Leave Campaign: Asking The Right Questions

The Matrix of "Remove + Keep + Reclaim + Gain" within the Leave Question

The Electoral Commission has done a good job in converting the "In/Out" or "Yes/No" question into a "Remain/Leave" question. However it's still a very limited means of capturing the most relevant headline information per response. The above I hope helps demomstrate this?

Electoral Commission: Our advice on the proposed EU referendum question

The major consideration for Leave respondents is:-

• Remove
• Keep
• Reclaim
• Gain

Remove is discussed by Ben Kelly The supranational root of our EU problem. It should be clear that signing up to the Supranational "Ever Closer Union" tends to make those people who want to see more of each member nations' sovereignty yielded to this organization, justified in their motivations to achieve this - by invariably whatever effective means possible: Usually the more invisible the more effective. One of the real positives of removing these, via Triggering Article 50 (via playing by the rules) is that our Democratic Mandate to the government to carry out this result via Article 50 is effective also in removing such motivations that undermine and disrupt and produce disunity and deception. All catelogued in Christopher Booker and Dr. Richard North's history of the European Union: The Great Deception. For many people who support Brexit this is the definitive result. Anything else is a bonus? It's also the primary definition of Brexit: Our leaders signatures or our signatures on joining and leaving.

Keep has been discussed "ad nauseum"; a particularly good summary at Campaign For An Independent Britain on The Market Solution primary path EFTA/EEA and this follows the rational of an interim state to ensure the above Political Question being resolved is not way-laid or sabotaged by Economic Questions. Hence the idea behind The Norway Option which secures Single Market Access, ensures cooperative schemes are all carried out to everyone's benefit. This is the mature attitude to ensure equal partners in our withdrawal and hence mutually agreeable and beneficial: It is of course a democratic decision and that must be respected by all: The way forward. It does hinge on Freedom Of Movement being conceded for this transition period. If you compare all that is gained then you'll find it a worthy concession to keep for the time-being.

Reclaim: If you have followed the history of the Fisheries by John Ashworth you'll see that it is a source of national shame concerning our politicians and civil servants against the people they are elected to serve. We will reclaim several major policy areas but it will take TIME! to reformat these over years.

Gain: Perhaps one of the least well appreciated or understood: We gain representation at the global bodies which have been advancing rapidly through the globalization process of regulations and standards where real global influence can be wielded. This is a true benefit and immediate upon withdrawal. Pete North has blogged about this extensively.

The exercise above is to "tot up" POSITIVES FOR LEAVING. Remember the "?" of Freedom of Movement if not combined will prevent any positives from being achieved most notably the "Remove" fundamentals of Brexit.

 Questions Behind The Question: EU Referendum: Remove, Keep, Reclaim, Gain

For more information on the questions and to try the exercise (removal and keep at least) head on over to a Question Survey at Survey Monkey I wrote up with some descriptions per option to flex out the details and your understanding.

However there's a very important element to asking the right questions for the Leave Campaign. If we do not, guess what? Deceptive Actors will ask the wrong questions in our place and sabotage the argument, as some examples will demonstrate:-

• Immigration: Cameron’s Emergency Brake (The Brexit Door); Immigration is this all we're arguing about? (White Wednesday)
• Enemy Within: Jurassic Park (Lost Leonardo), Conscious Free Conservatives (Semi-Partisan Politics)
• Fallacy of the Better/Best Deal NOW!: Eurosceptic tantrums will keep us in the EU (Pete North)
• Legacy News-Media Bombardment of FUD: And so the FUD continues……… (Scribblings From Seaham)
• Cameron using his Prestige to Deceive: Cameron's red card is a political decoy (Pete North)

And dominating the debate with a "Free Pass" in the Legacy News-Media keeping the public ignorant and in the dark:-

Beavis: "We'll %*&£!!! if we leave the EU" Butthead: "Trade Deal! Trade Deal!"

What a stupid spectacle the BBC serves up to the public; it's "biff-bam" modus operandi.

It's the same with Daniel Hannan, John Redwood, David Campbell-Bannerman, Douglas Carswell and Nigel Farage. Our politicians are too busy trying to sound important to be able to develop the education of knowledge for the voters to be able to understand asking the right questions for either Remain or Leave.

Leave HQ: With whom should the power rest?

 

 

Pro-Brexit Arguments: Beyond the Mirage

The promised political oasis awaits you... oh reader; read on and learn nothing!

I think I can say with some small satisfaction, I'm on the same wave-length as Dr. RAE North at EUReferendum.com in the latest blog: EU Referendum: fighting through the chaff. It's worth quoting a significant chunk:-

"In campaigning terms relative to this referendum, "chaff" does an analogous job – spurious arguments coming from all directions which confuse the issues and make it almost impossible to conduct a proper debate.

For instance, given the argument over the source of regulation, and the impact of leaving the EU on the food industry, it should be fairly simple to establish the facts. Legislation in the food sector, perhaps more than any other industry, is internationalised, which means that the overall impact should be slight.

After all, in the field, we have Codex Alimentarius, the OIE, the IPPC, UNECE and the OECD, amongst others all contributing to the body of international standards which filter down under the aegis of the WTO phytosanitary agreement and the agreement on technical barriers to trade, to determine much of the content of the EU's Single Market acquis.

Thus, when we explored this issue, we found a Norwegian official who did not feel that his country was in any way disadvantaged by not having voting rights in the EU. As far as he was concerned, the international bodies, not the EU – were the "top table"."

