The UK Politics and EU Referendum thread - merged

[MANTIS01]

Lolz that JCorbs asks BoJo to explain flip-flop on backstop whilst sneaking in his new remain stance

[kukushkin88]

It’s hard to come across well putting like this but I still do think that it’s appealing to people to entirely disregard reality because it hasn’t served them well to be constrained by rules. The person who’s never really been good at anything, maybe struggled in school/maths. This is their time, no value is attached maths (and everything else) being correct and nonsense and lies are winning over accuracy and knowledge. It’s a powerful bandwagon.

There’s also a bit of a badge of honour thing where the more wildly wrong you can be and get away with it the better. Boris is pretty good at it, Dominic Cummings is excellent. Woodsey makes some good attempts. ‘Laura Trevelyan’ was certainly quite silly.

[BigAdz]

Mantis

"Boris has the talent to write some numbers on a bus and it convinces the majority of people to vote leave. Now onto the GE where he simply needs to put bigger numbers on larger bus and let's gogogo to big majority in commons.  "

you might be right. parts of the leave vote and Trump brazenly talking any old bollocks and getting elected are evidence ofit

In your heart of hearts though this is very depressing isn't it? that policy, truth and principle don't matter. That voters will swallow any old crap (lack of knowledge, lack of interest etc)?

But there is no other option is there? It's just whose crap do we want to swallow.

It isn’t the case though. There haven’t been political campaigns in recent times in the UK/US dominated entirely by and won through lying. Boris/Trump/Leave have totally changed the game. Trump has more than 10,000 lies on record since he took office!

It’s not the most even handed publication but what they’ve written here is true and corroborated by lots of analysis including the Electoral Commission.

https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/vote-leave-director-admits-won-lied-public/08/02/

It clearly shows a large number of people almost believe what they want to be the truth, rather than what they know is the truth.

This seems to be where Remoaners have it so wrong. I have said it time and again, the numbers on the bus were irrelevant, it was the message of positivity that roped them in.

If Remoan has posted how much better things would be in the EU, it would have been no contest, but they couldn't have the bullshit positive factor as we have been in so long, rarely with any good news. That wasn't gonna wash...

[nirvana]

Aaron is quite right about Boris being a racist.

Sure, people might say he sacked off white cabinet members, replacing top jobs of Chancellor/Home Secretary with Javid and Patel.

But don’t forget he is a liar too so these are just the actions of a weird racist liar.

This is another of those weird ones that makes no sense. Is it a confused and failed satire? Surely you aren’t saying Boris isn’t a liar? Not easy when he does it on TV and was sacked by the Conservative Party and The Times for lying.

The reasons why he says and writes lots of racist things are more nuanced but still not a great look.

If being a liar precluded people from being PM then we'd never have one

‘They’re all liars’ is such a tired and inadequate argument. There hasn’t been a PM in my lifetime who was continually publicly exposed as a liar and was fired from multiple jobs for lying.

In many circs I'd say the same as you. But that doesn't change the fact that a lie is a lie and being caught, exposed and punished doesn't make you morally inferior or less equipped for certain roles than someone who isn't caught.

I genuinely don't think his lies (affairs, kippers, straight bananas- there must be worse that I've forgotten but cant be bothered to look up) trouble me much compared with so much of the mendacity that surrounds politics. Here's another tired argument - compare his lies with the labour party dissembling on anti semitism

[kukushkin88]

Aaron is quite right about Boris being a racist.

Sure, people might say he sacked off white cabinet members, replacing top jobs of Chancellor/Home Secretary with Javid and Patel.

But don’t forget he is a liar too so these are just the actions of a weird racist liar.

This is another of those weird ones that makes no sense. Is it a confused and failed satire? Surely you aren’t saying Boris isn’t a liar? Not easy when he does it on TV and was sacked by the Conservative Party and The Times for lying.

The reasons why he says and writes lots of racist things are more nuanced but still not a great look.

If being a liar precluded people from being PM then we'd never have one

‘They’re all liars’ is such a tired and inadequate argument. There hasn’t been a PM in my lifetime who was continually publicly exposed as a liar and was fired from multiple jobs for lying.

In many circs I'd say the same as you. But that doesn't change the fact that a lie is a lie and being caught, exposed and punished doesn't make you morally inferior or less equipped for certain roles than someone who isn't caught.

I genuinely don't think his lies (affairs, kippers, straight bananas- there must be worse that I've forgotten but cant be bothered to look up) trouble me much compared with so much of the mendacity that surrounds politics. Here's another tired argument - compare his lies with the labour party dissembling on anti semitism

The Labour Party/JC screwed up on that, if they have any sort of mitigation it’s that they missed the actual problem, conflating it with the centrist sabotage, no excuses though.

