/2017/04/02/article-50-and-after/Andrew Curry's blog on futures, trends, emerging issues and scenariosSun, 02 Apr 2017 18:29:04 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.com//2017/04/02/article-50-and-after/#comment-6541Sun, 02 Apr 2017 18:29:04 +0000/?p=6895#comment-6541A great analysis, and the Britain Thinks typology seems reasonable (I write as a Devastated Pessimist). The behaviour of the pro-Brexit press and hardline MPs suggests that they are very bad winners. Magnanimity is in short supply, and one explanation is that (as with Johnson, Davis and Fox) it has dawned on the hard Brexit faction that their optimism about having cake and eating it is ill-founded. Indeed, the best outcome for the UK now is that we pay a great deal more to have something approaching the links with the EU we now have, minus any control over the rules of the game. Explaining this to the public will be a horrible exercise for the entire political class, but especially so for the Brexiteers. The cognitive dissonance involved can only be dealt with by getting one’s excuses in very early and finding a suitable set of scapegoats. I fear we can expect, for these reasons, an increase in xenophobia, anti-EU vitriol and blaming of Remainers as we negotiate our exit and for some time after we have ceased to be members of the Union. The PM and the Opposition parties have a great responsibility to come down hard against any such tendencies.

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