UKMT General Elextravaganza 2017: Lord Buckethead would have won

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > UKMT General Elextravaganza 2017: Lord Buckethead would have won

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What is the best flav... you all know what this question is: This poll is closed.
Labour	907	49.92%
Theresa May Team (Conservative)	48	2.64%
Liberal Democrats	31	1.71%
UKIP	13	0.72%
Plaid Cymru	25	1.38%
Green	22	1.21%
Scottish Socialist Party	12	0.66%
Scottish Conservative Party	1	0.06%
Scottish National Party	59	3.25%
Some Kind of Irish Unionist	4	0.22%
Alliance / Irish Nonsectarian	3	0.17%
Some Kind of Irish Nationalist	36	1.98%
Misc. Far Left Trots	35	1.93%
Misc. Far Right Fash	8	0.44%
Monster Raving Loony	49	2.70%
Space Navies Party	39	2.15%
Independent / Single Issue	2	0.11%
Can't Vote	188	10.35%
Won't Vote	8	0.44%
Spoiled Ballot	15	0.83%
Pissflaps	312	17.17%
Total:	1817 votes

[Edit Poll (moderators only)]

Lord Hydronium: Sep 25, 2007; Non, je ne regrette rien

Mister Adequate posted:

What is Northern Ireland?

As an ignorant American who's been lurking this thread trying to understand UK politics, thanks for this.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:09

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# ? May 14, 2024 07:22

kustomkarkommando: Oct 22, 2012

Nissin Cup Nudist posted:

I see. SF coming out of nowhere is still one hell of a thought experiment.

How much longer do The Troubles old guard have left?

Guys who joined up in their 20s in the early 80s are pushing into their 50s so still a decade or so, but there is a younger generation of cunts who've been taken under their wing

They pass the time shooting drug dealers in the knees and extorting money from teenage drug addicts and ordering their parents to bring them to dark alleys to get crippled

Real nice guys

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:10

Ms Adequate: Oct 30, 2011; Baby even when I'm dead and gone
You will always be my only one, my only one
When the night is calling
No matter who I become
You will always be my only one, my only one, my only one
When the night is calling

Angepain posted:

Thanks for this. Maybe someone put this in the OP as it might come up a lot?

Also highly important follow up question, out of curiosity is there a name I can use for Derry and/or Londonderry that will not piss one side off if I use it or should I just resort to faking a coughing fit so nobody can tell which one I used. This is important.

Overlooked this, but most of the time Derry is fine, if someone takes exception you can be assured they're a real old-school hardliner.

Sarah Bellum posted:

El Derry (from L'Derry) or Stroke City (Derry/Londonderry). But just go ahead and call it Derry. All the residents of Derry do so, nationalist and unionist. There are Protestant insititutions based there called things like "The Apprentice Boys of Derry" who commemorate the "siege of Derry". Only scary loyalists from other counties and British newsreaders call it Londonderry.

No complaints from me on Mister Adequate's effort post either, and I'm from the other side. It could maybe use a paragraph about why there is no Stormont Executive at the minute and why there won't be, but I can assure you that SF are sitting back and enjoying all of this, in a way that would put you in mind of Littlefinger's "chaos is a ladder" comment. They have collapsed powersharing and have Arlene Foster, the DUP leader and supposed First Minister, seriously flustered.

