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Theresa May Becomes UK's 'Spy Queen' and New Prime Minister (arstechnica.co.uk)
An anonymous reader writes from a report via Ars Technica: Theresa May has become the new British Prime Minister. As she sat down with the Queen on Wednesday, a controversial surveillance draft legislation that looks to significantly increase surveillance of Brits' online activity will be debated during its second committee stage day in the House of Lords. Ars Technica reports: "The Investigatory Powers Act could be in place within months of May arriving at Number 10 -- if peers and legal spats fail to scupper its passage through parliament -- after MPs recently waved it through having secured only minor amendments to the bill. As home secretary, May fought for six years to get her so-called Snoopers' Charter onto the statute books." According to Ars Technica, Theresa May's key political moments on the Investigatory Powers Bill start in 1997 when she became the Member of Parliament for Maidenhead. During her opposition years, her home affairs record shows that she generally votes against the Labour government's more draconian measures on topics such as anti-terrorism and ID cards. Mid-2009: May votes against requiring ISPs to retain certain categories of communications data, which they generate or process, for a minimum period of 12 months. 2010: She was appointed home secretary in coalition government between the Conservatives and junior partner the Liberal Democrats. 2011: The previous government's shelved Interception Modernization Program is rebranded as the Communications Capabilities Development Program (CCDP) by home office under May. Mid-2012: The CCDP morphs into Communications Data Bill, which is brought before parliament. Late-2012: May's Snoopers' Charter bid fails as deputy PM Nick Clegg orders the home office to go back to the drawing board. Mid-2014: May rushes what she characterizes as an "emergency" Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill through parliament, after the European Court of Justice invalidates the Data Retention Directive for failing to have adequate privacy safeguards in place. Late-2015: British security services have intercepted bulk communications data of UK citizens for years, May reveals to MPs for the first time as she brings her revamped Snoopers' Charter bid -- this time dubbed the Investigatory Powers Bill (IPB) -- before parliament. Mid-2016: MPs support thrust of IPB as it passes through the House of Commons. July 13, 2016: Theresa May becomes the UK's new prime minister as peers in the House of Lords undertake a second day of committee stage scrutiny of the Investigatory Powers Bill. UPDATE 7/13/16: Boris Johnson, the former London mayor who led the Brexit campaign, has been made foreign secretary by the new Prime Minister Theresa May.
I keep reading these headlines that Theresa "may" become prime minister. I wish they would make up their minds.
We can hope it works...
A national referendum is one of the more democratic ways of doing something. In the US you can only vote for a representative that (through gerrymandering and other tricks) may not even be who you want or what you want the government to represent. There is no way of disagreeing with a particular law or even your representative other than calling their office (and who do you think they work for, you or the guy they got 50k from) or breaking the law and thus challenging the law from a prison cell.
In this case, the PM didn't like the way the vote went and instead of doing what the people wanted, he stepped down. There was no referendum on that nor was that a requirement, he just said "fuck it". Could happen in the US if Trump gets elected and all the Democrat elected representative says "fuck it" and leaves all offices (the house and senate and committees) solely in Republican control.
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Seems you're a week or two behind the news.
The UK needs a new prime minister because the previous prime minister has voluntarily stepped down. David Cameron was against the exit from the EU. He decided that since the country's majority ran contrary to his stance, it was a good idea to vacate his position and let someone else lead.
Love sees no species.
This looks a lot like punishment for the unwashed masses for their vote of no confidence in the Politicians (both sides) that the BRExit vote looked like.
I see a large number of the voters in that were voting against the politicians in one of their few chances (elections are not, as you have to vote for
politicians on one side or the other..) due to the complete lack of representation that seems to be in fashion these days, where bills are either pushed through
to support loud minorities 'See! The Government does care!' or corporate sponsors 'We need to protect trade, the economy, jobs!'
It is interesting to watch the developing class wars between those in power and those not, however I am a little surprised that the UK is that close to the leading edge of it - racing to catch up to the US?
This is not spying, which implies some form of balance or power and care, this is just collecting the ability to go hunt for historical dirt on anyone who dares challenge the powerbase.
Left or Right? Socialist or Capitalist? That is long gone, what we have now is the building of totalitarian states with the illusion of democracy, and that is
unfortunately a world wide (mostly) problem. It will not be controlled unless the masses can put aside the petty arguments bout side issues, and address
this elephant in the room.
Unfortunately reality television, cooking competitions, and social justice for [insert this weeks cause] trumps that it seems. Sad times.
Please don't post when you don't have a clue what is going on. The PM led (poorly) the "Remain" campaign. When the country voted against him, it was effectively a no-confidence vote in the PM. His position wasn't tenable.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
In her previous incarnation she was champion of the "Snoopers Charter": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
You're forgetting a lot of downsides of the U.S. system, and the fact that individual states do have referendums, and you're oversimplifying the UK system.