Effectively the Guardian piece Brexit a 'nightmare scenario' for UK food and drink business is "chaff". They could have chosen numerous different policy areas and the legacy news-media continues to do so - to the same effect: Producing more chaff: In effect the cumulative outcome is a Mirage Argument that involves pointless battles between confused people on both sides of the debate and a decline in argument quality. This time it's Food Regulations; I'm sure there will be a next time with yet another Policy area inducing FUD from the Guardian and the like:-

Legacy News-Media: "The Rat In The Room"

 Leave HQ already warned that Pro-Brexit arguments are not about reducing Regulations (they'll be harmonized, consolidated, rationalized via the Globalization process now) in The big four Brexit Nos.

1. Don't talk about how much money Brexit will save [edit:(or lose!)]

 Open Europe, IEA, CER love the "Angels Dancing on Pins" Arguments

2. Don't talk about leaving the single market

 Legacy News-Media FUD: "Emotional Anxiety-Loop Indecision/Freeze response inducement"

3. Don't talk about cutting regulations 

25 Years Out of Date Argument: Little EU loss of perspective arguments

Here's The Economist huffing and puffing as usual: A background guide to “Brexit” from the European Union about very little to do with Brexit other than their "sophisticated presentation on mirages": A background guide to “Brexit” from the European Union:-

"British trade with other EU countries has risen rapidly since 1973, though as the European economy has slowed, its share of the total is declining (the EU now takes over 51% of British exports of goods, and close to 45% if services are added in). Yet whether Britain is in or out, the EU will be a key partner. For non-members such as Norway or Switzerland, trade with the EU makes up a bigger share of the total than it does for Britain. The effects of EU membership on trade patterns are difficult to measure, but John Springford of the Centre for European Reform, a London-based think-tank, and colleagues have carried out a modelling exercise which concluded that Britain’s trade with the rest of the EU was 55% greater than it would have been if outside."

4. Don't talk about controlling immigration

 Cameron will Trump Farage's demands: "Just enough to win a referendum"

Political (mirage) Success = Measures that can be done and will be offered by the EU

With Cameron hopes for EU concessions in 'second-tier membership' for UK and applying a sort of Emergency Break and multiple other small print additions, this is dealing with a derivative argument of The Great Deception - only an worse only politically - not Democratically nor Pragmatically across full scope of Migration Policy control (decision-making) and execution (management).

And here we need to cut through the chaff and look at what the Main Argument looks like:-

Most Of Our Politics is ABOVE our own system (electorate disconnection) and concerns our own politicians far more than we the electorate do.

There's two fundamental problems here:

1. The super-machinery of the EU is designed for forging a Political Entity above the National Member state.
2. Our own National "super-machinery" has been hijacked to serve this purpose and this is named The Great Deception. 

Most of the arguments we've seen above and that shape the conceptual understanding of so many people is as Dr. RAE North points out is "Chaff". Here we can compare the other side of the EU Argument:-

1. Political Structure = Little EU (above) = Remain
2. Regulatory Structure = Globalization! (below) = Leave

Quoting Dr. RAE North again:-

"Think then how much more advanced the "remain" campaign could be if two years or more ago, when Flexcit started to take the shape that we now see, journalists and activists had recognised the work for what it is. But, with elements on both sides studiously ignoring Flexcit, we have the bizarre position where they are falling over each other to complain that there is nothing."

Namely we see the Mirages in the Legacy News-Media from both sides of the argument. Eg Dominic Cummings is one of the worst culprits as per Mr. Brexit:
Dominic Cummings, his naked lies and supposed legal alternatives to Article 50

 "Any member state may decide, in accordance with its constitutional rules, to withdraw from the union."

It's really worth understanding Article 50 Lisbon Treaty as per Leave HQ once again: Article 50 And Withdrawal: An explainer. And why if there's one thing in the entire EU Referendum / Brexit argument we all should get right on all sides of the argument, it is Article 50:-

Here's why: REAL POWER:-

The Political Food Web of Prestige

The Food Web of Political Prestige

Before explaining the above, a wire frame version in text:-

Wire Frame: Layers (red arrows) & Levels (Groups) of Political Prestige

 Vital Statistic of this Vision of Politics of our EU Referendum:-

(1) Top of the Food Chain: David Cameron = PM Office of Power

At the top of the food web is David Cameron, The Great White Shark, with a huge huge huge Prestige Base flowing downwards far larger in magnitude than anything else both absolutely and in proportional ratio of dispersal of prestige further down the food chain.

Dr. RAE North has being making this effect explicit for sustained number of blogs, in particular: EU Referendum: the role of prestige. The ability to recommend via Government and via Statesmanship with the EU and other major institutions and other European leaders  and through various meetings shape the conditions of the vote is without equal.

(2) Legacy News-Media has a vast number of connections

What is noticeable, is that the channels of communication (their tentacles in the top diagram) of this Referendum are pivotal to the outcome of the vote. Groups can only influence other groups to influence yet further groups via the channels of communication available to them, their exposure.

A strong example of this is the spread coverage that the prestige of David Cameron entitles him and the folly of the legacy news-media reporting as per Dr. RAE North EU Referendum: a humiliating retreat from journalism this seems to explain a major component of the level of ignorance over the EU and Brexit of the British public for >40yrs... and again blogged about by LeaveHQ in The media has lost the plot  and again via The Sceptic Isle: The media’s analysis of the EU referendum is lamentable.

