Reason and Russia: Part 2


– Cardinal Richelieu









In my opinion, that’s not the pinnacle of legitimacy.





Reason and Russia

Let’s get back to reason.

Brexit did not happen because of Russia.









But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”


Britain’s omnipotence paradox

Omnipotence paradoxes have been examined for millennia. One of the most popular arguments on this subject is if God was omnipotent than he could create a rock he couldn’t lift. If then he could not lift that rock he would no longer be be omnipotent.

The examination of whether God is the author or is bound by logic is always interesting; unfortunately for the “Remain” camp there is no debate whether Parliament is bound by logic. In addition to logic, laws also bind Parliament.

Amongst the most important aspects of British law is parliamentary sovereignty, which is, as defined by Dicey:


Thus, as the “Remain” camp puts it, “no person” or persons can override the laws passed by Parliament and the Brexit referendum result must be thrown out. This is true. However, if the laws of parliamentary sovereignty exist as defined above, and capable of refuting a popular referendum, than that law must be applied consistently and equally.

According to EU law, or Community law, the European Court of Justice has ruled in Costa v ENEL that Community law takes primacy over national laws. Furthermore, legal superiority of Community law over the laws of Parliament were implemented in the UK under the European Communities Act section 2(1) when Britain joined the EU in 1973.

Therefore, if parliamentary sovereignty can legally be applied to negate a referendum, then it must also be exercised to leave the EU because, as defined above, “no person or body is recognised by the law of England as having a right to override or set aside the legislation of Parliament.” In this case, the “Remain” camp is defeated by their own reasoning – Brexit wins.

If, on the other hand, parliamentary sovereignty no longer is sanctioned as described above, then Parliament must recognise the result of the referendum. Brexit still wins.

One response to omnipotence paradoxes is that God cannot perform absurdities but can do anything only according to His nature. And so it is with British Parliament.

The European Union would be wise to remember what Lucretius once wrote, “Thus the sum of things is ever being reviewed,” and the ensuing question should be asked: which domino will fall next?


Simon Schama and the “Remain” shame

In Simon Schama’s latest editorial (“Let us write our own history and vote to remain a beacon of tolerance”, Weekend June 18th/19th) he makes several claims. Due to Mr Schama’s high profile status, I believe some of these avowals should be addressed.

First, Mr Schama asserts, “Most of the arguments about the unelected are uninformed by even a passing acquaintance with the way the institutions of the EU actually work. The commission proposes, but nothing can be enacted except by the decision of the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers, the latter composed of representatives of the elected governments of member states.”

Here, Mr Schama seems to concede the commission is indeed an unelected body, but no need to worry because there is the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers. What he fails to mention is the critical fact that this unelected body has the sole right to propose legislation. That means the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers can only make decisions on proposals from the commission, an unelected body. The fact that all decisions are derivatives of the whims of an unelected body is a somewhat important detail to overlook or omit. Additionally, unlike most parliaments, which are comprised of the government and the opposition, this dynamic is non-existent in the European Parliament. The European Parliament acts as a rubber stamper to whatever the unelected commission proposes.

After this, Mr Schama goes into some history of immigration to Britain from the Norman Conquest to Jewish émigrés, etc.…but he’s right when he admits the Brexit camp will say this has nothing to do with the EU, because it doesn’t.

His secondary argument is that Brexit will lead to isolation, economic catastrophe, xenophobia, racism, insularity, impotence and every other nasty word in Mr Schama’s vast lexicon. However, he fails to explain why nations must enter into political and/or monetary unions in order to engage in trade, immigration, cultural exchange, and other amicable transactions, and if they don’t, disaster is the inevitable result.

That’s because nations don’t have to enter into political or monetary unions simply to trade with each other – the idea is absurd and out-dated according to most economists (except those economists benefitting from the EU). As history tells us, most monetary unions (let alone political unions) implode. For example, the Latin Monetary Union started in 1865 by Napoleon III which blew up in 1927 – the Greek economy being one of the leading contributors. Even the monetary union between Norway, Sweden, and Denmark fell apart in 1924.

Sadly, Mr Schama ends with the tragic death of MP Jo Cox by writing, “I invoke the memory of Jo Cox, it is not to exploit her death but to honour her…she understood with instinctive decency that to be British was also to be a citizen of the world.”

