Brexit Minister releases first 25 'Preparing for a No Deal Brexit' papers. Trump unimpeachable.

cream on top of trifle

I joined a meeting of the South East Cambs For Europe last night, who are actively campaigning locally for a people's vote on the final brexit deal or even, heaven forbid, it looks like we are going for a no deal brexit.

The timing was appropriate as today, Dominic Raab, Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, announced the release of the first 25 papers on how different sectors of the UKshould prepare for the event of a no deeal Brexit.

The elements required 'to mitigate risks' that caught my eye were:

• Businesses being asked to prepare for added administrative HMRC steps when WTO trade conditions set in for imports and exports.
• Pharmacies being asked to stock up with several weeks of medicines originating from the EU.
• New Science and EU Student support being excluded from access to EU funding after March 2019.
• Small online purchases coming from the EU could be liable for VAT.

The main beneficiaries will be the additional 7000 plus administrators roped in to help deal with the extra red tape. More papers to be released over the coming month.

Whilst the hypnotically calm voice of Dominic Raab introduced the papers in soothing voice and with the assurance that of course we still hoped for a deal, Chancellor Philip Hammond dropped his own spoiler. He stated that the UK economy would suffer by up to 8%, whichever Brexit happened.

Good news from the US. According to President Trump, he cannot be impeached because the US, nay, the world economy would crash - after all, he has achieved so much more than any other president.

Teflon President's Associates Guilty as Fraudsters. A Peacock Wing Puzzle

Well, it was not a good day for Trump, with guilty charges and pleas from two of his former associates for illegal dealings and fraud. It must have been bad as the President didn't tweet on the issue for 12h. The issues might seem convoluted to an outsider - and possibly the President himself. I've tried to get them clear in my head below.

Paul Manafort, the presidents former campaign manager, was declared guilty on 8 of the 18 counts put against him. He was found to have submitted false foreign income declarations during the period where he acted as a consultant for the then pro Russian Ukrainian president and was paid tens of millions of dollars. Then, when the Ukraine money ran out, he used false declarations to achieve loans in millions of dollars from banks. His sentence could be for up to 60 years, according to US media, but was more likely to be between 8 to 10 years.

All these activities pre-date his involvement with the Trump campaign and the president praised Manafort on Twitter today after a long silence, for his refusal to 'break' under intense pressure and 'invent' stories about Trump.

President Trumps former longstanding lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty on charges of violating campaign finance laws, the latter done at the direction of "the candidate", for the "principal purpose of influencing [the] election". The payments were hush money paid to two women with whom Trump allegedly had affairs. Cohen also pleaded guilty to million dollar amounts of tax evasion. With his plea bargain, Cohen could see his sentence from reduced from 65 years to five years and three months, according to the BBC.

President Trump does not like Michael Cohen anymore but also thinks that the campaign payment violations were not a crime, as others like Obama had made them too in the past. Almost a reasonable argument until you find out that the Obama violation was due to delays of declaring donations made by others to the campaign within a required 48h period. The actions were not deliberately hidden and the donations were declared, so this was a civil offence. Cohen, on the other hand, deliberately chose to make payments (whether alone or under instruction) and keep them secret, making this a criminal offence.

But will the mud stick on the irascible Teflon President? Not yet.  Perhaps at some point in the future, all the accumulated inconsistencies and dealings will slowly add up even for his core electoral base -  until a small final addition causes a tipping point and a rapid fall from grace.

In-between work and other distractions, I finally managed to edit the image of a Peacock butterfly fore-wing. Over 3000 photographs taken, to create 103 focus stacks, which were then joined into one panorama. The final panorama had one small gap near the front edge of the wing in a dark area, after the poor Hugin panorama software had tried to assemble the full wing over the best part of a day. Today, I manually fitted in the missing piece. Ironically, I had to down-sample the image so that you can see it above. The level of detail is reflected in a small section of the image shown below. See if you can work out where it should fit.

Calm before the BrexiTrump storms. Soyuz and Gliding.

