There are those in the Vote Leave campaign who believe that Nigel Farage is a liability: having him as a spokesman for quitting the EU is a bit like getting a joy-rider to appear in a car commercial. I’m not so sure. There’s normally a cheeky-chappy appeal to Farage (admittedly not much in evidence in the telly debate a couple of nights ago) which brings a certain energy and even sense of fun to the campaign. On that calculation, I can see why some would want him on their side.
You may not agree with that but you’d be hard put to disagree with the intervention of Tony Blair. The former British PM is going to be in our tight and twisted little corner of the globe today, along with another former British PM, John Major, to tell us what a bad idea it would be to leave the EU.
No matter how persuasive Blair’s appeal (and he can be persuasive), I suspect there are many like myself who’ll find their thoughts drawn back to the time of the invasion of Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of people in the UK demonstrated their opposition to Britain’s part in that invasion and to Blair’s claims of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). But Blair, once a man who couldn’t choose a shirt without consulting a focus group, ignored all opposition as he rushed to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the gifted President George W Bush.
Bad enough that Blair was proved to be a liar with his claims of WMD – he’s now claiming that Jeremy Corbyn has blood on his hands. EH? You heard me, Virginia. “I’m accused of being a war criminal for removing Saddam Hussein…and yet Jeremy is seen as a progressive icon as we stand by and watch the people of Syria barrel-bombed, beaten and starved into submission and do nothing”.
So he’s arguing that Jeremy should organize things so that British war planes or British troops should go into Syria and save its suffering people. The Iraq invasion resulted in the deaths of some 160,000 Iraqi civilians and some 260,000 deaths, including combatants. All this Tony Blair willingly lent his hand to. And now he’s pointing the finger at Jeremy Corbyn.
“There’s a guy whose face is on the placard” Blair says. “That’s me: hate that guy. You’re the person in power taking difficult decisions. Jeremy is the guy with the placard, he’s the guy holding it. One’s the politics of power and the other’s the politics of protest”.
Insofar as this makes any kind of sense, Blair seems to be arguing that Corbyn is sitting on the sidelines carping while others (at one time himself) have to make hard political choices. There’s some truth in that. But in terms of Iraq, Blair made hard political decisions that brought a hard death from the skies on tens and hundreds of thousands of people – all based on a lie which he almost certainly knew was a lie.
Do us a favour, Tony.Some of us want the Vote Remain camp to win this referendum. We have enough hypocritical politicians of our own – get your brass neck and bony arse out of here.
Blair was chock full of that same mad evangelical zeal that had some poor demented arsehole ruining my past Sunday afternoon as he wailed about sin , damnation and sinners over a megaphone across the street…spoiling the very taste and piquancy of the cool ale I was supping down and frightening the birds into silence. People like Blair are driven by delusional thinking. He’s a convincing salesman if you take the smarm at face -value. He rail-roaded the UK into a war with Iraq with a view to progress his own personal agenda.He may have helped get rid of Saddam but he created an even bigger horror in the process.
Tony Blair and John Major played a very important part in the Northern Ireland Peace Process. They have every right to come and campaign. They are both former Prime Ministers so their thoughts resonate. As far as I am concerned they are welcome.
I agree Tony Blair played a positive role in the lead-up to the GFA, David. But he also encouraged, aided and abetted a war that left tens of thousands dead. Sorry – I can’t get past that one. And for him to then suggest Corbyn is responsible for not stopping the suffering in Syria? ‘Strewth…
Maybe Mr Blair could do something useful for the Remain campaign by drawing on perhaps the one area left untarnished from his reign and tell us whether he thinks Brexit is a breach of the GFA
https://bangordub.wordpress.com/2016/06/01/brexit-breaching-the-gfa-and-the-case-for-a-united-ireland/
And perhaps he could tell us whether he thinks Ms Villiers is hiding something from public view
https://bangordub.wordpress.com/2016/02/22/so-do-tell-us-theresa-what-did-mi5-tell-you/
Just reminds me of the Scottish referendum in September 2014 when the “big whigs” were wheeled from obscurity to add their “voice of reason” and influence. I recall Gordon Brown using the economic argument stating there would be an “economic trapdoor” from which “we might never escape” if Scottish Independence occurred Yet, low and behold the Labour Government with their economic policies created a trapdoor from which we still have not escaped … politicians and irony, huh?
