Blockchain is a really boring technology. It takes the simplest, non-scalable solution to a hard problem and ten declares victory.
Distributing a ledger to all agents then demanding they burn every increasing amount of energy to secure the ledger is a really stupid way of solving the problem. The fact that it may be the only way of solving problem suggests it's a stupid problem to solve.
It's not a good technology for a currency, but I can see that it could be useful for some applications with lowish volumes of transactions and the need to guarantee the integrity of the distributed ledger over very long periods.
Land registries, for example. Almost ideal for that.
Yes, although there is the problem of losing your private key!
I'm sad I didn't understand it enough in 2010... although I would have definitely sold any before now!
In the last couple of years of my professional poker career, there was a very soft site that operated in only bitcoin. I am very very very sad I decided not to play there. I know an individual who won 10,000 bitcoin on there.
I'm sad I didn't understand it enough in 2010... although I would have definitely sold any before now!
In the last couple of years of my professional poker career, there was a very soft site that operated in only bitcoin. I am very very very sad I decided not to play there. I know an individual who won 10,000 bitcoin on there.
One thing which is somewhat perverse, but nevertheless logical, is that the harder it is to leave, the more convinced some people will be that we should. Claims that we aren't tightly linked to the EU and it's all just a matter of convenience are hard to maintain now.
We're 'shackled' to European politics because of geography and history. The delusion was to convince ourselves that somehow we'd got in with the wrong crowd in the 70s but had plenty of other geopolitical options.
The failure of Brexit might bring back the British quality of stoic fatalism.
William suggests we should have supported Germany when they invaded Russia as they are our neighbours.
[snip] ...currencies are also mass popular delusions, in some respects.
No, they are not. As a means of exchange, they are guaranteed (indeed mandated) by the issuing state, and as a means of storing value they are protected by an implicit guarantee that the government won't let inflation get out of hand.
Of course, if the guarantee becomes worthless, as in the Weimar Republic or Zimbabwe, that's a different matter. but in normal circumstances people have every reason to believe that the currency of an advanced economy is OK.
Trust in government is, as I said, to some extent a mass popular delusion...
I've tried to understand it, and it just seems like a giant ponzi scheme run by a Nigerian Prince.
The biggest part of the ponzi to me if that you can now pay people for contracts to mine via cloud mining services.
They have all the equipment, you pay them for the contract for them to mine and they charge you a daily (variable) fee for running the mining equipment....seems to me the individual is basically taking all the risk, as the cloud mining company just adjusts their fee to solidify their profit margin.
I'm sad I didn't understand it enough in 2010... although I would have definitely sold any before now!
In the last couple of years of my professional poker career, there was a very soft site that operated in only bitcoin. I am very very very sad I decided not to play there. I know an individual who won 10,000 bitcoin on there.
Did he buy a (pineapple) pizza with his winnings?
Probably, more than one...among the professional poker playing community they have been all over crypto since very early on.
There are a lot who have made far more money out of it than the amount they made out of the online poker boom.
That doesn't make any sense. One was clearly the moral high ground and the other is most likely a tragic and damaging mistake.
Notcatcall. Both were campaigns fought for the best of reasons and which will make our country a better place to live. At the same time both demanded we fight on the same side as some people who used methods we would not condone.
The alternative was to simply give up the fight. Something we were not willing to.do. we did not confine the tactics used and will not apologise for the actions of others.
The trouble for poor old Alastair is that this us the only argument he has left. So he repeats it over and over again even when it has clearly failed.
No one cares. No one is apologising and no one thinks it makes a blind bit of difference.
I get that the Leavers are intensely comfortable with having won on a xenophobic campaign. That's their right and they have to live with their own consciences. Evidently this isn't a struggle for them.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
Definitely not a pyramid scheme Bitcoin has just hit $17k....
It may not have been intended to be a pyramid scheme, but it looks like it has become one.
Always let the devil take the hindmost.
It is the dotcom bubble all over again...and then in 10 years time, things will have calmed, nonsense like Crypto Kitties will have long since disappeared and we will have the amazon's / netflix / etc of blockchain.
I agree, Blockchain is an interesting technology. I believe central banks are looking into how they might use it.
Blockchain is a really boring technology. It takes the simplest, non-scalable solution to a hard problem and ten declares victory.
Distributing a ledger to all agents then demanding they burn every increasing amount of energy to secure the ledger is a really stupid way of solving the problem. The fact that it may be the only way of solving problem suggests it's a stupid problem to solve.
