Yes.

Didn't know film directors were getting a say on Brexit as well. :-)

(You probably meant "David")

I did! Thanks, man!! Editing right away.

I sure liked the first scene in Avatar, zero gravity in 3D onboard a spaceship. Yes! And the Albion ripoff that came afterwards was not bad, either!

Because we want Arabs and Africans instead...
But yeah, while I don't think everything can be blamed on the EU and the Euro (there is more than enough native misrule in Southern Europe), it's pretty disgusting how the massive youth unemployment in Southern Europe is somehow seen as something that just happened and has to be accepted.

I see, thanks!

Duuude, in pretty much all of academia national socialism is classified as far-right. Assuming that just because the name of the Nazi party included the word "socialist" they were far-left is Kindergarten-level of reasoning. Nazism was a far-right movement, as was the Italian fascism.

Seriously, just read up about it. You're making an ass of yourself, here.

Not right now, no. Currently we have single-party rule, all state organs that hold the government responsible have been pretty much neutralised and the government simply does the bidding of the ruling party's chairman. It's basically the same shit as in the People's Republic of Poland just in a light version so far. But we're getting there.

I did not purposefully leave out anything nor lie about anything, it seemed just more sensible that you meant the liberation of Poland after World War II.

Also, Poland restored democracy in June 1989, the Wall came down in November. Again, go educate yourself. The downfall of the Soviet Union began with the Solidarność movement, not the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Dude, don't even go there and pretend that you have the SLIGHTEST idea what is going on in this country. I live here, I see the effects of our right-wing populists on a daily basis. I witnessed how the president promised being independent but suddenly pledged allegiance to Kaczyński the moment PiS won the elections, I have witnessed radical changes happening over-night, I do know that PiS is limiting independent press coverage of what is going on in parliament, I do know how PiS is intentionally reorganising matters to exclude the opposition not only from decision-making but even witnessing how legislations are passed, I have seen how the state media started broadcasting propaganda 24/7, I know what kind of people were inserted into the constitutional tribunal (spoiler: PiS sympathisers), I know that Kaczyński met with Viktor Orban to learn tricks on establishing and maintaining a dictatorship within the European Union, I know of the Christian fundamentalist lawyers who work out the proposals for PiS, I have seen how they are inserting their propaganda into academia, I have heard Kaczyński openly say that realising his vision is worth shattering the economy, I know that surviving resistance fighters from WWII are disgusted by how their achievements are being hijacked by PiS to promote their party, I hear how PiS is discrediting people who were universally held in high regard until they rose to power, I do know how PiS is misrepresenting the downfall of communism, I know how the government is scaring people from speaking their mind online by having cops knock at their doors and confiscate their computers, I know how the former leadership of the Polish military forces left because they weren't willing to serve the interests of PiS, I know what shitty laws PiS has established or announced, I have heard our prime minister proclaim that she'd love to see our movie industry create right wing propaganda pictures. And most recently I have read about the government getting ready to even hijack the video game industry by automatically acquiring a certain percentage of shares in all public video game companies.

And there's currently nobody who holds them accountable. There are only two things they have to fear: an uprising or sanctions.

Ah, yes, surely it was solely the sovereignty argument that got people voting for Brexit, not discontent with the status quo and false promises of prosperity using fake numbers that were soon discredited.

Seriously, you don't seem to know the first thing about politics. If people voted primarily for ideological rather than practical reasons democracy would be a lot more stable. Winning over the electorate is done by convincing voters that you have the solutions to their problems, of course regardless of whether you actually have them or not. And you must have noticed that the Brexit campaign didn't focus on appealing to nationalist sentiments but on making promises of prosperity, citing specific examples of how this prosperity will supposedly be achieved (that these examples ranged from being flawed to blatant lies is another matter).


Dude, just like with any voluntary membership of anything being a member state of the EU grants certain benefits in exchange for certain obligations. Also, taking in some refugees is a small price to pay compared to the billions Poland has received in grants from the EU. Any and all people unwilling to have their country take in some refugees while having welcomed billions in grants are parasitic assholes, period.

You're naive about this if you think it would be limited to "some refugees", if a substantial community of Islamic/African immigrants gets established in Poland, it will eventually grow into millions because of family reunification (that's exactly what happened in Western Europe, only thing preventing the same in Poland would be the much lower welfare benefits). I don't know enough about the domestic situation to judge if PIS is really as unpleasant and authoritarian as you present it, but they're absolutely right in totally refusing any migrant quotas imposed by the EU whatsoever. Poland should consider itself blessed that today it is a fairly homogenous country and doesn't have to deal with the kind of problems that are increasingly destabilising Western Europe. Only a fool would throw that advantage away.

