His argument is perfect and yours was a goalpost shift.

He's arguing from general principles and you are countering with present realities which if you read him carefully you'll see are contingent and therefore not relevant.

So this wasn't a valid counterpoint from you dereds.

I'm not talking about why people did vote, I'm talking about why they should vote. That means xenophobes are probably making the right decision for the wrong reason, while remainers probably just made a mistake from bad analysis.

Its not as simple as repeal everything, it's a cost benefit analysis. My simplified view of the EU is that it is net $8.5bn cost to avoid $5.5bn of tariffs, and it imposes a large restriction of valuable options and a lot of demoralisation on the nation, so net -EV.

I do not consider where in the UK it invests our gross payments, or what laws and 'protections' it enforces, because they are not valid remit for a centralised power and those do not increase our options or value.

I heard a legal guy on one show saying that basically what they'll do is take all EU law and then institute it as British law, and then they can change it as and when.

This is much easier than starting from scratch and means they can change the bad bits and keep the good bits.

Yes, I think it would have been OK to have a plan that wouldn't even change our net payments or immigration laws at all at first, as long as they became changeable by local process. Perhaps not possible in practice though.

Okay in which case the quote below would have been clearer had you said my rather than the the in bold below.

Then the point is that many people believe a CBA that has the UK losing as a result of the vote. If the motivating factor is the principle then all other treaties are fare game, if the motivating factor is in fact a CBA then you'd allow there are times that a reduction in democratic control is beneficial but have decided that the WTO, UN, is such but the EU isn't.

I think we are in agreement (about the question, if not the answer).

Important detail is that the opinion of losses in the CBA you mention should not include opinions of the value of local investment decisions over alternatives. Otherwise yes.

tariffs are still the least of it. it's the non-tariff barriers that you should be worrying about

here's some math a think tank did. there's obviously plenty of uncertainty, so it's rough estimate, but it paints a picture


https://twitter.com/NIESRorg/status/824915005216870400

Personally I've been arguing for a while that it makes more sense to consider the referendum in terms of the principle than the potential outcomes. The reason for this is that the outcomes are not knowable, especially when we are voting on a deal that can't be negotiated until Article 50 is triggered. The CBA is too complex and will differ based on the type of Brexit deal that is negotiated and given this voting on those outcomes seems problematic.

I'm going to add goalpost shift to the list of terms you use and don't understand. At the moment we have

Egalitarianism and by reducto Altruism.
General Strike.
Moral Relativism.
Goalpost shift.

I'm sure there are others.

I'm wondering if you apply the same argument to spending within the UK? Wealthy areas subsidizing poor areas, do you recognize some value there? Should wealthy areas have an easy way to opt-out of the UK if they don't like net contributing?

Your argument is extremely self centered. These resources don't magically disappear, it's by design that rich nations are net contributors. Countries like Germany, UK, etc net contribute roughly 0.15% of their GDP to the EU budget. The "developing" countries like Poland, Romania etc draw in the order of 1% of their GDP from the EU. Most Eastern European nations made huge improvements under the EU.

If you are concerned with the development of the entire union, then spending money on infrastructure and reforms in comparatively poor countries definitely makes sense.

As for your more general point:
This is far too simplistic. Some projects/deals require long term commitment and can't work if parties maintain the ability to easily pull out at any time. Solutions of "Tragedy of the Commons" type problems are not possible if parties can just opt-out at any time and exploit everyone else, that just results in races to the bottom where everyone loses out in the end. (e.g. fishing quotas, environmental protection, workers rights, corporate taxes, etc.)

I agree with a lot of that.

In fact the most interesting discussion I had with an informed remainer was one in which we agreed on almost all of the analysis, just not the goals. I'm not against helping people, but I don't think its a valid political aim here for running this country right now.

Conceding being poorer was no part of the remain campaign, though. Which is probably why it came across as disingenuous.

Then the next question is - if you want to redistribute UK wealth to needy countries, is the EU bureaucracy the best-value way to do it?

And the next question is, would a UK population ever support that if it wasn't brought in somewhat deceptively by the back door. Even if hypothetically 'we leaders' are mega ethical, you can't autocratically give away a populations wealth these days, can you?

Majority (as in Burnley is a majority muslim town)
Although it could have been Wigan - he doesn't know because it was a wedding?

Nice to see derailing personal abuse being given a routine free pass here.

If we want to tackle some of the challenges i mentioned then the participating nations have to give up some sovereignty one way or another. Moving competencies to a democratic European body looks like a sensible approach to me.

What is the alternative? Negotiating multilateral agreements issue-by-issue without a shared democratic framework seems hopeless and even less transparent/accountable.

Regarding the budget / being poorer: The contribution is less than 0.15% of the UK's GDP and likely dwarfed by shared benefits (this really isn't a zero sum situation). And the UK still maintains 0.7%(?) GDP for development aid, so there has to be some support for the concept I suppose.

I wasn't derailing I was pointing out that your accusation of a goalpost shift was wrong then decided to add it to a list of stuff you don't understand. Doing this does not constitute personal abuse so along with majority we can add personal abuse to the list.

You'll notice Alex who i actually responded to seems to have accepted my complaint that he should have said his reason rather than the reason in the post I was responding to. This is because the ability to control immigration was a factor for a large number of voters irrespective of whether Alex thinks it should have been.

Egalitarianism and by reducto Altruism.
General Strike.
Moral Relativism.
Goalpost shift.
Majority
Personal abuse

Its funny to watch Lord get correctly called out for goal post shifting,then failing to use that term correctly.

He is quickly becoming one of my favourite posters, I like things that make me laugh.

Yeah Fascism needs to go on this list as well.

Egalitarianism and by reducto Altruism.
General Strike.
Moral Relativism.
Goalpost shift.
Majority
Personal abuse
Fascism

Honestly, I think for the vast majority of ordinary people voting, the key motivating factor is that the EU isn't our country. The WTO and UN don't have their flags flying on every public building on the continent, they don't have a national anthem or their own currency.

The WTO might be subject to a CBA, but people wouldn't answer the question of whether or not to become the 51st state of the USA on the basis of a cost benefit analysis.

The question is, does the EU aim to be something more like the WTO or something more like the USA.

This.

But no point arguing it here, these guys are obsessed with throwing insults, especially calling leave voters stupid racists.

Yip

Not everything should be subject to the whims of a democratic vote. Humanity progresses, amongst other things, through acceptance of human rights, encouraging inclusive behaviours, adopting anti-corruption policies and reducing inequality while rewarding enterprise (in its widest possible sense).

btw perhaps you can give a few examples of laws that are unconnected to the functioning of the Single Market that you would change post-Brexit.

I'm okay with this answer but I asked it because I'm not sure how it sits with Alex when Alex uses constraints on sovereignty as a motivating factor when other bodies also place such constraints.

I will say that while a vast majority may have considered the EU not being the UK the motivating factor some of them must have preferred the EU because the result was a lot closer than a vast majority. Fwiw I have numerous reservations about the EU project but given my first preference is less likely than my last preference would have voted remain strategically rather than on principle.

Absolutely. Especially as although people argue about outcomes they are mostly justifying their real reason which is about principles. That's not saying that people are lying. Rather that, for example, they argue the economic case for leaving/remaining even though most would have the same view on brexit even if they didn't believe those economic arguments.

"Its not the economy stupid".

You mean apart from the fact Lektor was responding to me and I've not done that?

Now if only there was a place ...