The EU: IN or OUT?

black_taxi_2

Prof. John Curtice's

now no fav--to close

BananaRepublic

Pincher wrote: »

If it's not too late, can we change the Referendum to have a third choice: Rule by Emperor Pincher?

My manifesto is simple: Reduce the world population down to the David Attenborough Line, one billion.

I will create a Killbot army to enforce my rule.
People who have more than one baby will be punished.
Extra babies will be recycled for organ transplant, if adoption by childless parents cannot be found.

Illegal immigrants will be sold into slavery, which includes organ transplant markets in the Middle East and Asia. That should put a damper to the flood of refugees from unrestricted breeding in the rest of the world.

As the rest of the world degenerate into chaos from over population, the Pincher Empire will conquer and occupy, cull the great unwashed masses, and restore the planet Earth to health.

Save the Planet, vote Emperor Pincher.

May I suggest you read about Vlad the Impaler (not Vlad the Impala, who is at Bristol zoo), from whom you may learn a thing or two.

Regarding the unwashed masses, can't we eliminate them by distributing some soap, that is a much more humane approach don't you think.

talexuser

BananaRepublic wrote: »

May I suggest you read about Vlad the Impaler.

For the purposes of global population control with no regard to morality Pincher might find Temujin later Ghegkis Khan more to his liking :eek: (I don't think Temugin was in favour of a free market economy so investment returns might be problematical).

masonic

mrginge wrote: »

So you are saying that the result of the referendum is meaningless then. Makes me wonder why we are bothering with it at all....

It's only meaningless if you are voting with unrealistic expectations. If the public votes for Brexit, then there is a significant possibility that Brexit will happen. That means that we will no longer be an EU member state. Beyond that, politicians will decide what happens - those in the Cameron government (possibly others in the commons in the case of a confidence vote) and those within the EU.

BananaRepublic

zolablue25 wrote: »

What a lovely theoretical thought. We have democracy. Really? We have something we call democracy. Is it democracy when 24% of registered voters elect a government (by government, I mean a party with an overall majority). Even if you take out the 34% of registered voters that didn't vote (34%!) the Conservatives were elected by only 37% of the voters.

The above is often said as a way of indicating that the current government is illegitimate. But everyone with the right to vote may vote, so the opportunity is there. Those that do not vote are acquiescing to the decision of those who do. As to first pass the post versus PR, well each has advantages, but to my mind ours has the chief advantage that we can choose to get rid of a given MP irrespective of how well they have ingratiated themselves with other politicians. The faults of PR are too big, but that is my judgement, many disagree. We did hold a referendum on this, and we voted against PR.

zolablue25 wrote: »

Anyway, I don't wish to take this off topic with a debate about democracy, and no, I don't necessarily thnk adding a further layer of EU politicians is necessarily a good thing I just think the whole system is broken.

I stand by my own opinion of the referendum in so much as the Tories felt they had to offer it and try to persuade voters to back the EU. If voters decide to ignore their arguments/lies and believe the "leave" campaigns arguments/lies then so that is up to them.

I can fully understand people wanting to change the status quo. That's a perfectly reasonably human desire. Personally, my life is pretty good at the moment so I would like things to remain the same but each to their own - after all, that's what democracy really is.

I don't think the issues are being discussed fairly. The remain crowd need to do more to promote membership. I see real issues with rule by Brussels, but I see no reason why we could get better trade deals outside the EU.

masonic

BananaRepublic wrote: »

We did hold a referendum on this, and we voted against PR.

We held a referendum on AV. AV is not a form of PR and may result in even less proportional representation than FPTP.

I voted against it, where I might have been in favour of STV for example.

colsten

If you haven't heard yet, both sides have suspended campaigning for the time being in the light of the callous murder of Jo Cox MP.

Please down your intellectual weapons in respect for Jo.

Statement from Brendan Cox, Jo's husband and father of her two young children:

BananaRepublic

zolablue25 wrote: »

Problem is, I reckon the EU politicians realise that, should UK leave and be given a good deal, then others will follow and the whole thing will collapse. They can't afford that (IMHO) and so will, I think, attempt to play hard ball to prevent others from wanting to follow.

And I bet they will do that even at the cost of slightly damaging their export trade. They have to set an example, as you rightly suggest.

BananaRepublic

mrginge wrote: »

So you believe that the EU will resort to bullying and intimidation to maintain its current status?
The wishes of to individual members are to be simply ignored if they do not fit with the EU model?

Why would anyone wish to be a member of such an organisation?

When Irish voters gave the wrong answer, they hels the referendum again.

BananaRepublic

PenguinJim wrote: »

Sorry. Despite kingrulzuk's frequent posts, I forget a lot of people posting here aren't native English speakers.

If we want to embrace isolation and xenophobia, an Out result makes sense.

If we want an Out result, that doesn't automatically mean that we want to embrace isolation and xenophobia.

All monkeys are animals, but not all animals are monkeys. See the difference?

However, I find your opinion that xenophobia and isolation are automatically bad to be rather... knee-jerk, perhaps? Surely you can see some circumstances where an isolationist attitude is correct and proper? For example, in the context of global catastrophe (hey! That's the same context as my post had! What a coincidence!).

My statement made sense in the context of your original post where you appeared to be equating leaving to pulling up the drawbridge etc. I'm not interested in otherwise commenting on your rather condescending post above.