by Of course, we’ve been flooded by them now. I’m afraid most of the left fails to properly understand Brexit. Yes, the anger at the economic malaise since 2008 has had something to do with it, and no doubt the sense of anger that democracy is being stolen by the EU as well. But there is something missing from the various analyses.A sample follows.Yanis Varoufakis, whose pro-EU dream world I have no time for, weighs in here. He says that, while campaigning for the UK to remain, arrayed against him were the UK Treasury and the City. Umm, what? They were both pro-EU. You were, broadly speaking, in the same camp as them, Yanis.Matias Vernengo gives his thoughts here, and argues that neoliberalism looks resurgent to him, especially in Latin America.He states:“At a minimum the European Union provided an environment in which people could move freely, in which petty nationalism gave way to acceptance of foreigners and immigrants, something particularly relevant with the refugee crisis in the neighboring region.” http://nakedkeynesianism.blogspot.com/2016/06/a-few-brief-comments-on-brexit-and.htmlThe free movement of people by open borders combined with mass immigration from the Third World has not made people in Europe give up nationalism for “acceptance of foreigners and immigrants” – precisely the opposite has happened.
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Lord Keynes considers the following as important: Left-Wing reactions to Brexit
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A sample follows.
Yanis Varoufakis, whose pro-EU dream world I have no time for, weighs in here. He says that, while campaigning for the UK to remain, arrayed against him were the UK Treasury and the City.
Umm, what? They were both pro-EU. You were, broadly speaking, in the same camp as them, Yanis.
Matias Vernengo gives his thoughts here, and argues that neoliberalism looks resurgent to him, especially in Latin America.
He states:
“At a minimum the European Union provided an environment in which people could move freely, in which petty nationalism gave way to acceptance of foreigners and immigrants, something particularly relevant with the refugee crisis in the neighboring region.”The free movement of people by open borders combined with mass immigration from the Third World has not made people in Europe give up nationalism for “acceptance of foreigners and immigrants” – precisely the opposite has happened. It’s the bitter rejection of open borders by ordinary people that was the main issue driving this Brexit result.
http://nakedkeynesianism.blogspot.com/2016/06/a-few-brief-comments-on-brexit-and.html
Mark Blyth gives his thoughts here:
Well, yes, this is all very well, Mark, but have you not considered that genuinely decent and normal people voted against the EU because they don’t like the terrible economic and social effects of mass immigration?
Over at Pravda – err, I mean the Guardian, that bastion of left-wing, bubble-world, middle-class delusion, we have this piece by Alan Travis, in which he argues that it was only “fear” of immigration that drove the leave vote, but, inexplicably, not immigration itself!
This is the issue that won’t go away. The mainstream Left is so isolated, arrogant and divorced from reality on this issue, it stinks to high heaven.
However, you can already see a change is underway. Over at Counterpunch, which is firmly left-wing, there is this breath of fresh air, which actually goes so far as to state the truth: yes, it’s the immigration, stupid.
Finally, this is some of the finest analysis of Brexit I have seen so far: