BC BREXIT
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🚨🇬🇧🇪🇺🚛🍤🐟🥬📦✈️🇬🇧🇪🇺🚨
So here it is. After the euphoria, the @FinancialTimes @FTMag long read of how @BorisJohnson did his Trade deal with the EU. Tl:dr...not so much “build back better”, more “build back the borders” - stay with me/1.

 @FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson The really under-appreciated part of this story is the extent to which the Johnson government, having won its 80 seat majority promising to "Get Brexit Done" then explicitly and actively chose the hardest possible version of #brexit in defiance of commercial interests /2
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson Our story begins in January last year when David Frost commenced what Whitehall insiders call a "Star Chamber" process to strip away anything that might be considered more than a "Canada-style" deal - regardless of the fact that UK doesn't trade with EU like Canada! /3
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson So what did that mean in practice?

Well, for example leaving EU aviation safety agency (EASA); Chemicals agency (ECHA), not getting a waiver of 'safety and security' declarations for hauliers, not seeking special arrangements for animal products...on and on it goes /4
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson Didn't industry object? Well yes it did - but those who yelled too hard found themselves shut out of the door.

Did Whitehall object? Yes it did - Defra and Beis and Treasury all tried at some level to temper the revolutionary fury. But mostly failed. /5
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson I recall reporting at the time that the haulage industry just couldn't believe, given 10,000 trucks a day crossed the Channel, that the UK gov wouldn't want a waiver on Safety & Security decs....a waiver Norway and Switzerland have. But no. Only Canada./6
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson Some did belly-ache. I recall this amazing letter from @PauleverittADS about the government's promise to consult over EASA membership...and then announcing it had decided anyway. Objections were just batted away.... /7

https://t.co/DE5wV3HNH6
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS As @GeorgeWParker - brilliant steward of this piece - reported back in January 2020, industries were told they were in "secular decline" - and who could forget @afneil telling @MakeUK_ conference that No.10 thought 3D printing was the answer /8

https://t.co/kYX7jOn8n9
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ To be fair, no secret was made of this - @DavidGHFrost went to Brussels and gave a speech in which he said industry was exaggerating...the next few years will show whether he was right. Doesn't feel that way to fishermen like Ian Perkes./9

https://t.co/1kLxFovh1U
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost I should add a side-note here on services, which where already pretty much forsaken because of ending free movement - but the City knew that battle was lost. One exec observes Tory party is "controlled by ideologues" that put sovereignty over the economy. /10
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost The brutal paring back of ambition created an unprecedented inversion of what trade talks are about - growing trade.

So that 'success' defined by @BorisJohnson's own terms - landing a Canada-style deal - meant the constriction of trade. We slipped through the looking glass./11
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost It is true that the 'deal' is better than a 'no deal' would have been, but this was a barebones deal that was done with heads deliberately stuck in the sand. Damage assessments were not done. “Someone would occasionally proposedoing the work and everyone would say: ‘No.’”

Wow/12
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost I wonder if any company CEO, or headteacher, or hospital administrator or bus driver or cafe owner proceeded on this basis...how long would they keep their job before being struck off, or suffering a shareholder revolt, or going bust? Could you do it in a normal walk of life? /13
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost The negotiation itself was successful on its own terms - the UK did indeed get a skinny deal, walking into the 'elephant trap' that Sir Ivan Rogers had set out in Christmas 2019 - and neatly summarised here by @AntonSpisak

https://t.co/vH7H8p44zZ
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak When the endgame came - wonderfully reported by my Brussels colleagues @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming - the UK gave up even on the 'extras' it had asked for on professional services and 'cross-cumulation of rules of origin' for carmakers.../14

https://t.co/fNX50cPPKu
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming As time wore on, the UK deployed its 'madman' strategy - not even @BorisJohnson knew if he'd go for deal or no deal - and there were times when there was so little strategy you wondered if that was actually true. I never spoke to EU folk who believed he'd do no deal fwiw /15
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming There was that small matter of the threat to break international law...which UK negotiators believed shook things up, but on EU side, only seemed to push Berlin behind Paris in demanding tough 'ratchet clauses' etc. And damaged our world standing /16

