Intelligence, Common Sense and Politics

Neither 'pure' intellectual capacity nor the applicability of a person's perception to the events in the visible and audible world around her [or him] can be measured with any degree of accuracy. Yet there is a common assumption within society that some peoples' processing-power for complex and abstract thought is greater than other peoples'; while other people are seen to have a greater-than-average capability to assess the movement of events and the actions of other people in ways that are useful guides for themselves and for others who trust them to base their own actions on. It is usually assumed that people with the highest perceived 'intelligence' are often not very 'practical': and very often it is manifest that a person of highly-rated academic intelligence is not capable of managing all aspects  of their everyday life in a way that the generality of their community would consider to be sensible.

President Macron is well on the way to getting himself regarded as a vain and shallow man by allowing his acolytes to assert that he is 'too intelligent' and his utterances are too complex for ordinary folk [and press reporters] to understand. Some of President Trump's most obviously-infantile tweets are when he asserts that he is of superior intelligence; and he appears to be quite singularly lacking in both pure intellect and common sense. Boris Johnson is often asserted to be of a very high intelligence; but even those who quote this as a qualification for even higher office than he now holds also admit - often, before they are challenged on the point - that he lacks both assiduity in his current duties and any sort of empathy with the 'common man's' reaction to life's vagaries. Rowan Williams was elevated to the Archbishopric of Canterbury on a reputation for extremely superior intelligence: he was an utter failure in the role, as his sermons wandered off into incomprehensibility and his actions showed an almost total failure to address real-world situations.

By contrast, Stephen Hawking has shown, notwithstanding his extreme physical challenges, that he can combine both superior intelligence with the ability to explain theoretical physics to a wide audience. Clement Attlee is often described as the most under-rated prime minister of the twentieth century, and there is no doubt that he mastered every aspect of leading the country through the biggest-ever government-led socio-economic change in modern history; he was notoriously taciturn [thus leaving the fewest possible hostages to fortune] but he always ensured that he was clearly understood by the audience to which he addressed his comments.

The context in which I raise these issues is the present sorry and shameful state of the Brexit issue. A Tory whip who I shall not bother to name has demanded that university heads tell him the names and syllabus summaries of the lecturers who teach students about Brexit: the universities are rightly rejecting those demands, in most cases, as being unacceptable political interference with 'academic freedom'.  The request is not necessary, anyway, as separate data which have recently been released show that a significant majority of lecturers on European affairs in UK universities are emphasising the extreme economic risks that will arise from Brexit, and the almost-certain economic damage that will be done by a 'hard Brexit' or a no-deal situation. Leaders from virtually every sector of business, large and small, are pressing similar views on the government: unless something very close to membership of the European Economic Area [EEA] succeeds EU membership, the effects on the economy, on jobs and on living standards will be catastrophic.

The point is being learned, in most places other than the headbanging quartile of the Conservative party, that tariffs are not 'the big issue': what would be lost by exit from the EEA are common regulatory standards which allow the free passage of goods and services between the member countries. It is the loss of common standards in everything from medicines through nuclear controls to aviation that would really bankrupt Britain if we walzed away into oblivion.

It is impossible to make a positive judgement of the intellectual capacity of the 'other two' Brexit ministers who are meant to form a team with Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary. Liam Fox [Trade Secretary] talks about future trade possibilities as if tariffs and WTO rules are all that really matter - which is fantasy - and David Davis gives increasing cause for worry. As 'Brexit Secretary' Davis is Mrs May's point-man on the 'divorce' negotiations with the EU, and he told the Commons Committee on his chosen subject yesterday that no definitive motion may be put before the Commons until after the Brexit deadline has passed [in March, 2019]; thus implying that whatever has been agreed, or failed to be agreed, by that date will be the future context for the nation to live with. This displays a lack of both intelligence and common sense that is truly spectacular. 'Number Ten' has already begun to 'clarify' what he may have meant, beyond presenting a further demonstration of the government's complete lack of competence. But is it crystal clear that any academic who is honestly and objectively trying to give her students an understanding of the events that are shaping their future lives must be highly critical of the process that is in hand and of the competence of the people who are conducting it.

