How’s the endless Brexit shitstorm working for you?…

Do you incline your head towards the wall with some velocity or are you hiding in the cupboard and swearing never again to turn on the news? Or do you love every bloodied plot twist (unlikely, but all tastes must be catered for)?

Theresa May’s latest meaningful vote turned out to be another meaningless mess. And as usual she is swearing to plough on, her internal idiot satnav stuck on the only destination she acknowledges.

Sadly, that satnav has been on the blink for ages. It’s been sending her round in endless circles. And every time she gets back to where she started, she croaks out the same speech, the one she’s been giving since the crack of Brexit’s dawn. Then she’s off again in another circle.

Some still see admirable doggedness in Mrs Maybe’s determination to plough on, and this morning’s Daily Mail front page blames not her but the House of Commons. “The House of fools,” the headline booms. “They vowed to deliver the Brexit Britain voted for…” says a sub-heading…” best read out in one of those Hollywood movie trailer voices. Or possibly in an Alan Carr voice, to capture the full fancy fury.

The Daily Express, its brain long since rotted by Brexit, rises from its afternoon chair to ask not unreasonably: “How much more of this can Britain take?” Less reasonable is an old Leaver line – “Nearly 1,000 days after the nation voted to quit the EU…”

Oh, yeah, that one again. The nation didn’t vote to leave the EU: a badly run referendum – possibly corruptly run – came out with a 4% margin for Leave. Translating that into the “voice of the nation” is one of the Brexit lies that have helped to compound this unyielding mess.

Other front pages today run their bloodshot eyes over May’s catastrophic defeat, her humiliation and another crushing, pointing out that there are only 16 days before we are supposed to leave.

Another vote in the Commons today is expected to reject a no-deal departure. And that leaves us where? God alone knows, certainly not the vicar’s daughter, with her stubborn refusal to adapt or see which way the wind blows.

It is hard to imagine a prime minister less suited to the task at hand. Where adroitness might have been an advantage, Theresa May has ploughed on regardless, digging herself deeper into that rut. Where people skills might have helped, she met no other eye; where deeper thought might have got her somewhere, she has narrowed her mind.

We should have spotted all this when she promised to deliver a great Brexit for Britain – something that mainly seemed to involve muttering “Brexit means Brexit”, that gnomic incantation of a busted spell, while setting off on another of her robotic rambles.

Here we all are, up Brexit-shit creek without a paddle and possibly minus a canoe, too. All political parties have contributed to this mess, but it’s not fair to blame the “House of fools”, as the Mail does. Let’s just point the finger at Theresa May and the Conservative Party.

For while there are cross-party tensions over Brexit, and while Jeremy Corbyn’s position has been vacillating and infuriating, this Brexit balls-up is a Tory Party production: a big budget blow-out set in motion by one Tory prime minister, then properly cocked-up by another.


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