

If Russia was to mount an aggressive campaign in the Baltics or along the Polish border, it would be Nato troops that would be confronting them. 

If the UK was to leave the EU, it would not make the slightest difference to its membership of NATO.

 

Cameron said that UK influence is greater these days than at any time since the low point of the Suez crisis in 1956 and attributes this in part to Europe. Not true. The UK does not have military forces remotely comparable to what it had in 1956 or even 10 years ago.

It has influence through being a permanent member of the UN security council and leaving the EU would not affect that. 

But as always the dominant force in western security is the US. All other countries, including the UK, are by comparison bit players. Whether the UK is in or out of the EU would not alter that fact.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/may/09/is-david-cameron-right-leaving-eu-brexit-increase-risk-war

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26 minutes ago, Numero Veinticinco said:

I always thought the anti war argument against leaving the EU was facile. Most of these nations are in NATO and have a incredible levels of interoperability and cooperation because of it. To hand wave that away is probably due to lack of understanding about how these countries militaries operate. 

I don't think it's an argument against the UK leaving the EU, but it's definitely worth mentioning to nobheads who bang on as if no good has ever come from the existence of the EU and who want the EU to disintegrate. 

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