Pro-EU Arguments: Critical Thinking

A picture is worth a thousand words: Pro-EU Arguments = Anti-Brexit Arguments not Pro-EU Arguments!

The above pictures are captivating. They've each been used by Pro-EU Think Tanks: British Influence, Open Europe and Centre For European Reform (CER). and indeed replicated across other areas in the Legacy News-Media such as The Guardian.

The salient features of the above images:-

• Britain is small; EU/Europe is big
• Big Question marks
• Holes in where we fit in.
• We're being plucked out of Europe
• Our withdrawal would shatter ourselves and Europe/EU/EURO.

This really does a lot to frame the argument as we looked at in the last blog Flawed Arguments: Critical Thinking as "EU-Centric" and again this is replicated in the actual Pro-EU Arguments which are invariably conflations of Europe/EU/Single Market into one:-

• Single Market = Prosperity
• EU = Safety
• EU = Size & influence
• Brexit = -EU = -Prosperity -Safety -Influence == FUD

I think it is possible to back up these summaries of the Pro-EU arguments at least using Twitter as snap-shot of sources (avoiding a full analysis of for example Focal Point: Critical Thinking where we found a particular Pro-EU argument was 10/12 roughly actually a Single Market argument.

• Stronger In Europe (BSE) = business support for "EU"
• Academics for Europe = Leaving EU = Smaller
• British Influence = Leaving EU = Less Influence in research
• Brexit Watch = Economic Security/Safety
• Britain In Europe = Brexit is "Breaking" border collaborations

Have you yet noticed a pattern ABOVE the summary provided above, yet?

Pro-EU Arguments = Anti-Brexit Arguments not Pro-EU Arguments.

What effectively is happening is that Pro-Brexit arguments are not so far being intelligently made and coherently made as we already saw from Dr. RAE North at EUReferendum.com:-

Vote Leave - Get Remain; EU Major New Treaty = Pro-EU Argument, Cameron's "reform 2017 use by date", Protest Vote =/= Effective Campaign

Meanwhile the real Pro-EU arguments are from David Cameron, but we know we won't see those either until nearer Spring 2017 as per:-

The Bruges Group: EU Renegotiation Briefing: Associate Membership of the EU and David Cameron’s Reform Proposals

Hence the Legacy News-Media's insistence on Virtual Reality Politics TV: Westminster: In The Big Brother Household. The combination of Pro-EU groups arguing Anti-Brexit (Single Market + FUD repetition) arguments and Pro-Brexit groups arguing incoherent ghibberish, babbling like baboons, has been picked up a little bit in the news. But it's mostly been a waste of everybody's time, attention and energy: Making us all poorer effectively and if you observe it closely, making you feel like you're ageing daily or else finding something curiously hilarious about it all:-

Small things please small minds - immensely! (Jim Carrey, Dumb & Dumber)

But coming back to the Pro-EU Arguments seeing as we're so familiar with FLEXCIT and The Great Deception and indeed with the Brexit Plans. Little focus has been on Pro-EU Arguments:-

Borders of democracy? Ft. Ulrike Guerot, director of the European Democracy Lab

CLOSE THE GAP Tackling Europe’s democratic deficit - CHRIS TERRY

EU Political Plans: "Bringing Democracy to Nations" or "Ever Closer Union"?

To quote The Brexit Door who looks in-depth at The Fundamental Law of the EUropean Union:-

"This would be the last step to the truly Federal Union, the long held aim of the architects of European Integration.
When the PM comes back and says he has removed the words ‘ Ever Closer Union’ – he won’t be lying. They do not appear in the new text. This is because the Federal Union is complete, the words become redundant.
The inner core would have primacy, it could use special co-operation to increase its own internal centralisation, the associate members would not be part of that process.
In international affairs, the EU would have primacy in a way it has not had up to this point. Britain (and all the associate members) would be increasingly marginalised as the core pressed ahead with its own agenda.
If we fail to secure a Leave vote in 2017, it will be on the back of this agenda being disguised as ‘the British Option’. Once we have voted to remain, it is unlikely that the British public would want to engage with the detail of this again, making ratification of the full federalisation a strong likelihood.
If a Remain vote in 2017 could be read as our Federalist opponents placing us in Check, the ratification of a new treaty that followed the principles in the Fundamental Law would simply be…."
Checkmate

Here, we've at last arrived at the real Pro-EU Arguments. The intention of the current Anti-Brexit Arguments argued by the Pro-EU Campaigners is simple:-

• (LHS) Vote Leave: Prevent Pro-Brexit Arguments from developing
• (RHS) BSE: Prevent Pro-EU Arguments from being visible

We know from White Wednesday the strategy is triangulation by David Cameron and Dr. RAE North: Strategy ten: triangulation:-

"In this referendum what should come first is an intelligence-driven appraisal of the enemy intentions. Then we devise our response and implement it. The polls are simply tools (and limited ones at that) for measuring the effects of our own strategy, allowing us to fine-tune our activities."

