ml1dch

Well, the eloquence and insight of your argument sure has convinced me of the fallacy of my position.

Well, quite.

In this case, not really. Not least, because your criticisms are all pretty well accepted. I'd bet there's nobody who went to London on Saturday and thought that if they achieved their aim then the whole thing was sorted out forever and people could just return to their happy little pre-June 2016 bubbles. If a second referendum does happen (and I'm still pretty sure that it won't), then that's square one on the Snakes & Ladders board, not square one hundred. All the problems that you describe are definitely there (and a few others besides), but they are problems to face rather than reasons for people not to try.

Well, the obvious question then is what is? They're all terrible options. The implication from your earlier post is that it should be a Government-taken decision to just stop the whole thing. If so, that's also a terrible option. There's no way this plays out that isn't really, really awful in some way.

I know. My words were deliberately chosen.

A big well done to everyone who went. At the very least, they won't have to sheepishly look at their feet when their grandkids ask them what they did at the time to try and stop the country being broken apart The other side held a demonstration in Manchester as well which had a pretty decent turnout. I make it around twenty-five, assuming none are plain clothes policemen.

Because that's what our country is now.

The twenty convictions against a Huddersfield grooming gang secured today resulting in sentences of between five and eighteen years for all accused? Those were the trials that Yaxley-Lennon and his dickish cohorts were trying to ruin.

You appear to have missed my point. I'm not all that bothered. Maybe never. Balls to both of them. They've both let down their country when they were needed, and history will judge them for it. You seem to have forgotten to answer the only question I asked though.

It's certainly arguable. It's pretty inarguable that we wouldn't be embarking on the subject of this thread though, isn't it?

I was trying to do one of those there allegory things.

So just to be clear, Michael Gove, Andrea Leadsom, Esther McVey et al, didn't really understand what they'd signed up for and want the option to change their mind on it? Is that basically the gist?

John Bercow apparently confirming he's stepping down next summer. Presumably so he can make sure the Commons can stop all this if it wants to. And before he can be dragged too heavily over the coals for bullying. Edit - although by all accounts he had already suggested this before.

Not sure what he has to complain about. The Government is just trying to carry out what he asked them to do with his vote. The little knob.

(Small print - nothing has really changed since March)

Apparently it was all agreed, then Dominic Raab turned up and it all went to shit. Story of his life really.

I don't mean since the FTPA was introduced. I mean ever. I got back as far as Wilson and decided I couldn't go any further.

Probably not, but it's still what we were talking about. And although the FTPA means it doesn't end the Government it would still be pretty unprecedented. I can't even find the last time it happened.

Budget - not withdrawal agreement.

Maybe. But although they have a history of voting with the Government on Brexit matters, I'm not sure that extends to supporting them on non-Brexit matters. And while they can (somewhat justifiably) claim that on Brexit votes they are honouring the referendum result, it's a harder argument to make on the budget.

The rumour about the DUP potentially voting down the budget in protest could make that vote fascinating. Something a friend emailed me (hence no link), I make no judgement on the accuracy of his analysis.

It's the Government's official version of "if you like the EU so much why not just go and live there".

So the current deal (assuming it's not scuttled by the DUP), it appears that we're staying in the Customs Union in perpetuity (or rather for a time-limited period that doesn't specify a time limit) and keeping our standards, rules and regulations completely aligned with the other 31 countries. And all we have to give up to keep things pretty much as they are now, is any say at all in the rules that we'd be governed by. So I guess it all comes down to each individual's definition of a "reasonable deal". On the bright side, plenty of Quitters will be able to triumphantly claim next April that things didn't turn out like all those catastrophic predictions said they would.

Speaking of whom, the Paedofinder General and his cohorts clearly couldn't find the time to hang out around court this week when a convicted paedophile was being sentenced to 18 years in prison for multiple child sex offences. The fact that it was EDL activist Pete Gillett in the dock had nothing to do with their decision not to turn up though, I'm sure.