To correct a misgiving in the past few pages, though: Their announcement regarding the breach of the Good Friday Agreement is not an implicit threat of a return to violence, IRA on the streets, gun battles on the peacelines etc. It's a simple "this is an international binding treaty and you cannot break the terms of it as we absolutely will challenge it" warning. They've been sitting quietly with that one up their sleeve in the event of Brexit, holding the legal threat of "You can't Brexit us too, it's in the treaty that we have to stay in the EU and be subject to the ECHR" and waiting for the right time use it. Since they can utterly gently caress up May's government, they've pulled it out now. SF are very, very savvy political players and have an end game in mind. Gerry Adams won't be running to the queen to say the SF members will take their seats, not just because they won't (and that's entirely down to the oath to the queen, not the legitimacy of the UK government, but they also can't do that because they've been quashing rivals like Gerry Carroll of the far left People Before Profit in west Belfast from becoming a serious challenge by yelling from the rooftops that he's a Brit and a traitor and a unionist because he said he'd take the oath) because he's not even involved in politics in the north right now. He's a sitting TD in the Irish D�il, where SF have been slowly but very surely increasing their presence and influence over the past 15 years. They are purely political players and very adept at turning chaos to their advantage. Stormont will not reform because it suits their interests to not allow it to reform. Theresa May will not form a government with the DUP because SF will not allow her to form a government with the DUP, by taking her to an international tribunal for breaking the terms of the treaty. They can and will be able to pull the same stunt in two years time if they try to take the north out of the EU. The GFA is their trump card and they will play it as and when it suits them.

I'm honestly not currently well-informed enough on the Stormont situation to say anything beyond "It's buggered", or I would have included more about that.

Also yes if I gave the impression that there's a threat of violence I was very wrong to do so, it's very much a threat of the sort you describe. Violence is a possible result of everything spinning off its axis, not something anyone is eagerly planning (well there are always some I'm sure, but not more than normal).

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:12

kustomkarkommando: Oct 22, 2012

Like the last big wave of IRA hard men joined up post hunger strike in 1981 so if they where like 19-21 at time were talking mid 50s

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:13

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

E: Holy poo poo I just saw Lord Mandelson on Sky News sort of endorsing Corbyn :stare:

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:13

Tsaedje: May 11, 2007; BRAWNY BUTTONS 4 LYFE

TheRat posted:

E: Holy poo poo I just saw Lord Mandelson on Sky News sort of endorsing Corbyn

Campbell pointedly saying he voted for Corbyn and so did Tony Blair was a strange experience

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:16

axeil: Feb 14, 2006

Miftan posted:

What's with all the nice Americans showing up? This is not what we've become accustomed to over the past couple of weeks.

Our politics are depressing and hopeless while in the UK, Hope Lives.

Plus Brexit is going to have a world-wide impact so it's a good idea to be informed about how it's going to go down

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:17

Plasmafountain: Jun 17, 2008

Tsaedje posted:

Campbell pointedly saying he voted for Corbyn and so did Tony Blair was a strange experience

Wait what

didnt blair excoriate corbyn not too long ago

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:18

Firos: Apr 30, 2007; Staying abreast of the latest developments in jam communism

Watching Newsnight, and Prezza is sticking the boot in. This is great.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:18

Wolfsbane: Jul 29, 2009; What time is it, Eccles?

waffle posted:

Proud of you all from here in Southampton. I'm gutted by the Itchen loss (31 votes) but we'll get them next time. I don't wanna "I told you so" with the local party for focusing on Test rather than Itchen, but,

Yeah, I was in test because that was the target seat, so a few of us headed down from safe Tory land. Never mind, it's very firmly safe Labour now, so I'll probably see you in Itchen in 6 months

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:18

jBrereton: May 30, 2013; Grimey Drawer

kustomkarkommando posted:

Guys who joined up in their 20s in the early 80s are pushing into their 50s so still a decade or so, but there is a younger generation of cunts who've been taken under their wing

They pass the time shooting drug dealers in the knees and extorting money from teenage drug addicts and ordering their parents to bring them to dark alleys to get crippled

Real nice guys

Right and just to 100% reiterate for foreign viewers, RAAD + similar do not do this in the "enemy" neighbourhoods because the people involved would go to the police instead of being bound by a code of silence, this is intracommunity violence.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:19

Sarah Bellum: Oct 21, 2008

Mister Adequate posted:

Also yes if I gave the impression that there's a threat of violence I was very wrong to do so, it's very much a threat of the sort you describe. Violence is a possible result of everything spinning off its axis, not something anyone is eagerly planning (well there are always some I'm sure, but not more than normal).

You didn't, not at all, but I think some people took it up that way.

