On the Record | President Trump’s Brexit Opening

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘President Trump’s Brexit Opening’:

London in July, and more than an unusual summer heat wave awaits Britain’s prime minister Theresa May. The Brexit timetable is “hotting up” as ministers prepare to finalize the Government’s list of demands for Brussels, while restive Conservative MPs jostle for position to defenestrate their leader once the European Union deal is done. As tensions heighten, can President Trump offer respite to his beleaguered British counterpart?

The Cabinet meets this Friday at the premier’s country retreat at Chequers, where they will thrash out the Government’s white paper setting out the objectives for its future social, economic, and security relationship with Europe. Too little, too late, is the general consensus, as the formal Brexit separation takes place next March: while various measures and proposals have been drawn up and discussed desultorily, none have benefited from rigorous analysis, and now Brexiteers are fearful that the Cabinet will be presented with a fait accompli, take-it-or-leave-it Damoclean sword dangling over their heads.

Rumors circulate, for instance, that Mrs. May will propose abiding by European single market rules for goods, leaving the corollary of free movement of labor for the UK-EU negotiating table — ostensibly on the grounds that, as the United Kingdom currently abides by these regulations, this trade component can be quickly agreed by the two parties. Yet her critics argue that this concession empowers the EU to continue dictating terms, frustrating British attempts to innovate and compete for international trade agreements. Brussels mandarins, who habitually voice their disdain for Britain’s “independence” initiative, have no incentive to coöperate and encourage discontent on the Continent. They regularly back-foot Mrs. May and her Brexit ministers.

“Nothing durable can be accomplished without the impulse of general concurrence,” wrote Germaine de Staël, during those unfortunate “eras in history when the course of national feeling is dependent on a single man.” Woe to Britain that its fate rests with Theresa May, unloved by Conservatives, and overwhelmed and underwhelming on the Brexit file.

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

On the Record | Brexit’s Exit Light Remains On

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘Brexit’s Exit Light Remains On’:

Queried about the Waterloo battle that witnessed the defeat of Napoleon and his dream of continental conquest, victorious British general the Duke of Wellington replied: “It has been a damned nice thing — the nearest run thing you ever saw in your life.” Brexit supporters doubtless are equally apprehensive about the success of Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union as the two-year anniversary of their momentous vote nears.

From the start, the Brexit campaign was fraught with uncertainty. It began as a throw-away promise by then prime minister David Cameron to placate Europhile MPs in his Conservative caucus, a concession he never thought he’d live to regret until that June 23 vote in 2016 in which a majority of Britons voted for “Leave.” Mr. Cameron resigned and in the race to succeed him three leading Brexit campaigners — Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, and Andrea Leadsom — had their hopes dashed as “Remain” supporter Theresa May won the race.

Whatever euphoria Brexiteers initially may have enjoyed was soon dashed, too. Government plans to proceed with Brexit negotiations with the EU fell afoul of demands that Parliament be consulted. After legislation passed both Houses of Parliament and received Royal Assent Mrs. May, over-confident of her ministry’s support in the country, went to the polls against a seemingly weak opposition to strengthen her hand for future negotiations and badly miscalculated, losing her majority, her momentum, and her credibility in the process.

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

On the Record | Tories Manhandle Brexit at Birthplace of Manchester School

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘Tories Manhandle Brexit at Birthplace of Manchester School’:

“Our first and most important duty is to get Brexit right.” So vows Prime Minister Theresa May at the conclusion of the Conservative conference at Manchester. In the early 19^th century, this northern English city nurtured faith in free trade. Led by Richard Cobden and John Bright, the “Manchester School” rose to protest agricultural protection against imports of cheap foreign wheat from feeding England’s working poor. In time, Manchester came to represent the principles of free trade and economic liberty; so much so that, according to one economic historian, “Manchester liberalism has come to mean a policy that relies on the market as much as it can and somewhat more than it ought.”

(As October is anniversary of the infamous “Charge of the Light Brigade,” a topical aside: Florence Nightingale, heroine of the Crimean War and founder of the Victorian Order of Nurses, spoke out in favor of a strong British army; she thus castigated the Manchester School’s pacifism that wished to cut army expenditures, which “made a deity of cheapness.”)

Yet little of the ghost of the Manchester School walked among Tory conference delegates, whose sympathy for interventionist welfare economics influences the party much as it did before the era of Margaret Thatcher. Only the conference’s Brexit segment gives cause for encouragement, with two stand-out performances.

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

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May I wish friends and supporters Happy ‘Canadian’ Thanksgiving!

