by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
In a sense, the political fates of the United States and the United Kingdom continue to be intertwined on a macro level. The thing about what’s going on in both nations is they each face systemic, existential problems. With the United States it’s the attempt on the part of the Trump Administration to turn the very idea of America from open and aspirational on an international level to one of “blood and soil.” Meanwhile, the British have a far more convoluted crisis.
With Great Britain, there is actually more than one crisis. There’s the obvious crisis of Brexit itself and in what exact manner it will take place. But there’s an even deeper problem — is Great Britain going to continue to exist in the first place? A simple and superficial sketching out of the future give you any number of endgames that result in Scotland leaving the UK altogether. I think that’s why Trump was babbling about “not hearing about England that much anymore.” He was struggling with Boris Johnson telling them was a chance that England may lose everything because of No Deal Brexit.
I only keep writing about this because I guess the idea that the people of the United Kingdom might take control of their fate once and for all in opposition to Brexit gives me some hope that Americans might do the same when it comes to Trump. I continue to think that there is a 99% chance that anything dramatic that happens to UK on an existential level will happen after No Deal Brexit, not before it.
The reason why I say this is from America, at least, neither side appears to have radicalized to the extent necessary to stop Brexit before it happens. Remainers are simply too disorganized. Just like MAGA in the United States, Brexiters are willing to use “new rules” to get what they want. Not until Remainers radicalize will anything happen. (Not that I want this to happen, of course.)
And, so, what little hope I have about the whole situation stems more from just the general uncertainty of the situation than any sense that what I want to happen — Remainers right the ship of state and save the country from itself — will happen. If that did happen, of course, then maybe Americans would be inspired to address the systemic problems that Trump represents. Or something.
But it’s not to be, at least as of right now. The bad guys will continue to win.