Bitcoin might be today's tulip mania - certainly the last year's price action most closely matches that of the tulip bubble - but it is equally possible it could become the digital alternative to gold as a store of value... ...currencies are also mass popular delusions, in some respects.
You can pay your British taxes in pounds sterling.
Bitcoin has no storage capability, it's is predicated on the continual burning of energy. The less people who burn energy the less valuable it becomes.
FWIW like other Vote Leavers in this thread, I have nothing to apologise for and consider my role in the campaign one of my proudest accomplishments.
If only the Remainers had put in a tenth of their post-result energies into the campaign itself....
Heh!
Yes if Alistair Meeks had put in as much effort campaigning for Remain before the referendum as he has whinging about the result after the referendum he would have won it single handed!
And, FWIW, I think you're probably inclined to see the bits you like on holiday or business: living in Switzerland, France or Portugal is a very different kettle of fish, and the UK compares well in comparison.
All these things are matters of taste, of course, but I lived in Switzerland for 16 years and in Denmark for 16 years before that, and thought they both "worked" much better than Britain - people were generally less disgruntled and more engaged in society, and felt a greater sense of common purpose. And in practical terms they were just more confident that things would work out well and they'd prosper. I feel at home in Britain and doubt if I'll live long-term abroad again, but on the whole I preferred the way (albeit very different to each other) their societies worked.
Out of interest, what do you think the snags are about Switzerland (I don't have an educated feeling for what France or Portugal are like to live in)?
On your other post, while I'd in principle like a world government (with lots of subsidarity, of course), I agree it's a loooong way off. But individual nation states seem to me to be increasingly impotent and less relevant to our travelling younger generation.
That doesn't make any sense. One was clearly the moral high ground and the other is most likely a tragic and damaging mistake.
Notcatcall. Both were campaigns fought for the best of reasons and which will make our country a better place to live. At the same time both demanded we fight on the same side as some people who used methods we would not condone.
The alternative was to simply give up the fight. Something we were not willing to.do. we did not confine the tactics used and will not apologise for the actions of others.
The trouble for poor old Alastair is that this us the only argument he has left. So he repeats it over and over again even when it has clearly failed.
No one cares. No one is apologising and no one thinks it makes a blind bit of difference.
I get that the Leavers are intensely comfortable with having won on a xenophobic campaign. That's their right and they have to live with their own consciences. Evidently this isn't a struggle for them.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
So, what are you going to do, xenophobes?
By Alistair's logic, everyone who voted and supported Labour is an extreme anti Semite.
That doesn't make any sense. One was clearly the moral high ground and the other is most likely a tragic and damaging mistake.
Notcatcall. Both were campaigns fought for the best of reasons and which will make our country a better place to live. At the same time both demanded we fight on the same side as some people who used methods we would not condone.
The alternative was to simply give up the fight. Something we were not willing to.do. we did not confine the tactics used and will not apologise for the actions of others.
The trouble for poor old Alastair is that this us the only argument he has left. So he repeats it over and over again even when it has clearly failed.
No one cares. No one is apologising and no one thinks it makes a blind bit of difference.
I get that the Leavers are intensely comfortable with having won on a xenophobic campaign. That's their right and they have to live with their own consciences. Evidently this isn't a struggle for them.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
So, what are you going to do, xenophobes?
Nothing st all. We are not uncomfortable and just find your continual harping on about this to be amusing rubbish. Something to entertain us on train journeys.
If anything were needed to prove to me that your whole world view is somewhat warped it is how you have latched on to this in the desperate hope that it has any meaning in the real world.
The country is going to carry on going backwards until Leavers appreciate the consequences of the campaign that they fought for. Since they currently have no interest in doing so, the country will keep going backwards.
My approval or disapproval is beside the point.
Which consequences do which Leavers need to appreciate, how do they need to appreciate them, and how will their appreciation of the consequences change the direction of the country?
You could learn that pointing at the other side and shouting "RACIST!" doesn't work very well. You don't seem to be.
I assume - maybe I'm wrong - but I assume that at some point Leavers want to live in a country that is reasonably united. Until Leavers appreciate that their entire approach to Brexit has been founded on a campaign that pandered to xenophobia by lying and the impact that had on those on the other side of the debate, there is no chance of that happening any time soon.
You won. Get over it and start dealing with it. 18 months on, Leavers are as clueless as ever.
My approach to Brexit has been founded on a campaign? What does that mean?
My feelings on Brexit were founded long before that, and my "approach" to it hasn't been to "pander to xenephobia by lying".
I've got a feeling that there's something specific that you want Leavers to say, to prove they're not racists. Like, "I support FOM"?