Therefore we have 3-steps:-

1. Develop Brexit Argument to neutralize the Anti-Brexit Arguments of the fools making them under the guise of Pro-EU Campaigners.
2. Expose as much as possible the real Pro-EU arguments and when they are counter-argued argued our Pro-Brexit Arguments back (reserve the present situation)
3. In time before Cameron's Middle Way Reform Score-Card is played for Association Membership which will look like what it really is: Pro-EU Argument disguised. 

And it's here we can leave with Pete North's vlog request to UKIP and other Migration worried people: Yes! You're correct there's a problem with our policy. But the BIGGER/BIGGEST problem is to quote Dr. RAE North again:-

"The issue of concern is the ABILITY to control our own policy - in the wider sense."

We do that by first withdrawing from the EU via Article 50 Rules (explained here The Brexit Door and here LEAVE HQ Article 50: An Explainer) putting pressure back and only on Westminster politicians who hide behind the EU and don't hence allow themselves to be represented directly and responsibly to the voters in the UK who do want management of Migration Policy improved, for one of many examples. Who has allowed this to go and was elected on such promises of Migration management? Cue David Cameron.

 

FIRST we must regain Political Control before we can correct Policies: Migration, Fisheries and many more NEXT.

As I said the best way to control David Cameron is through Brexit arguments that neutralized Anti-Brexit puppets. So that we can argue about What Is The EU? and demonstrate only Brexit resolves the problem of the EU - not David Cameron's lies.

Finally if you look again at the title images of Brexit. They are powerful and visible symbols of Anti-Brexit.

Here's The Fundamental Law Of The European Union. There's no image of it.

What we now need to do is focus on this Pro-EU Argument, the real Pro-EU Argument and give it a real face with which to argue about and contrast with Brexit more clearly.

Then it may be seen that the we can shift the frame of reference from "EU-Centric" tunnel vision to "UNECE/Global-Centric expanding horizons.

Now how about that picture of The Fundamental Law?

Flawed Arguments: Critical Thinking

The Vortex Model: A new way of looking at our solar system - Very interesting, great presentation, but is it actually accurate?

Over the Summer I was helping teach about the Earth's Orbit within the Solar System at a school for a very basic introduction to the ideas of the development of science knowledge of the:-

• Spheroid Earth vs a Flat World
• Heliocentric Solar System vs a Geocentric System.
• Relative Frames of Reference yield different descriptions
• Unifying Theory of Gravity & Relativity to explain the above descriptions

Of course these models are often not to scale, and static. So when you come across a new way of looking at the solar system and it's presented brilliantly you are naturally very interested in it's potential.

Geocentric is observed from our frame of reference, but theory of gravity helps explain why heliocentric theory is more objectively accurate - how about a further frame of reference greater than our Sun?!!

However as with teaching the solar system at a basic level, when you look at the details it becomes much more complicated as Signal To Noise blog that suggests many areas of inaccuracies in the above:-

1. Jupiter is in the wrong place.  The video has it located between Neptune and Pluto, when it is between Mars and Saturn.
2. The video asserts the heliocentric model is wrong because the sun moves through space.  Not true.
3. It has the Sun moving along its axis (relative to what?), when this is not how the Sun moves in the galaxy.
4. It visualizes the planets lagging behind the Sun, which is not accurate.
5. It asserts the Sun drags planets along through space (in its wake), which is totally wrong.
6. It confuses vortex (circular fluid motion) with helix (a spiral path).
7. It makes wild claims about how spirals equate to life and asserts this leads to some new interpretation of physics.

That said, such flawed models we hope are merely manifestations of flaws in the author's own understanding of the arguments. In deriving our conclusions we must always allow room for proportional scepticism so as to encourage proportional debate; even if the above is wrong, the attempt if honest provokes interest and considerations of re-shaping our conventional model of understanding.