Whilst President Trump's tweets have gradually lost their interest factor due to the almost predictable Good Guys - Bad Guys rhetoric, critical changes could be in the air this week. The accumulation of court cases and investigations is set to reach at least one litmus test in the immediate future. Will Paul Manafort, his onetime campaign chairman, be sentenced to a life in prison or will he walk free, after a case investigating apparently shady financial dealings with Ukraine politicians and fraud charges.

In the UK, senior cabinet members have been beavering away over the Summer, attempting to sweet talk a range of EU leaders into agreeing that the Prime Minister's Chequers deal is a reasonable option, especially when compared to the looming prospect of a No Deal Brexit. With the latter now having a 50:50 chance of occurring, the government has promised to release a whole range of papers this Thursday, advising how different sectors and presumably the general population should prepare for a hard Brexit, just in case.

Meanwhile the pound meanders slowly downwards against the Euro (at €1.11 today), and financially troubled Turkey becomes a desirable holiday destination as holidays there are still cheap.

As ever, life still goes on. We traveled to Peterborough on Thursday to see the Soyuz capsule that returned UK Astronaut Tim Peake home. It was displayed in the left wing of Peterborough Cathedral and drew a steady crown of the curious. The fire scarred exterior, ancient and robust wiring and cramped inner space brought home the perils of spaceflight, at a fatality rate of 1% to date.

Yesterday evening, after the rain had cleared the air, you could apparently see the reflections from London's Shard, 60 miles away up in a glider. I missed that view as I was concentrating on trying to keep the glider nose at the right trim whilst conducting straight-line flight and simple left and right turns under the watchful eyes of experienced pilots. I flew in two different two-seaters with dual controls. The first was a modern design, with the pilot sitting behind the passenger. The glide ratio was about 46:1. The second glider was a 1950s open cockpit, wooden model, the Bluebell, with a glide ratio of around 20:1. Pilot and passenger sat side by side. Even to an inexperienced passenger, the flight characteristics were very different when allowed to handle the joy stick. Despite the disconcerting element of having to wear a parachute, gliding is relatively safe, with a probability of fatality of 0.7 per 100,000 flights. This is a lot safer than driving in the UK, where the number of fatalities is about 5.1 per 100,000. The flights themselves were much safer than the drive to and from the airport!

UK White Paper scrapes through parliament but founders against EU wall

Engineering Train at Ely

The government continue to have a battle on it's hand, both with itself and in Parliament as the soft Brexit supporters attempted to introduce their amendments.

It is perhaps a sign of the bitterness and close balance between different approached to Brexit, that the conservativ e chief whip felt he could press Tory MPs to renege on their pairing deals. Pairing deals have been a respected route for MPs who cannot attend a particular parliamentary sitting, to pair with one of the opposition, effectively cancelling their vote.

LibDem MP Jo Swinson, who was on maternity leave, must have felt particularly aggrieved on the betrayal of that trust by her agreed partner on the Tory side, party chairman, Brandon Lewis. He did claim afterwards that he had handled in error in the heat of the moment and apologised. However, when the government wins by the skin of its teeth with a couple of votes, the pressure to break rules, written or unspoken, is obviously very great.

Mind you, it is all political pissing in the wind, a senseless struggle for dominance in internal politics with scant regard for the reality outside. When the governments white paper was presented to the EU negotiators, their was a polite interest as a starting point, but a gentle reminder that it did not meet EU requirements on mobility within the EU market and the need for no hard border on Ireland. The EU had also released their white paper asking member states to consider preparing for a hard brexit or crah out by the UK. Whatever concessions have to be made to the EU by UK negotiators led by Dominic Raab will re-ignite the internal UK battles and likely shoot the amended document down on its return to parliament.

The pound-euro rate is a realistic barometer of how things are progressing and they do not look favourable - the value of the pound has dropped to €1.12.

We have had the second of two new book titles arrive back from the printer this week, 'Sons of Scotland' is now completed, a week after 'Alzheimers - My Turn Next'. I travelled to Ely twice on the train this week. The second time, I took my bike on the train so I could cycle to an appointment at the other end. A great way to travel, at least during off-peak times.

