Union Jerk

The United Kingdom is officially out of the European Union (EU), the withdrawal having taken place this past Friday.  British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is looking forward to negotiating new trade deals with the EU before the end of the withdrawal process on December 31.

Good luck with that, Boris.  Experts who know a whole lot more about these things than I do say that Johnson will have a tremendously difficult time negotiating with a 27-nation economic bloc with a hundred million or so more people than the U.S., a country that would theoretically benefit from Britain's new free-agent status in terms of trade. Britain is a country of only sixty million people or so.  What's Johnson's leverage?

The British probably dream of restoring their empire, which is pretty hard to do when you remember that its collection of overseas dependencies is down to Bermuda, a few islands in the Caribbean, the Falkland Islands, a military base on some forgotten atoll in the Indian Ocean, and a rock on the Spanish coast.  They probably hope to re-affirm their close ties to the Commonwealth formed out of its former colonies, particularly its economic ties, but at this point re-affirming its connections to Canada and India, and other places mentioned in that Kinks song, would sort of be a parent-child relationship in which the children take care of the mother country.  Ironically, it was the Commonwealth that served as a reason for French President Charles de Gaulle to block British entry into the EU, then called the European Economic Community (EEC), or the Common Market, and worries about the fragmentation of the Commonwealth made joining the EEC made it a hot issue in Britain for the Wilson and Heath governments.  (Britain joined in 1973.)  

Britain is not profiting off its exit from the EU just yet and may not do so for a long time.  The pound is sinking (to cop a song title from Paul McCartney),  and economic growth has stagnated.  Scotland, where the EU is more popular, is thinking of seceding and joining the EU, and Ulster could re-unite with the rest of Ireland on the basis of Scottish independence.  But no matter how dumb this withdrawal from the EU may be, Brexit is nowhere nearly as stupid as the U.S. exiting the Paris Agreement.  Crashing out of a continental market is much less severe than crashing into the climate. >:-( 

Boris the Victor

Since the House Judiciary Committee forwarded articles of impeachment against Trump to the full House, and since his impeachment is as foregone a conclusion ad is acquittal in the Senate is, I won't talk about that today.  Instead, let's look at Boris Johnson, the prime minister of the United Kingdom.

His Conservative Party's smashing victory over Labour in parliamentary elections on December 12 revealed two things; the Brits are united against socialism but divided by nationalism.  Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn may have taken a stand against British withdrawal from the European Union, but he took a bigger stand for greater nationalization of public services, and his staunch socialist stance led to a crushing defeat.  The British public couldn't see how spending so much money and ceding so much private enterprise to London under a Labour government was going to improve life in Britain. But with the relative success of the Scottish National Party in the elections, a growing nationalism may fracture the Anglo-Scottish union that has survived for over three hundred years, with strong devotion to the nation over the British state possibly setting England asunder from Scotland as well as the other way around.  Scottish nationalism is particularly potent, given the country's efforts to regain its independence (though, ironically, the formal 1707 union of England and Scotland was made possible in part by the Scottish House of Stuart succeeding to the English throne a century before that) and find a way to stay in the European Union.  

As for Corbyn's loss, it certainly sends a signal to the Democratic Party in the United States not to nominate someone too liberal to oppose Trump.  American liberals may not heed the warning, however, because Corbyn had problems that Americans can't relate to.  He called for renationalizing passenger rail transport, while Amtrak is already nationalized (and it may even be in better shape than British Rail, if you can believe that!), and he advocated strengthening the single-payer National Health Service, while candidates like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are still trying to simply establish such a thing here. Also, Corbyn was accused of anti-Semitism, something no one in the Democratic Party has to worry about.  Corbyn's program was far more radical than what Warren and Sanders are proposing, but the Brits, being used to some forms of socialism and government services (the BBC, for example) that are anathema to Americans, found Labour proposing socialism too far left for even continental Western Europe, never mind Britain.  In short,Warren and Sanders are not the leftists that Corbyn is.  But they're still too leftist for many American, and as I said before, the purpose of getting rid of Trump is not to replace reactionary conservatism with socialism (Trump isn't even a reactionary, he's not enlightened enough to be called that!) but to replace Trumpism with what came before it and worry about going left later.  If Democrats go for a sweeping agenda to get rid of Trump that's even remotely like the one the Labour came up with to get rid of Johnson, they'll be in big trouble for 2020.

Johnson will now be able to being the Brexit process on January 31, 2020.  It will be a long process; by the time Britain is finally out of the European Union, the U.S. will have gotten out of everything else already.

Brexit Redux Redux

The British are doing their process of withdrawal from the European Union over again.  And again.  And again.  And yet . . . again.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has worked out a deal for British withdrawal from the European Union - "Brexit" - that phases in new tax and trade regulations gradually and offers a deal over goods crossing the U.K.-Irish border that separates British Ulster from the rest of Ireland, which boils down to a streamlined set of rules that avoids unnecessary disruptions.  (If I tried to explain the new Brexit deal in detail, I'd be here too long.)  Instead of pleasing enough Members of Parliament (MPs) to vote for the detail, Johnson angered more MPs than satisfied them, with the Northern Irish Democratic Unionists fearing that the deal would allow for Irish unification under the Republic of Ireland rather than allow Ulster to remain in the United Kingdom, and Scottish MPs increasing their demands for Scotland's independence.  And Labour, which wanted the United Kingdom to remain in the European Union (EU), doesn't like the deal at any rate.  Parliament instead passed a resolution requiring Johnson to ask the EU for yet another delay, beyond the current October 31 deadline.  Johnson has vowed not to ask for another delay, which means the U.K. could crash out of the EU, Johnson could call an election to expand his conservative majority in Parliament and get Brexit passed at a time when the Tories are ahead in the polls, or have an election after a hypothetical crashing-out.  People in Britain are sick of this ongoing soap opera, and I'm tried of following it.