https://t.co/o88fnMkQKy
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming But @BorisJohnson got his deal, barebones as intended - and then told everyone that it contained no "no non-tariff barriers to trade" - and that wasn't an off-the-cuff remark. Watch the tape at 7m.29s, he's reading a text /17
https://t.co/FPP3IgFHLH
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming That means that someone in No.10 actually wrote that down. They put it into an approved text when they must have known it not to be true. Perhaps @BorisJohnson wrote it himself, but that really is an alternative fact.

Odd to be so proud of a Canada deal, then disown it. /18
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming And so what about the future? Yes, we'll suffer some frictions burns at the border now, but that will open the door to a sea of opportunity etc... @ColdChainShane says trade will be "slower, more expensive and
less flexible"...but the upside seems less clear. /19
@FinancialTimes @FTMag @BorisJohnson @PauleverittADS @GeorgeWParker @afneil @MakeUK_ @DavidGHFrost @AntonSpisak @jimbrunsden @Sam1Fleming @ColdChainShane Still. What's done is done...what it will mean for the future - politically and economically - is still very unclear. At some level, the architects of this deal must know - amongst all the cries of freedom etc - they've created a lot of burdens for a lot of people. Now what? ENDS

More from Peter Foster

Peter Foster
Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
The UK refusing to give full diplomatic status the EU's mission in London is baffling at at time when @BorisJohnson is trying to connect with @JoeBiden - because it recalls what Trump administration did to the EU ambassador back in 2019. Stay with

@JoeBiden The spat has been going for a while - we reported it in May, when the #Brexit trade talks were getting testy and - I assumed - it was the UK seeking a bit of leverage as the talks progressed. But we have a deal...and still no deal on the EU

@JoeBiden Essentially the UK government wants to treat the @EUdelegationUK as a "international organisation based in London" - and not accord it full diplomatic status, as almost every other country in the world does, including the United States /3

@JoeBiden @EUdelegationUK Indeed when EU formed it's External Action Service (EEAS) the UK supported the idea that EU representatives should be full ambassadors - a fact reflected in the Treaty of Lisbon which we signed - and which reflected on fact EU had a currency, made laws etc. /4

@JoeBiden @EUdelegationUK It took some time for everyone to recognise this, but after @BarackObama came to power in 2016 even the USA did the same....then along came Donald Trump and in 2019 surreptitiously downgraded the status of the EU ambassador @D0Sullivan /4
BREXIT
Peter Foster
Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
Another head-banging day for the £112bn UK creative sector that is starting to ingest how difficult #Brexit is going to make their lives - and how little the government is really willing to do to fix the lack of a 'mobility' chapter in the EU-UK trade deal. Quick update.../1

First Equity @EquityUK put out a letter to @BorisJohnson warning that #brexit was a "towering hurdle" (you'd want Brian Blessed reading that part) to UK actors plying their trade in EU - a double whammy with #COVID19 /2

https://t.co/mXjTAISqZk


@BorisJohnson One third of Equity members say they've seen job ads asking for EU passport holders: "Before, we were able to travel to Europe visa-free. Now we have to pay hundreds of pounds, fill in form after form, and spend weeks waiting for approval" /3

@BorisJohnson Worth recalling that all this goes back to the UK desire NOT to have a 'mobility' provision within the TCA - all part of 'ending Free Movement' and the professional services folk - including musicians, actors, fashion models etc -are all victim of

@BorisJohnson What's the government going to do about all this? Good question, which brings us to todays @CommonsDCMS hearing in which the Culture Minister Caroline Dinenage @cj_dinenage frankly pin-balled around the issues /5
BREXIT
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Peter Foster
Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
It's OUT! My latest #Brexit Briefing for @FinancialTimes - examining @BorisJohnson
"buy now, pay later" Northern Ireland Protocol, why the EU-UK trust deficit is killing it, how that can be restored - because it needs to work. /1

@BorisJohnson The danger here is that lingering animus over the opportunistic nature Johnson's Faustian bargain - dividing his Kingdom in order to 'get #Brexit done' and win an 80-seat majority - is clouding judgement on both sides of the Channel /2

@BorisJohnson The facts of the Protocol are no less true for Johnson's constant denial of them - that there would be checks, that there really is a trade border that now prevents plants and pets from travelling freely from Bedford to Ballymena as M.Gove reminds us. But these are other facts/3

@BorisJohnson Firstly, NI remains part of UK, even if it is now has EU customs rules.

