Porter’s Pensées

We’re going down the plug-hole. This is the end of ‘Great Britain’, literally (the ‘Great’ of course refers to the union of the four kingdoms, one of which might leave soon to re-join the EU), and of the sort of tolerant England that I was always, despite my doubts and frustrations, fond of and loyal to. Our political parties are engaged in childish scrapping while huge existential dangers loom on the horizon: global neo-liberal tyranny, irrationalist religious terrorism, neo-fascism, and possibly (though I’m personally less afeared of this) the familiar ‘Russian bear’. The dogs of anarchy have been released. Yet all we in Britain have to stand against them is a rickety political system that simply can’t cope.

I’ve been pinning my hopes up to now on New-New Labour (Corbyn’s). But that seems to have come a cropper with the PLP and the sneering press. Folk are talking about the end of Labour as a party. If that’s so, we must look to the future. If Labour is finished that must leave room for a new left-leaning, pro-Europe, anti-austerity, anti-racist, pro-welfare, anti-big business, green, non-elite party  – New-New-New Labour? – that can make a convincing case that it’s outside the ‘Westminster bubble’. (That’s important.) Either that, or a coalition of smaller parties, each of which focuses on one or other of these causes. That should appeal to a wide constituency, including all Labour voters, Lib Dems, Greens, Scots, old-fashioned paternalistic Tories and even (I would say) at least half the Ukippers: the ones who scapegoat Europe because they haven’t had the chance to vote their real enemies out. Its greatest draw would be that it would express the kind of direct democracy that the EU referendum was supposed to appeal to, but without such disastrous results.

There are presently two main obstacles to this. The first is our electoral system, which militates against new parties gaining any effective leverage until they’ve become old parties, and so prevents public opinion’s being accurately reflected and expressed in all its changeable variety. (The present composition of the House of Commons is a blatant example.) The answer to that, of course, is some form of PR. The second is the lack of a charismatic leader to spearhead this new party or coalition, and inspire people to flock to it. Boris is charismatic but no leader. Jeremy (in my view) is a great, innovative leader, but apparently not charismatic enough. What we need is a left of centre Churchill. I can’t see where he or she is coming from: can you?

*

PS (later the same day). Breaking news. Boris has withdrawn from the contest for new PM. One consolation to be drawn from this whole mess has been that those who caused it would have to clear it up. But Boris just walks away. What a shit.

The referendum result has shown up huge and possibly fatal flaws in our political system and culture. This is not just a Remainer’s sour grapes; I’ve written about it before. (https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/02/29/first-past-the-post/; https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/06/19/the-demonization-of-politics/) The referendum is billed as uniquely democratic, and to be respected for that reason. So, no challenges or re-runs. But that’s to see it out of political and historical context.

What made the referendum uniquely democratic was that its result truly and proportionately reflected the will of the people (those who voted, anyway). But this was in a political system that doesn’t normally reflect the views of the populace; producing extraordinary results like the last general election’s, for example, where only 35% of the votes produced a government with an overall majority of seats in Parliament, but hated by most people. This of course gave rise to widespread discontent in the country, and a general alienation from politics, on the grounds that voting ‘makes no difference’.

Then along came the referendum: a very rare occasion where it was felt that voting could make a difference. Hence the high turn-out. But hence also the fact that when people came to cast their votes, they used them to as an outlet for all the frustrations that had been built up in them for so long by the political system they had had to endure. This was the first time they could really ‘get at’ the government and the rest of the political ‘establishment’. I’m sure many of them voted on the European issue too, and not just as a scapegoat for their sufferings under ‘austerity’. But I’m equally sure that if we had had a fairer electoral system in the first place – and a fairer press, but that’s another question – people’s grievances generally wouldn’t have needed to be funnelled into this single issue, as I think they were. And nor would the campaign have been so nasty and racist, which is another symptom of the general frustration and anger pent up by our present political system and culture.

Maybe the result would have been the same. Sadly, we’ll never know. But in any case the underlying problem with our so-called ‘democracy’ will remain, to continue to poison our national life – now as an off-shore island – for decades to come. We’re seeing it in the leadership contests in both the Conservative and Labour parties today. Just imagine the situation if you had proportional representation, and the proliferation of viable parties that this allows. Dissidents in both parties could join or form other groups, which – unhampered by first-past-the-post – would have as fair a chance of being represented in the Commons as the parties they had quarrelled with. It’s a no-brainer. All governments would need to be coalitions, of course, but coalitions that truly reflected the popular voice. (The argument against this used to be that first-past-the-post produced more political stability. Oh yes? Look around.) And people would not need to channel their built-up frustration on many matters against just one of them, because that was the only one they were allowed to have their say on.