(3) The Electorate/Public are many LAYERS down the Prestige Food Web

Looking at Polls, the randomness of them in conjunction to general public sentiment, the obsession of the politicians with Big Data Mining of people's information, the rarity of Referendums in the UK and indeed voting on Major Treaties to do with the EU, the public are treated as political problem to be avoided as much as possible. Given the failure of the Legacy News-Media to educate at the same time as the opportunity of the public to set up their own blogs for other people and organize the information from other groups such as Think Tanks, papers published by the HM Government, by the EU or indeed the vast range of Global Bodies (UNECE, EFTA, Codex Alimentarius, WTO, G20, etc etc) as well as Political Parties, there exists an opportunity to directly communicate structured information via the internet to voters for this Popular Referendum.

The Referendum is when the politicians have failed to resolve a question of politics which continues to damage their legitimacy and hence must pose the question directly to the public. More information on Referendums as per Direct/Real Democracy: How They Do It In Switzerland by Campaign For An Independent Britain.

(4) The LEVELS of Prestige at which each group functions prohibits public education

It seems to me that blogs are exposing this, along with Twitter; leading to Technological Disruption to the old order. Some clear examples of these clashes:-

Lost Leonardo blogs about such an exchange at F For Fail. Another example is from the Pro-EU Think Tank British Influence which published Ten questions that Eurosceptics must answer about Brexit ; but when challenged by a blog "below the line" (get used to the meaning of this phrase!!) such as, Brexit: Ten answers to ten questions and then the "Think Tank" British Influence avoids communication as per the follow-up: British Influence haven't the guts to take us on. What is fascinating is that the video linked:-

FLEXCIT Presentation by Dr. RAE North

Is highly accessible. If I was from a Journalist post or a Think Tank, doing my research in this area, I would have found this video and compared it to many else besides for example these "Brexit" presentations list: Alternatives to EU Membership Conference 2015 - 16 videos and even the Brexit IEA shortlist from another "Think Tank" and developed a full picture of the state of the art of Brexit. But the Fallacy of Omission is employed via the tools of Prestige.

(5) The Higher The LEVEL of Prestige operating the more compromised the communication

A very good example of this is our Prime Minister, David Cameron or indeed the many eminent high status personages we met in The Columbo Method: Norway. Dr. RAE North records David Cameron's words here EU Referendum: in the deadly grip of "Europe" which is increasing beginning to hark back to one Tony Blair and the national sense of betrayal over The Iraq War. But then this is decades old as we've also discovered written in the history of the EU in The Great Deception, which continues to be largely ignored, apart from the very rare gleam of light, "AN OPTIMISTIC VISION OF A POST-EU UNITED KINGDOM" - Rt Hon Owen Paterson MP through the self-made miasma of confusion created by the interrelation and interactions of the different layers of prestige per group per level. This insistence not to form a researched basis or common ground for argument over the perceived problem of EU Membership continues to add more layers of deception over the original ones, decades ago by such as Edward Heath.

(6) Party Politics & Think Tanks, News-Media & Campaigns tend to be compromised by each other

The curiosity this food web of prestige is made clear in a number of blogs by The Boiling Frog:

• EU Referendum: WESS Digital, Guido And Matthew Elliott
• EU Referendum: Enriching Matthew Elliott and Friends...?
• Business For Elliott's Friends 
• EU Referendum, Data Mining And Hong Kong
• Guido Fawkes: Vote Leave, Take Control?
• EU Referendum: Elliott Was Director Of Britain in Europe Campaign Ltd 

 And it extends to "friends in journalism":-

• EU Referendum: a particularly stupid idea
• EU Referendum: designation - the war of words  

A different angle compromising so-called Think Tanks was covered previously with the IEA Brexit Prize:-

• Lakshmi: Goddess of Prosperity (2) 

When we do get Think Tanks that hover nearer to a more "impartial" picture of Brexit as per The Adam Smith Institute "What exactly is the case for Brexit?" they seem too partial to their own filters and could simply refer for a much clearer and "on the pulse" picture from a "mere blogger" as Lost Leonardo provides: The Story So Far... 

Perhaps for a Referendum one of the worst forms of negative bias is the "tribal identity politics" such as discussed by both White Wednesday and The Brexit Door respectively, dragging everyone else down to their low quality argument zones as per Argument Abstraction, respectively:-

• We need to talk about immigration 
• Presenting The 'Open Goal'

This problem is easily magnified when for example a Twitter a/c with a handle that contains all the costume of "eurosceptic" retweets sources that are compromised by this food web that confuse, deceive and play according to the rules of prestige not real information quality and no wonder Pete North blogs Fun while it lasted concerning the "damaged goods" that is all three of the present Referendum Campaigns (Vote Leave, Leave.EU and BSE):-

LeaveEU is evidently passionate about leaving but I've yet to come across an Economist EU/Brexit article that was not deeply compromised... and the "decoy" starts drawing other "birds of a feather" in.

(7) The Structure of the Polical "Food Web" suggests a Top-Down Political Reality...

