It's called the commonwealth, and it includes 30 percent of the land mass of earth.
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UK votes to leave EU
231–240 of 1001 posts
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#232As other comments have noted, the point is that the EU will not want to give the UK a good deal on leaving, because the EU does not want to give any encouragement to the other countries which want to leave the EU (some of which want to leave more strongly than the UK do - apparently). Secondly, why would the UK end up with a Norway or Switzerland deal, when the UK is the 5th largest economy in the world? This is unpr…
“The EU” is not the same as the people of the EU. The French and Dutch people voted against the Maastricht Treaty when given the chance.
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#233I had been following the likelihood of a Brexit on Bloomberg. Before polls opened today, they said there was a 25% chance of the UK leaving. Seems they were quite, quite wrong. http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2016-brexit-watch/
25% chance of leaving is not the same as "they are definitely going to stay". I don't see how you can call a percentage based prediction "quite wrong" if it doesn't end up happening.
Fair enough. Perhaps my surprise comes from the fact that the prediction markets got it wrong as well.
You're right nevertheless--25% is a meaningful probability.
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#234I wish people would stop opening pandoras box. This could get messy.
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#235Populism is seen as bad by people who want centralization of power (socialists of all borders in general, as well as fascists). So if you have been fed the socialist propaganda for years when living in the EU, you assume it's bad.
Please don't call names in arguments (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html), especially politically inflammatory ones.
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Re: UK votes to leave EU
#236It's amazing that such deep constitutional change will be achieved with such a slim majority. 48% of British people will be ejected out of the EU essentially against their will. The UK has always embraced first past the post voting, but it really shows here how it creates very discontinuous inflection points.
That's what a democracy is all about, isn't it? Isn't it insane how close the race between G.W. Bush and Al Gore was in 2000? Consider the consequences of that decision for a moment. And the voter turnout was only 51.2% in that election, not ~70%. Saying that in the end a small amount of voters make all the difference, that's true in so many cases... At least regarding the Brexit-vote no one can complain that there w…
If 51% of voters choose to murder all minorities, would that be allowed? The US has constitutionalism which requires supermajorities to effect fundamental changes. It slows down progress on issues like universal health care, but when progress is made, it is rarely rolled back.
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#237In my opinion, the chances of any sort of war at this point remain pretty low. However, it's possible a Trump presidency and fractured EU might lead to a perfect storm for some kind of global conflict in a few years. I think still a low chance, but it does almost sound like the beginning chapter of a history book.
Let's not forget this was the general sentiment pre WWI and WWII...
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#238It's amazing that such deep constitutional change will be achieved with such a slim majority. 48% of British people will be ejected out of the EU essentially against their will. The UK has always embraced first past the post voting, but it really shows here how it creates very discontinuous inflection points.
I've heard yesterday that the referendum itself is non-binding, and that Parliament is still in charge of the final decision. Further Parliamentary lawmakers are supposedly mostly pro-Remain, so given the slim margin of victory it's not clear what will ultimately happen.
It would achieve nothing: what would happen if the UK stays in the EU while the British have voted to leave? EU criticism and discontent would become so loud it would be impossible to lead a normal life. Everything would be blamed on the EU.
I do not think any politician can fight for such a prospect. They will need to accept the result.
Out is out.
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#239It's amazing that such deep constitutional change will be achieved with such a slim majority. 48% of British people will be ejected out of the EU essentially against their will. The UK has always embraced first past the post voting, but it really shows here how it creates very discontinuous inflection points.
I agree, but it would have been the same either way. ~50% ejected against their will, or ~50% trapped against their will.
Re: UK votes to leave EU
#240Unfortunately nationalism and populism won another war. Now watch Scotland make referendum to leave UK and after leaving they will join EU.
Is populism supposed to be bad? I just looked up the definition to make sure and it's basically the principle that ordinary people should have control over government rather than political insiders and wealthy elite. That sounds like democracy to me. Is there an aspect I'm missing?
Populism rewards short-term thinking at the expense of long-term results, because the common person isn't always aware of the deeper issues in a given field. Put another way, would expect the average person in the street to have an informed opinion on the details of [banking|medical|energy|transport|agriculture] industries?
We already know how easy it is for yellow journalism to sway popular opinion; expecting direct democracy to be able to deal with the subtle nuances of governing a millions-strong society is nice in theory, but simply isn't practical.