Workaround
by Volker Weber
[Thanks Thomas & Stephen]
Comments
There is a german word i am not happy to use here: “Schadenfreude”. And the other is “Weltschmerz”.
The almost tragic thing about this development is that there were countless studies and researches in 2015/16 that predicted exactly these development(s).
With "Take back control" irresponsible populists like Johnson and Farage, and even more irresponsible, power-oriented elitists like Cameron caused this development and - oh the irony - they reject any responsibility for what is happening right now. It’s still always B&B, Brussels or Berlin. Funny enough never Madrid, never Paris, never Amsterdam, never Vienna.
I am not looking forward to use my “Reisepass” for the first time in my life to travel to the UK, Scotland to be precise, hopefully next year again, as i traveled every year in the last 30 years. To quote Mark Hollis: Such a Shame.
Thing is, the Brexiters have long moved on from this. They claim that the real growth opportunities are elsewhere in the world as the EU is sclerotic and slow growing (which to an extent is true), their argument is that the UK can now agree great new free trade agreements around the world and move on to a great new bright future (which is rather debatable and even themselves have admitted this will take 10+ years. While in the meantime lots of smaller current businesses are going bust, jobs are being lost etc). Their argument now is short term pain for long term gain. And as long as enough voters buy it (which because of FPTP don't need to be that many) the Tories remain in power. Which is all that matters.
And it's not always Brussels & Berlin. Paris gets a lot of complaints as well, the French fishermen, the French lorry drivers, the French government, plenty of complaints there. The Spanish government gets blamed for destroying the dreams of second home owners who can't stay more than 90 days now (even though that rule was actually something afaik the UK government lobbied for while the UK was still in the EU).
