Miffymog

I agree. He comes across as too idealistic for the actual world. I think his biggest mistake was mis-reading of Arab turmoil that resulted in Syrian and Libyan disasters. And it's not even close to be finished yet.

 

Be careful, the blame for the Libyan catastrophe which has seen a complete break down of government and law and order really should be put at the door of the French and British. It was us who gladly fired missiles in to the country with no thought of the consequences of the removal of the government.

To the credit of the Americans, although they took down Saddam, they at least have the financial clout to try and support the puppet government they put in place of him. In Libya, we Brits and French just let the whole country turn into a total shit hole after interfering, so at least that one's not on Obama.

I initially liked the way he came across during his speeches and thought that the idea behind Obamacare was good, even if the actioning of it was not, However, as time has gone on he has lost his ability to detach his emotions from his opinions of people (Putin and Trump) and I really don't like the mistrust he has toward Russia.

Given the build up of troops on the Russian / EU-NATO border over the past year or two, the election of a more Russian friendly Trump which will decrease tensions is for me a truly a fantastic thing, 

http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/683518/EU-collapse-Brexit-EU-referendum-European-Union-George-Soros-investors

For me, I liked some of the ideas behind a nice large trading block. The EU could even hold American companies like Apple to account on terms of tax dodging in Ireland. This is something that no one EU country could ever dream of and is no bad thing. But, a single currency has just not worked. Each country needs to be able to value its currency independently so they can naturally devalue if required. (There are other issues with the EU too)

Like Soros says, there only seems to be a trend to it coming to an end. So, will it just muddle through or completely finish. Hmmmm ... cant tell yet, the out comes of these European elections will shed more light on it.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/there-is-no-plan-for-brexit-leaked-memo-says/ar-AAkiVZA?li=BBnbcA1

 

What I expected.

Of course there's no plan. The deal we get completely depends on the stability of the EU when the deals are made. There are lots of very important elections coming up in Europe over the next year which could literally cripple the whole thing. In the event of the EU collapsing over the next year, which is a possibility, no deal will even need to be made.

2017 will be a very interesting year indeed.

I have done a similar type of meditation to vipassana. When I do it regularly during my normal life, the insights are just about the life I'm living at the time i.e. how to reinterpret an event so that it no longer frustrates and annoys me as much. When I've done it during a retreat, I've never gained any particular insight, rather I just have experiences.

Former air force commander wins Bulgaria presidential election - exit polls

http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-bulgaria-election-idUKKBN13801S?il=0

More candidates winning off the back of strong anti-immigration stances

Just saying I'm enjoying this thread. I've only had my ZZ practice for just over a year now so this topic is a bit advanced for me, but I like hearing what people are saying. I've done a bit of MCO seated and as I've said in a previous post, my first experience is relaxation, my second is a bit of pleasure, then I feel jaded. So I now never do it. I've tried a bit of healing sounds, but I didn't really like doing it as I feel I've got enough going on in my mind just doing a basic stand. But, in the future I may be happier trying other things out, that's why I'm following this post with interest.

I know she said she was looking forward to her children no longer being in the spot light so much - but my money is on Michelle Obama, especially after the performances she gave during this campaign. Although, given that the selection procedure takes nearly 2 years, maybe it is too soon for her (if ever).

Trump elected

Hollande shows some trepidation

Merkel shows some trepidation

May sidesteps all questions about some the more controversial comments Trump made during the campaign and declares how much we're looking forward to working with him.

We've now got a friend who also likes to protect their own national identity, this gives me a little bit of relief.

But the pollsters are getting it totally wrong. I actually thought the Latino vote would block Trump, but, despite Brexit, the pollsters still made a big miscalculation. Is there something more sinister going on underneath it? You can get any result you want from a poll depending on how you conduct it - hmmmmmm.

So would this still have happened if it hadn't been Hilary as the Democratic challenger? Yes. ie, I don't think another candidate with out her history would have won either. No Democrat would have won this, there is a real ground swelling that Trump tap into.

Yep - there'll be no immediate changes, and any will be slow coming. I guess its a greater attitudinal movement among the people and how this may influence the various elections coming up in Europe. 

O.K. So how does this effect Brexit? And then the EU?

My only understanding is that in terms of trade deals, he wasn't going to push back an American/British trade deal.

NATO is not so important to him.

Does it weaken the EU slightly?

I don't know much about how the voting works, but it looks like a bit of a spanking - a greater majority than Brexit, this was not expected - well, not by most people.

After my £10 bet on Trump 2 months ago I'm now £30 richer !!!

Ha ha, I'm doing that at work tomorrow!

Well American's I have some sympathy with the emotional roller coaster ride that you're going through with the election, as I'm going through one with this Brexit malarkey.

There I was this morning reading the 4 aspects of Brexit that the leader of our opposition was going to demand from negotiations given that our parliament now gets to vote on whether it goes ahead or not. These would have resulted in a very soft Brexit which would only be agreed upon by the EU if we still made massive contributions to their budget.

The out come, we'd still be contributing to the EU, but not get invited to any meetings, so our limited influence would completely disappear, i.e. we'd be much worse off than we were before the referendum

I felt that what he was doing was actually quite astute, as it means that if a general election was held, Labour would, effectively represent the remain vote, therefore making a general election about the leave or remain – and a very interesting vote that would have been indeed.

But, what do I read just 4 hours later? Well, the deputy leader of the opposition totally disagrees with his boss and says that of course the Labour opposition will up hold the outcome of the referendum when it comes down to a parliamentary vote.

