2. EEC

General election Q & A – Happy Maastricht ;-)

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Yippeee! Another general election 😉 the third since the five year fixed term parliament act came into err “force” in 2011.

Your Christmas General Election quiz starts here. Just 10 questions to answer.

There may be prizes (Ed: I doubt it …)

The biggest question left for me is “does this Boris Johnson’s exit deal actually give us freedom from the EU?”.

My current understanding is that it still ties us into EU rules (for some years) and we continue to pay the EU £billions. £39 billion?

I don’t know yet, even having read the bill, it is still unclear to me. No deal is still the option if we get to 31st January 2020 without agreeing ‘the deal’.

That means that probably “no deal” is almost certainly the best result for the United Kingdom of Great Britain in the long term.

Why? Because it removes politicians from the mix 😉 and after the last 3 years of irritating and pointless fluff I think most of us can raise a glass to that!

Businesses will have issues, of course, and things will not be as favourable as they currently are.

BUT, the simple fact is this, European businesses will still want to sell us their stuff in return for us selling them our stuff; that was always the case.

OK then here is your quiz.

A unified defence policy is one of the main aims of the EU, introduced on page 3 of the Maastricht Treaty signed by John Major in 1992.

Q1) Can you imagine twenty seven (Ed: 26?) countries agreeing on a united stance against Russia when Germany so heavily relies on Russia for gas?

Most commentators think that the eventual creation of a united European army could never be met.

So then, if your answer is no (Ed: Obvs! (Sorry about him, but he’s been getting out a bit more lately)) then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party on 12th December 2019.

Just one of many examples of how Maastricht is just potty; to put it mildly. More examples follow.

But, before we go on to more questions, I must share two videos from Margaret Thatcher; they are both just over one minute and well worth a listen.

As many of you will know, she is not my favourite politician but here she speaks with a clarity that should make any remainer stop in their tracks.

In one minute twenty seconds Margaret Thatcher calmly explains why the Maastricht Treaty will take the EU in a direction that the UK should not follow.

This was just before she was ousted as PM by her personal “night of the long knives”.

Q2) Do you want our foreign policy to be decided in Brussels by the next version of Herman Von Rompuy? (Ed: Who he? Me: Look it up)

That was another main aim for the EU introduced in the Maastricht Treaty of 1992. (Page 4)

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q3) Do you really want 70 trucks to continue to move the EU parliament from Brussels to Strasbourg each month?

This at an annual cost of 114 million Euros (at 2014 prices). The MEPs + staff + cooks & bottle washers stay there for four days and they all come back to Brussels again.

The Strasbourg EU parliament building. This is used for 4 days a month then deserted for the next 27. ;-(  It only cost €470 million to build. What a bargain!

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This stupid state of affairs has been there since the establishment of the Iron and Steel Community in 1952.

(Ed: Really didn’t know that? (Yes that move really has happened each month for the last 67 years).

67 years @ €114 million per year = € 7,638,000,000 in wasted cash – your cash 😉

For your amusement please read my source here.

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q4) Do you never, like me, want to see that piggy faced (apologies to all pigs everywhere) SNP MP bore spout the same old undemocratic bollocks nonsense again and again? He’s the one banging on and on about Scottish independence because, when he had a referendum on that, he lost. He’s the one who ignores the simple fact that Scotland is in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and is not – nor ever will be a separate country with the Euro-haggis as a currency.

Most of us, including the Scots, want Scotland to stay in the UK and do not want two more referendums on Brexit & Scottish independence which is Labour party policy.

The official result of the Scottish Independence Referendum on a turnout of 84.6% was:

Yes 1,617,989 (45%) No 2,001,926 (55%)

If you can still remember the question, and your answer is yes, then you must vote for Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party BUT not this time.

Q5) Do you want eventually to replace the pound with the Euro? Maastricht (Page 3). Currently we have an opt out that costs us dearly.

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q6) Do you really want free unregulated movement (people and capital) to continue? This also means that citizenship is regulated by the EU. Both on Page 6 of the Maastricht Treaty.

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q7) Article 104 b (page 27) prohibits the EU taking on the financial commitments of a member state; effectively prohibiting bailouts.

However, the EU has ignored that rule 12 times to the tune of €544 billion (of your money) as at 2018.

So do you want to be party to an organisation which breaks its own rules regularly and so spectacularly?

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party. (Ed: Obvs.)

Q8) Page 73 Article 188(b) is a wonderful pile of garbage. This sets up the “Court of Auditors”. Yup – the EU does its own auditing, but get this: for the last 21 years the auditors of the EU have identified serious shortcomings in in the “veracity” of the figures. The consequence of which is err nothing. Throughout the Maastricht Treaty you may read the words “Recommendations and opinions shall have no binding force.'” This applies to the auditors and therefore renders them toothless. Also applies to the European Central Bank.

So do you think that is a good way to manage your money?

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party. (Ed: Obvs.)

Q9) Page 3 creates the Euro to establish a monetary and fiscal union; ‘one currency to bind them all’.

This means that all members of the Euro have the same fiscal (tax) policy. If you think that makes sense then I suggest that you do a bit of economic analysis of each member state before bursting out with laughter. First term lecture two or three of any economics course would have put you right.

Then, if you think still that the Euro works as well for Greece as it does for Germany, then you must vote for Jeremy Corbyn or Jo Swinson.

Q10) Page 200 ensures that “1. Each Member State shall ensure that the principle of equal pay for male and female workers for equal work is applied.”

If you think that is going well, after 27 years of “member states ensuring” that it happens, then you must vote Liberal Democrat. Jo Swinson becomes our next Prime Minister. ;-o

I thought I should finish with a joke (The line just above this one just in case you missed it).

One could go on and on …but one won’t (Ed: thank you).

