Why the Brexit vote should concern people who think Trump can’t win

Filed in National by on June 24, 2016

People voted with their fears, not their heads. This Guardian lede sums it up perfectly. Exchange Trump for EU Exit, and you have a chilling look at our possible future. Our fearfully isolationist, angrily racist, self-destructive future.

In the end those who placed their faith in the “experts” were always going to be disappointed. The pollsters were wrong; the currency traders were wrong; the pundits were confounded. People who did not feel they had been heard have not just spoken. Given a one-off chance to tell the world what they think of how they are governed they have screamed a piercing cry of alienation and desperation.

Given the choice between the status quo and change (changing something, anything) Britain voted for change. It got its wish. This will change everything.

We are also diminished. Our politics are poisoned, our discourse is fragile, our leaders are discredited. Facts ceased to matter, knowledge ceased to be valued, compassion appeared to evaporate. As large majorities for one side or the other racked up in various parts of the country it became clear that for many of us, beyond our families, we didn’t just disagree with the other side. We literally didn’t know them. Britain is not greater for this decision and this campaign but smaller, weaker and more vulnerable.

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Jason330 is a deep cover double agent working for the GOP. Don't tell anybody.

Comments (46)

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  1. Ben says:

    Trump has loudly proclaimed his approval of this move. As the UK (and global markets) suffers the effects of tossing itself off a cliff, he will have to own that approval.

  2. jason330 says:

    So? Some insiders and plutocrats lost some money in the markets that are otherwise rigged to pay off like a broken slot machine. Big deal.

  3. Jason330 says:

    More here related to Clinton supporters:

    A narrative among Clinton supporters about Bernie backers who say they’ll vote Trump rather than Clinton is that they’re radical leftists exhibiting depraved indifference to the undeniable horrors of a Trump presidency. There may be some voters who fit that description, but I believe a much larger pool is a “none of the above” group who think — correctly — that the establishments of both parties are willing to throw them and their children under the bus (with TPP, harsh criminal “justice” reforms, Wall Street bailouts, mass surveillance, pointless foreign wars, destruction of the social safety net) and will vote for anyone who promises any kind of alternative, even a nightmarish one.

  4. Jason330 says:

    Here’s my lesson from Brexit: when you’ve got nothing to lose, and you’re being asked to vote between someone who’ll be terrible for you but good for the people who took everything you love; and someone who’ll be a disaster for everyone, including the people who screwed you over, even terrible choices can seem good. It’s a mistake to think that Trump supporters all believe that he’ll be good for the country: plenty just believe that he’ll visit their tormentors with the kind of misery they’ve endured since the Reagan years.”

  5. Jenr says:

    People know what they don’t want. They don’t want what they perceive to be the status quo. So they gravitate to an alternative. And for some, regardless of the consequences.

  6. Steve Newton says:

    Our political system has been ignoring signals of massive discontent (call it “right” and “left” populist if you want to) for well over a decade. The Occupy movement, the Tea Party movement, Ron Paul, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump–these are all symptoms rather than causes of the breakdown.

    These folks don’t see themselves as destroying the system (although many of them really don’t care about that), they see themselves as either “restoring” it (a mythical “golden age”) or pressing the “re-set” button. If you already feel (for whatever reason) that the existing system has been a catastrophe for you, then breaking it beyond repair is not a tough call.

  7. Jason330 says:

    Exactly. That’s why you can’t scare anyone out of voting for Trump.

    Pundit: “He’ll burn everything down!”
    Trump Voter: “Good!”

    If Clinton’s campaign tries to scare people out of voting for Trump, we are screwed. It has to be the sunniest, happiest, most optimistic campaign for “reform” or “change” in the fucking history of campaigns.

  8. donviti says:

    I think people continue to under estimate how badly people want change. They voted for a black guy 8 years ago….so what do the Dems do to keep down the path….put back in power the establishment…that Obama voters were elated to defeat and thought they were done with.

