andrewducker | Interesting Links for 24-09-2018

Crossposts: https://andrewducker.livejournal.com/3726743.html

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Interesting Links for 24-09-2018

Majority Of Voters Back Urgent Reform Of Westminster System: (tags: reform voting uk )
Why it matters that Bert and Ernie are gay, which they are: (tags: lgbt muppets SesameStreet )
Octopuses on MDMA reveal genetic evolution link to human social behaviors: (tags: social octopus ecstasy psychology )
Continental Drift - It's amazing how recent anything even vaguely resembling modern continents arise: (tags: geology geography video time )
How the World Map Looks Wildly Different Than You Think: (tags: video maps world size )
Solar panels replaced tarmac on a motorway. Here are the results.: (tags: solarpower roads fail )
App update rejected for mentioning iPhone XR in release notes: (tags: apple wtf )
Chechnya starts concentration camps for gay men, first time after Hitler: (tags: lgbt homosexuality Chechnya fascism bigotry OhForFucksSake )
Labour's new Brexit referendum would not offer option to remain in EU, says John McDonnell: (tags: Labour UK Europe OhForFucksSake )
No one understands why DC is now removing Batman’s penis from comic: (tags: comics penis censorship )
Malware Disguised as Job Offers Distributed on Freelance Sites: (tags: jobs malware virus OhForFucksSake )
“Unadoptable” shelter cats get second chance at life by chasing mice: (tags: cats mice jobs )

He can't engineer a general election. But given that May can't get anything through the House of Commons, the likelihood of one must be sufficient for it to be worth planning for.

Sufficiently likely to be worth planning for but not sufficiently likely or suffiiently controllable (I think) to make the central plank of my strategy. Not in public.

I still think the Tories will hang together and the DUP will not switch sides and Sein Fein will not turn up.

Nor do I think that the Labour Party are likely to improve their position in a general election. Although, John McDonnel obviously has to publically asume that they are likely to.

Tories will hang together to back what?

To stay in power.

Sorry, not clear. Behind what deal? There is no workable option currently on the table. They’ve ruled out Norway and Canada plus requires a border in the Irish Sea.

The Tories will hang together because if they break apart they lose power in the House of Commons and thus control of the Government.

There is no deal they can agree to, "Norway" has that icky free movement of people immigration requirement which millions of their voters would object to never mind payments to the EU, supremacy of the ECJ and more. Canada plus plus loses them the DUP and thus the House of Commons. There is nothing else except their fantasy Chequers cherry-picking exercise which cannot be accepted by the EU from a country outside the EU's rules since it directly contradicts the four freedoms core of the EU's structure. The Tories can't revoke Article 50 and stay in the EU because they'd lose power for a generation and more, and power is why they're in Government in the first place.

We're headed for a no-deal exit.

I do not think the statement "they will hang together" has any meaning if they are not hanging together behind something. And I do not believe (perhaps wrongly) that they will hang together behind a no-deal exit to the extent that they can get it through Parliament, given how slim their majority is. The number of people needed to block this getting through is pretty small.

The Tories can vote for a No Deal Brexit. We effectively default on our existing obligations and become a pariah nation for a decade. Our economy shrinks by 10% in Q2 of CY2019. A quarter of million poor people die. The pound hits US$0.90. It's less than ideal but it's better than the Tory Party splitting.

Okay. I'm going to nail my colours to the mast and say that I don't think there's a majority in the party for that. I could be wrong. They don't need many people to refuse to endorse it before they lose the ability to get it through Parliament.

You are less cynical about the Tory party than I am.

As you know, I come from a long, long line of Labour activists and whilst I might be on hiatus from the tribe you can take the boy out of Labour but you can't take the Labour out of the boy.

For enough Tories to vote to effectively bring down their own government they need to be comfortable with losing their jobs, their friends and allies losing their jobs, being banished from their tribe and risking both a Corbyn government and a permanent split in the Tory party and vote They also need to be sure that sufficient other Tories will vote with them, or else they have isolated themselves and sacrificed themselves for no good purpose.

You may be right about them but I've always been with Nye Bevan on the subject of Tories.

I mean, don't get me wrong, I do genuinely think there's a good chance of no deal - currently putting it at 40%. But I don't think that'll come from a vote. I think it'll come from the lack of one.

I'm not trying to split hairs here but what sort of scenario are you thinking of when you say not a vote.

It's open to backbenchers to trigger various proceedures in the Commons, up to and including a vote of No Confidence - so they ought to be able to force a vote.

I currently think 60%

Sorry, I mean a vote that legitimises leaving the EU without a deal.

I see.

I think the reality is that it's all going to be murky, up to and including threats of violence. So, who knows what anyone will do.

I also do not think that a Tory government would survive a no-deal scenario for very long, and some of the politicians whose sole aim is the survival of the party will take this into account.

I fear many of them have decided that the die is cast and the only way out is to go through and out the other side.

Yup, with you there.

I really hope there isn't, but most worried about labour MPs supporting a no deal (or bad deal) brexit :(

There will be some, yes. Hoey, Field, another one whom I've forgotten. But I (possibly wrongly) don't think there will be so many that it makes the passage of no deal inevitable. The Labour Party will be strongly whipped to vote against it.

I think an accidental no-deal is a very real possibility, just because the clock stops ticking before there's any possibility of a deal. But I think it's pretty unlikely to be a deliberate outcome.

The same thing they always hang together to back when times get tough - the continued existence of a Tory government.

See reply to nojay above. They still have to vote for something, and that something then has to be agreed with the EU.

They vote against all possible options; the EU says right, no options then; we leave on March 29th with no deal. They don't have to vote for that; they just have to vote against everything else.

Yes, but that's not quite what this thread was about. It was about whether the Tories would unite around an option.

I think there is a difference between uniting around an option and everyone deciding not to push their own faction's prefered option, and by doing that actively cause a split with the end result being no deal, either because we run out of time, or the EU says enough is enough or it is easier for the Tory Party to blame the EU for a no deal than it is to blame one of its factions for the content of an actual deal that is hugely flawed.

I expect you are right but have no idea how to parse this sentence, so am not quite sure. Could it be two?

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Interesting Links for 24-09-2018

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