European elections or that Labour-Tory compromise – or both? The relentess promotion of Farage, whichever
YouGov has published another opinion poll on voting intention for the EU elections. The commission came from Hope Not Hate, which does apparently use the services of YouGov regularly for its own nefarious purposes – this time, it seems, to encourage turnout against the actor who plays “Tommy Robinson” who, with the UK Government continuing to stand-downǂ regarding his contempt of court case, has no apparent concerns about any impending prison sentence and, as such, is standing as a candidate in the elections. Hope Not Hate also apparently needs its own avenue into the arena in which there is promotion of the Brexit Party. Hope Not Hate’s take on the matter, of course, is that Farage’s Judas goat operation is “radical”, and therefore, by association, so are all Leave-voters. (Please see the FBEL article UK Government’s Cointelpro, 2019 version; the role of Hope Not Hate and “Tommy Robinson” in it – link).
That being said, at the moment we are less interested in motive for commissioning the poll, and more in its result which would suggest that, further to the most recently previous FBEL article which initially pointed out the shape of things to be deduced from two other YouGov polls, there is a continuation of a tendency in a large proportion of the public to not want to participate in the European elections. If we were cynical, noting that the tally for those who “would not vote” has slipped 3 points in the newest poll from the 18% that figured in a poll conducted between 16th and 17th April, so that the Brexit Party now has a lead by the very same 3 percentage points, we would say that this time YouGov has targeted its respondents with greater care with a view to denying the very damaging message that had hitherto and very likely unintentionally emerged from its polling: i.e. “the ‘faction’ that would in fact ‘win’ the EU elections are the people who are not going to vote in them.”
Indeed, cynicism about the latest YouGov is abundantly justified given that very real concern is being openly declared in the media by which the Government class speaks to each other. Lately, the Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Sir John Holmes, wrote an op-ed for The Times that Politico summarised in its headline as a pronouncement to the effect that “Theresa May [is] risking public faith in politics over EU election”. An extract follows:
“Even if the elections go ahead as planned, no one can tell whether those elected will take their seats or, if so, for how long,” Holmes wrote. “There are bound to be questions about the impact on voters, now and in future, when a significant electoral process is in such doubt, especially when its value is being openly questioned by the government.”
The idea that Government itself is introducing doubt is a strawman. All doubt – not to mention anger and tendency to outright rebellion – that is a cause for the “serious concerns” that the Chairman of the Electoral Commission expresses, and that will no doubt be shared by his ilk, is due to the appearance of business-as-usual EU-membership as symbolised by participation in European elections, and thus the referendum vote appearing to count for naught. If the reader would care to look at the opinion polling ahead of the 2014 European elections, he will notice that the Brexit Party is not doing as well as UKIP did then, with a ComRes poll scoring Farage’s old party on 38% at three weeks or so away from election day. In 2014, the battle to secure a referendum provided a kind of motivation that is not being replicated by the Brexit Party’s attempt to exploit the massive post-referendum anti-climax and disappointment. Moreover, turnout for 2014 was 35.6%. We should perhaps expect to see that even this dismal figure will not be matched.
Indeed, we should hazard a guess that, such is the concern about the statement that Britons are about to make by the scale of the rejection of the European elections, the UK Government is perhaps preparing to scrap its long-held plan to try to engineer public approval of its Article 50 treaty with the EU (Government efforts to this purpose, in the form of perpetual psychological operations utilising parliamentary theatre, have been covered extensively at FBEL – see here for a starting point). There is talk that the Tory executive and Labour opposition parts of Government are about to collaborate to produce a “compromise”, and a variation of the Article 50 treaty that Parliament can agree to. Of course, what we would be seeing is parliamentary theatre and then the production by sleight of hand of the Very Fake Brexit that UK Government has always dreamt of; lest we forget that in February 2017, yours truly penned the following:
The essential act in leaving the EU is the repealing of the EC Act 1972. May the author suggest, then, that the triggering of Article 50 is to allow an opportunity for the British Government and the EU to conspire to create apparently new circumstances which amount to the same thing – or maintain the old relationship under a new name – to be sold to the British public as being necessary for leaving the EU? Here is how it would work: the EU will want this thing, the British Government will want that. A compromise will have be made or else, we will be told, Britain can’t leave the EU. Then there will be the second level. The British Government will take the compromise to Parliament, which is pro-EU, and will quietly have this compromise watered down some more – it will be necessary, you see, to get the whole thing passed – after all, leaving the EU is what you want, isn’t it?
