Wednesday, 13 April 2016

Toryland's Every Pillar

And now, the IMF.

Moreover, much as it pains me to agree with Nick Cohen, he is right that no one in what is in any case the imaginary "Anglosphere" would have slightest interest in Britain outside the EU.

Not even the Australian Liberal-National Coalition, which is normally revered by those proponents of such things, admittedly a very small minority of the total, who know the first thing about Australia, Canada or New Zealand.

From that and everyone else of any importance in the "Anglosphere", to the IMF, via the military top brass, the City, the CBI, the upper echelons of the Church of England, the only Royal intervention that has not been made up by The Sun, and of course the Conservative Party itself: Toryland must face the fact that its every pillar is in favour of continued British membership of the EU.

Apart from the licensed dissent of one or two columnists apiece, the Tory papers (they have no ideology, only loyalty to the party) will come into line as the referendum day draws near. And at that point, the set will be complete, the house will be full.

If there is a vote to Remain, then it will be partly for that reason, and partly because so many people simply could not bring themselves to vote with the anti-EU Right, especially UKIP. It will be, in no small measure, UKIP's fault for existing at all.

But it will not affect relations with the Commonwealth, to which, contrary to the fantasies of the Loony Right, there is rather a lot more than even the real Australia, Canada and New Zealand, never mind those countries as they exist in actual fact.

Enoch Powell despised the Commonwealth. The 1980s Radical Right, which now lauds it as an alternative to the EU, used to call for Britain to leave it.

In no part of the Commonwealth has time stood still since 1973, waiting for the return of whatever is imagined to have been the previous relationship with Britain. The Commonwealth has never been either a trading bloc or a military alliance.

What it has always been, and what it remains, is a cultural club, as a perfectly legitimate end in itself. It should be celebrated in those terms. Terms that have nothing to do with EU membership, one way or the other.

4 comments:

  1. Incidentally, we'll see how "made up" the Sun's story about the Queen was, when it wins the case.

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    1. What, it's going go beat the Queen? Course it is, dear. Course it is.

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    2. Something to look forward to, isn't it? The Queen's official spokesman will be asked what happened, he will answer, and that will be that. Case closed. If he says it then it's not just the truth, it's the law. Anyone who doesn't like that can fuck off back to America and Australia.

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    3. If they are stupid enough to take it that far. Perhaps they are? Between this and Hillsborough, The Sun will go down to the jeering of the entire country and of the entire political spectrum.

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