For me I can't do better than suggest despite the slight tendentious diagram construction, that better communication will lead to better relationships which requires systematic reformation of our politics closer towards people:-

• Brexit - A Catalyst For Political Reform
• Grand Strategy: "Promotion"

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Restore Britain's Fish (A New Hope)

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish is the famous line and book from British sci-fi writer, Douglas Adams, a comedy of sorts. Unfortunately the story of Britain's Fisheries is a tragedy. The original campaign Save Britain's Fish to remove the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) failed to save Britain's fish and indeed it's industry and hence the new campaign is now to "RESTORE" (Restore Britain's Fish) it from this politically inflicted disaster both on the industry and the natural resource that make up both sides of the Fisheries of Britain.

Wikipedia guide: The Common Fisheries Policy (CFP)

 Map: Fisheries is a visibly significant British Resource; Norway and Iceland remained outside the CFP outside the EU; as EFTA/EEA members

To understand this, we must look at "White  Paper, The  United  Kingdom  and  the  European  Communities" as per The Great Deception: The Great Fisheries Scandal, p.179:-

"There is no question of Britain losing essential national sovereignty; what is proposed is a sharing and an enlargement of individual national sovereignties in the economic interest."

Under "Fisheries":-

"The  Government  is  determined  to  secure  proper  safeguards  for  the  British fishing  industry. The  Community  has  recognised  the  need  to  change  its fisheries  policy  for  an  enlarged Community  of  Ten,  particularly  in  regard  to access to fishing grounds."

 Britain's Fisheries: An expendable political chip

We compare the above communication to the people with the politicians negotiations on 30th June, 1970:-

"Furthermore,  there  was  already  international  pressure  for  a  major  revision  of the  international  law  of  the  sea,  to  extend  national  control  of  fisheries  to  200 miles (or the ‘median line’ between two  nations). When  this  took  place,  the waters  of  the  four  applicants  would  contain  well  over  90  percent  of  western Europe’s fish, some 80 percent of the total in seas controlled by Britain."

These were the conditions for Britain. The condition for the EEC (as the EU was called then).

LeaveHQ: Restore Britain's Fish

 "Britain's Got Talent Fish!"

To quote  John Ashworth at Campaign For An Independent Britain (Who is lead campaigner of both Save Britain's Fish in the 1990's and now again in the new campaign in conjunction with persons from the fishing industry and ancillary industries from all coastal areas from Cornwall to Shetland and Northern Ireland.):-

"Coming back to Britain’s Accession, the original six members, hours before the signed application for membership from the four was handed in, created Fisheries regulation 2140/70, which contained:"

The above shows Article 2 of the regulation as well as quote from Judgment of the Court, Cornelis Kramer and Others, Joined Cases 3, 4 and 6/76 (14 July 1976) with interpretation of the description of this Regulation within contention between "High Seas" vs "Sovereign Coastal Waters". It suggests that under the EEC/EU nations held 12-mile rights but under Article 2 gave up the full 200-miles rights to the community (number of members with equal rights to these British Sovereign Waters).

United Nations: Oceans & Law of the Sea (UNCLOS):-

Sovereign Coastal Waters: 12-miles (EEC) vs 200-miles (UN)

PART V

EXCLUSIVE ECONOMIC ZONE

Article57

Breadth of the exclusive economic zone

"The exclusive economic zone shall not extend beyond 200 nautical miles from the baselines from which the breadth of the territorial sea is measured."


HM Government: Review of the Balance of Competences between the United Kingdom and the European Union Fisheries Report (Summer 2014)


Coming back to The Great Deception, it is recorded how various different approaches to finding a legal basis to the Treaty to enact "equal access to all members" was sought via numerous convoluted and tenuous possibilities within the existing Treaties, going back so as to The Treaty of Rome. Effectively the "fingerprints of such actions recorded" gave away the intention/motive of this regulation at it's inception:-

"On  the  basis  of  this  evaluation,  it  was  evident  that  the  Treaty  offered  no justification   for   what   was   clearly   being   considered,   and   therefore   any regulation  enacting it  would  a  legal  base. Nevertheless,  a  regulation  was drafted to define the ‘equal access’ principle, with the intention of placing it in the acquis before  the  four  would-be  entrants  lodged  their  applications. It would  then have to  be  accepted  by  them,  without  argument. By  any  measure or description, this was a trap, aimed at appropriating the applicants’ property in order to share it between the Community members." ~ The Great Deception, Christopher Booker and Richard North, p.180

The next question to ask is: What is/was the effect of this on Britain's Fisheries; quoting FLEXCIT: Stage 4 - Restoring independent policies ~ 14.0 Fisheries, p.267:-

"The  figures  themselves  told  the  story. In 1972,  a  total  of  939,800  tons  was landed  by  British  vessels,  compared  with  145,850  tons  landed  by  foreign vessels. Vessel numbers were then not accurately recorded (and nor indeed was the  entire  UK  catch).  But  in 1995, we  know  that 9,200  fishing  vessels  landed 912,000 tonnes of  fish– not a great difference, but then the CFP was only just beginning to bite."

"In  2002, however,  after  Commission  effects  to  reduce  the  fishing  effort, there were only 7,578 vessels, which landed 686,000 tonnes – a 25 percent reduction in  catches  over  eight  years."

"By  2012,  the  UK  fleet  had  dropped  to  6,406 vessels, comprising 5,032 ten-metre and under vessels and 1,374 over ten-metre vessels. Landings dropped to 627,000 tonnes, with a value of £770 million. But the real contrast came with the imports. In the same year, these reached 638,410 tonnes,  valued  at  £2.6bn.  Of  that,  £797  million  came  from  the  EU-27,  a significant proportion of which were caught in UK waters."