To get a decent political culture in Britain will need some fundamental reforms. The electoral system is one area; the press is another. (I see from today’s paper, incidentally, that Murdoch is backing Trump. Of course. Another immoral capitalist.) And the public schools, obviously. A model that reformers might look to is Sweden, whose electoral system is much fairer (I’d miss having my ‘own’ MP, but there are ways around that: see my previous post), and whose press – even the tabloids – is basically honest and restrained. They’re also a more equal, happier and more prosperous people than us. But I can’t see that happening in Britain. Our main political parties do so well out of the present system, and our press barons are too powerful. It will require a revolution. And we don’t ‘do’ revolutions, do we?

Alternatively… Can’t we ask the Vikings to come back? Last time it didn’t work out very well, for us at any rate; but I believe the Scandinavians have grown out of the raping and pillaging, and become quite civilised. Quite honestly, if they wanted to come and re-colonise us now, I wouldn’t object. Now we’re out of the EU (almost), we’re ripe for the picking. I’d welcome a flotilla of longships sailing up the Humber, their crews singing fierce Abba war songs, offering the natives meat-balls, and waving their self-assembly flat-pack swords. They could do an awful lot of good for us. I’m rather against imperialism in general; but in this case…

The British Empire had no definite beginning. It just sort of emerged out of the gloom. Nor did it have a definite end – until yesterday. Up until then, writing books about the history of the Empire (which is what I do), I had always found it difficult to know where to stop. There are several dates that can be picked for the beginning of the end, of course: either of the two world wars, Indian independence, Suez, the retrocession of Hong Kong, even, before any of these events, my own favourite: the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902). But still there remained traces of the Empire all over: far-flung British populations, the Falklands, island tax havens, the English language, deprecating views of ‘coloured’ peoples that may have been inherited from colonial times, and so on. But when could we say it was all finally over? That’s no clearer than its exact starting date. In cases like this all we can do is to pick a symbolic event; and England (pop. 53 million) 1, Iceland (pop. 330,000) 2, in Stade de Nice on Monday 27 June 2016, coming on top of ‘Brexit’ just three days earlier, seems to me as good a choice as any.

It’s a good symbol because, as everyone knows, it was the Brits who invented football, and then exported it to the world under the cover of their ‘informal’ empire: that is, the empire of their world-wide trade. It’s also apt because our defeat was at the hands of the Vikings (essentially), who have been a pain in our arses for over a thousand years: invading, raping, pillaging and colonising us in the 9^th-11^th centuries; conquering us (disguised as Frenchmen) in 1066; the great au pair invasion of the 1960s, undermining our morals; and making us struggle with their flat-pack furniture.

Brexit, however, is a more substantial terminal point. Of course we haven’t had a (significant) empire for ages; but we’ve still been ‘Great Britain’. The ‘Great’, of course, isn’t any kind of boast, but simply indicates that Britain is more than just England: for my Swedish friends, stor rather than stark. It consists of four separate nations. With Scotland about to hive off to rejoin Europe, and similar noises coming from Wales and Northern Ireland, we in England may not be able to claim that title any more. That must mark the end. From imperial Britain to Little England. Iceland 2, England 1.

I’ve replaced Saturday’s ‘Fuck, What have we done?’ post with a longer and better one. There’s also a shorter version, with a more polite heading, on the LRB Blog (http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2016/06/27/bernard-porter/historic-failure/).

