Quote:
Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop
The Brexit referendum passed by a non-large margin, but Theresa May's proposal today got crushed in Parliament. If you assume that Parliament represents the country on this, which it may not, then many Britons are for the abstract idea of Brexit, but against the actual Brexit deal which this government has been able to negotiate. Anyone who has been paying attention has to believe that the May government has done about what could be expected, given that it has no leverage vis-a-vis the other 27 EU member states. So the problem is that there are many Britons who like and voted for some notional Brexit, but who don't like actual Brexit.
eta: Sort of like the way that Donald Trump got enough votes to win against Hillary, but most of the country has been unhappy with him. Sort of.
eata:  |
Some majority of Britons appear to want the trade advantages of the EU without the liberal immigration. The EU has to take an all-in or all-out posture. Otherwise, every other country can arm-twist for a bespoke “membership.”
What will be interesting is if a no deal Brexit proceeds and somehow the economic impact to GB is not as significant as expected. This would embolden problem debtor nations in the EU to push against austerity dictates from Brussels. The EU could run into enforcement problems regarding other members if GB survives a hard Brexit.
