How's it hanging in Brexitland? Politicians fiddle while Brits stare catastrophe in the face

With mere weeks to go before Britain crashes deal-less out of the European Union, where are we now?

Britain is leaving the EU just as Japan's ground-breaking trade pact with the EU kicks in, making those combined forces the world's largest trading body and one in which we still (for a nanosecond or two) have a major say.

The rest of the world's trade is blowing up under US tariffs, trade wars and imminent hot wars, while the WTO, which is supposed to be our life-raft after Brexit, has been marked for death by Trump.

Theresa May's principle-free efforts to push through Brexit at all costs are so unpopular that there were suggestions she might even have to call upon the Queen to overrule Parliament and force it through by royal decree ... until 25 Labour rebels helped her out by abstaining or voting against Yvette Cooper's attempt to extend Article 50. If the Queen had done so, it would have been the first use of the royal prerogative of prorogation (shutting down Parliament) in 300 years.

Someone's taking back control, but it isn't us.

Meanwhile, facial recognition technology is forced on UK citizens in expectation of riots on a No Deal Brexit, with one guy in Romford fined on the spot £90 for not complying. Cold War plans are being revived to evacuate the Queen and the royals to "safety" and away from the civil unrest (in other words, legitimate protest) that the rest of us will be coping with.

Goodbye NHS, already eyed up by Farage et al for privatisation, the 80 per cent of our fresh food that comes from Europe, libraries, anything that gave some bare bones to the nation's infrastructure for working class people.  It was already being clawed back. Brexit accelerates the process.

Perhaps Jeremy Corbyn's Brexit-supporting coterie is co-operating with the Tories because they hope that in the ensuing chaos, they will win power. Triggering Article 50 and then doing the bare minimum in the Remain campaign to the extent that swathes of the population have no idea where Labour stands on Brexit, against a legally questionable Leave campaign, may have seemed like a good idea to Lexiteers stuck in the 1970s. However, I have news for them: this is the right's revolution. Not the left's.

Despite John McDonnell's touching faith that Labour MPs will never accept Theresa May's bribes, there are some like John Mann ("Show me the money!") willing to take the Tory shilling when much of the problem was created by Tory austerity in the first place. I am even more doubtful about good faith on offer after Corbyn took no disciplinary action against the 25 pro-Brexit Labour MPs — including 8 front-benchers — who refrained from voting or voted against Yvette Cooper's attempt to extend Article 50, a chance for a second referendum. As every good tailor knows, you have to measure twice and cut once to make sure. So what gives?

How will Labour play the post-Brexit unrest when the state rolls out its repression? Will Corbyn weep for the youth protesting against the very measures he helped usher in? If he gets voted in, he'll be the one wielding the power of the state. The squirmy squaring of that contradiction will be fascinating to watch.

The three-quarters of the population who did NOT vote for the permanent Brexit change to the constitution in the ADVISORY referendum, including the youth generation who weren't allowed to vote in 2016, have had their future ripped from them by charlatans who have already moved their money offshore, and applied for French/Irish/other European passports for themselves and their children. At least the wealthy will avoid the EU tax avoidance laws and get to buy up UK assets at firesale prices. After all, it's an ill wind that blows nobody any good.

Rees-Mogg in line for a huge personal windfall when Britain exits the single market. His firm Somerset Capital has 9.6 billion dollars under management according to its website. Banking on Brexit! https://t.co/ZyjxahRBXy via @LondonEconomic

— Gina Miller (@thatginamiller) February 8, 2018

President Trump to personally handle UK trade deal despite his nightmare record in business: Theresa May rolls over

President Trump has told Theresa May that he will personally negotiate the trade deal with the UK. He has no commerce secretary yet.

Many of us are wondering what could possibly go wrong?

Estimates that the Trump chicken comes home to roost (in the Chinese year of the Fire Rooster, note) are set somewhere around the autumn. Trump can't possibly achieve the 3-4 per cent growth he's promised due to the unvavourable demographics. Baby boomers are retiring and not being replaced. US unemployment is low so wages will rise (a good thing), leading to inflation (bad if this is due to rising costs, not greater demand or consumption).

My understanding is that the underlying pattern is deflation after the stagflation period (inflation with stagnant growth). So the Fed will have to tighten monetary control by raising interest rates to control rising inflation after years of trying to kick start it, and the US will be at, or heading back to, negative rates by next year.

However, rather than lower rates stimulating growth and investment (it didn't work before, it created bubbles), expect an exodus of money from overpriced US stock markets which may trigger the inevitable crash everyone's been waiting for as they play pass the parcel with a live grenade.

Trump can only disappoint.

Wealth fleeing the stock markets will chase bonds for a fixed income — even if Treasury bond yields hit 2.5-3%, this will be higher than plummeting or negative interest rates by then. Then the yields drop as everyone dives back in and when these fail, it's down to cash and digital currencies.

Depending on who you listen to, gold will either soar to 10,000 bucks an ounce or it will drop to $700 as it's not a currency and you can't buy a loaf of bread with a flake of gold if things actually get that bad. There's a saying: "Buy gold for protection but hope it doesn't go up." 'Cause then you know something seriously ba-a-a-ad is happpening and the price of gold is probably the least of your problems by then.

In the meantime emerging markets (EM) such as Brazil, India and Asia in general — the one area of meaningful growth — will have been damaged by Trump's protectionist policies. The dollar will keep heading north as there will be fewer of them and global trade is carried out in dollars. This will make US manufacturing hellishly expensive for overseas buyers. So I think there will be disaster within Trump's first two or three years. He may even have the inevitable crash later this year.

And who will get the blame?

Round up the usual suspects: immigrants and China.

If things look particularly dire, central banks may return to the bankrupt policy of Quantitive Easing whereby the government floods the economy by buying its own debt bonds and keeps everything artificially buoyed up, creating asset bubbles. Capitalism allows the market's survival of the fittest rules to decide everything except when it comes to a crisis that hits the wealthy. Then the markets must be rigged — which is what QE and bailing out failing banks amounts to. Socialism for the rich, capitalism for everyone else.

I don't see how we can't be pulled into the US maelstrom especially if our post EU trade depends on the US. Britain has landed between Scylla and Charybdis, the whirlpool of an imploding EU and the crashing rocks of the Trump toddler on the protectionist smash-up. The best we can do is win a role as a vassal state of the US. Well done Cameron for triggering a global domino collapse with that unnecessary referendum which MPs voted for because they were assured IT WASN'T LEGALLY BINDING ...

Asia might pull something positive out of a hat, especially if China fills the gap left by a protectionist USA. But then the stubby-fingered one will most likely try to bomb them back to the stone age. You can see the boys gagging to play with the toys with a blockade of the South China Sea's Malacca Straits as the opener.

Maybe this is the one area where he gets to please his mates after all.

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