The problem with lying is a bigger deal than we’ve acknowledged in this thread I think. Once people start assuming power and winning referenda almost exclusively on the strength of lies and then people like Mantis start getting excited about lying being an effective tool for winning. It’s a very dangerous thing. Humans have been here before, once we disregard the truth entirely, as Donald has and Vote Leave have/did (Boris isn’t up to their standard yet but Cummings is bitb) we don’t usually come out of it well.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/beta.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/06/10/president-trump-has-made-false-or-misleading-claims-over-days/%3foutputType=amp

[MANTIS01]

Major flaws in your argument as per kuku

Lies will afford you temporary opportunity and as such literally everybody lies. There are millions of CV’s winging their way to job applications as we speak, all containing lies. If invited to interview all candidates will lie. When offered the position every applicant will have a small window of opportunity to provide substance. Lies will always self regulate. So let’s dry our eyes shall we and call it marketing instead.

Let me tell you a secret. If you drink a can of red bull you won’t actually grow wings and be able to fly mate. It’s a lie. But after making your purchase everybody has the free choice to decide if it’s a lie they wish to continue buying.

Or let’s call it perspective. In the commons today BoJo says it’s a time for optimism. Probably a lie because of the impossible challenges we face. Then again JCorbs says it’s a time to be very serious. Probably a lie because taking life too seriously is a flawed concept. Judging the landscape of joe public mood (the test of competence for politicians) the people who hold the key to power/success will deffo prefer the optimism lie. Hence BoJo will be a winner and JCorbs a serial loser (and also a proven liar)

This is the world. It is not “very dangerous”. It is the truth. Your quest for total honesty can only exist in theory just like every other crack pot leftie dream.

[nirvana]

I'm no fan of liars but I don't think Vote Leave lied much at all - people talk about the bus and future accessions. For sure some of the material could easily mislead some people and I'd prefer politics wasn't like that, but lies is a bit OTT in my view

[Doobs]

I'm no fan of liars but I don't think Vote Leave lied much at all - people talk about the bus and future accessions. For sure some of the material could easily mislead some people and I'd prefer politics wasn't like that, but lies is a bit OTT in my view

O RLY?

[kukushkin88]

I'm no fan of liars but I don't think Vote Leave lied much at all - people talk about the bus and future accessions. For sure some of the material could easily mislead some people and I'd prefer politics wasn't like that, but lies is a bit OTT in my view

This very long list of lies is well researched and decently sourced. Would be interesting if you can refute any of them.

https://www.richardcorbett.org.uk/long-list-leave-lies/

[kukushkin88]

Major flaws in your argument as per kuku

Lies will afford you temporary opportunity and as such literally everybody lies. There are millions of CV’s winging their way to job applications as we speak, all containing lies. If invited to interview all candidates will lie. When offered the position every applicant will have a small window of opportunity to provide substance. Lies will always self regulate. So let’s dry our eyes shall we and call it marketing instead.

Let me tell you a secret. If you drink a can of red bull you won’t actually grow wings and be able to fly mate. It’s a lie. But after making your purchase everybody has the free choice to decide if it’s a lie they wish to continue buying.

Or let’s call it perspective. In the commons today BoJo says it’s a time for optimism. Probably a lie because of the impossible challenges we face. Then again JCorbs says it’s a time to be very serious. Probably a lie because taking life too seriously is a flawed concept. Judging the landscape of joe public mood (the test of competence for politicians) the people who hold the key to power/success will deffo prefer the optimism lie. Hence BoJo will be a winner and JCorbs a serial loser (and also a proven liar)

This is the world. It is not “very dangerous”. It is the truth. Your quest for total honesty can only exist in theory just like every other crack pot leftie dream.

I feel ridiculous even wasting the time to respond, it really is all nonsense. CV’s are nothing like elections or referenda. Advertising is nothing like elections or referenda but it is an industry where lying is heavily regulated. Can you work why they’re allowed to say Red Bull gives you wings?

[nirvana]

I'm no fan of liars but I don't think Vote Leave lied much at all - people talk about the bus and future accessions. For sure some of the material could easily mislead some people and I'd prefer politics wasn't like that, but lies is a bit OTT in my view

This very long list of lies is well researched and decently sourced. Would be interesting if you can refute any of them.

https://www.richardcorbett.org.uk/long-list-leave-lies/

Only 24 by my count - QED

[MANTIS01]

“Health tourism costs us billions”

Well it costs us tens of millions each year

Talk to us about the difference in attitude that spending a load of money on deliberate health tourism or a very load of money creates in the voter?

Tens of millions = cool?

Billions = not cool?

So the lie really matters not. And it’s the effect not the lie that’s the bottom line truth here

[MANTIS01]

Oh and Cambridge Analytical would lol at advertising/marketing has nothing to do with elections

[ripple11]

I'm no fan of liars but I don't think Vote Leave lied much at all - people talk about the bus and future accessions. For sure some of the material could easily mislead some people and I'd prefer politics wasn't like that, but lies is a bit OTT in my view

This very long list of lies is well researched and decently sourced. Would be interesting if you can refute any of them.

https://www.richardcorbett.org.uk/long-list-leave-lies/

The bus should have used the net figure , not gross, so people can claim "a lie". However the message was so powerful the net figure would have worked just as well!

[kukushkin88]

Oh and Cambridge Analytical would lol at advertising/marketing has nothing to do with elections

We were clearly talking about the advertising industry, which is very different of course but yeah, room for improvement for me there.