Conclusion

This election is just about achieving our clean departure from the EU and nothing else, despite what Corbyn is trying to say.

The least worse of our party leaders is, for me, Boris Johnson. He ain’t perfect but his time is now and he is exactly who we need to get us out of the pile of poo that is the EU.

The Maastricht Treaty, signed by John Major in 1992 is a woolly pile of legalese which converted the EEC, which was a trade union (which sort of made sense), into a political and monetary union (which makes no sense at all). Derogation is a word that means “an exemption from or relaxation of a rule or law” which is mentioned 48 times in the treaty and basically means that if a rule within the treaty is broken by a member state they are told off very firmly but their two hour lunch continues unabated.

A final point of interest:

My spell checker corrects ‘Maastricht’ into ‘Christmas’ – funny old world eh?

Happy Maastricht!

 

 

 

 

Go BoJo! Who are the Pro Rogues now?

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May I try to put the childish, irrelevant “furious backlash“, as reported today by the BrBC (British remoaning Broadcasting Corporation), into some logical context?

A view from Winston Churchill – he never envisaged that we would be a part of a political union

You may have guessed that I am for leaving the EU by now 😉

The remainers have been told effectively to shut by Boris.

Hurrah for him!

This is why: our MPs are simply ignoring the wishes of the British people.

In 2016 the people were asked by our government to make the decision, for the government, to either leave the EU or to remain.

This simple question was easy to answer.

More people voted in that referendum than had voted in any general election since had Noah floated across the Straights of Hormuz.

Those of us who voted to to leave won, or so we thought.

Back in 2016 we didn’t know or care about about “a deal”. We just assumed our politicians had the job of competently removing us from the pile of poo that is the EU.

Back in 2016 we had never heard about the Customs Union. We didn’t know the implications of a deal or no deal.

Back in 2016 we didn’t even think or care about the Irish border complexities. Our dear competent politicians would sort that out.

Back in 2016 we just assumed that the politicians would calmly and competently remove us from the disastrous future created by Maastricht in 1987.

Back in 2016 we did not know why we were being ruled Herman Von Rompuy, or who he was. We did not know, or care, who the President of the EU was, or why there were 4 other parts of the EU that made the whole thing completely undemocratic, by design!

There were many other things about the EU that we did not know about either, we did not care. We just wanted out!

It had nothing to with economics or most of the argument we later heard ad nauseam from the remainers who could not accept that they had lost the most direct form democratic of vote we have.

The following describe my reasons for leaving the EU.

The EU:-

  • was in 1975 an trade union (we had a referendum to decide that). The EU became a political union in in 1987 (Maastricht: no referendum on that!)
  • is undemocratic by design, more so after Maastricht,
  • is faceless (go on, tell me who Herman Von Rompuy is?),
  • is financially incompetent,
  • has disregarded failed audit reports for over 20 years,
  • is intent on creating a federal European state ruled from Belgium (Maastricht),
  • is intent of creating a European Army (Maastricht),
  • is intent on supporting global business to the detriment of the people’s benefit,
  • is run (until last month) by a corporate tax avoidance specialist; Jean Claude Juncker
  • is designed to support Germany first, France second and everybody else third (the Euro created by Maastricht),
  • has created agricultural subsidies that make no sense unless you are French or German

Finally a few words from Daniel Hannan MEP. A touch of humour to cheer you all up!

 

 

 

Salzburg, time for May to walk away, enough is enough

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The BBC’s ridiculous pro-Remain stance is irritating enough, but Salzburg has exposed Theresa May, yet again, to be completely clueless. I have been saying this for months here and here and here.

Brexit means “buggered if I know”

Do the BBC, Theresa May & Dominic Raab really think we are all stupid?

The EU’s delusional bureaucracy is simply fighting for its very existence. It is scared shitless of the domino effect once we, the second largest net contributor, leave.

The EU is a failed organisation run by failed politicians and tax avoidance specialists. It is incapable of realising, as David Cameron found out to his cost, that their future depends on sensible changes to the preposterous way they run things.

May’s technical people, the ones who know how things work, have all deserted the sinking ship that is the Tory party. They together with David Davis, hoped that the EU & Theresa May would see the sensible but fair way forward and hoped, somewhat irrationally, that the EU would also see.

Labour and the Liberals sank with Milliband and Clegg and are all still at sea too. Help!

‘Tis the same with politicians and journalists in the Westmonster (spelled correctly) village. They speak the same language but only listen to words from like minded narrow focused professionals who spout the same bollocks.

Meanwhile, the rest of us can see that the EU is a dreadful example of humanity’s stupidity and ignorance. The Euro is simply daft and cannot ever work for Greece & Germany at the same time because the Euro is effectively the Deutsch-mark.

The EEC was just about acceptable as a way to stop Germany starting another world war but Churchill never intended that we join the damn organisation!

Even, my pet hate, Margaret Thatcher, who was a disaster for the UK in so many ways, saw the stupidity of Maastricht and would never have signed the damn treaty that created the EU.

Please watch her famous “No, No No speech here. One of the finest moments of our history, now all but forgotten by anyone under 40.

Mrs May, for Pete’s sake do not waste any more time on the EU, they are in denial of their own inevitable demise, as are you.

Instead start working on a successful No Deal exit on March 29th 2019.

Then you can focus on things like:-

  1. Keeping the lights on as we close coal & nuclear powered stations destined for closure over the next few years.
  2. Making sure that Amazon, Google etc., Facebook, Vodaphone, et al pay realistic tax to HMRC. Stop them laughing at the UK for its damn stupid tax regime
  3. Don’t worry about UK businesses, they will sort themselves out, as the successful ones always do.
  4. Population control. That requires a 50 year plan and some careful wise thought processes…
  5. NHS, educashun, HS2, Northern Ireland government self rule and so many more it makes my teeth hurt.
  6. Your legacy might then mean something …

There are so many more important issues for any government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain to be worried about. far more so than the ridiculous EU.