The other thing I feared (https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/06/02/corbyns-fault/) is now happening. Corbyn is being blamed for not getting out the Labour vote. With his shadow cabinet resigning in shoals, it really doesn’t look as though he can last long. I’m deeply saddened by this. Corbyn is the only Labour leader for years that I’ve felt I could identify with. It may be partly that he looks a bit like me – old, grey-bearded, sloppily dressed – but it’s mainly because of his political principles, most of which (not all) I share, and his transparent honesty, which may not be as rare as we think among politicians but probably is among those who reach the top. I’ve also admired his ‘performances’ at Prime Minister’s Question Time in the Commons. I like his ‘new style’ of political leadership: less of the Führerprinzip that Thatcher brought in. And I thought his many speeches on behalf of the ‘Remain’ campaign were excellent: more measured, rational, honest and therefore persuasive than most Tory Brexiters’ and Remainers’; though it was difficult sometimes to find them, with the media largely ignoring him. This was a great part of his problem. People got the impression he wasn’t pulling his weight, but only because the BBC, ITV and even the ‘quality’ press hardly gave him any coverage. When they did, it was only to sneer – even the Guardian. Corbyn represents ‘rational man’; who was nowhere near as newsworthy as Boris the clown and Nigel the idiot, and as the soap opera melodramatics on the ‘Blue’ side of politics. As Tony Blair learned to his political advantage, but to our existential peril, it’s the press barons that run this country. Jeremy didn’t stand a chance.

I shall always bear a grudge against the media for this, and against those Labour MPs who are presently seeking to bring him down. For the moment, however, we need to deal with realities, one of which is this media bias, until we achieve power, and can do something about it. For my part, I wasn’t at all impressed with any of the other candidates in the last Labour leadership election, but have been since then with Hilary Benn. It’s his sacking by Corbyn, of course, following his telling the latter that he no longer had confidence in him, that has triggered today’s shadow cabinet revolt. I disagree with him on some issues, including that one; but on the other hand his speeches are both rational and impressive oratorically, he has ministerial experience, and he must have some of his father’s DNA still lurking there. (That doesn’t always follow. Look at the deplorable Kinnock fils.) He would go down well on all parts of the Labour benches, and hopefully among ordinary Labour members too. I understand that he has expressed no interest in leading the party, but if so I hope he can be persuaded otherwise. He’s the only one that would stay the hand holding my letter of resignation from the party, when Jeremy is sacrificed to the Gods of (what used to be) Fleet Street and Broadcasting House.

PS. Or Yvette Cooper.

I’ve not noticed much rejoicing on the winning side of the EU debate, such as you might expect on an ‘Independence Day’. Are they having second thoughts? Waking up thinking, ‘Fuck, what have we done?’ as the pound plummets, Cameron falls on his sword, a clown is set to take over, Corbyn (the only one who put a rational case for the EU, if only the press had bothered reporting it) is stabbed by the Brutuses in his own party, the UK breaks up, region turns against region and generation against generation (I’m embarrassed meeting young people now; I must get a badge: ‘I may be an old fart, but I voted Remain’), Trump and Putin start rubbing their hands in glee, other foreigners laugh at us (see the cover of the current New Yorker: http://nyer.cm/OSpSXcg), racists and neo-fascists are encouraged all over Europe, and the rest of the EU looks about to disintegrate? (That’s why it won’t give an ‘independent’ UK an easy ride in trade talks with it – pour décourager les autres.) Brexit leaders are now back-pedalling on their most persuasive arguments during the referendum campaign: no, immigration won’t fall, we’ll just be able to (theoretically) ‘control’ it; no, the money we save won’t go to the NHS – we never said it would. (Oh yes they did; it was on the side of their battle bus.) None of the leading Brexiters had the least idea what they wanted to succeed Britain-in-Europe, apart from some woolly abstractions – ‘control’, ‘freedom’, ‘greatness’, ‘the good old days’ – and some totally inappropriate models elsewhere – Canada, Norway, Switzerland. Apparently no thought at all had been put into this. As you would have expected there to have been if they’d really believed they could win.

Perhaps they never really wanted to win. Is that the answer? Like utopian socialists and fundamentalist Christians they never expected to prevail, and rather liked this position, for the freedom it gave them to criticise others on socialist or fundamentalist grounds. Europhobia in particular was a terrific cause, so long as it remained just that: a one-size-fits-all scapegoat for everything that went wrong, a way to bond people together, giving them a warm feeling of collective injustice, and a means of getting at the toffs and ‘experts’, at the top – without any danger that their wild alternative might be tested. For Boris it gave him the opportunity to win over the Right of his party to his succession to Cameron – but not yet, for God’s sake! And think of all the fun conspiracy theories its defeat might have spawned – indeed, was already starting to: MI5 doctoring the polling returns (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/eu-referendum-brexit-how-to-vote-own-pens-polling-station-polls-live-latest-mi5-conspiracy-fears-a7097011.html), murdering a young Remain woman MP to get sympathy (http://alternative-right.blogspot.com/2016/06/conspiracy-corner-killing-of-jo-cox.html.), and running the ridiculous Nigel Farage in order to discredit his side. (Actually that last one’s mine. But I’m sure they would have thought of it.) Now the cause is about to be tested. And within twenty-four hours it has come to look far more complicated and difficult than they had assumed – or had fooled their followers that it would be.

