Leaked Memo: UK Faces Medicine and Food Shortages if Brexit Goes Through

The parallels between Trump supporters and Brexit supporters continues and now a leaked government memo indicates that economic chaos, including medicine and food shortages are likely if the UK crashes out of the European Union. Despite such potential dire consequences, pro-Brexit supporters motivated by anti-immigrant - read non-white - animus and delusions of restoring a lost empire continue to push for economic suicide.  The parallels with Mid-West American farmers who continue to support Donald Trump despite his policies that are driving many farms towards bankruptcy are stark. Like their British counterparts who long for the days of rue Britannia, these Americans are driven by racism and a delusional dream of a return to a society of the 1950's when blacks, other non-whites, women and gays "knew their place" and  remained invisible and downtrodden.  Highlights from the Washington Post look at Britain's potential self-inflicted harm:

An increasingly likely “no-deal” Brexit could wreak havoc on Britain’s economy, infrastructure and social fabric, the government says in classified documents leaked to a British newspaper.

The costs of food and social care would rise, while medicines could be delayed, the Sunday Times reported. Border delays would interrupt fuel supplies. Ports would suffer severe disruptions and recover only partially after three months, leaving traffic at 50 to 70 percent of the current flow.

Those are some of the effects predicted by “Operation Yellowhammer,” which the newspaper said was compiled this month by Britain’s Cabinet Office and available to those with “need to know” security clearances.

Brexit critics have warned that crashing out of the European Union without an agreement with the rest of the bloc will damage the British economy, devalue its currency and create instability. British leaders have sought unsuccessfully since the 2016 Brexit vote to pass a “divorce” plan.

New Prime Minister Boris Johnson, a leading Brexit supporter, has promised to get his country out of the E.U., deal or no deal, during his first 100 days in office. He’s set to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron this week to press his case for a new deal. At the moment, negotiations are at a standstill.
Opposition lawmakers have been discussing ways of blocking a no-deal Brexit, including bringing down the government by calling a no-confidence vote in early September.  It’s unclear whether Johnson would win such a vote.

The Sunday Times said the government predicts a need to restore a “hard border” of limited, controlled crossing points in Ireland, which could cause protests.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has said there would be “no chance” of Congress approving a U.S.-U.K. trade deal after Brexit if it undermined the Good Friday agreement, the 20-year-old deal between Britain and Ireland that helped advance peace in Northern Ireland.

The government warns that some businesses would halt trade to avoid tariffs, while others who keep trading would pass higher costs on to customers. Agriculture “will be the hardest hit, given its reliance on highly integrated cross-border supply chains” and high trade barriers. And the black market could grow, it says, especially in border communities.

Other possible ramifications detailed in the memo:

• Increased costs for social-care providers caused by inflation could lead some providers to fail.

• Temporary cuts in tariffs would render the oil industry uncompetitive, closing two refineries, causing the loss of 2,000 jobs, spurring strikes and further disrupting fuel supplies.

• Delays at European airports, the Eurotunnel and other transportation hubs.

• Months of slowdowns of over four hours at the Spanish border with Britain’s overseas territory of Gibraltar, which could harm the area’s economy.

• Shortages of certain fresh foods leading to less choice, higher prices and potential panic buying.

• A risk of disruption to supplies of chemicals used to treat water.

• A risk of dust-ups between British and European fishing boats in British waters.

[T]he leaked documents show Britain is mostly unprepared amid “E.U. exit fatigue” after the country missed a planned departure date in March, the Sunday Times reported.

Boris Johnson, Brexit and the End of the United Kingdom

Previous posts have looked at the parallels between Trump supporters and pro-Breixt voters in the United Kingdom: both groups are motivated by racism and a longing for a past that will never return. Now, in the person of Boris Johnson, the United Kingdom has a prime minister who is the equivalent of Donald Trump who is antagonizing allies and causing division with in the country.  Some believe it could end in the dissolution of the United Kingdom, with Scotland leaving the union and Northern Ireland ultimately joining the Irish Republic.  If this happens, Brexit supporters will find themselves in a much smaller and far weaker country that will only make the past they so long for even more impossible to recreate. With both groups - Trump supporters and Breixt supporters - racism and delusions have set them on a course for long term national disaster.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at the potential collapse of the UK as a untied country.  Here are highlights:

In his first speech last week as Britain’s new leader, Prime Minister Boris Johnson exhibited his customary bravado: “The people who bet against Britain are going to lose their shirts because we are going to restore trust in our democracy,” he said, reiterating his promise to lead the country out of the European Union, “and we are going to fulfill the repeated promises of Parliament to the people and come out of the E.U. on October 31st. No ifs or buts.”

But already, it’s Johnson who is starting to look like the prime minister with no clothes.

On Tuesday, the British pound dropped to its lowest level in two years, a reaction to growing alarm over the likelihood of Johnson’s government crashing Britain out of Europe in a “no-deal” Brexit. His cabinet is packed with hard-line Brexiteers who, like Johnson, want to see Brexit achieved at almost any cost. One minister has already indicated that the government is operating under the “assumption” that it must prepare for a “no-deal” departure: a scenario that would see tariffs immediately slapped on British exports to the continent, financial chaos, lines and delays at border checks, and an endless assortment of other (in some cases, still unforeseen) problems.

Johnson, undaunted, has engaged in a game of brinkmanship with Brussels and Dublin. Over the weekend, he talked tough on his Brexit intentions, voicing his opposition to the “Irish backstop” — the current understanding forged between Britain and the European Union that would preserve a soft border between Ireland and Northern Ireland and therefore theoretically keep all of Britain in the E.U.’s customs union.

