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The EU is a nightmare. Once the UK leaves and people see they are doing better it’s going to start a procession of other countries out the door. Too many regula

The EU is a nightmare. Once the UK leaves and people see they are doing better it’s going to start a procession of other countries out the door. Too many regulations and red tape like this make doing business in the EU difficult. I am slightly annoyed every time a cookie banner blocks my view on a website. To think some person in Belgium decided that was a good idea and now everyone online has to deal with it is disturbing.

dsfyu404ed 8y ago
Regardless of EU membership the UK is very much not on a track to "do better" when it comes to anything freedom related.
- confounded 8y ago
  Reminder that the European courts are currently restraining the UK from the worst of its surveillance plan, as they’ve found it to be incompatible with the Human Right to Privacy. All signs point to the UK taking an increasingly authoritarian attitude to the net post-Brexit.
malvosenior 8y ago
I totally agree with you, except the UK are the ones with the cookie banners. At least if each country comes up with their own draconian set of internet laws, it will be easier to ignore them all since there will be less "juice" behind each version of the law.
munk-a 8y ago
I don't think that in the best of terms the UK not being part of the EU would be beneficial to the UK - the way Brexit is happening is definitely going to hoop them though. They are taking an antagonistic stance against all their major trading partners and to continue to do business with them they'll end up needing to follow those regulations anyways. I am unaware of major cases of regulatory capture in the EU governance and most regulation proceeding this has been well intentioned - if the cookie banner is annoying then tell your the site to stop tracking you.
- WillPostForFood 8y ago
  GDPR is effectively massive regulatory capture, benefitting Google and hurting small ad networks that haven't been able to effectively comply. https://cliqz.com/en/magazine/study-google-is-the-biggest-beneficiary-of-the-gdpr https://cliqz.com/en/magazine/study-google-is-the-biggest-be...
- Pharmakon 8y ago
  It’s important to realize that Brexit is a bit more complicated than the rhetoric would have you believe. First it began with a combination of simple populism/nationalism/jingoism in the form of UKIP and at the same time a section of the political class in the Tory and Labour parties. For the Tories (at least the ones who became ERG members) it’s pure self-interest. They are filthy rich and like many filthy rich businessmen they think they’d thrive in a more lenient regulatory environment. They can create that environment for themselves if the EU is out of the picture and they keep power. Labour is more Remain, but Corbin and his fellow hardliners want a Brexit because they want the UK to be Socialist/Marxist. They know that’s just not going to happen in the context of the EU. So you had Farrah’s and others playing the usual “Hey struggling masses, all of your problems are those immigrant’s fault” game. Over time the political success of UKIP and internal strife within the Tories led David “The Chinless Pudding” Cameron to promise that he would hold a referendum on the issue of re-elected. At the time he assumed that he would win by the same narrow margin he had previously and once again would enter into a “power-sharing” deal with the Liberal Democrats. He could then blame the LibDems for blocking the referendum, defuse the Tory civil war, and shut Farage up for another election cycle. Then he won, decisively, and the LibDems tanked. So Cameron had no excuse to not have the referendum. He assumed that people who had been openly pro-remain such as Boris Johnson would put aside their personal ambitions and support Remain, but of course that didn’t happen. So what you had was a group of highly motivated people such as Boris who used this as a means to get power, people like Farrage being populist demagogues, and the ERG playing ideologue while just looking to get even richer. Cameron quit and literally walked away humming a little tune, and the Tories went to war with themselves. In the end everyone “died” and out of the ashes rose the silent one, Theresa May, who had switched from staunch pro-Remain to equally staunch Brexiteer mode overnight. The rest is history. In a sense at the highest levels where Brexit isn’t about gaining short-term power and settling grudges, it’s about the long-term goal of being able to capture UK regulatory bodies. “People” like Jacob Rees-Mogg see how the business class can rob the state in the US, and they want a slice of that. The EU would prevent much of it, so they want out of the EU. The details of why individual people (who bothered to vote at all) voted to Leave is a lot less interesting and has less to do with Brexit than the political reality.
btilly 8y ago
When will the UK leave? The latest extension offered to Brexit is until Oct 31. And another extension is likely to be offered then.
- munk-a 8y ago
  I feel like, at this point, a possibly likely option is a continued bump of leave dates until the British population gets sick of the BS and forces a stay decision in like 20 years once the old racists go away - but my money is still on UK doing a no-deal brexit because they can't decide on anything else... that will probably happen during the next european recession when the EU gets sick of wasting bureaucratic effort on supporting the UK being silly... and it looks like we're 9-18 months out from the next global recession.
  - btilly 8y ago
    It is a complete mess. The MPs in office overwhelmingly oppose Brexit. They don't support anything else, but they oppose Brexit as well. But the country is fairly evenly divided. However the Conservative party hung itself out to dry on a promise to deliver Brexit, and the Conservative base very strongly wishes that Brexit had happened already. If it doesn't, it is not impossible that the Conservative party will fall apart. The Conservative leadership's opinion is that their base consist of "swivel-eyed loons", but without that base, the Conservatives don't win elections. Also the Conservatives are in a coalition right now with the DUP, and the DUP is strongly for Brexit. (As I commented to a friend today, if the Conservative base consists of swivel-eyed loons, the DUP base consists of steel-eyed goons.) The country as a whole is fairly evenly divided. Polls suggest that a re-do would come up Remain. But polls suggested the same thing before the referendum as well. Demographics suggest that the country as a whole will support Remain in the future. However large parts of the country are strongly Leave and that won't be changing any time soon. And no, they aren't simply stupid racists. They have some valid concerns, such as the long-term effect of EU regulations (such as GDPR and the new Copyright bill) on economic growth.
    - munk-a 8y ago
adrianratnapala 8y ago
As dsfyu404ed@ points out, the UK no longer has good track-record of due process and fundamental-rights compared to the continent. In 18th and even 19th century, Britain's unwritten constitution and notions of "English liberty" did indeed stand out -- and inspired the American to crystalise the ideas into written constitutions. But 20th century ideologies, and the modern administrative state have "obsoleted" all that. Needless to say Britain coped with the change better than lots of pre-war countries (Germany!). But post-war, Europeans have put in place formal human rights protections that a working imperfectly, but better than the British non-constitution. British citizens have their basic rights protected in large part because the UK now shares these formal rules with Europe.

dsfyu404ed 8y ago

Regardless of EU membership the UK is very much not on a track to "do better" when it comes to anything freedom related.

confounded 8y ago
Reminder that the European courts are currently restraining the UK from the worst of its surveillance plan, as they’ve found it to be incompatible with the Human Right to Privacy. All signs point to the UK taking an increasingly authoritarian attitude to the net post-Brexit.

malvosenior 8y ago

I totally agree with you, except the UK are the ones with the cookie banners. At least if each country comes up with their own draconian set of internet laws, it will be easier to ignore them all since there will be less "juice" behind each version of the law.

munk-a 8y ago

I don't think that in the best of terms the UK not being part of the EU would be beneficial to the UK - the way Brexit is happening is definitely going to hoop them though. They are taking an antagonistic stance against all their major trading partners and to continue to do business with them they'll end up needing to follow those regulations anyways. I am unaware of major cases of regulatory capture in the EU governance and most regulation proceeding this has been well intentioned - if the cookie banner is annoying then tell your the site to stop tracking you.

WillPostForFood 8y ago
GDPR is effectively massive regulatory capture, benefitting Google and hurting small ad networks that haven't been able to effectively comply. https://cliqz.com/en/magazine/study-google-is-the-biggest-beneficiary-of-the-gdpr https://cliqz.com/en/magazine/study-google-is-the-biggest-be...
Pharmakon 8y ago
It’s important to realize that Brexit is a bit more complicated than the rhetoric would have you believe. First it began with a combination of simple populism/nationalism/jingoism in the form of UKIP and at the same time a section of the political class in the Tory and Labour parties. For the Tories (at least the ones who became ERG members) it’s pure self-interest. They are filthy rich and like many filthy rich businessmen they think they’d thrive in a more lenient regulatory environment. They can create that environment for themselves if the EU is out of the picture and they keep power. Labour is more Remain, but Corbin and his fellow hardliners want a Brexit because they want the UK to be Socialist/Marxist. They know that’s just not going to happen in the context of the EU. So you had Farrah’s and others playing the usual “Hey struggling masses, all of your problems are those immigrant’s fault” game. Over time the political success of UKIP and internal strife within the Tories led David “The Chinless Pudding” Cameron to promise that he would hold a referendum on the issue of re-elected. At the time he assumed that he would win by the same narrow margin he had previously and once again would enter into a “power-sharing” deal with the Liberal Democrats. He could then blame the LibDems for blocking the referendum, defuse the Tory civil war, and shut Farage up for another election cycle. Then he won, decisively, and the LibDems tanked. So Cameron had no excuse to not have the referendum. He assumed that people who had been openly pro-remain such as Boris Johnson would put aside their personal ambitions and support Remain, but of course that didn’t happen. So what you had was a group of highly motivated people such as Boris who used this as a means to get power, people like Farrage being populist demagogues, and the ERG playing ideologue while just looking to get even richer. Cameron quit and literally walked away humming a little tune, and the Tories went to war with themselves. In the end everyone “died” and out of the ashes rose the silent one, Theresa May, who had switched from staunch pro-Remain to equally staunch Brexiteer mode overnight. The rest is history. In a sense at the highest levels where Brexit isn’t about gaining short-term power and settling grudges, it’s about the long-term goal of being able to capture UK regulatory bodies. “People” like Jacob Rees-Mogg see how the business class can rob the state in the US, and they want a slice of that. The EU would prevent much of it, so they want out of the EU. The details of why individual people (who bothered to vote at all) voted to Leave is a lot less interesting and has less to do with Brexit than the political reality.

btilly 8y ago

When will the UK leave? The latest extension offered to Brexit is until Oct 31. And another extension is likely to be offered then.

munk-a 8y ago
I feel like, at this point, a possibly likely option is a continued bump of leave dates until the British population gets sick of the BS and forces a stay decision in like 20 years once the old racists go away - but my money is still on UK doing a no-deal brexit because they can't decide on anything else... that will probably happen during the next european recession when the EU gets sick of wasting bureaucratic effort on supporting the UK being silly... and it looks like we're 9-18 months out from the next global recession.
- btilly 8y ago
  It is a complete mess. The MPs in office overwhelmingly oppose Brexit. They don't support anything else, but they oppose Brexit as well. But the country is fairly evenly divided. However the Conservative party hung itself out to dry on a promise to deliver Brexit, and the Conservative base very strongly wishes that Brexit had happened already. If it doesn't, it is not impossible that the Conservative party will fall apart. The Conservative leadership's opinion is that their base consist of "swivel-eyed loons", but without that base, the Conservatives don't win elections. Also the Conservatives are in a coalition right now with the DUP, and the DUP is strongly for Brexit. (As I commented to a friend today, if the Conservative base consists of swivel-eyed loons, the DUP base consists of steel-eyed goons.) The country as a whole is fairly evenly divided. Polls suggest that a re-do would come up Remain. But polls suggested the same thing before the referendum as well. Demographics suggest that the country as a whole will support Remain in the future. However large parts of the country are strongly Leave and that won't be changing any time soon. And no, they aren't simply stupid racists. They have some valid concerns, such as the long-term effect of EU regulations (such as GDPR and the new Copyright bill) on economic growth.
  - munk-a 8y ago

adrianratnapala 8y ago

As dsfyu404ed@ points out, the UK no longer has good track-record of due process and fundamental-rights compared to the continent. In 18th and even 19th century, Britain's unwritten constitution and notions of "English liberty" did indeed stand out -- and inspired the American to crystalise the ideas into written constitutions. But 20th century ideologies, and the modern administrative state have "obsoleted" all that. Needless to say Britain coped with the change better than lots of pre-war countries (Germany!). But post-war, Europeans have put in place formal human rights protections that a working imperfectly, but better than the British non-constitution. British citizens have their basic rights protected in large part because the UK now shares these formal rules with Europe.