Fantasy: In the fairy-tale land of Brexit we're trading with the world
"I'd get used to humiliation if I were a Tory.
I grant you that, one day, there will be a trade deal with the US, but only when the Conservatives break their promises to farmers and consumers about never allowing in US chlorinated chicken and hormone-treated beef. I am not being over-cynical. They are already pushing through a trade bill that will allow them to do just that.
The new cold war, Hong Kong and the persecution of Uighurs make a trade deal with China impossible, so that's another Vote Leave promise gone. Instead, the government is, in apparent seriousness, proposing that Britain join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. Alert readers will know that these islands are not Pacific islands. They will understand that, like every country in the world, we trade most with our neighbours and our neighbours are Europeans. We are a part of Europe, "a piece of the continent, a part of the main", as John Donne said. The Conservatives have ripped us from our only possible home.
I can see why Truss, Johnson and Gove hope no one will notice that their hard Brexit has seen the people of Northern Ireland suffer the consequences of a border in the Irish Sea, Amsterdam overtake London as Europe's largest share-trading centre and businesses drown in paperwork. They lied to the nation and to themselves and don't want to suffer the consequences. Their spinning and diversionary tactics are to be expected.
For the life of me, however, I do not understand why Labour and those parts of the broadcast media outside the control of the political right play along with the deception and pretend that the world as it is does not exist.
It's as if Britain were a Victorian family keeping up appearances. As if not just a government with every reason to conceal, but the opposition and media are bound by a promise to never wash Britain's dirty laundry in public - even as its stink becomes overwhelming."