Should There be a Revote on Brexit? (user search)
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  Should There be a Revote on Brexit? (search mode)
Pages: [1]
Poll
Question: Should Britons be able to have a revote on Brexit?
#1
Briton: Yes
 
#2
Briton: No
 
#3
Non-Briton: Yes
 
#4
Non-Briton: No
 
Show Pie Chart
Partisan results

Total Voters: 161

Author Topic: Should There be a Revote on Brexit?  (Read 7995 times)
Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,965
United States


Political Matrix
E: -7.87, S: -3.83

P P
« on: January 07, 2019, 01:10:10 AM »

Yes and no:

The best choice for the UK policy-wise would be to leave the EU but stay in the common market, Norway-style, and then call a new referendum specifically on whether they should also leave the common market, in full knowledge of the potentially disastrous economic implications. That way, the mandate of the referendum will have been formally respected, but those who call for a new referendum would also get a chance to make their case.
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,965
United States


Political Matrix
E: -7.87, S: -3.83

P P
« Reply #1 on: January 10, 2019, 05:24:24 PM »

We should have a second vote, and then when we vote to remain, the leavers will demand best out of three, and then a fourth and fifth, every year for the rest of time. It could be like a new British tradition, national referendum day!

First, welcome to Atlas!

Secondly, I love your username.  Smiley

Thx, good to be here, also yeah I do think America should join us again, I mean we're gonna need some new friends after March Wink


How about Americanizing Britain instead

We're already pretty Americanised, but anyway I think we'll pass on that offer

If you spell it "Americanised" you're clearly not Americanized enough. Tongue
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,965
United States


Political Matrix
E: -7.87, S: -3.83

P P
« Reply #2 on: January 15, 2019, 07:47:29 PM »

Again, just get out of the EU, keep the Norway model provisionally, and hold a new referendum on that vs No Deal. Win-win.
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,965
United States


Political Matrix
E: -7.87, S: -3.83

P P
« Reply #3 on: January 18, 2019, 02:23:36 AM »

Some of you might do well to remember that Brexit is something that is going to have a huge human cost.

As it stands it's going to break up families, destroy livelihoods and so on. But sure, Britain should go through with it because I've got a bunch of facile clichés to flog

Just consider one immediate issue: if there is a 'No Deal' situation, then there will be a bottleneck and a backlog at Dover and all the ports because of the extra time required to process everything. This won't last for particularly long in the grand scheme of things, not even in the worst case scenario, but many pharmaceuticals are imported, including insulin. This is not a game.

Well, of course, only a psychopath or someone who lives in complete denial could be actively rooting for a no-deal Brexit.

The thing is, a no-Brexit solution is also unacceptable, because yes, democracy does need to matter and have consequences. There's nothing inconsistent about holding both positions, as long as you're willing to support compromises like May's deal (whatever you can say about May herself, and I have little good to say about her).

The tragedy is that the psychopaths/denialists on one side and the shameless elitists on the other each thought rejecting the deal would lead to their preferred outcome. And they both have a fair chance of being proven wrong, although I'd say the elitists are in a slightly better position.
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,965
United States


Political Matrix
E: -7.87, S: -3.83

P P
« Reply #4 on: January 18, 2019, 08:40:28 PM »

In May, Switzerland is going to be having a referendum about a question that it had 2 years ago - because the circumstances and the options available have changed in the mean time.

Of course, no-one is up in arms about this, because this is how mature direct democracies actually work.

Either you have a coherent logic about how, why and when referendums are held - or else whining about what the "democratic will of the people" is is essentially meaningless.

I think that this is a key point; circumstances change, the options available to people change and frankly people change their minds when more facts become available.  The fact is that in 2016 the model of Brexit that was proposed was not possible - as many of us made clear at the time - and so asking a question between the status quo and a more precise version of Brexit would be clear.  This wouldn't be against the norms of other Westminster system countries - look at the New Zealand electoral reform referendums (the first question was a simple "do you want electoral reform" and a list of proposed alternatives as a second question, then three years later they asked "do you want MMP or FPTP?" - and hell they had a second repeat of that process again a few years ago to double check with people only they stopped after MMP got majority support in stage 1) or the above mentioned Canada situations for examples of that.

To use the democracy argument against a second referendum is very silly in my eyes - that argument could be easily used against having regular general elections for example.  There are many reasons to be against a second referendum (and for a long time I was: its divisive and if you can find a solution that meets the result of the referendum without tanking the economy of the country or alienating significant numbers of people then you should compromise and do that instead of asking the question again or leaving a lot of very dissatisfied people) but the democracy one is silly.

The difference between Switzerland and the UK is that in Switzerland the initiative for referendums is also in the hands of the people. In the UK, parliament has the absolute prerogative on determining what issue to put or not to put to a referendum. That's a considerable power, and when the parliament abuses it to ask the same question again when they didn't like the first answer they got (let's face it, there would be zero chance of a second referendum if remain had won), that creates a terrible precedent.
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,965
United States


Political Matrix
E: -7.87, S: -3.83

P P
« Reply #5 on: January 21, 2019, 02:28:58 AM »

to be utterly pedantic; the Brexit referendum was a redo on a referendum - as were both devolution referenda.  Its been done before when situations have changed significantly to warrant asking the question again and I think that its fair this time.

The 1973 referendum had a concrete outcome: the UK became part of the EU for the next half-century. The Brexit vote still, to this day, hasn't produced anything meaningful. The irony, of course, is that this is the hard brexiteers' fault. The UK could have left the EU long ago if it had gone for a Norway-style kind of arrangement that avoided the most painful (and therefore difficult to negotiate) consequences of Brexit. Instead, May decided to go all-in on pandering to, not the Brexit voters, but a radicalized subset of the Brexit voters. And this may well have doomed the whole Brexit project.
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