Everything that could go wrong with Britain’s imminent departure from the European Union seems to have done so. With only 59 days to go until the U.K. automatically crashes out of the bloc, British lawmakers still haven’t approved a deal with EU leaders that would avoid a cataclysmic rupture. The odds are not good. The House of Commons decisively rejected Prime Minister Theresa May’s proposal earlier this month, handing her the biggest parliamentary defeat for a British government in the country’s history. Members will vote on Tuesday on amendments to May’s “Plan B” legislation that could avoid, or guarantee, a no-deal Brexit.

As an American, following this debacle is like watching one sinking ship from the deck of another sinking ship. The Brexit vote was a foreshock of sorts, a surge of ethno-nationalist populism that preceded President Donald Trump’s election by six months. “Basically, they took back their country,” Trump told reporters when he landed in Scotland the day after the referendum. He rode a similar confluence of factors—unabashed xenophobia, the Great Recession’s unhealed wounds, a […]

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