Question about Brexit

No English problem here. I quite like the English. This is afterall a Brexit thread on an English motorcycle forum so let's put the Civil War talk away.

Nice talking to you Freddie, agree to disagree and no hard feelings!
none taken fella. be a boring pub if everyone supported the same team. take care and ride safe
 
I've heard so many times the Civil War wasn't about slavery I could puke.

The economy in the Confederacy hinged on cheap labor (slavery) and the Union sought to end slavery, thus gutting the slave-based economy. Of course it was about money. If you fought for the Confederacy, you were fighting to maintain slavery (States Rights was a subterfuge). If you fought for the Union, you were fighting to end it. The Union won the war and slavery ended. The economy in the former Confederacy took years to recover and still depends a great deal upon cheap(er) labor. The idea that Lee and Jackson were anti-slavery is based upon propaganda used to get the population behind the war and fight with a "clear conscience" thinking they weren't fighting for slavery but for their individual States. They were likely like a lot of educated Southerners; they turned up their noses at the stench of slavery but the money it made them and their friends didn't bother them at all.

You can gloss over Rommel and his like, but he fought to make the world a Nazi-dominated place. Fortunately, Rommel lost, because Hitler miscalculated the amount of fuel needed to prosecute the war. Tanks stalled before they got to Russia for lack of fuel. Meanwhile, the trains kept a-runnin to Auschwitz and Buchenwald. Slavery and Nazism are not gone, but they do not dominate as they would have if both wars would have ended differently.

You mix many points. And you home in on selective ones...

Example: the idea that Rommel lost because Hitler miscalculated the fuel needs! Yes, he may have done, but there were many more complexities that lead to the result, than that one fact!

I’m not sure what the rest of you points about ridding the world of slavery and nazism are intended to achieve. I’m British remember... slavery was abolished here way before it was even in the Union states. And Britain faced off the Nazis alone for several years before you guys showed up. And Britain sacrificed her own Empire to quash the Nazis. So we’re clearly on the same side there!

As to the rest, we have differing opinions, but we’re not alone there. History and politics do that a lot. Mix them together and you’re lucky to find two people in a room who agree!
 
You mix many points. And you home in on selective ones...

Example: the idea that Rommel lost because Hitler miscalculated the fuel needs! Yes, he may have done, but there were many more complexities that lead to the result, than that one fact!

I’m not sure what the rest of you points about ridding the world of slavery and nazism are intended to achieve. I’m British remember... slavery was abolished here way before it was even in the Union states. And Britain faced off the Nazis alone for several years before you guys showed up. And Britain sacrificed her own Empire to quash the Nazis. So we’re clearly on the same side there!

As to the rest, we have differing opinions, but we’re not alone there. History and politics do that a lot. Mix them together and you’re lucky to find two people in a room who agree!
if the Japanese hadn't bombed pearl harbour you would still be watching from afar as we kept you safe. lend lease? bend over while we really screw you! radar , steam catapult, jet engine. no need for a patent chaps. they've just given it to us!
 
and as for the rhetoric of chuck yeager. about saving us again! check out the miles m.52. or maybe the tsr2. you've had bloody a labour government have us over so many times! yeager wouldn't have got near the sound barrier. then see how we did it a few weeks later with a proper plane!
 
and as for the rhetoric of chuck yeager. about saving us again! check out the miles m.52. or maybe the tsr2. you've had bloody a labour government have us over so many times! yeager wouldn't have got near the sound barrier. then see how we did it a few weeks later with a proper plane!
or chobam armour for your tanks maybe?
 
yeager went for the barrier in a space suit. we went for it with a leather cap and a pair of doctor martins! lol. joke you lot on the other side of the pond!
 
Let's not get into a dick measuring contest, we ALL know how that will end...
 
What is important is that Hitler and the Japanese Imperialism were defeated, looking through your own glasses gives but one tint to a scene, try the other on first before jumping to a conclusion, it may surprise you.
 
I can’t leave misinformed assertions sbout the American Civil War stand unchallenged.

The North was loaded with racists who didn’t care enough about slavery to go to war over it.

The tariff - largely against British/Euro goods - was paid by agricultural states and protected Northern manufacturing states.

The tariff was THE primary revenue for the federal government.

Revenues from the tariff were spent disproportionately in the North.

Yes there were some religious extremists who thought killing people - War - was righteous if it abolished slavery.

So, slavery was Lincoln’s fig leaf; he talked slavery when his motive actually was about the North’s economic exploitation of the South. THAT is why the South seceded - BREXIT - and THAT is why Lincoln - the EU - went to war.

Lincoln could not admit that he was motivated by the tariffs that were paid by the agrarian South and which protected the manufacturing North. THAT is why Lincoln grabbed the fig leaf of slavery.

Yes, there was a coalition between the religious abolitionists and the commercial interests of Lincoln’s Republicans. To that extent, the war WAS about abolition.

Yes, the South was defending slavery too, just as yes, some of the support for BREXIT is arguably racist. That fact is important but it does not eradicate the fact that MONEY is a driving motive

The standard story, taught by the winners, and taught by the government schools, tells one side, leaving out the money motive side. We see the same today in the BBC bias regarding BREXIT
 
Last edited:
Ok so iv'e changed my mind ! Not blaming the Vikings anymore. Homosapiens are the problem ! Neanderthals had so much going for them, until us lot balls it up. The world will continue to spin long after our species are extinct. Nobody to remember what a load of .....heads we are. The planet will look after itself without us and has done for a couple of years. Unions, management, and the uncivil service. Really, just enjoy today. Mind you, it's too cold for a ride out for this dinosaur.
 
I was born 7 days before Pearl Harbour, so I was a baby in Melbourne during WW2. I knew what anxiety was and to us the Yank soldiers were the best guys on the planet. I still cannot believe that most of them were conscripts. In Australia, we have compulsory voting, but we rarely ever conscript for military service. Nor do we ever shoot one on ten of our soldiers, if they jack-up on the battle field. It is a different situation if you are there voluntarily to that if you are conscripted. Most of our guys volunteer because they believe in 'a fair go' - that might be indoctrination - I don't know, but they are usually extremely effective when they fight. It probably has something to do with our convict past and collectivism.
 
I have relatives who were journalists for The Guardian in the UK. They now live in Australia. When they first arrived, John Howard was Prime Minister. They could not believe what he was getting away with - stuff which would never wash in the UK. What happened with Murdoch in the UK was barely mentioned in the Australian media.
 
Bonza to the ANZACS, we would have been up Sh.t without them and the yanks. We are a little 3rd world country now, but our politicians seem to think we are something special ? Laughing stock of the world, have you seen the kindergarden called Westminster ? Kids today are more savvy and polite. Okay sometimes !
 
According to an article I just googled, England will become what is defined in EU treaties as a "third country" not exactly third world, but not aligned with USA (1st world) Russia (2nd) or the EU.

Kinda like a lonely little turd circling the drain...
 
Nigel once said 'Australians have a chip on their shoulders'. We don't like to feel inferior to anyone, but I recognise the reality. The British have been done over so thoroughly over the last couple of hundred years, they would never be so naïve that they would cop what Australians cop from our politicians. I have watched video of the British parliament - they almost talk in Morse code and yet are far more effective than any of our guys have ever been. If we had a British politician in our Australian parliament, they might as well talk in Swahili, for all the understanding they would get.
 
Transit 3rd world country then. Stepping stone for something even better. Immigration no issue for me, we raped half the world for our gain and now it's payback time.
 
Back
Top