Lame Ducks and Kamikaze in Cloud-Cuckoo Land

Mrs May's new ploy might be quite clever; and if it is, one wonders who dreamed it up for her. To issue a draft speech two days early is a new trick, as far as I know. It is designed to set the media into a frenzy and to challenge the opposition parties to make a considered response to the apparently-arid actual content of the discourse.

Mrs May appears to be a lame duck premier, but her party dare not precipitate an election if it can be avoided. She may indeed survive long enough for the arch-Brexiteers to be shown up as lame ducks, instead.

A so-called Kamikaze wing of the Conservative party is - against all reason - demanding a 'hard' Brexit, which seems to mean complete withdrawal from the European Economic Area and the destruction of what the Thatcherites [and the neo-Thatcherite New Labour crew] left of the British economy. With various degrees of enthusiasm about self-immolation, there are reckoned to be up to sixty people of that persuasion: enough the prevent any more moderate consensus in the Tory party. Before her spectacularly unsuccessful election campaign, Mrs May hoped to get a big enough majority, including a large number of Remainers among the new MPs, to be able to face down the loonies and come to a solution of the Brexit dilemma [which she did not solicit personally] that could probably attract massive support in parliament and in the so-called parliament of the EU.

She is now launching an attempt to build a Commons consensus anyway. It will take a long time, but it may have the effect of moderating the success of the Momentum movement in the Labour Party.
Corbyn was spectacularly equivocal in all the recent election grandstanding about the Brexit issue. His personal antagonism towards anything that might protect or strengthen capitalism is beyond doubt, and as is evidenced in Germany the EU is good for business. M Macron's euro-enthusiasm is largely driven by his recognition that it will be less difficult finally to smash the French trade unions in a context of a stronger European Union than in has proven to be in a still-sovereign France. The Corbynistas will have noticed that: Macron is a product of the French system for producing technocrats who serve the secret state that lies behind the constitution, and the hard left recognises the enemy. This is the context in which Corbyn's twists and turns in the coming months should be observed. He has command of the party - increasingly - thanks to the crazy constitutional changes that his predecessor pushed through the party: but he has no empathy with the mainstream tradition of the Labour party which most of his MPs [including the new cohort] represent.

Thus Mrs May's scenario planning could set the Corbynista minority of Labour and the Kamikaze minority of the Tories on the outside of a developing consensus. As that political experiment fails at the first hurdle, but might eventually be made to run, economic reality will turn the enthusiastic Brexiteer ministers into lame ducks. Putting both Fox and Davis alongside Johnson in key roles at the sharp edge of the Brexit negotiations seemed crazy at first: and perhaps it was simply that: crazy. But now the real evidence is coming to the top, the wedges between the three musketeers will become apparent. David Davis is learning the limits of practicality, and will soon have to make a decision about whether he sides with Philip Hammond [who has already, in effect, said that the UK must remain within the European Economic Area] or go out on a limb. Johnson will follow where the wind blows: he was late in deciding to opt for the Brexit camp, astonished when they won, and confused now that they are faced with increasingly harsh realities.

Liam Fox has appeared to be the most dangerous Brexiteer minister. He seems really to have believed what he said about the gains that post-Brexit agreements with the USA and India and China can bring to the country. But today the main manufacturing employers' body has emphasised that point protectionism is increasingly transcending overall trade agreements specifically in China, India and the USA. To protect their own firms, trade associations and governments in those countries are simply setting up ad hoc barriers against imports, especially of the high-tech and IP-strong exports that Britain needs to build up in the future. Fox will be proven to be a very lame duck before he can be really dangerous; and that public exposure will greatly strengthen the argument that the UK must remain within the European Free Trade Area: on almost-any terms.