BC BREXIT
Saved by @Mollyycolllinss

1. This beautiful and thought provoking piece of 21st century art was shared widely in anti-EU Facebook groups, Twitter replies to journalists and elsewhere online, in 2016.

Is it an untrackable, untraceable, Cambridge Analytica-style, fake?

 2. The design is obviously substandard, to be charitable .

But look a bit closer, it appears intentionally bad.
3. A lightning strike blended through a Union Jack is not the work of a beginner, in Photoshop.
4. Is it believable that a designer capable of creating that effect in Photoshop, would also be virtually illiterate?

Literate enough to spell “Sovereignty” correctly.
5. But not literate enough to spell “corrupt”.
6. Does that seem likely?

Cambridge Analytica boasted on hidden camera that they created “untraceable, untrackable” social media themes, memes and propaganda that spread.
7. In undercover footage Cambridge Analytica’s CEO said:

“We put the information into the bloodstream of the internet and watch it grow.

Give it a little push.

This stuff infiltrates the online community and expands.

With no branding.

So it’s unattributable, untrackable"
8. So, where’s it from?

It’s impossible to find out unless you work at Facebook or Google.

But there are some strange clues.
9. Google image search shows nothing.

TinEye reverse image search shows that it was first saved by their web crawler in 2016.

A few days before the EU referendum in the UK.
10. One of the very first signs of the meme on the internet were from a Twitter user called: “johnny”

With the username “niteoflight”.

Note the strange spelling and grammar; ‘re_election'
11. The user “Johnny”’s favourite news outlet, the one Johnny shared the most often, was Russia Today (RT).

(A table of Johnny's most shared accounts on Twitter)
12. Niteoflight “Johnny” went quiet in early 2018, after 4 years of activity of tweeting.

Unusually for a pro-Brexit British man named Johnny, he often used “Beeter”.

An obscure Japanese Twitter app, to Tweet.
13. During his time on Twitter, Johnny’s unusual approach to the English language made some people suspect he might not be a real person.
14. "Politiants & mister’s, Chukka will Drive the 350"

"Take one get one free. "
15. Strange.

But probably just a random weird guy, from the UK?

Who can’t really speak English.

Who likes Russian government TV more than any other news outlet.

Who uses a defunct, obscure Japanese language Twitter app, to post to Twitter.
16. We can’t really know where this meme appeared first.

But searching back further, the earliest example of this meme that we could find was not on Google, Twitter or Facebook.
17. The earliest appearance of the 40 YEARS EU RULE meme was on Vkontakte, or VK, the Russian version of Facebook (a clone).

The first evidence of it anywhere online, is from a guy called “Martin Corner”. Who posted the meme on Russian Facebook (VK), on the 3rd of June 2016.
18. 'Martin Corner' on VK purports to be a far right person based in the North of England.

The people who liked the 40 YEARS EU RULE post on VK purport to be English neo-Nazis and fascists, if their posts on VK are to be believed.
19. Like this guy, who liked the 40 YEARS EU RULE meme on Vkontakte: He's called ‘Chad Ingverbart’.

He loves Hitler and IKEA candles.

But hates the EU.

Who’d have thought.
20. He seemed bored in 2016.
21. Whatever the truth, this meme was not an amateur creation that has gone viral.
22. The evidence could suggest that someone made it to look amateur.

Seeded it online via various “independent” groups and activists, who spread it so that it multiplied across social media without being tracked back to the creators.
23. It is “unbranded, untraceable” and spread by 'activists'.

Just like the Cambridge Analytica salesman boasted in the undercover footage.
24. The full undercover report from the UK’s Channel 4 News is here.

https://t.co/4YNFn0gV0K
25. Very genuine. Very cool. It could never happen here!

Welcome to the @TrollZoo ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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Ireland's foreign min @SimonCoveney says there will be no breakthru at the #euco this wk, that EU fishermen will not be "sold out" in order to secure a future relationship deal, and that if there is a deal it will not be ratified unless the UK "remove" Internal Mkt Bill clauses

2/ Speaking at the General Affairs Council Mr Coveney said: “We value fishermen, we value their contribution across the EU and cerainly EU fishermen are not going to be sold out in an effort to get an agreement on a future relationship with the UK on trade.”

3/ He said that while there had been some progress on the level playing field area, there had been “little or no” movement on fisheries. Both sides, he said, had legitimate concerns on the issue.