David Cameron wasn't ousted, he pushed hard for a specific outcome in the referendum, and he lost. The voters rejected a deal he had negotiated, and a policy he willingly bet his premiership on. All that said, he could have stayed as long as the Conservative party wanted him, but it's reasonable for him to step down after losing.
The vote itself also wasn't binding, it's up to Parliament to execute it. This wasn't a law that was passed by referendum. Unlike in the U.S., Parliament (technically the "Queen in Parliament") is supreme in the UK, and can change any law it wants. There's no written constitution, and thus not really the concept of an "unconstitutional" law. The PM is elected by a majority of parliament. This system means that a government usually can get its manifesto legislation passed, and it's easier to hold a government responsible for keeping its promises. The U.S. system can allow for years of deadlock, and whereas an independent commission is responsible for defining constituency boundaries in the UK, they're set by politicians in the U.S. If a party can gain control of the legislature of a state (quick - name any member of your state legislature), it can effectively control that state's seats in Congress for a decade. All of this lends a lot more legitimacy to the UK government.
So yes, getting things done in the U.S. system is harder, and it's easier for a few states to block legislation. That doesn't mean the U.S. system has greater legitimacy, quite the opposite. The state governments are barely accountable for their actions, and even a party with strong popular support can fail to get its legislation passed thanks to the byzantine electoral system.
The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.
Come on dude, what you said was naive. If you were watching British news and reading articles at BBC, Sun.uk, The Times, etc. you would understand even if you are American.
But you are clueless and don't have any interest in UK politics. Then you talk as is you are speaking knowledgeably --- when in fact your opinion is a demonstrates a lack of knowledge and understanding of UK politics.
Pay attention is fine. Not paying attention is fine. Not paying attention and then trying to speak from a position of knowledge is just lame dude.
This demonstrates the superiority of the Westminster parliamentary system vs the US where they elect the emperor, then can't get rid of him when he's a dud.
In this case, the PM didn't like the way the vote went and instead of doing what the people wanted, he stepped down.
That is how parliamentary systems work. Dave was elected by his party, not by the people.
Could happen in the US
It DID happen in the US, last year. John Boehner resigned, and was replaced by Paul Ryan. David Cameron is the head of the lower house of parliament, just like John Boehner was. The equivalent of Barrack Obama, as head of state, is Queen Elizabeth. She is not resigning.
Yep, it sure is a good thing they didn't become the Prime Minister!
Dear editors,
I'm genuinely interested in understanding this summary but, it's effectively a gigantic wall of text that's almost impossible to understand or follow. Could you please, I dunno, edit...
If those elected don't vote how those who elected them would vote, they certainly wouldn't be representative would they?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Clearly you are in the minority. Would you find it more democratic if the minority opinion won?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
So most Britains didn't understand the voting "leave" meant you would leave?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
* Remain a member of the European Union
* Leave the European Union
Nothing in those two questions asks about who governs Britain. Those are very straight up questions. Stay or stay not was the question, and the majority of Brits clearly chose to stay not.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Gerrymandering by the legislature is no longer possible in:
Arizona
California
Hawaii
Idaho
New Jersey
Washington
If you don't live in one of these states put the pressure on to change the process.
a,e,i,o,u and sometimes w and y (at be if of up cwm by)
Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary isn't the only Cabinet Minister she's appointed which will have international implications, she has also created two new cabinet posts;
Secretary of State for Exiting the EU - David Davis
Secretary of State for International Trade - Liam Fox
The first is getting us out of the EU, the second is for getting new trade agreements for when we are out of the EU.
All these three are Brexiters, and will be responsible for the aftermath. Very clever - as May was a Remainer, she has effectively delegated responsibility for the success or failure of exiting the EU on to those who campaigned to get us into this situation in the first place!
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough. - Blake
provide the evidence for that claim.
"The hands that help are better far than lips that pray." - Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
Dave's not here man.
So the biased papers had people believing that if they voted "leave" they would "stay"?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
The UK has a tradition going back decades of deciding major constitutional issues via referendum. Political parties are traditionally nervous about making major constitutional change part of their manifesto, because of the potential for this to overshadow a General Election. Moreover, there would be doubts about whether a party that was elected on such a manifesto really had a mandate to take through the changes, as elections are fought across a wide policy spectrum and some of their voters may not have supported the specific change in question.
So basically, when there is an issue that fundamentally changes "the rules of the game" as it were, we usually have a referendum. We had one on remaining in the European Common Market in 1975 (having entered it two years earlier). More recently, we have had votes within the last five years on whether to change our voting system and, for Scotland only, on whether Scotland should leave the UK. Both of those came down in favour of the status quo.