Secondly, NI remains politically divided and fragile; the Good Friday Agreement is a constant work in progress.

Thirdly, both the EU and the UK agreed to this unsatisfactory arrangement jointly. /4

@BorisJohnson Fourthly, therefore, they have a joint responsibility to make it work because

Fifthly - and most importantly — there is no alternative to it. /5
BREXIT
Peter Foster
Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
🚨🚨🚚🚛🚨🚨email from Robert Hardy @RobHardyFR8 whose Customs Clearance Consortium is part of govt’s £200m scheme for GB-NI border warns of “huge shortage” of customs agents. Via @SJAMcBride /1

https://t.co/WoLWdI8LoF


He adds: “Export from GB with import to Ireland [is] amongst the most complicated...We expect heavy volumes at Dover from tonight as GB exports start to ramp up and many transporters do not have transit and EU clearance in place.” ...remember @BrandonLewis ‘no border’ tweet 🙄/2


He then warns - as @RHARichardB had warned - that the issue is companies providing poorly cleansed/matched data...and announces CCC doesn’t have capacity to raise docs in mainland EU/3


This is example of what Biz needs to do when moving agri foods - hauliers and vets tell me there is still no solution from Defra/Daera on how to do multiple pickups that require export health certificates at each stop (not uncommon) /4


In the next week or two we’ll see how these issue play into supply chains - and the issue that trucks flow in a cycle, GB-NI/IE-GB...so you need enough returning to keep the flow going. /5
FINANCE
Peter Foster
Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
BREAK: The UK drops all its 'law breaking' clauses - including plans for more in forthcoming taxation bill - after @michaelgove
and @MarosSefcovic agree deal on terms of implementing Northern Irish Protocol. 1/

https://t.co/MdBbcI8vjd


@MarosSefcovic This is obviously very good news - recalling that it relates to the implementation of last autumn's deal to allow #Brexit to happen without returning a trade border to island of Ireland...but leaving one in the Irish Sea. /2

@MarosSefcovic The statement says that the two sides have determined "criteria for goods to be considered 'not at risk' of entering the EU" - though the extent to which goods pay tariffs UK-EU will depend on whether we get an FTA with the EU. (Even if we do, some still will) /3

@MarosSefcovic The two sides have also agreed on the 'reachback' of Article 10 or the "application of State aid under the terms of the Protocol" which the UK govt feared could be used to constrain UK govt subsidy decisions after January 1 /4

@MarosSefcovic This was because EU state aid law applied to UK in respect of NI Goods - so risk of 'catching' a UK decision to, say, give a bank a tax break if it had NI Clients...thereby blowing hole in @BorisJohnson 'sovereign' Brexit. An understanding has been reached here. /5
TAXATION BILL

More from Brexit

Joe Mayes
Joe Mayes
@Joe_Mayes
New: the U.K. is claiming victory over the EU in the Brexit talks. Let's take a closer look... 1/

.@EuroGuido has shared a `scorecard' of the negotiations, claiming Britain `won' 43% of the issues in the talks. EU won 17%, 40% were mutual compromise. Bear in mind, this is the British negotiating team marking its own work.. 2/

The key q is *how important* are the issues. Just tallying them up doesn't say much. If you won lots of small, low-impact areas, but lost in big areas important to your economy, that's what matters 3/

And at first glance, there are some important things missing for the UK. 1) No mutual recognition of conformity assessment. This means companies will have to pay to certify their products in both the UK and EU. Double regulation = double the cost 4/