Trump Completes Elephant in China Shop Foreign Trip in Helsinki. May's Chequers Brexit Plans Damaged

First, the good news, to quote one report - The President is returning from his foreign policy trip abroad. The bad news, he lent more credence to the statements of President Vladimir Putin than his own American security agencies and military and private advisers. Russian interference in the US elections, the invasion of Crimea, the poisoning of the Skripals and innocent civilians in the UK with Novichok, all appear to mean nothing in comparison to Mano a Mano male bonding of one world leader and a wannabee. Though now it is not clear who is who.

There must be serious considerations going on in European and Nato capitals about whether the US can really be trusted with their own security information anymore. Even some Republicans in the US are aghast at the elephant in a china shop approach of their president to foreign policy.

The Prime Minister had to accept several amendments to her Chequers Brexit plans that were submitted by brexiteers. Outrage in parliament. The amendments just squeeked through by a couple of votes. Brexiteers are crowing that they believe that this might have killed off the Chequers deal once it is presented to the EU.

The political excitement of the day barely served to rouse me from the apathy after a busy weekend (and a migraine). We took it easy as the hot summer continues.

Trump Destabilises and Antagonises UK. May Asserts Herself. Our Open Studio Suffers Sport and Heat

Artwork 'Amoeba'

I've deliberately left a couple of days to cover the Trump visit to the UK as his position is constantly changing as he plays his destabilisation card again. It began with an interview with The Sun where he intimated that the White Paper, that Prime Minister Theresa May had negotiated with her cabinet, would mean the that the UK could not get a trade deal with the US. He also praised Boris Johnson. Apparently the news came out just as he was sitting down with Theresa May for dinner at Chequers. The next day he was all charm and praise for the Prime Minister in her presence. His visit evinced major demonstrations against him in London, Edinburgh and near his Scottish golf club, where  70% of the populations views him unfavourably.

His whole visit became major news, and again left his hosts wondering in which direction he was going to jump next. Tellingly, it was against the EU, Russia and China, all described as Foes before he set off on his flight to meet President Putin of Russia in Helsinki.

Prime Minister May appears to have weathered both the storm of the Trump visit AND the resignations of Johnson and David Davis from her cabinet. Major Brexiteers are beginning to make noises, but it looks as if the PM is relying on the fact that she is the only one with concrete proposals in the White Paper.

Our days before the Weekend were spent in final preparations for our first Cambridge Open Studio Weekend. Which arrived with a blaze of heat, the World Cup and Wimbledon Finals, The Duxford Airshow and the Big Weekend in Cambridge. Visitor numbers were therefore low compared to previous years. Sales were low, but we were rewarded with some interesting conversations and unexpected shared interests with visitors.

The Amoeba sculpture relied on visitors to animate it, which they did with a little encouragement, resulting in the gif animation above.

Our hopes for a bit of rain and a cooler next weekend to bring out the visitors appears to be disappearing , if the changing weather forecast is any thing to go by.

Trumpeting and Misinformation at the NATO summit.

Fisherman's tales?

President Trump lands in Brussels for the NATO meeting and launches two broadsides. One, that the other NATO countries should up their contributions as at present the US was paying for their security. Two, that Germany was totally under Russian control due to a 60 to 70% dependency of its energy supplies from Russia.

The call for the other NATO members to spend more on their military budget (2% of their GDP) is an old one already made by President Obama, and NATO countries are responding. The number of countries spending 2% of their GDP on defence will increase from 3 to 8 in 2018. It should be noted that the large US spending on it's military in Europe is in part due to the convenience/necessity to have bases that are closer geographically to theatres where the US has a military influence.

The accusation of German total dependency on Russia for energy is just crass and inaccurate, as any fact checker will tell you. What's more, as Angela Merkel gently pointed out, she had the experience of what it had been like to live in East Germany, dependent on Russia, and knew that she was now enjoying living in a free united Germany that could make its own decisions.

The suspicion is that this confrontational approach is on the one hand primarily directed at the home voters, and on the other intended to push for a deal. Fortunately, this time the US remained committed to the principles of NATO and supporting it.

Other news of the day, England lost against Croatia in the semifinals - news coverage expected to return to normal in the next few days.

Today, we cleared out the garage and repaired the holes in the whiteboards to be used for our Cambridge Open Studios exhibition this weekend. I also completed the mounts for the first run of lino-prints and prepasred the 25+ individual units for my planned mobile, interactive sculpture.