On the Record | Brexit cunning leaves Eurocrats nonplussed

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘Brexit cunning leaves Eurocrats nonplussed’:

Baldrick, of Blackadder fame, a member of Team Brexit? Who knew? For the uninitiated, Blackadder is a British comedy series, starring Rowan Atkinson (of Mr. Bean renown) in the title role, as various scheming rogues through the march of history. Tony Robinson plays his dogsbody Baldrick, who in times of crisis invariably says, “I have a cunning plan.”

Baldrick’s “outing” as the fourth Brexiteer — the three UK Government principals are David Davis at Exiting the European Union, Liam Fox at International Trade, and Boris Johnson at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office — comes courtesy of this Politico headline, “Brussels fears Britain’s ‘Brexit chaos’ part of cunning plan.” EU officials are nonplussed at the cool nonchalance of their Westminster counterparts. “Trade attachés in particular who know their British colleagues as tough, canny negotiators are suspicious of the seemingly fickle and aimless procrastination from the British government,” Politico reports. “The Brits’ chaotic early posture in the Brexit talks has left them wondering whether London is pulling some sort of deft ploy — a strategy of pretending not to have a strategy.”

One EU official is worried that when negotiations resume in September, the British team is “going to swamp us with [position] papers on the fault lines — exactly the issues where they know we [the EU27 countries] are divided.” Further remarks from the Maltese prime minister will encourage Brits anxious over their government’s competence to pull the country out of the European Union. “People who say the Brits don’t know what they are doing are wrong,” Joseph Muscat told the Dutch daily de Volkskrant. “I have lived in Britain, I know the British mentality. A non-prepared British government official simply doesn’t exist.” But Brexiteers shouldn’t get cocky. “A seasoned EU diplomat said that if London had constructed an elaborate ruse to gain the upper hand in Brexit, it had fooled even the British negotiators,” according to Politico. “If it is indeed a mise en scène, this diplomat said: ‘It would be an extremely sophisticated one.’”

As I conclude:

In the end, all we can do is wait and trust in the skill, strategy, and foresight of the Brexit negotiators. As Blackadder fans will attest, poor Baldrick’s cunning plans were outlandish nonsense, meant to evoke scorn from his superior and laughter from the audience. And Brexit is no laughing matter. But Baldrick is just the sort of patriotic “everyman,” common in English theatre, who voted for Brexit and whom the Government serves: he is full of ideas for making good — for himself, his family, and his nation. As long as his cunning never tires, never fear, for Britain will prosper. “It is the highest impertinence and presumption, therefore, in kings and ministers, to pretend to watch over the economy of private people,” Adam Smith wrote of the ruling class of his day. “Let them look well after their own expense, and they may safely trust private people with theirs. If their own extravagance does not ruin the state, that of their subjects never will.” Trust in the people animates Brexit. No wonder the EU is flummoxed.

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

On the Record | Tony Blair struts and frets his hour upon the stage to frustrate the people’s Brexit

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘Tony Blair struts and frets his hour upon the stage to frustrate the people’s Brexit’:

Nothing so annoys an audience as the artless ham who simply won’t get off the stage, trying their patience. Just so former prime minister Tony Blair, as he loiters on the UK political stage, with his incessant need for the spotlight, as put-upon Britons await the needful theatre hook to yank him back to the wings and, with him, his tireless and tiring crusade against Brexit — Britain’s escape from the étatist European Union.

“I think it’s possible now that Brexit doesn’t happen,” Mr. Blair confided to a Sky News interviewer. “I think it’s absolutely necessary that it doesn’t happen because I think every day is bringing us fresh evidence that it’s doing us damage economically, certainly doing us damage politically.”

This pro-EU platform is well-trod by Mr. Blair (once a contender for its presidency), and the Continental project of ever greater integration of its member-states. Britain only escaped the catastrophe of the single currency because Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown insisted that five conditions be met before Britain signed on to the Euro, and internal Labour Party tensions meant that Blair thought twice before crossing his Chancellor.

But the Labour prime minister had no qualms about crossing the electorate. He promised and eventually reneged on giving Britons a voice on a “federated” European constitution, released from his pledge when the plan of an EU super-state failed to pass muster in several other countries. Brussels bureaucrats obfuscated and simply passed the legislation as the Lisbon Treaty, a constitution in all but name. It was Conservative premier David Cameron who ultimately gave the people a choice, which earned him Mr. Blair’s opprobrium for bowing to his Euroskeptic Tories’ demand for democratic accountability. Mr. Blair came out against the 2016 referendum and campaigned for Remain, and has continued to snipe ever since, even threatening to re-enter the political arena at the time of last June’s general election. True to form, as Fleet Street busily reports on Brexit difficulties (real or imagined) with the EU negotiating team, once more our aging pantomime artist slaps on the grease paint and heads out before the Krieg lights.