Also, do you remember Paul Berry, the DUP MLA who got a "sports massage" from a rent boy in the Ramada hotel? I once vandalised his wikipedia page to say that his name was Paul 'London' Berry, and it went unnoticed for about a year. It was only caught and removed when some other eedjit also took the notion to vandalise his page with homophobic slurs.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:19

WAR CRIME GIGOLO: Oct 3, 2012; The Hague
tryna get me
for these glutes

How can you blame them? Northern Ireland and Ireland proper? The only other countries that are divided by direction are North Korea and South Korea, (And South Sudan + Sudan Proper) Many of the cases of this are Filled with constant strife. How can you Not expect NI to be a hotbed of youth terrorism? The troubles was like an intifada. East and West Germany didn't work well now did it.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:19

blunt: Jul 7, 2005

The Mail Online, having run out of anything positive to say about the government, has opened it's emergency box:

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:19

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

Zero Gravitas posted:

Wait what

didnt blair excoriate corbyn not too long ago

*In Theresa May voice* Everything has changed! Everything has changed!

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:19

hakimashou: Jul 15, 2002; Upset Trowel

Zero Gravitas posted:

Wait what

didnt blair excoriate corbyn not too long ago

You guys really gotta let go of the hate for Blair.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:19

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

hakimashou posted:

You guys really gotta let go of the hate for Blair.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:20

Manic_Misanthrope: Jul 1, 2010

Zero Gravitas posted:

Wait what

didnt blair excoriate corbyn not too long ago

The best performance in a decade while the Tories toss away a majority has gone a long way to making Corbyn look more paletable to the Blairites. Centrism was never a strict ideology, just a path to power.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:22

Tsaedje: May 11, 2007; BRAWNY BUTTONS 4 LYFE

Zero Gravitas posted:

Wait what

didnt blair excoriate corbyn not too long ago

It's obvious that both of them would vote Labour regardless of who the leader was, but going on national television and dropping a statement that he and Blair voted for Corbyn's manifesto basically unprompted was unexpected.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:22

Kurtofan: Feb 16, 2011; hon hon hon

look what i found

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/labour-mps-should-break-away-from-party-after-election-says-nick-clegg_uk_59373c01e4b0ce1e7408c30d

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:22

Plasmafountain: Jun 17, 2008

hakimashou posted:

You guys really gotta let go of the hate for Blair.

no

seriously though, I thought blair came out not so long ago during a periodic "make me relevant again" shitfit throwing the usual at Corbyn - hes too left wing, itll never loving work, embrace ~~the sweet kiss of death~~ blairism to get anywhere

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:22

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

https://twitter.com/imajsaclaimant/status/873214646995628032

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:23

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

Tsaedje posted:

Campbell pointedly saying he voted for Corbyn and so did Tony Blair was a strange experience

was this one of these old couples where one comes into the polling booth and "helps" the other one to vote that the thread was talking about earlier

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:24

Tsaedje: May 11, 2007; BRAWNY BUTTONS 4 LYFE

Zero Gravitas posted:

no

seriously though, I thought blair came out not so long ago during a periodic "make me relevant again" shitfit throwing the usual at Corbyn - hes too left wing, itll never loving work, embrace ~~the sweet kiss of death~~ blairism to get anywhere

Yeah but they're all meekly admitting they are happy to have been proven wrong, and let's go Corbyn now

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:25

Snipee: Mar 27, 2010

hakimashou posted:

You guys really gotta let go of the hate for Blair.

It's not just that I personally hate Blair and would like to see him along with George W. Bush be tried for causing an entirely unnecessary war with disastrous consequences. I also hate a lot of what he stands for. The latter was still of questionable relevance to the Labour Party up until the election results.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:25

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

https://twitter.com/Freeman_George/status/873306395952721921

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:26

hakimashou: Jul 15, 2002; Upset Trowel

Snipee posted:

It's not just that I personally hate Blair though and would like to see him along with George W. Bush be tried for causing an entirely unnecessary war with disastrous consequences. I also hate a lot of what he stands for. The latter was still of questionable relevance to the Labour Party up until the election results.

