Brexit Comes Closer

By Glenn N. Holliman

Our English writer, Terry Field, is once more in Florida for the winter.  From his warm haven in the sun, he spins a story for Americans of a thinly disguised United Kingdom that is hurdling toward its exit from the European Union in March of 2019. Here are our writer's latest fearful words on this turn in British history. I have inserted some 'translations' to ease our Americans understanding of this essay. 

Mr. Field is not the only person concerned about Brexit.  The December 22, 2019 Washington Post carries an opinion piece by Anne Applebaum echoing the words below.  It is worthy of taking the time to google. What will the new year bring for our many friends in the United Kingdom?  We shall soon see. - GNH

Bexit for Americans by Terrance Field

For Americans looking at Britain across the Atlantic, I suggest they consider their country as follows in order to get a flavor of what is happening in Britain at present.

Let is call that country 'Briterica'. Here is the picture I ask Americans to paint in their minds.

I am an Briterican.  MY country does not have a population of approximately 60 millions, with space all around. (As does the USA.) My country is more like 1.4 billion, crowded into about half the nation.  (If the U.K. had the geographical area of the USA.)

The rest is composed of hills and heather with the odd strange person wearing a colourful unisex plaid skirt, running around in it and asking after the next 'dram' or fried Mars-bar. 

Like Shakespeare often did, our Briterican (Terry Field, left, coins a new word whilst at leisure mulling great thoughts.

My country, Briterica has no natural resources at all, save for some good-quality anthracite coal, that sadly cannot be burned save for the sad outcome of destroying the planet's climate.

MY country is 23 miles away from a gigantic continent (Europe) containing one much more powerful economy and half a dozen more or less similar sized economics, The whole being about six times my country's GDP.

My country, Briterica, is socially divided and there is a cultural and political war that has caused my political system to paralyse and cease to function ( That at least is similar to America).

As a solution to my social and economic problems, of which the principle characteristics are all but no depth of industrial scale from design to output, save for armaments ( a little like Russia) and only one massive income earner, a thing called 'The City', a time-zone finance centre that can disappear like the morning dew if European competitors decide to do the same thing on a serious scale).

Briterica's auto and auto industry is a screwdriver shed operation, putting together major components trucked in from the continent and from Japanese owned factories around the central belt of the globe.

My education system, a little like America's is not globally competitive. It is losing ground to the best of the rest. Similar to America's. However, there is one very big difference between Briterica's educaton system, and Americas. In Briterica, about ten percent of the children are educated in very high quality private schools. the rest are educated via state or nation-funded schools. The ten percent get well over 80 percent of the best and well paid professional roles.

That means less than 20 percent go to the eighty percent who attend 'state' schools.

The people were given a choice. (The 2016 nation-wide referendum to stay or not to stay in the European Union with its rules, regulations and shared tariffs, customs and some laws.)

Do we wish to build a fence down the entire length of the Nississipi (the English Channel) with holes called customs posts, and border guards to stop people crossing between the two halves, as well as walls between the outside super continent and Briterica or not. The alternative was to keep the present trade, human discourse and social arraignments in place.

The people, before they decided to vote, were told by some of the politicians in favour of building the massive customs wall down the Nississipi that, if the people voted for the change, there would be a large green bird with blue spots who would fly over Briterica, and reign down free drugs for all the sick, and offer do-it yourself scalpels to allow all the very ill to correct their illnesses for free, Morphine would be provided, but it would be the type that had NO risk of any kind of addiction. (Terry here is referring to promises made to better fund the National Health Service.)

The people of Briterica believed these politicians, and, dreaming of the scalpels and drugs coming down for the sky, voted to divide the country and build the fence down the Nississipi.

Each side of the fence, by each entry point, there were built gigantic truck-parks, each the size of half the state they were found in.  As the goods passed east and west through these fence holes, customs officers checked everything. 

Thoroughly and slowly. Thus trucks took three weeks to make the crossing. Including salad vegetables.

As all trade was to be run by WTO terms, all goods passing across the Nisssissipi were subject to tariffs, varying between 6% for all industrial and related goods, to 46% for agricultural goods, livestock and the like.

To add flavor for an American, Briterica also started out, before this change, with a living standard 60% that of the average American income, and with real estate prices anything up to three hundred percent the American level.

As this new regime of hard borders, customs posts, high tariffs and dislocated economic failure takes hold, a little schoolboy in Peoria, Illinois stands up, and asks the teacher,

 " Miss, why did British adults do this???  Over the twenty mile stretch of Water, Great Germania, a much bigger country than Briterica, and Imperial Japanica, a massive country in the Mythical East, are closing ALL their factories!!!"

A school boy in Briteria will observe that no drugs (medicines) have fallen from heaven. One scalpel did arrive by GS mail, but Daddy had lost his job in The Baguar factory that closed, and he used it to slit his throat." Can I have free school lunches now? You cancelled them for lack of money??? 

Aaaaaaarrrrrrrrgggggggghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

 I hope you Americans get a flavor of the British reality.

Europe and the U.K.

Europe is Experiencing Two Forces, which the British Press Misdescribe by Terry Field

The economy of continental Europe is recovering, with real and substantial growth happening, and with major areas of innovation showing real sparkle and success.

These are early days, and large areas of Europe are not having such a good time, but that is to be expected, as the shape of the economy changes, some areas decline, some activities remain permanently depressed to the point of collapse as other areas previously poor suddenly become wealthy as the dice of capital spending fall where they must. Thus, in Germany, the appearance of a new right wing force that has nearly 13% of the Bundestag expresses both anti-migrant fervor and dislike of Europe. 

Terry at his home in Florida, looking through his camera into the future?

A quick look at the map shows where this is happening. It is happening in the extreme east of the country bordering on Poland. Poland, and un-indebted country, with still very low wages, has sucked economic life from the German neighbouring regions as it has grown fast and furious for a decade now. The same for Germans near the old German Sudeten Czech border lands.

The British press, generally right wing, and nearly always nationality-obsessed as they always are, suggest that this new 'nationalism' will derail 'Europe', yet the real evidence of what is happening suggest the reverse.

The first thing to observe is that there is no call for national assertiveness from many of these 'marginalized' Germans. It was interesting to listen to a local German station interview Germans who had voted right-wing and who lived near the old Sudeten border. Of all borders in the world, this one sears the mind of those who have a bent for history as being similar in its banner of tragedy to that of the border between India and Pakistan. In the Sudetenland, firstly, the Slav peoples living there were expelled by the German government when it as annexed by Hitler. Then, after the collapse of the Reich, the reverse was done to Germans- and with a bloody and dreadful vengeance.

It therefore came as a surprise that these modern, poor Germans, when interviewed, said gleefully that they would like to swap and become ‘Chech Sudeten Germans’ and leave Germany proper!

Why? Because that part of Czech is doing very well thank you.

In other words, for you nationalists who are obsessed with the nation state, the real message of the political developments in Germany, now with a Chancellor unable to form a proportional representation coalition - is that the problem, not the solution - for these people - is that they are subject to a German national and federal budget. Their distress is NOT making them look to a 'greater' Germany. Many wish to become Czech!

Because they will be prosperous, or so they think. 

Of course, the border with Poland excludes such dreams, history and prejudice being what they are. But these old 'Ossie' Germans are the old, stranded folk as their children moved to Frankfurt, Wuppertal, the rich Rhineland and the southwest to prosper after the wall fell. These poor old folks living on cracked socialist dreams are no argument for the nation state at all.

Even they recognize they are simply the flotsam of history. Self-pity and morbid introspection should be, and is, is the dominant emotion there, not nationalist fervour. Nigel Farage (United Kingdom Independence Party leader) was reported to have been engaged with this political uprising. Some uprising.

All it does is destabilise the Chancellorship for a period. But the solution here is European wide intervention. These marginal areas where misery has descended require the subsidies the immobile old live by. 

Nobody can or should imagine Europe is a failed idea because of this. It would be like saying the sea is not the solution for the life of fish, after a pod of pilot whales, stranded and dead on the beach have been observed.

Labour mobility and open borders are the solution here. Subsidy is needed. All else is irrelevant. National context is a simple irrelevance for these people, but it is a massive problem for Europe.

Plainly the German political structure amplifies division and it was designed to do so. The dominance of the German state in Europe is a problem for Europe, and the political incapacity of Germany points a searchlight at the need to radically reduce the power and political dominance of the nation state in the context of Europe. If that does not happen, Europe will fracture further, and it may disintegrate entirely. Yet that will simply impoverish all the members.

Right, an adult and adolescent owl resting on a tree branch at Terry's domicile in Florida.  Wisdom is present in many cultures.  Photo by Terry, 2017.

 The truth of the failure of the idea of the all-powerful nation state in Europe is the central reality. Many may deny that, may 'rally to the colours' in ignorance and superstition, but their success will be pyrrhic. In Europe, nationalism is self-defeating. Impoverishing. Diminishing of all aspects of high-functioning human life. Polish ultra-nationalism strands poor Germans unfortunate enough to live on its border. I know of no circumstance where nationalism in Europe offers anything worthwhile, good and true.   

Brexit and a Paralyzed Chancellor

Frau Merkel, always treading on eggshells, now has crocodiles hatching under her feet. There is now no appetite at all in Germany for kindness to Britain; rather they are enraged by us. 

British politicians claim the Spanish are 'arguing Britain's corner' (and if that is not grasping at straws I do not know what is), yet they publicly deny it and call the British political class utterly deluded.

Robust European economic growth will take much of the quite small sting the continent will feel at the British leaving with no comprehensive trade deal. It will be ruinous for British trade, however.

The rise of disparate political nationalism in Austria, Germany, Poland, Slovakia. Czech, Hungary, imperil the freedom of movement of the great political regions of Europe - found in France and Germany - and that pushes them harder now to cut Britain out utterly.

Europe as a political entity is more uncertain than ever, flanked by weak, self-destructive nationalist members, and not moving to secure its social fabric as it must. 