Arguably, the Governments of the day should have held votes on the Maastricht and Lisbon treaties, as both had significant consequences for how the UK is governed. As somebody who voted "Remain" in the most recent referendum but who held his nose while he did so, I like to think that this would have given the UK population the chance to put the brakes on European integration without actually leaving the whole circus. But both treaties needed to be passed under weak Prime Ministers (Major and Brown respectively), who were too afraid of any challenge to their position to allow for something that could have undermined them.
He decided that since the country's majority ran contrary to his stance, it was a good idea to vacate his position and let someone else lead.
Not exactly. He decided to hand the metaphorical flaming bag of excrement (the literal flaming bag is an old Eton tradition, so I hear) to Boris Johnson so he could watch him squirm take the blame in the aftermath.
If you think this is anything to do with representing the will of the people or ethics, then I have a bridge to sell you.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
supposedly 'independent' yet the boundaries were deliberately gerrymandered recently to make it harder to elect Labour MPs...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
Okay, for those of us who do take voting seriously, how did those papers convince people who otherwise would have voted to stay pull the leave lever instead?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
If a simple majority of the population is the most democratic thing, then you're advocating for mob rule. There's a reason most places, especially larger ones have representative democracies. The other thing of course is that you only know what the population though on one particular day. If it was a supermajority, sure the numbers would change but the overall outcome likely wouldn't change if the referendum was rerun soon. With such a small swing, it's likely change frequently if it was re-run indicating it's not in any meaningful manner the "will of the majority" that we should leave.
The Mandate for naming the RSS Boaty McBoatface was clear. The mandate for leaving the EU is not. Guess which we're doing!
SJW n. One who posts facts.
By telling them that the EU is planning to send 28 million Polacks, gyppos & other assorted wogs to steal their women and jobs.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The Mandate for naming the RSS Boaty McBoatface was clear. The mandate for leaving the EU is not. Guess which we're doing!
It indicates to me that the British don't take such votes very seriously. But yes, I can see how a nation that would vote to name a royal ship "Boaty McBoatface" would also vote to leave the EU. It's all just a joke after all.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
All that said, he could have stayed as long as the Conservative party wanted him, but it's reasonable for him to step down after losing.
Cameron was cutting his losses. Being PM is now a poison chalice. He knew that whoever was in the job would have to oversee an economic disaster and the break up of the UK as Scotland and perhaps even Gibraltar and Northern Ireland become independent. It's bad enough that he set up the referendum causing it; he didn't want his legacy to be overseeing it too.
The referendum itself gives May very little mandate. Okay, there was a narrow majority to come out of the EU, but it said nothing about the single market or freedom of movement or any number of other issues.
British democracy is now well and truly broken. May can rule, totally unelected and with no mandate, for another four years. That's long enough to leave the EU and set up deals with no say from the electorate, and by the time the next election comes around it will be too late to undo it. It's not like we can just re-join the EU or the single market. She seems to be planning to implement the wishes of a hard core minority of voters, against popular opinion and without a mandate.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Bloody hell! (in a posh accent)
Well, perhaps not so posh; apparently she is from a working class background, which isn't quite as unusual as one might think - a lot of working class Britons tend to be conservative, in that they just want things to work more or less like they use to. But she also seems like a very decent, down-to-earth person with some views that seem to be not at all common in the Tory party - and I suspect that there may be quite a lot of turbulence ahead for the government, despite their glossy show of unity just now. To me, it looks like we will have a very interesting time over the next few years, and I am in the strange situation of not being quite sure whether to vote one way or the other next time. If Mrs May turns out to be what I think she is, then perhaps I will vote for the Tories, unless Mr Corbyn manages to stay on as leader of Labour and unites the party, in which case I'll probably vote that way. And if you have followed British politics at all, you'll know just how strange that is.
To me it is all about the persons - the problems and their solutions dictate the policy at the moment, so both parties will have to do more or less the same; so it is down to whether you feel the actual persons are decent and trustworthy, and both Mrs May and Mr Corby appear to be that to a high degree. I think we have had enough of overly smart sounding politicians - Blair who sounded like an evangelist, Cameron who sounded like the Cillit Bang man and George "Lightyear" Osborne: "To the bone and beyond". There has been too much spin and too much schoolyard jeering, too much Tory Eton Bully and too much middle class Labour affrontedness. We just want sincere, pragmatic leadership, that works through the problems and takes care of the whole of the nation as best they can.
Britain is the name of a country. Someone from Britain is a Briton. Look it up.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
That's not really a great comparison because Queen Elizabeth has no executive powers, whereas Obama does.
The reality is that the UK simply just doesn't have a president equivalent, the closest thing is our prime minister, who, as you say, also doubles as leader of the house. All of Obama's executive powers are held by the Prime Minister in the UK.
What UK? Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Gibraltar are all set to leave.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Why is my post at -1? When I talk about moderation abuse, this is it. Seriously, can anyone explain why this system makes sense?
