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Web Petition For 2nd EU Referendum Draws Huge Interest (ap.org)
From an Associated Press report:An online petition seeking a second referendum on a British exit from the Europe Union has drawn more than 1.6 million names, a measure of the extraordinary divisiveness of Thursday's vote to leave the 28-nation bloc. The online petition site hosted by the House of Commons website even crashed Friday under the weight of the activity as officials said they'd seen unprecedented interest in the measure, which calls on the government to implement a rule that stating if that if "remain" or "leave" camps won less than 60 percent of the vote with less than a 75 percent turnout "there should be another referendum."According to reports, this is the biggest surge of support Parliament's website has ever seen. Looking at the keywords people were hitting up on Google after the news first broke, it was clear that a considerable portion of the population was clueless about the whole situation.
n/t
Might as well go pray. Has about the same effect.
How cute, the democratic result didn't go our way so we'll make a new referendum with skewed option balance. This surely will make our way the only way!
Should I stay or should I go
What a rotten party, have we run out of beer or something?
This is how government works. Keep having referendums until the voters get it right.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
They questioned the results of their betters, so the pro-EU media promotes a second referendum to get the "right" result.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
How could anyone have remained clueless with the wall to wall coverage? More importantly, why should anyone that apathetic be taken seriously now?
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
We didn't get the vote we wanted. Lets vote again.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
There is no such clause in the legislation that governed the referendum; he's asking the government to "implement a rule" by changing the rules after the fact, not implement a clause that was present in the legislation.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
And add some multiple choice questions about the EU this time. Five random questions from a pool of 100 drawn up by the Electoral Commission, get fewer than four right and your ballot counts as spoiled. Questions and answers to be made available online, in the press, etc., well in advance.
If you vote Leave to say "fuck the establishment and especially fuck the Tories" that's your right. If you vote Remain to force a second Scottish referendum, that's your right too - but if you don't know anything about what you're voting to remain in or to leave, and can't be arsed to educate yourself, you have no business voting.
It's a FAAAAKE!!
Hey Brits, we Americans are supposed to be the utmost in political apathy and ignorance. Get off our lawns, NOW!
This is a perfect example of why life changing decisions should be by a super majority of votes, 60% or more. Making such a big change like exiting the EU on the whim of a 50% vote is moronic. :/
~~~Please pass the salt, I hate unsalted MD5s
Judging by the evidence their "citizens" are idiots, so I'm not sure what point you were trying to make.
Here's the best analogy so far...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Maybe the problem is that a referendum has no concept of "degree". If 49% of voters have a strong preference for X, and 51% have a slight preference for Y, then the referendum outcome will be "Y" even though choosing X would maximize total happiness.
About 22 million of people voted for "stay". They can have all of them to sign the petition, they still remain the minority. This is supposed to be they way democracy works, or is internet changing the rules ?!?
Such an intellecutually dishonest headline, non-Brits don't get a say in Brits staying or leaving....
https://twitter.com/PrisonPlanet/status/746693908596400128
No captcha to stop bots, no proof required to certify your identity, and if you download the JSON file at the bottom of the page, you'll see that signatures come from Mozambique, Central Africa, and several other bizarre places. Note the roughly 400 signatures from Vatican City, whose residents are about 1000, and probably none of them British.
I'm surprised the British media still haven't trashed this "petition", somebody should tell them to reveal this blatant scam.
You know what? Tough shit. You had plenty of time to research the issue *before* the vote. But no, it only occurred people to even do something as paltry as a freaking google search, AFTER the vote had already taken place.
It's about fucking time people actually started taking responsibility for their actions. It's this "Oh whoopsie! I didn't mean to do that! I want backsies!" bullshit that is the reason why the entire world is deteriorating before our very eyes.... because people can't be bothered to spend two lousy seconds to stop and think about what they're going to do, before they actually do it.
What's the phrase? Measure twice, cut once? Well guess what... That little rule applies to a hell of a lot more than just cutting wood.
But of course, I'm just pissing in the wind. (Which is amazingly difficult to do from a squatting position, let me assure you...) The average person isn't going to make any effort to change, and the world is going to get even more fucked up than it is now.
The only thing that is going to happen is that those with both the foresight and the means to protect themselves, will hunker down and wait while everyone else blows a gasket and likely start killing each other.
A recent web petition revealed that a large majority of US citizens want Muslim immigration stopped.
And if the cause was helped by the clueless, so much the better. Anyone ignorant enough of the issue to vote for Brexit when, had they been paying attention, might have voted otherwise, are exactly the sort of unthinking fools that should not be permitted to subject the UK to foreign rule.
It's over millennials. Your parents know better than you and we're hoping you'll grow up and figure that out at some point.
Seriously, the British government wasn't obligated to even begin negotiations, let alone commit to removal.
And given that the EU's terms for withdrawal were not specified, I wouldn't even consider Parliament obligated to vote for withdrawal, and I'd think it prudent to put it up for a second referendum anyway.
So you are advocating allowing vote-buying?
Seriously, in order to get that data you would need an economic system of some sort. The best one we have is capitalism. So if you want people to vote the strength of their preference, charge per vote and allow multiple votes.
If you don't want the voting biased towards people that are successful at making the economy work, give everyone 100 votes when they are born, and 10 votes per year.
while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
ANYONE can vote for this: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/131215/signatures/new
I understand, that the referendum result is not actually legally binding, but that the PM/government has committed to act on it anyway.
It is an advice/instruction to the government to begin separation proceedings, and once the UK conservatives have elected a new prime minister, they may well bring a question to parliament. Do we issue an Article50 to the EU and enact/create the appropriate legislation to support this.
Now the people in UK have voted (barely!) in fafor of an exit. But the people in the UK have no constitutional powers. That responsibility is granted to Parliament by the Crown/Queen.
So.. all it would take, is the question being put in the house, and for enough MP's to rebel such that the motion fails and is not passed. Hence no Article50 and no brexit.
Then it becomes a matter for payback at the next General election....
