What’s the dealio with Boris suspending parliament? Is there anyway the Queen could have said no? It really seems like something Tommy and Philip would have tried to talk her out of.
Also, what’s the end game for Boris? If there are food shortages and people dying from not having insulin, doesn’t that hurt him politically?
I will admit that I hate Piers Morgan and Chris Hitchens so much that I am rooting somewhat for England to be brought to its knees. I know that it’s wrong but what can I do?
schrodingers_cat
United States, India and now Britain is self-immolating. We live in interesting times indeed.
(((CassandraLeo)))
Boris is probably hoping to be able to call elections right after crashing out of the EU, before the full extent of the Brexit clusterfuck becomes apparent; if he does, to my understanding, there wouldn’t be another election for five years unless the government collapsed or there were a vote of no confidence. (Correct me if I’m wrong on one of these!) This may or may not backfire on him; I’m not an expert on British politics by any means, but I’ve heard it suggested he’s less popular than May was when she called the elections a couple years ago, and being less popular than Theresa May is quite an accomplishment. (Again, if someone can confirm one way or the other whether this is accurate with a link to reliable poll data, I’d appreciate it. What’s the British equivalent of FiveThirtyEight?)
Either that, or he’s on Putin’s payroll. Irresponsible not to speculate.
Or it’s both. ¿Porqué no los dos?
One thing that isn’t an explanation is his intelligence. Boris Johnson is a lot of things, but he’s not an idiot. Of course, a lot of intelligent people believe and do some very stupid things, and this may be a case of that. His overall modus operandi has been to pile on the charm when he screws up, but this may be a case that his charm can’t get him out of.
The most sensible explanation I can think of is that someone must’ve wished on a monkey’s paw for one of their enemies to live in interesting times.
ETA: LOL, cross-posted the “interesting times” bit with Schrodinger’s Cat. Go figure.
… also this LGM thread might help
Ceterum censeo factionem Republicanam esse delendam.
JR
Can she make it as long as Charles I did?
J R in WV
OP:
Did you mean to leave Sullivan off that short list? ‘Cause I hate him quite a bit also. Seems like all the Brits who come here for a career and make a big name for themselves are arrogant and condescending gits. Or is it just that those noisy arrogant gits are the only ones we get to know that well?
PJ
Anyone who hates Piers Morgan and Christopher Hitchens is a-ok in my book.
As someone who is not a British citizen, I would be curious to see the ravages of a no-deal Brexit, but as someone with Irish connections, I think that it’s going to lead to suffering on both sides of the border, and I would rather not see that happen.
Ultimately, Brexit only helps people who want to see Europe weaker (i.e., Putin and Farage). If it happens, I think Boris is going to end up in a place a lot less happy than he thinks he will be.
PJ
@J R in WV: Yes, please add Sullivan to that list.
I think that one thing those three have in common, besides being ex-pats who came here to make their fortune, is that they are all short-sighted egotists.
Emerald
If Boris crashes the UK out of Europe, I suspect it will not be the UK after a time. Northern Ireland would have lots of incentive to reunite with Ireland proper. I can’t imagine that Scotland wouldn’t vote for independence. Even Wales will grumble.
Only my ancestral Cornwall would be happy to stick with England.
QQ: What is Boris getting out of this? Or is it just Putin? Asking for a friend.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@(((CassandraLeo))):
I hate to be that guy, but with the Monkey’s Paw, didn’t the wish also rebound on one making it especially?
I guess in this analogy an American/Brit must’ve made that wish ; )
Tony P.
I did not know that the late Christopher Hitchens took a position on Brexit. His unfortunately-not-late brother Peter may be the one you mean.
–TP
Sab
@J R in WV: Sullivan is one of ours now.
Mart
@schrodingers_cat: Brazil, Turkey, Austria, etc., etc.
Emerald
@Mart: Poland, Hungary.
Kent
Seems like Boris is somehow expecting Trump to bail him out of this mess through some sort of magic trade deal. Which seems to me to be the worst all time bet in the history of the world. Especially given there is very little made in the UK that Americans actually want to buy. And the agricultural products they now sell to the UK aren’t somehow magically going to appear on US grocery shelves when Mexico is so much closer and easier as a food supplier.
But WTF do I know, I’m just a casual observer.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Emerald:
It’s interesting question if England would willingly let them leave. Several months ago, I asked here about the possibility of a British civil war if Scotland tried for independence. Many said no, which pre-Brexit I suspect would be the case. But a post-Brexit England in chaos? I’m not so sure. Pretty terrifying
(((CassandraLeo)))
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Right. Possibly from one of the marginalised groups most affected by the negative policies of this administration* and/or Brexit. I haven’t fully thought this through though, so someone able to pay the matter more attention might be able to develop the analogy more thoroughly.
Ceterum censeo factionem Republicanam esse delendam.
Another Scott
In other news, Twitter:
Hmm….
Twitter is a pox. News people should know better (and I blame the Twitterization of news for vastly increasing the pressure to be “first” with “breaking stories” these days).
Cheers,
Scott.
MattF
I don’t believe Queen E has any options here. She could, perhaps, summon the leaders of other parties for a chat, and, perhaps, delay things a bit.
PaulWartenberg
Boris is currently playing a game of chicken with the “Soft Brexit” forces in his own party who have threatened to bolt over his obsession with going through with the No-Deal Brexit. By cutting short the amount of time before government shuts down for “the Queen’s Speech”, he’s trying to prevent a coalition from forming that would cut off his parliamentary powers without forcing a No-Confidence vote that could lead to Labour taking over (nobody seems to want Corbyn as Prime Minister except the hard left).
What’s happening now is the likelihood that a No-Deal Brexit will take place, which is EXACTLY what the Far Right wants (they kept lying about Soft Brexits for a reason) but which will enflame the rest of the nation. After the No-Deal goes through, Boris thinks he can force a new election that would revolve around an “Us vs. Them” campaign that would solidify the Leave voters around him while the Remain votes (divided between Labour factions and Lib Dems) fail to gain a majority.
Never mind the growing likelihood Scotland bolts before October, and never mind the likelihood of work strikes and street protests for the rest of autumn until October 31.
I have a feeling this year on November 5th a lot of people will be burning Borises instead of Guys for Bonfire Night.
feebog
@(((CassandraLeo))):
Objection your Honor, assumes facts not in evidence.
Llelldorin
@Kent: My impression is that Mr. Johnson is an evil man who successfully plays the buffoon to deflect criticism. I think he may have a fundamental misreading of Trump, who I think he seems as similar to himself. The problem is that AFAICT Trump is a buffoon playing an evil man playing the buffoon, so he’s NOT going to cleverly bail out Johnson when the time comes.
PaulWartenberg
@MattF:
Elizabeth did have an option to not go through with the speech, but it would have caused constitutional crises of its own. She should have noticed that Boris was asking for a shutdown far longer – a whole month! – than previous prorogues that last usually a week, and insisted on a short prorogue in order to hamper Boris’ coup attempt. Sigh.
Quinerly
@Another Scott: Trump’s attorney sent a letter to NBC brass.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/donald-trump-sends-legal-demand-comment-msnbcs-lawrence-o-donnell-1235171
Another Scott
@Kent: Nancy has said there’s not going to be any trade deal with the UK if Brexit damages the Good Friday Accord. And of course it would.
If Boris is counting on some trade deal with Donnie to save him, then he’s a very, very stupid man. I don’t think he’s that stupid.
Cheers,
Scott.
AThornton
“What’s the deali with Boris suspending parliament? ”
Boris wants a No Deal Exit and this will almost ensue it.
“Is there anyway the Queen could have said no? ”
According to the people I know who have been active in UK politics for decades: no.
“what’s the end game for Boris? ”
Polling indicates the Tories will capture the UKIP and Brexit Party votes giving the Tories an outright majority if the election is held soon after Brexit and before the consequences become apparent.
“If there are food shortages and people dying from not having insulin, doesn’t that hurt him politically?”
One would think. But if that happens after a snap election in early 2020, say, he can stay in power until 2025 and after that … who knows? Given it is highly likely the UK won’t be the UK in 2025. Scottish independence was 52% Yes/48% No with 60% of 18 – 49 year olds supporting Independence before this happened. The leader of the Scottish Tory Party is expected to resign tomorrow and after she is gone there’s no one with stature to lead the Unionist cause. Should that happen the Tory Party could very easily stay in power for the foreseeable future.
Emerald
@UH Ohhhhh.
Oh dear. If Lawrence turns out to be wrong about this, he is going to be in major trouble. A person could get fired for a mistake like that.
And it helps the shitgibbon. Helps him a lot.
