The break up of the Solarian League

jgnfld wrote:I have my doubts that Brexit will actually happen. You can see the delaying tactics from even the winning side already coming to the fore.

Oh, I think it pretty much has to happen at this point. The only possible fudge at this point (IMHO) is leaving the EU and rejoining EFTA alongside Norway, but even that is likely raise shrieks of "Stabbed in the back!" from UKIP and the Europhobic Tories.

Failure to do anything will just result in UKIP either winning the next general election (or having enough MPs to force Article 50 through along with the Europhobic Tories). And that's assuming things get that far ... Frankly I'm expecting David Cameron's next meeting of the European Council to open with him being directly asked "So is the UK leaving the EU then?". If he says "Yes" then they announce they accept his invocation of Article 50, if he says "No", "I don't know" or fudges then they leak that response to the British press (riots in the streets?).

PalmerSperry wrote:

jgnfld wrote:I have my doubts that Brexit will actually happen. You can see the delaying tactics from even the winning side already coming to the fore.

Oh, I think it pretty much has to happen at this point. The only possible fudge at this point (IMHO) is leaving the EU and rejoining EFTA alongside Norway, but even that is likely raise shrieks of "Stabbed in the back!" from UKIP and the Europhobic Tories.

Failure to do anything will just result in UKIP either winning the next general election (or having enough MPs to force Article 50 through along with the Europhobic Tories). And that's assuming things get that far ... Frankly I'm expecting David Cameron's next meeting of the European Council to open with him being directly asked "So is the UK leaving the EU then?". If he says "Yes" then they announce they accept his invocation of Article 50, if he says "No", "I don't know" or fudges then they leak that response to the British press (riots in the streets?).

Nope. Cameron is not going to pull the trigger on Article 50 himself. Otherwise, it would have happened at 8.20am on 24th June. He isn't going to do it, because he can pass the poisoned chalice to someone else. He already made that clear to everyone - his answer is "It's a decision for the next Prime Minister."

Whoever becomes the next Prime Minister(in October) will then have the option of putting it to Parliament for a vote or calling a general election, in addition to being able to unilaterally trigger Article 50.

Parliament might vote against it, on the basis that the referendum was a consultative one, not a legally binding one.

UKIP might win big in an election(they came second in 120 seats last year), but it's a long leap from there to majority government. Especially as its leader and most well-known face resigned today. At most, it'll be a junior coalition partner, or force a minority or another coalition government.

As for the europhobic Tories - there are only about 80 of them(out of 330). The rest are either europhiles or (mostly) mildly eurosceptic status-quo conservatives. Enough to bring the government down if they wanted to, but do they?

Either way, nothing will happen until after October.

PalmerSperry wrote:

jgnfld wrote:I have my doubts that Brexit will actually happen. You can see the delaying tactics from even the winning side already coming to the fore.

Oh, I think it pretty much has to happen at this point. The only possible fudge at this point (IMHO) is leaving the EU and rejoining EFTA alongside Norway, but even that is likely raise shrieks of "Stabbed in the back!" from UKIP and the Europhobic Tories.

Failure to do anything will just result in UKIP either winning the next general election (or having enough MPs to force Article 50 through along with the Europhobic Tories). And that's assuming things get that far ... Frankly I'm expecting David Cameron's next meeting of the European Council to open with him being directly asked "So is the UK leaving the EU then?". If he says "Yes" then they announce they accept his invocation of Article 50, if he says "No", "I don't know" or fudges then they leak that response to the British press (riots in the streets?).

All they have to do is say that the Leave vote was not a sufficient majority for such a drastic action to be taken. There are precedence. In the USA certain sweeping changes require a 2/3rd majority of both houses. Sweden has a similar 60% of 75% of the entire voting population. The UK government only has to say something like too small a percentage of to little of the voting population to actually go through with shooting ourselves in the foot.

GabrialSagan wrote:All they have to do is say that the Leave vote was not a sufficient majority for such a drastic action to be taken. There are precedence. In the USA certain sweeping changes require a 2/3rd majority of both houses. Sweden has a similar 60% of 75% of the entire voting population. The UK government only has to say something like too small a percentage of to little of the voting population to actually go through with shooting ourselves in the foot.

That is the one thing they cannot say. The turnout for the referendum was 72% of the electorate; far higher than the turnout for the past few elections. Also, if you look at the number of votes cast for each party only 36.9% actually voted for the Tories yet they got a 12 seat majority. Given that, having 52% voted for Brexit, a clear majority, then it would be hard to say that too few of the electorate voted, especially as a simple majority was the only requirement NOT a 2/3 majority which has never, I believe, been a part of any UK vote requirement.