    So yes, Trump has a shot because people in this country are tired of career politicians running things. It’s time to try the racist xenophobe….and I won’t be surprised if he wins.

  9. Dem19703 says:

    I know I shouldn’t be, but I still amazes me that (most of) the same folks out their who are calling for burning down the system are the same ones responsible for creating it. It’s the “throw all the bums out, except my guy” syndrome. I get it, people want change, but it seems like they want it everywhere else except in there own backyard. It’s the same as calling for term limits. We have them. They’re called elections. But I digress.

  10. pandora says:

    Oh please. People don’t want change. Not really. Just sorta. Just enough for them to keep everything they have and add more. So really, they want MORE of the same. Fair enough. But let’s not pretend that the people waxing lyrical over “revolutions” would be happy with the side they’d find themselves on if the “revolution” actually happened. You know, a “revolution” that benefited everyone.

    The people the system has been a catastrophe for have always existed and have suffered for far longer than 2008. This isn’t new and it bothers me that people act like it is. New for certain demographics, maybe, but not new for others.

    Brexit was a shortsighted move designed to lash out at immigrants – that will probably result in a hit to jobs in UK (you know, the thing people claim to care about) due to reinstating trade barriers. It’s going to interesting to watch.

  11. Liberal Elite says:

    @J “So? Some insiders and plutocrats lost some money in the markets…”

    Some??? Looks like $$$trillions lost and almost everywhere in the world.

  12. Liberal Elite says:

    @B “As the UK (and global markets) suffers the effects of tossing itself off a cliff, he will have to own that approval.”

    Someone should do before and after photos of England and overlay that with Trump’s speech as a campaign ad. You can remind people that there’s a steep price to pay for rank xenophobia.

  13. Andy says:

    @LE Trillions lost in 2008 who came out ahead?

  14. Jenr says:

    People may not want a revolution but to underestimate the desire for real change at this point in time would not be wise. Those have been elected or in power have largely sat by and ensured their own re-election and/or personal profit at a cost to the citizens and the well being of the country. They are not public servants. They are self-serving. And in this case, it’s a “bi-partisan” issue. There are exceptions but not enough of them.

  15. Liberal Elite says:

    @A “Trillions lost in 2008 who came out ahead?”

    The rent seekers who caused the crash did pretty well.
    Some people got quite rich off of unaffordable military contractor costs. The several $$$trillion we spent on Iraq mostly went to rich Americans connected with the military industrial complex.

    The mortgage fraud folks. There’s a reason we had a mortgage crisis. It was not an accident. Money was to be had…

    And Obama. The crash really did pave the way for a GOP smackdown.

  16. Liberal Elite says:

    @J “They are self-serving.”

    And so were the Britts. Too bad they had no idea how to really be self-serving.

    One good way to counter this is to teach people what their real interests are. Misinforming voters about their real interests seems to be the real motive behind Fox News from the beginning.

  17. kavips says:

    I think Clinton supporters are sooooo blinded by social issues. It is economics, stupid. Always has been …

    I hate social issues.. What at waste of time.

    Hillary Clinton, when are you going to tax the fuck out of the top one percent? At rates up to 95% If you can’t bring yourself to that, you haven’t earned anyones vote…

    Social issues. Pffffft.

  18. Liberal Elite says:

    @k “It is economics, stupid. Always has been …”

    Actually, it’s the quality of life. Always has been…
    …and so economics is a big part of quality of life, but social issues are also very much part of quality of life.

    What good is having money if you can’t marry the person you want, if you can’t safely venture from your domicile, if the cops will beat the crap out of you and maybe shoot you, if you can’t openly wear sectarian garb without being assaulted, if you can’t get affordable prescription drugs, if you can’t avoid getting harassed and maybe raped,… ???

    Hey… But they’re just social issues…

  19. puck says:

    “What good is having money if you can’t…”

    If you have money you can insulate yourself all those other things.

  20. pandora says:

    “If you have money you can insulate yourself all those other things.”

