On the IFS thing

Guido and Sky News are saying that Rosa Klebb has killed off a deal:

Merkel said that if Germany wanted to leave the EU they could do it no problem but the UK cannot leave without leaving Northern Ireland behind in a customs union and in full alignment forever. She said that Ireland is the government’s special problem and Ireland must at least have a veto on NI leaving. Merkel said that the PM should tell Northern Ireland that it must stay in full alignment forever, but that even this would not eliminate customs issues.

‘It was a very useful clarifying moment in all sorts of ways. If this represents a new established position, then it means a deal is essentially impossible not just now but ever. It also made clear that they are willing to torpedo the Good Friday Agreement’

23 days, chaps. It’s coming home.

I have already dealt with this .The interesting coincidence is that the last time we hit this awful position was the mid 60s which is also about the time France and Germany flew past us leaving us the sick man of Europe and the international joke we are again .
I have seen for ages that the Brexit charlatans planned to spend our children`s money covering up their lies and if we top out at 90 % be relived

you may feel that the fact that a bunch of sixth form Communists are just as dangerous makes it ok but it does very little for me .

Newmania – after we leave the EU, will you have to find a new mania?

Steve,

Have I read that correctly, from the Reich Fuhrer?

“If you want any kind of future trade deal with our cosy protection racket, ever, you must first surrender Northern Ireland to us”.

Is that the gist of it?

Because I can’t believe a majority of people in this country are such worthless nonces that they would capitulate to such a threat? And in which case, whatever the increasingly frantic squeals of Newms and all the multitudes of his fellow EU troughers, WTO it surely is?

I have already dealt with this

Problem solved then! Let’s move on.

I remember the days when the Krauts were honest and at least invaded you to annexe territory. Now they are so arrogant they just demand it.

PF – Via a Number 10 source as Ecksy says.

The DUP are being rather magnificent:

“The EU is not interested in a negotiated outcome at this time. Their position is the UK can only leave with a deal if it agrees a binding piece of international law permanently tying either the whole country or a part of it to the EU’s legal order over which it has no control.

“The true purpose of the ‘backstop’ is now in the open for all to see. Those who eagerly supported the backstop as the best of both worlds can now see the error of that assessment. It was neither temporary nor an insurance policy,” she said.

Labour, Lib Dems, they’d give up Northern Ireland just to have a nice word said about them at a dinner party. It’s pretty obvious what the Supreme Soviet in charge of the Labour Party feel about Northern Ireland.

23 days, chaps. It’s coming home.

Only if the remainers continue in disarray (which is one type of a “political accident” that I still see as the only route out). They’ll be very focussed now, so we’ll see.

The general chaos on all sides is encouraging.

We are assured that preparations are in place for a WTO exit. If that is correct then exit will not be disorderly.
As to the pros and cons of a deal, it depends entirely on the content of the deal.
Maybe if we agreed to hand over remainers in chains we might save some money- and they’re insisting on a deal, any deal, so they’ll be happy.

I fear Tory weakness and “rule of law” cockrot. Not the power of the remainiacs. Their “power” is ONLY the shadow of possible Tory weakness. I already outlined how Johnson could win–IF he has the balls.

Mercow’s mouth has made BoJo’s job easier–but her “territorial demands” would certainly have me reaching for the CCA –if not war powers.

BnIc–Yes-if they get a Caretaker Cunt in they will vote NO to a GE on the second vote. And by 2022 every turd over 14 with one foot on UK soil will be voting. Bye bye Brexit and bye bye UK.

Which is why BoJo can’t afford any of this “we must obey the law” shite. Because it will bring on those who don’t give a rat’s arse about laws but only power.

Brexit first then GE–a No Deal Brexit neutralises TBP–who will have what they want. There will need to be a new Party to counter BlueLabour in the future but that is for another day. Get Brexit at all costs and then Boris is placed to win a GE.