You all know the "Harrigton Doctrine"!

It says, if the League don´t Change their direction, manticore will hit the league hard enough that they will break apart.

If you see the Actions of Firebrand and maybe some other actions of the Alignement, do you think anyone at Elizabeth´s tea circle Comes the idea, that the alliance is helping the alinement to break up the league?

Maldorian wrote:You all know the "Harrigton Doctrine"!

It says, if the League don´t Change their direction, manticore will hit the league hard enough that they will break apart.

If you see the Actions of Firebrand and maybe some other actions of the Alignement, do you think anyone at Elizabeth´s tea circle Comes the idea, that the alliance is helping the alinement to break up the league?

Frankly, it doesn't really matter that the MAligment wants the League broken up. Manticore/the GA has to break the League in order to survive.
It's gone far enough that even if the League turned around its policies regarding Manticore right now, Manticore can no longer allow the League to remain intact as a survival imperative.
Operation Thunderbolt coming out of Haven's Bolthole was bad enough for Manticore. They can not and will not allow the League an opportunity to create an equivalent.

Kytheros wrote:

Maldorian wrote:You all know the "Harrigton Doctrine"!

It says, if the League don´t Change their direction, manticore will hit the league hard enough that they will break apart.

If you see the Actions of Firebrand and maybe some other actions of the Alignement, do you think anyone at Elizabeth´s tea circle Comes the idea, that the alliance is helping the alinement to break up the league?

Frankly, it doesn't really matter that the MAligment wants the League broken up. Manticore/the GA has to break the League in order to survive.
It's gone far enough that even if the League turned around its policies regarding Manticore right now, Manticore can no longer allow the League to remain intact as a survival imperative.
Operation Thunderbolt coming out of Haven's Bolthole was bad enough for Manticore. They can not and will not allow the League an opportunity to create an equivalent.

remember how mesa likes to load multiple strings in their bow's. Firebrant could be looked at as principally an attempt to embarrass and discredit manticore. the same is true for a lot of the MAlign's otehr operations.

Analysts lile oceans razor. We have multiple actions aimed at discrediting the grand alliance. I doubt that many if any would look deeper to see that the primary mission is to break up the SL, and discrediting the GA is only a side benifit.

I find it ironical that Damian Harahap's codename is Firebrand when that was the name of one of the worst aircraft to serve in the Fleet Air Arm. Conceived for one role but used for another it does remind me of the way Harahap has shifted allegiances.

Probably just the way my nerdish mind works.

Rincewind wrote:Ever since I read in A Rising Thunder how Oravil Barregos had foreseen the break up of the Solarian League & prepared accordingly I have wondered about the following:

How many other systems have also foreseen the break up of the Solarian League & started preparing accordingly?

If an Office of Frontier Security Sector Governor can foresee it long enough ago for him to prepare his Sepoy Option then surely some of the system governments within the League could also have predicted it: (I am not including those systems of the RF as they have been part of a conspiracy to cause it to happen). And, if they could predict it, then take steps to take advantage of or, at the very least, minimise the effects of?

Thoughts anyone?

Barregos was an atypical sector governor. He actually cares about the welfare of his sector. Most of the rest are "captured by the system"; where their only concern is how much they can "milk" out of the "cow". For them, things have been going on pretty much unchanged for so long they can't really conceive of future change.

OrlandoNative wrote:

Rincewind wrote:Ever since I read in A Rising Thunder how Oravil Barregos had foreseen the break up of the Solarian League & prepared accordingly I have wondered about the following:

How many other systems have also foreseen the break up of the Solarian League & started preparing accordingly?

If an Office of Frontier Security Sector Governor can foresee it long enough ago for him to prepare his Sepoy Option then surely some of the system governments within the League could also have predicted it: (I am not including those systems of the RF as they have been part of a conspiracy to cause it to happen). And, if they could predict it, then take steps to take advantage of or, at the very least, minimise the effects of?

Thoughts anyone?

Barregos was an atypical sector governor. He actually cares about the welfare of his sector. Most of the rest are "captured by the system"; where their only concern is how much they can "milk" out of the "cow". For them, things have been going on pretty much unchanged for so long they can't really conceive of future change.

Yeah, but the MAlign has also primed a bunch of them to secede as well.