You do realise the Bits are part of the EU?
And thus the pro-EU media speak for them.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
I'd prefer a united Ireland and an independent Schotland in the EU and a high Trump-like wall between Scotland and England to secure the EU outer frontiers, like the Brits always wanted. :-)
Germand car companies repatriating their English car factories (Mini, Vauxhall, Rolls Royce, Bentley etc) is a given, 5 Chinese banks already moved to Luxemburg, others will follow.
It will be a mighty small empire when this is finished.
That's because you're still a colony. So is the US, but they need the illusion more than you do.
And on what logic? Show and explain your work please.
As much as I hate the outcome of the referendum (I think it's a huge mistake for the United Kingdom to leave the EU), I really don't think that having another referendum immediately after the current results is in any way a good idea. Imagine you have some other topic, where the result is also somewhat close (i.e. not 65/35 or so): if passions run high, you will be able to get a lot of signatures from the losing side to have a new referendum on the topic - but that way just lies complete madness. There has to be some kind of finality to decisions, even if we really don't like the results - otherwise democracy is a farce. If you voted for staying in the EU: I feel for you, I really do, but repeating the referendum is a really, really bad idea.
And if you are a person in the UK who voted for leaving the EU or didn't vote at all, and are now surprised and appalled at the results: it's your own gorram effing fault that this happened, and it's not like this was some obscure thing on some ballot that nobody saw coming: both internationally and in the UK the "Brexit" was all that the media was talking about for weeks and even months. If you didn't vote for staying in the EU, you have no right to complain about the result that came out of this.
And by "it" I mean the Brexit. Too many people will realize what it's going to cost them, first and foremost Boris Johnson, who has already hinted that he wants to get "a mandate" in a general election. Nobody wants to be the guy who took the UK out of the EU and ended the United Kingdom. Scotland is going to go on a rampage through British politics if the UK actually leaves the EU: Even if they split from the UK and work on getting back in alone, Scotland isn't likely to get in quickly. Their deficit is too high to join the Euro, so they need their own currency first. This takes time. They won't be able to leave the UK before the UK leaves the EU. But unless they can leave the UK and then get into the EU right away, which they won't, they will also not attract the financial services industry which needs a foothold in the EU. The EU won't be very welcoming to Scotland either. There's the political problem that it would send a signal to other separatist regions in Europe. There's also the problem that EU politics would be suspicious of British politics reentering the EU through the back door.
17.4 million people voted to leave the EU. 1.6 million names is not even 10% of that.
And more modest.
The widdle cupcakes want a do-over.
I seems to me that only the left tries to overturn democratic processes they don't agree with.
And (pick your favorite US minority) are American citizens, too, so Congress speaks for them?
Youâ(TM)ll be back, soon youâ(TM)ll see Youâ(TM)ll remember you belong to me Youâ(TM)ll be back, time will tell Youâ(TM)ll remember that I served you well Oceans rise, empires fall We have seen each other through it all
Thirty four characters live here.
Jesus Christ. You people have had independence for less than 24 hours and you're already freaking out and looking for a mommy and daddy to save you from the big bad world. You Brits really are a bunch of pansies.
It's over millennials. Your parents know better than you and we're hoping you'll grow up and figure that out at some point.
I'm not sure where you're going with that. The demographics of the vote show clearly that millennials and under-50 voters were solidly in the "remain" camp.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Oh right, this was Obama's fault. Thank you for this insightful comment. That's why I read /.
Not!
Try to remember who is your Head of State :)
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
How about a third referendum if the second referendum ends up with an "exit" vote too?
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Is that perl?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Let me guess, you are a white emigrant from Europe. You are probably not even Canadian.
No idea why you keep broadcasting your incompetence and ignorance on every story. We already you you are an idiot, no need to remind us all the time.
And more modest.
I'm a Canadian, and I agree with your message (not the GP's.)
majority used to sneak the citizens of the UK into that Euro-swamp in the first place?
To save you time googling: No. The people of the UK were lied into the EU by the powerful politicians and the rich investment bankers. They were told back in the 1970s that this was just going to be a large trading block where goods and services would freely flow. They were most-definitely NOT told they were going to slowly lose their nation. The EU project was built on a mountain of lies about free trade within Europe, and it was put in place without the consent of the people, but it was then turned (as it was dishonestly designed to be) into a new Europe-wide government that now seeks to slowly replace all the national governments in the region. Half the rules and regulations recently applied within the UK were diktats from Brussels about which no UK citizen got a vote or had any appeal. EU courts (totally unaccountable to the citizens of the UK) have recently had supremacy over UK courts and UK laws. The scam was to very slowly boil the frog, so that one day when there no longer WAS a UK and the citizens realized they no longer WERE citizens and had no say in the politics of the new political entity that ran their lives - it would be too late. Multinational corporations and the biliionaire freaks of the annual Davos fests would control everybody's lives, with all that pesky voter stuff going to the dustbin of history.
The EU was apparently about to request a seat at the UN, as the United States (which it pretends to emulate) has - but none of the states within the US has a UN seat. The moment the EU gets a UN seat, then logically all the member states of the EU must surrender theirs. Many member states had already foolishly surrendered their currencies, and thus their economic sovereignty. The EU was talking about forming an EU army, which was being done to gradually convince the people of the region that national armies were obsolete (and thus also guarantee no nation would be able to get out in the future). NONE of this was done with the consent of even a simple majority of the people.
Those whining now FOR the EU and angry at their own independence should be seen for the traitors to the UK that they are, and they ought to go and prostrate themselves before Angela Merkel and beg to be allowed to serve her. The politicians who have been so cravenly subsuming the UK into the EU have been engaged in the classic definition of treason and ought to have long-ago had their heads separated from their shoulders for the unpardonable offense. Sadly the Royals of the UK have become little more than mascots; they are certainly NOT sovereigns if they are not from a sovereign land. No Queen who has herself destroyed her claim to the throne both by failing as "defender of the faith" and by accepting an EU passport could legitimately punish any of her subjects for a lesser form of the same offenses.
