Even on the most optimistic latest polls, for the Tories, the combined vote share for Leave supporting parties amounts to only 46%. By comparison, the total vote share, for parties opposing Brexit, comes in at 54%. As with every poll since the 2016 referendum, the support for Brexit is a minority, and with every passing day, it becomes an ever smaller minority. Whatever happens in, and after, this election, the reality is that Britain's future will be inside the EU. Its only a question of time.
And, that reality also means that, in any future elections, it will be impossible for Labour to win, unless it adopts a clear pro-EU stance. If Johnson does win the election, and takes Britain out of the EU, then Labour will have to commit to taking Britain back in, at the earliest opportunity. If Johnson does win and takes Britain out of the EU, it will not take long before those that voted for that find that they have been duped. They will find that rather than improving their lot, it will have badly worsened it. All of the claims about taking back control will be seen to have been so much bunkum, as an isolated Britain, a minnow amongst the big fish of the EU, US and China, will find itself having to do the bidding of these large players in order to avoid being eaten. It will not be long before there is wailing by those that were most keen for Brexit, who will bring out the well worn complaint that "No one warned us that this would happen", much as happened when those who speculated on rising property and share prices did, when those markets collapsed, and as those who bought houses in flood plains on a sunny day did, when the inevitable floods arrived, or as those who bought houses on leasehold, without bothering to find out what it meant did, when the consequences of their actions became clear to them. Life has become full of instances where people have made reckless decisions without understanding what they were doing, in the expectation that someone else will bail them out from their mistakes.
But, whilst the state bailed out the speculators after 2008, and previous crashes, and as it has bailed out those that recklessly bought houses in flood plains, and looks likely to do with those that recklessly bought houses on leasehold, there is no one that can bail out Britain, and its citizens for having recklessly voted for Brexit, and from which it will suffer the inevitable consequences. Its Britain itself that will have to bear that cost, and, as always happens in those cases, what that really means is that those that pay for it will be its poorest citizens. The super rich can sell their shares and bonds at a moment's notice, and move their money to Europe or the US; the affluent will pick up shares and property on the cheap, as the prices of those things crash; they will be able to employ some of those made unemployed, and thrown into reduced circumstances, as nannies, cleaners and so on. The people who will suffer most will be those of the older generation, who lack skills, including the mental skills to be retrained, who will find that they are left to languish, especially as all of the foreign workers required to provide health and social care, go back home to the EU.
The tragedy will be that, whilst a majority oppose the Brexit that will bring this about, much as a majority in the US voted against Trump, the peculiarities of the voting system will mean that the wishes of the minority are imposed upon the majority. It didn't have to be so. Had Labour come out clearly to promote a clear international socialist position of stopping Brexit, and of revoking Article 50, then it could have rallied all of the majority Remain vote around it, and would now have had a clear lead in the polls.
Its being argued that the Liberal advocacy of Revoke has been unpopular, and has lost them support. That is not true. The policy of Revoke is popular amongst Remain voters. It is more popular amongst Labour Remain voters than the party's own absurd position. 70% of Labour Remain voters believe that the Liberals Revoke option would be a good outcome. Even 25% of Labour Leave voters believe that it would be an acceptable outcome. But, Corbyn's absurd renegotiate a fantasy Brexit Deal, followed by another referendum, in which he would be "neutral", and god knows what would happen if it again came out for Leave, wins the backing of neither Labour Leave nor Remain voters. It has been a disaster, and not surprisingly.
What destroyed the Liberals was not their policy of advocating Revoke, but the ludicrously arrogant fantasy politics of Swinson, who ridiculously portrayed herself as the next Prime Minister, a Princess across the water, waiting to come in and swoop up millions of centrist voters, and thereby rescue the Blair-rights from the Corbyn nightmare. But, without both the Tory Party and Labour Party having split, and come across to the Liberals, ahead of the election, there was no possibility of that ever happening. Nor is there a possibility of enough Labour and Tory MP's crossing the flood after the election, so as to hoist Swinson, or someone of her choosing, aloft as the Prime Minister of a national government to stop Brexit. The Tories have been purged and cowed by Britain Trump Johnson, and Cummings, and without the Liberals having that critical mass, there is no way that careerist Labour politicians are going to go the way of the Chukas, and sacrifice themselves on the altar of Swinson's near religious ecstasies.
What destroyed Swinson and the Liberals was her fantasy politics, combined with her sectarianism towards other parties, most notably towards Labour itself. It is ludicrous for Swinson to say that she will not support Labour if Corbyn is its Leader. She does not get to make that decision, and if she does not support Labour the reality is that she would be supporting Johnson, just as she and the Liberals did in 2010, when they went into coalition with Cameron, and his reactionary conservatives that unnecessarily imposed ten years of austerity on the country, and created the mess we face today. Voters have looked at the other-worldly politics of Swinson, and her determination not to lend Liberal votes to Labour, they look at the sharp rightward turn of her party, on economics, under her leadership, and remember its support for those policies of austerity after 2010, and conclude, I think I'd rather just vote for Labour anyway.
As I write, Corbyn's absurd Brexit stance has turned away millions of Labour voters. Swinson's fantasy politics has caused many of them to hold their nose and decide to vote Labour anyway, in the hope that the party can again be forced back on to the righteous path of opposing Brexit. But, it is still not enough, and the electoral system means that without industrial scale tactical voting, or without Labour coming out far more decisively to emphasise its opposition to Brexit, we will get a Tory government. Johnson has done what I predicted a year ago. The Tories have swung to a hard right, Brexit stance, and thereby destroyed the Brexit Party. Meanwhile, Labour and Liberals have conspired to split the majority support for Remain, and thereby to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
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