Leto
@PJ: Similar boat as you. I have a lot of English friends and they’re going to be hurt. I can see this driving a stake into the UK heart with Scotland voting for independence and the Ireland’s reuniting. It’s going to be a catastrophic shit show.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@feebog: There’s plenty of evidence. He’s educated at Oxford and Eton, IIRC, and his public image is carefully calculated. He plays the buffoon in public because it’s what he thinks his voters want, probably with some justification. Even his dishevelled appearance is actually deliberate. It’s probably worth watching John Oliver’s piece on Boris Johnson. Oliver loathes Johnson but acknowledges that his intelligence is not one of his weak points. I’d go over this in further depth, but I’m a bit distracted at the moment, and Oliver covers the issue pretty well, as usual.
Ceterum censeo factionem Republicanam esse delendam.
Betty Cracker
If your title lyric is from the Sex Pistol’s “God Save the Queen,” I think it should read “There is no future, and England’s dreaming.”
As always, I wish the suffering from these political calamities (Brexit, Trumpism, etc.) could be confined to the people responsible for them. Sadly, it doesn’t work that way.
hueyplong
@Emerald: So everyone is accountable except Trump. He does that kind of shit a half dozen times a day before breakfast.
RepubAnon
I expect Boris plans to blame the EU for not caving in to his demands, Theresa May for not forcing the EU to surrender unconditionally to Britain’s demands, etc. He’ll then say that Britain needs to privatize its National Health system by selling it to the newly-created Trump Health Care program, consisting of forcing the sick into bankruptcy, then throwing them off the Dover cliffs.
Ironic that people who believed that leaving the EU would mean a better-funded health care system will discover that Boris actually intended to eliminate it completely. Sort of like the Trump voter experience.
trollhattan
@Llelldorin:
Yeah, somebody here, last week I think, posted his quals and not only did he go to prestigious schools, he did well there. It’s an act and the phrase “hook, line and sinker” applies to those who have now put him into power.
“It’s Boris, what can HE do?”
Now, we find out.
hueyplong
And so does the network Trump watches
Mr. Kite
@schrodingers_cat:
And Brazil, literally.
Somebody is working very hard to destroy democracies around the world. Or maybe that’s too conspiratorial way of putting it? I don’t know any more.
Thor Heyerdahl
@Another Scott: Was it that he was actually in trouble for something under investigation, not from Trump. It’s true, but spilled the beans early?
Richard Guhl
@JR:
That worked out well for Charles.
BC in Illinois
I get my UK news filtered through the Scottish National Party.
They are using words like “dictator.” :
They are joining a coalition (200 MPs so far) to create an “alternative parliament.”
Nicola Sturgeon said that
“But supporters of the UK government said that it [suspending Parliament] is not about stopping a no-deal Brexit, actually we’re only losing about four days of Parliament sitting, and Boris Johnson was saying there will be ample time when Parliament returns.”
And
It may not be automatic that an independent Scotland will easily become a full EU member. But they certainly want to stay in the European Economic Community (the old Common Market).
We shall see what happens next week.
Thor Heyerdahl
If there was a person who has a backpfeilgesicht it’s Jacob Rees-Mogg.
All these Etonian, upper class twits of the year with Mummy issues. Trump gave BoJo the seal of approval…so it’s doomed to fail now.
To borrow another German word, I’ll be in the corner having schadenfreude pie if it all blows up in BoJo and the ERG’s faces.
Wakeshift
Did L O’D get out in front of his skis?
Or was he fed something too delicious to pass or hold, but false, in order to preemptively discredit something else (true) about to drop?
Such are the gyrations of thought in our fragmented, ADD-addled, and click-for-profit media hellscape.
Sab
I guess I better stock up on mamelade.
schrodingers_cat
OT: Orange T lurrves the military.
USCIS confirms: As of October 29, children born to U.S. service members outside of the U.S. will no longer be automatically considered citizens.
Their parents will have to apply for citizenship on their behalf
unknown known
I’ve lived in the UK more of my life than anywhere else, so I can help a bit.
Boris is a lot like Trump in the sense of being amoral, egotistical to the nth degree, and gleefully disconnected from reality (as in, lies constantly and flagrantly based on whatever seems impressively dramatic at that moment). He’s got a better line in shmoozy charm, and he’s very good at building exciting-sounding sentences. As noted Iin post #2 above, he’s also not an idiot, although he plays the role of one so far to the hilt that it’s sometimes difficult to tell apart. I don’t think he’s as sadistic as Trump, but landsfar closer to the UK equivalent of a Posh frat boy – he’s lived disconnected from consequences for his entire life, and so his lived experience is that there really aren’t any consequences for bad behaviour, or, at least, none worth worrying about. His first career was as a journalist (eventually fired for making stuff up just a bit TOO outrageously) and cut his teeth being the correspondent from Brussels, writing home with entertianing tales that would take some tiny kernel of truth and spin it up into an outrageously entertaining story about how crazy the EU was. For instance, if I’ve got this right, the EU was once looking at a new HQ building, and some guy wrote to them (unsolicited) suggesting a nice tall building. So Boris wrote the story about how the EU in their arrogance were actively planning to build the tallest HQ ever, anywhere in the world, to show all of the rest of the world who was boss. Har har, those silly hubristic Euros who we beat in two world wars, they never learn, har har.
So what does he want? It’s impossible to know completely for sure, but some people speculate it’s to force an election that tries to pit “the people vs. the politiciians”… that’s possible, but a bit murky. My guess is that in his own mind he wants to be bold and take huge exciting stances and do wild historical stuff while also being a macho tough dude! He will leave the EU not just a little bit, but HARD CORE. AND IT WILL BE TOTALLY FANTASTIC!! In his mind I think the movie plays out that we break free of bondage from Brussels despite all the wimpy people saying “ooh, it will be hard”, and it unfolds like climax of a 1980’s hollywood film, with all observers immediately standing up and cheer wildly for no apparent reason, and then the president of the USA flying in and saying on live telly: “Amazing job Boris. Let’s make the best trade deal EVAR”, and then all of the former colonies suddenlty remember who the biggest badest and most in-charge-of-everything country n the world, and all immediately cheer “let’s get the band back together”, and then there is a certain amount of posing for statues to be chissled, etc. If you look at his time as London mayor, it was a smaller scale version of this – he had a penchant for big super projects that just didn’t really pan out, but hey, who cares, on to the next big thing.
As for the blowback consequences of people dying from insulin, etc… remember, the bit about UK equivalent of a frat boy: Consequences are for the little people who do the unseen cleaning up afterwards. Boooring, who cares. NEXT!
Now the Queen. Could she stop this? Well in theory yes. She’s the commander of the armed forces, parliament sits at her pleasure, no laws are passed until they receive royal assent, etc. In theory she could phone him up tomorrow and say “Boris you jackrod, you have displeased us and are no longer prime minister.” The wrinkle, of course, is that this would make a lot of people pretty upset, and you can bet entire body parts that this would be the last time she would ever get to even think about doing anything on that scale. The rules would get changed pronto to take the power away from her. As someone put it once, being Queen of England (or Canada, etc – same system there) is like having supreme power to do anything you like, on the one condition that you never use it.
So this puts her in a serious pickle. Lots of people know that she has the power to stop this, but lots of people (not necessarily the same ones) would be really angry with her if she did… so it’s really a lose-lose for her… The safe money is that she doesn’t do anything and lets the pols sort themselves out. That’s not 100% certain, but it’s reasonably close.
And why does he want to suspend Parliament for a little while? Basically just to give it less time to stop him from pulling a no-deal Brexit. The Prime Minister within the UK is a lot more powerful than the president within the US, because you don’t get to be prime minister in the first place unless your part also controls parliament*, and there is relatively strong party discipline within parliament**. Also the house of Lords is pretty weak (because it is unelected). So to translate, imagine that the president always has control of the House, and the Senate is heavily nerfed and can’t stop them doing much (though can try to add a few wrinkles here and there). This is the root of a classic poli-Sci 101 essay topic: “Who is more powerful? The president of the USA or the prime minister of Canada?” – the nub of it is “would you rather have loose control of a super power, or strong control of a tiny power.”
* Ok, there are exceptions when no one party controls parliament – and this is one such time, although it is historically very rare, and even so, you still don’t get to be PM unless you can cobble together a coalition that does get you to majority.
** Parliament historically has very strong part discipline in enforcing votes, but that’s starting to break down with Brexit – there have been people flouting party whips in ways that were previously unimaginable. Brexit is INCREDIBLY polarizing and radicalizing here, on both sides.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@schrodingers_cat: Dig at John McCain by stupid Hitler?
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Another Scott:
Or perhaps he thinks the Russian oligarch money in London will prop up Merry Old England?
randy khan
@PaulWartenberg:
Of course, if Scotland bolts, that helps Boris’s chances of winning a majority, so it’s not clear he’d be that upset about it.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@schrodingers_cat:
Wait, wtf!? I thought it didn’t matter where you were born, so long as at least one of your parents was a US citizen, so were you. As in that’s what the Constitution says
R-Jud
I think a no-deal Brexit will inevitably lead to further deep cuts to education and a fire sale of public goods such as the NHS. Especially the NHS, actually.
I have the option to move back to America if that happens. Yay me.
Calouste
@trollhattan: Incorrect. Eton you get in because your parents have money and connections, nothing more.
Johnson didn’t do well at Oxford (which you’re almost guaranteed entrance if you went to Eton). He only got a 2.2, which is the third highest of four possible grades in the British system. And I think at Oxford they suggest to students that they move somewhere else rather than sully the reputation of the university with a third class degree.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@randy khan:
Yes, but wouldn’t that result in a weaker “UK”, while suddenly having to worry about defending against a new northern neighbor? IOW, that shouldn’t be in his interests
Betty Cracker
@unknown known: Thanks — that was helpful.
unknown known
@PaulWartenberg:
The Tories would have mixed feelings about that. On the one hand it would be anathema, to their thinking, because England is supposed to be in charge of everything, and it’s unthinkable that the lesser bits would start getting ideas above their station, and so it is unlikely happen for that very reason – the lessers really do know their place, deep down in their hearts.
On the other hand, Scotland is one of the big power bases for Labour (albeit the SNP have been eating their lunch of late). So Scotland leaving would be a good thing in terms of stitching up permanent Tory control of England.
It’s really depressing getting your brain into the reptilian shape required to simulate their thought-process.
kindness
The UK is finished if England crashes out of the EU. Scotland will pull out and I would imagine that maybe even N. Ireland would consider linking up with the Republic of Ireland (even though too many detest each other there).
It’ll be England and Wales and that’s it. The Queen should have told Boris to stuff it.
schrodingers_cat
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: No that’s an actual USCIS directive.
mrmoshpotato
Fifty-two percent of the voters wanted that as well. Including dumbasses who voted for leaving the EU because “I didn’t think it would pass.”
TenguPhule
@schrodingers_cat:
Don’t forget Brazil.
Litlebritdifrnt
@schrodingers_cat: I just posted about that downstairs. It is an absolute slap in the face to the military. We send you to Germany but your kids are not American. F*ck that, every military member serving abroad should quit right now.
joel hanes
As in so many perplexities, I think that The Iron Law of Institutions* goes far to explain Boris’s actions. He is doing the things that will make him the PM at this time, even though those same actions may seriously damage Great Britain, and eventuate the decline of his own party.
Calouste
@unknown known: Labour in Scotland is on life support. Interesting day tomorrow for the Scottish Parliament: First there is a by-election where the SNP could pick up a seat, getting them within one of a majority, second the leader of the Scottish Tories is expected to resign.
Gin & Tonic
@schrodingers_cat: I tried to read that whole “guidance” since there is a small but non-zero probability that my US-citizen son and his non-citizen wife could end up being assigned out of country, and I know they will be interested in children. Long story short, my head hurt. I’m actually not sure at all what it’s trying to say, and suppose this will present them with yet another opportunity to pay immigration attorneys.
joel hanes
@Litlebritdifrnt:
every military member serving abroad should quit right now.
Um. It’s possible that officers may be able to resign their commissions at will, but that’s not how enlistment works. At all.
Raven
@Litlebritdifrnt: You can’t just “quit”.
TenguPhule
@Mr. Kite:
We live in a time where all the worst conspiracies turn out to be true.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@joel hanes:
@Raven:
TBF, it’s theoretically possible. Just unlikely to the point where it would never happen. If all enlisted members of the military everywhere decided to desert, there’d be very little their superiors could do about it, at least immediately.
But yeah, when you’re enlisted, you just can’t just “quit”
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@TenguPhule:
If that were true, Apollo 11 never actually landed on the moon and the Earth is flat //
Feathers
I keep hoping people will ask the Dem candidates about what they will do for the Good Friday agreement. Will they let Ireland fall back into war or will there be consequences for the U.K.?
What astonishes me is that no one has stepped up to become a real opposition leader. Is this something structural in the U.K.?
The decision to bail out the banks without consequences in 2008-9 looks very bad now. Would it have been worse than the global collapse of democracy we are seeing now?
Litlebritdifrnt
@Raven: I know that, but you can refuse to re-enlist. And I think every serving member of the military abroad should refuse to re-enlist. If they are going to refuse citizenship to their children then why should they put up with it?
Msb
Unknown known’s summary is a good one. A hard Brexit means that Irish unification will one sooner, rather than later and the Scots will be off. In fact they’re so tired of disrespect from London that they may be off, no matter what happens. Johnson may well ensure that he’s the last PM of the UK, and that Q Elizabeth is the last monarch of the UK. She must be furious, poor thing.
gvg
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: I am not sure but I think the weak point is that “what does the constitution mean there” is the problem. Both Congress and the Supreme Court have had to get involved. Congress has passed various laws clarifying things and I think the SC has had to rule on certain parts.
What do you think “natural born” means? Remember at one point our government managed not to think it meant slaves. Some of the Obama is not a citizen foolishness involves the fact that there was a clarifying law, which if it hadn’t existed, the fact that his mother lived overseas for a few years after she was I think 16 might have meant she hadn’t stayed in the US long enough before he was born. Of course the law did exist and the racists were nuts but…the law has been changed from time to time.
McCain was born to a father serving overseas (Panama) and this was also a matter of a clarifying law. It was mentioned and the Congress passed something saying he was natural born, when he was running.
Trump is usually breaking the law with this kind of shit because if there is an actual law about it, he can’t use executive powers to override. I am pretty sure this is the case here.
I would love to see a few servicemen sue immediately because there are military babies being born every minute so it wouldn’t take long and then it could play out in court during the election. I imagine his cronies will talk him out of it as soon as this threatens.
He does keep looking for ways to end birthright citizenship though. Racism,really serious dangerous racism.
opiejeanne
Sorry, off topic and I haven’t traipsed through all of the threads to see if anyone has brought this up yet:
Our government is proposing that US soldiers whose children are born abroad, on a base, do not have automatic citizenship and their parents must apply for it. It’s worse for the children of non-military citizens, even if they’re working for the US abroad. If I understand correctly, they can only enter as immigrants and apply for citizenship as an immigrant.
https://taskandpurpose.com/military-children-born-abroad-citizenship
Gin & Tonic
@Litlebritdifrnt: In fairness, you really need to read that entire directive. IANAL, but it’s not clear to me that the alarmist position prevailing on Twitter is really what this is doing. But, again, IANAL, and I’m sure you need to be one to understand the whole thing.
Raven
@Litlebritdifrnt: I thought you knew it which is why I was surprised you said it.
Emerald
@hueyplong: Oh yes. Everyone is accountable except tRump. Twas ever thus.
mrmoshpotato
@Betty Cracker:
Oh how sweet it would be to still have some of Bill Clinton’s budget surplus.
BC in Illinois
@joel hanes:
@Raven:
Agreed. Enlisted men and women can’t “just quit.”
But this has to hurt enlistment and retention.
Even people who can’t just quit can still consider whether they want to devote a significant part of their life to an institution that yanks them around stupidly and treats them with no respect at all.
There’s enough of that already in the military at its best.
gvg
@Litlebritdifrnt: Most of them signed up for years. Training is expensive, contracts are years. No what they will have to do is send pregnant wives back to the states rather than keeping them on base. Very lonely for both and rightly causing anger. this also applies to service women who happen to be I guess on inactive due to pregnancy. Not exactly sure how that works. The actual direct impact is on a small number, but the insult is outrageous.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@gvg:
Thanks. I hope this shit gets challenged in court and I’m sure it will. I have no idea, if it reaches the SCOTUS level how it will rule. I’d expect it to overturn this rule if only because conservatives like to venerate the military, but you can’t forget about the Trump factor. Plus a lot of conservative fluffing of the Armed Forces has usually just been talk when push comes to shove and the military (specifically the service members) gets shafted like everybody else occasionally
Calouste
Hugh Grant (yes, that one) just called Johnson an “overpromoted rubber bath-toy” on Twitter.
kindness
@Feathers: – Really? Nancy has already said there will be no new treaty if a hard border goes back in force in N. Ireland/Republic of Ireland. And honestly as treaties are negotiated by the Executive branch, Democrats will have zero say till 1/21/21. I think Democrats should say what the prefer but they can’t demand anything right now, Except Nancy. She’s a Goddess.
Raven
@gvg: if the Army wanted you to have a wife they would have issued you one.
Sab
@schrodingers_cat: Does this mean it’s possible some of these kids could be stateless?
unknown known
@Feathers:
No, not really. The UK has mirrored American politics weirdly for decades now. Thatcher and Reagan were in many ways pretty similar, and did similar things to their countries. Blair and Clinton were mirrored 3rd-way lefties who triangulated by stealing the right’s thunder on a bunch of issues. Corbyn is the UK’s Bernie, with a similar lack of general competence, nor ability to publicly simulate competence. The comparison isn’t exact: Corbyn is less grifty and more ideologically pure to the bone, and he has less charisma to those outside his base of enthusiastic young idealists (who don’t recognize his flavour of socialism as the undiluted 1970’s edition that much of the older generation had become somewhat disenchanted with, rightly or wrongly).