Mr Schama, just because you say you don’t wish to exploit her death doesn’t mean you’re not. You are exploiting her death – your meaning is as obvious as it is dangerous and repellent. Jo Cox was murdered at the hands of a mentally ill neo-Nazi, it has nothing to do with the Brexit debate. One might want to self reflect, particularly if in the same article you accuse people of, “Surfing the moral sewer.”

Finally, what Mr Schama and the Remain camp desire is illegal and unconstitutional under British law. Full stop. As Dicey wrote:


In light of the above, what else need be said?











It is the greatest endowment Britain gave the world.

It is the very soul of Britain.






[1] For more information please see (

It’s Yale, stupid

On April 7th the Dutch voted in a referendum against the EU-Ukraine association agreement by a majority of 61.1 per cent, albeit with a low turn out. Nonetheless, it would appear that in the Netherlands the roughly 1/3rd of the population familiar with this topic who turned out to vote strongly disagree with the EU status quo. What happened on April 7th in the Netherlands is called basic democracy.

The Dutch seem to suggest, why prop up a corrupt and divided government in Ukraine just to risk a possible conflict with Russia – to what benefit at what cost? It’s logical.

Then, in an April 13th letter to the Financial Times Yale Professor of Political Science, David R Cameron, writes that the EU should just forget about the Dutch vote because, “The outcome of the referendum hardly represents a democratic vote….” Because, “The vote was 61 per cent against [and] the turn out was 32 per cent. That means 19 per cent of the Dutch electorate voted against the agreement.” Thus, according to Professor Cameron, means only a small minority of the Dutch electorate voted against the EU – Ukraine association agreement and the referendum should be disregarded.

What is he talking about? I don’t exactly need to open up a new excel tab to realise Professor Cameron’s whole argument rests on the assumption that the 68 per cent of the people who were too lazy or didn’t care enough to turn out to vote are all deeply in favour of the EU-Ukraine association agreement and would risk a potential conflict with Russia in order to achieve it. Additionally, since we are talking numbers here, I don’t exactly have to make a giant statistical leap to know it’s a bit unlikely that 68 per cent of the Dutch electorate all agree with Professor Cameron.

This is almost as absurd as Yale Professor of Economics Aleh Tsyvinski who wrote in a recent report on China that growth during Mao was actually “pretty good.” What? What about the 40 – 60 million people who died of famine and from the mismanagement of the economy – so perhaps a better thesis would be, “Despite the holocaust of humanity, the famines, the purges, the unimaginable suffering, growth under Mao was actually pretty good.”

The bigger question is why so many things recently emanating from Yale are so…well stupid. From the outrage over the Halloween costume emails, to safe spaces, to the controversy over the title master, to whether or not Calhoun College should be renamed, the list goes on.

It seems the professors are reaping what they have sowed, which is essentially, stupidity.

Defending UKip

Margie 1

Published in Financial Times, September 29, 2014

Sir, I am increasingly becoming somewhat confused by a series of opinion pieces written from Niall Ferguson, apparently former Thatcherite, now suddenly the great pro-EU centrist. Again in the FT, Niall Ferguson has likened Nigel Farage and UKip to “populists” and neo-Nazi parties like Golden Dawn. Mr Ferguson said last year in a debate that the EU has had nothing to do with peace in Europe and “Europe has to be judged in its own terms, and its own terms have always been economic. How did it do? In the 1950’s it grew at 4 per cent, in the 1960’s it was about the same. In the 1970’s 2.8 per cent, in the 1980’s 2.1 per cent, in the 1990’s 1.7 per cent and so on down to 0. As integration has proceeded European growth has declined. The share of Europe in global GDP has fallen since 1980 from 31 per cent to just 19 per cent….” Now, a bit bizarrely, in “Scotland’s No echoes Europe’s Yes to grand coalitions” (comment September 22nd) Mr Ferguson lauds the grand and largely unelected coalitions that encompass the Byzantine institutions of the EU. Ukip wants to leave the EU because they believe in freer markets and self rule; two things Mr Ferguson’s hero Mrs Thatcher would agree with; I have no doubt that if Mrs Thatcher were alive today, she would probably be a member of UKip. After reading Mr Ferguson’s last opinion pieces on populism and UKip I can hear Mrs Thatcher screaming, “No, no, no,” from her grave.

Christopher Grace

New York, NY