In such a context a rabidly nationalistic Britain is more and more hated. And emotions drive policy.

Britain faces social disorder now based on nothing more than its present, known lamentable condition.

It is visibly moving out of the company of advanced humane forward-facing nations. That is palpable to all interested enough to see with clear eyes. 

I repeat what I wrote at the point nationalism tore my country into its present path. I love my country with a passion, but that love is directed at a Britain that was dying fast at the time I was being born.

Now I shudder at its future, and that of my beautiful step-children, and my exquisite step-grand-children.

On November 23, 2017, Terence Field wrote:

Today I read that the British IFS (Institute of Fiscal Studies) identifies suggests the debt profile will not recover to that of 2008 until 2060. 

I had penciled in a thirty-year period, ending about 2038, but they pencil in an additional twelve years.

Why?

Many reasons, related to extremely poor absolute and relative productivity, stubborn failure of the governments of the nation to adjust the pattern of the economy away from a 'rentier' be, and the consequent continuing need for incremental net state borrowing to allow spending 'commitments' to be met.

There is a projection of low growth of about 1.3, 1.4, 1.5 percent per annum. This is insufficient to maintain full employment in normal circumstances, but there are now no normal circumstances, thus more and more 'working' people will be paid insufficient to live, and state income subsidy will be required to increase and increase.

The world outside Britain grows well and strongly. Save for only two other economies in the entire world of economic activity, Britain exhibits persistently falling real incomes.

Poverty desperation and social dislocation is becoming the experience of a larger and larger proportion of the British people.

I could expand to describe an even grimmer picture, but frankly there seems little point. What is written here is quite sufficient.

Productivity, Camels and the Sahara Desert

I note that since the decision of the uninformed mob - in contrast to that of the 'Will of the Nation in Parliament Assembled' to exit the European political and social enterprise, inward economic investment has collapsed to a net negative-  a dis-investment. And that is simply the first reaction. No investment, and negative investment, after a few decades, makes the output resemble that of the Toureg in the Sahel. Productivity is all an economy has. Without productivity, there is no economy. It is core, fundamental, not a matter of trivial relevance.

The Brexit fantasists abused rational people as 'scaremongering' when we described the dreadful long-term consequences of this deluded nationalism. In reality, all we have seen so far is a pale imitation of what is to come. The chilling projections and current economic metrics are without the effect of real Brexit.

The immense productivity gains experienced in the advanced regions of the developed and the rapidly developing world eluded Britain. Britain is an anachronistic island - in every sense and not just the physical - of antique, rentier economy, broken class-ridden politics, society in a state of incipient violent disorder (even predicted by current serving ministers) and almost entirely bereft of the plastic, highly-educated, functionally literate population required to allow for the vital continuity that a changing, broadly creative and fully productive society vitally needs,

Brexit will add to the woes. And not to a trivial extent.

There is utter contempt for the posture and level of competence of the British government in Europe. 

The world is aghast at the political collapse there. The Dutch prime Minister stated that Britain's society, economy, politic was in a state of developing collapse. He was correct. 

We see it happening before our eyes.

There is real deep-seated re-assessment of the condition of Britain in all the chancelleries of the world. And the re-assessment is in one direction only.

What do the Brexit people imagine this will do to the continuing commitment to invest, to engage, to risk with and to apply executive thought in the direction of Britain? The answer to that is simple. They have not got a blind clue.

A Current Malaise

Terry Field of England, France and now also Florida is no stranger to these pages.  He writes with energy and vehemence on occasion.  His views are wide-ranging, penetrating and sometimes upsetting. On this page, he responds to several recent articles, spars briefly with Mr. Lott, a man he greatly respects, and then takes on American journalism. Mr. Field offers a thoughtful summary of what news American journalists should be covering.  He also believes that Brexit is leading the U.K. to an export and domestic debacle. - Glenn N. Holliman

Reflections on a Current Malaise
by Terrance Field

The two articles – one by the United Kingdom Independent Party ex-leader and the other by a distinguished American journalist all refer to a current malaise, namely the relationship between truth, politics and journalism. The American article bemoans the loss of international prestige the Trump ascendancy  brings in its wake, whilst claiming the United States is changed utterly, and its journalism a ruined edifice, never to recover.

Mr Lott, basking in the cold moonlight of the undead – the fate he ascribes to himself as an old white-haired male -  bemoans the distorting mirror of Mr Snow- anchor of Channel 4 BBC News – (for you fortunate enough to have not come across the dreadful creature). The Lott article could have been written by a participant in the French Revolution – the ‘revolution betrayed’ by lilly-livered cowards, scoundrels and nee’r-do-wells. The American complains of the international shame of being an American with King Trump on the gravy trail.

This all seems a touch silly, and more than a little self-indulgent. I voted in the Brexit referendum, as did Mr Lott; as did vast numbers of others. I have no clear idea what I voted for or against, in terms of policy and detailed objectives, as I suspect the rest of the population do not – save of course the UKIPers who were clear what they wanted – but hold on, when I listen to the UKIPers they fight like ferrets in a sack about what needs to be done – so clearly they are in the dark about what it all means, as well.