Jude, I gather from your last point you will be voting to remain in the EU. What do you make of David McWilliams arguments that a BREXIT could have detrimental effects on the Union thus having the potential to open up the United Ireland debate? Also Matt Carthy, SF MEP, whom you blogged on recently, stated that in the event of a BREXIT Irish citizens must be provided with an opportunity to “vote in a border poll to end partition” Are SF on the wrong side of this debate? Does SF’s commitment to the EU (albeit wanting reform) outweigh their commitment to their aspiration of a border poll and drive towards a United Ireland? Is there hypocrisy from SF on the EU issue?
SF, who espouse the Irish proclamation and its vision support the idea of “the people of Ireland having ownership of Ireland”, Sovereignty, independence and a society based on democratic, socialist principles – is support for and remaining within the EU not antithetical to the republican / nationalist / socialist agenda? Can you really be independent and a member of the EU?
I attended the BREXIT debate in St Mary’s on Tuesday evening. One thing I took away from the debate was Michelle Gildernew’s poor performance and lack of clarity on why remaining within the EU is the right choice – I was actually unsure whether she believed it was the right choice or whether she was simply toeing party line on the matter – farming subsidises, protection of the Irish language and the potential for border controls were the best she could offer on why remaining within the EU is imperative.
I have mixed feelings, TH, but I think staying – and democratising the EU – is the better option. The dead of two world wars is a massive reason; co-operation always beats competition in my book; and while the success of BREXIT would provide a powerful jolt to the continued existence of the UK, I think there are more positive routes – like SF producing a thoroughly research, independent assessment of the economic benefits – if they exist of an all-Ireland economy. Then we might have some leverage for a border referendum. It’s totally absurd that such a document wasn’t developed years ago. Finally, I’m pro-Europe because it encourages Irish people to see that there is world out there that simply by-passes Britain – i.e., there’ s life beyond the union with Britain…
“The dead of two world wars is a massive reason; co-operation always beats competition in my book;”
How does that equate with the growth of the far right over open borders within Europe which has been steadily growing and does not look like stopping.
Austria was almost the first to gain power and lost out by a handful of mail votes.
Add 76 Million Turks into the mix.
Harry might think it is refreshing the bloodstock, but it sickens me and I am not alone and I am not racist, it is simply madness to open borders to so many culturally diverse peoples so soon.
I would say the EU is rapidly increasing the likelihood of a WW3 and at a gradually escalating rate.
Lets look at the history of people forced into the last bloody war at the behest of right wing extremism, now look at the growth of the right wing in so many countries within the EU including Germany, Austria and France. Then look at the millions of refugees swarming in, this is not open borders, this is open floodgates.
And you are telling us you feel safer in the direction the EU is heading in at present. Really Jude???
I would say we are doing a good job of setting out children up for another decade of bloody misery on a scale never been seen before.
The problem is, we are already so far down the road, how do we avoid it without aggravating it?
Why is cultural diversity a bad thing Jessica? How would that negatively effect your or anyone else’s life if Poles, Turks or Germans came here to work?
Immigration is important to tackling the problems of an ageing population. They also fill gaps in the labour market were we would have labour shortages.
The rise of the right in Europe is more to do with the 2008 Great Recession and European economic stagnation than the immigration crisis. Parties of the extreme right and left always benefit from economic hardship just as the Nazis, Franco, and Lenin benefitted from the Great Depression and WW1.
Europe brings huge economic benefits to NI. Just this week it was announced we are to receive 200 million from the European investment bank to fund 5000 social houses, also 250 million was granted by the same institution to fund the new Ulster University campus in Belfast.
Why is cultural diversity a bad thing Jessica?
Cultural diversity is not a bad thing Scott.
Opening up borders overnight and allowing free mass movement to people who have vastly different capabilities, views, moralities and often unable to communicate at all is incomprehensible and I do think is a very bad thing.
“How would that negatively effect your or anyone else’s life if Poles, Turks or Germans came here to work?”
