Brexit scandals aren't being well covered in the press but it's crucial that UK people know what's going on, so here's a succinct summary with links to more information.
We understand the referendum better now
Leave campaigns didn't bother trying to tell us what would happen after a leave vote (because that problem was "insuperable", it would have taken years of planning to define an approach).
Instead, they used marketing tricks to procure a leave vote ("The more outrageous we are, the more attention we'll get", communication director for Leave.EU).
They found blaming immigrants for problems caused by austerity was the most effective approach ("the immigration issue was the one that set the wild fires burning [on social media]", Arron Banks, biggest funder of leave).
This approach led to a rise in hate crime.
They used social media advertising to get many poisonous message directly into people's lives (the UK's leading marketing body called their adverts "dark", "opaque" and in some cases "fake").
The leave campaign also seem to have failed to respect the three day truce agreed to show respect for MP Jo Cox's life, after her murder by a right wing extremist.
Leave campaign officials have also been repeatedly evasive, dishonest, un-cooperative and have sought to sew further confusion ("[they] resisted our investigation from the start, including contesting our right as the statutory regulator to open the investigation", Electoral Commission employee) and their attempts at evasion are frequently supported by serving MPs.
The Vote Leave campaign committee (who met weekly to "set the campaign strategy'') included many MPs (there's a list here) who remarkably - given the 'dark' adverts, lies, and overspending fines for vote leave - have not been subject to inquiry. Instead, many of them got promoted.
Electoral and Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) investigations
The Electoral Commission found (to a "criminal standard of proof", Chief Exec Officer) that Vote leave broke election spending rules and spent more money than they were legally allowed to in the run up to the referendum.
These were "serious breaches of the laws" with several maximum fines being applied, the laws in question being those designed to stop rich people buying election results.
It seems that CA used immoral and illegal methods in order to influence elections: The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee's Parliamentary report into fake news found evidence "of hacking, of disinformation, and of voter suppression" being used by SCL linked companies (SCL being the parent company of CA, with links to AIQ).
There are also serious concerns about where the money to fund the leave campaigns came from. This page explains some of the questions : how did 11 million pounds of leave funding disappear? Where did the DUP's mysterious 425k (secret donors were allowed in Ireland, but most of the money was spent on adverts in England) come from?
So what were the drivers of all this Brexit manipulation? What were the likely goals?
Chaos enables money to make money, especially if you have insider knowledge about what decisions will be taken during the chaos.
Here's an example of hedge funds contributing to leave campaigns then making hundreds of millions of pounds by securing knowledge of the result before the rest of us. That trade was aided by Farage wrongly claiming remain had won on referendum night (Farage denies any wrong doing). There's no suggestion that the hedge fund were aware of the illegalities described above.
Driver2: Likely Russian Interference to make other countries weaker
The NSA found Russian interference in French elections , the Mueller enquiry has charged 12 Russian intelligence officers with trying to impact the outcome of Trump's election (in Trump's favour) and there are similar questions about whether the Russian state tried to influence Brexit.
The DCMS report (linked above) says that Arron Banks (biggest funder of leave campaigns to circa 9 million pounds worth) and his sidekick, walked out of the committees evidence session 'to avoid scrutiny of the content of the discussions with the Russian Embassy'.
And the enquiry's verdict was that further investigation was needed (by the electoral commission, or the National Crime Agency) "we have evidence of Mr. Bank's discussions with Russian Embassy contacts, including the Russian Ambassador, over potential gold and diamond deals, and the passing of confidential information by Mr Banks". (Mr Banks denies any wrongdoing)
Driver3: Alt-Right Ideology.
This can be most easily explained using a brief narrative.
This site has had several leave voters – apparently normal people, no evidence that they're unusually nasty – tell us that the UK must leave because the EU is running a Eugenics programme to eradicate native European people.
Obviously, that's pretty crazy. Pure far right conspiracy poison, strongly reminiscent of the Nazi's paranoid ideology.
Where did apparently normal people get it from, and why are they so willing to repeat it in public?
Farage gave us a possible clue on Article 50 day when he was effusive in his thanks ("Extremely grateful") to a person called Steve Bannon for helping make Brexit happen.
