With the 29th March just over a week away, May’s melodrama of “my deal or nothing”, probably means Brexit is delayed till 30 June, or later.
The absolute mess which she has been making was, of course, totally predictable. There is no way she could ever have achieved a majority in the House of Commons to vote for her Withdrawal Deal given so-called “parliamentary arithmetic”. Even with warring Tory factions regrouped, the disagreements, infighting and ambitions on Tory benches meant that she remained (and remains!) stuck in this “Catch 22" of her and party's own making.
And the farce escalated further this week, when the Speaker dug out a historic precedent from the 1604 parliament of King James 1st, who, ironically was trying to unify England and Scotland! May was thus prevented from presenting an unchanged deal to parliament, for the third time, this week.
So now she has had the cheek to place the onus on the EU to come up with a suitable “change” with which to satisfy the Speaker, so she can get lucky, for a third time, next week, while pleading with the EU for an extension to the process...
All this, to show yet again just how absurd this Brexit comedy can get. To the point where now the politicians themselves are very worried about the damage to “democracy” and their reputations!
Behind their so-called "democracy"
For sure, MPs claim that by fighting their respective corners over Brexit they are showing their “respect for democracy” and their respect for “the will of the people”! In fact, this last week, every time they’ve opened their mouths, the word “democracy” has popped out.
But since when did they care about democracy? Did they check with “the people” before they passed legislation to cut NHS funding, or funding for public services? Or before they allowed the bosses to casualise work? Did they give “the people” a vote on this?
It was this government, and past governments (not the EU!) which made the huge cuts to the public sector and agreed to the use of temps and zero-hours contracts. So now there is a “record number” of people in work, who remain in poverty!
These champions of the “people’s will” and “our democracy” never put it to the vote either, when they cut money for schools, local councils, social care, or when they closed youth sports and social centres.
What they call "democracy" has nothing to do with granting the working class majority of the electorate, the say that it should have over all these things.
If the working class truly had the voice these politicians claim that it has, there is no way it would agree to lining the pockets of the rich, to low wages and casualisation, nor to the huge funding deficit in the NHS - all of which have been endorsed and voted for by the parliamentary “majority”!
The enemy is within
The truth is that "democracy" is just another word for what suits them, behind which they can try to sort out they seonly their problems and/or the problems of the class they represent - the financiers, bankers and the owners of industry...
So in 2016, Cameron used the fake "democracy" of his referendum loaded with lies, in order to appease his warring Tories. Today, May is using the “democracy” she claims is represented by the 37.8% of the electorate who turned out to vote for Brexit, in just the same way - to keep her Brexiteer warriors on board. To call this 37.8% the “will of the people” , is a joke.
And it is even more of a joke in this country: would a strike of NHS workers enjoying that kind of support be described as "the will of the workers"? Of course, not! It would quite simply be illegal!
It is precisely this kind of double standard that many of those who voted “Leave” thought they were voting against in 2016. But no, the double standard of the politicians’ “democracy” and the interests it serves, against the working class, cannot be fought by voting - neither in their elections nor their referendums!
But even worse: the politicians have used the climate this referendum created against “the EU” and against immigrants to create an “outside” enemy - which doesn’t even exist. In fact the enemy is within: it is this divide-and-rule, exploitative capitalist class and its lackeys in government, who "democratically" exploit our labour to fill the City's coffers. The working class has nothing to expect from their bogus democracy and its institutions. It can only defend its interests by taking over control of society as a whole and ensuring it works in the interests of all.