    Yeah, that’s not true.

  21. Jenr says:

    Could Brexit be a needed wake-up call to people (especially young voters) in America? When you don’t vote it’s at your own peril.

  22. puck says:

    “Yeah, that’s not true.”

    Profound analysis.

  23. pandora says:

    I’ve written quite a bit on why money doesn’t insulate against racism, sexism and bigotry. Not sure why you can’t see it.

    Jenr, I doubt it will have much impact, but it would be awesome if it did. As more info comes in on Brexit, more UKers are concerned over what they voted for and the fact that promises made by the Leave side are already being broken – Looks like the promise to take the money sent to the EU and apply it to the NHS was a big ol’ lie.

  24. puck says:

    “I’ve written quite a bit on why money doesn’t insulate against racism, sexism and bigotry. ”

    So where are you writing this from?

  25. anonymous says:

    You are wrong, Pandora. It doesn’t insulate perfectly, but it insulates quite a bit. If you think a middle-class black faces the same issues as a poor black, you are wrong. If you think a middle-class gay or lesbian faces the same problems as a poor one, you are again wrong. I could go right down the list. It doesn’t make all those problems go away, but it certainly ameliorates some of them.

    And that’s why you don’t get to pretend you have the high moral ground on economics vs. social issues.

  26. fightingbluehen says:

    “Could Brexit be a needed wake-up call to people (especially young voters) in America? When you don’t vote it’s at your own peril.”

    Voter turnout was 72%. This is a very high turnout, so I’m not sure I get your point.

    The newly elected mayor of the largest city in the UK (who happens to be a Muslim) wants to ban sexy woman in advertisements in London’s public transport system…..Go figure, that a month later, the UK votes to leave the EU.

  27. pandora says:

    Puck said, ““If you have money you can insulate yourself all those other things.”

    I disagree.

    Unless you believe that a middle class black man (and black women, too) isn’t concerned when pulled over by the police, or having racial slurs hurled at them doesn’t exist once they make $80,000. Unless you believe that middle class women don’t worry about their safety in middle class environments, or pay inequality (other minority groups face the same thing), or access to reproductive medical services/treatments. Unless you believe that the middle class LGBT community feels their paycheck insulates them from hate crimes. Unless you believe that middle class Hispanic US citizens are insulated against the stereotypes and harassment that comes with their skin tone. Unless you believe that middle class Muslim US citizens aren’t being accused of being terrorists or terrorist sympathizers. If you believe all that then I understand why you think the way you do, but I disagree.

    I’ve never claimed that making more money isn’t a good thing. I’ve stated it’s not the only thing.

  28. anonymous says:

    The problem with social issues as political subjects is that they do not respond well to legal solutions. It turns out you can indeed legislate morality, just not very effectively.

    I can point to every single example you gave as one in which the legal solution has been close to no solution at all. We have lots of laws against hate crimes. It hasn’t stopped them, and indeed there’s no evidence that those laws have ever prevented a single instance of the kind of acts we have legislated against. The bias against brown people of foreign birth will continue no matter what laws we pass to bar them or welcome them.

    And if you think it makes no difference between being poor and driving while black vs. being middle-class and driving while black, check again with your friends who have been both. Middle-class blacks get more respect from the cops, because middle-class people get more respect from the cops — and in both cases, it’s less respect than rich people of either color get from the cops.

    What you can’t legislate is any kind of equality other than the kind recognized by laws. That’s why all the equality laws end up not producing equality, but court awards and settlements for those who have been victimized, which in turn is how the city of Wilmington has managed to lose bias cases against both black AND white employees. I would argue, and it would take something persuasive to convince me otherwise, that a law that produces such results is a poorly designed law. I would argue, if less strenuously, that it could not be otherwise, because political actions are imperfect reflections of their motivations — that is, an action can have several possible motivations that must be proved in court by pointing to actions. A workplace careful about how it proceeds can get away with its bias.