I don’t see how people coming anywhere to work and fit in would negatively effect anyone life, it certainly wouldn’t mine.
“Immigration is important to tackling the problems of an ageing population. They also fill gaps in the labour market were we would have labour shortages.”
Yes, but you wouldn’t use a barrel to fill a cup, and when the barrel is full of cheap plonk and you want finest malt. I wont be employing any more Europeans and to hell with anyone who tells me otherwise.
“The rise of the right in Europe is more to do with the 2008 Great Recession and European economic stagnation than the immigration crisis.”
The right is growing in countries that are doing pretty well, in act Germany is one of them not to mention the UK.
Perhaps you are right.
Our borders are already open to EU nationals who want to come here and work, so it wouldn’t be opening the floodgates as you call it just a continuation of the current policy. Also many British/Irish people benefit from being allowed to work freely in the EU.
Freedom of movement for people and goods benefits our country enormously. As I said it benefits are a injection of fresh talent that allows companies to grow and adds youth to the population as it struggles with an ageing population. It also fills holes in our public services such as the NHS which couldn’t function without them.
What does it matter what cultural people are from, language they speak or religion the have as long as they come work, pay there taxes and obey the laws?
As with anything, too much of a good thing is a bad thing.
A points based system such as used in Australia would be the right thing to do including making it compulsory for everyone to learn the language within a reasonable timeframe and accommodate all of the positives you mention while preventing the risks.
Or do you think there are no risks?
The people in Turkey see women completely different to the west. Women are inferior there and many here will be at risk from an uncontrolled influx just as they are currently in many parts of the EU with the current membership.
The facts on crime statistics including rape prove such immigrants will often not obey the laws when they greatly differ from those in their own nations.
But sure, the odd bit of rape here and there will help refresh the bloodstock and if it helps corporates with labour isn’t it worth it??
“Perhaps you are right”
I’m not sure if you mean right wing ideologically or that I am correct
I would consider myself a liberal on most issues except maybe financial policy were I would be fairly conservative.
Screw the EU issue, why should Irish citizens be only provided with an opportunity to “vote in a border poll to end partition” in the event of a BREXIT????
Are we saying if Britain stay in Europe then the border is ok then???
I want debate on this regardless of the result of a referendum which I wont even be participating in and won’t even matter to us. Whether the money is filtered from London through Brussels or simply sent from Brussels wont change the fact we as a nation will never grow until we have to stand on our own two feet and wash our own faces.
If Britain leave, we may or may not have to make a choice as to whether or not to follow, but is a vote on our internal land borders not more important than one on our overseas borders with Europe???
Jessica I agree with you quite a bit.
Do you also think that The EU is a lot to blame for the war in Ukraine.
I think that the Eu peace prize is overplayed. The EU like other empires is only really interested in expansion.
Far from spreading peace they could well start another war be it Ukraine or Georgia or Belaraus. The EU mandrins will not stop.
I believe the World’s scientists who keep track of how close we are to a nuclear war.
Have set the clock at 3 Minutes to Midnight. The closest is has been to Midnight since the Cuban Missile Crisis AFAIK.
“Do you also think that The EU is a lot to blame for the war in Ukraine.”
The gas pipeline that runs through it does supply one third of EU gas needs through Gazprom.
That makes Ukraine quite relevant in terms if EU relations with Russia and could well be why EU unity is so important (strength in numbers) and why in particular the Ukraine could play an important role.
Expanding the EU into Turkey would also be a move towards opening another land border and front line with Russia as well as Iran, Iraq and a gateway to the middle east and linking up with Israel.
But I am sure that has not been considered and purely coincidental.
I wouldn’t say the EU was to blame, I would say that is just human nature and the wealthiest nations are intent on controlling as much of the planets wealth and resources as possible regardless of the consequences.
I am no expert on any of this by the way, that is just how I see things but I don’t really care about what the politically correct way of seeing things is.
Starting to smell like the last days of the Scottish independence referendum with all the living dead being wheeled in.
Baghdad, by dad !
Tony Blare of that stare is the nom de guerre
Of one who finds fun in psychological warfare
IRA with a Q ?
Let’s do a U !