The D’s in America have this exciting wave of new lefty leaders emerging now, but the UK hasn’t got its equivalent. The other potential Labour rivals to Corbyn are a somewhat bland set. I’m sure they’d do a competent enough job if put into power, but they aren’t inspiring anyone much. Oh for a British Liz Warren, or even a Buttigieg. Heck, I’d take a Biden in a heartbeat.
Gin & Tonic
Just on the off chance that somebody commenting about the rule might want to read it: https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/policymanual/updates/20190828-ResidenceForCitizenship.pdf
dmsilev
@opiejeanne: Man, Trump really really hates John McCain.
Gin & Tonic
@kindness: A treaty requires 67 Senators to assent.
schrodingers_cat
@Sab: IANAL but I guess that’s possible.
schrodingers_cat
And DHS and DOD got rid of USCIS offices on military bases when Kelly and Mattis were the secretaries for those departments. So applying for citizenship is not going to be that easy for our service men and women.
otmar
@Mart: Scratch Austria off this list for now. We had an interesting political summer.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Gin & Tonic:
Seems to me it says that children of service members stationed outside the US, and subsequently born on foreign soil, must go through the naturalization process. Am I getting anything wrong?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Gin & Tonic: So a child born to a serving member of the military born abroad would need to apply for naturalization and NOT be a natural born citizen. Trump really does hat John McCain.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@schrodingers_cat: They would have to do so when they returned to the states.
Mandalay
@Emerald:
Maybe, but even if Westminster got out of the way (which it won’t) and told the Irish to do whatever they want, the outcome is not predictable. There are plenty of people in Northern Ireland who would want to remain British, and some in the Republic of Ireland would not want a united Ireland.
And apart from the religious and political issues, there is also the thorny problem that Northern Ireland is bit of a money pit.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
Nope.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
And because they’re not natural born US citizens, under this USCIS rule, no child of service members born outside the US could become POTUS. What a slap in the face to the troops.
John McCain’s dead, Trump. There’s literally nothing you can do to him. Punishing the men and women of the Armed Forces won’t change that.
mrmoshpotato
@otmar: A summer of beating back fascism?
Thor Heyerdahl
@otmar: How long for the caretaker government until the election? Or do the far right parties still have to return from Ibiza?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Or, VP; since they are being naturalized, they wouldn’t be “natural born citizens”.
Gin & Tonic
@?BillinGlendaleCA: The way I read it, and compare it with INA 320, if the child were born abroad to a citizen parent and at some point before turning 18, the child and parent returned to the US for residence, then the citizenship remains “automatic.” I think this rule is for the cases of US citizen parents with children who reside abroad more or less permanently – which is very seldom the case with military or other government employees.
But as I said above, IANAL.
Quinerly
Has anyone posted this?
“Children born to U.S. service members and government employees overseas will no longer be automatically considered citizens of the United States, according to policy alertissued by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday.
Previously, children born to U.S. citizen parents were considered to be “residing in the United States,” and therefore would be automatically given citizenship under Immigration and Nationality Act 320. Now, children born to U.S. service members and government employees, such as those born in U.S. military hospitals or diplomatic facilities, will not be considered as residing in the U.S., changing the way that they potentially receive citizenship.”
laura
The Ham Head and his pocket Goebbels reach new lows every damn day.
Is it possible that these foreign born American children could be stateless if the countries of their birth consider the military bases US soil?
All this winning is damaging my heart.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Gin & Tonic: That’s not the way I read the last section on the military and government employees residing abroad. The children would have until they were 18 to be naturalized.
Quinerly
@Quinerly: link
https://taskandpurpose.com/military-children-born-abroad-citizenship
Mike Adamson
Convention tells us that the Queen wouldn’t decline the request. It’s possible that in particularly dire circumstances she might entertain the notion but this obviously doesn’t qualify. In Canada, PM Harper successfully prorogued Parliament to avoid losing a confidence vote so the bar is set pretty high.
Sab
@Quinerly: schrodinger’s cat started a discussion of this at comment #40
Quinerly
Gillibrand out.
Leto
So because Avalune and I are going fucking nuclear ballistic over this (we have friends overseas atm and I don’t know the status of their kids) here’s the article:
Task & Purpose https://apple.news/AvEQMCdpzM76s7me9FTDE0w
Quinerly
@Sab: late to thread. Started at bottom. Sorry for the offense. ?
Quinerly
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: this is NOT good for John McCain. ?
Mart
@Gin & Tonic: @otmar: I know, much better, but until the hidden video Österreich was pretty far off the rails.
Also too, I read the directive and for sure beginning Oct. 29th government employees and armed forces personnel having babies while based overseas will have to apply for their children’s IS citizenship prior to their 18th birthday. Their reasoning, old rules were confusing. Wonder how they get the kids home without papers. Maybe they can join the DACA youth and protest for the Dream Act.
HRA
@Quinerly:
I just came here to post it. I have a granddaughter born in Germany while her father was with the Patriot unit there. Yes, it was 30 years ago and she automatically became a US citizen.
I struggle to explain how I fight each day to not get myself depressed over this totally idiotic administration.
jonas
@Mr. Kite:
I don’t think they need any help. The Greeks knew long ago that the fatal weakness of all democracies is their tendency to throw themselves at the feet of a demagogue or tyrant when things got difficult or complicated. It’s why the Founders gave us a constitutional republic instead, but, as Ben Franklin supposedly put it, only “if we can keep it.”
Shalimar
@Another Scott: David Cay Johnston said on O’Donnell’s show last night that it was obvious oligarchs backed Trump’s loans but he would be surprised if they actually co-signed on them. It looks like further investigation may have proven that correct.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Quinerly: Yup, just got a news alert about that.
Sab
@Quinerly: No offense, and you said that you were late to the thread. Just letting you know there was discussion above that might interest you.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Quinerly:
If Trump had a time machine, no it would not be : )
Saw this tweet from I assume an NBC reporter:
ETA:
Julia E. Ainsley
@JuliaEAinsley
·
1h
Further reading says children *residing* abroad with their US citizen parents, not born. This is a very dense document. Can be found here. https://
MisterForkbeard
@Emerald: I think McDonnell’s explanation tonight is basically going to be: “I reported something from a source that I can’t verify. Even if I trusted the source and stated that the item was unverified, I should have waited until we had additional confirmation.”
Basically a CYA statement. It goes without saying that Fox (and Trump) do much worse every day in terms of public statements.
otmar
@Thor Heyerdahl: well, the election is in about a month from now. There won’t be a majority for a single party, thus a coalition government will have to be formed.
That may take some time, and the outcome is quite open. Until that is in place, the caretaker gov stays in power.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
D’oh! In my defense, everybody tends to forget about the VP, except when picking one for a campaign ticket
RAVEN
@HRA: A Patriot missile unit?
AThornton
@Quinerly:
That was in the cards. She pissed off too many of the money people when she stuck the shiv in Franken’s back.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: After a second read, it looks like spouses of service members are classified as long term residents under section 316, however it looks like it changes service members from section 320 to 322. IANAL.
Tony Jay
Johnson is doing this because he’s staked his Premiership on promising his supporters he can make the impossible come true, and he can’t do that anymore than he can visit an African village without chuntering distractedly about “Gracille spearchuckers stalking their leonine prey across the primordial savannah”. He can’t force the EU to renegotiate May’s withdrawal deal as promised, but his supporters are convinced that, a) The mere threat of leaving without a negotiated deal will force the EU’s pince-nez wearing bureaucrats to buckle at a minute to midnight and offer the UK anything and everything it wants to stay, thus proving Remainers to be liars (win), and b) No Deal = Unrestricted free trade operating on WTO rules without all of the EU’s strangulating restrictions, which will be just like the 1980s when Maggie unleashed the buccaneering spirit of British entrepreneurship and put those smelly Lefties in their bloody place. So he has to be seen to be making all the right moves, even if, in their hearts, his more rational advisers know it’s Grade A bubble-dwelling lunacy.
OTOH, the threat of a No Deal Brexit can be used to force the not-bonkers wing of his own Party to support the Labour Party in a No Confidence Vote, which would be the doomsday scenario for those Tory ‘moderates’ and which he’d almost certainly lose. Result? An interim Government, a request for an extension that the EU would grant and a General Election. Fucking Gold! He’d get to avoid actually tipping the UK off the cliff while still being able to campaign in the Election as the guy who simultaneously was going to deliver a No Deal/win concessions by threatening a No Deal. There’s no downside as far as he’s concerned. He either loses the Election and gets to throw bricks at Corbyn as he tries to clean up the Tories’ mess, or he gets 5 years to faff out some kind of solution he can benefit from and will still be Prime Minister!