And really, no-one anticipated it. Who would have thought that such a very little stone flung into the water by a saloon-bar bore like Nigel Farage could cause such ripples – a tsunami, almost? The reason, of course, is that the water, however smooth it had seemed on the surface, was seething underneath. British society was a reactionary, deeply undemocratic, divisive mess. It had been that for some time, but recent ‘Tory cuts’ hugely exacerbated the problem. The scale of distrust of and hostility to the ‘establishment’ was – is – unprecedented since the time of the Chartists. Of course the smooth, superficial Cameron, privileged, sheltered, and trained in deception (‘public relations’), couldn’t see that. Hence his richly-deserved nemesis: one of the great historic ‘failures’ among British prime ministers (following Chamberlain and Eden). And hence also the appalling, scary mess we’re in now: Britain certainly, Europe probably, and possibly the wider world. As Michael Gove’s derided ‘experts’ had predicted all along. Even for the winners, this is hardly a time to rejoice.

I’ve never before heard of a popular referendum, especially one as close and as confused as this, deciding the fate of a country and a continent without some further consideration. (Scotland, perhaps.) Doesn’t the ultimate power to withdraw from the EU rest with Parliament? Couldn’t the elected government override the ‘will of the people’ – at least until another referendum could be held, once Farage’s ‘decent people’ have been faced – as they are now – with the reality of an ‘out’ vote? It’s been all too willing to disregard the popular will in the case of ‘austerity’. I suppose Cameron doesn’t want to appear a ‘bad loser’. You can be sure that the Brexiters would have had no such qualms, if the vote had gone the other way. Perhaps the Queen could step in. (Wait a bit: she’s an even older fart than me.)

OK, the upside.

1. David Cameron is gone (nearly), rightly hoist by his own petard  – to coin a cliché. Osborne must surely follow shortly.
2. The ‘Establishment’ is discredited.
3. The public school system is discredited. Utterly.
4. Real, direct democracy has prevailed, albeit perversely. There’s something exciting about mob rule.
5. From now on no-one will be able to use the EU as a scapegoat for everything that goes wrong in Britain. Blame can be directed where it belongs  – currently Tory austerity.
6. We may be forced at last to re-examine our political system, critically. And our press. Perhaps.
7. We might learn to moderate the tone of our political discourse. That’s come under a lot of fire recently. Similarly, all the lies, on both sides. The Tory ones obviously weren’t believed. Everyone knew  they were whoppers.
8. Jeremy Corbyn could strengthen his hold over the Labour party, and his wider appeal, after being the only one in the game to argue a rational and measured pro-EU case, without recourse to untruths. But that will depend on (a) the press giving him some coverage; and (b) his bitter Blairite enemies in the party laying off him. (If not I’ll resign.)
9. The whole car-crash could well shake up the rest of Europe, where there is quite a lot of Euroscepticism about, and persuade it to undertake some much-needed reforms. (Brexit is the EU’s fault, too.) In particular, to loosen its neo-liberal structures (especially with regard to ‘free movement’), and to put a stop to its imperial expansion. (See https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/05/27/eumperialism/).
10. A Brexit government is bound to fuck things up; so bringing us closer to revolution. (I wish.)
11. With the young overwhelmingly voting for ‘Remain’ – and they after all are the ones that will have live with today’s decision longest – there’s hope for the future. Or the present, if they can make a case for disenfranchising us oldies. Or euthanising us. God, what a generation we are. (Not me; I voted Remain.)
12. We’re now spared all the conspiracy theories that were beginning to be prepared in case ‘Remain’ won. (MI5 altering ballot papers; Jo Cox’s murder a ‘false flag’ op., etc. See below.)
13. The Scots will almost certainly break away soon, to rejoin the EU. So we’ll be shot of them. And remember they invented free market economics. So, good riddance.
14. And finally: well, at least we’ve had some fun, haven’t we? All those clowns on the Brexit side. Politics is no longer dull. It can be as entertaining as Eastenders any day.

