Tony Blair: Brexit’s Stunning Coup

[elleng]

'The immediate impact of the Brexit vote is economic. The fallout has been as swift as it was predictable. At one point on Friday, the pound hit a 30-year low against the dollar, and a leading British stock index had dropped more than 8 percent. The nation’s credit rating is under threat.

The lasting effect, however, may be political, and with global implications. If the economic shocks continue, then the British experiment will serve as a warning. But if they abate, then populist movements in other countries will gain momentum. . .

The strains within Britain that led to this referendum result are universal, at least in the West. Insurgent movements of left and right, posing as standard-bearers of a popular revolt against the political establishment, can spread and grow at scale and speed. Today’s polarized and fragmented news coverage only encourages such insurgencies — an effect magnified many times by the social media revolution.

It was already clear before the Brexit vote that modern populist movements could take control of political parties. What wasn’t clear was whether they could take over a country like Britain. Now we know they can. . /.

The political center has lost its power to persuade and its essential means of connection to the people it seeks to represent. Instead, we are seeing a convergence of the far left and far right. The right attacks immigrants while the left rails at bankers, but the spirit of insurgency, the venting of anger at those in power and the addiction to simple, demagogic answers to complex problems are the same for both extremes. Underlying it all is a shared hostility to globalization. . .

If the people — usually a repository of common sense and practicality — do something that appears neither sensible nor practical, then it forces a period of long and hard reflection. My own politics is waking to this new political landscape. The same dangerous impulses are visible, too, in American politics, but the challenges of globalization cannot be met by isolationism or shutting borders.

The center must regain its political traction, rediscover its capacity to analyze the problems we all face and find solutions that rise above the populist anger. If we do not succeed in beating back the far left and far right before they take the nations of Europe on this reckless experiment, it will end the way such rash action always does in history: at best, in disillusion; at worst, in rancorous division. The center must hold.'

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/opinion/tony-blair-brexits-stunning-coup.html?

The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

http://www.potw.org/archive/potw351.html

[BlueMTexpat]

1. I don't hold Blair blameless in

this outcome. His acting as a lapdog for Bush-Cheney policies sent Labour on a downward spiral from which it has never recovered.

Screw him!

[katsy]

2. A big fuck you tony blair you maggot.

"The same dangerous impulses are visible, too, in American politics, but the challenges of globalization cannot be met by isolationism or shutting borders."


You and your ilk did this. All the blame lies at the feet of political whores like you and your counterparts across all continents.

You thought that the needs of the few or the one outweigh the needs of the many in some perversion of a decent star trek meme.

You and your kind set out on an experiment of profit extraction from what used to be the commons in order to enrich a select, powerful few. And you didn't do it in an orderly, humane way of funding adequate social safety nets to those who would suffer the most. No thought to those who thought you would champion their causes and the cause of great societies & democracies. Instead you cut them out of sharing economically.

The political center lost it's credibility by not equitably supporting the workforce, by fair wages for all and equal support of government, you let your own citizens watch their finances implode.

You allowed the rw to foment anger towards migrant workers instead of implementing fair economic policies for all, a level playing field. Hatred wouldn't have festered as much in a fair economic climate.

You did this. Neoliberal scumbag. You watched while they poisoned worker against worker. And now you decry isolationist policies... stupid fuck what did you expect? People willingly taking their lives so others may live better? That's not how people react when their existence is threatened. They fight back. Sometimes they fight an enemy you and your cohorts created simply to divide & conquer.

To be more accurate... The challenges of globalization cannot be met by douchbags such as yourself and your fellow neoliberals. You caused this hatred and divisiveness. Now you cry foul?

The challenges will be better met when labor has a seat at the economic table & wages are living wages as dictated by 1st world standards... not 3rd world wage slavery. The challenges will be met when government represents the commons not the 1%.

So. Fuck you very much.

[Ruby the Liberal]

4. Preach!

Well done!

[Ruby the Liberal]

3. "the problems we all face"

"We" don't face the same problems as those who live in the bubble.

[libdem4life]

5. American royalty needs to go, as well. Both families.

One simply cannot serve two masters...those to whom they are financially beholden and those, The People, who have only a simple vote.

Nothing to do with politics, per se. Just the stage players performing for the audience. They yell and scream and call names, kiss and hiss, and have duels and sword fights, then it ends...the curtain drawn.

All the Peasants go back to their dreary homes and the Players all sip champagne together counting the Take.