I won't. I'm against FOM because of the effect an unlimited supply of cheap labour has on wages at the bottom end of the labour market. I know this doesn't affect you, so you can afford to point and sneer "racists"
Do you want me to offer to marry an EU citizen, to help them worry less about staying the country? I quite sadly tried that with my Spanish girlfriend, but she dumped me instead.
Whether you think the EU is benign or not is largely irrelevant. It won't look to conquer by force adjacent countries, or oppress or exterminate minorities. Neither does the UK.
The issue is whether or not I wish to be governed by Britons and British institutions in the UK or by pan-Europeans and EU institutions in a federal Europe.
It goes down to the absolute fundamentals of social identity and self-determination.
That's absolutely fair enough.
It all comes down to how you view a demos and what such a demos is for. For me, identity is a very fluid thing. I am English in the UK, I am British in Europe and Asia, I am European in the US...
I accept absolutely that others may disagree.
I wish the referendum had been about that.
I agree. I also find that neither British party is close to my own political beliefs, and both are seriously flawed leaderships.
I am not bothered whether my democratic representatives are British, so much as whether they have the same aspirations as me. I would rather be represented by competent European Social Democrats than incompetent British Nationalists.
Yep, I am with you 100%. But that does not stop me feeling English or British, or strongly identifying as both. I am in a minority, though. There is no doubt about that!
The difference is I believe, and feel, you are wholly sincere in your patriotism.
I don't doubt yours and never have. As I said to you in a previous conversation: it's interesting how two relatively intelligent people can see exactly the same problem and react to it in entirely different ways. I don't blame you for campaigning for what you wanted and believed in. I don't agree with Alastair that you have any responsibility for the inflammatory nonsense spoken by those who led the Leave campaign, just as I take no responsibility for the nonsense about an immediate recession spouted by the leaders of Remain. Being on the soft centre left I am all too aware of the nuances of voting.
I may hold chancers and charlatans like Johnson, Fox, Davis and Farage in total contempt, but Leave voters are a different matter altogether. They are members of my family, they are friends and they are neighbours. We disagree. That does not make them evil.
That sounds fair. I understand Alastair's emotional reaction, but I do not share it.
Mr. Glenn, having ties to Europe is not the same as being integrated into the EU. We have a close relationship with the US, but we aren't in NAFTA, or the 51st state.
Mr. B, a fair point indeed. If Osborne hadn't flounced he'd be PM already, in all probability.
Which raises an interesting timing question. Let's say May resigns. Could Osborne stand if he isn't currently an MP? If he's a candidate in her constituency by-election?
Mr. Rentool, the new £1 coins are disappointing. Thinner than an old threepenny bit, and just a tiny bit too big. Threepenny bits and old £1 coins fit perfectly in a remodelled cartridge which worked as a pound coin holder (made for my grandfather and now, alas, defunct).
I would have thought somebody such as yourself into the IP game would be in your general wheelhouse of interest.
I only have so much brain space. Bitcoin just can't find a way in!
I'm glad that I'm not the only one. Every time anyone tries to explain bitcoin to me, my mind fuzzes over. My nephew looked at me with a mixture of pity and contempt when I admitted that to him.
Mr. Glenn, having ties to Europe is not the same as being integrated into the EU. We have a close relationship with the US, but we aren't in NAFTA, or the 51st state.
Mr. B, a fair point indeed. If Osborne hadn't flounced he'd be PM already, in all probability.
Which raises an interesting timing question. Let's say May resigns. Could Osborne stand if he isn't currently an MP? If he's a candidate in her constituency by-election?
You have to be an MP at the time nominations open, so in your scenario, he couldn't.
I would have thought somebody such as yourself into the IP game would be in your general wheelhouse of interest.
I only have so much brain space. Bitcoin just can't find a way in!
I'm glad that I'm not the only one. Every time anyone tries to explain bitcoin to me, my mind fuzzes over. My nephew looked at me with a mixture of pity and contempt when I admitted that to him.
That doesn't make any sense. One was clearly the moral high ground and the other is most likely a tragic and damaging mistake.
Notcatcall. Both were campaigns fought for the best of reasons and which will make our country a better place to live. At the same time both demanded we fight on the same side as some people who used methods we would not condone.
The alternative was to simply give up the fight. Something we were not willing to.do. we did not confine the tactics used and will not apologise for the actions of others.
The trouble for poor old Alastair is that this us the only argument he has left. So he repeats it over and over again even when it has clearly failed.
No one cares. No one is apologising and no one thinks it makes a blind bit of difference.
