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The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

washingtonpost.com

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Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#151

Post by rayiner »

netcan wrote: post #82

I'm strangely moved by this whole thing. It's a pretty decent status check on where we are with democracy ATM. I'm not against democracy, but I do think we need to pay attention to what it can & can't do. On one hand, this has been a model of democracy. A primary election agenda and referendum. The phrasing of the question was simple, clear and unbiased. The "will of the people" won over the will of the ruling struct…

Democracy is fine. The intellectual class just needs to learn to respect it. There is pretty much nothing that deserves to be decided by the will of the people--their values, their emotions, their world views--than the question of "what body politic do I want to belong to?"

The deep irony of the anti-Brexit narrative is that the same people would froth at the mouth if you said "India would've been better off economically if it hadn't separated from the British Empire." Whether or not that's true, it's an argument--like the anti-Brexit rhetoric--misses the point completely.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#152

Post by yincrash »

Inthenameofmine wrote: post #145
netcan wrote: post #82

I'm strangely moved by this whole thing. It's a pretty decent status check on where we are with democracy ATM. I'm not against democracy, but I do think we need to pay attention to what it can & can't do. On one hand, this has been a model of democracy. A primary election agenda and referendum. The phrasing of the question was simple, clear and unbiased. The "will of the people" won over the will of the ruling struct…

> We haven't figured this shit out yet. Kings anyone? How about the best wrestler gets to be in charge? ideas? As a Swiss citizen, I think the swiss system is very close to perfect in this regard. Sure, emotional and stupid arguments sometimes prevail, but most of the time the people make the perfect decision. Public discourse is most often also very rational, more so than most world parliaments. Irrational arguments…

Switzerland is also much smaller than the UK or California in most respects.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#154

Post by thesimpsons1022 »

Inthenameofmine wrote: post #145
netcan wrote: post #82

I'm strangely moved by this whole thing. It's a pretty decent status check on where we are with democracy ATM. I'm not against democracy, but I do think we need to pay attention to what it can & can't do. On one hand, this has been a model of democracy. A primary election agenda and referendum. The phrasing of the question was simple, clear and unbiased. The "will of the people" won over the will of the ruling struct…

> We haven't figured this shit out yet. Kings anyone? How about the best wrestler gets to be in charge? ideas? As a Swiss citizen, I think the swiss system is very close to perfect in this regard. Sure, emotional and stupid arguments sometimes prevail, but most of the time the people make the perfect decision. Public discourse is most often also very rational, more so than most world parliaments. Irrational arguments…

what part of California are you referring to?

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#155

Post by bobjordan »

oldmanjay wrote: post #111
netcan wrote: post #82

I'm strangely moved by this whole thing. It's a pretty decent status check on where we are with democracy ATM. I'm not against democracy, but I do think we need to pay attention to what it can & can't do. On one hand, this has been a model of democracy. A primary election agenda and referendum. The phrasing of the question was simple, clear and unbiased. The "will of the people" won over the will of the ruling struct…

Being "the best wrestler" is basically Trump's campaign strategy so that concept may well be tested soon

This will no doubt give Trump some twitter scale ammo, given his bickering with the UK, who discussed banning him.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#156

Post by ixtli »

nbouscal wrote: post #147
netcan wrote: post #82

I'm strangely moved by this whole thing. It's a pretty decent status check on where we are with democracy ATM. I'm not against democracy, but I do think we need to pay attention to what it can & can't do. On one hand, this has been a model of democracy. A primary election agenda and referendum. The phrasing of the question was simple, clear and unbiased. The "will of the people" won over the will of the ruling struct…

What prominent lies from Remain? There was a lot of what people were calling scaremongering, but if you look at the markets it looks like it was pretty accurate. I've seen thorough takedowns of blatant lies from Leave, but haven't seen anything similar for Remain.

https://www.facebook.com/WTFlockNews/videos/1132580646806052 Nigel Farage made direct, public claims that the "money going to the EU" would be redirected to the NHS. An hour after the referendum he went on TV claiming that his adverts aren't what he said. This is just the most recent, flaming pile of noxious vomit to come from him but not the only one.

EDIT: I completely misread the parent post. My bad! :)

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#157

Post by DrJokepu »

Nelson69 wrote: post #96
a-priori wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, perhaps, it's a compelling reason why things like this shouldn't be decided by referendum.

Well you can have another, can't you? Or is leaving the EU a one-way thing? I'm sort of jealous. They had a referendum on Scottish independence and they honored the outcome. I'd love to have an up/down national vote on abortion, gay marriage, gun background checks.. At best here in the US, you're voting for a derivative, you're electing someone on the wish/hope that they support your issues if they get a chance or op…

> Or is leaving the EU a one-way thing?

It's possible to get readmitted, but only with the consent of every single member state.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#158

Post by CM30 »

rayiner wrote: post #65
mc32 wrote: post #9

Isn't that expected? People who voted for the establishment status quo want to know what might happen in the years to come now that the vote has gone against them. Voting to stay meant no change, therefore they knew more or less the outcome, but now that the outcome is opposite their votes, they want to look into the repercussions --this informs that it's likely they stay vote didn't investigate the alternative befor…

> But way to go WaPo and imply naïveté on the Brexiters. The D.C. political class : politics :: MBAs : business. And WaPo is the Harvard Business Review. In that it's often useful, but suffers from the belief that the hoi polloi would be lost without the "professional political class" to tell them what they want, and derisively dismisses ideas that don't originate within certain orthodox circles.

So in other words, a lot like most of the media then. As well as quite a few university students and most politicians.

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#159

Post by advertising »

Some voter demographic info - http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36616028

- Rural areas mostly voted to leave

- Younger voters voted to stay, but turnout by younger voters was lower

- Of 30 areas with the fewest graduates (I assume this means college? wasn't clear) 28 voted to leave

Re: The British are Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it

#160

Post by wildmusings »

projectramo wrote: post #120
mc32 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, if that's not an elitist take I dunno what is. Maybe we should require IQ tests for voters, eh? Don't want the working class voting against the elites, now.

It may be elitist but it is not irrelevant in this case. The question being asked is, literally, which side is less likely to even know what the EU is.

When it comes to politics, intelligent and rich people have proven themselves just as capable of blunder as the simplest common man. Just switch the ignorance for a sincere belief in things that aren't true.
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