Communication: Shadows On The Wall (2)

Shadows on the wall

In Plato's well-known Allegory of the Cave, he describes:-

"A gathering of people who have lived chained to the wall of a cave all of their lives, facing a blank wall. The people watch shadows projected on the wall from things passing in front of a fire behind them, and they begin to give names to these shadows. The shadows are as close as the prisoners get to viewing reality."

This is really so very applicable to the Legacy News-Media reporting that suffuses and smothers the knowledge and understanding of people concerning the twin-subjects of: The EU and Brexit (British Exit). What is reported is like the shadow above. It is derived, it matches what is visually, but it is not the same, and it reduces the potential increase in understanding that voters require to express their opinions freely in the Referendum on EU membership, which is likely in 2017, the first time since 1975: 45 years: Almost half a century of time. There's your "fire" that casts this shadow.

In the previous blog,  Communication: Learning To Speak Dog (1), the Brexit article in Money Week was considered in the context of the type of communication we experience as part of the EU. I've tried to assert one core proposition concerning Brexit of the EU deals with the quality and type of communication we have a record of as members for 43yrs as almost as important as the assessment of the condition of our membership status vs Brexit status. In this blog this article in Money Week "Why we're backing Brexit" [subscription] (it could be Pro-EU or Pro-Brexit it does not matter) is the template, or "shadow on the wall" and I hope I am successful in showing in tandem the fire/flame simultaneously:-

 "Our membership of the European Union (EU) is a subject that divides Britain."

 The article references a recent poll, but the above is far more significant suggesting imo amnesia and lack of increase in public understanding (namely: temperamental ephemeral politics in action)

The EU suffers a "democratic deficit"... it is reactive rather than proactive... many question the future of the European project and the EU's drive for "ever closer union"."

Here's some essential concepts to appreciate:-

Robert Oulds in his book Everything You Wanted To Know About The EU - But were afraid to ask, mentions that the "democratic deficit" is no such thing: "trading democracy for dictatorship on the false prospectus that they would deliver prosperity" it was effectively a design to REDUCE democracy (mainly via Qualified Majority Voting QMV) and hence was intentional (eg x7 Major Treaties without a public Referendum in 45yrs!).

The reactionary consideration also requires a conceptual understanding of the above "how" the EU works as well as "Beneficial Crisis" of "Engrenage" requiring... you guessed yet more/another major new Treaty called by the politicians!

Finally the nature of the EU is not a question of how much more "Ever Closer Union" or reverting back to more of an Economic EU: As per The Great Deception history which is never referenced (!) the plan by Jean Monnet was always to avoid the mistakes of the League of Nations and have power over the nations ie Supranationalism which requires competencies of national policies ever closer to political union for example Monetary Union requiring Fiscal Union and centralized budget setting for the EU.

 What do you think: Arrears of public voting on all those Treaties of "Ever Closer Union"

"The key difference is that the Ins believe we should try to reform the EU from within, rather than take the risk of leaving... the Outs see reform as impossible, and the risks of leaving as overstated."

 The journalists favourite approach to Brexit is "biff-bam" categorization of the beliefs of two large equal but opposite groups/tribal colours. This is very very artificial: Defining what Brexit is properly clears up almost all the fun to be had here for the journalists:-

• Brexit (British Exit) = "Withdrawal from the EU Treaties and membership via representation in the EU Institutions via triggering Article 50 TEU Lisbon Treaty - ONLY."

The White Line that ONLY divides, it does NOT define!!

From this definition it is clear that the UK can use the 2 year period to renegotiate access to the Single Market devoid of the above political/legal status as a member SUB-/under EU Treaties compared with relationship EXTRA-/outside EU Treaties. Various routes to accessing The Single Market are described in Dr. RAE North's FLEXCIT document at EUReferendum.com under "The Market Solution". This changes the so-called polling groups above like "alchemy" into voting for 

• Single Market relationship with the EU vs Political Ever Closer Union + Single Market relationship with the EU.

 Which is in which: Light and Darkness?

One of the core arguments against this are simply exercises in "bad relationship" which all people can understand: Coercion, Dominance-Submission, FUD for example. This is very important feature of the upcoming Referendum which empowers people "to speak to each, each according to their own understanding."

"In short, the status quo won't do - we need to reach a new deal that gives us more autonomy and a greater say in our own future."

Here the misconception is that the Status Quo is implicitly in stasis. The Status Quo of the EU is the inherent instability of the Treaties and this consequential political uncertainty. This word "Uncertainty" has been used as one of the key descriptions of the Prestigious VIP's who have advocated EU Membership since before Macmillan used it in the 1960's to state EEC "was causing uncertainty"! So too today, with a New Treaty being described as per A Fundamental Law Of The European Union. 

"...and this appears structural (a product of the eurozone's design) rather than cyclical (due to temporary unfavourable economic conditions)."

This is where the article is on firm ground and seems confident of itself. It would be a useful addition to paraphrase Dr. RAE North and point out that these "structural flaws" are not so much a bug in the design of the Eurozone but a "feature" as per Beneficial Crisis for the completion of Sovereign policy powers to the ECB to include Fiscal with Monetary.

 The lack of memory or consolidation of information in EU/Brexit articles: This graph is immensely useful visual aid of the Eurozone and the description of "Political Project" > Economic Project of the EU/EZ itself.

"It's worth noting on this point that we're far from alone in questioning our relationship with the EU. Finland's parliament will debate its membership of the euro next year."

"David Cameron - best described as a right-wing In vote - wrote to Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council with four demands."

The article is wasting space here: It has no bearing on Cameron, and by labelling him as "right-wing in vote" shows how poorly the EU is understood, let alone the empty Breadcrumbing of the above Theatre: The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast. we've discussed previously. Talking about Finland only reinforces the lack of historic context here and is anohter case of Politicians: No Taste, No Style, So Derivative! ie superficial indications being taken seriously; namely the article is in full "describing shadows" mode, at this point.

"The Ins both left and right-wing, see Britain as the bridge between Europe and the English-speaking world. The EU would be weaker without us, and the risks to us of leaving are too high, so why rock the boat? ... The Outs, on the other hand, come at the issue from the opposite end of the political spectrum. The Outs on the right cite right cite  greater global trade, less regulation, and improved control over immigration... but they want to keep the free movement of capital goods and labour. The Outs on the left... they want to nationalize or subsidize industries... both... want our laws to be written in Britain, not Brussels."

Random Items Selection: "Macy has 7 apples, Brad has 5 pears and Emma has 11 oranges... How can they share them equally if..."

Apart from the perverse use of Out/In instead of Leave/Remain... the above is very interesting because having defined Brexit as a subjective of groups' disparate and effectively random desires/inclinations, a summary of the above is then used to define Brexit or EU Membership as per the groups. Interestingly such groups are labelled as very lacking in knowledge about the EU here Brits know less about the EU than anyone else ! Very likely the sort of stuff written as per this Money Week article to reshape that poor understanding and nudge it as per the polls graph since the 70's along with "cyclical events" such as the economy. Effectively the authors here are basing their arguments on shifting sands.

What do other non-EU European PEOPLE think of the EU?

"As for Norway - the nation held a referendum on joining the European Economic Community in 1972 and 53.5% of voters said "no". The Norwegian government dragged them into the European Economic Area regardless in 1994. That gives them 100% of the regulations and 0% of the say - hardly an enviable position."

I intend to go over the influence subject in this blog despite it already being covered numerously, particularly in FLEXCIT: 5.0 The Market versus the Swiss option p.88 and again in this blog:  The Columbo Method: Norway

"Business for Britain (a right-wing Out group) has put together a detailed analysis of how a new trade deal with the EU could be pre-negotiated before any Brexit. The rest would quickly fall into place. Steve Baker, MP, head of Conservatives for Britain, notes that Britain is already a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Under these rules, Europe must offer us "most favoured nation" trading status. As a result, says Baker, "our membership of WTO defrays even the worst-case scenario of trade  barriers being erected under WTO rules if we left."

Oh dear, there's a lot by Dr. RAE North on this subject if they bothered to research as per google "eu referendum" coming in at No.1 Result then adding "+WTO":- EU exit: death of the WTO option? and Pete North Whose rules are they anyway? and again EU referendum: we the invisibles ; showing that the shadows are what are presented to the people, not the actual "flame". And more from Ruth Lea who is Globalisation: a conspiracy of silence?