1) Scotland and Northern Ireland get a bad deal here since they wanted to remain in the EU. This is against their will. This would be harder in the US system.
2) Why should the Prime minister be ousted? This makes no sense.
3) When votes are done by elected officials, there aren't debates about whether the vote should count or of a revote is needed. No matter how things turn out, people will have a case if they say the outcome isn't valid.
Why is this system a good thing? Seriously, I think the US system makes more sense and I asked my questions in good faith.
1)It wasn't a separate vote, it was a UK vote. The result was the result like it or not for the UK. If you lose a vote you can't just pick up you ball and go do whatever anyway. It doesn't work like that.
2)The PM wasn't ousted he quit because he didn't want to deal with this mess he got us into.
3) When such a big decision comes out so close to a 50/50 split and pretty much all of the experts agree the 'wrong' side won, not least because of massive lies told during the campaign that were admitted to be lies on result day and the protest vote factor it's not quite as definitive as some people might like to imply.
The system sucks and is rotten to the core but is it seriously worse that what america is facing with trump v clinton. tsa, patriot act and all that? I'm not so sure that either are worth shouting about.
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So the biased papers had people believing that if they voted "leave" they would "stay"?
Kinda, they basically told the gullible we'd be able to stop migration, keep all the money, have the influence AND still have full if not better access to the single market and all other eu benefits while simultaneously telling all the fat cats to fuck off. That's what the daily fail and co would have you believe a leave vote meant.
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We really shouldn't have let Dave do that.
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Do you write your replies in notepad and paste them in or something?
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It's all the same evidence that supported the leave vote. Didn't you see it? It's around here somewhere...hang on a sec...
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"So yes, getting things done in the U.S. system is harder, and it's easier for a few states to block legislation. That doesn't mean the U.S. system has greater legitimacy, quite the opposite. The state governments are barely accountable for their actions, and even a party with strong popular support can fail to get its legislation passed thanks to the byzantine electoral system."
I think you have a rose tinted view of the UK's electoral system if you genuinely believe it leads to greater accountability. Let's be clear here, the ruling party has 100% of the power in the UK despite only representing 37% of the voting electorate in this parliament, worse though, party leaders determine the direction of the country and are typically the figurehead that people vote for, and as such when there is a handover in this case, the country can be pushed in a direction that is completely against the will of the people. Theresa May now has the option to take the country in whatever direction she wants for 4 years despite having no democratic mandate to do so, beyond on one simple point, that we should leave the EU but with no definition of when or how.
The UK would be better if it had proportional representation, but it doesn't, due to first past the post, the UK's electoral system nearly always turns out what can be best described as minority backed dictatorship as the British system almost never turns out a party backed by a majority, or a coalition backed by a combined majority. The last government was the first exception in a hundred years where we had a coalition that actually represented a compromise goverment covering over 50% of the population's votes.
The idea of our system is that it leaves us with local representatives, but even this is broken and is in itself the source of the problem - at local level the representatives can be even less representative, in some constituencies a represented is elected with less than 25% of local support, this absurd situation means that someone who is meant to represent his local region is actually opposed by over 75% of the people that live there. If those 75% are liberal and support gay married, whereas the other 25% are an organised church loving, gay hating minority, then that representative may vote in a manner that the vast majority of his constituents are firmly opposed to.
Germany is one of the better examples of governance in the world. Picking between the UK and US electoral systems is like narrowing yourself to a choice between Stalin and Hitler as your leader when you could instead go with a 3rd option and just have Churchill.
dont be a fuckwit. the ScotsNats may try to force another referendum but that's still not a given. Northern Ireland will never leave the UK until there is a majority catholic population, and even then I'd suspect a small but significant minority of them would vote to stay in the UK, And Gib will never drop the UK since it would pretty much allow spain to dominate them with no recourse.
1. Democracy rules. Scotland already had an independence vote, the answer was no. They must, therefore, surrender to the will of the Majority.
2. He wasn't ousted, he walked because things didn't go his way. His replacement is the same but WORSE.
3. I don't get it. What did I just read??
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
The vote in Scotland and Northern Ireland was bordering on 50% too, so, it's not like it was a blanket vote there either. Around 50% of people will be satisfied either way. So, no, not necessarily a bad deal really for all in those countries as you make it out.
I should note that I live in the only county in Northern Ireland that voted majority leave, what about counties? Should we start splitting up the counties too?
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Yes, gerrymandering causes some problems...
Some problems? You make it sound like a coffee stain on a brown T-shirt. Gerrymandering is a huge problem in the US.
Well, perhaps not so posh; apparently she is from a working class background
According to Wikipedia she is the daughter of a vicar. Even if he was a poor and hard-working vicar, in English class terms that makes her at least middle class.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
So the biased papers had people believing that if they voted "leave" they would "stay"?
