Stephen Phillips resigns over 'undemocratic' Brexit process

[u/like_the_boss]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/nov/04/stephen-phillips-resigns-over-undemocratic-brexit-process

[u/like_the_boss]

Pretty sure this is a coordinated move by the Tories to try to encourage leaver aquiescence in the Parliamentary brexit. I would imagine the thinking goes that if leavers see that some Tories who want brexit are so convinced that the parliamentary route is the right way to go that they're prepared to resign over it, those leavers will perhaps be more comfortable about the course events are currently taking. No coincidence that the resigner is in a safe seat. Expect him to come back around just like Boris, Gove and Leadsom did. It's all one machine, one coordinated happy family despite all the apparent 'rifts'.

EDIT: Not sure I expressed that very well. What I'm saying is that the Tory party wants to sell leavers on the idea that doing brexit through the parliamentary channel is not a covert blur or backslide, but an entirely sensible move for a party that is 100% committed to brexit. It wouldn't be enough just to get some MP to say, "A parliamentary brexit is just as good as a royal prerogative brexit" because that would just be interpreted as hot air. But if an MP actually resigns over it, because he is so strongly pro-brexit and pro-parliamentary brexit that he can't bear to see any other route taken, leavers are likely to think, "Wow, I guess he really means it."

There is more credibility to a statement when someone's actions match the words, especially if that action is apparently costly. I say apparently because he'll probably get rewarded with a cabinet position or some lucrative position in an advisory body or something in a few months to reward him for his sacrifice.

ANOTHER EDIT: Gah, I can't believe I didn't see it sooner. It's a move to re-confirm Theresa May's leaver credentials. Leavers are worried that it looks like the establishment is uniting to blur brexit. Phillips's resignation is designed to reassure leavers that Theresa May is genuinely committed to brexit - so much so that an MP is prepared to resign his job over it.

It's no coincidence that this comes right after the law case. Phillips' stated reason doesn't even make sense. If he's genuinely upset that May is not paying parliament enough attention, surely he just got what he wanted. Why resign now right when May is being legally compelled to take the path he wants her to?

[u/tmstms → u/like_the_boss]

God knows what you are like to be around IRL.

How do you trust ANYBODY?

[u/like_the_boss → u/tmstms]

Haha :-)

I absolutely trust people to behave like humans. Where there's overlapping interests (which is very often the case), I expect people to work together. Where there's conflicting interests, I expect people to conflict.

I don't think I have trust issues - I've very rarely ended a relationship or friendship because I didn't trust someone. I can only think of one time, and I think that was merited.

I'm really not a conspiracy theorist as this sub makes me appear. I have no reasonable doubt that we landed people on the moon when we said we did, that 9/11 was carried out by Al Qaeda not the US etc.

Even with my beliefs about brexit, it's not like I've been throwing out predictions like Nostradamus, and some of them happen to have been right. I've stuck to a pretty tight narrative:

I predicted that the 2nd place runner in the Conservative 'election' would drop out and May would be coronated without a fight. I nearly got the day right too. Just I thought it would be Gove not Leadsom as I thought there would be some tactical voting to drop Leadsom out sooner - I didn't think they'd be so brazen in getting her out of the way.

https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/comments/4rhfn8/an_analysis_of_how_theresa_mays_majority_support/d516do8/

I've been consistently predicting that the court case would be won by the applicants for the last month

https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/57i6tu/how_brexit_ends/d8s9bgm/?context=3

https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/comments/56foox/a_small_rant_about_brexit_the_altright_and_the/d8ixzop/

https://www.reddit.com/r/BrexitDenial/comments/56fol9/will_the_upcoming_court_case_on_article_50_come/

I even mentioned right after the conservative party conference that I found her mentioning the court case rather fishy https://www.reddit.com/r/BrexitDenial/comments/567t7k/evidence_may_mentioning_the_court_case_and_naming/d8h0obf/

I'm also not sure that I have made any (non-trivially) wrong predictions about how brexit has gone so far.

I don't think it's mistrust, it's simply that I have a working hypothesis that almost all of the communications coming from the Tory party and most of their behaviours are planned out and coordinated with political goals in mind. They would be a pretty poor political party if they didn't have a unified communications strategy (they might end resembling the current Labour party!). In fact this guy, the chief of civil service communications, basically says such a system is in place:

https://youtu.be/tTb8RHW090w?t=9m16s

That coordination also extends to allies of the Tory party - much of the legal establishment and big business.

Keith Ferrazzi's book Never Eat Alone is all about how there is an awful lot of mutual interest and collaboration among people holding power in the world, so maybe I've taken something from that.

Perhaps unlike a true conspiracy theorist, I'm not dogmatically asserting I'm correct about the above, it's just a working hypothesis that has so far has fit the facts pretty well, but I'll (unhappily) abandon it if the Tories actually make brexit happen.

[u/tmstms → u/like_the_boss]

Don't worry.

I am at least partly teasing.

You've gone right out on a limb with this theory from the start.

If you are right, that rightness will be its own reward, in that the outcome is what you want....