Interesting snippet from someone who is apparently (anonymous source) working on Number 10’s strategy. Via James Forsyth at the Speccy: https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/how-number-10-view-the-state-of-the-negotiations/

The negotiations will probably end this week. Varadkar doesn’t want to negotiate. Varadkar was keen on talking before the Benn Act when he thought that the choice would be ‘new deal or no deal’. Since the Benn Act passed he has gone very cold and in the last week the official channels and the backchannels have also gone cold. Varadkar has also gone back on his commitments — he said if we moved on manufactured goods then he would also move but instead he just attacked us publicly. It’s clear he wants to gamble on a second referendum and that he’s encouraging Barnier to stick to the line that the UK cannot leave the EU without leaving Northern Ireland behind.

Those who pushed the Benn Act intended to sabotage a deal and they’ve probably succeeded. So the main effect of it will probably be to help us win an election by uniting the leave vote and then a no deal Brexit. History is full of such ironies and tragedies.

Tactical voting in the North will do it. Nor are there a vast number of EU sucking shite out there–3 to 4 to 5 million hard core remainiac pricks–but their polls are as bogus as their 3 and 4 times exaggerated march numbers and their bullshit petitions.

@Ecks

Not all Labour voters are tribal indeed, but that tends to manifest as either tending to stay at home if they don’t feel enthusiastic about the Labour offer, or as defecting to a more transfer-friendly party (this time round The Brexit Party will be expecting to perform reasonably well in terms of vote-share in such seats, but the polling doesn’t suggest they’ll actually be in a serious competition in more than a handful of them).

The polling picture of strong unwillingness to vote Tory among both Labour Leavers and TBP voters, and the fact that Labour Leavers rate other priorities higher than Brexit, are not good news from the tactical voting perspective. I know you hate polls but that’s also consistent with records from local elections, European elections, and local and parliamentary by-elections – if there is to be the huge swathe of red-to-blue converts that the Tory strategy requires, there’s little sign of them yet, so they’re going to have to get pulled out of a hat at just the right moment. That’s a cross your fingers and hope job at the moment, though I can see the proposed spending splurge is partly targeted at them. I do agree that tactical voting is going to be crucial and the worry is that Labour, Green, Lib Dem and hardcore Tory-leaning Remainers may be more willing to switch to achieve their aim.

My main hope at the moment is that parliamentary Remainers or the EU or both do something really profoundly stupid and ignite the rage of Leave voters. At the moment, Remain voters have more motivation and momentum. The Merkel quote is pretty good. More MPs calling Leave voters uneducated racists would also be handy, but there’s been plenty of that already and it hasn’t proven decisive just yet. A move towards Revoke might prove the tipping point, but that’s a bit of an elephant trap so not sure how many MPs will go down that route – certainly not a majority even of Remainers, but maybe enough to raise some alarms.

A good old row between Labour and the Lib Dems (and maybe the Greens) would be helpful in making them less transfer-friendly. Or internal ructions. The LD parliamentary party has swallowed up a lot of Tories lately and even though it was mostly wets, they’re no longer so distinctly left-of-centre – the Phillip Lee defection triggered some “homophobia” resignations in the LD LGBT wing, but that quietened down pretty fast. Perhaps a more centrist LDs would be less attractive to left-wing potential tactical voters. Maybe Labour will cock up the balance and become too explictly Remain-backing to carry some of their Leave-backing constituencies, or will go the other way and be too equivocal on Brexit to gain LD/Green switchers. A blame game between Swinson and Corbyn about why the government couldn’t be brought down sooner might raise suspicions among Remain voters that one or maybe both parties are more interested in power-play and less in doing whatever it takes to prevent Brexit. Like @PJF, I’m hoping the current lack of coordination is laying down the groundwork for more chaos to come and that may open up some opportunities.

