ml1dch

They should attempt to remove the Government, meaning that all legislative functions cease for a two week period, two weeks before we're due to leave? I'm not sure that's a particularly good idea.

No. The accepted logic is: 1) get the DUP onside somehow 2) the ERM feel a bit silly acting more outraged over Northern Ireland than the DUP so fall into line 3) Labour MPs who see no point torching their party relationship for something that is bound to fail, but will reluctantly vote for something that will squeak over the line They all need to happen.

Seems like it's been a good couple of weeks since it was brought out...

Two of those three things aren't outcomes. There are three possible outcomes. 1) we stay in 2) we leave with something looking a lot like the current withdrawal agreement (maybe going back to the Ireland only backstop when the time comes that they can stop caring about the DUP), and we just spend the next twenty years arguing that we're too close or not close enough to Europe depending on who happens to be Prime Minister that day 3) we crash out, have a few months of chaos and then sheepishly do (2) So actually two and a half outcomes.

It's staggering how someone can have so little grasp of what's actually going on.

I expect you're correct. The problem is, for this process to move forward something does have to pass the house, and a new referendum is just another thing on the big pile of "things that won't pass the house". Until something comes off that pile, it's as feasible a way through the impasse as any other.

I think it's a Frederick Forsyth novel.

Tony's right. Ring-fence the backstop and completely ignore it, what remains is still an ugly car-crash.

Would a general election suddenly see the various factions of both parties unite around a particular position and then result in a decisive enough win for one or the other to implement that position? If not, what good does it do?

Sweepstake? I'll go defeat by 75 due to abstentions. And it being held up as virtually a victory considering how bad it could have been.

As you were then.

The amendment wording was this: "and requires the Northern Ireland backstop to be replaced with alternative arrangements to avoid a hard border; supports leaving the European Union with a deal and would therefore support the Withdrawal Agreement subject to this change" This particular numpty is upset that his own, fantasy interpretation of "alternative arrangements" wasn't the chosen strategy. With good reason, as they're hilariously inadequate. So, no. There was no "instructing the government to pursue a specific line". The amendment wording was deliberately vague, as anything more precise wouldn't have passed. In the future coffee table book bestseller, "1,001 times Theresa May acted in bad faith", this would be lucky to make the cut.

I've gone for a can of this as my poncy, metropolitan elite, hipster craft beer of choice to celebrate today's win:

If you mean short-term (let's say three months), I reckon that anyone confidently predicting how it will play out hasn't understood it properly. It could be pretty much anything, but "it" should be a lot clearer by this time next week. If you mean long-term, my best guess is technically outside the EU but with so little changing as to have rendered the whole thing pointless. And with nobody having the energy to reopen Pandora's Box to have the same arguments again for a long time.

Based on how squeaky and excitable he gets, almost certainly the former.

What is the thing that is going to happen in this Parliament, given that there appears to be no majority for anything?

I give it three days before the first reports start coming through of people being blocked from viewing STD health information or LGBT support websites.

I'd say that someone who thinks that both the main parties are incompetent toss-pots who shouldn't be trusted to manage a local Tesco Metro is the dictionary definition of balanced.

Remember how Brexit always meant being outside the Single Market, and how anyone who doesn't want a quarter-witted crash out onto WTO terms is a treachorous remoaner?

Isn't that literally just a description of Twitter?

Which ones does he disagree with?

Excellent pun-work. If that's what you were doing.

#GammonballRun

He'll probably double that via the sharpened 2p pieces that well-wishers donate to him en route.