Steve Bannon was a founder of Breitbart News, a website that Time magazine journalists described as mainlining "racist, sexist, xenophobic and anti-Semitic material into the vein of the alternative right" with the wiki entry suggesting the "site has published a number of falsehoods, conspiracy theories and intentionally misleading stories".
These types of site, combined with the recurring willingness of the BBC to give air space to far right 'think tanks' whose funding sources are not clear, seems to be making far right attitudes the acceptable norm in some sections of UK society (in other words, the UK is being poisoned)
Steve Bannon was also employed by, and we believe an investor in, Cambridge Analytica (yes, the same disgraced company that Leave campaign's social media partner had links to) and this alt-right connection may be significant because having control of new technologies "allow[s] virtually anyone to exercise influence in a way that would have been inconceivable just a few years ago" with an entity having "root access [being] almost omnipotent" (from 'The Fourth Industrial Revolution', Klaus Schwab (affiliate link)).
That omnipotence increases when the company in question is wiling to breach data protection laws (see the ICO's report, linked above).
Having been involved with technology that attempts to influence the outcomes of elections, and been thanked by Farage for the Brexit referendum outcome, Bannon also served as chief exec for Donald Trump's election campaign (and later, strategist for Trump in the white house).
Bannon is now attempting to set-up a European operation which seems to have the explicit aim of taking down the EU, using 'analytics' (presumably like those described above) and Reuters suggest he's talking to candidates in the Tory Party who might replace May as Prime Minister.
We do not have all the answers yet, but overall, it seems that Brexit Britain has become a battle ground for global interests that wish to destroy the EU.
Not taking back control so much as giving control to extremism?
Brexit: a simpler explanation.
If we won though, how is it that we are we now told we must stockpile food against Brexit consequences?
Will our 'normal' politicians save us from these extremists? No. Labour and Tory leaderships are both pursuing extreme agendas, facilitated by Brexit (see here for more) so they are keeping remarkably quiet about all the perversions of UK democracy.
Have you taken action yet?
There's a clear majority for remaining. The UK can still revoke Article 50.
It seems crucial that we convince the Tories and Labour to switch UK democracy back on (getting them to agree the democratic necessity of a people's vote)
The easiest thing you can do is to share this article. The UK has been poisoned and truth is the antidote.
You can also follow people like Carole Cadwalladr (@carolecadwalla) or Molly Scott-Cato (@MollyMEP) on twitter to stay up to speed with developments. (Carole - aided by colleagues and whilstle blowers - broke the stories that led to the investigations mentioned above; Molly is the Green's Brexit spokesperson who created useful sites for more info on the above Bad Boys of Brexit and The Brexit Syndicate)
You can write to your MP (details in this article)
And you can sign the people's vote petition to take back control (here) and the final say petition (here)
Comments
"The will of the people" is an extreme Right Wing Tory excuse for when Brexit goes wrong and the UK becomes an offshore banana republic. "The will of the people" was to vote unknowingly in support of lies, damn liers and total deceit by Right Wing Politicians like Johnson, Gove and Farage.
"The will of the people now" has changed as they realised they have been lied to by a bunch of conspirators probably working with Putin to damage the EU.
Now is the time to avoid a civil war in the UK as passions grow and anger gets greater. May must denounce the Brexit project, recind Article 50 and keep the UK in the EU where it belongs. This way she should go down well in history, the other?? Well we dont have the block anymore - fortunately for her.
If the Brexit proposition had been explained clearly, I don't think many would have bought it. Interesting question as to how May might stop it (theoretically, because for now both she and Corbyn are still trying to secure brexit); received opinion seems to be that the EU would not pause, or stop a50 without a democratic mandate (which would have to be a referendum logically, as mixing brexit in with party politics - an election - could not possibly give an accurate result). she'll have more opportunity to do so in October (assuming she's still leader) as the full ICO report is due then. It certainly doesn't seem wise to press on 'as is' due to the advisory result being rooted in such corruption (moral and legal), and more than half the population now wanting to remain.
On Brexit Apathy and Anger https://academy-of-rock.bandcamp.com/track/exit-brexit-a-shas-dave-mockney-brexit-knees-up
quick warning: some might find words offensive; might be cathartic for others.