Unfortunately, and especially the latter is often more true in politics: The argument is flawed because the intention and motivation is to mislead audiences deliberately distorting reasoning to fit a preconceived agenda of the author or end result as opposed to an objectively derived model of understanding to share with others and even use to build newer and stronger models of understanding superceding such previous attempts.

Distinguishing between these two types of flawed arguments is very important for the EU Referendum debate to provide the best models of understanding in their accuracy to then present to voters in a form of communication they'll understand.

The Coexistence Fallacy

Interestingly White Wednesday's latest blog (above) attempts to tackle the former issue in the Brexit side of the debate: Namely the huge laundry list of descriptions about which Brexiteers or eurosceptics who all want the same thing: To withdraw from the EU, but who disagree on the correct model of understanding that explains these descriptions without contradicting relevant descriptions included as part of a complete explanation. There's a huge laundry list of disparate descriptions here at reddit for example: A Compilation of Reasons to Leave the EU by UKIP supporters.

 The Single Market Interim Positive Brexit: Using EU-Centric Frame of Reference: Hierarchy of concentric circles under the EU: All models look inferior; hence The Norway Option is an INTERIM solution to withdrawal from EU Treaties - initially and only: But on that criteria it is rigorous - for the time-being ie ~2yrs via Article 50!!

But what they don't have is a theory of explanation to systemize/organize/order these descriptions and hence assort which descriptions are incorrect facts, ie opinions, which may be correct but are not relevant and which do add up to a complete argument for Brexit that is rigorous and a stronger argument than the corresponding Remain argument! In Focal Point: Critical Thinking I tried to point out an example of a Remain Argument where most of the argument for Remaining was related to The Single Market and much much less directly to Political Union under EU Treaties. Brexit for Beginners even pointed out what is the EU? and this as the main argument for leaving.

 The Positive Global Market Vision: UNECE as the wider Frame of Reference: Nations become "Equals": This orders information across a time dimension: Something a "laundry list" of descriptions does not provide such meta-information of as well as "false information" to be culled or ordered appropriately and proportionally

There's 3 considerations here:-

1. A laundry list of descriptions = gaps in understanding
2. To make sense of the descriptions/observations a fully realized model of understanding arranges and orders all descriptions which are relevant to explanation and hence THEN can be communicated as a complete interacting whole. Namely the argument has logical consistency.
3. Appropriate presentation for mass communication.

Coming back to White Wednesday:-

"There are others I could add to this list but here’s another point: Some of the positions in the above conundrums may be simply assertions and factually dodgy, but they’re no less powerful for that. It is thus not just a case of different ‘egos’ getting in the way (as is often said); there are very real differences of substance here."

"This is why the range of Brexit views cannot easily coexist and this drives the temptation to have no exit plan at all (which appears to be Vote Leave’s strategy). The supposed logic of this approach, starting with a belief in that innocent-looking ‘menu’ of arguments, is that one should indeed deliver all of the above Brexit arguments in the hope that different ones will stick to different voters."

One of the problems with the range of Brexit views is that they are not only incompatible but also they currently serve to increase confusion because as noted arguments can be flawed due to limited understanding or else flawed due to deliberate misleading intentions.

The ruling example of this is the presentation of a limited array of options of all compromised relation to the EU-Centric Frame Of Reference. This is a classic trick used by deceptive arguments. It also allows false qualifiers over Brexit to amp up the conditions to a SUPER-relationship with the EU that is impossible; again setting a straw man argument for neutrals and tricking eurosceptics via their own greed. The best example of this is the immigration argument to point out that all eurosceptics would not tolerate the EEA for perhaps 2-4yrs as it requires freedom of movement. But within those 2-4 years and beyond we certainly would have more leverage for improving immigration than if we stay in the EU during that time!

The other technique is the false analogy of influence loss: The "Fax Democracy" or to use it's updated version "E-mail Democracy": But it is a false analogy used by the former Norway PM. And this is the real problem: We must remove the lies and deception from The Great Deception first before we can then assess the quality of arguments.

