Fear and Terror in 21st Century Brussels
The UK’s hardball approach to EU negotiations doesn’t appear to have won them any favors.
Is this a gamble that failed?
A miscalculation?
Or is it an act of desperation and fear?
Or an attempt to get the whole wretched business over and done with, as soon as is humanly possible?
Perhaps.
It could be a strategic error.
Or an act of desperation.
Or of impatience.
A fourth possibility, however, is that some people in the UK government think that it would be even more politically costly to not even try for a deal, than to try and fail.
After all, many people would just blame the EU’s stubbornness and obtuseness; more than (or even rather than) the politicians and other UK establishment figures involved in the negotiations.
Many of the people who might blame the government for any real or perceived negotiation failure may well have been opposed to Brexit to start with, anyway. So there might not be much of a loss if Brexit negotiations deliberately fail.
One last point: as human psychology is complex, this fifth option might be the uppermost idea in the minds of some UK negotiators; but they may also have a ‘reserve domain’ of their conscience which is desperately hoping for a miracle.
A miracle seems unlikely.
That said: if EU negotiators by any chance think the UK are sabotaging the negotiations, they may well decide to call our bluff, and land us with a shoddy deal that is difficult to refuse. That could be either out of revenge for the referendum having been called, or won; quite easily both. Resentment at such a ‘shallow trick’ as the one hypothesised here might also play a part.
If the EU did decide to pull this stunt, the UK negotiators would risk losing face, because turning down the deal would look very bad indeed.
What do you think the UK negotiators intend to do?
Donald Trump: Idiot or Saboteur?
Donald Trump acts as though he doesn’t really care whether some of his more contentious measures actual succeed both in being passed, and not being found constitutional.
Does he really want this ‘Muslim Ban,’ or does he really care that much about building the wall?
Or is he just a crybully who wants to get revenge on the establishment who never gave this 100-foot toddler all that he wanted?
Does he just ‘inhabit’ the role of this angry, thwarted dodgy politico? Whenever he rants about his policies not being passed, or suffering legal challenges, does he really mean it?
Or is he just like that teacher you had way back at high school?
The one that affected a stern and severe tone, but were actually pi**ing themselves laughing on the inside, whenever they played that game?
Corbyn’s Conspiracy Theory? Or Conspiracy Fact?
Is the rumor true that Corbyn was half-heartedly campaigning for Remain?
Or false?
Or another possibility: was he divided in his own mind?
It may turn out, in due course, that some of the Conservatives were the ones trying ‘vandalism.’
This, of course, is just speculation at this point.