I'm afraid that, while I'm sure he had the best of intentions, Carradice has mislead you slightly in the answer to your questions. This may be because he better understood the questions you were really asking than I do (I think it comes down to what you meant by "negotiate"), but to take your questions literally and answer them would be as follows:

1) The UK couldn't negotiate EU mandates in any meaningful sense, while it could in cases block things if it had enough support from a few other countries, the direct veto the UK used to have was diluted by the introduction of new members. It was sometimes the case where the EU could directly override the UK without any chance of the UK getting out of it. It could "argue", but "negotiate" suggests that you can't be directly ignored.

2) The UK cannot negotiate trade with EU countries, in fact it cannot negotiate trade with any country inside or outside of the EU. It can trade with other countries under the rules that are in place by the EU, but it cannot, for example, offer to trade at lower tariffs with Brazil. All trade deals are governed by the EU, and any and every EU member is strictly prohibited from any bi-lateral trade agreement. We can set the terms of trade with other countries only as the EU dictates. Within the single market tariffs are near zero (as Carradice pointed out), and outside of the single market they are often prohibitively high in what amounts to continental level protectionism.

Even now as we are preparing to leave, we are not allowed to actually negotiate or sign any new trade agreements (even prospective ones that would not come into force until after we left). This is why there's extensive "discussions" taking place with countries such as Australia, but we cannot even call them "negotiations" for fear of violating these rules. I believe the plan is that these "discussions" will proceed incredibly quickly to "agreements" the moment the EU negotiation period ends.

So there is some lack of autonomy resulting from being a member of the EU? It also seems like the gradual loss of bargaining power because of veto was unforeseen, because it was caused by new countries joining up as you said.

Since I don't know, I have to ask: why has it happened, and what, and by whom, should be done something about it? Is the culprit the Spanish government, or who?

I sometimes see suggestions that e.g. German companies should invest more to Spain etc. to help with their situation, but I see lots of problems with those suggestions, like can you really demand or force privately owned companies to invest to certain country, against the owners' (stock-holders) support?

I am interested in why e.g. Spain is supposed to be in such a poor condition now. I would think it should be in a much better position than e.g. Finland to get money from other countries, e.g. because of tourism. I mean, who would rather travel to Finland, instead of Spain? Other than some freako wanting to see igloos and polar bears, and we don't even have those either?

I'd expect the Spanish food and farming industry to be much bigger too, after all what can we grow in Finland? Snowballs? In Spain they have all kinds of tasty fruits. vegetables etc. that are also imported all the way here so that we have something to eat.

Is the youth employment possibly because there is lots of illegal cheap workforce from e.g. north African countries that work in Spain, taking the jobs from young Spaniards? Or don't Spanish want to work on Spanish farms etc.?

I don't really have much insight in the situation in Spain, but as I understand it there was a building boom in the early 2000s fueled by the Euro which made possible massive spending in a way that hadn't been possible before. That kind of fake growth collapsed in the wake of the financial crisis almost a decade ago and there hasn't been really a recovery since then.
No idea what is to be done about it, but I suppose the whole Euro straitjacket doesn't help things.

Yes, countries loose their financially, monetary sovereignty and their countries budget has to be approved by the European Union. Essentially Union can cut anything it want's in the countries budget. Internal Laws are also being mostly dictated by the European Union. Foreign policy has been mostly taken over by the European Union. Thankfully most south and eastern european countries are now working against european policy and their intent to import illegal aliens to europe (effectively breaking eu law but who cares).

In some countries like Greece and Spain European Union has removed elected governments and replaced them by puppet governments created by the European Central Bank. There is very little autonomy left especially if you live in a south european country which are effectively controlled by the European Central Bank.

Eitherway congratulations to Britain on exiting the totally derailed project.

It seems like nature of the EU is quite different in that while states / regions can have continual elasticity by trying to change certain policies, most EU obligations seem to be contractual one-time agreements enforced almost forever, and that seems to be a much more inflexible / unfair system.

Yeah there are separatist movements in many Indian states. Punjab in particular had an insurgent group demanding independence for a Sikh country back in the 70s.

A rather extraordinary post. Full of creative, alternative facts. What happened afterwards, Godzilla ate them all?

The part about Greece and Spain is specially intriguing. I want to know more!

I hope they get married in the end.