The excessive gloom and self-indulgent melancholy that pours forth from the American article speaks of a cadre used to the luxurious indulgence of magisterial accurate informative and high-flown journalism that informs, educates, enlightens and entertains. All now lost as the hacks swim in a cess-pit of informational sewage courtesy of ‘The Donald’. 

Far right, Terry shares thoughts with a Pennsylvania USA investment club.

I have spent some time now in my version of Mar-a-largo, enjoying the sybaritic pleasures of the subtropical wonderland that is Sarasota, and in that time I have had cause to watch some of this high-flown journalism now lost forever. Well, I must have been somewhere else – maybe I bought the condo in Bogota, Lima, or Valpawhatsit. The journalism I have observed in the last couple of months – at least on the Telly -has been – how can I put it – BLOODY DREADFUL!

I have heard these heroic penmen write about Trump's hair, his swearing, his crotch-grabbing, his ‘conflict of interest’, his ‘tweets’ his ‘appointments’, his wife’s sales of jewelry as part of her First Lady in Waiting interview.

I go to bed with this drivel ringing in my ears, I wake, have my ‘French Toast’ in care of the local Amish store , (excellent cinnamon bread – yours for 10 dollars a loaf – Sorry – dropping into Trumplife there) put the TV on and – NO CHANGE – the same mindless, unfocused, uncritical, utterly irrelevant trivial drivel, designed to numb the mind.

I watch Fox (News), and a glassy faced super-blond with a crotch the Donald would quiver before he approaches grinds on with MORE irrelevant guff. I turn to CNN and – yes you guessed it – a slightly less perfect but still magnificent GMO-free blond grinds on about the SAME RUBBISH for the next FOUR HOURS. There are clever witty journalists – a super-sharp dark-haired wonder-woman who speaks at the speed of a gattling gun and is ‘information-dense’ – but even she uses satire and cynical asides to avoid the provision of informative, and dearly longed-for information, let alone quiet reflection.

The written journals – you know- the ones who appeal to the ‘elites’ (education plus brains plus wisdom, terrible folk, a danger to the people) like the New Yorker, the Washington Post, the NY Times, of course give good journalism a run for its money, but even they fail in the analysis department, in grappling with what is really happening in the world, and WHY it is all happening. To a man, serious journalists deal with the world through collegiate, generally socially left, ‘inclusive’ ‘liberal’ eyes. Thus for them the total unacceptability of Trump winning precluded any of them actually saying he could or would win.

I hold no candle for Trump, but the core point here is that the electorate – via the electoral colleges – voted for him. He appeared with the laurel wreath because THE PEOPLE AND THE COLLEGES WANTED IT!!!!!

Where is this fine journalism that so fails to understand this????

I have a personal take on all this – more of that later, but – being objective – the left after so abusing the people, the economy, moral values and rational social order for decades are in headlong retreat – on both sides of the ‘pond’.

Post war left liberal hegemony died a while ago – but NO serious journalists have dealt with this head-on. They regret, they deny, they dissemble, they agonize – BUT THEY DO NOT CONFRONT – and that is their over-riding failure.

The real tragedy of this fine American journalism, on the major TV networks, is that intellectual and rigorous analysis is obvious by its absence, and where a little is allowed, its manipulation, its – let’s call it what it really is – its corruption and hollowing out, means the average American citizen has a major problem in comprehending what is actually going on.

A few subjects I hear nothing about in this most powerful of nations – there are many more, but these are here for starters:

- Climate change

- Global resource depletion

- The need to make a world without a repeat of the eternal great power rivalry and consequential violence and slaughter

- The moral dimension to over-consumption

- The awareness of the universality of human life, usually distorted by cheap tribal nationalism

- The spiritual value of humility and deference to others – rather than religion that reinforced selfishness, as it used to be applied to reinforce slavery and gross abuse.

- The destruction of vast numbers of species and the ruination of the existences of animals for human benefit.

The only President I ever heard talk even slightly of these things at all was President Carter – much dismissed by most Americans, and remembered for the hostage crisis and little else. But these sort of things are neither left nor right,  but concerning core human and global matters, the consequences of ignoring them likely to visit hell on earth to our children.

In truth, the modern electoral process is specifically designed to exclude the relevance and significance of the ballot- of what should be the power of universal suffrage.

Power sits in Corporations, national Treasuries, and the quiet clubs where the political power reclines, ever undisturbed.

In reality, the election of anyone now is not a reflection of people’s desires, but a mechanism to manage capital and resource independent of the pesky population.

Why?

We are tribal carnivores. Hairless apes, right at the end of our evolved potential to deal with reality.

Now, on to the lost British State, and Brexit angst,

Pretty obviously, the lunacy of Brexit has reached its dénouement now.

When did the collapse of the dreamland balloon happen?

Yesterday.

How did it happen?