Kinda, they basically told the gullible we'd be able to stop migration, keep all the money, have the influence AND still have full if not better access to the single market and all other eu benefits while simultaneously telling all the fat cats to fuck off. That's what the daily fail and co would have you believe a leave vote meant.
And don't forget, they said that if we left the EU we'd have 350 million quid a week to spend on hospitals and (probably) free blow and hookers.
If you keep repeating a lie often enough, for a lot of people it becomes the truth.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I agree, both Corbyn and May appear to be honest. Cameron, being a PR man by trade, could never master honesty (he had a bit of trouble with competence too).
Theresa May looks like the best of a bad bunch. On the debit side, her authoritarian tendencies have only increased during her time as Home Secretary (it seems to afflict nearly all who hold that post). To her credit, she has taken more notice of actual evidence than some politicians when making decisions and seems to want to be fair.
She'll need all the stubbornness she's noted for to hold to the words of her initial speech, against all the rich and powerful influences gathering at No. 10's door.
I'm unsure what her appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary means; maybe she had to have him inside the tent and has given him a last chance or enough rope. Seems a bit reckless though.
We've got our flag to wave and we've "taken back control"...
Which - unfortunately - is how a large number of people actually think.
It DID happen in the US, last year. John Boehner resigned, and was replaced by Paul Ryan. David Cameron is the head of the lower house of parliament, just like John Boehner was. The equivalent of Barrack Obama, as head of state, is Queen Elizabeth. She is not resigning.
This is not really accurate. The PM of the UK is NOT the same as the Leader of the House of Commons (the lower house of Parliament). That particular person right now is Chris Grayling. While it is true that on several occasions, the Leader of the House of Commons and the Prime Minister were the same person, the two offices are completely different (and the last person to do that was Neville Chamberlain). The Leader of the House of Commons is more of a administrative role for the house itself (sort of a Secretary of the House).
The PM is the head of government and the most powerful person in the UK (de jure at least). The role of head of the executive in the US is assigned to the President. However, the role of head of state in the US is ALSO assigned to the President. In the UK, the Queen is the head of state. So the only possible analogy here would be for the President of the US to renounce his legislative rights to another person but still remain President in name.
Yes, the Boris appointment was very interesting.
Personally, I find it all a little too convenient. It may very well have just been chance, but I wonder if Boris and Gove set up their 'stabbing in the back' thing as a way for Boris to exit from a situation he could not win from. Before his good friend Gove did this, Boris was basically trapped and would have had to follow through with brexit and all the ridiculous promises he made. He would basically have had to upset both the brexiters (by not being able to deliver on all the promises he made) and remainers (who see him as an unprincipled opportunist). He could have ended as the most hated prime minister in history, without anyone else to blame since he was the face of the brexit campaign.
If you consider his position, then what Gove did was actually an incredibly effective way for Boris to escape the trap. Gove spent his public image (which is off little value to him), and Boris got to preserve his by crawling off with hurt feelings, gaining some sympathy from the public instead of its scorn, and not having to deal with being labelled a quitter.
This would also explain a plot hole that didn't make sense to me before, around why Boris didn't just remain in the leadership race despite Gove joining. In the end all Gove had was claims that Boris wouldn't be a good leader. A seasoned politician like Boris could have easily run a PR campaign back that he would be a good leader, and discredit Gove (after all Gove had just stabbed him in the back). So why did he decide he suddenly had no chance of winning?
I suspect from this appointment that May was involved as well, and was promised the premiership at least until the next election. My prediction is Gove will do his 'penance' and then come back to the cabinet in a few months time, and Boris will start figuring out how to engineer a comeback as the 'hero of brexit' once May has done all the dirty work for him.
You have to understand; to an American, the concept of a leader voluntarily submitting to the will of the people is completely alien.
"-1, Overrated" works, too.
I always find it funny to get a "-1, Overrated" applied to a post that has no other moderation.
Love sees no species.
Like how Gibraltar is currently dominated by the UK, but without the border controls the UK will make them have?
I'm unsure what her appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary means; maybe she had to have him inside the tent and has given him a last chance or enough rope. Seems a bit reckless though.
I think it is a brilliant piece of strategic nastiness, that one can only admire, as an engineer. She wanted to remain in EU, he was the highest profile brexiteer; now he can sort out the mess. If he fails miserably - and it seems not unlikely - he'll get all the blame; if he succeeds, it shines a positive light on her as a good leader. Well played, I think.
We are seriously going to run out of simile soon. This is quite the most bizarre and unlikely position to be in, truth being stranger than fiction and all that.
She's put Bam-bam in as foreign secretary, and she's left a homeopathy supporter in charge of the NHS. However she HAS had the good sense to get rid of Michael Gove (snake in the grass has been returned to the green pastures of the Back Benches).