No, this doesn’t cheer me up much, either. Especially with the prospect of the clowns taking the asylum over. Just imagine: Boris PM; Gove Chancellor; Nigel – what? Master of the Revels? Kajsa, make up that room for me in Stockholm. (If I can still get free healthcare there.)

Eye op went OK, thanks; though I’m only seeing through a bloodshot haze. That seems apt.

11.30 p.m. – Here we are then. The polls open in a few hours. No more time for Farage to mouth his obscenities, Johnson to crack his tasteless jokes, Gove to bring up the Nazis again, Cameron to wriggle, slug-like, out of the traps he’s set himself (‘no ifs, no buts’), or Corbyn to argue his reasonable case unreported. Just a few moments for people to recall their frustration and anger with politicians, especially the posh boys at the head of the Tory Party, and to blame it all on ‘Europe’: the only target offered them to attack just now.

Whichever way it goes, this has been the most divisive, duplicitous and bruising debate in British politics since circa 1910 (Ireland, industrial anarchy, protectionism, the House of Lords, suffragism). It has done immense damage to the Tory party – one hopes – but also to Britain’s reputation abroad. There have been many markers along the road of Britain’s post-imperial decline and fall since 1945 – I’ve written about them; this is the latest. My country still has, I believe, some good sides, typified for example by the reaction of the majority of its people to Jo Cox’s murder last week. (Apart from the East Yorkshire Tory councillor who tweeted yesterday that his contribution to the appeal launched in her name would be ‘the steam off my own piss’.) But in this controversy it’s our worst sides that have risen, like scum, or the steam off Councillor Peacock’s piss, to the surface: small-mindedness, narrow nationalism, reaction, racism, straight stupidity, personal ambitions, perfidiousness, lies. Which is not to say that there aren’t some perfectly good, moral, socialist, even internationalist arguments for leaving the EU; most of which, however, have been drowned out by the dirtier water that has been dredged up.

What will happen now is anyone’s guess. If Remain wins, as I still expect it to do, though I’m not at all confident, it certainly won’t be over. Brexit will be back, claiming ‘we wos robbed’. If Brexit wins tomorrow, the waters are entirely uncharted. We can start speculating on that later, if and when it happens. But in any event, and quite apart from the eventual result, it is widely acknowledged that the ‘political discourse’ has been dreadfully coarsened by the ‘tone’ of the debate itself, from which it’s difficult to see any easy road back. As I’ve written more than once, it’s not Europe per se that has provoked this, but the shocking failings of our political system: a fundamentally flawed electoral system, a perverted press, bought governments, anti-democracy. (https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/06/16/is-it-really-about-the-eu/.) The failings of our system, note; not of democracy itself, though this may well be the lesson drawn by many of those on the Right of politics, as it was on the Continent in the 1930s, and seems to be in the USA today. That’s the real danger: the monster which Cameron, by his inane decision to call this referendum, has released from its cage. Either that, or socialism. But I can’t see that happening, can you?

Off to bed now, to vote tomorrow, and then to follow the count through the night on TV. The following morning I’m having an eye operation. With any luck that will be a distraction. And if both the referendum and the op go badly, I’ll have the consolation of never having to see the self-satisfied grin on that awful Gove’s fishy face. In any case, I’m unlikely to be able to blog again for a few days.

If ‘Remain’ wins, what will really bug me is that David Cameron will take the credit for it. He will have been the saviour of Europe, a fitting successor to the great Ted Heath. Labour will get no credit, of course. The soil has already been prepared for that, with the constant accusations from Remainers that Corbyn has been half-hearted in his advocacy, and almost invisible during the campaign. (See https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/06/02/corbyns-fault/.) That’s a lie. He has given dozens of speeches supporting Britain’s membership of the EU, culminating in a fine one in Manchester today. But they haven’t been reported in the tabloid press or on television, which are virtually the only means of achieving public visibility today. I was surprised to find Corbyn’s Manchester speech broadcast live this morning on both the main TV News channels: but only to be interrupted, at length, just before his peroration, by a piece of ‘breaking news’, which was of the conviction of a child-murderer. Good; but that could have waited. It remains to be seen whether the print press cover the speech tomorrow.* In general the mainstream media are ignoring him in this contest, either because they think him to be a hopeless case, as they have from the very beginning (the Guardian especially); or because he isn’t such good copy or television entertainment as the other combatants.

