The two extreme options are the canceling the deal and a hard brexit. Both have a minority of supporters and a majority of opponents for whom backing either option would be political suicide thus making that extremely unlikely. It's basically an empty threat. The past few days have shown there is a lot of movement in people grudgingly supporting this or that but still no majority for anything. So, that makes May's compromise deal the inevitable outcome. But nobody wants to own that, just yet.
All the posturing we are currently seeing on all sides is basically preemptive ass covering of politicians playing the "but I had no other choice" card. Hence Boris Johnson suddenly agreeing to back May. Not a surprise; he's smart enough to not want to be associated with an actual career ending hard brexit. This way he supports May and has a shot at taking over as prime minister without actually being the one that was in charge at the key moment. I doubt it will work out for him but it fits a pattern of taking populist positions but being reluctant to act accordingly.
IMHO the more likely a hard brexit becomes, the more likely it is there will be meaningful movement on the EU side to prevent exactly that. In good EU tradition all 'hard' deadlines become highly fluid when they get closer. Today was one until last week when they grudgingly extended that by 2 weeks. As the next date draws nearer, I fully expect that extensions to that will again be negotiated successfully. This will continue as long as the British parliament doesn't break it's current deadlock of actually voting in favor of just about anything.
The two extreme options are the canceling the deal and a hard brexit. Both have a minority of supporters and a majority of opponents for whom backing either option would be political suicide thus making that extremely unlikely. It's basically an empty threat. The past few days have shown there is a lot of movement in people grudgingly supporting this or that but still no majority for anything. So, that makes May's compromise deal the inevitable outcome. But nobody wants to own that, just yet.
All the posturing we are currently seeing on all sides is basically preemptive ass covering of politicians playing the "but I had no other choice" card. Hence Boris Johnson suddenly agreeing to back May. Not a surprise; he's smart enough to not want to be associated with an actual career ending hard brexit. This way he supports May and has a shot at taking over as prime minister without actually being the one that was in charge at the key moment. I doubt it will work out for him but it fits a pattern of taking populist positions but being reluctant to act accordingly.
IMHO the more likely a hard brexit becomes, the more likely it is there will be meaningful movement on the EU side to prevent exactly that. In good EU tradition all 'hard' deadlines become highly fluid when they get closer. Today was one until last week when they grudgingly extended that by 2 weeks. As the next date draws nearer, I fully expect that extensions to that will again be negotiated successfully. This will continue as long as the British parliament doesn't break it's current deadlock of actually voting in favor of just about anything.