Davies. The arch Euro-loather and Tory anti-EU Hard-Man. In two sentences he collapsed the dreamscape and replaced it with harsh reality. Until now, the May government made tough noises about border control, strongly implying the interpretation of the wishes of the nation as expressed in the vote was for a tough closed door on inward migration, and a massive reduction in net migration. Down to less than 100, 000 per annum.

The stance was to imply a total exit – political and economic – since to do other would imperil the sacred control over migration flows. How has this changed? Mr Davies has stated in the last twenty four hours that:

1 He would expect to pay an access fee to maintain the country in the single market. Why has he done this?  – simple – he is advised by increasingly desperate corporate folk, civil servants, economists and other highly undesirable ‘elite’ types that to do other would cause a crisis of exports not seen since Herr Doenitz blockaded the country on behalf of the Man with the Moustache. (For Americans this means Nazi bombers sent by Hitler in 1940.)

2 He has said that very significant inward migration of low skilled folk would be needed in order to continue to lubricate the wheels of the British economy. Strangely, he anticipates that this supply will come from Europe – Poland, etc, rather than from the far-flung regions of the Globe – Ulan Bator, Hyderabad, Ayers Rock, etc. This may seem a strange expectation to the UKIPers and Mr. Lott, but to the rest of us, used to the Europeans appearing to pick our pumpkins, serve our coffee, educate our children in private crammers, it seems normal, to be expected. Indeed, what we have become accustomed to.

In summary- we plan to leave, pay to stay in the single market, have no say in how the EU changes and develops, and take loads more ‘guest workers’ from precisely the same places in order to enjoy pumpkins and coffee, plus minimally remediated, otherwise completely uneducated offspring.

THEREFORE

Nothing much changes except the Frogs get to pick off the juicy bits of un-passported City of London activity that they always wanted, the Germs get to stuff Frankfurt with the same, and UK property prices decline – as does the economy in general, as the world realizes the whole aborted exercise makes the country look absurd, and a political risk to investment that it was not considered to be prior to the dreamfest.

And the reason for all this?

A section of the population intellectually, educationally, and temperamentally unsuited to decide even if their drains should be unblocked were asked to vote on a matter that they simply could not comprehend. - Terry Field

Comments?

Brexit Fallout

by Glenn N. Holliman

Comments continue to tumble in concerning the issue of the British Exit from the European Union and the tremendous political and economic upheavals that have followed. These are listed as they have arrived. Several have written twice. I offer them to you for 'reflections while reading'. - GNH 29 June 2016


The comments concerning the British Exit vote from the European Union have been many and largely on the fearful side. Here is the latest from some of our readers. I have had to edit comments due to the length of replies and to keep this blog manageable. - GNH

From a Librarian in Virginia USA....

Well said, Terry.  I fear that Britain has played right into Putin's hands.  This is the first of a series of dominoes that will weaken the West.  I have a deep sense of foreboding about this.

From an USA Judge for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania....

Too much history and too many factors to really understand goings on in the western world, but lots of gripes are being expressed--at least, for the present, through the ballot box--for the present.  Maybe the "anointed " haven't listened. 

Yeah, sad. Really.  Wait a day or two and buy some stock.

Right, the blog writer with friend Peter Smith, far right, of Bedfordshire in Swinford, England inspecting the graves of two Mitford sisters - Nancy and Unity who were on opposite sides of the political spectrum in 1939, another time of European crisis.

From a Disgruntled Englishman....

I am British and live on the continent. You are correct. The British hide - or hid - the vicious social, cultural and economic divisions that have existed there for many many years. It is, in reality, a viciously nasty place for the majority of the population to live. It became too much for me and I left.
The contrast with the continent is palpable - despite the economic difficulties here, There is much social 'solidarity', more adult behaviour in politics, and a lack of the vicious racist and xenophobic bitterness that is part of the currency of life in Britain. The damned 'battle of Britain' is lived there every waking day. It is pathetic.
The British diplomats are clever, the media is sophisticated, and maybe this blinded you to the very nasty reality.

I am ashamed of my country; I am reminded of the Germans waving eagerly at the man who spun a myth of dangers and then spun another myth of simple solutions.
This referendum was a hot, sweaty, nasty nationalistic dream-fest.
Reality will be hellish. It is tragic. But terminal for the British state, and the perspective of the world on Britain.
Beware when you next see Trump's bucolic face, and hear his childish mind.


From a Retired Educator outside of London....

Dear Glenn

I’ve not found the time to read everyone’s contributions but as a passionate European I am heartbroken at what has happened.  I do not know of a single educated person here who thought we should leave Europe.  So important a decision should not be put in the hands of the masses.  One newspaper called it “a reckless gamble by David Cameron".  Now it looks as if we will be faced with the break up of the United Kingdom.   The fact that Donald Trump has applauded Brexit surely says it all.  I am ashamed to be English.

Best regards

From our Writer in Australia....

Dear Glenn

As an antipodean (i.e, from afar and knowing little of trade agreements between countries) I still reckon that LEAVE was the way to go, but perhaps not if I had known that Scotland and Northern Ireland had the right to remain in the EU and if they do so would consequently render the UK into an FK (‘Fractured Kingdom’!).