Ya but you guys won, even Blair voted for Corbyn, let it go.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:26

Ms Adequate: Oct 30, 2011; Baby even when I'm dead and gone
You will always be my only one, my only one
When the night is calling
No matter who I become
You will always be my only one, my only one, my only one
When the night is calling

Sarah Bellum posted:

You didn't, not at all, but I think some people took it up that way.

Also, do you remember Paul Berry, the DUP MLA who got a "sports massage" from a rent boy in the Ramada hotel? I once vandalised his wikipedia page to say that his name was Paul 'London' Berry, and it went unnoticed for about a year. It was only caught and removed when some other eedjit also took the notion to vandalise his page with homophobic slurs.

Hahaha I love it :allears:

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:26

Rust Martialis: May 8, 2007; At night, Bavovnyatko quietly comes to the occupiers’ bases, depots, airfields, oil refineries and other places full of flammable items and starts playing with fire there

Someone repost the "Do the honourable thing" cartoon.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:27

Plasmafountain: Jun 17, 2008

Tsaedje posted:

Yeah but they're all meekly admitting they are happy to have been proven wrong, and let's go Corbyn now

Yeah hes still going to be first against the wall come the Jam Grandad revolution

PS: Can I interest you in how to Combat Liberalism?

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:27

Snipee: Mar 27, 2010

hakimashou posted:

Ya but you guys won, even Blair voted for Corbyn, let it go.

Yeah. You're right. We could be more gracious winners.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:27

Tortuga: Aug 27, 2011; Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

hakimashou posted:

You guys really gotta let go of the hate for Blair.

Not while he's still knocking around looking for an angle to get back in.

Speaking of which, has he been seen today? He's been conspicuous by his absence in the news but you would think the most successful Labour leader of the last half century would have something to say about these results. I'm sure he'd be out and about if it had been a shitshow for Corbyn.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:28

Vincent Van Goatse: Nov 8, 2006; Enjoy every sandwich.; Smellrose

Miftan posted:

What's with all the nice Americans showing up? This is not what we've become accustomed to over the past couple of weeks.

Lots of us think that Brexit was, in retrospect, a warning about what was going to happen in the presidential election. We're hoping the same thing holds true for this one and the 2018 midterms. The harder the Tories twist themselves into knots, the more hope we have for our own wretched future.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:28

Plasmafountain: Jun 17, 2008

Rust Martialis posted:

Someone repost the "Do the honourable thing" cartoon.

IF it chance your eye offend you,
Pluck it out, lad, and be sound:
�Twill hurt, but here are salves to friend you,
And many a balsam grows on ground.

And if your hand or foot offend you,
Cut it off, lad, and be whole;
But play the man, stand up and end you,
When your sickness is your soul.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:28

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

hakimashou posted:

Ya but you guys won, even Blair voted for Corbyn, let it go.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:28

Tsaedje: May 11, 2007; BRAWNY BUTTONS 4 LYFE

Blair's government did a lot of good, but it came at the price of their souls, and a Labour party with no soul quickly becomes disaffected.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:31

axeil: Feb 14, 2006

Mister Adequate posted:

Alright lads and lasses, seeing as there's a lot of questions about Are Wee Country given the DUP issue, I'm going to put together a small effortpost that can hopefully clear some things up. Bear in mind that I've not actually lived in the province for some time now, and though it's an area of interest, it's not an area I could be called a specialist. You can probably assume that anyone correcting me is more accurate than I am. Also, full disclosure, family of mine was killed in the Shankill Road Bombing of 1993, and I in principle support unification, so various biases may show. Anyway, caveats out of the way, here goes:

What is Northern Ireland?