I get that the Leavers are intensely comfortable with having won on a xenophobic campaign. That's their right and they have to live with their own consciences. Evidently this isn't a struggle for them.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
So, what are you going to do, xenophobes?
Do let us know if you get any responses from xenophobes. I can't help you, you see, because there weren't any xenophobes in the campaign I was part of.
Xenophobia. The blue-blanket for Remainers, who refuse to believe they lost the argument without the other side resorting to the most base of human conditions.
It does make them look rather more than a little ridiculous. And just keeps maturing that unexpected victory into the most delicious elixir.
You should all embroider a big red L for Leaver on the backs of your shirts, like the chick in that Hawthorne novel, and stand on street corners with a placard reading "Kick my arse, I'm a xenophobe."
This is just bonkers to the point of surrealism. Looking at what is going on in Hungary it's as if an even loopier version of Unity Mitford had spent her weekends in Berlin hangin' with Adolf and the gang, and her weeks telling her sister Diana that that Mosley chap had some pretty unsavoury racial theories.
That doesn't make any sense. One was clearly the moral high ground and the other is most likely a tragic and damaging mistake.
Notcatcall. Both were campaigns fought for the best of reasons and which will make our country a better place to live. At the same time both demanded we fight on the same side as some people who used methods we would not condone.
The alternative was to simply give up the fight. Something we were not willing to.do. we did not confine the tactics used and will not apologise for the actions of others.
The trouble for poor old Alastair is that this us the only argument he has left. So he repeats it over and over again even when it has clearly failed.
No one cares. No one is apologising and no one thinks it makes a blind bit of difference.
I get that the Leavers are intensely comfortable with having won on a xenophobic campaign. That's their right and they have to live with their own consciences. Evidently this isn't a struggle for them.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
So, what are you going to do, xenophobes?
Do let us know if you get any responses from xenophobes. I can't help you, you see, because there weren't any xenophobes in the campaign I was part of.
Xenophobia. The blue-blanket for Remainers, who refuse to believe they lost the argument without the other side resorting to the most base of human conditions.
It does make them look rather more than a little ridiculous. And just keeps maturing that unexpected victory into the most delicious elixir.
So I get a lot of huffing and puffing, and not the slightest indication how Leavers intend to build bridges with people whose support they eventually will want. Looks like it's going to be a bleak few years for Britain ahead.
It has certainly lost its potency as a weapon the Dems might have used to boot out House Republicans next year. (I think the Senate is disproportionately Democrats coming around again anyway?)
Mr. Eagles, mildly surprised but cheers for the answer.
Mr. Rentool, hmm. Not sure that's how democracy works. If they were giving May votes in the Commons, then she'd need to have them on board. During the Coalition, the Quad didn't have Labour or UKIP members, after all.
Not to mention, if smaller Northern Irish parties got given info and access and influence, Sturgeon would demand it too. May's got enough difficult with her own party and the DUP.
That doesn't make any sense. One was clearly the moral high ground and the other is most likely a tragic and damaging mistake.
Notcatcall. Both were campaigns fought for the best of reasons and which will make our country a better place to live. At the same time both demanded we fight on the same side as some people who used methods we would not condone.
The alternative was to simply give up the fight. Something we were not willing to.do. we did not confine the tactics used and will not apologise for the actions of others.
The trouble for poor old Alastair is that this us the only argument he has left. So he repeats it over and over again even when it has clearly failed.
No one cares. No one is apologising and no one thinks it makes a blind bit of difference.
I get that the Leavers are intensely comfortable with having won on a xenophobic campaign. That's their right and they have to live with their own consciences. Evidently this isn't a struggle for them.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
So, what are you going to do, xenophobes?
Do let us know if you get any responses from xenophobes. I can't help you, you see, because there weren't any xenophobes in the campaign I was part of.
Xenophobia. The blue-blanket for Remainers, who refuse to believe they lost the argument without the other side resorting to the most base of human conditions.
It does make them look rather more than a little ridiculous. And just keeps maturing that unexpected victory into the most delicious elixir.
So I get a lot of huffing and puffing, and not the slightest indication how Leavers intend to build bridges with people whose support they eventually will want. Looks like it's going to be a bleak few years for Britain ahead.
Mr. Eagles, one of my chief ways to procrastinate, PB aside, is watching videogame nonsense on Youtube. The Chuckle Brothers playing Hitman must be the best marketing video I've ever seen. It's a weird mixture of ice cold ("We don't need him any more," Paul Chuckle said after instructing the agent to put an unconscious man in a burning shed full of chemicals) and oddly amusing (they made the assassin bleed a radiator).