    Perhaps it’s easier to see if you look at your opponents on the other side, those who also believe social issues are more important that economic ones. Consider abortion.

    These people claim to be motivated by their emotions for the unborn, but we already know what would happen should they somehow get their wish for all abortion to be outlawed: Many women would get them anyway. We would not “solve” the problem as they want it solved — unwanted pregnancies always have been terminated, and always will be. The reason is simple: The law would fail to address the underlying reasons for wanting to terminate the pregnancy.

    The problem, I maintain, is that the apparatus of the law is not designed to fix people’s inner lives. We can force people to pay men and women the same, but that’s about it.

    Economics, not morality, is what the government is set up to regulate. Fixing the shrinking middle class doesn’t require us to change anyone’s mind about anything — it simply requires us to tax the rich more equitably and to spend the resulting revenue wisely. The political sphere is the proper place for the debate to occur because those are the kinds of issues the process was designed to address.

    The problem with social issues isn’t that they’re not important. It’s that they will never be solved by politics — and, from the standpoint of the conservative social warriors, that’s the beauty part. You can ask for money forever, because the fight will never end.

    Social issues were brought into politics by the GOP to give the kind of voter we think of as the GOP base a reason to vote for economic policies that hurt them. By pouring our resources onto that battlefield, we allowed Third Way Democrats to do the same thing — they stopped representing labor and switched to management, and we seldom complained because they were upholding our side in the culture wars.

    There will be no party that represents the economically disenfranchised until we demand one. If we get caught up in the equal-wage fight, they’ll eventually cave in and apply the crappy wages equally. Because the real issue for the corporatist isn’t the equality, it’s the crappy wages.

  29. pandora says:

    I hear you, and I agree with some of what you’ve written, but that wasn’t the discussion being had here.

  30. cassandra_m says:

    Unless you believe that a middle class black man (and black women, too) isn’t concerned when pulled over by the police, or having racial slurs hurled at them doesn’t exist once they make $80,000. Unless you believe that middle class women don’t worry about their safety in middle class environments, or pay inequality (other minority groups face the same thing), or access to reproductive medical services/treatments. Unless you believe that the middle class LGBT community feels their paycheck insulates them from hate crimes. Unless you believe that middle class Hispanic US citizens are insulated against the stereotypes and harassment that comes with their skin tone. Unless you believe that middle class Muslim US citizens aren’t being accused of being terrorists or terrorist sympathizers.

    This is *exactly* right.

    And anti-bigotry laws aren’t meant to fix anyone’s inner life. They are meant to increase the costs of acting on that broken inner life.

    There was a time in the history of this country when people argued that lynchings were a social problem that couldn’t be resolved with legislation — Federal legislation at least that was blocked by conservative Southern Dems for decades.

  31. Dave says:

    The biggest mass lynching in American his was in 1890 in New Orleans. 11 Italian-Americans were lynched by a mob (of mostly Irish). Then there was the San Francisco Vigilance Movement who targeted first the Irish and then Chinese.
    Followed by the Johnson County War, in Wyoming in the 1890’s with large ranchers, lynching small ranchers (mostly white Democrats) as “cattle rustlers.”

    Most often lynching had a social motivation (violation of Jim Crow) or economic motivation (the Irish didn’t want the dagos to take their laboring jobs and the ranchers didn’t want completion. All in all, it was about the social and economic dominance and the supremacy of one tribe over another.

    Tribalism continues today and is unabated, whether it is racial, ethnic, national, or economic. In order for tribes to survive they compete with other tribes for resources and dominance.

    Tribalism is probably the greatest threat to mankind today. The industrialized tribes cut down all the trees to build cities and then insist that undeveloped tribes leave forests alone and find some other way to develop.

    I have little hope for mankind and the only hope for the creatures of this planet is our extinction.

  32. Liberal Elite says:

    @a “We have lots of laws against hate crimes. It hasn’t stopped them…”

    But the laws do clearly state that we stand as a people and condemn such. It’s an important message for all. And that is why, in part, those laws are so important.