The rouge in his Red Flag is that of the Khmer.
Aw Mighty Perk…genius at work ….
GRMMA.PK
But, due credit to Tones: if he insists on becoming an Occidental Tourist, and then bends over with a sign attached to his tailored toin
-‘tabhair cic dom, led’ thoil / kindly donate a root with one’s boot’,
what is one to do ?
Agree wholeheartedly, and he can take Mr. Underpant’s with him too.
This man responsible for supporting ‘olim coloniae’ powers in invading Iraq then not following through leading to a second Iraq invasion, as well as the equally reprehensible invasion of Afghanistan, rather than their prime enemies home land, Saudi.
Blair and Major 2 sides of the same Tory coin coming to preach to the natives.
I wonder who is going to clean up the trail of slime that Tony will leave behind him.
As for the EU they treated Greece disgracefully and did they not refer to Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain collectively as the P.I.G.S. European solidarity how are ye!
Tony Blair converted to the Catholic faith while British PM but he was such a coward he kept quiet about it until out of office. I wish he and Major and the obnoxious Villiers would pack up their kitbags and leave Ireland for good. I want to remain in the EU and hopefully one day without any rule from across the water.
Two British establishment former prime ministers view a brexit as a ‘threat’ to the UK. That’ll do for me. These British establishment supporters want to remain at the top table of movers and shakers. They fear being out of the EU means they could be ignored when the west along with NATO decide to humanitarily intervene in another 3rd world country. Their juice wouldn’t be worth the squeeze by other western powers. And thus they would be out of the loop concerning the fruits of any carve up. The US want them to remain also to keep an eye on other EU countries that may not be pulling the same hardline as they would like within the EU. The special relationship between Britain is important the US. The relationship between the US and Ireland is less so.
One reason why immigrants are important to the health service etc is simply lower wages. The myth that they work harder is a fraud. Our equivalent of hard workers had to up sticks and find employment in Australia,US etc because the EU won’t ensure fair wages for all. The free state,Britain and other euro countries have all deliberately kept wages low under the disguise that ‘we havnt the people to do these jobs’, or ‘people(locals)don’t want to work and are lazy’. It’s a lie and they know it.
It may not change in a brexit but at least govts can’t blame the EU when they implement unsavoury policies on the average worker trying to earn an average living.
Low wages also equal lower prices for goods and services WT. This makes an economy more efficient and productive and benefits everyone. We also have a national minimum wage which will be £9 an hour come 2020 so if you work 37.5 hours a week you will take home £1258 a month. More than enough to live on I think.
Doctors, solicitors and engineers aren’t coming here to be undercut there local peers, they are coming here is because they are in high demand and we don’t have the people with the right skills. An example of this would be when Harland and wolf got a big contract to refurbish two oil rigs they had to look as far afield as Germany for specialists.
Most immigrants from the EU are not doctors, solicitors and engineers. They are people seeking a better life on welfare and to seek low level employment such as in processing plants.
Most doctors and nurses come from outside the EU and are the best so must continue.
As for minimum wage. If we increase the minimum wage far in advance of what it is elsewhere in Europe. How long until our children will be unable to get a job at all due to the equality laws and fair employment?
Or do you think there will be enough jobs to keep the flood gates open.
Perhaps you think we are such a tolerant race we will not have a problem with this??
Perhaps you should read more about our own history over the past few hundred years, when Catholics started taking jobs off protestants and owning property.
Didn’t work out too well.
But I am sure it will be different this time.
It is not as if history repeats itself.
Lower wages means the vast majority of folk have to borrow to provide a decent life for themelves and their kids.
The reason why there is a demand for engineers etc from overseas is due to the dumbing down of the education system as well as the removal of trade apprenticeships etc. Blair etc decided to promote every kid should go to university policy. Alas we now see that that plan was all about getting more folk to borrow and be in debt.
I hear people stating that the EU guarantees workers rights. Fact is trade unions guaranteed workers rights. Most people havnt noticed but to get around workers rights we now have employment agencies were you have very few rights eg holiday pay,maternity pay etc. Also zero contract jobs were you have no stability from one day to the next never mind one year to the next. All under the EU.
