by Arneb » Tue Apr 02, 2019 5:33 pm
And you know, the assumption in the UK government was always that, in the end, the EU would blink. All would come together for all-nighters, the clock would stop, Mutti would pour coffee for everyone, and there would be a solution. Then, a whimpering and agonized Commonms with a rock-solid Soft Brexiteer majority would vote Aye, Jeremy Corbyn would be screaming and finger-pointing at the sidelines, everyone would shrug and get to work again, while IM Mai would fill in the paperwork for a snap election and coast to five more years.
But that is not how it went. The first the EU did was to present a a 60 billion Euro exit invoice, they all 27 stuck together and issued the no-cherrypicking policy, and then everyone let Michel Barnier, and Michel Barnier only, lead the negotiations - an old pro who showed the British delegation how the EU administration was slow, dumb, and inefficient. Now the deal is sealed, it splendidly protects European interests, and nothing - nothing - can be done to unpack it. There is simply nothing the EU will do anymore, and all the drama is not beween St. Theresa and the Dragon from Brussels but between Hard-, Harder-, Somewhat-Softer-Than-Rock-Hard and Maybe-Not-Quite-So-Hard-Brexiteers - in London, not in Brussels, and the Brexit crowd slowly realise they'll have no-one but themselves to blame when this goes off the cliff. The Conservative Party, the Party of Business. Yeah, right.
Non sunt multiplicanda entia praeter necessitatem