Officials in Brussels, meanwhile, may be hoping that Johnson is compelled to blink first and that Britain’s Parliament acts to block a no-deal Brexit. That also may be a scenario Johnson actually wants. Another impasse at Westminster could prompt a snap general election that may yield a Parliament more inclined to back Johnson’s agenda.

[T]he domestic picture for Johnson is hardly rosy, either. For two days in a row, the prime minister was greeted by jeering crowds of protesters as he embarked on a tour of the United Kingdom’s home nations. On Monday, he received an icy welcome from Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister of Scotland, and was compelled to leave her residence in Edinburgh through a back door to avoid the angry demonstrations.

"The people of Scotland did not vote for this Tory government, they didn’t vote for this new prime minister, they didn’t vote for Brexit, and they certainly didn’t vote for a catastrophic no-deal Brexit, which Boris Johnson is now planning for,” Sturgeon said before his arrival. As my colleagues reported, the chaos and damage of a “no-deal” Brexit may speed calls for a new independence referendum in Scotland — a cause backed by Sturgeon’s Scottish Nationalist Party.

The next day in Wales, Johnson met a similarly dubious Welsh first minister. Mark Drakeford, a member of the opposition Labour party, warned in an interview with the Guardian that a no-deal Brexit would endanger Wales’s agricultural and manufacturing sectors and “a whole way of life that has existed for centuries.” He stressed that Johnson’s characteristic “bluff and bluster” was testing the unity of the United Kingdom itself.

“The prime minister’s twin ambitions are on a dangerous collision course,” noted an editorial in the Financial Times, referring to Johnson’s stated desire to both strengthen ties among Britain’s four home nations and lead the country swiftly out of the European Union. “Brexit in any shape promises to weaken the bonds between the nations of the British Isles. In the extreme form that seems to be the working assumption by Johnson’s new administration, it will impose intolerable strains. This could set in train a process that ends with the break-up of the union.”

On Tuesday, almost a full week after taking office, Johnson placed his first phone call to Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar. Their exchange was reportedly “testy” and not particularly productive. According to an Irish readout, Varadkar reminded Johnson that the backstop was “a consequence” of Britain’s political decision to embark on Brexit and that Ireland had the full strength of the E.U. behind it.

On Friday, Varadkar hinted at the possibility of Northern Ireland severing its ties with the United Kingdom in the event of a no-deal Brexit. “I think increasingly you see liberal Protestants and Unionists who will start to ask where they feel more at home,” he said. “One of the things that ironically could really undermine the union of the U.K. is a hard Brexit, both for Northern Ireland and for Scotland, and that is a problem they are going to have to face.”

Not for nothing did former British prime minister Gordon Brown remark at a London event last week that Johnson could be remembered “not as the 55th prime minister of the U.K. but as the first prime minister of England.”

Vladimir Putin must be truly smiling.

Brexit and Trump: Self inflicted Harm With Help From Russia

Separated by the Atlantic Ocean, perhaps the two greatest democracies in the world - the United Kingdom and the United States - are each suffering from self-inflicted harm.  There are parallels between the two scenarios of democratic suicide: (i) Russia employed cyber-space attacks fanning racial fears and bigotry and pushed for votes that would render harm both internally and externally, and (ii) in each case far less than a majority of voters (mostly rural), many fighting against modernity and others clinging to delusions of restoring a lost past, voted against the best interests of themselves and their nations.  The only true winners: Vladimir Putin and Russia. Now, Britain is at a true crisis point and it's economic future uncertain.  To anyone sane, the solution is a new referendum that could reverse the race towards the cliff.  A piece in the New York Times looks at the crisis.  America is not far behind the UK in terms of self-destruction. Here are article excerpts:

With Prime Minister Theresa May’s bill expected to lose, the question dominating British politics is: What comes next?

If the agreement is not approved, she would have until Monday to present a backup plan to Parliament. The range of possibilities is wide, unappealing and a bit bewildering.

If the deal loses by a narrow margin, she might be able to win a few concessions from Brussels and bring those revisions to Parliament for a second vote. But if the defeat is a crushing one, that option is likely to be unavailable.

As things now stand, Britain will leave the European Union on March 29. Neither Mrs. May’s government nor the European bloc wants that to happen without an agreement in place — most experts predict that a no-deal Brexit would be chaotic and do severe economic damage.

With little time left to negotiate anew with the European Union, the prime minister may be forced to ask Parliament to postpone Brexit.

She could also call a second referendum, an option favored by lawmakers who hope that British voters have changed their minds. But Mrs. May and the Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, have both rejected that idea.

Mr. Corbyn wants to force early elections, and seems likely to call for a vote of no confidence in the government, putting the prime minister on the brink.

The vote will provide little of the detail that businesses need to plan their operations, but it could at least narrow the options.

“The longer this Brexit political drama continues, the less and less attractive the U.K. is going to be” to investors, Iain Anderson, the executive chairman of the consulting firm Cicero Group, said last week.

Manufacturers remain concerned that a no-deal situation would wreak havoc on just-in-time manufacturing, which relies on goods crossing the British border, sometimes multiple times, and arriving within minutes of assembly. — Amie Tsang

Last week, a member of Parliament proposed an amendment requiring Prime Minister Theresa May to return within three days to announce what the government intended to do next if the original deal was rejected. She previously had 21 days to decide.

By Parliament’s arcane rules (it mostly hinged on the meaning of “forthwith”), Mr. Bercow should have rejected that amendment. But he didn’t. And Parliament passed it by a slim margin.

That decision single-handedly tipped the balance of power to Parliament from Mrs. May’s government. The episode made a no-deal exit less likely and will let lawmakers weigh in — quickly — with alternatives.

And Mr. Bercow may not be done yet. Commentators said it could end up being the most radical shift in relations between the government and Parliament since the speaker defied King Charles I in 1642. — Benjamin Mueller