The Scots and the North Irish would be wise to wait before acting rashly. This Brexit may well be the best thing to hit Europe since the formation of NATO (which still exists and is still the actual guarantor of peace in the region). It would be mighty silly of the North Irish and/or Scots to bail out of the UK and cling to the EU at a time when an increasingly dysfunctional EU may be simultaneously and schizophrenically trying to grow and seize even more power from the masses while melting down culturally and financially over Syria, Turkey, Greece, and waves of intentionally-imported Islamofascism. Are the North Irish and the Scots REALLY so very desperate to surrender their flags and rights to Brussels and so very enthusiastic to bear the financial/military/immigration burdens which the EU is planning to ratchet-up? The Scots in particular are always complaining about the influence of England and Wales as though these are terrible burdens, but those will be nothing compared to what the leaders of the EU had planned. If they want to go, they should, but only after negotiating a treaty with London that says they must
Aren't these the same people who voted to name their latest naval ship Boaty McBoatface? Astley for Prime Minister - he's never gonna give you up!
A degree-brexit voting ballot would look like this:
- I really want to remain
- I prefer to remain
- I don't care either way
- I prefer to leave
- I really want to leave
The counts for each of the 5 categories would be public, and the decision would be computed using weights 2,1,0,1,2.
There's no money or voting quotas involved. Of course voters can simulate a weight-0 vote by not going voting, and a weight-1 vote by flipping a coin to decide if they're going to vote, but then they would leak some information about their vote, and anyway it's more interesting to know the 5-way breakdown.
Agreed, because freedom is idiotic.
The citizens are the ones signing this petition.
And yeah, given the leave campaign's lies disintegrated the day the result was called, Iit's pretty clear what is the right result.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
A recent web petition revealed that a large majority of US citizens want Muslim immigration stopped.
I find it hard to believe that the majority (50%+1) of US citizens even participated on the petition, let along the vast majority.
And if it wasn't the vast majority actually participating, then you fall into statistics. And statistics require methodology. What was the methodology for the sampling? What was the error margin? Standard deviation?
No wonder you are posting anonymously. You are a moron.
morcego
The result was very narrow. The turn-out was relatively low for such an important decision. A lot of people are expressing regret, the victorious side instantly reneged on a number of promises and the predicted economic meltdown that people didn't believe would happen happened.
Yep. Lots of reasons to disavow a democratically voted referendum.
Can you think of any reason why disavowing the vote would be bad?
I don't have a dog in this fight, but a (Brit) friend asked me about this a couple of months ago. The conversation went like this:
Him: Should I vote for the UK to leave the EU?
Me: Yes, absolutely.
Him: Why?
Me: Because if you don't, nothing will change
Expounding on that last bit, note that if the vote had happened 5 years ago the results would probably have been 55% stay/45% leave. If you'd done the vote 10 years ago it would have been 60% stay/40% leave, and the poll actually taken in 1975 was 67% stay/33% leave.
Leaving the EU right at this moment may seem like a bad idea, but from the historical perspective it's the most efficiently timed revolution that's ever been.
It's clear that being part of the EU was causing a slow buildup of problems for the English people. Dissatisfaction was on the rise, and there were valid reasons for wanting change.
The EU is blithely unsupportive of the needs of its members - it's like any government who, once they are in power, tends to ignore the needs of its people. Looking at Greece as an example, it's clear that the EU puts the needs of the banks ahead of the needs of Greece as a country. As many people pointed out, the EU could have just let Greece default and the banks take a loss. That would have been the best outcome for Greece and its people, but the banks...
The EU management saw the referendum coming and did nothing about it. They could easily have swung the vote by making concessions.
And note that earlier, Cameron went to the EU to ask for some relief. It's my understanding that not only did they say "no", they treated him disrespectfully. (And probably were chuckling to themselves saying "what 'ya gonna do - leave? HAH HAH HAH!)
And now I hear that even if the UK manages to reverse the referendum, France, Germany, and Brussels won't let them. The EU in general didn't like the UK to begin with, are glad to see them go, and will enforce the referendum in any case.
Really, it was a bad situation and there'll be tough times at first, but when the dust has settled I think you'll see that this is much better for the English people.
Oh, and about "this is sooooo bad", note that no one has accurately described the flip side of the situation. John Oliver's treatment of the flip side could be summed up as "yes, it's not perfect". It was clear that he, and all the woo in the media, was trumping up all the disadvantages of leaving without addressing or even describing the reasons people wanted to leave.
Lots of people used extreme rhetoric to try to get people to stay (Cameron's various statements were particularly transparent), and it was transparently bullshit.
Once the dust settles, I think the UK will be stronger, more secure, and more satisfied.
I think that the way President Obama basically threatened the UK voters might actually have had a negative effect. A lot of people react badly to threats choosing to act out of spite. It was a foolish action and in the end left egg on his face and now he's petulant that they went against his wishes.
as of now there is over 2.1 million signatures
True. However, turnout was vastly different between age groups. Among millennials, turnout was around 36%. Among the over 65s, turnout was 83%.
Had turnout been consistent across age groups, and had voting intentions carried over to the non-voters (admittedly an unlikely assumption), then the result would have been the reverse.
so the pro-EU media promotes a second referendum to get the "right" result.
You mean like the Sun, the biggest newspaper in the country?
Fucking moron.
You're entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
It was no less a champion of freedom than Ben Franklin who said,
We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.
I'm thinking Thursday's vote demonstrated that England and Wales prefer the latter.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
European here. Contrary to your belief (as probably induced by the somewhat biased media reports), many European civilians are not mourning at all. Many of us are happy to finally see EU dictatorship come to a halt. The Brits will do fine outside the EU. And so will many other countries.
EU is a failed project, perhaps good for the elite and large companies, but it sucks for ordinary citizens. Unlimited import of society-wrecking hordes, unreal money pits, total neglect for ordinary citizens, destruction of carefully crafted wellfare systems, pensions down the drain, job losses, and mind-boggling burocracy. That's EU for us. This project should return to being an economic powerhouse, without the common currency and without tens of thousands of useless, overpaid burocrats.