"This  provided  a  graphic  illustration  of  the  way  the  CFP  worked.  Access  to fishing grounds had been dominated by political considerations, on the basis of "equal  access" to  what  was defined  as  a "common  resource"."

Common Fisheries Policy (CFP): Interpreting "Dolphin" for "Good-bye!"

This has been a tragic story; much like the self-inflicted EURO. But the story continues from John Ashworth is writing a weekly blog on this subject starting with The Common Fisheries Policy – Part 1 and continuing each Monday over the next few weeks at Campaign For An Independent Britain. If I've made any factual errors, please let me know: It's a very interesting area of the EU debate, which is hopefully conveyed in the above introductory (background) summary above.

The promises to people by the politicians motioning to join the EEC/EURO/EU or whatever next, have been proven to be great deceptions based on super-political logic that have damaged people's lives, damaged resources and damaged industries, we could end by saying, with respect to Fisheries:-

"It's The Same Kettle Of Fish."

Listening to the Sounds of a Referendum

"Sounds Of Silence" by Astranat (Deviantart)

Most people have heard of The Butterfly Effect?

"In chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the sensitive dependence on initial conditions in which a small change in one state of a deterministic nonlinear system can result in large differences in a later state."

Some interesting observations concerning the so-called national discussion of Britain's Referendum on EU Membership in the legacy news-media from Dr. RAE North EU Referendum: the tedium of it all and from Lost Leonardo The Mainstream Debate ; an excellent summary at The Sceptic Isle The media’s analysis of the EU referendum is lamentable:-

"Prepare yourself for the long haul; there will be no early referendum. The timetable was set out last June in the Five Presidents’ Report. The process of treaty change will begin in 2017 and will look to create a two-tier EU, it is on the basis of that treaty that David Cameron will present Britain with it’s “reformed Europe” and “British model” of membership."

"Despite this reality having been apparent for quite some time the media are still making up rubbish about an early referendum, demands being made, rebuffed and backtracked on and generally muddying the waters."

The Brexit Door Presenting The 'Open Goal' along with many such refrains from White Wednesday (We Need To Talk About Immigration) laments the degradation of quality of argument (see Argument Abstraction) that is not only demeaning but also detracting from winning the argument (the irony of bigotry)

Brexit simplified = Arguing the Central Point: "What is Brexit?"

What all the above are really illustrating in total combination is this point (pun intended): The Central Argument not being argued means the quality of argument suffers; which Pete North points out in direct relation to both Leave Campaigns in Fun While It Lasted. It does mean more waffle to fill columns, more "controversy generation" for the legacy news-media. An example of a news-story that caught my eye in particular illustrating this:-

Glamour, Controversy, Accusations, Counter-Accusations: Purr-fect!

I can't see too many downsides to this story: The BBC gets splash coverage of Strictly Come Dancing (which is quite an enjoyable musical-dance show imo), Ola Jordan gets some publicity perhaps for her subsequent act and the news-media are delivered a news-story with all the elements of interest, in particular Ola Jordan herself, a consummately, professional dancer and alluring screen presence rolled into one.

Sometimes I don't really mind these sorts of stories, I think I "get" what is going on and I remember when the above lady won Strictly Come Dancing with Chris Hollins, demonstrating a huge degree of professional pride when they both won demonstrating two really wonderful emotions we all enjoy seeing on our screens (Reference: Raph Koster, A Theory of Fun):-

• Fiero = The expression of triumph when you have achieved a significant task (pumping your fist, for example). 
• Naches = The feeling you get when someone you mentor succeeds (professional pride)

In particular, Strictly Come Dancing demonstrates the second emotion very well in my opinion and it's great to see.

However such Sound And The Fury when it comes to Politics, an area where perhaps less pleasure should be mixed with business, we end up with:-

It's barely entertaining, in fact as per above it's "tedious and boring" which are deadly to democracy.

"It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." ~ William Shakespeare, Macbeth Act 5, scene 5, 19–28

As we can see, most people are attracted to controversy, as per Robert Cialdini,  strong social relations pressures drive us to act in ways that influence us far more than we're really ready to admit and the result is the battle between people climbing the social ladder to dominate and those falling down the ladder into submission, for every Naches there's Schadenfreude at seeing our competitors or rivals fall off the ladder (!). If you notice a lot of those google news stories have "David Cameron" at the top: He must be very very important to our societies very survival and well-being to hold such media exposure and talk around him?

And this is the problem: This is not entertainment but very serious for millions of people yet here we are with this soap-drama scrutinizing the emotions on David Cameron's face; all that is going on is the Dominance-Submission relationship as per Legitimacy & Listening. But there we learnt that this is built from Authority Influence (see Cialdini: The "expert" in the white coat selling you toothpaste on the television advert (who is in fact an actor picked for his "chemistry appeal" again Cialdini) which itself is derived from The Office of Prime Minister which is based on 3 levels of Legitimacy:-

• Cognitive
• Moral
• Pragmatic

How do we lose the Referendum? By ensuring that authority is perceived in the public debate only through David Cameron. This is presently operating.

The sound of a tiny drop of water dropping into an ocean.

How do we win the Referendum? By questioning that authority against expertise and real knowledge that is communicated from a source of authority based off that cognitive legitimacy that is tranmitted either through or around the legacy news-media. The more it can be shown/revealed that Cameron's legitimacy is deeply compromised by The Great Deception and vica-versa the more cognitive legitimacy is amplified from a source of authority in public, open communication, the greater the public will make their verdict on the EU Referendum on the value of David Cameron to our society vs the damage to our society he is perceived to be causing and continuing via his domination of the Popular Referendum.

