Friday 18 January 2019

Dissolve Parliament.. Now.

Lets stop all of this nonsense of a second referendum and the political elite looking for a mandate to overturn the 2016 result.

Lets have a general election now that each party has shown their true colours.

Neither main party wants a no-deal Brexit. Jeremy Corbyn is actively seeking for Theresa May to remove it from the table before he starts talks with her. We didn't vote to stay in the single market or "the", "a" or any other form of customs union.

So in my mind, Labour is out of any further participation in politics. Until they learn the true meaning of the word democracy.

Theresa May and the majority remain Tory MPs have also shown their complete inability to understand the result of the vote back in 2016. We voted to leave, we did not vote to leave in name only, nor the minimum legal definition of leaving, or some half-arsed deal where we stay in the customs unit or single market. We did not vote for some deal where Northern Ireland stays in the EU in perpetuity. In fact the pre-referendum Tory government sent us a leaflet printed at great cost, to every household and told us categorically that if we voted to leave we would be out of the customs union, out of the single market and we still bloody voted leave on that basis.

So the Tories are out as far as I can see as well.

We need a general election now to settle the issue. Do voters want more of the same unfocussed chaos, or do they want something or someone new?

Do they want to vote for a party that has consistently promised to deliver a real and complete removal from the EU politically and physically?

Do they (finally) want to vote for UKIP?

Or do the parties in power finally knuckle down and leave the EU? Not "crashing out" or leving by accident because time runs out.

No, we want a proper, controlled, planned, documented, forewarned, clinical exit from the single market, customs union and political machine.

After the May capitulation was voted down in Parliament, we want out government to start the no-deal process. NOW!

Or call an election and let the people chose who they trust to deliver the proper Brexit that reflects the one we were promised and voted for in the 2016 referendum.

Wednesday 16 January 2019

Delusional Government or Stitch-Up in Progress?

All I'm hearing from Government ministers (including Liz Truss on tonight's Peston programme) is that the Government only lost the vote because of poor presentation.

They expect to re-present the deal to Parliament and this time carry the vote.

How can that be? The deal will be exactly the same unless the EU make concessions. Letters of intent do not make legally binding documents, so various EU members can write as many letters as they want, but if the legal wording of the deal is not changed, the deal is not changed.

So, what is happening?

Is this just smoke and mirrors and a fake fight? A theatre to provide the illusion of disagreement until suddenly a change is faked and everyone gets behind the deal? Just exactly what will change in the next week or so?

I get a bad feeling about this. I did say shortly after the referendum that we would need to be wary of a stitch-up. I get the feeling that stitch-up is almost upon us.

The Sinister Background to YouTube and Patreon Platforming

Now that the dust has more or less settled about Sargon's removal from Patreon, let's analyse Patreon's own words as to why it happened and the sinister fallout from that.

Okay, so by now most will know that last year Sargon of Akaad aka Carl Benjamin was removed without warning from Patreon. Essentially for words he used on a live stream on someone else's account 10 months previously. The details of what he said can be seen on multiple accounts of the affair.

Then Matt Christiansen, another YouTube vlogger supported by Patreon patrons was approached by Patreon to explain the reason for Sargon's removal.

Listening to the transcript of that conversation, it doesn't come across well for Patreon. Effectively what we learn from the head of Patreon's "Trust and Safety" team is: (a) That Patreon don't actively seek bad content, but instead wait for reports from internet users. (b) that content could be from months or years ago on any platform on the internet and (c) Patreon's trust and Safety team look at that content and then make arbitrary decisions on whether to ban; there is no definitive terms and conditions statement that a Patreon account holder can view in order to stay on the right side of the fence, Patreon will just decide on a whim if they will remove the person.

We also learned there is no warning system, so the first thing an account holder knows is that they are removed. They are not given the opportunity to review the content, remove it or issue a public apology if that content cannot be removed. Instead Patreon pull the plug.

Finally Jaqueline Hart, the person in charge of Patreon's trust and safety team hints that the pressure is not coming from general internet users, but instead from payment processors.

This would fit with the removal of payment facilities from SubscribeStar, a competitor of Patreon's that suddenly lost payment facilities from PayPal and Stripe in the wake of the Sargon affair and the move by many Patreon account holders to SubscribeStar.

