There's something appropriate about Brexit being scheduled for Halloween.
Brexiteers, in my observation, have had two motivations in connection to the departure policy: a desire for reduced immigration and a desire for foreign trade policies more favorable to the British (...okay, English) workers. Setting aside the moral issue I take with the former goal to focus on the latter, the stupidity of Brexit is that it will have the exact opposite real-world impact, and we have already seen as much quite clearly in the harsh terms that both the Trump Administration here in the U.S. and also Xi Jinping's government in China have demanded upon the UK vis-a-vis any new, post-Brexit trading deal that may be reached (example). What the tougher stances of the U.S. and China toward the UK in this new atmosphere demonstrate is the reality that leaving the European Union means that the UK will have MUCH LESS bargaining power in the future, NOT more! The UK will emerge from this process much weaker, not stronger. That is why Brexit, and especially a hard Brexit, has been the policy most favored and advanced by Russian intelligence.