I have to hand it to Brits opposed to Brexit, though . . . they have plenty of power to block Johnson's initiatives.  In America, whenever Trump wants to pull our of anything - Syria being the latest example - Trump pulls out, and despite protests form his opponents, that's the end of it.  Thee's no appeal to a Trump decision.  Not even on protecting the Kurds, as Mitch McConnell is about to find out.     

Boris On the Brink

Boris Johnson - he of the messy blond Beatle haircut - made an effort to get a no-deal Brexit plan through Parliament and got . . . no deal.  The House of Commons wouldn't go along with it.  Then when he tried to call for snap elections to get something resembling legitimacy for his prime ministership, Labour Leader of the Opposition Jeremy Corbyn blocked the effort.  Johnson's efforts were stymied by defections from his own Conservative, or Tory, party, and numerous Tories resigned their Member of Parliament (MP) seats.  Two of them were relatives of famous British prime ministers.  One was the grandson of Winston Churchill, and the other was the brother of . . . Boris Johnson. 

The United Kingdom may still leave the European Union, but Johnson's efforts to subvert Parliament - including an effort to dissolve it - are being met with resistance from a bipartisan group of MPs, the sort of national interest you do not see among Republicans in Congress when Donald Trump tries to buy Greenland or, I don;t know, occupy the Rhineland.  British lawmakers stand up to Johnson when he tries to pull a fast one to take the U.K. out of the European Union.  Here, Trump can force the United States to make pullouts of its own, like withdrawals form the Paris Agreement and the Iran nuclear deal, and that's the end of it.  No one can figure out how to appeal a Trump decision.

Just remember, the British perfected democracy long before we did.

Boris the Primer

That creepy-crawly guy in Britain with the messy Beatle haircut just became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson assumed the top job in the mother county yesterday, and his pugnacious, uncultured approach to politics may be the only British thing that's more difficult to swallow than mutton.  Johnson has long been compared to Trump for his hair and his attitude, and some of his beliefs are in line with the Trumpster as well.  He wants to make the United Kingdom great again, which means withdrawing from the European Union and making his country a force to be reckoned with once agin, even though he's getting off to a shaky start as he's having the same pesky trouble with Khamenei and Rouhani in Iran over harassed British oil tankers that Anthony Eden had with Nasser in Egypt over control of the Suez Canal.  He has to deal with Iran while honoring the nuclear deal brokered primarily by the United States, which has since withdrawn from said deal, but he needs to repair cracks in the 150-year special relationship with the U.S. brought about by differences between Trump and Johnson's predecessor, Theresa May.

And then there's Brexit.  May couldn't get approval for a deal that allows Britain to withdraw from the European Union that maintains Britain's obligation to abide by trade and border-crossing rules set by the EU that Britain cannot change, nor could she secure a deal that allows Britain to get out without having to adhere to EU riles at all - a soft Brexit or a hard Brexit.  Johnson has vowed to get the U.K. out of the EU even of it means no deal at all - something May was skittish about.  He's ready to plunge right ahead (or "straightaway," as the Brits like to say) like a bull in a china shop - he's fired half of the Tory Cabinet - and the next couple of months and years are going to mean anarchy in the U.K. like the Sex Pistols couldn't imagine.

Good luck, Brits, you're going to need it.  Now you'll know what it's like to live in a country run by a lunatic like we Yanks already do.

Anarchy In the U.K. (Again)

Brexit is coming.  An the United Kingdom is completely unprepared for it.

The British Parliament has been trying to find a deal that would allow the U.K. to leave the European Union with some sort of financial or economic ties with that bloc, and every effort to come up with a deal that would spare the British people an abrupt transition to being left on its own has failed. The U.K. is scheduled to leave the European Union this coming Friday (April 12) and Tory Prime Minister Theresa May is scrambling to get a deal working with . . . the Labour opposition. Led by a guy some of called a Marxist.  Yeah, that'll work out fine.

Many of the British people who support Brexit pine for an imperial past, a strain that has persisted  long after the Empire was dismantled.  People saw that strain fifty years ago when the British sent troops to put down a pro-independence faction in one of their remaining colonies . . . the West Indian island of Anguilla.  It was obvious when Margaret Thatcher allied herself so closely to Ronald Reagan and dragged her heels negotiating the fate of Hong Kong with China.  And of course, there was the Falklands War.  Britain is still a global power in terms of its influence and multilateral activity, but it's going to end up being a global pretender, the way things are going with a backward scheme like Brexit.

The only consolation I get from watching the Brexit controversy is that there's at least one national government out in the world as screwed up as the American government.    

May In June

After denying that she would seek an early election in Britain, Prime Minister Theresa May is now doing just that, calling Parliament to stand for a vote in June in an effort to shore up public support for her Conservative (Tory) Party.

May wants a larger majority in the House of Commons for the Tories to strengthen Britain's position going into negotiations with the European Union over British withdrawal from that body.   She doesn't have a solid mandate with the current Tory caucus, and she hopes that she can put Labour aside for awhile, as that party is spectacularly weak despite - or even because of - underfunded social programs and the socialistic Jeremy Corbyn's leadership of the Labour Party.

Right now, the only thing that's stopping May from getting that solid Conservative majority she wants is the party of the Liberal Democrats, a left-of-center group that opposes a hard, clean break from the European Union and demanding a "Brexit" strategy that will produce "a Britain that is open, tolerant and united."  They can do it, too; they forced the formation of a coalition government in 2010 after the Conservatives failed to gain a majority in Parliament, which involved a lot of compromising to get anything done.

As for May, the shock was not that she broke her promise to avoid another election until 2020 but that she broke it so soon.

European politics are about to get even more interesting.