We discussed the cost of bureaucracy duplication due to Brexit here 5/
BREXIT
Joe Mayes
Joe Mayes
@Joe_Mayes
It's been another torrid week at the border - inundated customs agents, goods stuck for days, companies buckling under the paperwork 1/ https://t.co/2A301guhB6 w/ @lizzzburden

Take Branimir Vuckovic, 45, who runs goods between the U.K. and EU. He spent this week stuck in Kent because he couldn't find a customs broker to do his Brexit paperwork. Even with traffic levels below normal, the system is being overwhelmed 2/


The government has admitted this problem itself. On a Q&A with businesses on Thursday, Heather Jones from the Border Delivery Group said: `We are starting to realize that customs agents’ capacity and capability is being extremely stretched' 3/ 🚨

Eddie Maybank, an independent customs broker, says he's been having a breakdown. He's forwarding inbound queries on to other agents in Dover, but they've told him to stop. `I’m inundated, and so is everyone else,' he said 4/

UK-Ireland trade has been badly affected, particularly food shipments. Stephen McAneney of Allied Fleet Services in NI said he saw consignments of potatoes, apples and cream being destroyed at ports because they lacked the right documents 5/
BREXIT
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Peter Foster
Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
🚨🚨🚨🇪🇺🇬🇧🚛🚒🇪🇺🇬🇧🚨🚨🚨 serious #brexit story alert - companies now starting to see penny drop on what rules of origin does to supply chains (food for example) but Brussels seems deaf to both EU & U.K. pleading. A bellwether? 😬 Stay with me. 1/


So first the problem: its a tad complicated but basically goods that are imported into UK and then 'hubbed' onwards into Ireland or other parts of the EU are facing full EU tariffs - this is particularly bad for food stuffs, which attract high tariffs. Why is this? /2

It's a function of the Rules of Origin clauses that mean that goods have to sufficiently "originate" in the UK to qualify for zero-tariff entry to EU (and vice versa).

But to qualify, you have to do something to the goods - process them or add value - not just punt them on /3

The brilliant @AnnaJerzewska does a better job than me of explaining, but the important thing is that this is a nightmare for companies that 'hub' /distribute products through the UK - and that's both EU and UK companies /4


So both the @Foodanddrinkfed and EU groups like @CAOBISCO_EU (chocs etc) say they want the EU Commission to fix this with a derogation/waiver that takes into account proximity and interdependence of EU/UK supply chains. /5
BREXIT
David Henig
David Henig
@DavidHenigUK
So many stories of new barriers to trade between UK and EU, but you might be thinking at some point these will run out. The government is certainly hoping so. Well they may slow down, but trade relations and regulations are not static, and changes will lead to further problems.

The likelihood of continued trade problems for a £650 bn trade relationship is why there should be a huge cross-government effort led by the Foreign Office and Department for International Trade to put in place the necessary resources to seek best results.

There isn't.

So the UK's relationship with the EU currently consists of two not particularly good deals and no consistent effort to manage current problems or prevent future ones. Joint committees are a second order problem to putting in place the right internal structures.

But that's been the consistent UK problem in relations with the EU since 2016. Lack of focus on getting the right internal structures, people, asks, strategy, too much attention on being tough and a single leader.

News just in. This doesn't necessarily mean the right structure being put into UK-EU relations. I suspect Frost's main role is to ensure no renegotiations with the EU.

Also, wonder what this says about the PM's trust in Michael Gove?
BREXIT
john milbank
john milbank
@johnmilbank3
This very short article by Jeremy Cliffe is the best thing I have ever read on Brexit and the EU. It pivots on the contrast between Delors’ and Thatcher’s authentically provincial Christian visions and suggests the battle in Britain between the two is not over.


Thatcher: Protestant believer in the totally free market and absolutely sovereign centralised nation state. Delors: Catholic believer in third way personalism, corporatism and federalism. Individualism versus relational love. Heterodoxy versus Orthodoxy.

