Nick Cohen, one of my favourite writers on Brexit, has another gem of an article in The Guardian about Farage's supporters and how they lap up the lies. This is something that has always fascinated me. How otherwise intelligent people reject anything with HM government's seal on it, from The Treasury for example, or from trusted members of the media, especially the broadcasters with strict impartiality rules, in favour of solid gold fibs from charlatans like Farage. They do because it reinforces their own prejudices.
Cohen says:
"The louder they scream 'all politicians are liars', the harder they fall for the big lie from their chosen demagogue. Political scientists define devoted supporters of Farage, Trump and Corbyn as “low-trust” voters, who believe nothing they hear on the news. And yet they turn as trusting as children when their great leaders lead them on. In the case of Brexit, they are easy to lead and to fool."
And they certainly are. Some Brexit Party supporters, 3000 reportedly, paid £100 for the privilege of just getting onto the list of parliamentary candidates only to be told almost immediately that they hadn't been selected, That's another £300K in the bank then. Meanwhile, the party's list is stuffed with Farage's mates and acolytes. Yet the grassroots still support him!
James Melville had an article in The Byline Times on a wider if similar theme. That leave voters hopes have been exploited by men (and women) who did it for their own ends:
"Hope is a powerful thing. Politicians ruthlessly exploit it. And with Brexit, it has been exploited to such a high degree that it has become a political sting. Brexit is the greatest political heist that Britain has ever seen. A gigantic con led by a group of right-wing libertarians who have exploited the hopes of millions of people to convince them that they were taking back control, when in fact, they were giving control away to the people who conned them. So instead of making things better, Brexit will make things a lot worse. Britain will become a place where the hope becomes hopeless."
Melville says it isn't the Bulgarian immigrant looking for a better life who has shafted the country but Tory politicians who wear "bespoke pinstripe suits in Parliament; who have exceedingly good manners and faux politeness and who many people in Britain have a peculiar trait of forelock tugging towards." I am sorry to say he's right.
But what is the betting that when it eventually dawns on the average leave voter that he has been sold a pack of lies, another charlatan, one who may not even be a public figure at the moment, will not be waiting with an even bigger pack of lies - which they will once more readily accept, provided he or she has that certain undefinable something that gives a veneer of truth to a lie or credibility to more nonsense.
Never was it so true that the people get the government they deserve.
This also plays into the 'groupthink' mentality that Richard North raised recently where evidence is ignored in favour of received thinking. This goes on in all organisations, even the best run and most professional ones, but this is usually where evidence against the mainstream is thin and counter intuitive. Nobody can say that on Brexit. In fact it's completely the opposite.
Sajid Javid, the Chancellor, has refused to publish an up to date economic impact assessment, saying that, "My starting point is that agreeing the Withdrawal Agreement is self-evidently in our economic interest,". No need to bother with any evidence - just accept it, it's self evident. As far as 99% of serious economists are concerned it is anything but. This is what worries me.
The idea that Brexit is a benefit to anyone is now so ingrained in a huge chunk of the population that even the man in charge of the public finances dare not openly challenge it. Javid isn't all that different to Phillip Hammond, a man we all know is a remainer who thinks Brexit is a very bad idea, but even he only allowed himself to say "nobody voted to be poorer". Hardly a rallying cry to the remain cause. Perhaps we shouldn't be too hard on either of them. The die was cast when Cameron gave in to pressure and called a referendum. The act itself lent credence to the idea that leaving or remaining were two equivalent options. We are slowly discovering that they are not.
A recent poll by Opinium for The Guardian (giving the Tories a 16 point lead over Labour) finds that 57% now think holding the referendum in the first place was a mistake, against 29% who believe it wasn't. I would wager a lot that the 29% are among the least qualified to understand what Brexit even means.
On the topic of polls, something to watch out for over the coming weeks is the size of the Tory lead. The Guardian polling claims it as 16%, while over at The Daily Mail and The Telegraph it's down to 8%. I have noticed how each side provides polling data calculated to encourage their own voters.
Amazing that but it's always so.