The trouble with this outcome, as has become clear to the author in the intervening years, is that it would shed even more party political support than any attempt to bring off Fake Brexit by confidence-tricking Tory Leave-voters into accepting the “undiluted” (by Labour) Article 50 treaty, and Labour Leave-voters into reflexively blaming the blue side as par for the course. In other words, this cross-party compromise solution risks the very survival of the false left-right spectrum†. Those in the Cult of the Son of Corbyn who are also of the “Lexit” persuasion, faced with a seemingly Labour-introduced customs union, for instance, will finally have to confront some bitter disappointment about their decidedly slippery Lord and Saviour. On the other side, of course, the Conservatroids have been complaining that the situation, where it so happened that they had naively believed David Cameron on face value when he told them that the country would leave the EU if they voted to do so, “does not compute” for quite the while already – as we might well know. The coming Labour-Tory compromise is going to alienate more people, not bring them along in support of a Brexit fudge and fudge-up – but even so, one is tempted to think that the EU elections are going to send such a bad message about the EU, and interest in it, that the UK Government thinks that stoking discontent is a better option.
The key piece of information in apprehending this idea is that Theresa May, which means to say everyone pulling her strings, is said to believe that it will be possible to cancel British participation in European elections on the completion of that compromise deal with Labour. It is not an idea that is shared by other people – “experts” as an Independent article describes them – but so what? The important thing out of all of this is that an impression is created that a Tory-Labour deal on the Article 50 treaty (something that Britain doesn’t actually need, let us not forget, in order to leave the EU) is a big red “stop” button on the machinery of European elections:
Theresa May has “no chance” of passing her Brexit deal in time to pull the UK out of the European parliament elections and avoid a likely devastating defeat, experts have concluded.
Time has already effectively run out on attempts to ratify the agreement by 22 May, they say – despite the prime minister insisting talks with Labour can still deliver a compromise before the deadline.
In the meantime, and on the other hand, efforts do continue to pour out from various orifices of Government, overt and covert: propaganda mouthpieces, social media personalities, charity/non-governmental organisation fronts, parties, candidates, and shilling operations in general are all working hard to draw attention to the imminence of European elections and, more importantly, to encourage participation. The following is very interesting to see coming from Hope Not Hate (link provided above):
Although he is viewed extremely negatively by most people, ‘Tommy Robinson’ has an actual chance of winning a seat in the North West. He needs to get 8.9% of the vote, but if turnout slumps, as a lot of people expect, that could end up translating into as little as 140,000 votes.
And so it seems it hasn’t yet been enough, in terms of eliciting the slightest bit of interest, to pitch the “Robinson” character up against George Galloway in the North West region. Galloway, of course, has plenty of baggage in the recent history of Muslim versus Zionist strife. “Robinson”, of course, is anti-Muslim, and is undoubtedly a Zionist. Galloway is known for defending Muslims against Israel. It appears that someone had an idea that a kind of Palestinian contest in microcosmic form would inspire people to go to the European ballot booths in Lancashire. Galloway duly played up to it in a tweet that was pinned to the top of his stream the last time the author looked:
Where did ROBINSON get tens of thousands of pounds to fight the European Elections? I think we should be told. This is him on a recent holiday…
The holiday referred to was that time “Robinson” visited Israel: underneath Galloway’s text was that picture of “Robinson” brandishing a weapon on an Israeli tank. If this had been the 1970s, Giant Haystacks would have stood for the Fat Party, Big Daddy would have stood for the Even Fatter Party, and Dickie Davies would have hosted a debate-evolving-into-a-wrestling-contest on World of Sport.