  33. Jenr says:

    “Voter turnout was 72%. This is a very high turnout, so I’m not sure I get your point.”

    Yes overall turnout was very high. Just wondering how the turnout will breakdown by age. Clearly younger voters wanted to stay in the EU. My guess is that as usual they got beat in the turnout game by older voters. Young people in the UK had the most at risk. Did they turnout?

    And if not, will it be a warning shot across the bow to young voters in America. Likely not. Just hopeful thinking I guess.

  34. fightingbluehen says:

    “Clearly younger voters wanted to stay in the EU.”

    I think it’s difficult to say for certain what people’s intentions are. Clearly the majority of people voted , and the question was a simple one.

    I think when the intention of a population’s vote is questioned, or you try to break down the demographics of turnout in order to facilitate some sort of re-vote or nullification, it is a slippery slope.

    Justifying a do over whenever the results don’t suit your particular agenda, smacks of something you might see in a banana republic, or possibly in the actions of a desperate organization trying to hold onto their power.

  35. anonymous says:

    “There was a time in the history of this country when people argued that lynchings were a social problem that couldn’t be resolved with legislation”

    We already had laws regarding murder. What you are quoting are justifications for not enforcing them. It took the feds to do that. It’s not much different from Delaware’s crooked politics today — the state has plenty of laws against it, but has never prosecuted anyone, or even investigated anyone, for corruption. That work won’t get done unless the feds do it. The same is true of education in the state today. Without federal involvement it wouldn’t get done. In the case of lynching, no special law is needed, merely the will to enforce existing law.

    “anti-bigotry laws aren’t meant to fix anyone’s inner life. They are meant to increase the costs of acting on that broken inner life.”

    As I noted, laws that can be cited in cases of “reverse racism” as well as actual racism are poor laws. Payouts under them are underwritten by insurance. All taxpayers ultimately pay, and only a fraction of the deserving collect; meanwhile, plenty of undeserving collect as well. If you’re okay with that, fine, but please don’t call it “justice.”

    “But the laws do clearly state that we stand as a people and condemn such. It’s an important message for all.”

    That’s exactly the same motivation behind the old laws against sodomy.

    “And that is why, in part, those laws are so important.”

    It started with good reason — trespassing laws didn’t address the terroristic threat of cross burning. But it has expanded to thought-police levels, which is a threat to civil liberties I don’t care to see.

  36. Dave says:

    Well the referendum was non-binding, so we’ll see what happens down the road.

  37. cassandra_m says:

    We already had laws regarding murder.

    Which didn’t cover people who weren’t considered “white”. And for the terrorists doing the lynching, they were exercising their entitlements to make sure that their inferiors were punished for whatever infractions they could make up for the day and to terrorize the rest of the non-white community. It became murder to lynch a non-white person when that person became “white” (see Italian Americans) or once lynching laws came into effect — providing African Americans enough legal status for the law to consider them murdered.

    This “reverse racism” doesn’t exist. Or, I should say, it exists in the minds of people abandoned by their dictionaries.

  38. anonymous says:

    You are incorrect about the reason for lack of prosecution of lynch mobs. While African-Americans were the primary victims, between 15 and 20 percent of lynchings were of whites, and nobody was prosecuted for those crimes either. The lack of prosecution was because no individuals were held responsible for the conduct of a mob. As in the Freddie Gray prosecution, no single person was responsible for his death, so nobody was held responsible.

    The federal law was repeatedly proposed because the states refused to act. And the proposed law was an attempt to charge not anyone in the mob but officials who failed to act against the mob.

  39. pandora says:

    This is the point:

    “It became murder to lynch a non-white person when that person became “white” (see Italian Americans)”

    Because we know damn well that lynchings of white, anglo-saxon people wouldn’t have been tolerated – let alone not prosecuted. There is a specific history here. I don’t understand why people are diluting it.

