Category: BREXIT
Enoch Powell: The Man Who Would Have Been Prime Minister
I feel if Enoch Powell hadn’t given the speech on that fateful day, British politics could well have unravelled in a dramatically different way. We may not have joined the Common Market and remained an independent self-governing nation, carrying on … Continue reading
Theresa May’s Brexit Speech in Midst of Rising Euroscepticism
The EU is hardly showering itself in glory among its citizens, tired of a lack of accountability and a deeply controversial migration policy. Brussels would be minded to not serve a blow to European businesses, too, just to frustrate Brexit … Continue reading
Trump’s ‘Retweets’ and ‘Tweets’ Cause Diplomatic Uproar in UK
During the press conference, the Jordanians cheered as May firmly refused to condone Trump’s Tweet. Meanwhile, back in Westminster, MPs on both sides of the house lined up to say, ‘enough is enough’. Senior British diplomat and Ambassador to America, … Continue reading
Winning the Moral Argument for Brexit: Emancipating the British Economy from Fortress Europe
As long as a product states ‘Fair Trade’ on the label and promises to build new schools, nobody pauses to wonder why coffee beans grown in Africa are not being roasted and sold by Africa. In 2014 Africa made £1.6 … Continue reading
Theresa May’s Florence Speech: A Deeply Brexity-looking Brexit
Britain won’t be seeking an unfair competitive advantage. It will be seeking a perfectly fair competitive advantage, which is exactly what the British people voted for. I have advocated for a long time that we do not need to be … Continue reading
BREXIT and Free Trade: Let’s Talk About ‘Conscious Uncoupling’
The public, while united over ending free movement of people and regaining full legislative autonomy from the European Courts of Justice, are not particularly perturbed by the idea of limited ongoing payments for a degree of access to the EU … Continue reading
The False Dichotomy Between Hard and Soft Brexit
Without doubt, Brexit is going to be a long, drawn out and complex process. It is the surgical separation of conjoined twins, not the amputation of necrotising flesh. If the main impetus for leaving was a rejection of bureaucratic, unaccountable … Continue reading
The European Spring Was Sprung, But Only a Fool Would Imagine Euroscepticism Is Dead in the UK
As I have made plain before, there is no such thing as a soft and a hard Brexit. This is little more than a narrative device enabling politicians to adopt a multitude of contradictory opinions in order to appease all … Continue reading
UK General Election Analysis
While the left hungrily defends anything considered minority, they feel emboldened to attack what have hitherto been majority viewpoints in an increasingly fascistic manner. I don’t know what this new social religion is, nor do I really wish to sign … Continue reading
Trump and America’s Changing Relationship with Europe
Two men changing the face of the Western political establishment joined together on stage. A tight handshake that would come to mark the future President of America’s most analysed body language… Continue reading
Bombs and Ballots: Intelligence Betrayals Before British Elections
The prevailing atmosphere of Washington, DC, what President Trump calls “the swamp” runs deeper and wider than any have ever imagined. The dysfunctional intelligence community raising its ugly head is becoming the revenge of the swamp monster. In fact, people … Continue reading
An Election to Change the Course of History
Perhaps Sturgeon’s bloody mindedness and political myopia will be her own downfall. To her, the primary narrative for a second ballot has been that Brexit is entirely against Scotland’s democratic wishes, as Scotland voted by a significant margin to remain. … Continue reading
Powell: Portentious or Polarising
Enoch Powell, of course, was an esteemed scholar. He was the most brilliant classical scholar of his generation at Cambridge, becoming the youngest professor in the British Empire, the youngest Brigadier in the Army, and the youngest Cabinet Minister. This … Continue reading
The EU’s Existential Crisis
Will the EU ship sink? With Britain leading the way and being the first member state to jump overboard, the question now hangs in the air of what will happen to the Union. There is no need for it to … Continue reading
The Peaceful Revolution is Complete
Perhaps the most assertive and British thing about Brexit was not the audacity to turn to a continent and say sorry and farewell, but the manner in which it was done. And that, I would argue, should give 65 million … Continue reading
EU Tusk Affair: Poland Is No UK
The new generation in Poland, born and raised in freedom, is absolutely worth watching – it is they, contrary to the popular narrative, and not the retirees, who swayed the last electoral cycle: the young, who don’t watch traditional TV, … Continue reading
Brexit Happened for a Reason: EU Members Like Poland Ought to Reassess
Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydło wrote a curiously desperate letter of last resort to the European Union to prevent the re-election of her Eurocrat predecessor, Donald Tusk. She appealed to democracy and national sovereignty. This must have sounded like a … Continue reading
Major’s Major Mistakes
The man responsible for putting pen to paper over the infamous Maastricht Treaty in 1992 tried to tell the country that they were the ones who had been wrong to back Brexit. John Major, part of the crack team of … Continue reading
Lords Rebellion Won’t Scupper Brexit – Here’s Why
By Alexandra Phillips l March 8, 2017 LONDON-There was a sharp intake of breath yesterday as the House of Lords added a second amendment to the Government’s Brexit Bill. The legislation enabling Theresa May to trigger Article 50 by the … Continue reading
Perhaps We Should Be Thankful for the Frenzy on the Radical Left
A braying and hypersensitive radical left is in many respects far better than their wily New Labour predecessors. After all, it was the likes of Tony Blair and Peter Mandelson who secretly administered the snake oil that sold Britain across … Continue reading
Brexit and Trump, the Two Big Electoral Shocks of 2016, Meet the New Narrative
When Theresa May went to meet Donald Trump in Washington, I was avidly watching and waiting to see how they would meld. The result was what I wanted: A reaffirmation of one of the most important global alliances in history, … Continue reading
Why Theresa May Has Played a Blinder
What with all the new free trade deals in the pipeline for Britain, and the EU’s infamous glacial pace at negotiating anything, as well as the constant economic alarm bells clanging from the crippled economies of the Mediterranean Eurozone (that … Continue reading
Reagan-Thatcher in the Age of Trump: The Origins of the Anglo-American Alliance
So, the Trump-May relationship begins on the cusp of greatness, and while many are not quite convinced that Theresa May is a true Conservative, this is a fresh start between both countries with a promising past. But much of the … Continue reading
Seismic Political Shifts in the West
Nigel Farage, the former UKIP leader and the man credited with the success of Brexit stated recently about Merkel and Obama, the symbols of the current EU and U.S. ruling establishments, that they “simply can’t face up to the fact … Continue reading
2017 Will Hail the European Spring
Scan the entire continent and there are more than just small pockets of discontent. Brexit is likely the first domino to fall and Malta’s Muscat must surely know this. It is under his stewardship what happens next. For the EU, … Continue reading
Brexit Means Business
My advice to Theresa May is “come to Ghana”. Come to the smaller countries in the developing world, trying to break through into the global market place. Come to the African Commonwealth who have been heinously undermined by multinational trade deals piped through the one-stop-shop of plutocratic Brussels where big business have dictated terms which have seen West African nations stripped of tariffs that afforded one third of their national GDP, being forced to trade on even terms when the ground is far from that. This week Theresa May said Brexit offered the UK the opportunity to be a world leader. Come to Ghana, Mrs May, or as Ghanaians would say ‘Akwaaba’. I am sure you will be very welcome indeed. Continue reading
Brexit, Article 50 and constitutional crisis: Why our quaint little nation, with its incredible history, was never really part of the EU
By repealing the European Economic Communities Act 1972 that initially brought us into the EU, decades of improvised legislative stacking would suddenly become unconstitutional. If a direct ‘yes or no’ question were put to Parliament, on repealing the Act or … Continue reading
Brexit: UK High Court Intervenes
Nobody is saying the referendum shouldn’t have happened, nor does this current judgment deny the result, it merely questions the apparatus by which the decision is now put into effect. The process should have the continuous involvement of recourse to Parliament, and could therefore drag on even longer, opening the door for economic instability both in the UK and in Europe in the interim. With a second Eurozone crisis looming, nobody wants Brexit to take decades. Continue reading
How does a Union leave a Union?
The principle clamor from each devolved country’s Nationalists is to remain in the Single Market, essentially a false dichotomy and surely off the table, thus moving the narrative closer towards a second Scottish referendum. May doesn’t appear willing to give way, and Sturgeon’s majority is such that she has almost absolute power in Scotland. I wonder now whether the imperative ‘leave’, from Catalonia to Cardiff to California is an even more attractive concept, in a new digitized, global era Continue reading
When does Brexit mean Brexit?