Northern Ireland occupies six of the thirty two historical counties of Ireland in the north-east of the island, and is one of the four constituent countries that make up the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (the other three being England, Wales, and Scotland). Whilst England has massive power due to population and hosting the actual UK Parliament, and Wales and Scotland have varying levels of devolved powers, Northern Ireland is a special case due to the legacy of the Troubles. NI is also sometimes called Ulster (Which isn't accurate to the historical Ulster and upsets some Nats as a result), or affectionately, Norn Iron, because that's how us eejits pronounce it. Norn Iron has basically no political connotations and is a pretty good informal term as a result.

What were The Troubles?

Most people will be aware that the Troubles were a period of enormous civil discord and conflict, primarily taking place in NI, lasting from the '60s to the late '90s. More specifically, it was a conflict between the 'Unionists' (So named due to their desire to remain in the United Kingdom) and the 'Nationalists' (Who support a united Ireland), with the Unionists getting under-the-table backing from UK state actors and the Nats having mostly to scrounge up support wherever they could, including weapons stolen from the Norwegian Army, AKs donated by Gaddafi, and various things bought in the US and smuggled over.

Anyway, the reasons for the conflict are vast and complicated, but at the simplest level, England embarked on an imperial project in Ireland that lasted almost a millennium, starting with the Norman invasion in the twelfth century. Over the long centuries the north of Ireland proved to be the most intractable to these foreign invaders, and as a result a huge number of settlers (mainly from Scotland) were brought into the region. So anyway Ireland wins independence, after literal centuries of revolts and rebellions, in the early years of the 20th century, but the settlements in the North had been effective enough to create a new identity of Ulster-Scots, and these people were fiercely loyal to the English throne. End result, Northern Ireland stays with the UK while the rest of Ireland goes their own way.

Unfortunately the settlement was not palatable to basically anyone, and tensions rose over the years, with Unionists terrified of an impending annexation by the Republic that would leave them all out of work at best, and Nats treated as second-class citizens, repressed by the Unionist-dominated coppers, and so on. In the late 60s this came to a head with the Battle of the Bogside, which was a fuckoff enormous riot in Derry (Or Londonderry if that's what you prefer). The Troubles were on. The Irish Republican Army (IRA) and Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) on the Nationalist side, and Ulster Defence Association (UDA), Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF), and a shitload of other wee groups and splinter factions on the Unionist side.

Basically we all spend the next thirty years bombing and shooting and baseball batting the shite out of each other, and Northern Ireland became a pretty brutal place, where police stations were armored like you'd expect to see in Iraq in 2006, violence was everyday, and Belfast at least had to be physically divided by huge-rear end walls euphemistically called Peace Lines because otherwise we all went into Permanent Riot Mode and it's like 28 Days Later up in.

So what ended this mess?

An extremely long and grueling political process, the Peace Process, whose cornerstone is commonly called the Good Friday Agreement. It is widely acknowledged to be a messy and imperfect situation, but it did well enough to put the worst of The Troubles in the past, and the few remaining diehards on both sides were mostly left out in the cold. In part this was because the peace process involved basically every group of relevance in the matter, which meant sitting down across the table from known terrorist leaders. Concessions of various sorts were made, one of the most contentious of which was prisoner releases of convicted terrorists and so on; not something many bereaved families want to see, but if it stops more families ending up in the same situation, it's something I'm personally able to live with.

As I say though, it was a good enough agreement to end the great majority of serious violence, despite ongoing issues with things like marches and so on. The thing is that one of the core, central, most indispensable parts of the agreement is the dissolution of a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, which brings us up to the current mess. There are many other ways in which the EU is an important guarantor of peace, but that is by far the main one. Almost everyone ended up in agreement on it, with referendums in both the North and Republic strongly in support of the agreement, and only one major political player opposed - the Democratic Unionist Party.

Wait, what about Sinn Fein? They don't take their seats, but could they, to change the maths?

Okay, Sinn Fein are/were the political wing of Irish Nationalism and were very strongly linked to the IRA, which is one of the main reasons aforesaid compromises were both hard to get and essential. They remain committed to a United Ireland, and they stand for UK General Elections in the North (They're also active in the Republic as a more 'normal' political party but that's not directly germane). They reliably get a handful of seats in Norn Iron, but due to history and objectives, they do not take the seats they win in the British Parliament. To do so would give legitimacy to British rule over Northern Ireland.

