Virgil Caine

I am reading Max Hastings book on the Vietnam War at the moment. It is all unbelievably grim The First Indo China War between the French and Vietminh was almost as bloody as the later war by the VC and NVA against the USA. The French Union suffered over 70,000 dead including 20,000 French soldiers. Unlike Britain the French desperately tried to hang onto their Empire after the Second World War. The 1945 Famine in Vietnam was worse than both wars killing an estimated 2 million Vietnamese in one year. Apparently those who survived it used to consider the war against the USA a doddle by comparison.

A three choice question is not referendum since the result can be won by a minority of those voting. It is just a pastiche of the FPTP electoral system with questions rather than candidates. The result would lack any true legitimacy in the eyes of most constitutionalists since a minority can not give up sovereignty for a majority (incidentally the problem with Parliament approving EEC entry in 1973 and signing up to Maastricht. It would settle nothing. May could put her deal before the public in a simple Yes/No referendum as that would be a simple choice which will deliver majority. It would also give her a way out of the situation she now finds herself. Unfortunately for her the EU Withdrawal Act 2018 says the deal has to be approved by Parliament so it's not really an option.

Apparently the doll is programmed to say -"Does my bum look big in this"

Corbyn wants a GE not a Referendum. This is his best chance of becoming PM

There are only 22 members of the Cabinet including the Prime Minister according to Wikipedia.

Oil is traded in dollars, that even applies to North Sea production so the exchange rate that matters is cable which is usually governed by the difference in interest rates. Strangely when the Lisbon Treaty was signed Campbell's chum Tony Blair told us that there was no need for a Referendum. In fact the distinguishing feature of Britain's European journey is that at the key points of constitutional change such as joining the Common Market, Maastricht and Lisbon etc the terms to which the country signed up were not put once to the voters in a Referendum.This is unlike many other EU states like Ireland and Denmark. The votes always seem to happen after the event and are usually triggered by Prime Ministers with narrow majorities and divided parties like Harold Wilson in 1976 and David Cameron in 2016 The wiki section on the UK governments response to Maastricht is worth quoting The British constitutional historian Vernon Bogdanor wrote at the time that there was “a clear constitutional rationale for requiring a referendum” because although MPs are entrusted with legislative power by the electorate, they are not given authority to transfer that power (the UK's previous three referenda all concerned the transfer of parliamentary powers). Further, as the ratification of the treaty was in the manifestos of the three major political parties, voters opposed to ratification had no way to express that opposition. For Bogdanor, while the ratification of the treaty by the House of Commons might be legal, it would not be legitimate - which requires popular consent. The way in which the treaty was ratified, he judged, was “likely to have fundamental consequences both for British politics and for Britain's relationship with the European Community”.

Problem for Remainers if the EU Commission have agreed at least in principle to this deal then staying on current terms is almost certainly not going to be an option. There will probably be conditions for that too including possible Euro membership. And needless to say all those politicians who think Brexit is a bad idea will need to explain why a lot of them voted in the aye lobby to pass the Referendum Bill in the first place (including the likes of Jo Johnson).

Indeed. The irony being that the Labour Party don't seem to understand that labour and capital can be applied to create added value to land. Marx understood the concept but apparently modern Marxists do not.

I hope McDonnell does not fly in light aircraft or go hill walking. As usual with Labour he also misses the point. The problem in the UK is control of land in all its forms not private dwellings.

Arbeit Macht Frei Kraft durch Freude We can all live in communal huts and subsist on 1000 calories a day. In a previous life all these people worked in concentration camps or running gulags because at root the mindset is exactly the same.

One thing you don't tend to hear when the transatlantic slave trade is discussed is the fact that the mortality rate on slave ships in the late 18th and early 19th centuries at about 15-16 % was often a good deal lower than on the coffin ships that took many poor European migrants to the Americas after 1800 where death rates up to 30% were not unknown. African slaves as goods to be sold were more valuable to ship owners than poor fare paying passengers from Britain or Ireland. About 12 million Africans were carried across the Middle Passage between the 16th and 19th Century but those numbers were dwarfed by European emigration in the 19th century when more than 60 million Europeans migrated across the Atlantic to America and to other parts of tbe globe.For example while much is made about Liverpools role in the Atlantic slave trade few realise that is was the single largest embarcation point for European emigrants with over 9 million people passing through it in the period 1830-1930.

Was not the Church of England one of the main beneficiaries. ?

I would not recommend you listening to Tago Mago by Can then. Makes Pink Floyd seem like the Bay City Rollers

This Nazi stuff is foreign rubbish. We need proper British fascist insignia with some contemporary relevance Dedicated to all Remainers

Welcome to the world of popular music. The track where Alan cooks his breakfast always made me hungry.