It’s fair to say that the new UK Prime Minister, Theresa May, having only been in office for a mere couple of months, has already demonstrated that she intends her government to commit to ‘full Brexit’. She has prudently placed … Continue reading
The Brexit Effect: Europe at a Crossroads
As long as the European Union fails to heed the clarion call of its members to start considering reforms, perhaps in such a manner that it would emphasize its economic and trade relations rather than its political ones, then the viability of its existence might soon be called into question. Continue reading
German Trumps Score Latest Gain in Berlin Elections
As Merkel steadfastly insists she will not limit the number of refugees entering Germany this year, the AfD grows in strength and numbers. How it fares at the polls next year will surely be a defining chapter in the saga of reunified Germany. Continue reading
Behind The Story of “Mr. Brexit” on the Trump Train
While the Donald declared they would be “friends for life,” Farage stopped short of actually endorsing Trump, saying it was not proper for a British citizen to tell American voters what to do—a not-so-subtle slap at President Obama for urging British voters to support “Remain” in the Brexit referendum. Continue reading
Like Trump and Brexit, AfD Showing in Germany Spells Bad Times for “Establishment”
With nearly 1 million refugees admitted to Germany last year alone and 220,000 asylum-seekers arriving since January 1 (according to Deutsche Welle News), the AfD is almost certain to be a major player in the 2017 national elections. Continue reading
Even With “Boris and the Brexiters,” May’s Cabinet is Mixed Bag for the Right
“Brexit is Brexit,” declared May in spelling out her position to execute the will of the voters in wanting to leave the European Union. Certainly her tapping of Johnson, Fox, Davis and several others are strong signs she means it and will act accordingly. But whether May goes on to become another Margaret Thatcher is a saga that is yet to be written. Continue reading
Brexit: Charlemagne vs. ‘Rule Britannia!’
What Brexit makes clear is that the British want their country back. They believe their beloved and ingrained notion of ‘Britishness’ being threatened in Europe elicited reactions from those who have had enough of the ruling class dictating the terms of success, power, and control. Continue reading
Brexit Calls for U.S. to Reconsider Foreign Policy
With Germany economically dependent on the natural gas provisions from Russia, it is hard to expect any strong German support for NATO activities on the eastern flank. This is proven by the German reaction to the joint NATO war games, Anaconda 16, that are taking place in Eastern Europe. A NATO member, as it is, Germany denied the right of passage to the allied troops on their way to the games referring to them as “saber-rattling and warmongering.” The centers of power in Europe are shifting and Washington needs to choose its allies carefully. When we look at the map of Europe, it is quite clear that the new rampart of NATO is no longer Germany but Poland and the Baltic States. Continue reading
Rule Britannia, and Now What?
Will the spirit of decentralization descend onto central and eastern Europe? That probably won’t happen right away because the denizens of the post-Soviet zone are too scared of the Russians to leave the imaginary security blanket of the EU behind. They keep forgetting that it is not the EU, but NATO that defends them. And there is no NATO without American leadership. Continue reading
America, Globalization and Brexit
The British have just voted to leave the European Union in order to regain their national independence. For England, the vote marks the beginning of a return to common sense. It is a victory of the God-fearing people over the internationalists who advocate a border-less, God-less and very much a meaning-less new world order. We do need an orderly world, but it should be a world of free nations. It is high time for America to regain its sense of nation and sense of mission. Continue reading
Europe’s Security Crisis: From Tolerance to Extremism
In light of all the chaos, one might say that the metaphoric battle of civilizations has reached European soil. But such a statement would be false. There is no battle, as a battle involves two or more sides actively engaged. The only active side in this story is the radicalized, anything but tolerant, threat of Islamic terror, which is ripping into the heart of Europe and putting people of all nations and religions in danger. The other side is the passive European continent, trying to cope with the philosophy of tolerance and to figure out what it may and may not say and do. Europe sleeps and extremists recruit. No, this is no battle. It is suicide. Continue reading
Boris Johnson: Brussels, Brexit and the Uncertain Future of the EU
“Let’s suppose somebody came to us all today, 2016, and said, bonjour, or guten tag, or ciao, we’ve got this brilliant idea for a new project to take all these higgledy-piggledy nations and turn them into a single political unit with a single currency and gradually moving, actually ever more rapidly, towards a single system of government, and you Brits will have to sign up for virtually all of it except the single currency. They would then be told that they would have to give up the right to make their own laws, pay for membership and have no border control. That’s the offer they make to us – a club that wastes our money massively, that subverts democracy in this country, takes away people’s power to elect the people who take the decisions, reduces the competitiveness of the European economy, and all for no real economic benefit. Why would we join such a club today? Why would we join such a woefully unreformed Europe? Would anybody in their right mind join the EU as it is today? I don’t think so.” – Boris Johnson Continue reading
“Brexit,” the British Exit from the EU, Campaign Heats Up
It is clear, though, that both sides have numerous supporters and the campaign will be vigorous. The voting to remain in the EU will be a vote against the risks to economic prosperity. Those voting for Brexit will be supporting Britain’s independence from Europe, primarily rejecting the tight control from Brussels. By virtue of the Brexit referendum, the nature of the European project will have been irrevocably altered, with “no return to the status quo ante.” Whatever the result on June 23, Brexit is going to be a campaign to remember. Continue reading