Leave Campaign: A source of cognitive legitimacy

We have this referendum because our politicians made a huge mistake they have not admitted to and have after >40yrs admitted they cannot resolve legitimately without the people signing up to "What Next?": How about politicians being forced to listen instead of making so much wasteful noise for once? As per Leave HQ: Why We Must Leave?

I Can't Believe It's Not Brexit! Can You?

I can: It's NOT butter!

I am very cynical of advertising; a particularly good area of research on  sales techniques is Robert Cialdini's The Art of Influence, so much so GCHQ as part of it's online influence training/methods referenced this work iirc. Effectively the above is attempting to ensure their brand is remembered by you when you're shopping and swamped by choices of which "butter" to buy, you may have a tendencies to pick the brand on familiarity simply due to a default and low requirement to think about such a trivial choice.

The above I remember because it had a very annoying "Ear Worm Catch-Phrase" but also for me, margerine tastes nothing like butter! Where one tastes "organic" in the way vegetables or meat taste "organic", margerine tastes synthetic. Evidently it sells very well, perhaps due to "low fat" branding and "easily spreadable properties" so it has it's place and I'm not knocking it as a poor quality product, just that it's an imitation butter and I'd personally prefer be labelled as such:-

"is an imitation butter spread used for spreading, baking, and cooking. It was originally created from beef tallow and skimmed milk in 1869 in France by Hippolyte Mège-Mouriès, as a result of a challenge proposed by Emperor Napoleon III to create a substitute for butter for the armed forces and lower classes. It would later be named “margarine”.

Whereas butter is made from the butterfat of milk, modern margarine is made mainly of refined vegetable oil and water, and may also contain milk. In some locales it is colloquially referred to as "oleo", short for oleomargarine.

Margarine, like butter, consists of a water-in-fat emulsion, with tiny droplets of water dispersed uniformly throughout a fat phase which is in a stable crystalline form. In some jurisdictions margarine must have a minimum fat content of 80% to be labelled as such, the same as butter. Colloquially in the US, the term margarine is used to describe "non-dairy spreads" like Country Crock, and I Can't Believe It's Not Butter! with varying amounts of fat content."

What I'm trying to say here, is that advertising is the Art of the Plausible. As such there's a great deal of this in politics, where multiple viewpoints and values in modern secular societies are concerned. This may be "Popularity Politics", but it leads to an erosion of clear definitons and hence clear communication as per Communication: Shadows On The Wall (2) .

The stricter definitions of the words are:-

Possible > Plausible > Probable > Likely

But in politics it boils down between Plausible and Popular Sounding to gain "Vote Share" (in whatever context (people/politicians/nations/etc) vs politically possible within the rules of for example Treaty Laws and the wider interrelations such as Market forces and as well within some scope of popular acceptability. As the diagram above attempts to illustrate there's a widening divergence between the the art of selling a political proposition and the actual political "product" itself. Like the above "margerine" it may advertise itself as equivalent to butter but it is not defined as butter technically!

And so it is with Brexit. Which I've defined very clearly and as simply as possible in Brexit For Beginners and elsewhere The Brexit Number and the EU Onion. The result of this lack of clarity is of course confusion as repeated numerous times for example: Understanding The Mountains Of Madness. We looked The Columbo Method: Norway previously and perhaps another detective can help when considering the Plausible vs the Possible:-

Brexit: When defined seems like a much less grand out-come than anticipated. But that's because it's merely the first step into a larger world.

To understand Brexit in terms of the difference between Plausibility and Possibility in Politics, FLEXCIT applies considerable definition of limitations ie demarcation between plausible and possible Brexit events and hence options. This is the grounding for The Market Solution:-

"Negotiators  will  have  to  deal  with  the  political  realities  of  the  day,  and  be forced to respond to the demands and limitations imposed on them."

"Compromise will not so much be possible as inevitable."

"We do not consider that it is possible to resolve all the issues arising from forty years of political and economic integration in one set of talks, or one stage."

"Whilst  we  aver  that  it would  be  impossible  to  win  a  referendum  with  a  plan which  seeks  to  reject  the  EU's  freedom  of  movement  provisions."

"Estimates  cannot  be  any  stronger  than  the  validity  of  the  assumptions on which they are based. Weak assumptions, lacking a sound evidential base or not  rooted  in the  real  world, are  poor  foundations  for  any  plan.  Dazzling predictive    models    and    complex    calculations    cannot    remedy    inherent deficiencies."

"No solutions offered in respect of specifics are of any  value unless  they  fit with others  to make a fully integrated whole.  There  is  no  point defining  any one  policy  area  if  the outcome creates irresolvable problems  elsewhere.  Partial  solutions  are  not  an  answer.  An  exit strategy must  work  as  a  whole,  providing  the  best  fit  over  the  entire  policy domain – even  if  it requires  adopting sub-optimal  policies  in  some specific areas."

Numerous stringent caveats on Brexit production are clearly given from multiple view points in FLEXCIT, by Dr. RAE North. Heed Sherlock Holmes' deductive advice!