It's not immediately clear which party would have him as a candidate, let alone where he could win.
The Lib Dems would take him, but it's hard to think of a constituency where the combination of that candidate and that rosette wouldn't be a loser.
I wouldn't touch him with a bargepole. That Paralympic audience had it right.
Pretty sure some of the PB Brexitories who so loathe Ozzie now were tutting at the bad form of the ghastly oiks booing him on that night. Funny old world..
I would have thought somebody such as yourself into the IP game would be in your general wheelhouse of interest.
I only have so much brain space. Bitcoin just can't find a way in!
I'm glad that I'm not the only one. Every time anyone tries to explain bitcoin to me, my mind fuzzes over. My nephew looked at me with a mixture of pity and contempt when I admitted that to him.
Never invest in anything that you cannot understand where the profit comes from.
Bitcoin the profit comes from selling on to the next mug. All very profitable until the music stops.
[..] the Secretary of State shall exercise the power under paragraph 1 if at any time it appears likely to him that a majority of those voting would express a wish that Northern Ireland should cease to be part of the United Kingdom and form part of a united Ireland.
So has Tezzie agreed to pay the Brussels Baksheesh in Bitcoin?
I can declare (unsurprisingly) that I haven't got a clue about Bitcoin. Heck, I still think getting a £2 coin in your change is a bit of a novelty.
More of a novelty is a £50 note .I never see them used apart from some foreign nationals , who have just entered the UK.
My brother runs a restaurant and he seems to come by tons of them.
Ian where is he based ? Never see them around here , people avoid them like the plaque when paying in cash for drinks etc.I have seen premises refuse them on many occasions.
The most bizarre thing about Brexit at the moment is that most commentators, politicians and even esteemed PB posters seem to have all decided that the government has completely screwed up just at the point where what has actually happened is that, for the first time since the referendum, we seem to be close to making some really major progress. The mood music from the EU26-and-a-half has been remarkably constructive and friendly - they do, at last, seem to accept that there will be an orderly exit deal, a transition deal, and a trade deal, and they are showing every sign of wanting to get on with it.
Admittedly there's a little local difficulty with the Irish, but when in the last 500 years has there not been? They are only arguing about semantics in respect of what happens if we don't agree a trade deal, and I'm sure some civil servant will be able to come up with some synonym for 'regulatory alignment' which doesn't scare the DUP horses.
I'm more optimistic about the overall picture than I have been at any time since the referendum. I seem to be in a minority of one in that, but 'Buy on the cannons, sell on the trumpets'.
Minority of 2.
Amazing how this “completely useless” government has won all The BREXIT bill amendments so far and is now over halfway through the process.....
[..] the Secretary of State shall exercise the power under paragraph 1 if at any time it appears likely to him that a majority of those voting would express a wish that Northern Ireland should cease to be part of the United Kingdom and form part of a united Ireland.
Time for Brokenshire to call a border poll?
The poll was conducted with the most pessimistic scenario.
So I get a lot of huffing and puffing, and not the slightest indication how Leavers intend to build bridges with people whose support they eventually will want. Looks like it's going to be a bleak few years for Britain ahead.
I have a quarter of a century of negotiating deals - internationally - under my belt. I have beenin tough places, physically and metaphorically. Many, if not all, much worse than Brussels. Most had patches that were fraught. I mean, REALLY fraught. They sometimes involved screaming fits. People walking out. Even standing up and turning their back on me once (a massive insult in parts of Africa).
But... we got through it. We all shook hands at the end, posed for photos, had a slap up meal - and got on with making that final deal happen day to day. To the benefit of all parties. Now admittedly, none of these negotiations were under the same glare of media scrutiny that Brexit is happening under (although often, they were nationally important to the future prospects of the country involved). The disruptive actions of civil servants, media people, grandstanding politicians - none of these are exactly helpful in getting to the end point of Brexit. But there will be an end. The structure of Article 50 requires it. Do a deal, guys - or we exit on WTO terms. The worst of all worlds, for all parties. And that adds a dimension of finality that was never underpinning any of my commercial negotiations - deals that could have collapsed, if we as negotiators had failed our respective superiors.
There will be a point when the UK is outside the EU. Wishing it otherwise will not alter that. Thkweaming and thkweaming and thkweaming until your sick won't alter that. The political imperative - delivering the will of the voters - requires that that not alter. What we are going through was never going to pretty. That some people choose to illuminate the inner workings of the sausage production line was always going to turn some stomachs.