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

On the Record | Making a Case for Trump’s Entrepreneurial Inaugural Address

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘Making a Case for Trump’s Entrepreneurial Inaugural Address’:

PRESS RELEASE

Hell’s Justice Department issues forth this “Devil’s Advocate” brief…

We are compelled to respond to the Institute of Economic Affairs’ policy head Ryan Bourne’s excellent analysis of President Donald Trump’s paean to protectionism in his first Inaugural Address. (See how we devils like to taunt our colleagues in the #NeverTrump department?) In response to the President’s admonition to “Buy American and Hire American,” Bourne replies that “If Trump goes down the protectionist route, he’ll be hurting American consumers and the growth potential of the US economy.”

In general, we agree with Bourne on the benefits of free trade: lower prices, greater and more diverse availability of goods and services, specialization as a facet of the division of labor, greater productivity, and overall more wealth for all. Yet it also behooves us to mention drawbacks to free trade, for those who lose their jobs to foreign competition and who must either take up new employment with lower emoluments, re-train, or relocate to more financially promising communities. Some, sadly, will find all these alternatives unpalatable or impossible to fulfill. In the larger scheme of things, these are short-term drawbacks, but for the individuals and families involved, they are no small matter and the negative impact can be great.

Nevertheless, we Devil’s Advocates can point to two elements of President Trump’s Inaugural that may give free traders consolation.

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

On the Record | Must the Blue States Remain Blue and Depressed?

Please see my latest wire for The American Spectator, ‘Must the Blue States Remain Blue and Depressed?’:

Has President-elect Donald Trump a mandate to govern? Debate roils on. While he captured the Electoral College, 306-to-232, critics respond that “popular” momentum lies with Hillary Clinton, who won by more than 2.6 million ballots. Trump supporters counter that in presidential politics, it’s the state-by-state tally that matters; otherwise, Republicans would have played a different ground game. Meanwhile, a world away from this partisan sniping, ordinary Americans eke out their existence. And in this all-important contest, Democrats are clearly losing.

So argues Trump economic adviser Stephen Moore. In a column charting the migration to business-friendly states from those burdened with over-government (analysed by Moore in ALEC’s Rich States, Poor States, co-authored with economists Arthur Laffer and Jonathan Williams), he describes the “economic depression in the blue states that went for Hillary.”

All have the hallmarks of Democrat politics. “High taxes rates. High welfare benefits. Heavy regulation. Environmental extremism. Super minimum wages.” And all are losing taxpayers to those red states where the government footprint is less intrusive, more welcoming to wealth creators. Americans are voting with their feet, to Texas and Florida from California and New York.

As I conclude:

It is time for Democrat states to throw off their artificial fetters, invigorate entrepreneurial innovation, and no longer be blue in spirit. They may not convert to red politically, but they can stop being “in” the red and prosper once more by being in the black. The Empire State, for one, should take a lesson from Tammany Hall sachem George Washington Plunkitt: “I seen my opportunities and I took ’em.”

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My thanks to editor Wlady Pleszczynski of The American Spectator.

On the Record | Trump Tariff Threat Gains Tactical Victory in Kentucky

Please see my first wire for The American Spectator, ‘Trump Tariff Threat Gains Tactical Victory in Kentucky’:

A mere fortnight after becoming President-elect, Donald Trump’s tariff threat gained a tactical victory in the battle to keep American jobs at home.

Trump announced via Twitter that Ford Motor Company intentions to transfer SUV production south of the border were shelved. Chairman Bill Ford “advised me that he will be keeping the Lincoln plant in Kentucky — no Mexico,” Trump tweeted last Thursday.

“During his campaign, Trump was relentless in his criticism of Ford for planning to move all its North American small-car production to Mexico,” Bloomberg reported, “where wages are 80 percent lower than in the U.S.” Critics argued that Ford had intended to relocate only the Lincoln MKC but, in response to the tweet, “the company acknowledged for the first time it had been considering moving production of the MKC to Mexico” following the expiration of the union contract, albeit to allow Ford to focus on its Escape model which outsells Lincoln, 12-to-1.

Nevertheless, Trump supporters, Kentucky politicians, and union members rejoice at the news. But this is only the beginning. The company issued a statement that the future of Ford production in America was contingent on the belief that “President-elect Trump and the new Congress will pursue policies that will improve U.S. competitiveness.” And therein lies the rub, for producers and consumers alike.

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My thanks to editors Wlady Pleszczynski and F.H. Buckley of The American Spectator.

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DMI wishes its American friends a happy Thanksgiving Day!