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by dudul 2 days ago
This is incorrect, the official Vote Leave campaign focused very heavily on immigration and overall sovereignty. Remain was the campaign highlighting risks for the economy.

Of course the argument was made re: EU contributions staying "home" to be allocated domestically, but the economy was always shrugged away as a "necessary unknown to take back control"

1 comments

You're saying the bus didn't exist?
Reading is hard I guess. I'm saying Brexit was not sold as being positive for the economy. Yes the bus probably existed, and as I said, the argument was made that the excess in EU contribution would be spent domestically instead. But improving the economy was not the main argument of the Leave. They always mostly acknowledged that it would be a bit unknown, but whatever happened would be worth it if it meant more sovereignty.
Look at the very first point on the archived vote leave page: https://web.archive.org/web/20160620214900/http://www.votele...

Sure, you could argue that they didn't mean it would be positive for the economy to save that money, but "we will save 350M/week" is what's on the buses and their website. Even if we assume the average voter clicks through here and reads everything point by point, or goes onto the website in the first place rather than by the headline, it is at the very least heavily implied... Otherwise what is the argument?

OK, so I'm right. They are specifically talking about the contribution to the EU budget that would remain at home. They did not talk about the economy as a whole. There is no "heavily implied".

Other replies are hilarious, focusing on "muh! The BUS!!!". I don't care about the bus, I'm focusing on the broader point. "The economy" was never at the forefront of the arguments put forward by Leave.

"the bus probably existed" wtf... there are photos of it, which were plastered all over media at the time. there's no "probably" about it
Here's Nigel Farage, at 6:53 AM the morning after Brexit passed, saying the claim on the bus was a "mistake" and they were never going to send that money to NHS.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSK0vVL2pg8

>Reading is hard I guess. I'm saying Brexit was not sold as being positive for the economy.

This is a lie. Provably so. Exhibit the other post replying to you.

But this is not unexpected, the entire brexit campaign was one lie after another, and the supporters lied about it continually too.

For much hilarity, read this. I still laugh each time:

https://www.reaction.life/p/britain-looks-like-brexit

> Yes the bus probably existed

“Probably”. Wow. Talk about self delusion and historical revisionism. You can’t bring yourself to admit the obvious reality that the Brexiteers were - to a man - self-serving, mendacious, con artists.