The alternative would be to let the public blame the Brexiteers themselves for selling take-back-control snake oil with bullshit-on-the-side-of-a-bus promises.

This is the obvious strategy to deflect blame and, sadly, the British pubic is a particularly fertile ground for xenophobia, having been drilled for decades into the idea that Johnny Foreigner in general and the EU in particular is the root of all evils that assail Britain.

I'll expect a lot of aggressive attitudes vis a vis the EU countries, backed by one of Europe's biggest militaries. Spain better be careful with Gibraltar or it could turn into Falklands 2.0

The only remaining question, really, is: how bad will it get?

Based on history, it looks like Britain doesn't generally do "radical revolutions" eventually followed by Thermidorian reaction, but hey, there was Cromwell, and the Brits have beheaded their king one century before we, French, came around to do the same.

Not wanting to predict details of how England might collapse, but one might imagine a pre-EEC economy comparable to what they had in 1970, except worse because of the loss of the Commonwealth market, and with an entirely different (better) economic situation on the Continent. The UK in 1970 was pretty horrible; it could be a lot worse than that.

What are your predictions for the EU leadership elections next Spring? Do you think Brexit will influence them in some way?

Does the growing nationalist tendency in Europe threaten neoliberalism and its handmaiden - austerity?

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

Even if there were to scrape 48 votes together, when it came to a nay or yea vote, which would be the next step, May would probably get overwhelming support from the rest of the Parliamentary party. Watching the Sunday politicals this morning, I got a real sense that people have had a cold shower and started to do their calculations and realised that May, deliberately or otherwise, has trapped them.

There's no time for a leadership contest. Acording to the rules there is a 12 week timetable for it to proceed, and that's without adding a week for Xmas. We leave the EU in 18 weeks. Even with a new leader, there is no time for any re-negotiation, even if the EU were willing.

So, there's no point in having a contest.

Also, NOBODY wants a no deal. Indeed, several people referred to an unofficial cross-party pact within Westminster that there is no way a no-deal would be allowed. Well, I say nobody; obviously there are a few, but fewer than 48 it seems.

So, it's a choice between this deal or no brexit. It has come down to this.
THAT IS THE CALCULATION THAT IS CONTRATING MINDS IN WESTMINSTER.

Not no-deal. They are worrying over the civil problem of no brexit and whether they can risk it. tbh If I were them, I'd worry too. And I'm a staunch Remainer

keep to the Fen Causeway

* It looks like they don't have the numbers for a spill : to quote my favourite pundit @borderirish :

The people who had the idea of Brexit but were too incompetent to actually organize it have now had the idea of staging a coup against their own idea but are too incompetent to actually organize it

• There is not a Conservative majority for May's brexit, BUT :
  
• As Helen notes, there is undoubtedly a majority of not-insane people in the Commons who, when push comes to shove, will not allow the wreckers to wreck
  
• The only politically coherent way for this to happen is for Labour to offer their help in a second (lightning) round of negotiations, where Barnier whips out a few concessions from his hip pocket (I think the EU deciders are pretty much aware of the options, and I think they are ready to the extra couple of yards. Not the extra mile though)
  
• Followed, not by a referendum, but a new election.

Very roughly, you go from an authoritarian state with centralised control over violence to the authoritarian state losing control. That leads to a phase with different factions using violence against each other, escalating to fill out civil war. When violence has been established as acceptable means to grasp power, the revolutionaries turn the states violence against each other, until the combination of a winning faction, a political leader, a worn out public and the re-established structure of state violence means you have a new authoritarian leader in place.

And that isn't what we have seen here, therefore I doubt that we will see a Thermidorean reaction as that is a re-establishment of centralised state violence (the Leviathan if you will). Or rather, that is how I see it in terms of revolutions. I would say that a radical Brexiteer government is possible, but I don't see who the army would back to overthrow them. The Queen?

If this is a revolutionary cycle, I would rather say we are in the preliminary stage were the authoritarian government undermines itself in the eyes of a sufficiently important class that then demands more power, setting of the loss of control in the first place. This would be the equivalent of the French nobility that demanded political power in exchange for taxes to fund the government (not fiat currency, they needed the metal). But I don't really see what group that would be. Or is there an UK equivalent to the CIA democrats waiting in the wings?

May replaced as leader by extreme Brexiter

Expected to make the EU quake in terror, it will instead cause them to walk away from negotiations muttering "Fuck this," and seal the Channel Tunnel with concrete. Britain will then enjoy a wonderful, nostalgic re-run of its glory days in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.

May can't get a majority because there never was a majority for a Brexit, there was various pluralities for mutually contradictory fantasies of Brexit.


She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

John McDonnell has said Labour should form a minority government if Theresa May fails to get her Brexit deal through the Commons, as the prime minister prepares to travel to Brussels to attempt to strike a final agreement.
The shadow chancellor said the government was in chaos, with its confidence and supply arrangement with DUP in disarray, and May's chances of getting her Brexit proposals through parliament looking increasingly remote.
"We just can't go on like this. We just cannot go on with this instability, uncertainty that there is in government, day by day and sometimes hour by hour," he said.

McDonnell told business leaders that if the government's deal was rejected in a meaningful vote next month, May would return to Brussels to seek concessions. If it fell again, then Labour should be given the chance to form an administration.
"At that stage, we will be saying give us the opportunity. You're a minority party, give us the opportunity to take over and see if we can form a government, a minority but with a majority position in parliament," he said.
"If that's denied us then we will be pressing for a general election, but as you know you need that two-thirds majority it's very difficult to get. Anything could happen at that stage."