Where is Spitting Image when you need it?
She will begin as prime minister of UK, and end as the prime minister of United England and Wales, once Scotland and Northern Ireland leaves.
Scotland voted no because they would not be able to stay in the EU otherwise. Since UK exits the EU anyway, there is one reason less for Scotland to remain a part of UK.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
All that said, he could have stayed as long as the Conservative party wanted him, but it's reasonable for him to step down after losing.
Cameron was cutting his losses. Being PM is now a poison chalice. He knew that whoever was in the job would have to oversee an economic disaster and the break up of the UK as Scotland and perhaps even Gibraltar and Northern Ireland become independent. It's bad enough that he set up the referendum causing it; he didn't want his legacy to be overseeing it too.
The referendum itself gives May very little mandate. Okay, there was a narrow majority to come out of the EU, but it said nothing about the single market or freedom of movement or any number of other issues.
British democracy is now well and truly broken. May can rule, totally unelected and with no mandate, for another four years. That's long enough to leave the EU and set up deals with no say from the electorate, and by the time the next election comes around it will be too late to undo it. It's not like we can just re-join the EU or the single market. She seems to be planning to implement the wishes of a hard core minority of voters, against popular opinion and without a mandate.
Indeed, its clear why all the 'Leave' campaigners ran away as soon as they won; they knew what a mess they had created and have distanced themselves from it. All I can think is that the likes of Boris, Farage and Gove hate Britain and would like to see it broken up.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
The Mandate for naming the RSS Boaty McBoatface was clear. The mandate for leaving the EU is not. Guess which we're doing!
It indicates to me that the British don't take such votes very seriously. But yes, I can see how a nation that would vote to name a royal ship "Boaty McBoatface" would also vote to leave the EU. It's all just a joke after all.
'Boaty McBoatface' was the least offensive option; the names that actually won the most votes were "Fuckface" and "Poopybum" but they got censored out. You might be able to tell from this that the British have a juvenile sense of humor but are too prudish to admit it and therefore hate themselves. Thats why they voted 'Leave'; because they hate themselves, and they especially hate young people (who will be the ones who have to grow up with the results of this fiasco).
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
By telling them that the EU is planning to send 28 million Polacks, gyppos & other assorted wogs to steal their women and jobs.
And this is exactly what elderly English people earnestly believe and fear. Thats why the Leave vote was mostly elderly English people and the younger generation voted to stay. But as England is an aging population, Leave won by a very small margin.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Britain is the name of a country. Someone from Britain is a Briton. Look it up.
'Great Britain' is the name of an Island. 'The United Kingdom' is the name of a country (actually its an abbreviated name of a country).
A 'Briton' is (was) a Celt from the island of Britain. They largely don't exist any more, but many people descended from Angles and Saxons (*spit*) like to refer to themselves as 'Britons' while referring to the Cymru (meaning 'comrades') as foreigners and 'Wales' comes from a Saxon word for foreigner. The 'Welsh' are actually the closest thing that survives today to British people or 'Britons'.
Confused much?
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
We really shouldn't have let Dave do that.
After the Brexit poll there was probably a creepy computerised voice in his office saying "I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
May has the dirt on EVERYONE. Thats how she became PM; everyone is too scared to stand against her.
(Hi, Theresa! I know you watch everything!)
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
All that said, he could have stayed as long as the Conservative party wanted him, but it's reasonable for him to step down after losing.
Very much so. If you strongly disagree with a decision, and can't see how to do it without causing a disaster, you are definitely not the person to be implementing it. Let someone who thought it was a good idea show you what nuance you were missing.
It's all the same evidence that supported the leave vote. Didn't you see it? It's around here somewhere...hang on a sec...
Because so many eldery English people voted Leave and we all know how much they contribute to the British economy! With the support of the 55 and up crowd the British economy will flourish as never before.
Why, soon all those old people will be out working in fields and factories to turn the British economy back to a production economy!
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Because we need more spying.
Well, Daniel Craig is retiring. You're going to have to get a new 007 from somewhere....
I read that appointing BoJo as Foreign Minister is like appointing Dan Quayle as US Sec'y of State... or maybe worse.
I remember an Atlantic? NatRev? cover in the late eighties, that was a map of the world, divided into "ok to send VP Dan Quayle, not ok, and deep do-do if he goes there...."
mark
He decided that since the country's majority ran contrary to his stance, it was a good idea to vacate his position and let someone else lead.
This is what we need in America. Instead of digging in and fighting tooth and nail against the peoples wishes.. just get the fuck out and do it with some dignity. The majority of our politicians are just stubborn children who will never concede defeat or admit to wrongs, no matter how much blood is still dripping from their hands.
The U.K. Constitution is now almost wholly written in light of decades of law reform in the area, but it's not consolidated into a single document, and is not especially well codified. (See the final paragraph below).