"Ruth Lea – member of the advisory board for Business for Britain"

"More broadly speaking, global trade tariffs have been falling under globalization. Free trade benefits all involved, so it is in no one's interests to reverse that."

EU Referendum: the tyranny of non-tariff barriers

"In Short, the problem is that while the EU may have been built on free-market ideals, it is a long way from achieving those ideals. The regulatory burden and the European parliament's supremacy over national parliaments is unwelcome... that attitude is holding back the rest of Europe, particularly those countries locked into the the EURO. That's a great pity. But we don't have to remain a part of that... it is better than remaining in an unreformed EU."

 It's difficult to tell whether the weasel is in the words or the wood is lost in the forest...

There's little to no conception of Globalization of Regulations! There's a lot of incomprehension as to the nature and definition of the EU and there's False Friend tone of voice about "Reform" and being moderate and sensible about Brexit if the EU does not reform. It makes no sense: These are the patterns on the wall for the public:-

 Plato's Cave: What do people know? What they are shown.

 

Jean Monnet's "Engrenage": Destination Unknown?

Above is a Virtual Model of the Antikythera Mechanism, considered one of the first analog computers ever discovered, dating from 150-205 BCE by the Ancient Hellenic Greeks. It was designed to: "Predict astronomical positions and eclipses for calendrical and astrological purposesas well as the Olympiads, the cycles of the ancient Olympic Games."

If you watch the video above you can see a clear demonstration of how the interlocking different sized gears and different number of "teeth" all orchestrate together according to the mathematical movements of the planets calculated and related to each other to therefore be able to mechanically turn and hence be "coded" for computation of future combinations of planet, time and position as per the picture:-

 Effectively small gears turn larger gears at a slower periodicity which simulates the different rates of the celestial movements.

To repeat a recent remark by Dr. RAE North for the third time: EU Referendum: flawed understanding

Described as a member of Business for Britain, one of Matthew Elliott's business ventures, this woman would have it that the EU was turning out to be a "flawed concept" because it had monetary union without fiscal or political union.

Seemingly a small detail, the EU cannot be regarded as a flawed concept for this reason. The very essence of the single currency was to launch an incomplete construct in the knowledge that the stresses would create political pressures which would drive further integration.

This is the mechanism of engrenage, at the core of the so-called Monnet Method, relying on the doctrine of the beneficial crisis. It is not, as they say, a bug, but a feature. The European Union was designed to act in this way.

To elaborate again from The Great Deception p.569:-

There  would  never  be  any  single,  clear  definition  of  these  terms. But  every ‘project’ insider would know what was meant by engrenage, or ‘gearing’. It provided a blanket  word  to  describe all  those  various  techniques  whereby  the ‘project’ could advance what was really its only underlying agenda: a steady, relentless pressure to extend the Commission’s supranational powers. Each new advance it  made would  merely be regarded as a means  of gearing up for the  next.

Each  new  addition  to  its  competences  might  begin  with  a  small, innocuous-seeming proposal to which nobody could object: until the principle was  conceded  and  those  powers  could  then  be  steadily  enlarged. Each  new problem or setback could be used as a ‘beneficial crisis’ to justify further extending the Commission’s powers to provide the remedy. Thus,  brick  by  brick,  would  the  great  supranational  structure  be  assembled. Above all it would be vital never to define too clearly what was the ‘project’s’ ultimate goal, for fear this would arouse the countervailing forces which might seek to sabotage it before it was complete.

In this sense, an intention to obscure and to deceive was implicit in the nature of the ‘project’ from  the  moment  it  was  launched. This  habit  of  concealment was to remain such a defining characteristic of the ‘project’ that it would come increasingly to affect all those caught in its spell.

The roots of deception

The big difference between The EU's "Engrenage" and the above he Antikythera Mechanism of course is that one is physical, the other is an organizational principle of systematic increase in it's competencies: The scale of each is different both is size and in scope of function. But as above the function is clearly defined and what's more cannot be "reversed" or otherwise significantly amended without breaking either device's inherent functioning. This example is made real from the mountain of evidence showing the flow of policy powers from Nation Members to the Supranational EU:-

Evolution of EU Competencies (policy powers) x1-Direction

We've already covered this in Can we have our cake and eat it too? with the "piling up of more Treaties over old Treaties. But as per How do you become a "eurosceptic"? where it was pointed out the observed gap between the EURO's performance and it's predicted or promised performance and the way Tim Worstall manages to dig into the history of the decisions, this is an exemplar of the Monnet Method as Dr. RAE North points out above: "It's not a bug, but a feature." From this insight we're recorded here, it follows that a fundamental consequence of EU Membership is:-

• The Nature of the EU Treaty Structures is to actively produce "Political Uncertainty" as part of the political gearing design of the EU.