The "Renegotiation" Is A Matter For The "Remainders"

This is very necessary, because the burden of proof is on Brexiteers to demonstrate higher levels of understanding to which to point out that it's not only worth leaving the EU but also removing the deceptive arguments our members seems to breed in our membership of the EU in those who support it! That is something Brexiteers cannot be allowed to be accused of! And it really is why Vote Leave are condemned and damned in their attempts to win the Electoral Commission's nomination; which is hardly surprising given their close ties to the heart of the Establishment which is the reason we're in the EU in the first place as per The Political Food Web of Prestige.

But as Lost Leonardo points out: The track record is there for the opaque and veiled "EU Reform" of David Cameron and the Pro-EU "in disguise" strategy they continue to insist on taking and beguiling the general public through the mass media with. quoting:-

"The established “leave” campaigns have not helped themselves in this regard. As recently as June 2015, Vote Leave CEO, Matthew Elliott told the London Evening Standard that: “If the Government gets a two-tier Europe, we’re very much in”.

This motivates them to use the frame of reference of the EU-Centric position as opposed to the Global greater frame of reference which the likes of Dr. RAE North in FLEXCIT advocates as his position. I would contend most of the output of the Pro-EU advocates conflates Single Market for EU for this very reason: Without this ruling frame of reference, their arguments are seen as very narrowing which in turn increases the emotional pitch of FUD of leaving the safety of the EU.

All the above do not matter if we withdraw from the EU Treaties, which is what Brexit is: A starting point outside the EU Treaties. A change of direction from the political. Without this, I contest the Pro-EU arguments look like a description without an explanation: "EU Reform" ; "Next New Major Treaty" ; "x1 Referendum >40yrs" ; "x7 Major Treaties without a public vote". The instability of the EU Treaties for all our membership is what drives the political uncertainty and lack of "safety": Our government has been so afraid of the public rejecting the EU Treaties that it has allowed the "pressure-cooker" to boil over to this singular point event and crammed in all the requisite issue of over 40yrs into this one referendum!! It's too fragile and not flexible enough.

In the next blog we'll see examples of just how there is no acknoweldgement by the Remain/Pro-EU advocates of this change of reference and hence position. They're not arguing different points of view about the same position(!), because they're not even acknowledging the position from which Dr. RAE North et al are making their arguments concerning:-

EU Referendum: the lies sharpen

Westminster: In The Big Brother Household

The great silver-back of democracy, David Cameron has spoken!

In The Guardian and elsewhere, the latest "EU News" front and top of google news" is this junk food story, Cameron has freed his ministers on the EU vote. Now his problems begin.

Effectively this is the story of the politicians in the Tory party and by the good grace of the Prime Minister David Cameron, our resident prophet of democracy, allows the minister to vote freely.

It does not matter: The politician in Westminster are the very reason we entered the EU and the very reason we're seemingly suffering "analysis-paralysis" of our membership of the EU!!

 The Legacy News-Media and Westminster = Big Brother Reality TV for Politics

We're back to Chimpanzee Politics with this story and it seems very little different from Big Brother Reality TV for Politics in my opinion. Fortunately for the journalists the narrative of The Tories at War over Europe can be arisen again:-

The ‘Dispossessed’, the‘Never-Possessed’ and the‘Bastards’ Debunking Major’s Myths of the Eurosceptics ~ Luke Stanley

"In his memoirs John Major argues that his premiership was damaged by the arrival of a new class of careerist politicians between 1979 and 1992, gradually replacing the ‘aldermanic guard’ of MPs without ministerial ambitions. In his infamous off-the-record conversation with reporter Michael Brunson, 

Major labelled three distinct categories of discontented careerists in his party; ‘the dispossessed’, ‘the never-possessed’ and ‘the bastards’. He believed the ‘dispossessed’ were angeredat their fall from office, ‘the never-possessed’ at having never been appointed to office with ‘the bastards’ inside the government coveting his premiership. Major assumed these discontented careerist politicians had concluded that the best way of attacking him was to use the issue of Europe, hoping to precipitate his fall and usher in a government which recognised their talents. To Major, the worst of these careerists were the new 1992 intake of MPs, who were particularly outspoken in their Eurosceptic views in order to establish their Eurosceptic credentials.

Together, this thoroughly biased narrative was the official line espoused by Major and his government allies throughout his premiership, up until the present day. As recently as October 2013 Major has described his bastards comment as ‘absolutely unforgiveable’ with his only excuse being that ‘it was true’.