Acknowledgement: Thank you Christian Adams for the cartoon

Brexit: UK fisheries are sold out … again

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As Nigel Farage has said today “We sold out fisheries when we joined the EEC and we’re selling them out now as we leave.”

I could not agree more, but it seems that almost nobody else can see that “we the people” are being screwed both by the EU and our own government.

I think the two cartoons below tell the story better than I can but where would we be without a sense of humour? (Answer: at foot of this article)

The journalistic coverage by the BBC and most daily papers is truly extraordinary in its quiet acceptance of U turn after U turn by our our truly pathetic government Brexit negotiating team.

Bailouts are illegal under Maaastricht but never mind eh? What’s for lunch? Ah yes British cod fillets YUM!

The smile of apparent pleasure on David Davis’ face yesterday raised my blood pressure to unknown levels. He should instead be hiding his head in shame.

Our Brexit “negotiating(?)” team has repeatedly shown us the way things will go, which is all in the favour of the laughably incompetent and corrupt EU management team of tax avoiding specialists headed by the biggest tax avoidance criminal of them all, Jean Claude Juncker.

Just a reminder of why we are leaving the EU:-

  1. First and foremost, the British people voted to leave, with a bigger percentage of the vote than any serving UK government has enjoyed in decades.
  2. The Maastricht treaty, signed by that complete idiot John Major which;-
    • created the Euro, a truly daft currency which has no economic merit, and which is actually designed to
      • force a federal Europe on European citizens who never even knew it was happening,
      • outlaw bailouts of failing member countries but has, to date, allowed 7
      • create a EU parliament which has no power what so ever!
      • allow Great Britain to keep just 40% of its own fish!
  3. The EU’s own accounts have NOT met auditing standards in the last 22 years. They are either completely financially incompetent or hiding corruption. WHICH IS IT? Does anyone care?
  4. Still continuing is the farcical, fortnightly convoy of lorries between Strasbourg & Brussels carrying all the files required to enable the administration to continue in two separate places. The convoy then picks it all up again and returns from whence it came.
  5. The EEC made sense, the EU never has and we the people were never asked. The EU does however work for multi-national big globalised business.
  6. Democracy? A distant memory …
  7. We want to keep curved bananas! (If you are under 40 you won’t get that joke. But, it was very nearly not a joke)
David Davis – can’t even see the joke

I have a further 15 or so reasons for leaving the ridiculous EU – they are all in this blog’s articles  over the last 7 years or so

I may have to give this up, I have almost lost my sense of humour ;-(

Acknowledgements: To VoxEurope who can see what is happening

Answer: Germany

The Institute for global change, Blair & Adonis

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The latest utterances from a so-called think tank called “The Institute for Global Change” blames Populism for the incorrect result of the Brexit referendum.  This needs to be challenged along with today’s poppycock spouted by Lord Adonis after his resignation as Chairman of the National Infrastructure Commission. Adonis said in his letter of resignation “Brexit is a populist and nationalist spasm worthy of Donald Trump” (full text of his letter here).

Blair agreed with Jeremy Corbyn then! See the full text extract from their 1983 manifesto at the foot of this post. An interesting read because it sounds just like today’s news!

This preposterously and egotistically named organisation, fronted by Tony Blair and funded by globalised multinationals (but try and find out who!) is a poorly camouflaged attempt attempt to make the call for a second referendum on EU membership seem reasonable.

You just have to follow this link for the Twitter response to his Christmas message on Twitter. The responses are enough to gladden the heart of any curmudgeon like me 😉

Lord Adonis, a Labour peer, was the last Blairite sympathiser to have remained anywhere near the seat of current political power and has chaired the National Infrastructure Commission since 2015. Both he and Blair are Remoaners but look how Blair’s views have changed since 1983 when he was a Labour leadership candidate.  Lord Adonis, who was transport secretary under Gordon Brown between 2009 and 2010, has chaired the National Infrastructure Commission since 2015. The commission produces a report in every Parliament advising the government on spending in areas such as transport connections and energy.

Lord Adonis sparked anger earlier this year when he compared Brexit to the appeasement of the Nazis in the 1930s, and has repeatedly called for last year’s referendum vote to be reversed.

Pope Blair on why he lied over the invasion of Iraq. A good Catholic convert from Anglicanism, just like Robert Mugabe…

The article appears so logical and is indeed very well researched, but fails to even consider the real reason for so-called populism, which is the proliferation of lying (sorry, of course I meant to say disingenuous), duplicitous self-interested scum-bags like Blair! The rise of the bland, but ‘clever’, career politician who never answers the question, who are trained to waste our time but who have at last succeeded in pissing off an entire generation of voters. We the people have nobody to vote for but we are all a bit too lazy to revolt, so we must take our share of blame. Any politician with integrity, balls and vision has either retired or cannot stomach what is now required to be today’s party political leader.

I hate almost everything about Tony Blair and just cannot understand why so many regard him as some sort of wise elder statesman. I have been unable to write about him for some years because the very sight of him just makes me feel sick. Most of us over the age of 40 will remember the first few weeks of his first term as PM and thinking “At last, a politician (see the glowing teeth of the young man to the left) with vision, integrity and the energy to change the status quo”.

How wrong we all were! The first clue as to his real nature, for me at least, was when I heard his smarmy utterance “I feel the hand of destiny on my shoulder (Diana’s death)” issuing from his loathsome face.

That realisation morphed into my disdain of everything he and his consumerist wife became and still are.

OK, back to his article on populism where the most important thing to know is who funds ‘think-tanks’. (You try to find out yourself!)