The Commons has 650 representatives, meaning on paper a party needs to win 326 seats in order to have a majority, and thereby have an uncomplicated mandate that only has to worry about their own party's MPs. Because SF doesn't take their seats, this number is reduced, usually to 323. This time around SF actually won seven seats, meaning that magic number for this Parliament is 322. As the Tories have 318, they need to find four seats from elsewhere to have the majority needed for getting things done. Everyone else is either too ideologically opposed to the Tories (e.g. the SNP) or has been badly burned by coalitions before (Liberal Democrats), which means the only game in town appears to be the DUP. In this instance, as the DUP have ten seats, a Tory-DUP coalition or alliance or whatever tots up to 328, which is a very narrow majority but enough.

However, there was last night a possible situation where the Tories and DUP would add up to about 323 seats, which would mean, should Sinn Fein actually take their seats, that this coalition would lose its majority. As SF loving detest the Tories with every fibre of their beings it is understandable that people could ask "Hang on... what if...?" but it was never really on the cards. Sinn Fein's party constitution explicitly forbids taking Westminster seats, and our dead, gay forum's general consensus is that whilst there may be some theoretical circumstance where they'd take their seats, we are talking about some kind of insane situation where they are needed in order to stop an existential threat. That all said, being able to kill a Tory-DUP coalition has to be the most tempting look at Westminster Sinn Fein's had in a long long time.

Alright, they're not taking their seats - So what about the DUP?

The Democratic Unionist Party, or DUP, are unique in UK politics in that they are an evangelical force that has considerable power at least in Norn Iron. They're anti-abortion, anti-gay-marriage, and have at least some people high in the party who deny climate change and are Young Earth Creationists. They were founded by the inimical Reverend Ian Paisley, who was, uh, firm in his stances on remaining part of the UK among other things. Now, normally this lot aren't doing anything on the UK stage as a whole, being more concerned with vetoing gay marriage or expansion of abortion rights in Norn Iron. Yesterday's election shattered that however; today the DUP are the only thing propping up Theresa May's government, giving them massive influence and power.

Now, the modern Conservative party has made attempts to be more socially progressive, and indeed they were the party who got gay marriage legislation through the Commons and legalized it in the UK minus Northern Ireland, and they more-or-less consider that stuff to be secondary at best, and a series of lost battles at worst. The DUP probably won't be demanding an abortion ban or anything, but they also can't be counted on to support anything progressive that comes up, because it's going to make Jimmy on the Newtownards Road extremely upset come next election time. Still, these are more-or-less negotiable or avoidable, and you'd be likely able to count on other parties supporting things like that regardless. The real problem is in Brexit.

Wait, Brexit? How does that effect Northern Ireland?

Remember when I said the Good Friday Agreement relied on an open border? Yeah, that's the problem. Regressive as they are in many ways, the DUP are smart enough to know that the border with the Republic is essential. Since the end of the Troubles, NI has seen a lot of new growth and development (place looks nothing like it did when I was wee), and the current economy is hugely reliant on being able to trade over the border with zero paperwork, fees, or anything else. You just hop in your truck in Newry, drive down to Drogheda, and start unloading.

So Brexit is going to put that to bed, because it will create a border between the United Kingdom and the European Union, a land border in the case of the island of Ireland. Absolutely everyone in Norn Iron is bricking it as a result because they know just how catastrophic this will be for the economy, and the DUP wants the softest Brexit they can get as a result. Whatever the border looks like, it needs to be as open to movement and trade as it is today, and every addition to that starts putting people out of work and closing businesses.