The next election is very likely to be swung by tactical voting between Leavers and Remainers, and our party system is probably years overdue realigning with the main political fault-line. Ecksy’s 100% correct that if the Tories can mobilise Northern Leavers they should take the election, and deservedly so – that would be a serious feat. If both sides struggle to achieve their optimal tactical allocations, though, then I’m pinning my hopes on the Greens, LDs and Labour wasting a lot of each other’s votes in seats the Tories manage to come through the middle.

Would love to know what Farage will do if the Tories explictly back No Deal. Will it be too tempting to have a last bash at destroying the Establishment or will he back off to avoid becoming The Man Who Accidentally Stopped Brexit?

Worth watching:
Nigel Farage meets Rod Liddle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weAruOCjMRc

Worth watching:
Nigel Farage meets Rod Liddle

Yes indeed. Rod Liddle and our Steve both make me laugh with their wordsmithery but I fear Rod is the Brexiteer with the better insight into the forces we’re up against.

They’re all political hack scum, including Boris and Cummings. I still say the only hope for Brexit is that all the bastards’ various combinations of greed and incompetence will lead to a political accident in which they run out of time to stop it this month.

But that’s unlikely. And as Liddle points out, what is likely is that we’ll be disappointed with the results of the subsequent GE.

If that leak to James Forsyth want directly from Cummings it was by someone who he’d briefed on what to say and probably signed off on the final wording, so we can take it that they were sending a message to the EU.

@MBE

In this game of 4 dimensional political chess Cummings also has to consider who gets on the Conservative ticket. No point in having a majority of 30 if 20 of them are going to bottle it when it comes to the crunch.

Only the use of emergency powers can stop their attempted coup. Yes the remainiac scum all hate each other with good reason–but that won’t stop their plan. VONC–install some POS–then vote down a GE on the 2nd vote –and two years of voter importation/extension to finish Brexit and the UK for good.

In the face of that only a fucking imbecile would by peeing their pants about “rule of law”. The only chance of that EVER being retained is to make sure the EU do not gain ascendency via their tame creatures.

We don’t need any war other than the one we are in Mr Galt. Win that and we are set fair to win the ones to come. WE MUST–or there is no future for anyone outside of the globo “elite”.

Remember –they are not EVER going to just leave us alone. They have plans and those plans are ALL bad news for ordinary folk who just want to get on with their lives.

Johnson needs to call out Economically & Militarily weak Merkel

Germany’s ailing economy can’t afford a no-deal Brexit

Berlin is on the brink – and a fresh eurozone crisis is looming; Liam Halligan
The UK was the ‘sick man’ when we ‘joined Europe’ in 1973. Now, with Britain on the cusp of leaving, the European Union’s largest economy is decidedly out of sorts. After failing to recover over the summer, Germany is now almost certainly in recession. The state of the fourth biggest economy on earth always matters — but with Germany dragging down the broader eurozone, its declining health could decisively impact Brexit negotiations too.

Politically, Brussels and Dublin are bullish. They have dismissed Boris Johnson’s proposals, gambling on an extension and perhaps Brexit being cancelled entirely. But such intransigence could yet cause a disorderly no-deal Brexit — which would have a pretty big impact on all major economies on the continent. With the eurozone on the edge of financial meltdown, the EU’s ailing economy needs a no-deal Brexit like a hole in the head.

Germany has long been the beating heart of the eurozone. But that economic pulse has been getting weaker. The German economy shrank between April and June, the second contraction in less than 12 months. Preliminary data for the third quarter, July to September, shows the country’s mighty manufacturing sector rapidly declining.

To make matters worse, Germany’s new services sector orders just fell for the first time in five years. Its neighbours look on in horror, knowing what a German slump might mean for them. They want Angela Merkel to embark on a debt-fuelled spending splurge to stave off a region-wide recession. She resists, insisting that Germany’s ‘culture’ is to avoid running up debt.