They were invented by a few clever, but conservative, strategists just before Margaret Thatcher first became Prime Minister. Their rise is probably the most significant event in recent British political history along with Special Advisers and the party whip system. I can heartily recommend Owen Jones’ book “The Establishment (and how they get way with it)”, in which he analyses the rise of the think tank in forensic detail. You won’t believe how they ever so cleverly changed public opinion.

‘A dissection of the profoundly and sickeningly corrupt state that is present-day Britain. He (Owen Jones) is a fine writer, and this is a truly necessary book’ Philip Pullman (author of His Dark Materials)

1983 Labour Party manifesto (extract)

It explains why we should have left years ago & demonstrates why we can’t trust Corbyn, and we all know we can’t trust Blair (I hope?)

This from 1983 is so reasonable and is fully supportive of Winston Churchill’s (Tory) and Clement Atlee’s (Labour) views in the 1950s despite Adonis and Blair saying otherwise.

Britain and the Common Market

Geography and history determine that Britain is part of Europe, and Labour wants to see Europe safe and prosperous. But the European Economic Community, which does not even include the whole of Western Europe, was never devised to suit us, and our experience as a member of it has made it more difficult for us to deal with our economic and industrial problems. It has sometimes weakened our ability to achieve the objectives of Labour’s international policy.

The next Labour government, committed to radical, socialist policies for reviving the British economy, is bound to find continued membership a most serious obstacle to the fulfilment of those policies. In particular the rules of the Treaty of Rome are bound to conflict with our strategy for economic growth and full employment, our proposals on industrial policy and for increasing trade, and our need to restore exchange controls and to regulate direct overseas investment. Moreover, by preventing us from buying food from the best sources of world supply, they would run counter to our plans to control prices and inflation.

For all these reasons, British withdrawal from the Community is the right policy for Britain – to be completed well within the lifetime of the parliament. That is our commitment. But we are also committed to bring about withdrawal in an amicable and orderly way, so that we do not prejudice employment or the prospect of increased political and economic co-operation with the whole of Europe.

We emphasise that our decision to bring about withdrawal in no sense represents any weakening of our commitment to internationalism and international co operation. We are not ‘withdrawing from Europe’. We are seeking to extricate ourselves from the Treaty of Rome and other Community treaties which place political burdens on Britain. Indeed, we believe our withdrawal will allow us to pursue a more dynamic and positive international policy – one which recognises the true political and geographical spread of international problems and interests. We will also seek agreement with other European governments – both in the EEC and outside – on a common strategy for economic expansion.

The process of withdrawal

On taking office we will open preliminary negotiations with the other EEC member states to establish a timetable for withdrawal; and we will publish the results of these negotiations in a White Paper. In addition, as soon as possible after the House assembles, we will introduce a Repeal Bill: first, in order to amend the 1972 European Communities Act, ending the powers of the Community in the UK; and second, to provide the necessary powers to repeal the 1972 Act, when the negotiations on withdrawal are completed.

Following the publication of the White Paper, we will begin the main negotiations on withdrawal. Later, when appropriate and in the same parliament, we will use our powers to repeal the 1972 Act and abrogate the Treaty of Accession – thus breaking all of our formal links with the Community. Britain will at this point withdraw from the Council of Ministers and from the European Parliament.

There will need to be a period of transition, to ensure a minimum of disruption – and to phase in any new agreements we might make with the Community. This will enable us to make all the necessary changes in our domestic legislation. Until these changes in UK law have taken place, the status quo as regards particular items of EEC legislation will remain. And this period will, of course, extend beyond the date when we cease, formally, to be members.

One gets a feeling of deja vu?

Toodleoo

The EEC, the EU and why it’s time to leave

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Ever since I started this blog, some 8 years ago, I have written many posts urging us to leave the EU because of what I discovered in my personal quest to understand why and how the EEC became the EU.

Prophetic is the description I would use, or so I hope, having just re-read them. I’d love to know what you think! 😉

This is my last chance to persuade you to vote leave on the 23rd June.

Do you have 15 minutes to spare? Please read on…

Here we go :

This from 2012:

Blackadder explains the Euro to Baldrick …

Blackadder explains the complexity of the Euro to Baldrick
Blackadder explains the complexity of the Euro to Baldrick

Baldrick: “What I want to know Sir, is, before there was a Euro there were lots of different types of money that different people used. And now there’s only one type of money that the foreign people use. And what I want to know is, how did we get from one state of affairs to the other state of affairs”
Blackadder: “Do you mean, how did the Euro start?”
Baldrick: “Yes Sir”
Blackadder: “Well, you see Baldrick, back in the 1980s there were many different countries all running their own finances and using different types of money. On one side you had the major economies of France , Belgium , Holland and Germany , and on the other, the weaker nations of Spain, Greece , Ireland , Italy and Portugal . They got together and decided that it would be much easier for everyone if they could all use the same money, have one Central Bank, and belong to one large club where everyone would be happy. This meant that there could never be a situation whereby financial meltdown would lead to social unrest, wars and crises”.
Baldrick: “But this is sort of a crisis, isn’t it Sir?”.
Blackadder: “That’s right Baldrick. You see, there was only one slight flaw with the plan”.
Baldrick: “What was that then, Sir?”
Blackadder: “It was bollocks”.

For a slightly more detailed analysis on why the creation of the Euro was a politically, incompetent cockup of the highest order, please see my final article on the Euro written in December 2011.

Acknowledgements: Unfortunately, I do not know who wrote this <the earliest reference I could find was on the UKIP website date 26th February 2012> but would like to thank them from the heart of my bottom!

This from 2014: Ed Milliband has never really found his way into our hearts since becoming leader of the New / Old / Labour / Lost / Middle party. The labour party faithful just cannot accept that he is simply not leadership material. He sounds odd and looks weird. If that seems unkind, well tough, it’s simply true! Not PC but true.