Left, Steph's friends in her garden.

I always thought that the entire UK was voting as one island, as it were. If Scotland breaks off from the majority vote in the UK, then all the control that the LEAVE people wanted will be badly undermined.  And as for the REMAINERS claiming that the LEAVERS were basing their decision upon emotion rather than pragmatism, I suspect that all those countries who have been forced to virtually open their borders, or who have willingly opened their borders, must be financially affected adversely. 

Of course immigrants take jobs - why wouldn't they? And as for the argument that they are prepared to take those jobs that the Brits refuse to do, just tighten up the social security net. Hard decision for Government to make, but I believe that currently it is ridiculously easy for people in Britain to take advantage of huge welfare benefits, especially encouraging them to have more and more children. All this must change, or Britain will go under. 

The same applies to Australia. We must keep control of our borders. We must be allowed to decide how many and who are admitted into this country. And there should be no incentives to breed, as there was with a mad baby bonus a few years ago in Oz, thought up by a very Catholic PM who didn’t even consult with his ‘team’ over it. This little globe is now dangerously stretched to its limit, and I selfishly want my patch to stay clean and green and comfortable for many years yet, so that my great grandchildren won’t be living in a place where dog eats dog. And I’m quite sure, whether you’re Terry F or David L, whether you’re Boris or David C, whether you are Catholic or atheist or moderate Muslim, this is what you want too. It’s the ‘how’ of it that no-one can agree on.

The close outcome leaves Britain divided sharply no matter which way the vote had gone. It’s a bit like the close contest between Trump and Clinton – no matter which one makes it to the Presidency it seems that the crevasse between the two ways of thinking is irrevocably too wide and too deep for any kind of united thinking ever again.

All I can do is to superstitiously cross my fingers and toes and hope like hell that the sky stays up for a while longer.

From a Remain Voter in the English Midlands....

Dear Glenn

We are now over the initial anger, but remain in a state of disbelief that some 52% of our compatriots voted to flush down the toilet, the very idea of a united Europe, taking with them, around the U-bend, our economic future. Not one of our colleagues, friends or family voted to leave, so who in hell are all these small-minded xenophobes?

We remain devastated. Presumably the Bexit people are bricking it, because they have no plan. 

We don't want to belong to an isolated nation, and, were we 47, rather than 67, we would unhesitatingly emigrate. Currently, Scotland looks like an option, because, with 62% of Scots having voted to remain in the EU, there is no reasonable argument for not letting them secede from the vestigial UK and joining the EU. The rest of the former Union would become, we guess, Wengland, or perhaps Engwales.

Right, New Years Eve, 2015 at Stoke-on-Trent six months before the vote!

It’s a nightmare, and we hope that we shall soon wake and realise that it’s not true.

This morning, my bank refused an order for Euros. Happily we have €275 in stock. We shall be in France on Monday, so we must hope that we can get some more there (market traders aren’t keen on credit cards!)

We are adrift, off the coast of continental Europe, in a sinking dinghy, fuel running out rapidly, with no life-vests and no-one sufficiently caring to come out and rescue us - and we, for two, can’t blame them. Don’t blame us, though - we are of the 48% who voted in favour of the EU.

From an Educator in Tennessee USA....

Glenn, this is fascinating…and downright scary, now that Brexit has actually happened.

From our Leave Supporter, David Lott....

Dear Glenn,

                           

Do take a look at this comment upon this observation entitled "Five Days after the Referendum".

  

The instruction from the people to the Government to leave the EU at the referendum last week is already being treated with contempt. I have lost count of the times I've heard a young person complain over the last few days that "You've stolen my future" by voting to leave the EU.

They need only to look at Greece, Italy, Spain and many other areas of the EU to see unemployment at rates of around 40 to 50 per cent amongst the young. Some might argue that this is due to the failed euro currency, but if we'd voted 'Remain' we would also have had to adopt the Euro in the not too distant future. 

Even in countries nearer to ours in matters of economy and facilities, such as France or Germany, it is nearly one in four unable to find work and, by extension, 'a future'. Record levels of immigration mean getting a job, home, children into school, a health appointment, just moving around and so on are much more difficult.

Laws and freedoms dating back centuries, and once taken for granted by every freeborn British person, are vanishing to be replaced by 'diktats' and EU Regulations. And so the question is "What future" had we stayed in the EU?

There is a real effort within the Government, Civil Service – now politicized and all the broadcast media to undermine the will of the people. By ignoring this plebiscite they ignore the message they have been sent. It is a message that far transcends the single issue of leaving the EU. They sneer at populism which displays their arrogance and contempt, they use the same venomous language that some pen to insult us. The Remainers in the debate hectored the people, the Leavers remained positive and calm. The result; a revolution without blood.

I cannot understand these sore losers, can they not see that all we demand is to behave as a normal independent country in our own interests. Can they not see we are sick of PR and spin substituting for performance. It appears they cannot. As a result they are signalling more of the same and that simply will not do.