I’d go along with that. Corbyn has been making a measured, reasonable, truthful and balanced but still highly persuasive argument for Remain, which is very different from Cameron’s and Osborne’s: emphasizing as it does what the EU has done and can do for working people, through the Social Chapter, and so on, which is what both Tory Remainers and Tory Brexiters specifically object to; and so hopefully reaching the parts – Labour voters – that the Tories can’t reach. But this Left-wing case for the EU is a subtle and nuanced one, as well as being anathema to the right-wing press, which is probably the main reason why it’s ignored. Subtlety and nuance, especially from the Left, are not nearly so newsworthy as the clownish soap-opera like rows that are splitting apart the Conservative party over this; and visions of economic Armageddon in the future (Cameron), or of regiments of bashi-bazouks descending on Europe over the Bosphorus in their millions (Farage). So these are what makes the news. The BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, especially, seems to be blind to subtlety. After the Manchester speech she was still asking Corbyn why he was so ‘lack-lustre’ in his advocacy. Good God.

In fact he’s been doing a good job – or at least trying to – with his constituency. This is the point. It’s important to get both constituencies on board if Remain is to win. Cameron can deliver the bankers; Corbyn the plebs.

And then of course there’s always MI5. According to a report on today’s Guardian website,

almost half of those planning to vote Leave believe that the referendum will be rigged against them, according to YouGov poll findings reported by politics.co.uk. This won’t surprise the Economist’s Jeremy Cliffe. In … this week’s edition he says that “at a recent Leave event your columnist witnessed Tories and Kippers urge their supporters to take pens into the polling booth on June 23rd to prevent the intelligence services from doctoring their votes”.

So, if anything looks like going wrong, the Remainers will still have the spooks there as a long-stop. Yet another conspiracy theory for the Brexiters to fall back on if they lose, to go with the ‘false flag’ one I mentioned a day or so ago. Either way, it surely won’t all be settled on the 24^th; for Britain, Europe, or the Tory Party. Hardly a saviour, then, eh, Dave?

*Wednesday. Not the Guardian – unless they’ve hidden it away.

By one way of looking at it, the vote on Thursday will be the latest in a long line of attempts by Britain to find the ‘role’ that she lost – as US Secretary of State Dean Acheson famously said in 1962 – when she was parted from her empire. It would be nice to think that it might also be the last stage, and that we can put all that empire stuff behind us after June 23^rd; but does anyone think that either side will accept the result if it goes against them? Of course they’ll cry foul. There are already conspiracy theories being posted on the web claiming that the atrocious murder of Jo Cox was in fact a ‘false flag’ operation, arranged by a secret cabal of ‘Remainers’ to garner the sympathy vote for their cause. (Here’s one example: http://alternative-right.blogspot.com/2016/06/conspiracy-corner-killing-of-jo-cox.html.) Without going quite that far, Farage today complained that Cameron was at least milking the murder to that end. On the Remain side, much is being made of the false propaganda (and it is false) used by the Brexiters to fool voters that, for example, £350 million a week net is going to Europe, and that Turkey is about to become a member of the EU.

From a neutral point of view it’s easy to argue – as I have done (https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/06/16/is-it-really-about-the-eu/) – that the vote won’t be about Britain’s place in Europe in any case, but rather about Tory austerity, getting rid of the Etonians, and people’s general discontent. Many voters will be attracted – or repelled – simply by the personalities of the men leading the debate. (Nearly all men. If only more women had come forward, or been allowed, to participate! At the very least that must have moderated the tone of the debate.) Anything but Europe per se. Any grievance will do, to land a blow on the Tory party, in this first chance the electorate has had for a year to get back at this minority out-of-touch austerity government which is the real fount – not the EU – of most of its miseries. It really is going to be difficult to vote for a cause led by Cameron and Osborne in these circumstances, even in pursuit of what you may feel is a greater good. It will certainly stick in my craw. It’s only the prospect of those other Tory clowns – Boris Johnson, Michael Gove and Nigel Farage – taking over, that strengthens my resolve. So I’ll not really be voting on the ‘issue’, either.