Merkel faces the dilemma at the heart of her country’s body politic — and its key role within the single currency. If she is to boost Germany’s economy, spreading growth across the eurozone, the nation’s instinctive economic caution must be overcome. And it’s about more than just Germany. How Merkel responds to recession — allowing a no-deal Brexit to happen or taking steps to prevent it — will impact not only the UK’s EU withdrawal. It could determine whether monetary union survives.

Germany is, to some extent, a victim of its own success. Its formidable export machine consistently generates trade surpluses equal to a massive 8 per cent of GDP — a projected $276 billion (£225 billion) this year, the biggest in the world. Yet heavy export reliance explains this dramatic domestic slowdown. When the global economy turns sour, there’s less demand for German wares.

At the last count, German export orders were dropping at the fastest rate for ten years. Tit-for-tat US-China tariffs mean cars made by German firms in America are more expensive when exported to China, at a time when Chinese car demand is plunging. Two-fifths of VW’s global sales are in China, and a third for Daimler and BMW — with German brands accounting for a quarter of all Chinese car sales. All that, plus the emissions scandal, is hammering German carmakers, whose output nosedived last year, weighing on the wider economy.

China might grab the headlines, but a fifth of German car exports are sold in Britain — the market with the highest profit margins. A no-deal Brexit could halve total exports to the UK, according to Germany’s respected IWH Institute, shattering domestic supply chains and costing 100,000 jobs.

Things became worse when the World Trade Organisation last week ruled that the aero-plane manufacturer Airbus has received illegal subsidies for the past 15 years, paving the way for the US to hit the EU with goods tariffs of up to 25 per cent as soon as next month. Successive shocks to Germany’s car industry add up to a major problem. The combination of a no-deal Brexit, plus heavy US tariffs, could do systemic damage to an industry vital to Germany and the eurozone.

Germany’s recent export success has been built — in part — on a cheap currency. Ahead of the euro’s 1999 launch, weaker currencies such as the Italian lira and Spanish peseta were hyped up, while enduing reunification costs tempered the German mark. So monetary union ‘locked in’ Germany’s competitive advantage, while lumbering less productive countries with an inflexible currency that was far too high.

This initial mispricing explains why the Italian economy has barely grown over the past two decades, with Greece shrinking by 25 per cent. The euro crisis of 2011-12 drove down the single currency against the dollar — extending Germany’s currency advantage to the global marketplace too. As Germany prospered, southern eurozone nations suffered. Then came the ignominy of the Club Med economies being bailed-out by Berlin, which to assuage its own electorate imposed repayment conditions that were inevitably breached — spreading discontent all round. Designed to promote Europe-wide prosperity and unity, monetary union has instead spread nationalism and mutual distrust.

Now, with Germany itself on its economic uppers, and eurozone bond markets distressed, there is massive pressure for policy stimulus. Having done so well out of eurozone membership, at the expense of others, Germany is now expected to show ‘solidarity’ with weaker states.

The European Central Bank cut interest rates again last month and returned to quantitative easing, churning out another €20 billion a month for the foreseeable future. But more ECB funny money could easily backfire, spooking financial markets more than it calms. Driving eurozone rates even further into negative territory (the base rate is now minus 0.5 per cent) also makes life harder for the eurozone’s fragile banking sector. The region’s stock of dodgy (non–performing) loans is three times higher than in the US and four times that of Japan. The likes of Greece and Cyprus remain the worse culprits, but Germany’s banks are not immune. Shares at Deutsche Bank remain over 90 per cent below their pre-crisis peak, as traders question the stability of this European banking lynchpin. Yet, by eating into profits, the ECB’s latest rate cut makes eurozone bank balance sheets even weaker.

Such monetary quackery certainly upsets Germany, where memories of inter-war hyperinflation, and resulting political chaos, run deep. A previously obscure ECB internal accounting system known as ‘Target-2’ — showing massive IOUs being racked up between Germany and weaker eurozone members — often features in the popular press. German tabloid Bild portrays Italian ECB supremo Mario Draghi as a vampire: ‘Count Draghila, sucking our accounts dry.’