But at the end of it, we will still be Europeans, if not in the EU. We will still be neighbours. We will still have the same security concerns. The same desires to turn a dollar. The same desire for politicians to look like they have ACHIEVED. Nobody looks good if the planes stop flying, if people stop crossing borders, ships stop delivering goods and materials - even if lawyers stop delivering services.
So have a little more faith that this a phase we are all going through. We'll come out of it at the other end in an OK shape. Or ALL parties will have failed. And deserve the kicking they would certainly get.
I have a quarter of a century of negotiating deals - internationally - under my belt. I have beenin tough places, physically and metaphorically. Many, if not all, much worse than Brussels. Most had patches that were fraught. I mean, REALLY fraught. They sometimes involved screaming fits. People walking out. Even standing up and turning their back on me once (a massive insult in parts of Africa).
But... we got through it. We all shook hands at the end, posed for photos, had a slap up meal - and got on with making that final deal happen day to day. To the benefit of all parties. Now admittedly, none of these negotiations were under the same glare of media scrutiny that Brexit is happening under (although often, they were nationally important to the future prospects of the country involved). The disruptive actions of civil servants, media people, grandstanding politicians - none of these are exactly helpful in getting to the end point of Brexit. But there will be an end. The structure of Article 50 requires it. Do a deal, guys - or we exit on WTO terms. The worst of all worlds, for all parties. And that adds a dimension of finality that was never underpinning any of my commercial negotiations - deals that could have collapsed, if we as negotiators had failed our respective superiors.
There will be a point when the UK is outside the EU. Wishing it otherwise will not alter that. Thkweaming and thkweaming and thkweaming until your sick won't alter that. The political imperative - delivering the will of the voters - requires that that not alter. What we are going through was never going to pretty. That some people choose to illuminate the inner workings of the sausage production line was always going to turn some stomachs.
But at the end of it, we will still be Europeans, if not in the EU. We will still be neighbours. We will still have the same security concerns. The same desires to turn a dollar. The same desire for politicians to look like they have ACHIEVED. Nobody looks good if the planes stop flying, if people stop crossing borders, ships stop delivering goods and materials - even if lawyers stop delivering services.
So have a little more faith that this a phase we are all going through. We'll come out of it at the other end in an OK shape. Or ALL parties will have failed. And deserve the kicking they would certainly get.
I long ago came to terms with the fact that Britain is leaving the EU.
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
The message was clear.
SUCK IT UP
That is indeed the only substantive response I have had. I'm sure that's a message that all those younger metropolitans are going to lap up.
It's the sheer self-defeating stupidity of Leavers that's most mind-blowing. You'd have thought they'd have given far more thought to how they could build a national consensus, since that's going to be essential if Brexit is to stand even the remotest chance of success. But they've been far too busy running a victory lap with their union jack boxer shorts on their heads to try.
@bbclaurak: Tusk statement is just before the markets open tomorrow.... suggests it might have big financial implications, or maybe he is meeting someone for a big breakfast...who knows
@bbclaurak: Tusk statement is just before the markets open tomorrow.... suggests it might have big financial implications, or maybe he is meeting someone for a big breakfast...who knows
@bbclaurak: Tusk statement is just before the markets open tomorrow.... suggests it might have big financial implications, or maybe he is meeting someone for a big breakfast...who knows
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
The message was clear.
SUCK IT UP
seems pretty much the message the europhiles have been pushing on to others for 50 years
@bbclaurak: Tusk statement is just before the markets open tomorrow.... suggests it might have big financial implications, or maybe he is meeting someone for a big breakfast...who knows
Fingers crossed for an agreement!
He will announce that David Davis has signed the UK up to the Euro.
I long ago came to terms with the fact that Britain is leaving the EU.
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
Yourself and Scott are utterly extreme in the vitriol you pour on Brexit. Most Remainers are baffled by the decision, concerned that it could end up a terrible outcome - but prepared to wait to see what actually gets delivered. They are much more pragmatic about the process. If, ultimately, the planes keep flying, the borders stay open, they can still visit their villas in Tuscany, can still buy their favourite premier cru - hey, what was all the fuss about?
I am also realisitic. I don't expect the final Brexit settlement to satisfy either you or Scott. Because our negotiatiors will not be conceding to a written statement from all Leave voters that they are pig-shit thick and all acted out of spite for their fellow Brits.
Written in their own blood.
And even then, I'm sure that would just be start of your demands.