The Brits have taken the lead. Will it hurt? Sure! But better to cut the ties now then to stay aboard a ship heading for the cliffs. I expect other countries to follow. The Clash had this in their lyrics: "If I go there will be trouble.. If I stay it will be double!!"
To Terminate, or not to Terminate, that's the question - SCSIROB
Democracy happened. As much as the result sucks, You can't say 'ah crap... best of 3?' and expect to be taken seriously.
The EU is bad for the UK. Thus the pro-EU media hate them and want them to suffer.
See how easy that is?
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
And whos fault is that? You get what you put in, and the young generation basically didn't turn out to voice their opinion. Their loss.
This petition is being called for by, wait for it... the citizens! How about that?
Also, what pro-EU media in the UK? The media has been fabricating lies and deception about the EU for decades. The public opinion has been completely poisoned for too long. "By Jove those euro blokes are trying to legislate how bananas bend" "Good show, old chaps, the EU wants to legislate on the size of holes in cheese", etc.
And this explains why people over 50 voted for Out. Their source of news continues to be the The Daily Fail, The Sun, The Mirror, etc.
I'd just mandate voting (being careful to keep it anonymous so we don't go full North Korea, you never go full North Korea). It's a civic duty. Like Jury. You should have to do it. Always.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
It was not a narrow vote. 51.9% 17,410,742 Votes it also was not a local boundary Borough vote.. it was a nation vote and every vote counts and the highest numbers win. If the extreme left wing cannot accept that then go and live in France or Germany. Calling the people of Britain racist for voting out is ridiculous Europeans are the same race. Bob Geldof is a dirty old tramp who is not a British citizen. And if Donald Trump, wins in the U.S., which is a regional voting as in a general election then he will be the president. The left-wing commies do not like democracy unless it is in total agreement with them. This is not the USSR AND IF YOU DON'T LIKE THAT FUCK OFF.
True. However, turnout was vastly different between age groups. Among millennials, turnout was around 36%. Among the over 65s, turnout was 83%.
And it was the over 65's who got us into the EU mess in the first place, and have lived with the consequences of it since..oh sure, common market, they said...
Had turnout been consistent across age groups, and had voting intentions carried over to the non-voters (admittedly an unlikely assumption), then the result would have been the reverse.
Big assumption you're making there about the young...I watched one of these 'millenials' bleat about the result on a TV show that night as it was all going south for her side, her opponent was another 'millenial', she descended to the level of making catty ageist remarks about her opponents relatives...ah, Vox dulcis puellae!
As a Swiss citizen, with several decades of experience in direct democracy, I'm half amazed and half amused at this whole Brexit referendum fiasco.
The quote says "With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility". With the referendum, the UK people received a great power, but certainly were not aware of the associated great responsibilty.
Consequences, like the generation split or the secession of members of the Union were not even discussed.
There might be a lesson to learn - let nations first try direct democracy on simpler issues before asking them important questions.
Funny, I don't know any Americans that actively desire Muslims to immigrate to America.
The UK is making billions on trade with the EU, so what part of the EU is bad for the UK???
And because trade on international scale is reciprocal so will the ex-EU partners suffer from this split.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
75% turn out of a vote is not low. It's noticeably higher than being statistically significant. So result probably won't be different if you include more people.
I'm not sure it's the only problem in that case, but I think it is an important one in general. That's one reason you should pay for voting. I mean proportionally to your income of course, like taxes.
Are from outside Britain though, so this isn't really saying much.
Are you sure EU is to blame? Jobs have moved to Asia. That has nothing to do with EU.
It's over millennials. Your parents know better than you and we're hoping you'll grow up and figure that out at some point.
I'm not sure where you're going with that. The demographics of the vote show clearly that millennials and under-50 voters were solidly in the "remain" camp.
Indeed. The NY Times has a few articles about this and an Op-Ed titled Brexit and Europe’s Angry Old Men mentioning a poll over there indicating the older the person, the more likely they were inclined to leave the EU:
Some 64 percent of the age group from 18 to 24 said they would vote for Remain; just 35 percent of those between 50 and 64 wanted to stay.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
When Bush "beat" Gore, 50+ million Americans would have loved a second vote -- to maybe get more voter turnout to ensure disaster was averted...
If you're a simpering spineless little twat who needs everything handed to him, I suppose..
This is just thwe worst of all the most self-righteous PeeCee undemocratic morons that can't deal with the fact that they actually lost something fair and square.
You get what you put in, and the young generation basically didn't turn out to voice their opinion.
Or more simply they don't have an opinion and don't care either way.
Read as:
I remember back in 2008 when they were voting for TARP. The first vote failed and the stock market crashed. So they put a bunch of pork into it and voted again saying DON'T FUCK THIS UP GUYS LAST TIME YOU FUCKED IT UP AND YOU CAUSED THE STOCK MARKET TO CRASH. So they voted for it this time and the stock market crashed again. I was watching it on C-SPAN while monitoring the market.
They want to play on people's fear and point to the markets around the world reacting negatively to try to change the vote. But I think the market reaction was more about the uncertainty than anything else. Long term the financial impact won't be a very big deal. They will make trade agreements with the EU to effectively get back to the same place.
Not that the petition matters anyway
Get a few more strong countries to leave and the European Union will be effectively dead. It couldn't come soon enough. Then each nation can go back to being entirely sovereign and stand up for itself.
I know I don't. America already has enough problems with dogmatic belief systems and their cults. We don't need another.
Oh right, this was Obama's fault. Thank you for this insightful comment. That's why I read /.
Not!
Reread the fucking comment, they're not saying it's Obama's fault, they're saying 'I think that the way President Obama basically threatened the UK voters might actually have had a negative effect.'
Negative effect, not bloody 'It wos Obama wot dunnit'.