  40. cassandra_m says:

    You are incorrect about the reason for lack of prosecution of lynch mobs.

    Go back and reread what I wrote. “white” is in quotes for a reason. I certainly know that there was a time where Italian Americans, Jewish Americans, Irish Americans and other people who are now considered white were also subject to lynching. The fight against lynching laws was a fight to preserve the privileges of whiteness to inflict whatever damage they wanted to in the name of protecting their communities. Even though that wasn’t the real motivation of lynchings, but certainly they argued that lynchings did reduce crime. Some of the southern pushback on anti-lynching law certainly made use of the State’s Rights argument — that murder was a state problem, not a federal one.

  41. anonymous says:

    The fight against lynching laws was a fight against state and local officials being held responsible for the actions of mobs.

    The non-African Americans who were lynched weren’t lynched to intimidate their communities. Lynching grew out of vigilante “justice” as practiced in the western territories even before the Civil War. It grew into the practice as you describe it, with intimidation as the main goal, under the KKK.

  42. Dave says:

    “a fight to preserve the privileges of whiteness”

    As long as you are defining “whiteness” as “supremacy” then yes, that’s true. Although the “supremacy” or “dominance” would be more accurate. Neither the Italians, nor the Irish (the Black Irish not withstanding), were considered non-white. The were consider “other” however. I think it is too simplistic to characterize that history in terms of white and black. Even though lynching of blacks far exceeded lynching of whites in terms of numbers, I don’t think it should be so completely defined in racial terms that the full extent is forgotten.

    This is what happened to Holocaust, which is have become so completely subsumed as part of the Jewish experience that most people have forgotten the Roma, mulattos, gays, Jehovah Witnesses, the disabled, and 3 million Polish Christians who were murdered during the Holocaust.

    Unfortunately, that’s what happens when we have discussions with sound bites, labels, slogans. We lose nuance, depth, and the totality of an often sordid history.

    I didn’t bring up the non-black lynchings to diminish the black experience, rather it was to assert that it was a means of domination. Which by the way, is often the real motivation for almost all acts of aggression.

  43. puck says:

    Lynching is terrorism, using a grotesque parody of legal execution. A simple murder could be accomplished more efficiently with a gun, which we always seem to have plenty of in the US.

  44. anonymous says:

    @Dave: The difference in the lynching of blacks was that the mob often didn’t care if the person caught and punished was the actual perpetrator of a crime. Despite the myths, most victims were not accused of rape or murder before their execution. In that regard it went from vigilante justice to terrorism.

    My point was that anti-lynching laws weren’t about charging the perpetrators with murder, but charging officials with failing to stop it.

    @puck: Murder with a gun can be attributed to the one person who pulled the trigger. The whole point about lynching was that the mob claimed to represent the community, so no individual was guilty.

    Seriously, the Freddie Gray case is a perfect illustration of this. Because six cops were involved, none was guilty of murder. If we extend the analogy to anti-lynching law, it would be like trying to pass laws that hold the mayor and police chief responsible for the actions of the police who collectively kill in their administration’s name.

    I strongly suspect that such a Black Lives Matter law that tried to address the lack of justice in killings by cops also would never pass Congress, just like the anti-lynching bills, and for the same reason: Most Congresspeople were local officials once, so that’s where their sympathies lie.

  45. cassandra_m says:

    For most lynchings of non-whites, the mob didn’t much care whether or not a real crime was committed. Italians, Irish, Jews could be lynched for economic reasons — taking jobs the whites wanted or even in operating businesses that threatened whites. Asians in California could be lynched for economic as well as racial oppression reasons. Mexicans left in the southwest after the US took that territory could be lynched also for economic reasons — because whites wanted lands they held. In the Wyoming Range Wars white people with large ranches lynched some of the white people with small ranches just to terrorize them into leaving. Even in the west lynching was not solely about alleged criminal behavior.

  46. mouse says:

    I don’t think we can trust white people. Can we stop white immigrants before it’s too late