Since 1997 there has been a significant roll-back of the personal prerogative by successive Parliaments legislating in areas where it was routinely exercised. As a recently relevant example, the Lascelles principles (from the Senex letters, for example) became obsolete with the Fixed-term Parliament Act 2011 (which controls events upon the demise of a government by expiration, resignation or loss of confidence), and several recent Representation of the People Acts and some acts controlling secondary legislation such as the Cabinet Manual, which outlines the continuity of government in the event of a demise (death or resignation) of the Prime Minister. The Queen did not have a right to reject Theresa May as Prime Minister even if Cameron's careful announcement of his plan to first tender his resignation and then recommend his successor described the actual order of events; her personal prerogative in the area is obsolete, and the (advised) prerogative vested in Cameron is now strictly controlled by statute.
For better or for worse, what's missing in the UK Constitution is a clear and standard entrenching mechanism. Practically every Constitutional scholar and lawyer in the country would agree that there *is* entrenching, and the concept that one Parliament cannot bind the next has been obsolete as a legal reality for some time, and as a political one for even longer. Ignoring entrenchings coupled to international treaties (e.g. the Single European Act), and entrenchings in the terms of statutes themselves, there are entrenchings controlled by terms in other Acts of Parliament. The tower of legislation needed to remove the Scotland Act would be enormous, for example. And the new Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union and the Attorney-General will be busy for years trying to identify what legislation will need to be included in the effective repeal of the European Communities Act 1972. A misstep will indeed risk the whole enterprise being declared defective by UK courts, which would effectively require Parliament to legislate to correct the defect or outright overrule the ruling (which in turn would need to be done carefully, otherwise "ping pong" results).
In effect, the major difference between Parliamentary supremacy in the UK in 2016 and Constitutional supremacy in Canada or Australia in 2016 is that the Queen of Canada and the Queen of Australia have prerogative powers that are *protected from* the federal parliaments by the Constitution. In the UK, any royal prereogative can be removed by Parliament, and the only protection today is the Queen's Consent (or the Prince's Consent where relevant), which are implemented as standing rules of the House of Commons and subject to change at the will of the majority of MPs. In Canada, for example, an enumerated power of the executive (e.g. the power to appoint Senators where there are vacancies) cannot be removed without the consent of some or all of the provincial legislatures. Several non-enumerated powers have been held by the courts in Canada to require provincial consent too. In the UK, by contrast, the power to summon members of the House of Lords has been modified by Parliament (and in some cases the House of Commons) acting alone several times in the past century, and even in the years since the effective federalism of devolution has arrived as a constitutional reality.
(A clear example is considering the difference between the Fixed-term Parliament Act 2011 in the UK, which withdrew a prerogative power altogether (preventing the executive from dissolving Parliament and calling an election), and the Canada Elections Act 2000 which in establishing fixed election dates had to consider that dissolution cannot be removed without a formal constitutional amendment involving provincial consent
All the more ironic, given that they're retired and so they don't have jobs, and as for the women I doubt they could get it up if the opportunity presented itself.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Because they convinced them that the vote was about immigrants. They clearly wanted the immigrants to leave.
It's not a strawman of what Barsteward said.
Examine even your most deeply held beliefs. Nobody is always right.
The Mandate for naming the RSS Boaty McBoatface was clear. The mandate for leaving the EU is not. Guess which we're doing!
This is why I love the British, their sense of humor makes a joke of everything. "Boaty McBoatface", "Leave the EU", it's all the same to them.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
>Picking between the UK and US electoral systems is like narrowing yourself to a choice between Stalin and Hitler as your leader when you could instead go with a 3rd option and just have Churchill.
While I thoroughly agree with your post - your choice of a 'good' third choice was terrible. Churchill was one of the worst leaders in world history. He willfully starved over 3 million children in India and when called out for it said 'let the Indians learn to take care of themselves, like we did' - which ignored that they HAD. The Indian government had over thousands of years developed a system to protect themselves from famines during that part of the monsoon cycle where you get several years of consecutive drought (which comes around ever few decades). They mandated a minimum percentage of crops be storeable crops (grains generally) which were kept in central storage locations and handed out in times of drought. It was Britain who dismantled this system - the empire demanded cash crops like cotton over storeable food crops like grains, and didn't store anything for droughts. When drought inevitably came - it came with famines. The one under Churchill was merely the last one - in total the British dismantling of India's food security program killed close to 20 million people (mostly children) over numerous famines. He was also the first head of state to ever use chemical weapons - and he used them on civilians.
In short - Churchil was a truly terrible person, he only looks good because the guy opposite him is literally Hitler.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
>1)It wasn't a separate vote, it was a UK vote. The result was the result like it or not for the UK. If you lose a vote you can't just pick up you ball and go do whatever anyway. It doesn't work like that.