As various commentators here in the UK said when he came out with his crap, 'how would the average US citizen react it if a senior UK politician went over there and actively interfered in US politics'?, his interference over here had *exactly* the same effect on a number of UK voters.
This time the two main campaing points of Leave have already been backtracked - Farage said that promising the current payments of 350M€ / week to NHS was a "campaign mistake" and he would not have said it, and another Leave leader just told BBC that they are still hoping to get free movement of labour.
( http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/25/leave-campaign-rows-back-key-pledges-immigration-nhs-spending )
If the house votes to ignore the referendum result it may not exist for much longer.
It wouldn't be civil war but you wouldn't want shares in an insurance company.
Do these morons not understand that this will paralyze democracy?
If the losing side can scream for a "do over" every vote, democracy itself is doomed.
-Styopa
My heavy investment in extrua Us in words that reallyu don't need them has prettyu much tanked. Althouugh I'm trying to divest them quuickly, I fear I may be left with a vast uunsellable oveurstock!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I don't know why she even wastes time and money assigning her people to do these European projects.
Check the json version of the petition, I saw a screenshot showing that when it hit like 2.5 million signatures, only ~300K were from the UK.
So, instead of having a legal process, institute a system of endless haggling and 're-haggling so nothing ever gets done.
Fuck that. Learn to fucking cope with reality you special snowflakes.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
It's currently 2.635 million. It's been raising by about 1000 every 15 seconds since this morning. I expect it'll drop off over night, but more than 2 million signing a petition in 24 hours is pretty damn impressive.
My anecdotal experiences have clearly shown that prayer has at least a 50% chance of success, far better than web petitions.
Given tge Goering-like threats Schauble et al issued before the vote, I can safely say Germans *never* changed at all. 10, 100, 1000 Dresden.
Jobs? Fight the robots. It's like you can't read
Queen Elizabeth II, the Queen of Canada, not to be confused with Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
The leaders in the Leave groups have gotten very bitchy when asked about when the UK will leave and how they will conduct the negotiation. You would think that if they were campaigning for a Leave result in the referendum they would be eager about getting to the leaving part.
One benefit of leaving the EU- fewer problems with Unicode characters.
As an American, I'd prefer *ALL* immigration be stopped, and even kick out tens of millions. This country is so overpopulated. I'd prefer it go back to under 200 million if not under 100 million.
I am not sure why you are modded troll but the Slashdot hivemind does have a very pro EU stance on this issue.
The fact of the matter is it was a 4% win to the leave vote and that is not small. The millennial generation are so used to being told they are all winners that a loss like this is hard for them to take. The web petition is being filled by many not in the UK and sites like 4chan are trying to make the petition exceed the population of the world.
You cant keep voting until you get the outcome you want and labeling people who voted differently to you as moronic poorly educated bigots.
The safe space cuddle bubble created at our universities really is destroying reality for these people and making a generation of hyper sensitive brats.
Disclaimer: I am from Australia and can only see economic benefits for my country being able to trade properly with the UK again.
And their platform is single issue; namely any kind of gun control is a take over of the constitution or a slippery slope leading there.
It's too bad that people don't seem to care as much about the Fourth Amendment and privacy, and that it's not as much of a dog whistle as the Second.
Why bother going for people's guns and fight with lead when you can simply find a couple of felonies to hang on them and send them away for a couple of years (or bankrupt them with legal wrangling so they don't have money to buy arms).
Seriously, the Second is probably the least useful in defending or gaining freedom. Neither India nor Poland needed arms to gain theirs.
I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but other Slashdotters have pointed out a few things that seem individually seem plausible, and paint an interesting picture. EU politics is not my expertise, and I would be delighted if someone more learned refuted this:
- UKIP et al. don't really want to leave, but want to appeal to their base and jockey for power
- Cameron holds the referendum to placate the conservatives and possibly win favor, believing it won't go the way of "exit"
- The vote results in "exit" winning
- Cameron and Exit leaders discuss "how do we stop this?"
- A deal is struck: Exit leaders/conservatives will take the heat for the UK not leaving the EU, despite the referendum, but want the PM spot
- Cameron resigns before triggering Article 50
- Exit leaders/conservatives rise to power and win the PM spot, but do not invoke Article 50
- Half the populace is pissed, but about half the people are happy with not leaving
- The whole thing blows over and the populace forgets, distracted by bread and circuses
If they didn't vote, that means they back the majority decision. So the 60-whatever pervent were all brexit votes too.
Certainly, if that were not the case, they would have cast a ballot saying otherwise!
And you can't really extrapolate how young voters to how young nonvoters would have voted anyway.
But did young people vote? I think most of them stayed home, at least much more than the other age groups...big mistake!
The reason the most-recent Democrat "gun control" attempts failed is PRECISELY because so many NRA members DO care about the other amendments too. The bills the Democrats proposed last week proposed to prevent people on the "no fly" list from buying guns, but the Republicans objected because the bills included no "due process" to permit people to find out if some bureaucrat had placed them on one of those lists and no way to get off such a list.
It has been argued (though many like me disagree) that the "no fly" list is a tiny bit less obnoxious because flying on an airliner is not a Constitutional right and people choose whether or not to go to an airport and pay somebody to fly them around on an airplane. Things like lists to prevent people from access to lawyers, or prevent free speech, or prevent self-defense are an extra level of obnoxious. These lists are fundamentally un-American when applied any Constitutional Rights. In the USA, we are not supposed to deprive somebody of his Constitutional rights anytime some anonymous paper-pusher puts that person's name on a list.
The Republicans tried to compromise, placing two bills in play that risked angering their NRA member backers, but adding-in a requirement for due process.... and the Democrats voted those down.
There is no honest way to declare that NRA members do not care about due process, or search-and-siezure issues. With their votes last week the Democrats proved they do not care about those issues and the NRA and the Republicans proved that they do.
Somehow humanity always gets either the people described in the second paragraph or the third....somehow we always miss the Vetinaris of the world.
The discussion is as old as civilization.
