The reason for a backstop

In Johnson's letter to the EU earlier this week, he stated it was the intention of the UK to diverge from EU rules and regulations.

This in itself shows the real problem with Brexit. In that divergence makes checks and harder borders inevitable.

The EU SM market is built on a common regulatory framework and regulation. Leave the SM and these common rules and regulations, then checks have to happen. The EU needs to ensure what is entering its SM, rules of origin and its safety rules for good and services.

If the UK cannot accept this as a direct result of Brexit, then this is a huge problem.

It is the UK that is leaving, not the EU kicked us out, so it is up to the UK to identify and mitigate potential risks. If a commercial project would have been managed the way in which May and Johnson have manged Brexit, then it would have failed and many people lost their job or reassigned.

At the most basic level, the louder Brexiteer complain and bitch about the backstop, the more obvious the very solutions they present are doomed to fail or be rejected. If the solutions they present would work as they suggest, the backstop stops being an issue.

The point here is, that there is no such thing as a truly independent country, not in terms of trade, you align with one trading block or another. Brexit is aiming to realign the UK with the US rather than the EU.

This brings problems.

Most basic of which, a lot of what the US will want to import into the UK is against the EU's rules. So, say, if chlorine-washed chicken were to enter the Uk from the US, and the UK wanted to export chicken to the EU, the EU would want to be 100% sure that the chicken was produced and supplied to its rules and regulations, not that something against them. So, rule of origin checks would begin, and be comprehensive enough to satisfy the EU. They would not take us at our word.

And there it is, Brexiteers want to align with the US, so their and our disaster capitalists can feast of the stinking economic carcass that is the UK, even if that, in trade terms, is economically illiterate. Trade is best and most cost efficient when it is with your closest neighbours. Trade with the Eu can never be replaced with trade to the rest of the world, or the US and Australia. Its just stupid to think so.