Despite the obvious bias of this hypothesis, with Major and his allies trying to deflect the blame in the aftermath of the Conservative’s worst electoral defeat since 1906, this interpretation of the Eurosceptics’ motives has found some tractionwith historians. Seldon argues that Europe was used as a way of ‘bashing down the leader they held in contempt’, whilst Hugo Young states that the rebel’s ‘real passion was for deconstructing John Major’. Bale agrees that in the 1992 intake,MPs such as Iain Duncan Smith and Bernard Jenkin, being ‘skilful troublemakers

Should Cameron secure re-election at the head of a minority or slim-majority
government, the ensuing Europe debate within the Conservative Party is likely to
be even more divisive than Maastricht. Understanding MPs’ behaviour on Europe will allow the pro-withdrawal faction to assess the optimum methods of convincing MPs to side with them, as well as how to counter the Europhile faction’s attempts to poach their followers. The secondary purpose of this work is therefore to act as a case study for newer Eurosceptic MPs to study. This will ensure that, unlike the Maastricht rebellion, the Eurosceptics will have an advantage. Lastly I hope to show that those Eurosceptic backbenchers who voted against the government and those frontbenchers that resigned over their convictions achieved far more than their colleagues who did not do the same."

Some of the general points I should like to point out:-

1. The argument concerning the EU relies more heavily on the historic record as recorded and thoroughly researched in The Great Deception to share a common picture of WHAT IS THE EU?
2. Major unwittingly shows how HE thinks about the EU: As power dynamic for Westminster politicians and the strains of Party "Solidarity" (there's that word again) over principle.
3. His "prestigious account has become the orthodox narrative surrounding the EU and Tories for decades since of in-fighting and Big Brother Household Drama that the Legacy News-Media report and the lack of quality reporting on WHAT IS THE EU? that we must rely on EUReferendum.com for instead.

I only need to turn on the BBC News for Damien Green to be almost speaking like the pig Squealer (I almost laughed when he added, to paraphrase more or less what he said: "And the very dangerous world we live in...": You wouldn't want Jones to Come Back would you?) concerning the EU Reform and the unleashing from their party leashes of Tory MP's:-

 Back to the Guardian:-

"The timing of today’s announcement suggests that Cameron does indeed plan to conclude negotiations in February and to hold the referendum sooner rather than later. He hopes for a swift victory, the rapid resumption of business as usual, and the entrenchment of Osborne’s position as the favourite to succeed him."

 EU Referendum: Another Reason Why June 2016 Poll Is Unlikely 

Here are 2 very clear examples: The Politicians in Westminster and The Legacy News-Media concocting narratives as if politics is The Big Brother Household Virtual Reality TV.

They are a complete waste of everyone's time, attention and energy: Our very roots of potential prosperity.

Focal Point: Critical Thinking

In the previous blog the article Britain needs Europe a lot more than Europe needs Britain was mentioned. This blog will dissect it. Apparently the author is one Dennis Novy (Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick and Associate at the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics). Thus valuing on "academic authority" we would appear to be in "Safe Hounds" with such a guide.

Main Argument: Value of Freedom and Independence vs EU Membership

I've provided a statement to synthesize his main argument in the article. He decides that Brexit is advocated as a means towards "Freedom and Independence". Which he waves away very quickly:-

"Who doesn’t like the idea of freedom and independence?"

Interestingly most of the world's nations are not in political union in a Supranational organization built on signing Treaties amongst the members. So it would help to establish how and why the UK entered the EU in the first place rather than erasing that useful context from memory as globally it's the exception rather than the rule.

 A mountain of confusion-making

But because we are EU Members we have to take that as the question: "What is the EU?" I argued what the EU essentially is in Brexit For Beginners: It is the Political Institutions and their functions which we have political representation within via our politicians with other European politicians under the rules and laws of the signed Treaties.

Therefore by deduction: Brexit means withdrawing from those - only. Now does that fit the concept of Freedom and Independence? Before answering that question, another of the statements by the author:-

"In fact, Britain needs Europe a lot more than Europe needs Britain. Isolation is costly."