Our next PM?
Our next PM?

Millibean’s  latest desperate pronouncement on not supporting an  EU referendum just shows how incapable of rational thought he is. He is caught in the party political game and cannot think about what is good for the people of Britain.

The alternative? god help us all!
The alternative? god help us all!
But see below >>>

This latest media fest on the EU referendum, as usual, discusses none of the real reasons for the UK leaving the sinking ship that is the EU. I repeat now what I said last May because the facts are just the same – the only thing that changes is the damn party politicians!

Nowhere has anyone actually got to grips with the real problems with the EU, just a few of which are these:-

1 – The EU is just too damn big; it is completely unmanageable and is run by bonkers, failed ex-leaders of failed countries (See 10 below)
2 – The EU has forgotten why it was formed in the first place (to stop Germany starting a third world war if you had forgotten or are too young to know)
3 – The EU is incompetent; those in charge are failures in their own countries – farmed out to a slow, but oh so well paid, death in Brussels
4 – The EU bureaucrats are overpaid for doing nothing to benefit the people of Europe
5 – The EU is so inefficient that it makes my teeth hurt
6 – The EU spends most of its time herding cats (people who will never agree on anything)
7 – The EU cannot even balance its books (19 years of audited but inaccurate, qualified final accounts).
8 – The EU is undemocratic; the MEPs have no power and cannot hold the executive to account by design!
9 – The EU wastes so much of our tax money that it’s leaders should be in jail

Boris for PM - Hurray ;-)
Boris for PM – Hurray 😉

10 – The EU is run by a failed former Portuguese Prime Minister and a failed Belgian Prime Minister! Well that’s alright then (Belgium has not had a valid government for years & Portugal is as bust as Greece)
11 – Germany has just announced an astonishing proposal for an 20 fold increase in the EU ‘diplomatic budget’  (but see 13 below)
12 – Oh, I almost forgot the Euro; possibly the most stupid ever invention ever conceived by man
13 – Even Van Rompuy & Baroness Ashton realise the game is up are are quitting in 2014
14 – Above all the EU is NOT what “we the people” want, which is the European Economic Community. We voted for the EEC in 1975 but since then the slow, slimy, sickening morphing into the EU has been quietly and completely undemocratically, foisted upon us.

Those in power are quietly allowing currencies to devalue (The £ by a shocking 35% since 2008!) whilst QE (That’s ‘quantitative easing’, not our Lizzie) creates a background slow death of inflation so the banks can stay in power.

Nowhere are these fundamentally important issues being discussed – why not?

This is mass madness on such a scale that words are beginning to fail me …OK not quite ;-)

We the people are being ‘handled’ while those who create the acres of meedja crap and spend the people’s money so incompetently are unchallenged by anyone talking common sense.

Here’s what needs to be done:-

  • Either the EU needs to be reformed back to the size of the EEC (pre Maastricht)

or

  • All those counties outside the Euro-zone should leave and let Germany stew in its own Euro fueled bonfire of failed European federalism.

If we can’t really take Dave, Ed, Nigel or Nick, well, there’s always ….Boris!

Note from the Editor: “No real people were hurt when taking these pictures of our beloved ruling elite.” 😉

This from 2012:

Two facts you may not know about the Maastricht Treaty…

Last December  (2011) I said there was no more to say about the ridiculous EU; just lately I have had to say more, mainly after José Manuel Barroso said the EU needs to become a Federation urgently! Baroso former PM of Portugal with a stupefying record of economic incompetence is now in charge of the EU project … words fail me …

If you, like me (a few years ago), didn’t give a damn about Maastricht or even notice it, well, you should; it is nothing short of a criminally incompetent plan to turn member states into a Federal European state run by Germany.

Barroso crying after he learns that the people of France & Holland do not want the EU
President of the EU; José Manuel Barroso, former PM of Portugal (there’s a CV to be proud of) crying after he learns that the people of France & Holland do not want the EU, but never mind, let’s just ignore the voters – as usual – and they did

The Maastricht treaty was the final, in a slimy, devious series, of non-democratic treaties; moves, by Federalists within the appointed EU bureaucracy, to change the EEC, which actually was a jolly good idea into the European Union. We voted YES for the EEC in the 1975 referendum.

We now have, in the EU’s current form, an organisation where the leaders are NOT taken from the elected European MPs – they are appointed by Herman Van Rompuy’s department. If you want to know how that happened then I welcome you to the LaLaland of smoke, mirrors, incompetence, unbelievable inefficiency and corruption of all that is decent about humanity; viz the EU Commissioners.

The Dutch said No

However, we, the people, never ever voted for this slow morphing of the EEC into the EU; and when, accidentally, the French & Dutch were given a chance to express their opinions in 2005 they said NO – very loudly; and were quietly and sickeningly ignored.

The French say Non!

The Irish were supposed to be asked too but this was delayed because they would have said no too; later, when they needed an illegal bailout – they said yes after a slimy YES campaign!

We, in the UK, were not asked and most of us didn’t know that we should care; so there we are – screwed!

The two facts you might not know:-

1) According to the Maastricht Treaty, EU member states are not allowed to finance their public deficits by printing money. That is one reason why the Bank of England has been buying government bonds from financial institutions, not directly from the government. However – the EU states led by England are doing exactly that, but now it is called ‘Quantitative Easing‘. Faced by those weasel words, most of us just turn off and watch X Factor or Strictly instead. Meanwhile our pensions are being raped by the rich because QE is inflation by another name.

Quantitative easing is actually a backdoor process to save the banking system by apparently improving the asset side of Banks’ balance sheets, and it STINKS!