What the EU acheived was peace between the traditional European powers that had fought over the spoils of colonialism. It didn’t and doesn’t provide peace to countries outside the EU, quite the contrary.
Small countries are not important to the EU commission. They must do what they are told like Greece. A commentator stated that 2/3 of MEP’s are right wing as is the commission. If that’s true then there really is no hope of improving workers conditions. Debt slavery dressed up as democracy.
Btw if Britain is being threatened by pro EU supporters of financial terrorism and even 3rd world wars in the event of a brexit then it’s patently not doing what it said on the tin.
Blair is the puppet of his Khazarian masters who own him – and run the ‘EU Criminals Club’.
Normally referred to, in departmental terms like: The IMF ,World Bank,BIS, EIB, IIB, IFAD etc.,- this project is essentially an hospitable ecosystem in the developed world, constructed in a criminally complex arrangement,- in order to conceal ‘rentier’ monopoly corporations, tax dodging elites and organised crime. Watch out for TTIP.
It has an executive so powerful, that it can crush ANY elected ‘member’ government.
Through the issuance of SDR’s (fiat money created out of thin air) sold for real money then lent- at sky high interest rates – they take the debtors’ infrastructure and mineral and industrial resources as forfeited security on insolvency. Look at Ireland Greece Italy etc. They call it ‘Debt-Restructuring’.
Austerity is written into the EU treaty as a ‘non-negotiable obligation,
‘Democracy’ is their euphemism for uprooting everyone and mixing the gene-pool so that no-one has any attachment to the land.
Permanent wars, create vast profits for the criminals in suits – and refugees and mass immigration in droves, which dilutes the gene-pool of nations and creates an overabundance of cheap labour and compliant serfs. Weakened hybrid nations are the result – and borderless political entities, ensure weak host nations – on which the EU parasite controllers feed.That’s why the EU and NATO are so inextricably linked.
It’s also why, when you go to your local supermarket, you get deep frozen meat products, made in Vietnam, Japan and Peru, having been injected with antibiotics, smothered with chemicals, washed in ammonia, compressed into blocks and frozen for years before being marketed as British Beef.
They poison you with this trash, pollute the land with glyphosate and GMO and sell us vaccines to poison our kids, so that we buy their toxic carcinogenic cures, all in the name of European Healthcare.
This is why Frau Merkel has this pathological altruism – that we all must atone for ‘pharisee’ bankers wars,- she – the ultimate exemplar of German self-loathing – and why her best pupils receive the Judeophile founding father Richard Coudenhove Kalergi ( he of PanEuropean Nationhood -Praktischer Idealismus) Prize each year, otherwise known as the Charlemagne Prize.
And yes …. guess who got it in 1999?
The EU is a mass social engineering project.
Don’t waste your time voting, because no matter what the numbers are – Britain will not be allowed to exit, – just as Ireland had to re-vote on the Lisbon Treaty until they got the result they wanted. Everything is lies.
Just sit back as I do and watch it collapse under the weight of its own hubris and corruption.
It will not even exist in ten years time.
Jude if you haven’t seen the drama Reg I urge you to look it up on I player. It was on last Monday on bbc. It dramatises the fight of a father who took on Blair at 2003 general election over the murder of his son in Iraq . His campaign was based on the lies of WMD
I saw it, Paul. REally powerful drama, mixing the pain of the personal with the bigger political picture. I thought it thorougly gutted Blair. Ann Cadwallader was criticised by Ed Molony for shaking hands with Freddie Scappaticci prior to a TV interview with him. Will Ed now go after Deirdre Heenan, who allowed Tony Blair to give her a two-cheek kiss before heading off yesterday? I mean, Scappaticci was in the half-penny place when it came to spreading death and destruction.
For me the best summary of Blairism is in Adam Rowson’s version of Gulliver’s Travels:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/bookreviews/9179013/Gullivers-Travels-Adapted-and-Updated-by-Martin-Rowson-review.html
https://www.amazon.com/Gullivers-Travels-Martin-Rowson/dp/1848872828?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0
It’s like they put Edward Gorey, Hunter S Thompson and Bremner, Bird & Fortune into that machine in ‘The Fly’ and this comic was the result.