Unfortunately for prospects of their coalition, the Tories have taken very much the opposite tack; a Full English Brexit, a Red White and Blue Brexit, a Hard Brexit, "No deal is better than a bad deal", and so on. Characterize it as you please, the end result is the same, the Tories don't give a flying gently caress about NI or the consequences of Brexit, and have traded on promises of sticking it to the EU and being willing to crash out of the negotiations if they can't get the deal they want. Unfortunately, contrary to what they claim, the EU does not need us more than we need them, and given how done Brussels is with our stupid bullshit, they're not going to be very open to us pissing around.

Everything else can be negotiated or just put on the back burner until the next parliament, but because Article 50 has been triggered, and the negotiations are scheduled to start in a mere ten days, Brexit cannot. It is coming down the tracks with absolute inexorability, and no matter what is done, SOMEONE is going to be angry enough to pull their support out of Parliament and scuttle the whole thing. May wasn't actually wrong that going in with like a 50+ seat majority would strengthen her hand, but it was actually about domestic strength more than with the EU negotiators. Now, if she pursues the hard Brexit her party wants, the DUP will tell her to get out tae gently caress. If she pursues one soft enough to satisfy them, her own MPs will tell her to get out tae gently caress. And the thing is that this does not change if she goes. Sometimes you can shore things up with a change of leadership, but whatever poor sod is in charge, with the Commons distributed as it is, faces exactly the same situation and exactly the same problems.

Further Constitutional Complications

In order to secure peace in Norn Iron, the London government had to basically step back from any sort of party political involvement in the Province. The UK at large was supposed to act as a guarantor and mediator, with the authority to bring everyone together and have them sit down and find agreements, but largely staying hands-off otherwise. To explicitly favor one political party or enter into agreement with them is deeply and fundamentally problematic in this regard. This may be why there's no announcement of a formal coalition, to maintain plausible deniability over this matter, but the problem was never going to be in the official name of the thing.

As the North is currently mired in an existing political crisis anyway, with the devolved government in Stormont unable to agree on an Executive and therefore not currently actually sitting, far past the deadline for forming a government, so it's hard to imagine any of this coming at a worse time. That deadline was extended due to the General Election but things are only more complicated right now.

So... Brexit bad?

Brexit bad enough that, if handled badly, we could be in for Troubles 2: Electric Boogaloo, or a NI unification referendum, or God alone knows. I wouldn't expect a marked increase in violence but who can say for sure? And the various groups are much smaller than at their heights, but they're mostly still there, carrying on as criminal gangs more than anything, but no doubt all able to get guns and bombs together for a new campaign if needed.

I just wanted to say that this is an excellent post and really helped out. Shared it with some friends in the States who are curious about what happens now in the UK. Thanks!

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:31

Skinty McEdger: Mar 9, 2008; I have NEVER received the respect I deserve as the leader and founder of The Masterflock, the internet's largest and oldest Christopher Masterpiece fan group in all of history, and I DEMAND that changes. From now on, you will respect Skinty McEdger!

TheRat posted:

https://twitter.com/Freeman_George/status/873306395952721921

Freeman's twitter timeline is fascinating, scathing and honest and clearly unhappy with May's leadership and a potential deal with the DUP. If he was just a backbencher this would be one thing, but he's the director of May's policy unit.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:32

Night10194: Feb 13, 2012; We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

Vincent Van Goatse posted:

Lots of us think that Brexit was, in retrospect, a warning about what was going to happen in the presidential election. We're hoping the same thing holds true for this one and the 2018 midterms. The harder the Tories twist themselves into knots, the more hope we have for our own wretched future.

Also we tend to think of the Brits like neighbors and are happy to see things didn't turn out totally poo poo for you.

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:33

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# ? May 14, 2024 07:22

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

Skinty McEdger posted:

Freeman's twitter timeline is fascinating, scathing and honest and clearly unhappy with May's leadership and a potential deal with the DUP. If he was just a backbencher this would be one thing, but he's the director of May's policy unit.

Yeah this one is fairly brutal:

https://twitter.com/Freeman_George/status/873271446092599297

# ? Jun 10, 2017 00:34

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > UKMT General Elextravaganza 2017: Lord Buckethead would have won

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