 This is really what the author is doing: He knows that selling EU Membership is not possible in a positive light for political reasons if we're rigorous in setting out our definitions of EU Membership and hence by deduction what Brexit means (even without looking at the historic context from The Great Deception). There's 3 lies in this statement:-

1. Setting up an antagonism; a false dichotomy of choices to Leave or Remain: You can have one side of the main argument but not both. And indeed embroiling the question of Membership of the EU as contentious and fractious should the UK be selfish and self-isolating. Namely a bad relationship. But this depends on conflating The Single Market (EEA) with the Political Union (EU)!
2. Framing Brexit as a little individual vs a large group. Socially ostracized. Namely not a social relationship. Again the EU is far from being "the only game in town"!
3. Brexit as an economic reality: An economic relationship. NO! The EU is a Political Relationship!!

We've barely begun and look at how the argument has become so distorted and confusing barely 2 sentences into this article: How disturbing is this implication for multiplication of confusion into the millions and how simple too. And here we see as "Brexiteers" that in real problem-solving not establishing the real problem and thus starting with the first problem-solving step is likely to finish with an unsolved problem by the last step where ever and how many ever steps later that may be (sooner than later no doubt!).

This little lesson is what both Vote Leave and Leave.EU and so many "eurosceptics" seem to fail to understand.

Brexit = Withdrawal from EU Treaties, Institutions and Representation: "Not A Penny More And Not A Penny Less."

Before coming back to "Freedom and Independence", which are actually defined as "Withdrawal from EU Treaties" via Article 50 TEU Lisbon Treaty as per the EU Treaties themselves, let's outline the supporting arguments to the main argument FOR EU MEMBERSHIP in the article:-

1. International Trade

•  45% of imports/exports to EU
• UK = 10% of EU Trade
• Regulations: acquis communautaire for Single Market
• EU Influence on those regulations
• Financial contribution to Single Market/EU Membership

1. Foreign Investment

   • FDI dependent on Single Market access
   • EEA Migration is part of Single Market and economically reasonable
   • FTA's are not realistic within the current parameters politically and indeed practically (I've paraphrased the correct problems here)
   • TTIP is an erroneous argument by the author part of the "GROUP" fallacy I've determined above and can be ignored. 
   • Administrative expertise: Indeed we'll come back to this.

2. Market Confidence

• Argument from emotion is again the "Bad relationship" fallacy I determined above and terrible tendentious; albeit in any new deal equal partners must be established again inviting eurosceptics to argue along the lines of fractious superiority.
• FUD is fuelled by confusing details and a hydra of unanswerable questions:-

"We have to ask: what would the world look like if Britain were on its own? How exactly would Britain’s international trade be affected? Would foreign direct investment into Britain decline? How can the British government match the policy expertise concentrated in Brussels? And how would other countries perceive a Britain that has lost its crucial influence in Europe?"

This is the perfect conclusion to the main argument: Freedom and Independence from the EU Treaties is the "norm" globally; secondly it was a great deception historically and thirdly and finally the future globalization is very positive WITH these very values!!

 "QQ": How to kill Brexit before it's already begun.

But what the author has done is tempt "eurosceptics" and other people with the cheese of "bartering and haggling" and ensuring the whole process is not one of PRINCIPLE but one of DETAIL. Which is death for Brexit.

Remember at the beginning of the article: Freedom and Independence were the prize of Brexit and the author like the clever politician firstly distracts the audience:-

"Well, that is an exceedingly excellent question... and I will tell you why... [LAUNCHES INTO STORY MODE...] *several minutes later*: And so you see there's so many questions that arise from these sorts of ideas, but the world is a frighteningly complex place - and fragile too."

Which if I may say so myself: IS precisely the sort of trick our magician author has just conducted.

Let's get back finally to Freedom and Independence: They are from those EU Treaties and the litmus test of successful Brexit is invoking Article 50 and removing ALL OUR POLITICIANS OUT OF THE EU POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

Why should that be so important? Because it's a sign of true withdrawal: An honest result that is indisputable. But to achieve this result we must retain access to the single market: Of the bullet points above the number that relate to the Single Market by my count are approximately give or take 1: 10/12.

Namely the proponents of the EU the "Pro-EU"'s own arguments are dramatically reduced back to where we want the question to be over EU Treaties/Institutions and Representation when we ensure the Single Market access is removed from the question by asserting future continuation of it. And when that is promoted the arguments look far more positive:-

 "GG": EFTA/EEA + UK Scorecard > Present EU Scorecard

But this scorecard is not to win the argument, it's to remove the old stale arguments and deceptions so that more people can more clearly see what the EU Referendum Question is really asking us:-

• What is EU Membership?
• What is the Positive Alternative?