Here is what actually happens:-

  • The Bank of England prints money electronically – one minute the UK money supply is say £40 trillion quid and the next second it is £41 trillion – magic!
  • The Bank of England buys government bonds from the banks with the magic money and a public statement is made by Osborne to the effect that banks should now lend more to business.
  • UK Banks’ balance sheets now look better and have more cash for bonuses HURRAH! Buying government bonds from Pension funds has the effect of reducing the return on bonds this making shares “look” more attractive and somehow overcomes the limitation of the accepted definition of “Printing money” (Pre-war Germany, Zimbabwe etc.)
  • However, banks still do not loan to businesses because that does not return as much profit as digging holes in 3rd world countries does, which by the way is how Merchant Banks have always made their money. It is a dirty exploitative way of making profit and it STINKS.

‘The Bank of England believes  QE is different because it is “printing money” as part of monetary policy – to prevent deflation. It is not printing money to help the government finance its deficit. Also, unlike Zimbabwe, this is a temporary policy: the Bank expects to sell the government bonds back into the market when the economy recovers.’ ( Ed: Oh yeah? We wait with bated breath … ? )

2) According to the Maastricht Treaty, EU member states cannot be bailed out if they cannot finance their own debt requirements. Err, but, they have been, as in Greece, Spain, Ireland and shortly Italy and in November Greece again. This is all simply par for the course for the worthless, disingenuous (aka lying, duplicitous) corrupt EU bureaucrats who invented the completely irrational Euro – simply madness to invent a common currency where no member state can control its own tax system or money supply.

To conclude:-
1) The Euro is a nonsensical construct by any rational examination; it was obviously conceived, as a first step, by those who wanted the United Federation of Europe by the back door.
2) Any member state breaking fiscal rules are simply told off (over a nice lunch) – and never held to account (e.g. Italy, Greece, Portugal never, ever met the 5 criteria for joining the Euro).
3) The so-called Treaties are worthless; because they are not democratic & nobody is ever held to account (i.e. fired!).
4) The EU itself is worthless and irrational; because no-one ever voted for it and its own accounts have failed every audit for the last 19 years!
5) Most European governments are colluding in this desperate measure to save the bankers from financial reality because it is the bankers that keep the status quo.

All three main UK political parties don’t seem to mind, do you?

This from 2015:

EU leaders remain clueless – Greece in denial

At London Conference of 1953, the Greek Minister of Finance signed a treaty agreeing to cancel 50% of Germany’s debt! How times change!

While the idiotic posturing of Jean-Claude Juncker (a banker friendly supporter of globalisation and an expert in tax avoidance for multi-nationals) waits for Greece to agree to ridiculous demands to pay back the banks, who were daft enough to loan a third world economy buckets of cash in the first place, Greece’s Prime Minister (and most of the Greek people) still want to retain the Euro.

Juncker talking out of the rear end of a German elephant
Juncker talking out of the rear end of a German elephant

Both sides in the debate, which is scheduled to end this Sunday (but don’t hold your breath) are publicly refusing to accept the inevitable, which is this:

  • Greece’s debt (almost twice its GDP) has to be reduced by at least 50% and the banksters will have to take their haircut. The longer the banks refuse their haircut, the worse the financial crash will be
  • Greece needs to cut the public sector back to 15% of the working population rather than the 40% it is today (similar to Northern Ireland…)
  • Greece must return the retirement age to 65 ish rather than the current ridiculous 61.9
  • Greek cash based tax avoidance culture is just too different from that of Northern Europe, and the EU’s incompetence in allowing Greece, Italy and Portugal to join is a cock-up which will inevitably lead to the Euro’s demise

Those are the simple economic realities which both sides are cannot face.

Yanis Varoufakis, the Greek finance minister sacked a few days ago (to appease EU bankers) was the only person qualified enough in economics to be worth listening to.

Yanis Varoufakis talking sense
Yanis Varoufakis talking about the EU, so, he had to go! Hehe!

His blog makes perfect sense in debunking the ridiculous Euro and the undemocratic nonsense that is the EU.

The stark realities are that 20% of the population of Greece are below the EU poverty line and levels of unemployment average out at 55%.

Behind all this posturing is, of course, the basic nonsense that is the Euro. William Hague wrote an excellent article in yesterday’s Daily Telegraph which explains what I have been saying here since 2006, i.e. that the Euro is potty, well worth a read ! Pity he didn’t have the balls to say it loud and clear when he had the power to do something about it.

Sad and tragic days ahead for Greece.

What happens next Sunday at the EU summit?

Buggered if I know!

Acknowledgements:

Steve Bell, Guardian cartoonist, for the elephant

Yanis Varoufakis Yanis Varoufakis blog

There are several more articles but if you have not watched Brexit the movie, I urge you to do so. You owe it to your grand children.

Cameraman, the EU & the pointless charade

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Everyone I meet who is even minimally interested in the EU, knows that Cameraman’s EU negotiations have been pointless from the start. The charade continues to be supported by the BBC and most journalists because “the story” fills up the time available for news broadcasts and keeps everyone busy.

I'm off soon anyway, just wanted to be in the press a lot before then...
… and anyway, I’m off soon anyway, and then it’s all over to Boris & George…

There is no reason at all to link the date of the promised referendum to what Cameraman is doing. Yet this is being presented as being a necessary step!

Absolute poppycock. (I would have preferred to use the word bollocks, but Chaucerian invective is out of fashion, so I am told).

Jacob Rees Mogg said it  if too politely (please watch him by clicking on the “said it” link) ; “what has been asked for is fundamentally trivial”,  “two of the four demands are gradually happening anyway”, “the third demand will never be accepted and the fourth part (the time delay for benefits availability) would not make very much difference to the numbers of EU immigrants coming here.