When I read Tim Worstall's article it was not that I was surprised by the result and hence based by opposition of the EU off this even though it was very elegantly presented:-

The European and Monetary Union (EMU): A Road Less Travelled

It was reading the history involving the founders of the EURO

Many of the euro’s problems can be traced to its birth defects. For political reasons, countries were included that weren’t ready at the time. Furthermore, a common currency cannot survive on the long term if it is not backed by a political union. Even as the euro was being born, many experts warned that currency union members didn’t belong together.

But it wasn’t just the experts. Documents from the Kohl administration, kept confidential until now, indicate that the euro’s founding fathers were well aware of its deficits. And that they pushed ahead with the project regardless.

he government files from the founding phase of the monetary union reveal that this construct cannot function. The message the documents convey is that political opportunism will ultimately prevail.

The political dimension of the EURO and not realizing how typical this was of the whole EU "Le Projet" as it became known to it's advocates around Jean Monnet.

Time-line of the Major EU Treaties

What is the significance of this? We learnt the immense importance of the breadth of discussion/understanding for argument in How about a nice game of chess? We then looked at the direct agency of the Conservatives in very general terms connecting to historic patterns of "Centralization" in The Goldfinch and the Gilded Cage and then very specifically because power is already centralized the ability to deploy deliberately lower quality arguments by our Prime Minister David Cameron to fix the context ie breadth of the discussion according to narrower limits in Big Ben: The Four-Faced Liar

What this leads to as per Dr. RAE North of these "Johnny-Come-Lately's": Beware of semi-sceptics The problem is they manage to equally narrow the breadth of the discussion down and hence build an incorrect "intellectual architecture" for useful communication and hence democracy in action for a national referendum, also.

I'm starting to think a 'Brexit' is a good idea and I never thought I'd ever say that

It's a very reasonable piece. It's also a pattern that is now becoming acceptable. The Political Correctness of Pro-EU Membership fashions has been superceded by this "latest fashion". The reason I style it such is because the underlying arguments are built on levels of superficial reasoning, there's a clear pausity of crowd movement in the Pro-EU direction, the media attention is swinging around to this position encouraged by the Prime Minister and Business For Britain and people are imitating "Monkey See Monkey Do" this change in attention and reshaping of the narrative. We've seen it with Owen Jones, it's been the fashion of various Tory "eusceptics" for years and so on. There's very little indicatio of historic context to these emotional inferred "U-Turns" in opinion.

A little better is: Ten Reasons to Rethink U.S. Support for British Membership of the European Union but as with the above example all they can contextualize is the failure of the EURO and the context of greater future growth elsewhere in the World. This context shapes things as an economic arrangement not a political one which you can clearly see above.

Why should "The Monnet Method" of "engrenage" be so imperceptible and so vitally important to the central point of our argument as Brexiteers? Is such as Anna  Soubrey right about "eurosceptics when she says: Cabinet minister tells Eurosceptics: 'Get a life!'

Ms Soubry went on: “It means that they have this obsession that they will do almost everything and anything, they will devote all their time in a way that really is not healthy for them in this run-up to the referendum.” “Because as I say, they live it, they eat it, they drink it. You want to say to them For God’s sake, get a life. But they’ve gone beyond that. That makes it very difficult for us.” 

What could be so vitally important that people would argue from principle and not practicality as the new Orthodoxy over our discussions concerning the EU are now being shaped by Matthew Elliott's Business For Britain budding from Westminster to deliver as reported extensively by The Boiling Frog (see blogroll)

Epiphanies from Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The European Union is a horrible, stupid project. The idea that unification would create an economy that could compete with China and be more like the United States is pure garbage. What ruined China, throughout history, is the top-down state. What made Europe great was the diversity: political and economic. Having the same currency, the euro, was a terrible idea. It encouraged everyone to borrow to the hilt.