Flashpoint

The above petition is doing the rounds on Twitter. Petitions come and go but most of them wither on the vine. This one has skyrocketed in just a few hours. Ground zero appears to be the Westmonster website, along with endorsements from Kate Hoey et al. The no deal propaganda has gone into overdrive. We are looking at a near total polarisation of the issue - especially on Twitter. 

Twitter polls are so far from scientific that they may as well be disregarded but even so, it is clear there is no sympathy on either side for May's deal. What is interesting though is the government petition heat map which tells its own story. It's an all England affair. Or rather all England against the capital. 

This is, of course, little more than rune reading, but it certainly sets the tone for the politics of Brexit. What it tells us, if anything, is that if May's deal does go ahead (or indeed any deal) the Brexiters will cry "betrayal" at every turn. That much has been evident for quite some time now which is why we needed strong leadership willing to speak to the nation rather than pandering to any one wing.

I won't be at all surprised if we now leave without a deal. Neither side is going to give an inch and for all that the Brexiteers are pumping out breathtakingly dishonest WTO claptrap, the remainers are still engaged in their jihad against the Norway option. There is no longer any compromise. One side has to lose and with democracy itself on trial, it's going to have to be the remainers.

Meanwhile, I'm detecting an odd change of mood. The legacy Remain campaign has faltered. The "Bollocks to Brexit" tour bus is the object of ridicule, with hardcore remain campaigners now heading into Ukip Calypso territory, while the People's Vote operation is rolling out the widely despised Tony Blair. It's highly likely that, were there a second vote, having learned nothing, Remain would once again lose.

This is all against a backdrop of widespread protests all over Europe, with it now converging on the European Commission building in Brussels. One gets a sense that this is now entirely in the realms of the political and there is no mood to hear more of technocratic solutions. Something is definitely up and the EU is not covering itself in glory. 

One also notices a distinct twinge of scorched earth petulance ot the remain camp - which we have seen before, but yesterday I observed an Economist hack telling us that they now support the breakup of the UK so that Scotland can rejoin the EU. There's also a surge in this sort of unhinged lunacy...

Perhaps we leavers could help out by wearing striped pyjamas and a little yellow star? 

It was about this time last year when we found ourselves at this impasse, and for all the hectares of articles written, we are still no further forward with no better idea of the outcome. The only difference being that we are edging ever closer to make or break time. It all now rests on whether there can be last minute edits to the deal and what parliament will do. It could all come down to the toss of a coin. 

This is no longer a matter of trade and economic outcomes. This is fundamentally a trust issue where the entire British establishment is on trial. they are damned if they do and damned if they don't. There is no outcome that does not lead to a worsening of this deep rooted political crisis. Being that there no majority for any particular outcome,there is talk of putting it back to the people, but but it can only be a May's deal vs no deal vote or a straight in/out re-run. There is no outcome that can unite the country. What was started in 2016 does not conclude any time soon.