@bbclaurak: Tusk statement is just before the markets open tomorrow.... suggests it might have big financial implications, or maybe he is meeting someone for a big breakfast...who knows
Poor old Laura K. Out the loop. How piss-poor of the UK not to tell the Beeb everything that is happening behind the scenes at the biggest negotiation this country has undertaken in a couple of generations.
And if we had voted Remain, we would be expected to go along with such a terrible idea. Thank God we took the last chance we would ever be offered to say No.
I long ago came to terms with the fact that Britain is leaving the EU.
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
Yourself and Scott are utterly extreme in the vitriol you pour on Brexit. Most Remainers are baffled by the decision, concerned that it could end up a terrible outcome - but prepared to wait to see what actually gets delivered. They are much more pragmatic about the process. If, ultimately, the planes keep flying, the borders stay open, they can still visit their villas in Tuscany, can still buy their favourite premier cru - hey, what was all the fuss about?
I am also realisitic. I don't expect the final Brexit settlement to satisfy either you or Scott. Because our negotiatiors will not be conceding to a written statement from all Leave voters that they are pig-shit thick and all acted out of spite for their fellow Brits.
Written in their own blood.
And even then, I'm sure that would just be start of your demands.
I don't think you begin to understand the contempt which many Remain supporters feel towards the Leave campaign and its leaders. It's a contempt that has only strengthened since the referendum result thanks to the conduct of the government and the swivel-eyed lunatics trumpeting its efforts.
At some point some form of reconstruction is going to need to be attempted. This time the Confederacy has won the war. They are going to have to work out how to make peace with the Union's supporters. So far, not only have they not tried, they haven't even realised there's a problem.
Comments
Heh!
They have all the equipment, you pay them for the contract for them to mine and they charge you a daily (variable) fee for running the mining equipment....seems to me the individual is basically taking all the risk, as the cloud mining company just adjusts their fee to solidify their profit margin.
Those silly little voters.
I wish he would move on and come to terms with defeat.
There are a lot who have made far more money out of it than the amount they made out of the online poker boom.
So be it.
Then they have to consider what they want to do with their victory. And they want to bring the rest of the country with them. And their lack of curiosity about their complete failure to persuade anyone on the losing side to their cause is extraordinary.
The country is more divided, more unhappy, more racist, less relevant than it was two years ago. It shows no signs of turning a corner: if anything, things are getting worse. Leavers are clueless how to turn this around. Or is the assumption that this will somehow go away?
Because it won't. There's a generation out there who think that Leave cheated them out of their birthright as part of a wider Europe through lies and racism. You might think they're wrong. You might even bellow at them that they're wrong. But they think it and they're going to go on thinking it.
So, what are you going to do, xenophobes?
https://www.wired.com/story/everipedia-blockchain/
Out of interest, what do you think the snags are about Switzerland (I don't have an educated feeling for what France or Portugal are like to live in)?
On your other post, while I'd in principle like a world government (with lots of subsidarity, of course), I agree it's a loooong way off. But individual nation states seem to me to be increasingly impotent and less relevant to our travelling younger generation.
I can declare (unsurprisingly) that I haven't got a clue about Bitcoin. Heck, I still think getting a £2 coin in your change is a bit of a novelty.
If anything were needed to prove to me that your whole world view is somewhat warped it is how you have latched on to this in the desperate hope that it has any meaning in the real world.
It doesn't.
My feelings on Brexit were founded long before that, and my "approach" to it hasn't been to "pander to xenephobia by lying".
I've got a feeling that there's something specific that you want Leavers to say, to prove they're not racists. Like, "I support FOM"?
I won't. I'm against FOM because of the effect an unlimited supply of cheap labour has on wages at the bottom end of the labour market. I know this doesn't affect you, so you can afford to point and sneer "racists"
Do you want me to offer to marry an EU citizen, to help them worry less about staying the country? I quite sadly tried that with my Spanish girlfriend, but she dumped me instead.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42271979
Mr. B, a fair point indeed. If Osborne hadn't flounced he'd be PM already, in all probability.
Which raises an interesting timing question. Let's say May resigns. Could Osborne stand if he isn't currently an MP? If he's a candidate in her constituency by-election?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-42265260
And three Untermensch nations are being sued for not agreeing to Germany's migration desires:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-42270239
Xenophobia. The blue-blanket for Remainers, who refuse to believe they lost the argument without the other side resorting to the most base of human conditions.
It does make them look rather more than a little ridiculous. And just keeps maturing that unexpected victory into the most delicious elixir.