Oh, and no, the Queen couldn’t tell him no without sparking the biggest constitutional crisis since her Uncle went all Nazi-curious.
Omnes Omnibus
https://twitter.com/HackedOffHugh/status/1166740030947287040?s=20
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@RAVEN:
Slightly OT, but I know you’ve mentioned you served in Vietnam. Did you ever watch Magnum PI? It was a pretty silly show much of the time but had the title character as a Vietnam vet. The pilot episode actually made a big deal of this, showing literal flashbacks. If you did, what did you think of the show’s handling/portrayal of Vietnam vets?
West of the Cascades
Here’s a USCIS explainer for today’s action — https://www.uscis.gov/news/fact-sheets/uscis-policy-manual-update — this policy change still sucks balls, but it is more limited than it seems on the surface — targeted mainly against children of non-US citizen parents or citizens who were not residents of the US before the child’s birth. But note that it does NOT affect children born outside the US whose parents were both US citizens and at least one of whom was a US resident before the child’s birth — they still get “citizenship at birth” under INA Section 301:
How Children Acquire Citizenship
U.S. laws allow children to acquire U.S. citizenship other than through birth in the United States. Children who were born outside of the United States to a U.S. citizen parent or parents may acquire U.S. citizenship at birth under INA 301 or 309. Children may also acquire citizenship after birth, but before the age of 18, through their U.S. citizen parent(s) under INA 320.
Policy Update Regarding Children of U.S. Government Employees or Service Members Employed or Stationed Abroad Who Were Born Outside the United States
Who This Policy Update Affects
This policy may affect children residing outside the United States who were born outside the United States to:
Non-U.S. citizen parents and adopted by a U.S. citizen U.S. government employee or U.S. service member after their birth;
Non-U.S. citizen parents, such as a lawful permanent resident U.S. government employee or U.S. service member who naturalized only after the child’s birth; or
Two U.S. citizen government employee or U.S. service member parents who do not meet the residence or physical presence requirements to transmit citizenship to their child at birth (or one non-U.S. citizen parent and one U.S. citizen parent who does not meet these requirements).
For more information on this policy update contact [email protected]. For case-specific inquiries, call the USCIS Contact Center.
Who This Policy Update Does Not Affect
This policy does not affect children born outside the United States who were citizens at birth or who have already acquired citizenship, including children who:
Were born to two U.S. citizen parents, at least one of whom has had a residence in the United States or one of its outlying possessions before the child’s birth;
Were born to married parents, one of whom is a U.S. citizen and one a foreign national, if the U.S. citizen parent was physically present in the U.S. or one of its outlying possessions for at least five years, at least two of which were after they turned 14 years old;
Were born to unmarried parents, one of whom is a U.S. citizen and one a foreign national, if the U.S. citizen parent meets the requirements listed in INA 309;
Are otherwise eligible to receive a Consular Report of Birth Abroad (CRBA) or a Certificate of Citizenship documenting U.S. citizenship acquired at birth; or
Are residing in the United States in the legal and physical custody of their U.S. citizen parent after being lawfully admitted to the U.S. for permanent residence.
Mandalay
@Quinerly:
Good news, and while I think she is a fraud and a mediocrity, I give her credit for this:
Well said.
Any of the one percenters who want to be crybabies about missing the next debate can go fly a kite.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@AThornton:
Wasn’t the final straw with Franken when Senate Democratic aides accused him of misconduct? At that point, I’m not sure if Franken could’ve survived that
J R in WV
@schrodingers_cat:
But citizenship is defined by the law, which has very specific rules about who is a citizen. If both parents are American citizens who have lived in the US, all their children are, by law, citizens. Mr Trump’s hallucinatory hereby orders cannot overturn the law.
The military will oppose this, Americans will oppose this, the Diplomatic Corps will oppose this, and I expect the House and Senate will oppose this.
Trump keeps dancing and skipping closer to committing acts both insane, illegal, and intolerable to nearly everyone. Kentucky is a state with a high level of participation in the military, and no one will support this high-handed and totalitarian action. It will leave Moscow Mitch all alone in his support for Trump’s madness.
That’s what this is, too. Madness. The military would have to ferry dependents home for their pregnancy, and the troops of female persuasion as well. Nuts!!
Martin
@MisterForkbeard: Yep. Given how explosive that information is, if it’s wrong, then NBC might have a real problem on their hands. Sounds like he got smacked down pretty hard by the execs for breaking protocol on verifying information.
germy
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Omnes Omnibus: Hugh seems, ah, shrill.
MisterForkbeard
@Quinerly: We’re going to see a lot more of these as people fail to make the debate.
@AThornton: I think the problem is that while she was theoretically interesting, in practice there just wasn’t much driving her candidacy to voters. She also had a high profile (if complicated and not clear cut) problem with a harasser in her own campaign, and when that’s your primary issue it just makes you look unserious.
MisterForkbeard
@Martin: Worst case, I think it’ll be sort of like the documents about George W. Bush during his time in the reserve or whatever. The actual substance of that case (Bush basically went AWOL all the time) was actually correct, though the document in question was a forgery.
In this case, we might end up with “Russian Oligarch’s backed his loans in other ways but didnt’ co-sign them”, which is essentially the same thing: Wrong in the exact accusation, but the overall point (AWOL/Owned by Russians) is still true.
A Ghost To Most
@AThornton: Her supporters didn’t win many converts by their dismissive attitude towards the whole ugly episode.
HRA
@RAVEN:
Yes, in defense of Israel at that time.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Mandalay:
See Tim Ryan, my backbencher nobody Rep. “But Bill Clinton stayed in longer! The DNC is trying to rig the election for the radicals and push out the moderates!”
He conveniently forgets that Biden is currently the front runner
debbie
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
As he should be. Hugh’s children’s increasingly bleak futures are being dictated by an ass who was elected by only a couple hundred other asses.
Even worse, whoever is the next PM will have to deal with a majorly fucked-up situation.
The world needs a timeout.
MisterForkbeard
@Mandalay: I saw NPR talking about how the DNC was “making decisions and intervening” on the process.
No. Ugh, fuck NPR. Saying “We had some complaints the last time around, so we’ve taken votes and made it much more wide open – here are the rules for the debates, go run your campaigns” and then people failing to meet that criteria 10 months later is not “intervening”.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Martin: It’s more likely that he had a rather unpleasant morning with NBCU’s General Counsel.
debbie
@MisterForkbeard:
He could always get guidance from Dan Rather. //
TS (the original)
The Queen cannot refuse to do as requested by the PM – she has zero political power. Scotland is so small they have financial issues if they separate from England – rather like the US southern states – they take more than they give tax wise. This is why the referendum to leave failed. What may happen after brexit is unknown
Cameron started the rot & Boris will finish it. Conservatives like to rule – they just cannot do it without failing most of the population. We can blame some people for voting for trump, only his constituents voted for Boris, the party elected him PM.
Groucho48
Is this an attempted end run around the 14th Amendment?
Uncle Cosmo
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: I’m wondering if an Act of Congress once enacted (if necessary by overriding a Presidential veto) could negate this. If so, Democrats should file the necessary legislation (ETA: to repeal the executive ordure & enshrine the currently active regulations into law) tomorrow at the latest & dare the fucking Thugs to vote against it. And dare Wussolini to veto it.
misterpuff
@BC in Illinois: If Scotland cuts ties with the UK (if is allowed to cut ties), does it get the North Sea Oil? Or does that international water remain with England? Or is it a negotiating chip?
And everytime I hear “backstop”, I think “build it and they will come”. Break it and they will leave (the UK).
EDIT Brexit and they will leave (the Union).
Baud
@Mandalay:
Good for her.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@West of the Cascades:
It looks like they’ve tightened the residency requirements quite a bit that could impact service members that are assigned overseas.
Brachiator
@PaulWartenberg:
The weird thing is that the various factions are fighting for power and ignoring the wider implications of BREXIT. Scotland, Ireland, even Gibraltar may set off major problems that few seem to want to honestly acknowledge.
@schrodingers_cat: Yes. The US, the UK and India all seem to be in the hands of foolish leadership offering a simplistic and ultimately poisonous vision of nationalism. The blindness is astounding.
Sab
@MisterForkbeard: Every year when I donate to my local NPR station (which has good reporting) I tell them that I am donating despite the NPR label and NPR national programming.
Mandalay
@MisterForkbeard:
The problem was that Gillibrand boxed herself into a corner on sexual harassment. She insisted on “zero tolerance”, and tweeted of Franken:
She didn’t even want Franken to go before the Ethics Connittee. And yet when one of her staff complained of harassment, and resigned because of it. the person responsible is still working for her.
The hypocrisy of Gillibrand is mind boggling.
Sab
@Uncle Cosmo: Senate is run by Moscow Mitch.
Tony Jay
You know, this may be unfair, but whenever I read someone describe Corbyn as a ‘British Bernie’ I just roll my eyes and stop reading, because I know that anything that follows will have about as much connection to observable fact as a NYT profile on Hillary Clinton.
It’s lazy. And boring, and facile.
But mostly just lazy.
SiubhanDuinne
Who is “Tommy”? I’ve racked my brain and cannot figure out to whom this refers.
Mike in NC
The whole BREXIT thing was sold as bullshit. “Do you want your laws to be made in London or Brussels?” “Do you want your currency to be the Pound or the Euro?” and so forth. Just like the complete stupidity of a racist demagogue claiming “I will build a great wall and Mexico will pay for it!” and people buying that. Morons all.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@J R in WV: a) watching Trump, I think he’s given up on re-election.
b) This is grandstanding. BS so Trump can tell his lackeys when Trump holds court “well McCain wasn’t a REAL American like me”
The whole point of REAL Americanism it is an accident of birth.
debbie
Cuteness Alert: PBS is running a documentary tonight (at least in my area) titled, Animal Babies: First Year on Earth.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mike in NC: Wall is going to be black, I’m seeing some government purchases of black paint to paint existing border barriers black.
Ladyraxterinok
@PJ: Isn’t the historian Nigel Ferguson another Brit who’s kind, sorta weird?
debbie
@Tony Jay:
Why, if so many hate him — even in his own party — is Corbyn not voted out?
(ETA: Thanks for your response this morning.)
Sloane Ranger
Most of the questions Doug J asks have already been answered but I’ll put in my tuppenyworth.
The constitutional position is that the Queen acts on the advice of her Ministers. This is on the basis that Ministers represent the will of Parliament (specifically the House of Commons who are the representatives of the people). This may not be the case here but no-one, including the Queen, can be certain of that until Parliament holds a vote on the matter and, unless the Speaker or Remain MP’s can somehow find a way to hold a vote of no confidence against the Government before they are sent home, she never will. Currently, therefore, she had no option but to follow BoJo’s advice. It is noteworthy that no political insider is suggesting that she could have done anything else.
Boris Johnson won a scholarship to both Eton and Oxford. He gained prizes in English and Classics at Eton and graduated Oxford with an upper level 2nd class degree (2.1), which is the level just below a 1st class degree, the highest available. He is not a fool but carefully manages his public persona to seem like one.
Why has he done this? He has climbed to the top of the greasy pole on the back of Brexit and his political future in the short term is reliant on it taking place on 31st October. Afterwards, IMO, he expects there to be a snap election, which he also expects to win on the back of Brexiteers initial glee that their promised land has been achieved and the unpopularity of Jeremy Corbyn. After that, he will have 5 years and a lot can happen in that time. He’ll worry about that then.
I’m not sure if Scotland will vote for independence or not. On the one hand, Remain is strong there, on the other, the Scottish government’s own reports show the country to be deep in the red. In any case, Johnson probably believes he can charm them into staying in the Union.
Northern Ireland won’t leave immediately, not while Protestants remain in the majority but demographics and changing attitudes are against them. If the Tories no longer have to rely on DUP votes and the Troubles start again, it’s even possible that a Tory government would encourage reunification to save money (and that’s something I would not have dreamed possible even a year ago).
debbie
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
To absorb heat better, I suppose? Or to appear thinner?
Tony Jay
@Ladyraxterinok: @Ladyraxterinok:
Niall Ferguson. The bad historian who has made an absolute mint positioning himself as the ‘academic’ defender of Empire as the awesome source of whatever civilization the wogs have had bolted to their ramshackle societies.
J R in WV
@joel hanes:
As a former swabbie in the USN, I know that full well.
On the other hand, this is a major and direct change to the conditions under which enlistments occurred. No one enlists assuming their children could be deprived of citizenship. In a court of law, that may well cause the enlistment to be overturned.
This is just one step towards taking citizenship from whole huge classes of the population. Trump isn’t the only person in his administration who is insane!
Did no one ask the Pentagon about this? I know the answer to that as well as everyone else does! Nope!!!
JPL
@Tony Jay: Where’s David Cameron these days? It seems like he got off easy for the havoc that he initiated.
Ruckus
@(((CassandraLeo))):
Had a philosophy prof that had a saying:
“If common sense was so common, more people would have some.”
Only reasonable thing he ever said.
Intelligence does not determine how well you respond to common every day details and actual facts. A common example would be faux news people. If you are so unintelligent that basic living is hard you probably won’t have a lot of common sense, or it’s a lot harder to learn it, but just because your “IQ” is above normal doesn’t mean you have one iota of common sense because that common sense is a learned thing.
OK this is freaky. I just got back from the local ER because of dizziness and I’m looking at the screen and the text appears to be moving right to left when I just try to read it. Damn that’s fucking weird. When I’m typing it doesn’t do that. Before you ask, going to the VA tomorrow, buddy is taking me. Right now I couldn’t drive if I had to.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@debbie: For Wall being black? I guess to burn the Messicins that might want to get though it*. As far as the black paint? Obviously to make the success of building Wall to more more substantial that it really is.
*Remember we’re talking Trump/Miller logic here.
Brachiator
@Tony Jay:
Sigh. Makes me nostalgic for the days when Brits only had to feel embarrassed at Theresa May giving a go at African dance.
I don’t know. If moderates succeed in getting an extension and delaying BREXIT, Johnson puts his future at risk. If Tories and a coalition of other parties definitely reject a no deal BREXIT, what’s the point of a Boris Johnson anymore?
Very droll.
Brachiator
@Ruckus:
Take care of yourself. If possible, you might ask someone to check in with you later this evening to make sure all is well.
Ladyraxterinok
@Mr. Kite: Group of wealthy/powerful/etc families got tired of having to ‘play nice’ and pretend those not in the family mattered.
They decided to strike and take back what they’d so weakly given up.
Taking revenge on Teddy Roosevelt–notice how they are out to destroy the US Park system. That was one of Teddy’s greatest ideas and accomplishments.
Also out to finally beat that other evil .Roosevelt and eliminate all his ‘class traitor’ actions.
Brachiator
@Sloane Ranger:
I’ve heard that Johnson knows exactly how many Etonians have become prime minister.
Tony Jay
@debbie:
Because that whole meme is, to steal a great phrase, loose stool-water of the most rancid kind. Corbyn won two leadership elections by large margins and turned the previously moribund ‘New’ Labour movement into the largest Left Wing Party in Europe. His policies gave Labour its largest share of the vote in 20 years when every single political prognosticator was confidently assuming a Conservative landslide. The same Labour Party that is still in one piece and offering the only plausible route out of the Brexit disaster that the Tories and their allies in the Media have foisted on the country.
All of this despite an unrelenting, vicious and determinedly fact-free blowtorch of contemptuous bile from the British Press and BBC News. Aided and abetted by people within the Party who couldn’t beat him at the ballot box and so have fallen back on backstabbing and sabotage while crying plaintively on the Opinion pages about how bullied they are by those nasty Party members. Don’t they know they’re just supposed to do all the hard work of getting them elected every five years and shut up in between?
Hated? Sure he is. But when you look at – who – hates him, and why, the only rational response is “Good. I’m glad. Fuckem”.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Ruckus:
I wish I could tell you what that is. I would call your doc at the VA and tell them now. In the ER, did the staff do any patient teaching or indicate what the cause of your dizziness is?
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
Thanks. Yeah this is new territory for me. I’ve go issues that go deep and aren’t obvious, but this is up front and makes doing much of anything normal a massive pain in the ass. A bigger pain in the ass than drumpy, and that is saying a mouthful. The VA is working on it, buddy is driving me.
Once again, thanks.
Sab
@Ruckus: I hope you are OK. This is disturbing.
Ladyraxterinok
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: I think it’s meant to affect foreigners serving in military or in Gov service abroad who hoped thereby to get citizenship. Presumably spouses are from same country.
Message? We really, REALLY hate all foreigners and will get rid of you. Best go quietly!
Ruckus
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
VA is on it. Going in tomorrow, which it almost would be if I left two hours ago.
@Sab:
It is fun, this living stuff.
spanky
@Ruckus: That’s vertigo. And you’re right, DO NOT ATTEMPT TO DRIVE.
I feel weird saying “welcome to old age” hen you’ve got a half dozen years on me, but that’s pretty common. Mine started about 10 years go. Kinda early, but there you are.
Tony Jay
@JPL:
Keeping his molded plastic head down while he waits for an opportune moment to re-emerge as the tut-tutting ‘veteran leader’ who tried so hard to convince Britain of the value of EU membership only to be let down by those around him.
Won’t work. He’ll be forever known as the pig-fucking ponce who shafted the country because he was scared of Nigel Farage.
Barry
@schrodingers_cat: “No that’s an actual USCIS directive.”
So basically every NCO and Officer of the US Armed Forces will be told that future children born on US bases in other countries are not citizens, but have the same status as adopted foreign-born children.
Ruckus
This is disturbing and interesting at the same time. My clock is across the room, next to the door. If I look at the clock I can read the time but the clock, the corner of the room and the door appear to be moving to the left, but they also are in the same place. Worst acid trip ever. And besides I have never even taken any. The brain is a funny thing, at least mine is. And that’s not HaHa funny.
Mandalay
@Tony Jay:
I’d read that Cameron never actually received oral sex from a dead pig, but was happy for the false allegation to persist.
I’m not sure what’s worse: that Cameron actually did it, or that he wants people to believe that he did it even though he didn’t.
So did he, or didn’t he?
unknown known
@Tony Jay:
No, I don’t think that’s quite fair. There are a lot of differences if you know them from up close, but when attempting broad cultural translation you are always dealing in approximations.
And there are big similarities. They are both in their 70’s, and have been unapologetic and open socialists for decades, even before it started getting fashionable again. They both have somewhat abraisive personalities and rather inflexible leadership styles, and a professorial demeanour. If you are describing them to a total stranger, the label “cranky hard left elderly uncle” is a caricature that at least gets them into the ballpark. Both of them have a rabid and demographically narrow support base (white, young, educated), and struggle heavily for traction outside that group. They traditionally had comparable gladfly roles within their parties.
As I say, there are differences too. If you are more familiar with them, they are clearly different people. Bernie seems to put more thought into detailed policy plans, he’s more of a grifter in it for the personal notoriety, he worked on stuff in the senate. Corbyn is a creature of an ideological movement well-entrenched in the labour party, with strong union roots. Bernie is Jewish, while Corbyn struggles with cultural antisematism issues in his party. And their political fortunes have been very different. Bernie ran and lost, but still got a lot of his ideas absorbed into the democratic mainstream (part of the reason he doesn’t look nearly so radical this cycle). Corbyn won the labour leadership, and has hung on to it, though with a considerable amount of bloodletting and infighting within the party, but it’s not clear that he’s moved it’s ideological core in any particularly lasting way. Blah blah blah…
Tony Jay
@Brachiator:
Oh, he’ll be golden. He’ll be the only Tory leader with the credibility on the hard-Right to count on Farage’s BXP cultists and a large majority of Conservative Party members, and he’ll be able to campaign on the well-prepared ground of Brexit Betrayal! That’s what I think this is all about. Brextremists can’t govern and have no program to lift the country out of Tory Austerity, but when it comes to tapping into White Resentment and victimitude they’ve got it down. He’d much rather be campaigning as the underdog against an ‘anti-democratic’ Parliamentary coalition that has more splits than a Broadway dance-troupe.
Sloane Ranger
@Brachiator: That’s correct. He is and always has been wildly ambitious. He did “Who do you Think You Are” a few years ago and discovered he is distantly related to the Queen. The joke at the time was that you could see him mentally calculating how many people he’d have to knock off to become King.
Also he fancies that history will see him as the Winston Churchill of the 21st century.
Mr. Kite
@Mandalay:
No, what’s mind boggling is your endless Gillibrand bashing. Are you hoping for an attaboy from Franken or what? Give it a f*ing rest already. You’re almost like that guy with the blood thirsty tumbler fixation in every other thread.
Mandalay
@Ruckus: I am not a doctor, and I have no absolutely clue about your problem, but if I was in your situation I don’t think I would be waiting until tomorrow to get checked.
Failing that, keep posting here so we know what’s going on….
Tony Jay
@Mandalay:
Sadly, the pig signed an NDA and refuses to comment, but come on, we all know it’s true. You don’t try and style it out with a “Yah, it’s tosh but I like the edge it gives me” flabble unless yeah, you did, but so did other people who are now in very senior positions, and they would NOT like it if this became a ‘thing’ everyone in those circles was asked about.
PJ
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Not really. Apparently there was a current Senate worker who alleged that, years before, when she visited Air America (when Franken was not a Senator), Franken looked like he was going to kiss her. It was after she came forward with this accusation that Gillibrand demanded that Franken resign.
Ruckus
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
And most other countries do not give citizenship due to birth. So a child born that country to non citizens of that country, would/might not have any actual citizenship. This is throwing out long established law if I’m not mistaken.
drumpy is a massive fucking disaster. OK that’s not actually news but it sure is crappy to have to learn how much worse he can get every day.
SiubhanDuinne
@Martin:
I watched relevant clips of LO’D’s program last night (not the whole thing), and he repeatedly stressed that the information was not independently verified and kept saying “if true” and other disclaimers. True, he’d have been better off not reporting on it at all or at least waiting for confirmation, but given that he and producers chose to run with it, seems to me they did what they should have done.
Jay
@Tony Jay:
The Moron who wrote “The End of History” positing early on that the initial sucess of Dubya Dubya Me Too meant that that history was dead and everything would be ‘Merkin ever after.
unknown known
@Tony Jay:
True.
Not fully clear how you count this, but they’ve had some membership bounce, so let’s stipulate it as true. The knock on Corbyn is not that he doesn’t energize his base. He does. They LOVE him. And – yes, like Bernie – he appealed to a sizable swatch of the educated populace who were relieved to see someone finally offering full-throated and unashamed socialism. And good for them. The issue is how broad his appeal is beyond that.
Ok, this is where we have gotten into the spin zone. This is true, BUT, he was running in that election against a historically unpopular Tory party who had just foisted the whole Brexit thing on the country, and were seen as in the early stages of making a shambles of running it. The only reason there was an election at all is because Theresa May thought that Corbyn was so incredibly unpopular that she couldn’t possibly lose to him. Jeremy did far better as a campaigner than people expected – and full credit to him for that – but he was running seriously uphill in that election. A genuinely charismatic leader should have mopped the floor with the Tories in that election. Sadly labour is not exactly dripping with possibilities on that front. I’m developing serious envy of the D’s current bench of talent.
In one piece – apart from the MP’s who literally quit the party to form their own with some rebel Tories… (and who proved so utterly inept at running that party that a bunch of them have now left it). So… let’s say “mostly” in one piece. And this is a party with a LOT of history and institutional and cultural weight behind it. Blowing it up would be seriously difficult.
Sorry, that was my spit take. Their “plausible route” is that labour would take over from the Tories and then successfully negotiate a much better exit agreement, but if that doesn’t work, then might have a referendum on the old deal, with an ill-defined set of alternatives offered to voters. Now look, it’s no bad thing to have a plan which has a bunch of “ifs” and fallback positions built into it, but that is TERRIBLE retail politics, especially on the single most polarizing and contentious debate of your day. Labour’s plan has been “constructive ambiguity” where they don’t really come down on a leave OR remain side, but waffle somewhere in the middle – which is the kind of thing you can only get away with as an opposition party, not as a ruling party where you have to make actual decisions… and a lot of people started picking up on that… which is why labour haemoraged so many votes to the Lib Dems in the last Euro election that they pretty much single handedly revived the fortunes of that party who – actually DID take a clear and unambiguous anti-brexit stance.
So yeah, go back to lecturing about people being lazy and simplistic please.
Ruckus
@Mandalay:
Not bad advice. And as I said above I went. First ambulance ride in 70 yrs. The VA actually called 911 and had me picked up and taken to the ER and I was on the phone with them when the paramedics/ambulance arrived.
thalarctosMaritimus
@SiubhanDuinne: I’m guessing it’s Tommy Lascelles, who served the royal family for decades.
“The Crown” makes him out to be a real popinjay; I have no idea how true that depiction is.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Lascelles
opiejeanne
@Mart: On top of that, what about the children born outside the US to American citizens who are neither Government employees or military? Are they in an even worse position?
chris
@Jay: That was Francis Fukuyama and I think he sort of apologised for The End of History. Ferguson is much worse.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Ruckus:
Good. As somebody else said upthread it sounds like vertigo.
@Ruckus:
Exactly. They would be effectively stateless.
unknown known
@Ruckus: I have hazy memories of studying perceptual psych as an undergrad, but I do recall that the visual cortex has a pretty funky setup, with different layers that code for edges, objects, movement, stuff like that. If one bit of it goes wonky then the normal fused experience can go pretty darn wonky.
Brachiator
@SiubhanDuinne:
“If true” ain’t news, it’s rumor mongering. Given how Trump and the right love to bash journalists, this kind of thing was the best gift possible. A gift that will keep on giving.
Jimmm
@Betty Cracker:
Actually, I believe DougJ has it right with “in England’s dreaming” (double-checked with their official lyrics page).
Tony Jay
@unknown known:
Sorry, but no. Bernie is a self-aggrandizing prick who lashes out at criticism and tries to knee-cap anyone horning in on ‘his’ issues. Corbyn’s entire thing is consensus-building, sitting down with people he doesn’t like or trust or agree with and seeing what kind of de-escalation and compromise they can reach. Bernie wants credit and adoration, Corbyn wants mass-democracy and a Party guided by its membership. They’re not even in the same sport, never mind ballpark.
Corbyn’s Labour Party came back from a 20 point deficit in the polls to almost unseat a Conservative Government that no one at the time thought was in any way vulnerable, and he did it by reaching out with policies that won Labour its largest share of the vote since Tony Blair strolled to victory in 1997. That’s not narrow in any sense. Bernie couldn’t win a Primary contest in a head-to-head contest with History’s Greatest Monster with all of the Media backing him. And as far as gladfly status goes, sure, except, on all those issues, Corbyn was consistent and right, while Bernie, as far as I know, has some very odd votes to defend.
No. Sorry, 100% no. Corbyn is a lifelong campaigner against racism of all kinds who has suffered from a manufactured ‘antisemitism crisis’ because his pro-Palestinian stance is anathema to the right of the Party. That the only Jewish voices within Labour who are ever given a media platform just so happen to be rabid opponents of Corbyn’s entire policy portfolio is a huge tell, and does a real disservice to the thousands of Jewish Labour members who would be happy to speak out against the campaign but are whitewashed out of the picture to service a false narrative.
(Yeah, I get really annoyed by that particular smear. Nothing personal)
Bit odd this one. Bernie’s more popular ideas could quite justifiably be claimed as generic Democratic ideas and I’m sure there are a lot of Hillary supporters here who’d be happy to tell you that she was further to the left on a lot of issues than he was. OTOH, what bloodletting within Labour are you referring to? I mean, I’ve heard an awful lot of whining about Purges and bullying and silencing of ‘mainstream voices’ but offhand I can’t think of a single anti-Corbyn Labour figure who has actually been forced out of the Party by the leadership or deselected by their constituency Party. I can think of a lot of Corbyn supporters who’ve been falsely tarred as anti-Semites and railroaded out by the disciplinary leadership that was in place before Jennie Formby took over, but otherwise, no, all I can see is a lot of entitled holdovers from the New Labour era who have spent the last three years crying wolf because they are scared shitless of facing democratic scrutiny by their constituency parties, and some who’ve jumped in the expectation of a soft landing and discovered that their value rapidly declined when they were no longer pissing inside the big tent.
In short. Sorry, no. Comparing Corbyn to Bernie really does just come down to “White, 70s, call themselves socialists” and that’s it. Everything else is cladding put on from the outside to make the justified dislike of Bernie transferable to Corbyn for an American audience.
Ruckus
@unknown known:
Pretty darn wonky it is then.
Seems to be as good a diagnosis as any I’ve gotten in the last 20 yrs. I’ll ask the VA if that’s a valid diagnosis tomorrow. But I like it, actual humans can understand pretty darn wonky. Although I normally add one m in that second word.
Tony Jay
@Jay:
Wasn’t that Fukayama or am I getting people mixed up?
Sab
@Ruckus: So are you OK? I had my first ambulance ride at 60. It was entertaining, but also informative. Love those guys now.
unknown known
@Ruckus: I believe Wonky is the official DSM XII term of art (or, at least, it will be when they get to that version).
Jay
@chris:
Thanks for the correction. Getting my mediocre entitled always wrong arseholes mixed up.
schrodingers_cat
@Ruckus: Call 911. This could be serious, don’t wait until tomorrow.
debbie
@Tony Jay:
Somewhat relatedly, I listened to an interview of a Conservative member (Pauline Layton?) and she said she didn’t know what the fuss was; Parliament will be on vacation for all but a few of the days it’s suspended. So again I ask, why go through all this shit and cause all this crazy chaos?
unknown known
@Tony Jay:
Look, it probably isn’t coming across here, but I *like* Corbyn. But he doens’t help himself with stuff like naming a shadow cabinet and forgetting to include any women until it’s pointed out to him. While no, nobody has been deselected, there’s been lots of dark muttering about it, and a lot of front benchers resigning. The anti-semitism thing… I don’t think anyone believes that he is personally, but you hear enough reports from Jewish members quitting because of the things they hear said to them at meetings, etc… if it were any group but your own you’d start to wonder why this pattern seemed so regular.
And his handling of the whole brexit thing has been not so great. And I realize he’s in a super tough place, because he has a whole lot of constituencies that he NEEDS that voted leave. I get that. He doesn’t have any win-win choices, and for a while it was reasonable to try to finesse all the differences. But he misread how polarized the country has become, to the point that sitting on the fence was not a winning strategy. And he’s not really ever been able to shake the label of being a closet LEXITer.
Tony Jay
@unknown known:
I’m sorry? I don’t have a passport to Earth 3 so I’ll just have to relate evidence from the reality I’m familiar with, where what you’ve just written is gobsmackingly untrue.
Historically unpopular? The Tories at that point were depicted in the media as unbeatable, May was on a pedestal they’d been polishing for the Next Thatcher, they were 20 points ahead in the polls and the entire national media Establishment was united in dismissing Corbyn’s Labour as the last gasp of a prehistoric Hard Left rump that would be utterly destroyed by a vigorous and broadly popular Conservative Party that had re-positioned itself as the Party of the Referendum majority. It wasn’t until the campaign started and people started paying attention to Labour’s actual real-world policies and Corbyn himself stared getting on their TV screens that the polls started to shift.
Fuck’s sake. Do you remember the day after the Election? The stunned thousand-yard stares on the political correspondents? The stuttering admissions of total ineptitude from the talking heads who had been predicting an absolutely certain Tory landslide? Claiming that “Oh yeah, any centrist Labour leader would have totally beaten May’s Tories” is counterfactual wank of the worst kind. It’s much more likely that sans Corbyn and the injection of actual left-wing policies Labour would have continued its post 1997 slide in votes and membership and handed May the majority she was hoping for. Brexit would have happened last year and we’d all be fucked.
Yeah, a handful jumped ship with all the media support they could hope for and…… splat.
If Labour had gone full Remain when a big chunk of its voters went Leave you would have seen about 20 Labour MPs go Independent and eventually BXT. And we’d still have enjoyed the whole pantomime of “Corbyn really wants Brexit, you can’t trust him” anyway. By sticking to the policy agreed at Conference Corbyn kept that from happening and look where we are now. If a cloned Tony Blair had followed exactly the same policy while licking up to Murdoch he’d be touted as a political realist of the first order, but that’s not the narrative, is it?
Look, it’s late, and I don’t think you’re going to agree that you’re totally wrong . 8-) Let’s just see what happens in the General Election after Labour have had the same coverage under the same conditions as Johnson’s Kamikazee Kult and compare notes.
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: A number of soldiers who married German women choose to stay in Germany after retirement. The people who were the real voices of Milli Vanilli had parents like that.
Tony Jay
One last thing before I get to a VERY late bed. I did a whole massive post about this because it pissed me off so much that I may dig out of the embers and throw it up again because it is so bullshit it makes me seethe. In a country where 60+ of Tory members happily state they’d never accept a muslim leader and the Tory leader casually dumps a promised investigation into Tory Islamaphobia we’ve had three years of consistent, organised smearing of the Labour Party that the Media has been gleefully front-paged whenever the Tories get in trouble.
It’s bullshit. Criticism of Israel shouldn’t be repackaged as proof of anti-Semitism, and people who lie about it shouldn’t be garlanded as heroes.
Now I am going to bed. Ta Ta.
Tehanu
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
My guess is he thinks that the Russian oligarch money will prop HIM up. Everyone else can fall down a hole for all he cares. Just like Dump.
Ruckus
@schrodingers_cat:
Oh I believe it’s serious. I’ve been to the ER. As I said above the VA called 911 for me and are paying for the ride. The ER ran a lot of tests, see nothing wrong to fix. If they admit me they will run massive tests, same as has been done. I expect to have the VA admit me tomorrow or send me to the VA ER to get tests done that I’m already scheduled for but get them now rather than in 12 days.
IOW, doctors have looked at me, tests were done, nothing conclusive or even slightly out of line has been found. The only way is digging a lot deeper, possibly invasively, and that won’t happen until at least tomorrow no matter what I want or do. If you aren’t actively bleeding, or have broken bones, waiting is normal in our, and probably most every other healthcare system on the planet. It may not be good but it is the system and truth be told I don’t really see how it would work to give a lot of very expensive tests to anyone who wasn’t 100% normal trying to look, as said in the medical profession, for zebras when you hear hoofbeats. I’ve been looking for answers for over 4 yrs and the only ones I gotten are, “We know it isn’t…….” I had an angiogram and the doctor said while doing this rather invasive test, “Why are we here doing this, there is absolutely nothing wrong here.”
Another Scott
@Ruckus: Hang in there.
Cheers,
Scott.
Lynno
It will hit the fan when the Queen does not have milk for her tea