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| I do have to ask, why do you feel the EU has any responsibility to offer to negotiate prior to the invocation of article 50? Or why should it offer the UK, or anyone else, access to the single market, without adhering to freedom of movement?
The UK is seeking to negotiate it's future position as a independent entity from the EU, where it will be a separate and sovereign rival. And an entity who has essentially given the EU the finger and if it makes a success of it would only serve to undermine the EU's interests.
Basically some people seem to be living in some form of fantasy World where the EU should be nice to the UK, despite them becoming potential rivals, despite the UK having cause serious trouble for the EU and despite the fact that were the UK to get an easy time of it, it would likely damage the EU. Reverse the roles and the UK would have done nothing different.
It's called Realpolitik. I'm not really sure why anyone is debating this any more. At this stage it's only being debated by the Anglophone media and only because certain British politicians have been coming out with this nonsense because they want to claim to their voters that the EU are being rotten sports when they inevitably tell them where they can stick their cake and eat it vision of diplomacy and not because they sold everyone a fantasy in the first place. | |
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Nothing wrong with playing Realpolitik and partying as if Bismark were still alive.
But then just don't act surprised if not listening to members gets interpreted as a democarcy deficit.