This small comment completely changes the situation as to whether a general election will have to be called in order to get the Brexit motion past. Why all this confusion though with in the same party? Well, each person is actually only making statements that further their own particular agenda. The leader wants to stay leader and his statements make him quite electable, the deputy wants nothing more than to get rid of his boss.

But what about me as I read the Sunday websites drinking my cup of tea? Where am I left in all these mixed messages? What am I to do? Well, it's simply to find out how things are going on with the chaos on the other side for the Atlantic.

Oh dear...

The world is absolutely fine if you choose to see it that way. It helps if you worry a little less about that which you cannot change. After that, it is easier to make peace / come to terms with those things you dislike about the world. Then, you can start to see all the good in the world. All over the place, all the time, people are working hard to make their life and others lives better (in spite of the challenges). Choose to see these things, and the world can be a better place.

PS.  I got an A grade in 'O' Level British Constitution -  thank you and good night sir.

'O' level - what's one of those ...

Right, I've had a little think.

I reckon the judgement will be upheld on appeal, if so ...

I reckon this will lead to a general election.

May would probably like to be elected by the people, and there's a good chance her majority will increase (Labour are still in a position where their leader quite likes leaving but the rest of the party not so much).

Brexit makes a nice clear issue for the Conservatives to put forward while simultaneously exposing the contradiction between the Labour leadership and their back benches, which gives the remainers a dilemma as to whom to vote for

Lib Dems will make a small comeback.

With a better majority, Brexit should then get through parliament.

It could be that, if the judicial decision is upheld, May tries to go straight to parliament without an election, but I doubt it

This does make things interesting. But I thought that if this did happen, what's to stop May just telling the EU we want to leave anyway. Ignoring the ruling may be a controversial act, but if the EU accept May's request to leave the block because they want some kind of closure and for this all to be over, then surely that's what will happen. May says - we want to leave, EU says - that's fine by us. What effect would this judicial ruling then have?

I guess it's partly a question of whether May would go against it?

And what if it does go to parliament, a vote to stay and then what?

Or we have an election and it becomes a election issue?

Anyway, I don't mind my attention being diverted from the presidential election for a short while ...

Interesting articles on the Washington Post website

Comey decided that it was better to be forthright with the emails before the election rather than being seen as holding back information until after the election as that would have looked worse (not all agree with this)

Recent polls show Trump is 2% behind, which is as much as no difference.

Washington Times website is banging the drum of the 'hidden' Trump vote, where as there's going to no 'hidden' Clinton vote.

The countdown continues ...

So the government has given Nissan a sweat heart deal get them to keep their factories in the UK. This leads to the idea that any Brexit will, in fact, be soft. What's a soft Brexit? Well, it's where we still allow freedom of movement from the EU in the UK and still contribute to the EU budget in return for allowing our industrial and financial sectors to do business with the EU with out trade tariffs.

So what, you may ask, is the difference between this and the situation we had before? Well, with the extremely 'soft' Brexit as described above, there are still benefits of having voted out. One, we'll no longer have to answer to the European courts and we'll be able to set up our own trade agreements with other countries. This means that we can then start to become more international in our trade which in the long term may well benefit us.

But, there has also been another bonus of Brexit - the destruction of the immigrant camp called the Jungle in Calais. For ten years the French have just let this place grow and grow, happy to blame something that is their problem on us the British, as blaming the British for anything always tends to make them happy.

They would moan and moan about how it should be our problem and we should deal with it, despite it negatively effecting their own population. But they could not make it our problem because the migrants who had travelled across Europe had neither passports or tickets for the ferry, so they could not be let on and instead just built up due to the porous borders in other countries.

But, after Brexit, the EU is weaker, and the Jungle was a clear example of a failing in one of the key principles of the EU, which is the freedom of movement. Given how little effort the French have put into removing the Jungle over the last few years, they were clearly lent on by Germany to finally get rid of it, so there was not such a clear symbol of an EU failing.

This, in itself, is actually quite a god send for the people who use the channel during the holidays as there's now less chance of the ports and tunnels being closed down during peak times. This inconvenience actually caused great merriment for the French and the fact that now instead they are having to house 10,000 migrants across the country is a testament to just how important it is to the EU that they try to remove any signs of weakness.

So how does this tie in to a hard or soft Brexit? Well, the complex inter-country relationships have so many aspects that they are hard for any one person to understand all of them. So this means that the status quo, whatever it is at the moment, will remain fairly static. Hence the deal that Nissan got, it was an attempt to keep things as they are, rather than risk drastic change.

The greatest influence on Brexit and whether it will be soft or hard will actually not be anything to do with what happens in the UK, but rather what happens to the political parties in the EU over the next couple of years. The more dissonant the other member states become, the stronger position the UK will be in.

And, given that somehow, someone managed to force the French (!) to deal with a problem they really didn't want to is a sign of how fragile the Europhiles are feeling at the moment.

Oh god, this campaign is the gift that doesn't stop giving. A couple of months ago I decided, on the basis of Brexit, to put a tenner on Trump winning. During the last two weeks with all the accusations flying at Trump, I thought that £10 was as good as lost. But what goes and happens? The FBI suddenly step in with less than two weeks left and seem to bring everything back to square one.

Did the timing of this really have absolutely nothing to do with the election? Do they want to hold some thing over Clinton if/when she gets in?

Who knows? But if Trump does get in I'm up £30 and the chances of that have just increased thanks to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (and, of course, Hillary's abuse of private email server...)