Any Berlin-boost, then, will be fiscal — lower taxes and/or higher spending. Germany has pretty low national debt, having run budget surpluses since 2013, so Merkel does have scope to act. She faces, though, a national aversion to borrowing, known as schwarze null, or black zero — a deep-seated cross-party belief in balanced budgets, another reflection of Germany’s tumultuous past. Such caution would limit any German stimulus, to the dismay of the French. Many in Germany now question the black zero logic. ‘In a fragile economic situation, black zero should be put under review,’ says Joachim Lang, director-general of the BDI industry group, a bastion of German conservatism. ‘German fiscal policy must change.’

After all, with negative bond rates, markets are offering to pay, to lend money to German government. A €50 billion growth package has been officially mooted, but only if recession happens. Waiting for the slump before you act risks serious damage to business and consumer sentiment. And €50 billion isn’t much — less than 1.5 per cent of German GDP.

What’s clear is that a fresh eurozone crisis is looming — and it could be a lot more serious than in 2011. Back then it was the economic minnows in trouble — Greece, Portugal, Ireland. This time, much bigger economies could face bank runs and crises of confidence. A eurozone implosion sparked by Italy, for instance, would roil global markets, risking a 2008 re-run.

Italian banks have bought at least €360 billion of domestic government debt, representing over 10 per cent of bank assets. This has created a ‘doom loop’, with the state itself heavily exposed in any banking crisis. Even the eurozone authorities would struggle to fund any Italian rescue-plan — giving Rome kamikaze bargaining power in its ongoing budget rows with Brussels. During the last crisis, too, Draghi could credibly promise to do ‘whatever it takes’, cutting rates and dousing down bond and equity markets with QE cash. Now, government debts, across the board, are much higher. And with rates already negative, and endless QE a given, the ECB’s medicine cupboard is bare.

Unless Germany takes bold fiscal action, boosting growth elsewhere, we can expect populist Euroscepticism to rise in Italy, France and Germany itself. That could cause bond markets finally to crack, the ECB unable to stop the patient from slipping away.

Which brings us to Merkel’s dilemma. Driving forward the ‘European project’ is central to Germany’s modern political identity. But so is staunch fiscal restraint. Both orthodoxies have their roots in the extremes and excesses of 20th century German history. But to adhere to one sacred commitment — a balanced budget — Berlin may have to sacrifice the other: preventing a eurozone implosion by unleashing a debt-fuelled spending boom. On cue, the French are cranking up the pressure. Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire just condemned Germany for a ‘total lack of investment in the eurozone’ — only the latest sign of tension between Merkel and Emmanuel Macron. The French President has previously denounced Germany’s ‘perpetual fetish for budget and trade surpluses… always at the expense of others’.
Amid civil unrest and continued ‘yellow jacket’ agitation (what, you didn’t know?), Paris accuses Berlin of having the money to do more but refusing. ‘We must not wait until the economic situation worsens to make the necessary decisions,’ says Le Maire.

For several years, France has appealed to Germany to invest more to ‘stabilise’ the eurozone — that is, write off inter-eurozone debts and spread cash across the continent, including to France. Now the Elysée is looking its own furious street protesters in the eye and telling them it’s all Germany’s fault. The European Commission on Wednesday added its voice, calling for ‘pre-emptive, rather than reactive’ fiscal policy — which only Germany can deliver. It is against this background that Berlin, and all EU governments, must consider if they want the additional economic fall-out from a no-deal Brexit.

‘The economic sky is not cloudless,’ Merkel remarked when she met Boris Johnson in Berlin over the summer — adding that Brexit is ‘already causing us headaches’, so an ‘orderly withdrawal is preferable in every respect’.

For the German Chancellor, holding the economic future of the continent in her hands, this is the worst possible time for talks with the UK to collapse. Boris Johnson should remember that. Despite the latest brinkmanship, Merkel remains his best ally in securing any last-minute Brexit deal.
(C) The Spectator, 2019