You should tell Texas that - they threaten secession every time a democrat wins the white house. The difference of course is that, unlike Scotland and Northern Ireland - there isn't a pre-existing and well defined protocol that allows for Texas to leave the union and form an independent country if enough Texans support it. The last time states tried to do so - it led to a civil war. It's unlikely that if Scotland chose to leave the UK they UK would start a war to force them to stay and not only because the UK's nukes are all in Scotland and the Scots would obviously cease them if a war happen and basically get to say "End the war or London is a glass parking lot".
After centuries of war and conquest the system of today was formed - which makes Scottland's membership of the UK voluntary and they still have their own parliament, laws and their own legal system (which is markedly different from the English one). If they wanted to leave the UK entirely (which would basically come down to replacing the Queen with a President or something and no longer being subject to English foreign policy or treaties) they have the legal right and means to do so.
There are areas where becoming sovereign is an easy option to allow you to avoid being forced into something voted for by others - and areas where it is not. But your claims is a major oversimplification of reality at best, an outright lie at worst.
>2)The PM wasn't ousted he quit because he didn't want to deal with this mess he got us into.
Well he was a terrible PM, getting rid of him is a good thing - but her track record suggests the BEST we can hope for is for May to be AS BAD as he was.
>3) When such a big decision comes out so close to a 50/50 split and pretty much all of the experts agree the 'wrong' side won, not least because of massive lies told during the campaign that were admitted to be lies on result day and the protest vote factor it's not quite as definitive as some people might like to imply.
If there is something key missing from modern day representative democracies it is a way to instantly punish failures to follow through on election promises. Imagine if - as part of the campaign a party had to publicly publish draft legislation for each election promise they made - and all of this automatically got agenda'd in parliament/congress if they won. Where it could get amended (but not so it fails to fulfill the promise - which a court challenge could judge) or lose but there would simply be no option NOT to introduce it. And if you walk back a promise after a vote the vote is automatically invalidated.
The first brexit promise to be walked back happened less than an hour after the results - by the end of the weekend they had walked back every promise they made, with zero intention of making any of them happen. That alone ought to invalidate the result.
Now it's possible that leave could win without those lies - but I strongly doubt it, failing to implement (or at least table legislation) to achieve a promise made should invalidate the election and lead to an automatic revote.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
>The vote in Scotland and Northern Ireland was bordering on 50% too
Only if you combine them - which doesn't make any sense. By itself Scotland OVERWHELMINGLY voted remain - closer to 60%.
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Actually, if I combine them, it makes your point. However, I didn't combine them, I looked at the largest geographical areas for Scotland on:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-p...
The vast majority of larger counties in reality are closer to 50% than 60%, it's really just the numerous smaller counties that pushed it upwards. That's not really "overwhelming" to me.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
"While I thoroughly agree with your post - your choice of a 'good' third choice was terrible."
I don't see how this can realistically be blamed on Churchill, it was an inherited problem, and Britain was in the midst of war with barely enough resources to feed it's own population. What exactly could he have even done by that point? India was already defacto out of British rule by that point anyway because it was a condition of India's support for Britain in the war, hence why a mere 4 years later they were able to transition to full independence.
Do I think Churchill was perfect? No, his government after all was responsible for the treatment of Turing and Turing's resultant death. But Churchill did a lot of incredibly good things as well, the European Court of Human Rights being an obvious example, but his efforts post-war were what led directly, and indirectly to things like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Criminal Court, the EU and so on and so forth - institutions he either led creation of, or created the environment in which such institutions could be created have created decades of European stability, and given justice to and protected the human rights of millions.
If you judge him by the standards of the time he was far and away about the most progressive leader going. Of course, standards at the time were pretty poor sure, but it's still a night and day choice between Churchill, Stalin and Hitler - declaring him one of the worst leaders in history is rather over the top hyperbole, you're effectively basing that on making him guilty of inaction in not pulling a magic trick to resolve a problem he did not cause and could not realistically resolve, and ignoring the fact that the ideas he had and institutions he created are what have led to the stability and success of the modern Western world. This is something that is all too well being eroded as modern leaders regularly declare things like human rights as bad, or try and shout down the international criminal court because it dares to try and tackle war criminals and so forth. Churchill sought to create structures and institutions that would prevent or minimise the likelihood of the atrocities of World War II ever coming to the fore on that scale again, and to bring justice when they do happen. As much as modern world leaders are now fighting back against that, he has to date, been completely successful, and so if you do blame those 3 million Indian deaths on him you must also credit him with the 100s of millions of lives he's saved both in helping to push an end to the war, and with the prevention of further instability preventing further wars and war crimes since. You cannot simply pick some indirect problem and blame it on him without also accepting the other indirect good things.
An inherritted problem is only an excuse if you did something to fix it.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *