Brexit, the biggest lie ever told.

Remember when you were a kid and told a small lie so that you wouldn't get into trouble, only then you had to tell another, slightly larger lie to cover for the first lie. And so on, and so forth. Eventually the whole stack of lies came tumbling down around you.
Well, Brexit is the world's largest lie, and then they followed it up with a massive stack of lies to try to support it.

And now we are coming to the end of the beginning (Brexit is nowhere near "done", another lie) and the lies are now stacked so high, you can't even see the original lie.

I wish I could say that all the lies will come tumbling down at this point, but brexiters just keep stacking them higher and attacking anyone that points this fact out.

I wish I knew where all this will end, at the conclusion of the transition period it will either be extended or we will hard brexit.

I still maintain that this is Johnson's game plan, pretend he did all that was possible and blame the EU when we hard brexit without any kind of trade deal with the EU.

At that point the UK will be at the mercy of massive fish like China, Russia and the USA. I don't have a great deal of faith that we won't get eaten up and the remains spat out. None of these countries are our friends, unlike the EU members that brexiter's have worked VERY hard to make into our enemies.

There is no magic wand we can wave to make this all go away, there is no happy ending.

Who's afraid of the big bad UKIP/Bexit party Ltd.?

Well, it turns out that the simple answer to that question is, moderate Tories.

But why?

Well, extreme far right Tories said they had to be. After all, evil Nigel was coming to steal their seats!

Except, was he really?

The politics of fear is an approach long perfected in the USA where either Nazis (or the redcoats if we go back even further), the Communists (Reds under the bed!) and more recently terrorists have been set up as the enemy to be rolled out every time what passes for moderates in the US start to gain traction politically.

What does this have to do with right wing Tories?

It's the same thing. They used UKIP and then BXP Ltd. to scare moderates into backing them, but was there ever really a threat to moderate Tory seats?

The UK uses a first past the post electoral system which has ensured that only two parties ever really stand a chance of winning major elections. So even at their most popular, the BXP/UKIP have never really stood a chance.

Look at Nigel Farage's woeful election history, he was once beaten by a guy dressed in a dolphin suit!

If that doesn't tell you something about his "party's" chances of winning seats in parliament, I don't know what does.

But, I hear you say, UKIP have had two MPs!

Both were loaned by the Tories, neither won their seats while part of UKIP and both very quickly scurried back to their actual home once their job was done.

But what about EU elections (you know, the "undemocratic" ones)?

They have always had a MUCH lower turnout than general elections and don't use the FPTP electoral system so it's easier to get elected ("undemocratically") to office by smaller parties.

So, the "threat" of the extremists was never anything more than a right wing ploy to keep moderate Tories in line.

And now our political system is under attack from the very people sworn to uphold it.

Scary times.

A VERY American coup

Recently Donald Trump has said that those who worked on the Mueller report are traitors. This fits in with his portrayal of anyone who is against him as being against America.
In his mind Trump = America. A very dangerous situation.

This is dictator behaviour.

America needs to be extremely careful during the coming elections to ensure that:

A: There is no election fixing. It's something there is a very long history of in the US, usually on the Republican side (tho sometimes the Dems have meddled also, just nothing like as much).

B: That trump doesn't concoct a story-line where he can claim the elections were corrupted by the so-called Deep State (lol, yeah) against him and simply refuses to give up the presidency.

This is not as far fetched as it may seem, he has form when it comes to this kind of thing. Had he not "won" the 2016 election (by getting less votes) due to the electoral college method he was already preparing such a story-line (he had previously attacked the electoral college method, but when it enabled his "win" he suddenly dropped that line).

Even some members of the Republican party have started to speak out against him, and (most shocking) Fox "news" have done so (tho they usually try to refute the criticism later). His reaction to these transgressions has been to attack those responsible.

Trump has always seen anyone who doesn't wholeheartedly agree with him as being his "enemy", when he equates those who don't agree with him as being enemies of America, expect very dark times ahead for the USA.

Hate... hate?

I was recently taken to task for saying that people like myself shouldn't hate extremists as hate itself is bad.
So, if we aren't allowed to hate those who would do us harm, what are we allowed?
Can we disagree with them? Because we have been doing that quite loudly and so far it's not worked.
There are Nazis openly marching in America and in the UK, the right wing of the Conservative party has the government in a death grip they seem unable, or maybe unwilling to break out of.

Meanwhile we have actual hate "preachers" such as Nigel Farage and Katie Hopkins trying to use anything that looks even slightly like terrorism to spread their vile lies.

So, when, if ever is it OK to hate these extremists? When they are marching on the streets with guns and torches? When they are using cars or bombs to maim and kill those they disagree with? When they run  entire countries and use lies to whip up their supporters into a frenzy? When they use mass surveillance to pinpoint those who would speak up or take a stand against them?

Or can we hate them when they use the state apparatus and social media against us and herd us into camps to concentrate us? It hasn't happened in the west yet, but it's not very long since it last did and history has a nasty way of repeating when we forget it's lessons or try to pretend that loving your enemy has any useful effect.

Thus far, all not hating and standing against extremism has done is to give carte blanche to them to go on and build power in the very countries that stood and fought against everything they represent.

The Trumpocalypse

Well, here we are, more than three quarters of a year into the utter shitshow that is #donaldtrump's presidency and what can we say.
He has exceeded in every way possible our worst predictions and done so with a form of manic intensity that horrifies sane onlookers.
Those who thought he might "settle down" once he became president were proven wrong almost immediately and those members of the press that search in vain for any sign of gravitas from him must surely give up any hope.
He will continue to react in the worst knee-jerk manner to anyone who attacks him and he may even turn against the Republican party if they decide not to back him on the Iran nuclear situation.
I have to admit that at this point, I would love to see the bunfight that would break out were that to happen.
And then there's the Korea problem. I't pretty clear that they have read Trump like a book (probably one of those ones for toddlers with the woven pages) and are playing him like a badly made, gold plated fiddle.
I only hope the finale doesn't come with bright flashes, this won't be any 1812 overture.

The price (continued)

I gave up trying to make ends meet in rented accommodation, it just wasn't possible. My total out goings (rent/food) was greater than my total incoming by nearly £200/month. Once all my savings were used up, I gave the landlord a months notice and had to move back with my family.
I can only imagine what would have happened if I had no family I could have done this with :(
I was lucky, many are now homeless as a direct result of UK tory party policies. Many are dead as a result.
Many people are now in working poverty, barely earning enough to live on while working several jobs.
We need to bring down this government (general election ASAP!) for the good of the UK.

The horror of the Trumpocalypse will soon be upon us. Combined with the Brexitshambles (brexit means wrexit) and the advances the far right fascists are making in Europe, Vladimir Putin must be crying with laughter (thats if he even has tear ducts). All his christmas wishes come at once! Next step, recreate the old soviet union and expand it even further.