Thread by @Staedtler

The trade part of twitter and the political part of twitter are not quite wired up right.

The trade part of twitter is all about the practical business of crossing borders.
While the political part of twitter is all about borders in people's head.

If you see Brexit as nothing more than trade rules, it will always mystify you why it doesn't work.
But once you understand it as ideology and nationalism, you know it will never work because it can never satisfy the emotions driving it.

I still see people wasting their time with Brexit acrobatics trying to find a version of it that satisfies whoever it is that wants it.

I've been taking the piss for ages about what I've called an English gentleman's Brexit. It's probably a crap name, but what I mean is this idea of achieving a Brexit that satisfies all the various parties

If you want compromise the best way to achieve it was to stay in the European Union. That's what Europe is, it's an ongoing compromise, a means of continuous negotiation.

But the biggest problem with Brexit is trying to define the Irish border. And the problem I've seen again and again is that people think it's about what FORM the border should take. But it's only about what PLACE the border should go

Think about this. It won't matter what form the border takes if you can work out where it goes.
You're not allowed a border in Ireland. So it it has to go in the Irish Sea.

So what form of border in the Irish Sea?
Wait a minute. The Tories can't agree to that either because it would split the union and give a mighty boost to Scottish independence. So it has to go in Ireland

While everyone keeps going off about trade deals, all I keep doing is looking at the border.
It's not about trade rules, it's about that fucking border and the people who have to live with it

We keep going round and round like a demented hamster.
We can't put a border in Ireland. we won't put a border in the Irish Sea. and we refuse to share a legal code that makes a border unnecessary.

Round and round and round. Five years

The reason I predict Johnson's resignation is because he can't finish it. Finishing Brexit means deciding WHERE the border goes.
In Ireland, in the Irish Sea or somewhere wholly outside Britain and Ireland entirely

The border has to end up in one of three places.
In Ireland - Johnson wouldn't last five minutes if he tries. Too many powerful countries are involved.

The Irish Sea - His party would mutiny. He's repudiated his own agreement. he can't repudiate his own repudiation.

Then the only place the border can go is outside both Britain and Ireland so we have a common legal area.
But we had that in Europe, and we've left. And Ireland isn't leaving Europe, so that's out as well.

And that's how I know Johnson is going to resign. he has to choose one of three things, and they all mean his resignation.
It's proof by elimination. You look at all the options and all of them are impossible.

But wait a minute, you say. There can't just be no answer. Something has to happen.
Yes it does, and that something will be staying in Europe, and it will happen without Boris Johnson.

The only way to solve the Brexit puzzle is to remove Boris Johnson. He is the problem, nothing else. Without him it's easy. With him it's impossible.

The Tories are going to sack Boris Johnson and stay in Europe, or as much as they can with where they've got themselves.
And the reason I keep saying it's going to end like that is because it's the only way it can end.