Oven Ready Turkeys Vote for Christmas…
By: Roland Howard
Tags: Brexit, European Union, Deal, Johnson

Oven Ready Turkeys Vote for Christmas…

Who knows whether we will back down and snatch defeat from the jaws of total defeat? There is no victory. Bojo and his rugger buggers thought that if Brits could scrum up and charge against those effete Europeans, they would collapse like a souffle. But bluster and bravado hit a concrete wall, a rock solid scrum of cheese-eating surrender monkeys, robotic Krauts, clog-wearing, doobie-smoking Dutchmen, greasy, corrupt wops and sombrero wearing, flamenco-strumming dagos. Maybe, late in the day, they realised that these people were intelligent, articulate and strong-minded human beings. And so much more principled (and stylish).

Bojo and co. love a slogan, a flag, a stirring tune and other bulldog myths of English (for it is English, not Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish) exceptionalism. Slogans over substance, nostalgia and nationalism over decency and democracy. This has hit the buffers in terms of the much more powerful, principled and economically vibrant European Union. By cutting off the EU (and all the global trade and cooperation deals that they have), we have exposed ourselves to less benign predators (Russia, China and the USA). We were playing poker with a weak hand and hoping our bulldog spirit will make our competitors “fold”. They didn’t; they knew we were a busted flush. This farce has been played out in public whilst Putin and Trump have been rubbing their hands together, eyeing the spoils. We are indeed oven ready. Our goose is cooked.

So who is to blame for the unenviable situation that we have got ourselves into? Certainly our tabloids of stone haven’t helped. For years, owned and dominated by the mega rich, they have created a culture of “Brits are good and true and foreigners are flaky and fake”. A racist dogma, fueled by fear. A little bit like that mega Kraut, Hitler. Then, take a try-hard, beer-swilling, fag-smoking nationalist like Farage, desperate to peddle lies about those despicables. For instance, his tirade about those MEPs (like him) who have “never done a proper job”- when behind him sat a face-palming cardiac surgeon who survived Soviet Gulags. Farage, like Hitler in his early days, in so many ways , has no shame: a product of Dulwich College and the city; a rich, posh boy pretending to be a prole, peddling simplistic platitudes also known as lies.

Sadly, Johnson was only too ready to follow in his wake. Pretending that Farage was a beyond-the-pale racist, Bojo aped every policy and prejudice and the Conservatives morphed into a nationalist party without the Nazi or far right regalia. Is Johnson a racist? Perhaps, but more importantly he is an opportunist who effortlessly puts power above principle. Like Trump he had delusions of grandeur based in presumption of entitlement, greatness and fame, rather than the slightly preferable noblesse oblige. Add to this, the schoolgirl hubris of Jo Swinson (my remain manifesto will bring all the boys to the yard…with all the allure of a Head Girl or Prefect) agreeing to an election, plus a dithering Corbyn sat on the horns of a uncomfortable dilemma, and we got to where we are. No deal. No deal which Johnson said was never going to happen- “ one in a million” he said; the “easiest deal in human history”, they said. Now Bojo tells us no deal is the “most likely outcome.” But he once asked us ,”Do you seriously believe that they would put up tariffs against UK produce of any kind? It is totally and utterly absurd .”

And now they are admitting that, of course, that there will be tariffs, things are going to be more expensive, we are going to be poorer. I don’t remember that on the side of a bus. They are admitting that supermarkets are going to have to introduce rationing, that fresh veg, alcohol, any European products are going to be more expensive. We face up to the fact that car manufacturers are likely to move to EU countries; that British companies will face masses of new bureaucracy (do you remember hearing about those “Brussels bureaucrats?) and some fear that they will no longer be viable, that unemployment will run through the country like a pandemic. After all, 45% of our exports go to Europe. We have created formidable obstacles for our businesses instead: we have thrown the seamless, smooth and tariff free system under the bus and replaced it with a bureaucratic, sluggish, high tariff system. It is, as the Europeans told us it would be, an example of national self harm. Since, we’re rejecting European security and anti-terrorism cooperation, it could be real, literal, literal, harm.

Now we learn that flights to Europe will be disrupted; we learn that we have to get a new license to drive in the EU; we learn that roaming charges are coming; we learn that we can’t retire abroad; we learn that for some countries we’ll need visas and, for all, we’ll have a limited time to stay before we become “illegal immigrants”; we learn that we won’t have access to healthcare and that we need private health insurance. Did you see that on the side of a (EU made) bus?

So what are those nasty Brussels bureaucrats objecting to? Why won’t they accept Bojo’s ideas and give us a deal? Erm, they’re objecting to exactly the things that they’ve said they would since Johnson signed on the Withdrawal Deal that he reneged on. Indeed, they have been consistently saying that a level-playing field, that shared governance of the deal, fishing rights and Northern Ireland were the issues. For years. Why do they care about these things?

Well, quite rightly, they don’t trust the Britons now leading us. That is the context. We tear up agreements, try to bully, make completely unreasonable demands. It’s a bit like Michael Gove or Jacob Rees Mogg trying to lie, cheat and bully Mike Tyson. Plain silly- though we’d all like to see the outcome. Why don’t the EU trust us?

Well, we reneged on the Withdrawal Treaty; we reneged on the Good Friday agreement (although, under pressure we have agreed that there will be a border down the Irish Sea); we obfuscated on a level playing field, claiming sovereignty, strangely forgetting that all trade deals involve rules that are fair to both parties, without invoking Her Majesty. Indeed, the EU is made of 27 sovereign countries but in Johnson’s eyes, they don’t count. Boris and his chums really believed that the EU would agree to playing rugger uphill!

The EU said that tariff free trade must mean that workers’ rights, environmental rights, government subsidies must be in the same ball park otherwise the Brits could use “slave labour”, no environmental standards and huge government subsidy and massively undercut European markets. No trade deal in the world would allow that and we pretend to be surprised. They also want to have a role in overseeing such a deal, in case (can you imagine?!) that we cheat and lie. Perhaps, less reasonably, (though it is something that friendly nations would agree to) they want fishing rights to be phased in over time. But again, our stupidity is remarkable: the EU won’t buy our fish unless we compromise and we export 80% of them to Europe (Johnson admitted as much when he said he’d give Nicola Sturgeon loads of surplus fish for Christmas) if we play dirty.

If it’s NO DEAL or, as Johnson likes to put it, “An Australia deal” — which means tariffs, bureacracy and delays- it is the worst possible outcome but we will “prosper mightily” according to Johnson. The Australian Prime Minister says it is not a desirable way to trade and that’s why Australia are trying to get out of it by striking a deal with the EU. Bad for Australia, bad for the UK.

They were hoping that Trump (an exaggerated version of our own buffoon) would give us a good deal when anyone knows that he would have got the USA a very good deal. Biden, however, has made it clear (as an honest politician) he who would rather deal with the EU. Deeply involved with the Good Friday Agreement, he has made it clear that the Disunited Kingdom (Scotland are likely to leave; Northern Ireland is leaning towards Ireland and the EU-and troubles may come back) is bottom of the pile. That’s the problem when you send Gove, Rees Mogg or Johnson into the ring with Tyson; it doesn’t end well.

And for workers it will almost certainly mean undermining their protections and rights. It will be the same for the environment. Johnson’s bright new flag-waving future resembles a journey back in time. Rations, gunships in the channel, a country of elitists and the poor. Can we trust these mega-rich mendacious fools to lead us over the top? We have no choice; we voted them in. Like turkey’s voting for Christmas. Oven ready.