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Some of the great moments of history sneak up on businesspeople. Two years ago, Britain looked to be Europe's most economically rational country; now its companies seem to be rolling from one economic earthquake to another, with Brexit looking increasingly likely to be followed by the election of a near-Marxist prime minister, Jeremy Corbyn.
Looking back, two things stand out. First, there were some deep underlying "irrational" causes that business ignored, such as the pent-up anger against immigration and globalization. Second, there was a string of short-term political decisions that proved to be miscalculations. For decades, for example, attacking the European Union was a "free hit" for British politicians. If David Cameron had it to do over again, would he really have made the referendum on whether to stay in it a simple majority vote (or indeed called a vote at all)? Does Angela Merkel now regret giving Cameron so few concessions before the Brexit vote? Would the moderate Labour members of Parliament who helped Corbyn get on their party's leadership ballot in the name of political diversity really do that again?
Now, another rupture may be sneaking up on Europe, driven by a similar mixture of pent-up anger and short-term political maneuvering. This one is between the old West European democratic core of the EU, led by Merkel and increasingly by Emmanuel Macron, who are keen to integrate the euro zone, and the populist authoritarians of Eastern Europe, who dislike Brussels. This time the arguments are ones about political freedom and national sovereignty.
Eastern Europe's gripes are nothing a little anschluss couldn't cure.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 06 2017, @04:04AM (5 children)
The rumor is separatists were trolling for a martyr. All they got was some "batoning", same thing than UK miners or French farmers got in the past. No more no less that what takes place in Western countries, so nobody gaves any credit to "holier than you" claims. Mossos loved "batonning" their own with the 15M movement displays, but for some of those they are heroes now.
And the huge numbers of "injuried", around 800, seem to be the total number of medical assistances for the Sunday: asthma, indigestion, bee stings, blood clots, etc including the smaller number of police targets. Vote % added to above 100. Separatists fucked up too, now they look like a bunch of liars that have no plan for the future and no brain to forecast the obvious path companies are taking. They even keep negating separation means total split, and insist they will keep whatever they want, like EU membership.
Counterexample: Scotland, they checked and followed all the laws for their referendum, with proper majority levels and at least a vague idea of what would happen (out of UK = out of EU, thus remain won).
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday October 06 2017, @04:15AM (1 child)
out of UK = out of EU, thus remain won
This policy by the EU is stupid. Now the UK is probably going to leave the union, and that means the entire UK will be out of the EU. If the EU didn't have this idiotic policy, Scotland might have seceded, but it'd now be a stalwart member of the EU, and Brexit wouldn't be quite so bad.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 06 2017, @05:32AM
Brexit isn't bad. Parts are, but the good outweighs the bad. The UK is non-Euro, Five Eyes, and Commonwealth. Having that in the EU was a huge conflict of interest that blocked the EU from becoming a proper nation.
Scotland belongs with the UK. The truly tragic part of Brexit is that Ireland also belongs with the UK. Stupid historical reasons are at fault. Ireland is now an English-speaking country; they really ought to be unified with the UK.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 06 2017, @04:36AM
Your mentality has lead to this lose-lose situation. Now, even if Catalonia remains within Spain, they would be even more of a fifth column. Nice going, Spain, simply brilliant.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 06 2017, @06:24AM (1 child)
I got another rumor for you, Hillary Clinton has a 98% chance of winning the Presidency.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Friday October 06 2017, @06:37AM
That is consistent with what happened. Without sufficiently many repetitions of the election, we cannot say whether it is true or false.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.