This is just bonkers to the point of surrealism. Looking at what is going on in Hungary it's as if an even loopier version of Unity Mitford had spent her weekends in Berlin hangin' with Adolf and the gang, and her weeks telling her sister Diana that that Mosley chap had some pretty unsavoury racial theories.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/universal-credit-labour_uk_5a295fa0e4b0fa7986129b0b
Martin Schulz demands creation of Unitted sates of Europe by 2025
any country which doesnt want it will be forced to leave EU
https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article171358179/Schulz-will-Vereinigte-Staaten-von-Europa-bis-2025.html
Or you could invest in my new project: crypto tulips.
Leo said lets invite the nutters in
Mr. Rentool, hmm. Not sure that's how democracy works. If they were giving May votes in the Commons, then she'd need to have them on board. During the Coalition, the Quad didn't have Labour or UKIP members, after all.
Not to mention, if smaller Northern Irish parties got given info and access and influence, Sturgeon would demand it too. May's got enough difficult with her own party and the DUP.
A/ Because their dad had a vasectomy, vasectoyou
https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/938825404542078976
https://twitter.com/Sennesation/status/938718590517248001?ref_src=twsrc^tfw&ref_url=http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/sport/football/transfer-news/liverpool-news-transfers-live-reaction-14004641
Bitcoin the profit comes from selling on to the next mug. All very profitable until the music stops.
Time for Brokenshire to call a border poll?
Not everyone's opinion is as cast-iron and restricted as the SNP party line...
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/07/nazanin-zaghari-ratcliffe-boris-johnson-expected-to-go-to-tehran-this-weekend?CMP=share_btn_tw
Amazing how this “completely useless” government has won all The BREXIT bill amendments so far and is now over halfway through the process.....
But... we got through it. We all shook hands at the end, posed for photos, had a slap up meal - and got on with making that final deal happen day to day. To the benefit of all parties. Now admittedly, none of these negotiations were under the same glare of media scrutiny that Brexit is happening under (although often, they were nationally important to the future prospects of the country involved). The disruptive actions of civil servants, media people, grandstanding politicians - none of these are exactly helpful in getting to the end point of Brexit. But there will be an end. The structure of Article 50 requires it. Do a deal, guys - or we exit on WTO terms. The worst of all worlds, for all parties. And that adds a dimension of finality that was never underpinning any of my commercial negotiations - deals that could have collapsed, if we as negotiators had failed our respective superiors.
There will be a point when the UK is outside the EU. Wishing it otherwise will not alter that. Thkweaming and thkweaming and thkweaming until your sick won't alter that. The political imperative - delivering the will of the voters - requires that that not alter. What we are going through was never going to pretty. That some people choose to illuminate the inner workings of the sausage production line was always going to turn some stomachs.
But at the end of it, we will still be Europeans, if not in the EU. We will still be neighbours. We will still have the same security concerns. The same desires to turn a dollar. The same desire for politicians to look like they have ACHIEVED. Nobody looks good if the planes stop flying, if people stop crossing borders, ships stop delivering goods and materials - even if lawyers stop delivering services.
So have a little more faith that this a phase we are all going through. We'll come out of it at the other end in an OK shape. Or ALL parties will have failed. And deserve the kicking they would certainly get.
You've written five paragraphs arguing from authority and not a word about how you're going to mend fences with the large number of British people who you're not negotiating with, who are completely alienated from your ambition and who think you're mad and malign. Now, how do you propose to get them on board with your shopworn idea of Brexit that is visibly wilting now that it has been exposed to sunlight for an extended period?
https://twitter.com/MartinSchulz/status/938748359720013824?s=17
SUCK IT UP
It's the sheer self-defeating stupidity of Leavers that's most mind-blowing. You'd have thought they'd have given far more thought to how they could build a national consensus, since that's going to be essential if Brexit is to stand even the remotest chance of success. But they've been far too busy running a victory lap with their union jack boxer shorts on their heads to try.
@bbclaurak: Tusk statement is just before the markets open tomorrow.... suggests it might have big financial implications, or maybe he is meeting someone for a big breakfast...who knows
https://twitter.com/sinnfeinireland/status/938760420797579264?s=17
your rules
enjoy
I am also realisitic. I don't expect the final Brexit settlement to satisfy either you or Scott. Because our negotiatiors will not be conceding to a written statement from all Leave voters that they are pig-shit thick and all acted out of spite for their fellow Brits.
Written in their own blood.
And even then, I'm sure that would just be start of your demands.
At some point some form of reconstruction is going to need to be attempted. This time the Confederacy has won the war. They are going to have to work out how to make peace with the Union's supporters. So far, not only have they not tried, they haven't even realised there's a problem.