The article useful gives the lie to the idea that the Catholic vision of the EU has altogether vanished even though it is weakened. Delors wanted a social dimension to the free market and single currency and yet lexiteers laughably insist the EU is more neoliberal than the U.K.!

Subsidiary federalism is a doctrine of democracy and human fraternity. State sovereignty is a doctrine of naked power. It is a face of Antichrist. Leviathan.

Those combined that democracy can only be inside a single state fail to power just how much of private law and evermore so is necessarily international. Thus if political institutions don’t extend over borders there can be no democracy.
BREXIT

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Andrew Chen
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👇Thread.

Published a new essay: The red flags and magic numbers that investors look for in your startup’s metrics – 80 slide deck included!


This was a deck that I created on my (longish) interview process with @a16z. It was a long path, starting with meeting folks at the firm 10 years ago. But the purpose of the deck was to explain how I would use my superpower in an investing context

Here's what I explain in the deck. As investors (whether angel or VC) we're often confronted with an up-and-to-the-right graph. Is it going to go up? Or down?


One solution to forecast these growth curves is the Growth Accounting Framework, where you add up New+Reactivated and subtract churned users. In each time period that gives you the difference in monthly actives.


The problem with this is that it's a lagging metric, not a leading one. We need to go one level deeper and look at the underlying loops that drive these numbers, to understand the quality.
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Brian Cates
Brian Cates
@drawandstrike
Great article from @AsheSchow. I lived thru the 'Satanic Panic' of the 1980's/early 1990's asking myself "Has eveyrbody lost their GODDAMN MINDS?!"


The 3 big things that made the 1980's/early 1990's surreal for me.

1) Satanic Panic - satanism in the day cares ahhhh!

2) "Repressed memory" syndrome

3) Facilitated Communication [FC]

All 3 led to massive abuse.

"Therapists" -and I use the term to describe these quacks loosely - would hypnotize people & convince they they were 'reliving' past memories of Mom & Dad killing babies in Satanic rituals in the basement while they were growing up.

Other 'therapists' would badger kids until they invented stories about watching alligators eat babies dropped into a lake from a hot air balloon. Kids would deny anything happened for hours until the therapist 'broke through' and 'found' the 'truth'.

FC was a movement that started with the claim severely handicapped individuals were able to 'type' legible sentences & communicate if a 'helper' guided their hands over a keyboard.
CULTURE
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Arif Hasan\U0001f1ee\U0001f1f3
Arif Hasan🇮🇳...
@arifhasan18
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Unconventional approach of 60-40 RSI and range shift concept.

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Cole Escola
Cole Escola
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... full of dog food and she said, "I'm pretending this is ice cream! Treat me like a baby!" and proceeded to hump her own arm and I thought, "something tells me this isn't the real Norah Jones"... (117 of 4,625)

...cost me $7,000. I had to put it on two separate credit cards! It wasn't 'til I got to my car that I realized "that's way too expensive for one onion." But I didn't have time. Amanda Seyfried was begging to change my diaper... (1,001 of 4,625)

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Jaya_Upadhyaya
Jaya_Upadhyaya
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SRI MOOKAMBIKA DEVI, KOLLUR (KAR)

There was an Asura, Kaumasura, who was doing penance to please Shiva and get a boon. To prevent him from asking for a boon, Devi Saraswati made him dumb (hence called Mookasur)
Later, Adi Parashakti slayed him and came to be called Mookambika.


It is said that Adi Shankaracharya had a vision in which Devi agreed to follow him provided he did not look back. He kept walking and was assured of her presence due to the sound of anklets. When he reached here in Kollur, he turned back as the sound of anklets had stopped.


So Devi stayed here and merged with the lingam. The place came to be called Mookambika Kshetram.
The linga has integrated on it’s left side MahaKali, Maha Lakshmi and Maha Saraswathi and on the right side- Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.


A swarna rekha (gold line) divides this linga into left and right portion. Adi Shakthi in this Udhbhavlinga form appears only here.
Devi sits in padmasana and has 4 hands.
Adi Shankaracharya installed the Sri Chakra in front of Devi and also composed the Soundarya Lahiri here.
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