And much of the Legacy News-Media and "think tanks" stream of report after report about "What is Brexit?" including "Plausible Brexit Options" not appreciating the narrowing to "Possible Brexit Options", for example: British Influence: What Would Happen if the UK Voted To Leave or indeed another report it's similar to: Global Council Brexit: The Impact on the UK and the EU and there are endless numbers of these reports. The most interesting facet of them comes down to:-

Advertising political propositions: Which is the more plausible product vs MORE importantly which is the most possible product?

No doubt David Cameron's Association Membership "British Model" will be "much better/butter" (sorry about the pun!) than all? Well no not if it's a lateral transition not a vertical transition in redefining our relationship with the EU:-

So we come back to: British Influence: Ten questions that Brexit supporters need to be able to answer which LeaveHQ addresses, which draws from much of the answers to these questions already written in FLEXCIT: The definitive EU exit plan for Britain:-

Brexit: Ten answers to ten questions

So feel free to read the more in-depth answers there. However, one of the important tasks of this EU/Referendum/Brexit debate is to organize information and increase understanding. A "war of words" or "wall of text" is an inhibitor to this outcome. So given the above use of conceptual understanding given above, to answer the questions in a way that presents the essence of A Science of Simplicity in which is asserted:-

• Complexity = EU = Fragile = Deceptive
• Simplicity = Brexit = Flexible = Trust

Where Brexit defined =

"Brexit (British Exit)" = “Withdrawal from the EU Political Treaties which grant representation of politicians in the EU political institutions and removal of such representation” - only – via triggering Article 50 Lisbon Treaty

Which means Brexit is merely x1 step, a single stage or Present Simple Event of change of Relationship Status of the UK with the EU qualitatively not quantitatively as component of FLEXCIT, the full process, itself. This incidentally is not wishful thinking: It mirrors the "Engrenage" and "negotiations" that are phantom of our Prime Minister David Cameron according to the EU Time-Table on Association Membership status (new relationship quantitatively not qualitatively) stretching from 2013-2017-2020+!

Here's the answer to British Influence. I've even appropriately organized the questions according to their categorization to help with clarity of understanding. What Brexiteers/Pro-Brexit Supporters need to do is understand that Brexit must be politically possible (which is much much smaller range of possibility than "politically plausible"), to then trigger democratic legitimacy and trump The Great Deception once and for all in Britain.

Grand Strategy: "Promotion"

The Lewis Chessmen at The British Museum

The Lewis Chessman can be viewed at The British Museum apart from many other stupendous wonders. A brief description of them:-

"The Lewis Chessmen form a remarkable group of iconic objects within the world collection of the British Museum. They were probably made in Norway, about AD 1150- 1200. At this period, the Western Isles, where the chess pieces were buried, were part of the Kingdom of Norway, not Scotland. It seems likely they were buried for safe keeping on route to be traded in Ireland."

"The chess pieces testify to the strong cultural and political connections between Britain and Scandinavia in the Middle Ages, and to the growing popularity within Europe of the game of chess, the origins of which lie in ancient India."

These beautiful chess pieces are a nice segue from The Columbo Method: Norway. where we looked at the disparity between the strategy of the prestigious "King/Queen" pieces vs what the people aka the "Pawns" felt about The Norway Option. In fact as per these above chess pieces, people are more than happy with trade relations; so long as we remember the value of understanding our politics in a wider context and don't fall into the trap of narrowing the argument down via increasing the emotional pitch and pressure/compression as per Can we have our cake and eat it too? and How about a nice game of chess?

The Queen & King: The Yin & Yang of Power protecting Prestige

Dr. RAE North has blogged a series on politics categorized as "Strategy Ten" at EUReferendum.com. This is summarized in Strategy ten: summary and conclusion or indeed you can use the search or archive feature of that website or else google: [eureferendum.com: "....."]. For many people it's possibly too high-level considerations, the domain of the "Kings and Queens" of politics. And yet this is the real thing, what is reported as "strategy or negotiation" in the news-media is the equivalent of "Fool's Gold":-

• a ​mineral that is ​found in ​rocks and ​looks like ​gold but is not ​worth anything
• something that you ​think will be very ​pleasant or ​successful but is not or as per the Urban Dictionary: Someone who is in love with someone who is only using them, or taking advantage of them, but the person being used is still in love with the other person.

An example would be David Cameron's so-called renegotiation which seems to have chopped and changed, from memory:-

Fool's Gold (Pyrite) Reporting in the Media:-

1. 24 renegotiation/reform pts
2. 11 renegotiation/reform pts
3. 10 renegotiation/reform pts
4. 7 renegotiation/reform pts
5. 4 "principles"
6. 0 progress before December "afterall"... !

At each stage the News-Media has faithfully reported the "latest news" only for the "news" to magically change. In fact all that is happening is as per the strategy of Breadcrumbing the people along via the News reports. This strategy is all part of the theatre and projection of power to protect the prestige of the offices of Prime Minister and the offices of the other heads of government and the Institutional credibility of the EU as to it's legitimacy to authority and governance as per Legitimacy & Listening.

Opening Gambit: Pawns are placed into strategic formation: They're... "political pawns"!