Simple facts have been ignored. Britain is the fifth largest economy in the world with Germany fourth and France sixth. Italy is eighth and the Netherlands seventeenth and the other 23 member states are way down the list. Child benefit in Romania is £2 per week and £16 here. In short, the economies are so diverse that “ever closer union” is just plain daft and a common currency was always daft.

The reason so many people want to come to Britain is that we have a higher standard of living, a humane police force, stability and Radio 4. Well OK, perhaps that last one is more about me than them 😉 , but we have a culture that is the envy of the world and a minimum wage to drool over, if you are Romanian that is.

Cameron’s original idea of “reform” was supposed to apply to all EU members, remember that? Well, the so called ‘trivial’ reforms, if ever agreed, will only ever apply to Britain. The whole process is meaningless, time consuming drivel.

What Cameraman has not demanded are the really important things:

a) Financial competence please: The EU is systemically incapable of financial competence. Nineteen years of accounts which cannot be supported by its auditors! Yup, the EU’s accounts have never provided a “true and fair view” of financial matters.

b) Democracy please: The EU is undemocratic by design. The MEPs (salaries vastly higher than our own MPs) have no say on policy and spend most of their time arguing over wording in committees for legislation that most people in Europe find irritating, pointless or plain daft.

c) Immigration control please. Measures which make sense to you and me.

d) The Euro is a daft currency, based purely on party political desires rather than any economic common sense. Greece, Portugal, Italy and Spain are still as bust as they were 3 years ago and the danger of the Euro collapsing has not gone away. The German Central bank is now charging negative interest to some depositors! The whole economics of the Euro is a joke. The EU is hell bent on supporting the banking system rather than the little people (that’s you and me and your Polish plumber whose kids still live in Poland).

e) The EU is too beholden to corporate interests, and the behind-closed-doors negotiations over the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) confirm this. This poses a huge threat to our environmental standards, consumer protections and workers’ rights. If you don’t know what TTIP is then please find out!

f) We would like the EEC back please – that sort of made sense.

We need to get out of this oversized, potty political union as soon as possible before it bankrupts us.

The only beneficiaries of staying in the EU are globalised business and oversized banks.

I’m a person, just like you dear reader, with common sense.

GET US OUT OF HERE!!

VOTE LEAVE, it will be alright, really it will.

EU 2014 fallout; a ray of hope for the EEC?

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Our “None of the above” protest vote is still not being heard by any of the political parties.

Clegg in the Poo
Clegg in the Poo

What we the people have said is what none of those in power want to hear.

We, the people, have said it, not just in Britain, but, all over Europe.

The knee jerk response to the EU, is UKIP’s “out is best”. I have a fair degree of sympathy with that view, but let’s examine the alternatives.

Notice, I do not mention immigration once and that is where UKIP have gone wrong in my view. The immigration policies of the EU, Labour, Lib-dims and Tory have been crazy for the last 20 years, but that’s not the main problem with Europe. The damage done to the fabric of Britishness is what most upsets many who directly experience the ghettoisation of many cities in the UK. Multi-culturalism was the issue, misunderstood by the political class and never dealt with; these EU election results and UKIP’s success is the result.

We the people never wanted the astonishing intrusion to our national identity, that is the direct result of EU law.

The main problem with the EU is that it was the EEC that we all voted for in the 1975 referendum.
– the EEC was a sensible construct; designed to stop Germany shooting at us all again
– the EEC was an economic collaboration of similar advanced European countries; it made sense
– the EEC morphed into a wishy washy federalist state designed by faceless twits in Brussels
– the EU is far too big and is run by failed politicians from Portugal & Belgium
– the EU is completely undemocratic, therefore, crass decisions are never opposed
– the job of an MEP is pointless; their votes do not count towards policy decisions at all (by design)
– corruption & inefficiency is endemic
– ridiculous situations are perpetuated, e.g.
– the fortnightly move from Brussels to Strasbourg in a fleet of lorries
– the Common Agricultural Policy which favours France to the point of idiocy
– inflated salaries are the norm for jobs that do nothing for we the people
– as for the Euro, words almost fail me. The Euro-zone “crisis” remains un-addressed. Disaster still lurks while they hope it goes away

The required reforms are these:-
– the complete unwinding of the EU back to the EEC (i.e. pre-Maastricht)
– the removal of the Euro from all but Germany, France and perhaps Holland. The rest of the Euro-zone is so economically primitive that it just beggars belief that it was allowed to join.

David Cameraman wants to tinker with bits here and there but still supports the global pro-EU businesses that support the Tory party.euroresults25may14-1-478158 Labour still can’t accept that Ed Millibean is a joke, perhaps a number 2, but NOT a leader. The Lib-dims (who dey?) still can’t accept that Nick Clegg (who he?) is unelectable and that the EU needs such fundamental reform that his continued support for it is just ridiculous.

So then, perhaps UKIP are right after all, there’s just too much wrong with the EU. Let’s just get out and renegotiate individual agreements like we used to.
It will be OK, don’t listen to words of fear, its only globalised commerce that’s scared of a smaller EU, less easy money to be made.

Acknowledgement:

Brian Adcock for the cartoon that says it all on Cagle.com

The EU, silly Millband and daft Dave’s desperate days

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Ed Milliband has never really found his way into our hearts since becoming leader of the New / Old / Labour / Lost / Middle party. The labour party faithful just cannot accept that he is simply not leadership material. He sounds odd and looks weird. If that seems unkind, well tough, it’s simply true! Not PC but true.

Our next PM?
Our next PM?

Millibean’s  latest desperate pronouncement on not supporting a referendum just shows how incapable of rational thought he is. He is caught in the party political game and cannot think about what is good for the people of Britain.

