It was a mixed year for the Brexit inclined. The general election was messy from a Brexit perspective: sure, one can say that given Labour’s hard Brexit stance at the time, 85% of the electorate voted for parties that supported not just leaving the EU, but doing so in the “cleanest” way possible. Yet given […]
Archives for December 2017
Why the UN Jerusalem vote is bigger than you think it is – it shows us the future of America
Yesterday, the United Nations general assembly had a vote around the United States’ decision to formally recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel by relocating its embassy there. It was a landslide victory for those countries who voted against America’s decision, with 128 countries voting to support the longstanding international consensus that who gets to […]
Here’s what I really loved about “The Last Jedi”
This article contains spoilers. Only two main pieces of plot information are given over below, but if you really don’t want to know anything at all about the film, turn away now. “The Last Jedi” has received a mixed reaction so far. Critics, by and large, love it; hardcore Star Wars fanboys, for the most […]
I think I’ve finally figured out why Theresa May lost her majority in June – and why that’s still important now
There are many competing theories as to why May managed to lose her parliamentary majority in a snap election she called in order to increase the slim one she was sitting on. In my book “Apocalypse Delayed: Why the Left is Still in Trouble”, I had a go at few myself. Usually people surmise it […]
There are now two main tribes of Brexiteers. Here’s how that might play out
As talk between the UK government and the EU moves past phase one (the easy bit, which wasn’t particularly easy) onto discussions around the transitional phase (or implementation phase according to government semantics), people have begun to wonder how Theresa May will manage to keep both Remainers and Leavers in her party happy. I’ll go […]
My take on the #CatPerson phenomenon
A few days ago, the New Yorker published a short story called “Cat Person”, written by Kristen Roupenian. It tells the tale of a twenty-year-old woman named Margo and her brief affair with a man named Robert, whom she initially thinks is in his mid-twenties but actually turns out to be 34. He is also […]
What will “meaningful vote” actually mean in the end? The importance of tonight’s vote
David Davis and his ministers have already promised a vote on the deal the government strikes with the EU, ages ago now in Brexit terms. Only, it was never much of a concession: it’s take it or leave it, in the words of Steve Baker, meaning either parliament would accept the deal – or Britain […]
The new Brexit “deal” – and how the Customs Union fits in
Theresa May has managed to move the trade talks with the EU onto phase two. Whatever I have ever said to her discredit, I have to hand her that victory. It may have saved her premiership – although, as I’ve said many times before, I have my doubts about whether Tory MPs really would have […]
Here’s why the hardcore Tory Brexiteers are sticking with May – and will probably continue to do so
One of the strangest things about the current political era is that we have a prime minister who campaigned (however weakly) for Remain, yet has (in public rhetoric terms anyhow) become the one who has set out a hard Brexit path. It has been widely speculated that the reason hard Brexiteers have been relatively loyal […]
It may well come down to a choice between Brexit and keeping the Union together
One of the things about the whole Brexit dynamic that I fail to grasp, and by Brexit dynamic I don’t just mean the referendum held on June 23, 2016 and its aftermath but rather the whole of Eurosceptic thought since at least 2009, is the attitudes towards the Union shown by the Brexit passionate. Almost […]