As everyone knows who's played chess: The "early game" has all sorts of openings usually with an emphasis on pawns and ensuring they are moved with economy of movement into formation. Their power is in their "cannon-fodder" quality (trading pieces for tractical positions) and their "numbers". In the EU Referendum the people are pawns and the current news-media reports are effectively placing the people into formation. One of the key early lessons I was told in chess was that commanding the "Middle Ground" was vitally important for maximizing position and movement options all around; influencing the rest of the board compared to the edges. For this reason, the rise of polling to try to coordinate these pawns into strategic positions has of course grown. Leave.EU: The Science Behind Our Strategy (Goddard & Gunster) has employed such methods via Cambridge Analytica as well as Stronger In Europe on both sides of the chess board (Black (pro-intergovernmentalism pawns) vs White (pro-supranationalism pawns) (goes 1st!)) to ensure they get the most out of their "pawns":-

Application of the tools of data science to polling data

As we've seen with the control of the message from the media in I've been expecting you... ;  Fatal Car Crash: Two Dead After Car Accident and Understanding The Mountains of Madness ; polling seems the most appropriate way to influence voters in their millions through the filter of the News-Media, the Knights of the Legacy-Media with their ability to confuse and jump around deceptively and camouflage the next move:-

The Knight or Rook (Legacy-News Media) is a most especially deceptive and supportive piece

And of course to finally complete the Chess Analogy the power of the Castles of Big Business & Banks, the CBI and the big banks. Perhaps too little attention has been given to these pieces in this blog so far, apart from Lakshmi: Goddess of Prosperity (1) and Lakshmi: Goddess of Prosperity (2) and most of the politicians themselves, the Sweet-Tongued Bishops with their ability to come at you "sideways".

I've always thought how well these two work together projecting power from a distance: Castle (business/banks) and Bishop (politicians)

Despite all these powerful pieces, as any chess-player knows or quickly learns: Looking after your pawns, deploying them skilfully and understanding their strategic role is where the game is often won and lost: The fine margins long before the "end-game". And this is going to be very true of the EU Referendum in 2017. Many people are not interested in politics, our politicians have deliberately obfuscated and confused the subject as per the huge in-tray voters have to contend with from Brexit for Beginners.

In chess the win/loss conditions are "Check-Mate" or "Resignation by toppling the King" ; the assumption is that Leave vs Remain win condition is a >=51% result to either side in the Referendum. But actually there's another game of political chess being played here: Democracy as well as EU Membership. The Referendum is a chance for people/the pawns to win the game where for >40yrs they've been deprived a say and over x7 major treaties as well as removing such a large source of enervating political energy that itself is costly. In Chess there's a special rule for pawns called "Promotion":-

"Promotion is a chess rule that a pawn that reaches its eighth rank is immediately changed into the player's choice of a queen, knight, rook, or bishop of the same color. The new piece replaces the pawn on the same square, as part of the same move. The choice of new piece is not limited to pieces that have already been captured; it is legal for promotion to result in a player controlling, for example, two Queens of the same color despite starting the game with one. Promotion is immediate and mandatory for any pawn that reaches its eighth rank, and the pawn may not remain a pawn. Pawn promotion, or the threat of it, often decides the result of a chess endgame."

"Since the queen is the most powerful piece, the vast majority of promotions are to a queen. Promotion to a queen is often referred to as queening. A promotion to a piece other than a queen is called underpromotion"

To use one more final analogy: The most important game for people/pawns is not the EU Membership status, but the status of our politics of governance: Our democracy and how that is represented in a global world vs an EU construct.

Promotion: From Pawn to Queen

Pete North makes this clear in a this recent blog: Brexit: a time to step up to the plate :-

This year I've gone big on the global regulatory agencies. Not just because I'm an epic nerd but also because knowledge is power and in this game, and it can be a most potent weapon. It's as exciting as it is interesting.
Because regulation is all about making things work better, faster, safer, and cleaner and working in harmony with other systems it means it is at the cutting edge of technology. [...]

While this process isn't inherently corrupt, it can at times be murky and half the reason for that is that virtually nobody is watching this process and it is accountable to no-one. If ever there was something considerately in need of democratisation it is the global regulatory process. Our media tends to focus on the daily biff-bam politics of Westminster which is so far down the chain as to be completely uninteresting to anyone following the real business of government.

Watching MP's debating whether schools should be teaching first aid is like watching my local parish council deciding if Filton roundabout should have new street-lamps. It's actually embarrassing to watch the mother of all parliaments reduced to this. What's depressing is that MPs can't begin to comprehend just how debased and usurped that institution is.

And again from LeaveHQ: Land of the dinosaurs

Time to adapt to new strategies for survival and prosperity at the Global Level

"That is why LeaveHQ takes a different pitch to the old guard. We have talked at length about the way in which regulations are now going global and that the EU is not the top table and is just as much a recipient of law as we are. Examining the consultation process shows that the EU routinely usurps our own influence in initiating reforms and often adopts law we would otherwise veto. 

We are no longer a heavy industry economy, we rely on intellectual innovations as our exports and thus industries can spring up out of nowhere. If we want to create the best trading environment for them then we need to be looking out for their interests at the global level and not waiting on the packed time table of the EU's diplomatic service. Our current relationship is a hindrance to our global agility and it is our view that all of Europe suffers for the lack of competitiveness.

In order to get the best for ourselves and Europe, Britain needs to be at the top tables looking after its own interests. What's good for London and our tech industry is good for all of Europe - and it is myopic of the EU not to recognise this."

EU Referendum: the role of prestige

Political Strategy: "Pawns of Prestige"

Perhaps the "win condition" for the upcoming EU Referendum in 2017 is not what people think it is defined as, perhaps the real win condition will be the success rate of the conversion or to use our analogy Promotion of people from "political pawns" into "political actors" with real knowledge and hence real political power?

"Your Move."