By sticking to the main argument we can start making real progress on education and informing on these twin questions for Remain vs Leave. That process itself is as much the dividends of holding a Popular Referendum on x7 Major EU Treaties spanning >40 years without public participation as much as the Positive Vision of life outside the EU.

 Brexiteers: Brexit Focal Point is argument from principle = Clear Vision

Our politicians have left us the people with the pieces to pick up and little time to put them together: Who should we trust? Them or Ourselves more?

Crystal Clear: Critical Thinking

It seems to me Brexit should be as clear and enjoyable as this!

Happy New Year!

There's a been a lot of water/flooding in the UK over the Christmas and New Year holiday period; which has been commented on expertly over at EUReferendum.com in Dr. RAE North's EU Referendum: a directive too far. Some of my blogging "New Year resolutions" will be:-

• Beginning active personal campaigning to recruit and educate people I meet and know and have contact details for.
• Blogging in a more academic style when needed as well as my current idiosyncratic presentation style.
• Attempting some original blogs of my own research (a mighty undertaking!).
• Attempting to capture different types of resources that can be of use to readers for example useful links selections and organization of; some quantified data and search tools.

That's going to be a huge amount of work on top of normal life, but I aspire to such visions of Brexit being as clear and enjoyable as swiming in crystal clear tropical waters for voters as opposed to the "muddy, polluted and abused rivers of politicians".

However this blog will have to cover old, completely sodden, ground and start with another blog I found interesting from The Brexit Door: Economic Consideration who points out an article in The Guardian from a certain Ulrich Speck who effectively performs the propaganda exercise given a platform in The Guardian of one Squealer in Animal Farm:-

The early apples were now ripening, and the grass of the orchard was littered with windfalls. The animals had assumed as a matter of course that these would be shared out equally; one day, however, the order went forth that all the windfalls were to be collected and brought to the harness-room for the use of the pigs. At this some of the other animals murmured, but it was no use. All the pigs were in full agreement on this point, even Snowball and Napoleon. Squealer was sent to make the necessary explanations to the others.

"Comrades!" he cried. "You do not imagine, I hope, that we pigs are doing this in a spirit of selfishness and privilege? Many of us actually dislike milk and apples. I dislike them myself. Our sole object in taking these things is to preserve our health. Milk and apples (this has been proved by Science, comrades) contain substances absolutely necessary to the well-being of a pig. We pigs are brainworkers. The whole management and organisation of this farm depend on us. Day and night we are watching over your welfare. It is for YOUR sake that we drink that milk and eat those apples. Do you know what would happen if we pigs failed in our duty? Jones would come back! Yes, Jones would come back! Surely, comrades," cried Squealer almost pleadingly, skipping from side to side and whisking his tail, "surely there is no one among you who wants to see Jones come back?"

Now if there was one thing that the animals were completely certain of, it was that they did not want Jones back. When it was put to them in this light, they had no more to say. The importance of keeping the pigs in good health was all too obvious. So it was agreed without further argument that the milk and the windfall apples (and also the main crop of apples when they ripened) should be reserved for the pigs alone.

One of the central points I've attempted to promulgate in this blog is my own viewpoint that Brexit is a democratic movement: Movement is a dynamic force that requires activation energy thresholds over a certain accumulation by many contributing people to construct higher quality arguments that gain traction, than is permissible/actionable via our present deleterious "Political Food Web Of Prestige".

The product of this is the type of propaganda George Orwell so marvellously and skillfully exposing in the use of the Animal Allegory of Animal Farm (above). To replace this product, we have to employ Critical Thinking in the arguments to reject these results given free berth in The Legacy News-Media as per The Guardian so willingly accedes to publishing.

Dr. RAE North makes a compelling point about Brexit: EU Referendum: a directive too far:-

The real point, therefore, about the EU is that it is unnecessary. It simply adds another layer of government and adds to the confusion and lack of accountability in areas where clarity and certainty are required. 

That, more than anything, is why we are best off leaving the EU.