If the reader would like things any more Barnum and Bailey, elsewhere, the Daily Express announced that 96% of 7660 respondents to a poll that it had conducted said they would definitely take part in the European elections. The author highly doubts that there has ever before been such a blatant case of perception-engineering for peer-motivation out of the corporate-media. Peer-motivation, simply put, is when people do something because other people they know are doing it. However, such is the carefully nurtured state (by Government and its apparatus) of British public psychology, that peer-motivation can no doubt be created by merely introducing the perception, true or not, that there is an irresistible fashion for a certain behaviour.
Of course, the unrepentant and unrelenting promotion of the Brexit Party continues with, for instance, Allison Pearson‡ of The Telegraph having developed her position from asking her readership to spoil their European election ballot papers into outright support for the Judas goat operation: “Why I will be voting for the Brexit Party”, goes the headline. On the other side of the fake spectrum – and the same operation – is Owen Jones: he who was involved in promotion of the Brexit Party right at its very conception (see here). Lately, Jones has written about the dangers of activity by the parliamentary Labour party in terms of handing the Brexit Party electoral success:
In three weeks’ time, it is entirely plausible that Nigel Farage’s Brexit party will triumph in the European parliamentary elections. It will be the greatest victory for bigotry in politics since the EU referendum campaign; it will be a shot in the arm for the Tory hard Brexiteers, emboldening them and providing them with renewed legitimacy; it will damage the chances of a soft Brexit; and it will inflict probably terminal harm on any prospect of a second referendum. Preventing this completely and utterly inarguable outcome should – you would think – preoccupy every single remainer and every single self-declared opponent of Tory rule.
The reader is asked to notice the lumping together of the “remainer” and the “opponent of Tory rule” – which is crude psychology aimed at people identifying as being “of the Left” so that they have trouble reconciling wanting to leave the EU, and that leftist identity. In fact, the technique is so crude, it is a wonder that there are people still stupid enough to fall for it.
As for all those supposed benefits for nasty right wingers coming from a Brexit Party triumph in the European elections, the truth is that such an outcome will not make the blindest bit of difference to anything – except, of course, if the snake, Farage – for reasons explained before, and in copious amounts, here at FBEL – manages to inspire a big turnout – with the help of his co-operatives, the likes of Owen Jones, Allison Pearson, and last but not least, Hope Not Hate, of course. What Jones’ piece boils down to is exhortation to take part in the European elections. This is what all the corporate-media is doing, in lockstep concerted effort: the full spectrum dominance system is pulling together to try to generate turnout using the tried and tested “don’t let the other side win” method.
While the technique to thrash out the same old tune never changes, the instrument which is played has certainly been made to evolve by constant strumming. And yet, the chances are that the British public are, in the majority, still too entirely stupid to appreciate being manipulated like a wobbly banjo. What also remains to be seen is if the Government will indeed try to spring its European elections trap, or whether it thinks that there is no hope, underneath all the hype, of being able to claim, when the smoke clears after 23rd May, that consent has been signalled for European government. A clue to future events, however, may present itself in the form of tomorrow’s local elections, where candidates and councillors have been complaining to the BBC of being intimidated by the people they are canvassing; people who have been made angry by “Brexit betrayal”. Politicians being told that there will be hanging of traitors over Brexit does not bode well for large scale voter engagement.
ǂ Update 12th May, 2019: As a matter of fact, an Independent article of 26th April – discovered on day of update by the author – briefly tells of “Robinson’s” upcoming appearance at the High Court on 14th May.
Update 14th May, 2019: This should be very simple, but the Government is making it very hard to follow. For some reason, the Old Bailey sat on 14th May, and ruled that “Tommy Robinson” should face trial on 4th and 5th July – according to the BBC. The statement stands: Government continues to stand down.
† Thus there is an even greater need for a new controlled opposition for maintaining the populace in the manner of the established order; i.e. the Brexit Party.
‡ Behind a pay wall. The headline and a paragraph or two is all a non-subscriber can read. Naturally, the author does not subscribe to The Telegraph.