So the sinister aspect of this is that it's now Payment Processors who are the arbiters of what is allowed on the internet. Not politicians, or the public, but PayPal, Stripe, and card providers.

What business have payment providers in controlling what you ay on the internet? Since when have they been put in charge of that? That's the business of people we vote into power, our politicians. Payment providers have no business in being moral arbiters of internet content.

Just think for this a second: payment processors are trawling the internet for material they find offensive and will pull the plug on your account if it falls foul of their standards. Not that these so-called standards are published anywhere, or made public in any way, shape or form.

As an example, just think how Orwellian it is that if a card provider sees you at a protest on the internet, or you publish written material they deem offensive, they can stop your card from working.

This is the future folks: tow the line or you will be unpersonned. You will loose the facility to pay bills and you will lose the ability to withdraw cash. I dare say anyone that supports you by drawing cash out will be unpersonned too.

So how do you get round that? Get your employer to pay you in cash? How long before that's outlawed, if it isn't already. The governments of this world want a cashless society so they can do exactly this: and by this I mean control the population.

How long before card providers put pressure on employers? Lose you job, money, home, food... the list goes on, just because to espouse a certain viewpoint, or say the wrong words.

I'm not liking what I'm seeing if what Patreon is saying is true. I hope they are just squirming and trying to pass the buck and blame the payment processors. But what happened to SubscribeStar, Gab and to Alex Jones shows that they may have inadvertently let the cat out of the bag and told the cold clinical and frightening truth.

If They Do Not Work For You... Change Them!

I can't say how strongly I feel about this.

Both parties are not working in the best interests of the people that voted them into power. It can't be any clearer during these final stages of the Brexit process.

Rather than do as commanded by the people and exit the EU machine completely and totally (as we were told during the referendum), Theresa may has decided upon herself that we should be treated like children and came up with a "deal" that effectively removed us from the EU political machine, but locked us into all other aspects of the EU. i.e. not what we were warned about or promised during the referendum process.

So the Conservative do not warrant our vote for their twisting of the "deal" to keep us in the EU, to all intents and purposes providing the minimum legal definition of the phrase "Leaving the EU". For example leaving the EU commission and Parliament, but staying in the customs union and single market.

Labour are no better. With mere weeks to go to the 29th of march, they are saying "hand the reins over to us, we can negotiate a better deal!" really? With weeks to go they can modify months of negotiations? When they've already promised to keep us in "a" customs union? Don't make me laugh.

Labour as always are making cheap political points, rather than providing serious alternatives.

No, to be credible, Labour need to get off the fence, stop prevaricating and start to tell us EXACTLY what they would do if they (God forbid) won the no confidence vote today and got into power.

Without that EXACT roadmap, we cannot in good conscience vote for them. It sounds like it will be more of the same prevarication and weasel words, leading us into exactly the same position we are in now.

I say that the public should not vote for them. Both Labour and Conservative have had their go and they have failed spectacularly. The Conservatives have failed to deliver a real and proper Brexit and Labour have failed to hold them to task. Both behind the scenes want us to stay linked to the EU tighter than the Leave voters want.

So Fuck 'em. Don't vote for them, because if you do, you get the same damn thing. Nothing changes.

If you want change, vote for someone else. I say vote for UKIP, because they have the best chance of garnering enough votes to make a dent in the Westminster bubble. The threat of UKIP last time forced David Cameron to try and get concessions from Brussels. It forced him to hold the referendum. Only when the public show they will vote elsewhere will the mainstream parties listen.

Even if UKIP don't get a majority, getting a few MPs in Parliament will send enough shockwaves into the main parties to effect change.

Voting the same way and expecting change is the definition of madness. Vote UKIP and get change.

Tuesday 15 January 2019

May Deal Rejected

The House of Commons voted by a significant margin to reject the deal Theresa May took to the EU.
By no sense was the deal a negotiated one. David Davies'  Canada +++ deal was the one negotiated between the UK and the EU. May's Chequers deal so publicly promoted as "The" deal was further watered down behind the scenes to become a capitulation.

There is a no confidence vote tomorrow. The best that can happen is that May resigns and the Tories install a leader with vision who can push back against those in the EU and our civil service that refuse the result of June 2016.

Everything in any deal must be (a) time limited and (b) allow us to walk away on our terms.

Anything less is a betrayal of the referendum result.