The vote to leave crossed Party lines and new associations and friendships formed.  I, for instance, attended a meeting addressed by a Labour Councillor and it was superb. I could work with him comfortably and our UK Independence members at the meeting agreed and mixed and worked in harmony with those of different party members of all age groups, social class, town or country, employee or business men and women.

The rumble of change is growing louder, we are sick of unfulfilled promises, failure to deal with reality, our country full to bursting with little forward planning for public services, corruption in politics and corporatism along with wars and lies.

If you will not change then we shall replace you. That is just how big this peaceful revolution will be.  

Right, the blog writer in yellow with David White, a retired RAF Group Captain, admiring the English country side of Buckinghamshire. 

From our Remain Voter, Terry Field....

The leavers asked nonsense about the funding of the healthcare system.They now retract it. The leavers said they could set up better trade deals for Britain.Not with Europe now, not with the USA now, and there are 50 race deals internationally to reconstruct and Britain has almost no expertise here. The leavers incited foreigner loathing, a series of posters that were disgraceful, and now we see Poles and others attacks in the streets and told they will be deported. I have never heard such gross bullying of reasonable alternative arguments.

The EU has major problems, but outside is worse for Britain, and the Germans and French will use the Commission as a blunt instrument to dictate terms. There will be no scenario whereby Britain saunters into the room and tell Europe what is will accept. The reverse will apply.

The lie about closing down migration has already been backtracked by the amoral little chancer Boris Johnson - why? Simple - if the UK insists as such, there will be a default out of not just the EU single market arrangements, but outside the EEA arrangements. That would be ruinous for Britain. its credit rating would collapse, and it would not be able to utter a budget.

My comments are not insults - they are objective reality, as is now being reported hourly. 

The warnings were in fact too light. The currency values and the stock values of debt exposed businesses such as banks has collapsed by up to 41%.

Goldman is warning of a mild immediate recession, but the downgrading of the credit score will hit debt refinancing of the 1.7 trillion debt progressively over the years.

The unpleasant reality is that the UK has exposed to the word its xenophobic exclusiveness.

It has suggested to a world of large powers that they must look on with baited breath as Britain breaks are to wed them in connubial trading bliss. How lunatic a hubris is that?!

The argument put forward earlier that the financial falls are the result of 'speculation' and powers who engineered advanced knowledge is cot true - why? Many hedge funds lost big time on guessing the out-turn, and the gains, by those like George Soros resulted from a simple understanding of reality, economics and market behaviour.

Yes, David correctly identified ironic social failure in Europe, and dreadful democratic deficit there also. BUT the solution is not to do what Mr Soros suggests - pull the edifice down like Samson, but to remain and force change. 

If Europe collapses to a set of small European states, it will be in spite of the powerful work now being undertaken by the US to avoid that. Shattered Europe give Russia massive potentially violent opportunities.

And as for competing with India, China, the USA, it would be game over.

The Germans will be kind to us - after 1870, 1914-18, 1939-45?!?!?!? We threaten, directly, their long range strategy.

Britain will be the subject of vituperative responses once it announces that it is leaving. For all their failures, the EU powers are massive, and they will go for the jugular, to corral the others, and as revenge for the almost continuous political cowardice in Britain, whereby the local political incompetence in Britain is covered by blaming the EU. 

As I type, Wales says it wants independence in a federal structure, Scotland's First Minister reiterates Scotland will not tolerate this exit; and they will leave,

As for new political groupings, it is truly nauseating to see the level of political prostitution taking place as the rats shift their position in order to save their incomes and tinpot status.

At present there are 490 PMs of 650 who favoured remain. They see the abyss clearly. Will they be corralled to vote through the auto-castration?

The entire civil service believes this is a lunatic move to catastrophe. Should they not act accordingly.

The referendum is advisory to government; The Commons and the government should, and may, fully look at this. There is terror at the prospect of invoking Article 50. I share their trepidation.

Who knows.

Some people will do absolutely anything for money and power.

And as for the economy, this decline to poverty will be a slow burn over decades - just as the communist decision in 1945 to nationalise the major industries resulted in progressive recapitalisation and total failure by 179 when Margaret Thatcher said to hell with the state subsidies - and they all went belly up. BUT it took 34 years. This will be the same.

I well understand David's position, respect it, disagree with it, respect and like him. But I am truly revolted by many of the creatures who have agreed to leave, and my country looks to the world to be, in my view, a really rather nasty place.

Farage said it is a triumph for decent people.  This indecent one could not disagree more.

Kind wishes to you both.

From a Remain Business Woman in Glasgow, Scotland....

Deep sadness here, could not believe what I was hearing when we heard result on Friday morning, still in deep shock, unsure what is in front of us.

We were lucky to be home before the pound dropped.  Fingers crossed for future and we hope no more referendums but can't count on that now.

Left, the sturdy stone walls of Scotland south of Glasgow.

From a Pennsylvania Barrister.....