One of the very notable observations about the cluster of bloggers represented and supported here, is that due to the monopoly of channels of mass communication, often the blogs are critical and sceptic pieces about what is published in the public domain or purported to be positive politics when it is not such as so well evidenced in the growing collection of fascinating blogs from Restore Britain's Fish which will with increasing number of them be a subject for a future blog:-

• The Common Fisheries Policy – Part 1
• The Common Fisheries Policy – Part 2
• The Common Fisheries Policy – Part 3
• The Common Fisheries Policy – Part 4

In general: Original deception, then execution post-hoc of real intention, then stalling and promising then delaying then ignoring and dropping of the argument and actively sabotaging it's engagment in politics and public as recorded so far by John Ashworth.

And this comes back to The Brexit Door's blog post above:-

"He does however, make one useful point, and it is in his first line: that the debate has been dominated by considerations of an economic variety."

"This has been the fault of the two largest and best publicised (and earliest launched) Leave campaigns – Leave.EU and Vote Leave Ltd." [...]

"That’s why we look separately at the political and economic elements of the EU and the Single Market – and accept that for a time remaining in the single market via the EEA agreement is the best path forward."

It's been said enough times, the ground is sodden with the reasoning. But often the "opposing argument" acts as a greater instrument of persuasion than the supporting argument to the target audience and hence an example of this needs to be used:-

Britain needs Europe a lot more than Europe needs Britain

The first thing to be aware of is that these arguments keeps on appearing like the Hydra with many heads: Lopping one off for yet more to rise in it's place by either the same or some new figurehead; in this case Dennis Novy (above). This is demonstrable because the "Floor" for debate is controlled/is not impartially adjudicated for example:-

Engaging with the arguments of the opposition:-

• British Influence haven't the guts to take us on 
• Brexit: Ten answers to ten questions

Engaging with the arguments by David Cameron over EFTA/EEA (aka "The Norway Option"):-

•  The Norway Option - The Brexit Door
• Why the Leave camps cannot allow the lies on Norway to pass - White Wednesday

Etc. There's a very important to make here: We argue honestly and we are shoved aside in the so-called freedom of speech and strength of argument that underpin so-called democracy.

Then our resort is to appeal to fairness if our truth is rejected. And here is where the Leave Campaigns or other "eurosceptic" supporters fail to keep the waters of argument clear: We must not lie ourselves or be led astray in making false claims for tempting political gains. If the process rejects us because it's simply corrupt then we revert our arguments to that effect:-

Brexit becomes as much about removing the false and falty process of our own democracy as it does about resolving practical policy politics. 

This is why I notice time and time again the appeals to "Unity" amongst eurosceptics or we should call them Pro-Brexit Supporters aka "Brexiteers" is a false cry for "solidarity". It's inept thinking, from lack of understanding of our own predicament in a corrupt system and how to appropriately respond.

By sticking to the "high ground" no matter that it's a "hard sell" initially when the argument moves to the lack of democracy if we stick to intellectual honesty and build unity around that principle as opposed to individuals own credos or nostrums of "Should be united to win", then the Leave Campaigns can only grow in political power over time as people sense an unease and dare I say it an "evil feeling" with our own elected deceptive leaders in SW1/Westminster.

• The big four Brexit Nos
• Land of the dinosaurs   
• Leave us out of the bean-counting
• A message to Brexiteers... 

Pete North has had to contend with this (lack of) understanding in Brexiteers in both his former blog How To Be A Complete Bastard and his present one of which a few examples:-

• Fun while it lasted
• Are they trying to lose?

There's a couple of example "in action" why this is very necessary to realize:-

1. On twitter you'll find eurosceptics demanding "unity" and failing to appreciate that change starts with "change within oneself" before that flows outwards to other people. That requires knowledge of the arguments which is available via The Great Deception and FLEXCIT.
2.  False Friends/False Flag actors will do immense damage masquerading as Leavers and resorting to racism, extremism: It's almost so easy it's comically funny if it were not so seriously damaging and indeed inviting genuine bigots under such banners is no-one's interests on either side of the argument.
3. As said the arguments must be argued with truth so that when the system itself rejects them we can move the arguments onto the next phase: Fairness or it's absence. From those ashes...

And this is the real hope: There really is a positive vision (again look to Leave HQ) on globalization our place within the wide world.

• Our Vision
• The Plan
• Our Values

That change can only occur by observing the stronger arguments in action through the above process. If there is to be a Leave Campaign that is fit for purpose to which it accuses via scepticism and critical thinking that the Remain Campaign clearly is not, then it must abide by those conditions, by those precepts: Not merely talk about them but genuinely act by them.
 
 

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."