Should we care?
The DUP has decided to reject the Windsor Framework and doubtless some of the ERG will join them. The whinging protests that a few checks in the Irish Sea mean the UK is a slave state will be rolled out again. Ulster Unionists will cry betrayal, mainly because if they don’t even more radical and hardline Unionists will cry betrayal and that costs votes. The ERG will claim betrayal because it is an easy way of claiming that Brexit was never tried properly and that is why it is failing.
How they square that with also saying Brexit has been a triumph, is beyond me.
Meanwhile the deal will go ahead but should we care that the PM has been unable to bring the ultras along with him?
In one respect we should be happy, the ultras have lost and they know it. But we should really care about the damage they can do and the shifting power in Northern Ireland.
The unionists have managed to let Sinn Fein become the largest party in the province by splitting their vote three ways. Every vote that is not for the DUP lets more candidates from other parties succeed.
That is why Brexit was such a kamikaze mission for the Unionists, they have voluntarily given away their majority, split their cause once again, hacked off pretty much every other party in not just NI but the UK too and still they want to fight in the last ditch, again.
We should really care that Unionists are so poorly served and led, the consequences of political failure in NI are huge, painful and long lasting.
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.
By Jonty Bloom Media