The alternative? god help us all!
The alternative? god help us all!
But see below >>>

This latest media fest on the EU referendum, as usual, discusses none of the real reasons for the UK leaving the sinking ship that is the EU. I repeat now what I said last May because the facts are just the same – the only thing that changes is the damn party politicians!

Nowhere has anyone actually got to grips with the real problems with the EU, just a few of which are these:-

1 – The EU is just too damn big; it is completely unmanageable and is run by bonkers, failed ex-leaders of failed countries (See 10 below)
2 – The EU has forgotten why it was formed in the first place (to stop Germany starting a third world war if you had forgotten or are too young to know)
3 – The EU is incompetent; those in charge are failures in their own countries – farmed out to a slow, but oh so well paid, death in Brussels
4 – The EU bureaucrats are overpaid for doing nothing to benefit the people of Europe
5 – The EU is so inefficient that it makes my teeth hurt
6 – The EU spends most of its time herding cats (people who will never agree on anything)
7 – The EU cannot even balance its books (19 years of audited but inaccurate, qualified final accounts).
8 – The EU is undemocratic; the MEPs have no power and cannot hold the executive to account by design!
9 – The EU wastes so much of our tax money that it’s leaders should be in jail

Boris for PM - Hurray ;-)
Boris for PM – Hurray 😉

10 – The EU is run by a failed former Portuguese Prime Minister and a failed Belgian Prime Minister! Well that’s alright then (Belgium has not had a valid government for years & Portugal is as bust as Greece)
11 – Germany has just announced an astonishing proposal for an 20 fold increase in the EU ‘diplomatic budget’  (but see 13 below)
12 – Oh, I almost forgot the Euro; possibly the most stupid ever invention ever conceived by man
13 – Even Van Rompuy & Baroness Ashton realise the game is up are are quitting in 2014
14 – Above all the EU is NOT what “we the people” want, which is the European Economic Community. We voted for the EEC in 1975 but since then the slow, slimy, sickening morphing into the EU has been quietly and completely undemocratically, foisted upon us.

Those in power are quietly allowing currencies to devalue (The £ by a shocking 35% since 2008!) whilst QE creates a background slow death of inflation so the banks can stay in power.

Nowhere are these fundamentally important issues being discussed – why not?

This is mass madness on such a scale that words are beginning to fail me …OK not quite ;-)

We the people are being ‘handled’ while those who create the acres of meedja crap and spend the people’s money so incompetently are unchallenged by anyone talking common sense.

Here’s what needs to be done:-

  • Either the EU needs to be reformed back to the size of the EEC (pre Maastricht)

or

  • All those counties outside the Euro-zone should leave and let Germany stew in its own Euro fueled bonfire of failed European federalism.

If we can’t really take Dave, Ed, Nigel or Nick, well, there’s always ….Boris!

Note from the Editor: “No real people were hurt when taking these pictures of our beloved ruling elite.” 😉

 

EU debate – the ‘in or out’ un-reality show

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Everywhere the meedja is full of the ‘politics’ of the EU “in / out” issue.

Nowhere are the reasons for being in or out of the EU being discussed rationally.

This says it all - hehe
This says it all – hehe

Everywhere the need for “reform” is argued.

Nowhere is “reform” actually defined.

Everywhere hundreds (maybe thousands) of highly paid journalists and politicians are producing acres of crap about who said what, why that might be important and to whom and how this might affect some other political being or argument, i.e fluff, poo & piffle.

Nowhere has anyone actually got to grips with the real problems with the EU, just a few of which are these:-

1 – The EU is just too damn big – it is completely unmanageable and is run by bonkers, failed ex-leaders of failed countries (See 10 below)
2 – The EU has forgotten why it was formed in the first place (to stop Germany starting a third world war if you had forgotten or are too young to know)
3 – The EU is incompetent – those in charge are failures in their own countries – farmed out to a slow, but oh so well paid, death in Brussels
4 – The EU bureaucrats are overpaid for doing nothing to benefit the people of Europe
5 – The EU is so inefficient that it makes my teeth hurt
6 – The EU spends most of its time herding cats (people who will never agree on anything)
7 – The EU cannot even balance its books (19 years of audited but inaccurate, qualified final accounts).
8 – The EU is undemocratic – the MEPs have no power and cannot hold the executive to account BY DESIGN! 9 – The EU wastes so much of our tax money that it’s leaders should be in jail

10 – The EU is run by a failed former Portuguese Prime Minister and a failed Belgian Prime Minister! Well that’s alright then (Belgium has not had a valid government for years & Portugal is as bust as Greece)
11 – Germany has just announced an astonishing proposal for an 20 fold increase in the EU ‘diplomatic budget’  (but see 13 below)
12 – Oh, I almost forgot the Euro – possibly the most stupid ever invention ever conceived by man
13 – Even Van Rompuy & Baroness Ashton realise the game is up are are quitting in 2014

14 – Above all the EU is NOT what “we the people” want, which is the European Economic Community. We voted for the EEC in 1975 but since then the slow, slimy, sickening morphing into the EU has been quietly and completely undemocratically, foisted upon us.

Those in power are quietly allowing currencies to devalue (The £ by a shocking 35% since 2008!) whilst QE creates a background slow death of inflation so the banks can stay in power.

Nowhere are these fundamentally important issues being discussed – why not?

This is mass madness on such a scale that words are beginning to fail me …OK not quite 😉

We the people are being ‘handled’ while those who create the acres of meedja crap and spend the people’s money so incompetently are unchallenged by anyone talking common sense.

Here’s what needs to be done:-

  • Either the EU needs to be reformed back to the size of the EEC (pre Maastricht)

or

  • All those counties outside the Euro-zone should leave and let Germany stew in its own foul soup of failed European federalism and silly funny money.

There is a world outside of this EU farce that we can do business with.

Acknowledgement:-  Thanks to Patrick Chappatte for the cartoon