"Technically, the city of Ankh-Morpork is a Tyranny, which is not always the same thing as a monarchy, and in fact even the post of Tyrant has been somewhat redefined by the incumbent, Lord Vetinari, as the only form of democracy that works. Everyone is entitled to vote, unless disqualified by reason of age or not being Lord Vetinari.
And yet it does work. This has annoyed a number of people who feel, somehow, that it should not, and who want a monarch instead, thus replacing a man who has achieved his position by cunning, a deep understanding of the realities of the human psyche, breathtaking diplomacy, a certain prowess with the stiletto dagger, and, all agree, a mind like a perfectly balanced circular saw, with a man who has got there by being born
A third proposition, that the city be governed by a choice of respectable members of the community who would promise not to give themselves airs or betray the public trust at every turn, was instantly the subject of music-hall jokes all over the city."
Sir Terry Pratchett, "Unseen academicals"
Why do I suspect that if the exact same margins had been achieved, but with the opposite outcome, all these left-wing globalists morons would be perfectly happy and not demanding a re-do????
The rules of this in/out vote were well known for over a YEAR.
Typical of the left, they want to re-vote/re-count over and over again until they get the result they want. "Hanging chads" or Minnesota Senate race all over again, and again, and again...
For any election to be valid:
[a] The rules need to be published well in advance, which these were.
[b] The consequences of voting yes or no need to be published/explained well in advance, which these were.
[c] The rules for counting votes need to be unchanged after the votes are cast, which these were but Florida's in 2000 were not
[d] The vote, once certified as accurately counted must be final. If one side can re-count or re-vote until they get the result they want, then the entire election is phoney. It's simply not a free election if the results will be changed to achieve a particular desired outcome.
Having your national sovereignty means that you make your own laws, have your own courts, your government is yours (both for good and for ill) and these entities are in some manner accountable to the population. A Sovereign people can pass laws making various things legal or illegal and specifying what sort of judicial and penal system they have, what procedures apply within these systems, etc.
The US can be said to be sovereign in that its people and their legislatures pass their laws and their courts rule according to those laws etc. Under the EU, countries like the UK were no longer sovereign - they had laws written in Brussels by people not elected in the UK and not accountable to the citizens of the UK. If a citizen of the UK objected, he had no recourse because his own lawmakers and representatives had no say. An obnoxious German or Belgian sitting in a cubicle somewhere on the continent had more power than a British Member of Parliament
The never-Brexit types have been living in a dream world and are lucky enough that this happened before a few more years had passed. Had this vote occurred in 2030 or some such year, the EU might have had the time to assert some of the added control it has been wanting to exercise and the average "Remain" voter would likely have experienced some of that lost sovereignty. As it is they are able to pretend that they have not lost anything by being in the EU.
If you see "combined sovereignty", as you call your surrender and servitude, as a good thing then you should ask yourself why your grandparents were willing to wage WWII to avoid "combined sovereignty" with Hitler's Germany. A single-nation-state of Europe under Hitler would have provided many benefits too, including a massive continent-wide "free trade" zone and unified passports and courts too...
All the mindless moronic rantings of the youth, post-Brexit vote, has me convinced that the young of the UK are too incompetent to be entrusted with voting rights. The UK either needs to reform its schools and wrestle the lesson plans away from the traitorous Europhiles or the voting age should be immediately raised to 35 to insulate the fate of the nation from the stupidity of people too-young, too-dumb, and too self-absorbed to be considered as responsible adults and have their votes considered valid enough to affect the lives of actual adults.
I am of German descent, have German relatives and worked with German nationals in an engineering environment for nearly a decade.
I judge Merkel and the Brussels fanatics properly, by their actions and plans, and with an eye on their history which included two world wars and many millions of dead bodies piled high in the name of a united European continent with Germany as it's center of power. Merkel's fanatical obsession with importing millions of fanatical Jew-haters into the EU is more than just mildly disturbing for those who remember that the Muslim Brotherhood actually volunteered to serve Hitler in WWII and were part of the effort to eliminate the Jewish people. Junkers was as defiant towards and unwilling to compromise with the Brits in these "negotiations" in 2016 as von Ribbentrop was 70 years ago. In fact it's a mark of just how bad the EU is going to get that the EU was so very unwilling to concede ANYTHING of substance to Cameron in order to keep the UK in and thus preserve the EU. The folks in Brussels are clearly fanatical and would have become insanely abusive had they succeeded in calling the bluff of the typical working man in the UK. Had the UK voted "remain" the people in Brussels would have concluded that the UK nationals would tolerate ANYTHING without leaving.
I never said that nobody got to vote on anything related to the EU...... just that the people themselves never had a vote on whether to subjugate themselves to a pan-European government. This whole beast was a built as a lie. Go back and look at the old newspapers if you must (I do not need to as I was alive at the time and remember the dishonesty). The people of the UK and elsewhere were told this would NOT become a government of Europe, and whenever anybody against the formation of the EU voiced concerns that it would gradually become one they were denounced as dishonest... by the very Europhiles who were themselves the big liars of the project and who were even then planning to use this monster to conquer all the peoples of Europe and gift-wrap them as presents to be offered to and sacrificed by multinational bankers. The EU will never again be as free as it is today... it's designed to become bigger and bigger and gradually eliminate all national boundaries and laws (and any liberty/freedom that those nations and their hard-won laws provide). Nothing about the EU is designed to improve the lives and liberties of individuals; it's designed as a massive money- and trade-manipulating scheme for the sort of super-rich who go to Davos every year and hang-out with former NAZI collaborator George Soros.
It's always easy for the young to not miss what their parents gave away, which is why the EU has working to re-educate European youths and why so many of those upset by Brexit are young. The fact that many of the young do not miss their lost sovereignty does not mean they are not being harmed by it....it just means they are gullible and ignorant and foolish
the part where many members of the UK parliament only recently (AFTER getting elected and being in office) announced where they stand on membership in the EU, and the fact that many of them have even changed their position while in parliament. As a result, your entire argument is logically invalid. If they do not tell the people their position before standing for election, and if they feel free to change their position after getting elected, then the sort of control and accountability you pretend exists is really only an illusion - exactly the sort the multinational corporations want the voters to think they have.