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I really can’t see how, after the last four and half years, the breakup of the UK can be avoided. What a historical irony that a Brexit intended to make Britain ‘great again’ actually brings about the demise of ‘Great’ Britain.

I actually don’t see this as a bad thing. After all, the aggressive chauvinistic nationalism, hubris, and exceptionalism that made Brexit possible is predominantly an English phenomenon. Part of the historical paradox whereby Englishness expresses itself through Britishness,

without explicitly recognising that this nationalism is primarily embedded in England rather than the Celtic periphery. A United Ireland is long overdue. Scotland - regardless of the debates about the economic viability of independence- has reached the point when a decisive

breach now seems inevitable. If this happens, Wales may well follow. Then, finally, England will have to decide what it wants to be, and look at the flaws and failings - political, economic, and constitutional - that it has put off dealing with, or blamed on others

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Amid all the announcements today, it's easy to overlook that the OBR has updated its scenario on a no-deal Brexit. It exposes an undeniably hard reality for the Govt that claims that the UK would "prosper mightily" under no-deal next year.

(Short thread)

1. Key chart: a no-deal/WTO/Australia-style Brexit would delay the point at which econ output regains its pre-virus peak by "almost a year to the third quarter of 2023."

In the upside scenario, this cross-over point could be at the start of 2022; in the downside, in 2025. Grim.


2. Next year, a no deal Brexit would reduce real GDP by around a further 2% - as a result of immediate disruption to the border and uncertainty facing businesses. That's on top of the Covid-related contraction.


3. While there's some short-term border disruption, most of the costs come in the medium term: from lost employment; productivity losses; lower business investment.

Exactly the opposite of what the Chancellor said to @AndrewMarr9 on Sunday.

4. Underneath these numbers, output would fall *below* the Covid levels for several key sectors: Manufacturing, professional services, financial services, retail, energy.

All trade intensive sectors that have been spared the same drop in output as the non-tradables this year.
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When Jacob Rees Mogg threw dead fish into the Thames at WETminster, I thought, like most of you, he was making a point on behalf of the Fishing INDUSTRY.

It was only yesterday that we all learned he was acting on behalf of the FISH.

Fish happiness, not Brexit, was the goal!


In the year before #Brexit started -
(note: Brexit was not done, it's just begun)
- I worried about those most impacted.

My logic was while those wishing to remain would be most disappointed, they would also be most prepared.

#BrexitDeal would hurt its supporters.
Starting ☝️


Two reasons were anticipated.

1. Famously the economic consequences would hurt Leave voters the most (albeit no one expected the madness of combining #Brexit with #Covid19)

2. Sovereignty and independence would be reversed; we'd end up with less of both (as we have).

Number 3?

We didn't spend enough time on No.3. Few anticipated only 15 days of #Brexit would be needed.

Also a dilemma. It would have needed remainers to be listened to. Or leavers to question #Brexit.

3. What happens: A small leave group realise the con; disagree with Leave Mainstream?


No 3: And now
Mogg boasts of having fish back while:

* The fishing industry is in arms; screaming betrayal
* Some fisheries are already bankrupting
* Because fish we can't sell is rotting

Yet Jake's happy the fish are happy.
Almost as if ☝️ he had nothing to do with this
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Update from MEP @PeterLiese, health spokesman for the largest party in the EU Parliament (thread):

He maintains #AstraZeneca is treating people in EU as "2nd class citizens" and that doses have gone from the EU to the UK.

"They gave 3 different explanations in less than a week"


Carrot: He's says objections are with AZ behaviour, not vaccine's efficacy

"There's been a lot of talk about AZ being a bad vaccine - very strange fake news in German media. It's definitely not true"

"If someone offered me AZ, and it’s my turn, I wouldn’t hesitate for a minute"

“The AstraZeneca vaccine has not as good data as the vaccines from BioNTech/Pfizer and Moderna but still it is a good vaccine. In October, we would have been happy to have a vaccine that has an efficiency well above 50%."

Stick: "AZ gave 3⃣ different explanations in less than a week why there is a shortage of supply on the European continent and why they want to deliver only 31 million doses instead of 80 million that they committed to in the contract until the end of March."

1⃣ "1st explanation was different supply chains. This is wrong because in contract with the EU, two plants in the UK are mentioned for the supply on the continent and at least until a few days ago the final finishing of the vaccine [for UK] has been in a plant in Dessau, Germany"
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