In the week since the Brexit vote, we’ve read a number of analyses about why the Brits — or Little Englanders, to be more specific — chose to secede from the European Union, and what that portends for the world’s current English-speaking empire.

Not to put too fine a point on it: They’re White. And they’re angry.

From there, comparisons with current United States politics are straightforward. We’ll even grant that they’re true. But we find them insufficient.

The broader picture is more historical, and more complicated. Two forces are at play here, one inevitable, the other deliberate: Globalization and Thatcherism — or, as we know the latter, Reaganism.

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Happy Celebration of the Arrival of Refugees to the U.S., Stinquers! May you be blessed with a holiday feast that doesn’t involve gas-bag relatives raving about Ben Carson or asking “shouldn’t all lives matter?”

Those of you who are obsessive Simpsons viewers will get the headline.

And to answer Bloggie’s question on the previous post, NBC is going to start carrying broadcasts of English Premier League football [soccer to you Yanks]. The following promo ad is better than a wrap-around on a subway car.

Wrap-around ad, you wankers, get your minds out of the gutter!

And yes, Christopher Guest could – and should – totally extend this hilarious clip into a full-length movie, preferably with his Best in Show/Spinal Tap colleagues and Will Farrell involved.

[NYT]

My love for Dame Judi Dench continues to grow.  H/T Lux Mentis:

But perhaps the most arresting memory that they take away from being on set with living legend Judi Dench is not her boundless fascination with acting but her penchant for subversive needlework. Her work certainly did not resemble the delicately stitched roses of a Mrs. Bennet. “She makes these like needlework embroideries on set in the tedium of filming”, says MacFadyen, “but they are all: ‘You Are a Cunt’. And she gives them as presents. And it’s Dame Judi Dench. And she is doing this beautifully, intricate, ornate (work). You kind of see the work materializing as the shoot goes on. Like: ‘You Are a Fucking Shit.’ Knightley never received her embroidered cushion from Dench but remarks: “I love that! She gives this fantastic air. She just sits there and she embroiders and you think: ‘Oh, that’s so nice! It’s Judi Dench. It’s so quaint; she’s embroidering a cushion,’ and you go: ‘What are you embroidering?’ And (it says): ‘Fuck!’ Apparently she’s got hundreds of them just covered in swear words or rude sayings.”

[Darcylicious]

[Illustration/Make Your Own Kits: Subversive Cross Stitch]

[Guardian]

“Britain is on course to adopt gay marriage after the House of Commons voted to give the marriage (same sex couples) bill a second reading by a majority of 225. The bill will still have to receive line-by-line scrutiny in the Commons, and then it will have to get through the Lords, but the size of the majority, and the fact that the leaders of all three main parties are in favour, suggest that it is now inevitable that gay marriage will become law.” [Guardian UK]