I've seen the argument this article trots out that the referendum should've required a supermajority a lot, but it always seems more like an attempt to block something the author doesn't want than an actual principled argument.<p>There was no supermajority required to take the major and quite possibly irreversible step of joining the EU. Indeed, there was no referendum on it at all; the 1975 referendum was on leaving after we'd already joined, and came with the same terrifying warnings about the perils of leaving as the more recent one. The government of the time just decided to join and put it through parliament like any other law. It squeaked through the House of Commons on an incredibly tight 309-301 vote...
There is a great Alvin Toffler quote that foretold this:
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One of the functions of a legislature is to negotiate compromises among various constituencies. Well, the constituencies today are so numerous, their demands are so complex, and the rate of change in their demands and in the constituencies is so high that nobody in Congress represents anybody anymore. They represent themselves. Because their constituency changes from day to day. And as a consequence, their ability to broker out differences to arrive at compromise is more limited than it was.
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The law of the universe dictates that our world is always moving toward entropy (chaos) no matter what, and things will keep getting more and more chaos everyday.<p>These so called "elite" politicians are after all just homo sapiens, thus limited by human capabilities. They are nothing more special than you and me. Nobody really has any fucking clue what's going on or how to fix it. Nobody has been more wrong throughout the history than those expert economists. Everybody sort of just wings it and hope they will get lucky. Even a broken clock is correct twice a day.<p>This shows you what a clusterfuck we are all in. Stop fighting, go get a drink and just enjoy the ride as there's nothing we can do to fight against the force of entropy. Shit will sort itself out.
A system failed not the ‘elites’. This was a referendum we should never have had. This was a referendum that was badly executed. This was a referendum whose result was impossible to achieve. This is a disaster of a modern democracy.<p>Never have a referendum that doesn’t explain in detail how to achieve either result. If you can’t explain how to achieve the results then it’s not a matter that is appropriate for a referendum. Brexit falls squarely in the latter camp.
This is a time where the monarch can and should apply mild pressure. That’s kind of the benefit of a monarchy, they have the long term interest at heart and can (used sparingly) knock people into place
I'm not sure how this is a failure of the elite. The elite want to be in the EU and we are still in the EU. That doesn't seem to be a failure to me. That seems to be a success.
Perhaps if the Brexit referendum required 66% or some other supermajority, this would not be so hard to make happen.<p>I don't know enough about Brexit to know whether I would be in the leave or remain camp if I was allowed to vote in the referendum, but I do know that they screwed up in the beginning by making this massive decision only need 50% + 1 vote in order to be passed. However, since those were the rules of the game, I do think they should go forward with it.
how is it a failure? they are in power. all a politician should care about is getting into power and remaining in power (and gracefully exiting gracefully before people shoot you out) they promised a referendum because that's what people wanted in order to vote for them. success #1.<p>they held the referendum and accepted the result, based their policy on it, because that was people had voted for. the result was winning an election and clinging to power. success #2.<p>perhaps the new leader of the tories will do things differently and ignore the referendum, but that will only be a succcess if he manages to win the election. but to me it seems unlikely that will be a succesful strategy especially with that corbyn dude breathing down your neck. papers like the economist tend to dismiss him as an extremist, but he's a man with an affinity for populism and a serious problem for the tories.<p>apparantly chooosing your schoolmates to be your running mate is the recipe for success in politics. perhaps power is all about whom you can trust. maybe boris johnson is an idiot, but he is someone who has affinity for the common man, she knows him from way back and she knows he would not stab her in the back. that makes him a rather useful idiot.
From my reading of Brexit it appears that there are a lot of elites on both sides of the fight...<p>Just seems to me that one side of elites has co-opted the non-elites more effectively on this occasion.