...(white middle class heterosexual males with jobs and savings and a retirement plan)...
Actually no. This is not how democracy is supposed to work. Democracy is not supposed to be a tool for any majority to completely dominate minorities. Minority rights, compromise and balance are very important. Which is why direct democracy is frowned upon and is actually really bad for a population of more than a couple hundred people.
AFAIK the current UK government has a majority in parliament, even though they only received a popular vote of 37% with 66% of people voting.
Even without the apostrophe that's a total load of garbage.
http://www.bbc.com/news/busine...
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Have a word with that nice Mr Putin, I'm sure he'd be happy to oblige.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
They questioned the results of their betters, so the pro-EU media promotes a second referendum to get the "right" result. Never mind that the second poll has largely been faked.
Naturally, such a post would attract tons of pro-EU shills to attack my post.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
While I understand it might be difficult to see them choose freedom, but the Remain side is lying.
Globalism lost, the British won.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
It requires the UK to follow the EU's lead, disenfranchising their own country.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Another European here. Basically what you said, except the exact opposite.
Most of what you say should result in you looking inward to your own country, not outwards to the EU. Welfare is alive and well (pun intended) in many EU member nations, as is societal integration, pensions, and ... wait what job losses? Unemployment has been steadily dropping the past several years, it's low as it was in 2000 there was this niggling little thing called a global recession in between in which the EU fared quite well compared to many industrialised nations.
There is quite a bit of bureaucracy, but that's the only thing I'll agree with.
As for breaking up the common currency. Pass thanks. Ideally we combined the central banks to prevent each country screwing with the system, but really screw going back to the driving for 1 hour and having to have 3 difference currencies because ... reasons.
I am also an EU citizen.
The only good thing about Brexit is that people like you are soon going to realize what a terrible idea it was. So this poisonous propaganda will stop, and the rest of the union will be saved. I feel sorry for the Brits, though, they will suffer through this crap so that the rest of us don't need to.
Don't believe me? Let's just wait one year, and see what were the short-term consequences of this vote. Then we talk.
entropy happens
Are these nimrods folks who didn't vote the first time, or just want to overturn a democratic election?
The part where non-democratic governments are bad. The part where growing centralized power never ends well (75 years ago Britain had a rather different view of a unified Europe). Hey, if you want to trade democracy for slightly cheaper consumer goods, that's your vote. Others voted otherwise. But don't assume your conclusion when making your argument.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Dear young Remainers..
65yo+ knew rationing
75yo+ knew the Luftwaffe
90yo+ knew Panzers
They didn't "steal your future", they gave you one.
Progressivism: Parasites helping parasites to help themselves - to other people's stuff.
Silly me, here's me thinking we lived in some sort of democracy, now suddenly because of a result some didn't like, Parliament are supposed to introduce a retrospective law and agree a new referendum to reverse the first result? Really?
Don't fall for this bullshit, unless there's a credible audit done on all the names and votes.
. . . these signatories are only 1.6 million of Kim Kardashian's fake twitter followers.
The law is not an ass. No really.
Because we need another Rotherham because 1,400 rapes wasn't enough to satisfy you fucking morons.
The remainers are a bunch of sore losers. Even resorting to hacking the petition site to increase the numbers! We are our own country again, instead of a state in a larger one.
It will never happen. It will not even be heard - because it is not in public interest. Which basically means if it was heard, then it would create more trouble.
It is not going to happen - spreading rumours caused BREXIT. Continuing to spread rumours will do what?
I find it really amusing that some in the Remain camp are complaining that this was too close a vote for such an important topic.
Might I remind everyone that this was a slightly larger win, percentage-wise, than Obama's "landslide" re-election victory over Romney. (Maybe we should have a do-over on that one too.) If this had been a 50.5% to 49.5% Remain victory then this would have been considered Settled Once And For All.
If you cared so damn much you should have got your ass out and voted in the first place.
If you really want to prove right all of the people who are angry that they're not being listened to and that the government doesn't care what they have to say, then ignore this vote. The reason we don't have armed revolts is because people have the ballot box. Eventually you'll get what you deserve if you take that away from them.
Yes, but this isn't just any old web petition. This one was implemented by the House of Commons, and is capable of demonstrating that enough people were either ill informed, or complety ignorant of the whole thing until after the votes were cast, Clueless, in fact, just as the OP stated.. Typical citizens behavor, in fact. Bet you if they hold another the result would be waay different this time.....
Indeed. The NY Times has a few articles about this and an Op-Ed titled Brexit and Europe’s Angry Old Men mentioning a poll over there indicating the older the person, the more likely they were inclined to leave the EU:
That's because the older ones can remember what Britain was like before EU compliance turned GB unto a financial and political armed camp. Unfortunately, now, the damage is done, and the younger ones understand the damage that leaving would do...
First off I voted out, the main reason was because I do not want to be ruled by someone I did not vote for or more importantly I can vote out if I don't like what they are doing. Secondly because our country is overcrowded we are a small island and cannot cope with the number of people we have already and the EU's policy of free movement means we cannot control how many people come to the UK. Thirdly I think economically the EU is doomed. Greece is on life support, Italy, Spain France and Portugal are all struggling. One currency and one economic policy does not make sense with such diverse countries. Staying in would have meant we would have been pulled down with them, so all this postulation that we are better in the EU rather than out is just a guess and therefore no better than my guess that we will be better out of it.
I am appalled at a) the Scots who think that just because all their voting regions voted stay they have some right to block the rest of the UK who voted by majority of over 1 million people to leave the EU. That's not democracy, you can't just elect to ignore a referendum because it doesn't suit you. The majority of the UK voted out, that's it, grow up and accept democracy!
b) I am appalled at how biased the BBC have been throughout the lead up and after the referendum. It's very noticeable that the London area was one of the few parts of England that wanted to remain and the once highly trusted BBC have favoured the remain campaign, none of the totally bogus arguments have been seriously questioned by the BBC. Tonight I was watching them interviewing a couple at the Glastonbury festival. They were remain voters who moaned about the result, why was there no interview with 2 other youngsters who wanted to come out?! The BBC has lost my support over this they were and still are biased in favour of remain.
If the London bubble doesn't sit up and listen to the rest of the UK and pay attention to what we have told them, I am seriously worried about what the consequences will be. I really do think that the political elite in the UK are becoming so far removed from the vast majority of the country that we could be heading for a major revolt. The hard working people who live North of Watford Gap are sick of the London elite thinking that what they want is right for the rest of us! It's not!
Martley, Near Worcester UK.
Me and my friend, we did not vote, we thought we could simply sign a petition the next day to cancel the referendum if we happen to lose. :)
When a politician resorts to calling for a referendum, it's very exactly admitting s/he cannot take the issue in charge.
Elected people are supposed to be most responsible persons, carefully selected to take in charge unexpected problems to come -not jupt people that'll call referendums for any new problem.
Otherwise we can as well replace them with automated polling machines.
I for one am not at all for direct democracy, in which obviously the majority of voter do not know all consequences.
Ideally we should vote for people we really are confident in, whose curriculum among others should be convincing -but there are fewer and fewer such, perhaps because of the way political parties work, perhaps because of the way media raise our attention (only to the most shocking out of them, etc.)
Direct democracy elects Hitlers.
This, said by a French citizen, whose country's referendum directly voted against the European Constitution, a mark I'll keep till my death.
Herve S.
But did young people vote? I think most of them stayed home, at least much more than the other age groups...big mistake!
Well, the Boaty McBoatface election proved their vote would be ignored.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
I'm worried the Brits are now gonna play hard to loose. And using that as leverage in the upcomming trade deals.
I'm afraid this will take half a decade at least to settle.
I'm afraid you are right. They are going to try to drag this crap as long as possible. And this would be a deadly blow to the EU. I hope they see this and refuse to play along.
entropy happens
Mulligan
Living in Belgium, working in Brussels.Many I know are also not mourning at all, but for different reasons.
The UK was never a full member of the EU as we see it. Not signing Schengen, not joining the EURO. Those are the major ones.
So we say: good riddance and we will welcome Scotland and Northern-Ireland. The last as an independent country or as a part of the Republic of Ireland. We have expereience with these situations.
You know why people blame the EU for all these new laws and burocracy? Bceuase it is easier for your local politician to say "I tried, but, you know, Brussels ..." than it is to say that it might be something unfavourable, but better in the end.
Is it 100% perfect? Obviously not, but it is better than having all these countries compete with each other. I live in Belgium. My sister lives in Germany, my parents in Spain and this since before the EURO, so I know what it is without all these advantages.
Roaming cost will be something of the past very soon. I can go to any country and buy something wiithout paying extra taxes or import things (some exceptions apply) and I can work anywhere I like.
So yes, for me the EU has more advantages than it has disadvantages and loosing a nagging UK will only benefit that. Will it hurt? A little bit perhaps as the markets panick. For the EU this will even out. For the UK? Probably not. They will be worse off, but who cares?
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I remember when we went to the Euro. People all said it would be worse and we would loose money and what not. The Euroa was apparently a very bad idea.
Not sure in other countries, but in Belgium prices did not jump besides the standard increases. And what is more important, the money they used WAS already a Euro. It was just named differently in each and every country.
A bit like the Imperial system that uses the Inch, but is actually SI where it is fixed how long an inch is comaperd to cm. So if the cm changes, the inch changes.
Same with the euro, before it was real monies. You Franc, Guilder or Mark where fixed to the EUR.
And then that first trip from living in Belgium, visiting friends in The Netherlands, to my sister in Germany and then a trip to my parents in Spain, all within a week and no need to change money. Delightfull.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
wouldnt she be queen Elizabeth I of canada. unless you had another one and didnt tell us...
Not sure in other countries, but in Belgium prices did not jump besides the standard increases.
My grandma tells me that things got incredibly expensive. She constantly tells me stories of how many shillings something cost and then shows me a tattered old conversion chart she was given when Austria joined the EU.
And that's kind of fundamentally the point. People take a reference and compare it with the assumption that nothing changes. As if the shilling would magically experience 20 years of zero inflation, and society would experience 20 years of fixed prices. But there's no telling them that.
Wow. That was fast. Merkel will not play along.
entropy happens
we imported £23.9 billion more from the EU than we exported to it in the first quarter of this year alone. go us.
Yea, it's weird numbering. I guess it's how she chose to be called and she is the Queen.
Prince William will be even weirder if he becomes King as the first 3 were only Kings of England so really he'd be King William the 5th and 2nd but I think will be known as the 5th even in places like Scotland.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
So, this makes some sense. MOST people prefer to keep their heads in the sand. Keep having referendums until a vast majority of the constituents show they UNDERSTAND the issues and that they are casting an educated vote.
YET - the referendum needs to verify that the voter understands the issue and ramifications. History has proven that many people vote blindly, and that is bad for everyone.
So, then, it is first and foremost a necessity to EDUCATE the constituency before asking their choice. One cannot paint the walls when the walls are not yet completed!
When 75%-plus finally do vote, then the referendum outcome will, indeed, show a much better representation of the majority of the people.
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
Internet has been UNITING the world;
It's prudent to DIVIDE nations into smaller countries to PROTECT the interests of common man;
A country is NOT made of land; a country is made of its people.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...
Casteism
So maybe it depends on if you are a country with few local jobs so you can ship the excess labor to some other country. the country that ships the people suddenly has a much higher employment index and the place where they go to has a lower one. basically it levels the score so that the more advanced nations suffer and the least advanced nations will prosper.
Linkedin http://in.linkedin.com/in/robinsaikatchatterjee