Incredibly, yes incredibly, Theresa May may still get her Withdrawal Agreement through, although the window of opportunity is shrinking by the hour. An hour is the new measurement in politics by the way; because too much happens in a day, let alone a week…

However, at least 20 Tory MPs currently aided and abetted by the DUP, may hold out regardless, unwilling to sacrifice any compromise on methods of EU departure, including the PM’s guaranteed resignation, on the altar of a pure Brexit. Wow.

And, as a reminder, think who those DUP allies are. A bunch of illiberal, old-fashioned, pork-barrel driven politicians opposed to abortion and same sex marriage; everything modern Tories should abhor. A potential nail in the coffin for the Tories’ longer term survival, to be re-visited at a later date.

Tomorrow we have a series of indicative votes on other options of how, if at all, to leave the EU. The Government lost three further highly-able, moderate ministers last night who voted for this measure. There will not be enough ministers to cover the workings of government at this rate.

And there are real dangers in these indicative votes. The potential to tear the Tories apart is huge with leading government figures voting all over the place. Imagine Philip Hammond voting for a single market/customs union option versus many of his colleagues for example…It might be the second longer term nail in the Tories’ coffin, which is why May, so anxious to keep her beloved Party together, was keen to avoid indicative votes, let alone because it also takes parliamentary control away from the executive.

Incredibly (see above), there is a small chance that if Parliament is split fairly evenly between various options, then the Withdrawal Agreement splutters into life. But this is hard to rely on because of the Kamikazi 20.

The Tories are almost fatally split particularly because of those die-hard Brexit purists. If the Cabinet divides across various indicative vote options, if TM can’t get her Withdrawal Agreement through and resigns; if we crash out of the EU without a deal, precipitating chaos, or if Brexit is delayed beyond May then a General Election is the only solution left, probably followed by a second referendum.

The Tories will pay the price and rightly so. The Kamikazi 20, possibly supported by the DUP, will take the lead in being responsible for causing this unwanted General Election. If it happens, it may end the hegemony of Conservative-led administrations for at least a generation, if not longer, as politics re-aligns. As for The Independent Group, they are not even a Party yet, but things are looking increasingly bright for them. Good!

What a period of Mayhem. There was no majority for Theresa May’s deal second time around and no majority for no-deal. Parliament is gridlocked and poisonous, the clock is running down and Brexiteers see their chance of ever leaving the EU diminish by the day.

That is why May is likely to get her deal through at the very, very last minute. Unloved though it is, it is Brexiteers’ only guarantee of ever leaving the EU in the foreseeable future.

And May’s deal should really please everyone ex the side-show of the back-stop. The UK leaves the EU with 21 months to forge a new trading relationship. It allows Brexiteers to negotiate a clean break. It allows Remainers a chance to reverse the decision one way or another, possibly encompassing a ‘Norway option’ during this time.

If we can bear to look forward, the next issue is who are the casualties of all this chaos?

First, the Prime Minister. Theresa May made many initial mistakes with her red lines and triggering Article 50 which all unravelled when she lost her majority in an unnecessary General Election. But since then she has been tenacious; admirable in her dedication to getting a deal done which she believes delivers on the referendum result (whatever people understood by their vote), and which rescues her reputation.

The problem is that her suspicious, distrusting, unfriendly, often wooden approach to her premiership has allowed her enemies to multiply. There has been no bridge/coalition building. No reaching out to make new friends in seeking a deal. No sense that she can think laterally and ‘out of the box’ to create new solutions. Her rigid focus has been her strength but ultimately her fatal weakness.

Many thought she would soldier on post March 29th for quite a while, drifting closer to the next election with perhaps a wild hope she could defy the odds and fight in 2022. No longer. She has been wounded too many times; her colleagues are sick of her. From all sides of the EU debate, her Party wants a new leader and a fresh approach to the next chapter with Europe and, indeed, domestic policies generally. She will go before she is pushed, ahead of November. She will have to find a life outside politics, but with a legacy certainly better than her predecessor.

Second, and a fervent hope, the next casualty will be the DUP. How unedifying watching this recalcitrant, prejudiced, mediocre bunch of old cronies hold the government to ransom. Nobody, ex the Right of the Tory Party, likes them or wants them. Northern Ireland voted to remain, future Tory governments will want their revenge. They will be rightly punished at the next election if not before.

Last, the Tories’ European Research Group. Awful in their disloyalty, grandstanding, and hatred of the EU, any future leader of the Tory Party, from whatever wing, will want to distance themselves from them. If they do not, The Independent Group will flourish, fueled by Tory defections, and the Tories will be out of power for a generation, if not forever as currently constituted.

Hard to believe, but ultimately some good one way or another may come out of this awful mess.

Politically the news just gets grimmer. Here in the UK we face another chaotic week with the possibility of no deal, no government and no PM by Friday, as Theresa May forlornly throws the dice on her Withdrawal Agreement for the last (or almost the last) time. She got some movement from the EU yesterday but there is a mountain to climb as MPs put Party and personal interests before those of the country. The possibility of a catastrophic collapse in our parliamentary system over Brexit is becoming very real. Whatever happens, the cumulative damage of the past two years will take a generation to repair.

But elsewhere the news is also grim as the fall-out from a populist surge gathers pace. Take events in Hungary for example. Orban, the rampantly nationalistic premier, has curtailed a free press and promoted homophobia, xenophobia and anti-Semitism, the latter used most notably to try and run George Soros out of town. His party, Fidesz, is likely to be thrown out of the moderate centre-right European People’s Party in the European parliament only to join forces with ruling parties in Poland and Italy to create a far-right alliance.

In Poland, the Law and Justice party (somewhat of a misnomer) is trying to curtail judicial and media independence with some success. Matteo Salvini’s League party in Italy whips up anti-immigration sentiment, and in recent weeks has even shown solidarity with the Gilets jaunes in France as they oppose moderate Macron. All three of these parties in Hungary, Poland and Italy fuel prejudice in the name of populism.

In Germany, courtesy of Merkel, far-right populists are again present in mainstream politics and such politicians are never far from influence in France.

Then in the US, Trump uses barely concealed racist rhetoric to identify with his populist voter base. His America First policies pull US influence from the world stage as he embraces the likes of the new far-right Brazilian president, Bolsonaro, Kim Jong-un and Putin, but shuns the liberal democratic leaders of the EU, Canada, Australia, let alone NATO as a whole. Only his erratic behaviour and the constitution’s checks and balances keep him from inflicting more damage on America’s future, but it is an amoral presidency. In Russia, Putin’s nationalistic and murderous hold on power strengthens as he plunders the State with wholly fascist intent.

There is a real and growing threat to liberal democracy across the West. I am no longer with Matthew Parris’s recent analysis in The Times on this. We can no longer assume we can ‘muddle through’.

Which takes us to the UK, that bastion of moderation. We have Government ministers warning that failure to implement Brexit will lead to the rise of the far-right. As if this should dictate policy!! We have moderate women MPs subject to horrific online abuse and harassment by our own version of Gilets jaunes outside parliament, whilst the police looked on, initially failing to intervene. We have Tommy Robinson raising hundreds of thousands of pounds as he peddles his Islamophobic views. We have anti-Semitism rife and excused within the Labour Party. We have a Tory Party driven to the right by the ideological toxicity of the Brexit debate.

Nothing can be taken for granted anymore and moderates need to rise up. In the UK, and probably much of elsewhere, the vast majority of voters and politicians sit broadly in the centre ground, but they need to wake up and be counted. Two cheers at least for The Independent Group. It will be too late when, through complacency, we realise the liberal democratic politics of the last few decades, and the benefits it has brought, has gone.