In any event, who is really bothered today about Britain’s ‘role’ or ‘place’ in either Europe or the world? (Apart from sporting.) A few leading politicians, probably, for whom it comes with the territory. But your ordinary Joe – or Jo?  Workers (if there are any left), shop assistants, bus drivers, doctors, nurses, teachers, academics scribbling their books and blogs in provincial towns? – In fact scarcely anyone seems to be looking at the international implications of the vote, either way; just at what they think it can do for them, personally and selfishly. All the propaganda is addressed to that. Nothing on what it will do to Europe, or to the stability of the world. We really are – to adapt Napoleon’s notorious bon mot – just a nation of shoppers, oblivious to broader and higher things. In a way that might be said to answer Dean Acheson’s point. This – a country of consumers – is our new ‘role’.

From Europe’s point of view the whole appalling debate has severely undermined that ‘role’, or at least our reputation and image. Continental press reaction (judging by the Swedish papers) is a mixture of disbelief, mockery and fright. (See https://bernardjporter.wordpress.com/2016/06/14/the-stupidest-nation-on-earth/.) It’s all very insalubrious, and embarrassing for someone who lives abroad much of the time. I’m used to having to apologise for the empire; now I’ve got to try to excuse this. What an awful misjudgment it was, to call a referendum at this time! It could destroy us, whichever way it goes. Cameron will never be forgiven for it. At least poor, weak John Major was able to face his Eurosceptic ‘bastards’ down.

But it will be exciting. I’ll be watching it on TV. Either that or the disaster movie on the other side.

*

For what it’s worth, I predict a ‘Remain’ win, by about seven points. That’s based on nothing but gut feeling. I know it goes against today’s poll findings, but they’ve been notoriously wrong before. We’ll see, in three days’ time.

Few of the world’s really awful events have been unexpected. For ten years before both the first and the second World Wars people were warning that something dreadful was about to happen. They might not have known what form exactly the catastrophe would take, though in both these cases European war was the obvious one. The atmosphere was febrile, culturally as well as politically. So neither war took many people by surprise.

Having intensively studied the history of those two periods, I think I can detect some of these same signs today. It’s not something I can back up with solid evidence, exactly; just a feeling I get from having soaked myself in the pre-1914 and pre-1939 periods. But there are things one can point to, common to all three times: and, significantly, not to others, or not in quite the same way. A recent economic depression is one, followed by stagnation. A widespread lack of confidence in both the economic and the political systems one is bound by is another. Pessimism was rife. Who is an optimist today? Growing nationalism almost everywhere is a third sign, much of it based quite manifestly on feelings of recent national humiliation. The rise of blatant irrationalism is a fourth, seen today most obviously in Donald Trump, but also, more mildly, in Michael Gove’s recent comment on ‘experts’. (And if you think I’m being patronizing there, it’s probably because you’re one of the irrationalists yourself. There are some around, even in academia.) There were some particularly ‘toxic’ political controversies before both wars, and on similar themes to today’s. A sixth sign may be the two substantial influxes of refugees that took place prior to the wars, in those cases both Jewish, unsettling communities, at the very least. There may be other parallels – moral shifts, criminal trends, literature (like dystopian science fiction), and artistic fashions – which I don’t know about, not having studied them deeply. But these will do for a start.

Lastly: there is the outpouring of published statements of doom and gloom coming out just now, as they did then, in a way that hasn’t been seen before in my lifetime – save from paranoid Tories under Labour (‘country’s going to the dogs…’), and of course at the time of the USA-USSR nuclear face-off. But this is different. Here’s one example, picked at random, posted by Owen Jones on Facebook at the height of the current poisonous debate over Brexit, and just after Jo Cox’s murder. ‘I love this country, but never have I been so scared about it. The growing bitterness, resentment and hatred is genuinely frightening.’ That’s typical. I go along with it.

Like most of the Cassandras before World Wars I and II, I’m not sure what guise the crisis will assume. I can see, or sense, the glowering clouds, but can’t tell what exactly they forebode. It’s unlikely to be another Anglo-German war – I guess. The best case scenario is a collapse of the government here, which might not be so bad. Ditto the break-up of the European Union. The worst case doesn’t bear thinking about, with the Donald’s finger on the nuclear button. But whichever it is, we can’t say we haven’t been warned.