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Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#101
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. They are not citizens, their lives may be affected but they have no vote. This has no bearing whatsoever on any of my argument above. 2. I voted 'remain'. If this result is ignored for a.second referendum I will vote 'leave' because I believe democratic respect is more important than EU membership. 3. Your 10% figure is pure conjecture. 4. It was a 4% margin. 5. Whether the referendum is legally binding or not has…

I guess you do not care whether the UK will be (or maybe is) way worse off economically and that xenophobia/racism is now an "every day" thing. Fine, vote "leave", probably suits better that mentality.

Xenophobia isn't the reason intelligent people are pro 'Leave'.

For example, many powerful free-trade Libertarian think-tanks backed Brexit: the Hoover Institution [0], the Cato Institute [1], the Adam Smith Institute [2], etc.

These certainly aren't racist dumb-dumbs or protectionist "little Englanders", and their opinions are well worth a read. While bigots exist and certainly voted 'Leave' that does not mean that there are not good, open, free-market reasons to leave the EU.

[0] http://www.hoover.org/research/cautious-yes-brexit

[1] http://www.cato.org/publications/economic-development-bullet...

[2] http://www.adamsmith.org/evolution-not-revolution

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#102
post #95
post #47

To quote a Tory MP: "Nicola Sturgeon seems to be the only one who knows what's she's doing". Warning of a constitutional crisis is good tactics. It probably will not lead to canceling brexit, though it will probably break the 1998 devolution law and change how Scotland can "sell" independence and its claim to stay in the EU. So it looks like this is either to lay ground for a "fast track" EU access due to special cir…

Definitely the former. That and possibly an attempt at a second indyref if the current momentum doesn't die. I live in Edinburgh, one of the areas with the highest No vote in the indyref, and pretty much everyone I talk to who voted No would strongly consider a Yes vote. Depending how the situation in westminster develops, this might calm down or it could get stronger.

They're mad now.

But a second referendum would force the situation to be analysed a lot more carefully. And that situation would not be a strong argument for leaving, no matter how much the Scots might like the idea of the EU.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#103
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you do not care whether the UK will be (or maybe is) way worse off economically and that xenophobia/racism is now an "every day" thing. Fine, vote "leave", probably suits better that mentality.

This hate by some on the remain side is most unbecoming. You've got effectively called me a racist there. You realise this is precisely the sort of rhetoric that's lead us here?

Calling episodes of racism and xenophobia for what they are qualifies as "hate" towards those who voted Leave?

The attack on the Polish cultural centre is "rhetoric"? The murder of Jo Cox is rhetoric?

Feel offended, but at least don't try to paint yourself as subject of hate.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is also my opinion, but for those downvoting/greying this comment could you elaborate why you disagree?

I believe democracy is about following the will of the people. As such, there are several levels I object to this comment, in particular that we have fair reason to believe the will of the people might have changed in recent days. Stubbornly following the result of a majority vote is majoritarianism, not democracy.

Stubbornly following the result of a majority vote is majoritarianism, not democracy.

Nonsense. In the case of an A/B referendum, following the majority vote is democracy.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#106
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, but I think they could make it very difficult for Westminster if they wanted to. It's not a fight they can legally win, but it could still be in their interests to fight it anyway. There's a joke going around here in London that we should devolve with them forming Scotlondon and set up immigration controls at M25 junctions. It's becoming pretty clear that a lot of exit voters never imagined it could act…

Sounds funny, but maybe closer to the reality of the modern age? So much of GDP now comes from cities & information workers, I'd imagine. Is it just London that wanted to remain? What about the other cities? I haven't followed the race closely, but I'm guessing it was the country bumpkins mostly in favor of leaving?

> Is it just London that wanted to remain? What about the other cities?

Despite much of the media describing this as the north voting to leave, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle upon Tyne, Harrogate and York all voted to remain. Further south there's also Bristol, Cardiff, Cambridge, Oxford.

There are cities and urban areas that voted to leave, but generally speaking it does seem to be that the areas with lower population density voted to leave. I'd be interested to see a visualisation which examined this correlation.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#107

No. Sturgeon is just playing up to her base. Scotland is effectively a one party system, which is quite dangerous, never mind that the common man/woman do not see this. The consequences for leaving the UK are well known. Companies aren't going to stay in because of Europe. They are going to move over the border. Also. The UK rescued the Scottish banks. Scotland will have to take on half this debt. Will the EU bail ou…

"The UK rescued the Scottish banks. Scotland will have to take on half this debt."

That's an extremely common fallacy. The banks were bailed out not by the countries they were based in but by the proportion of their wealth that belonged to citizens of each countries (roughly, it is slightly more complicated than that). Only a small proportion of the "Scottish Banks" wealth was actually that of Scottish citizens. The majority of it was English wealth along with a few other countries, therefore England would have had to bail out a sizeable chunk to avoid the economic ramifications of these "Scottish Banks" collapsing.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#108
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much of this is the media indulging its own bias, and how significant the 'bregret'* stuff really is. I really hope we don't find out how a second referendum goes, as I think it would paint the EU and westminster in a worse light, and put UKIP firmly into ascendancy. *I really hate all these portmanteaus...

The media is working really hard with the bregret thing, the same they worked really hard making sure everybody would vote remain. It's sickening how they want to suppress the will of the majority.

Really? From what I saw, the news sources with the biggest circulation tended to be heavily biased towards leaving.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#109

No. Sturgeon is just playing up to her base. Scotland is effectively a one party system, which is quite dangerous, never mind that the common man/woman do not see this. The consequences for leaving the UK are well known. Companies aren't going to stay in because of Europe. They are going to move over the border. Also. The UK rescued the Scottish banks. Scotland will have to take on half this debt. Will the EU bail ou…

"The UK rescued the Scottish banks. Scotland will have to take on half this debt."

That's an extremely common fallacy. The banks were bailed out not by the countries they were based in but by the proportion of their wealth that belonged to citizens of each countries (roughly, it is slightly more complicated than that). Only a small proportion of the "Scottish Banks" wealth was actually that of Scottish citizens. The majority of it was English wealth along with a few other countries, therefore England would have had to bail out a sizeable chunk to avoid the economic ramifications of these "Scottish Banks" collapsing.

Re: Could the Scottish Parliament Stop the UK from Leaving the EU?

#110
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This hate by some on the remain side is most unbecoming. You've got effectively called me a racist there. You realise this is precisely the sort of rhetoric that's lead us here?

Calling episodes of racism and xenophobia for what they are qualifies as "hate" towards those who voted Leave? The attack on the Polish cultural centre is "rhetoric"? The murder of Jo Cox is rhetoric? Feel offended, but at least don't try to paint yourself as subject of hate.

The incidents you mention were awful and are not to be tolerated. We (as a nation) voted to leave the EU, not to allow this kind of hateful violence.

But you know full well that the rhetoric I'm talking about, as exemplified by that post, is the attempt to paint everyone with any 'leave' symapthies as a racist.

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