Glenn.    Very interesting.  Note the hatred of the Establishment. I am reading Jeffrey Rosen's new book on Justice Louis Brandeis.  He was a Jeffersonian who hated bigness in the corporate world and in the political world.  The second chapter of the book is called the "Curse of Bigness."  Wouldn't it be wonderful if we all could return to Jeffersonian America or to Victorian England when things were smaller and everyone knew their place.  Oh, well.

From an Alabama Cousin....

The actions of voters in the UK, has inspired an Alabama Representative to Congress, (R) Mike Rodgers, to introduce a bill that, if enacted into law, would remove the United States from the United Nations.The fact that  Trump endorsed Brexit, even though he doesn't have a clue what it really means, should make every Brit nervous and concerned. To this American with English roots, it just seems that the real reason for the exit from the European Union has nothing to do with economics, but sadly, racism, and/or  xenophobia.

till taking stock after the referendum

Again from David Lott reflecting on the Reaction to the Leave Vote....

The Leave vote reverberations continue around the world in the first week following the UK referendum. Whilst I am surprised at the level of horror by the losers, and they are very sore indeed and I can understand this. It is, after all, the globalists first defeat after decades of growing 'successes'.But what they regard as success is not universally supported by any means. The world has become a very unstable and more dangerous place as the West, driven by the US, interferes internally in country after country. I love the US, its people, its variety and energy but their leadership is appalling. 

You were sorely injured with the 9/11 attacks and properly wished to avenge the dead and make the US and the world a safer place but you have signally failed to do so and the dead and deprived swell by millions.

Economic success for the individual has shrivelled and suffered after a disastrous recession as a result of bad judgement by the housing lenders and their enormous backers: the six great banks egged on by politicians.

Democracy itself is a shadow of its former self. There are many people for whom 'democracy' means 'what I want'. Cheating is no longer considered a bad thing, whether in football or Treasury modelling.  

Gordon Fanthom reminds us of Pitt the Even Younger in Blackadder's famous 'Dunny-on-the-Wold' by-election: "I smeared my opponent, bribed the press to be on my side, threatened to torture the electorate if we lost; I fail to see what more a decent politician could have done."

Pitt the Even Younger and his self-regarding mates are still whining after the referendum that 'old people' have 'robbed them of their future'. We should point out on this anniversary of The Somme that their great-grandparents gave their young lives so they could live in a free and (relatively) honest democracy.

In the UK  we have the startling spectacle of a 'petition' to over-rule the referendum, which has been signed by 3.5 million 'people' from more than 100 countries around the world, including Antarctica. As Freddy Vachha points out, it was being signed overnight at the steady rate of 47 names per minute. So who is behind this petition?

Democracy has indeed been badly wounded by those who support globalism. In the US Bernie Sanders appeals to those who have been left behind by the globalists and he has come close in the Democratic primaries. Donald Trump has succeeded in the GOP primaries and pulled in millions of those who formerly did not vote at all. They felt ignored by the elites, as their standard of living was diminished by the importation of cheap labour by the politicians and mighty corporations who finance many election candidates. Brexit, Sanders and Trump followers demonstrate cross party unity against globalisation.

A massive shift is taking place in western politics and it might not be too grandiose to proclaim that Brexit may have saved democracy in the nick of time. I am indeed amazed at the potential of our success to change the West for the better. A small group that included a young Nigel Farage started all this 23 years ago and our aims were limited to the UK leaving the EU. We seem to have started something much much bigger. 

From a Leave Resident of Guildford south of London....

I think there will be ups and downs before we stabilise but the stock market always has its panics, and then revives.  If people just carry on as normal, normalcy will be more likely to prevail.  

Europe has to make changes but I think the politicians may try to use us as an example to the other members to push them to remain compliant.  The immigration laws are just unsustainable.  Britain is tiny compared to the other economically sound nations.  We can't continue to add half a million people each year without suffering serious problems.   

 For most educated people who voted out, it's not a racist issue, but one of practicality.  Immigration is good as long as it's controlled.  If the amount of people allowed to move freely was proportional to the size of the country, that would be an answer.  If the countries all had equally vibrant economies, then there wouldn't be an issue.  But you don't see too many Brits wanting to move to Latvia, Bulgaria or Hungary!  Something has to change!!!

This election has had more ugly emotions expressed than any I've ever known. If the practicalities of migration had been better dealt with, we wouldn't be in this situation.  Liberal people wouldn't be attacked for being 'racist' and those who are racist, wouldn't be feeling free to be vicious and abhorrent.

No one knows what the future will be.  We don't know whether it will be bad for a long time or become good for a long time.  When we get some leadership here, then things will begin to move forward.  That's the next battle.  

I truly don't understand what's happening in the Labour Party.  Crazy timing. Jeremy Corbyn was pro-Remain and much of the Labour movement was too, so I don't get why they're pushing him out.  They claim they need better opposition to the Conservatives, based on how he performed in the Referendum, but that vote wasn't a Party-line vote.  Confused?  Yes!

Comments welcome as financial and political history continues to unfold.....GNH