Brexit and Article 50

Perhaps the one thing David Cameron supports that I agree with him on is the UK's membership in the European Union, and possibly the only political move of his that I respect was his resignation following the vote to withdraw from the EU.

Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty provides the mechanisms a country must use to withdraw from the EU, as an interconnected network of over two dozen countries, it isn't as simple as just saying "we don't use the Euro anymore, also you can't come in" some people think the process will take up to ten years.

As of now, the UK has not invoked article 50, and Cameron has stated that he will not do so and will leave that to whoever becomes prime minister after him, this has irritated many other EU members, who appear to have taken the referendum personally and are urging Britain to start the process as soon as possible, however I am not entirely sure they will.

Possibly they can't, there is a fair bit of turmoil in the various parties at the moment and without a government that has a broad base of support, it will be quite difficult to agree on any of the details of leaving the EU, such as disentangling finances, dealing with workers in and from other countries, and so on while at the same time fending off attempts by Scotland to secede and rejoin the EU as well as the inevitable legal challenges that will pop up at every step of the way.

The theory I have is that this will end similarly to how it did with Greece, after a couple years the EU will restructure itself slightly in a way that will seem to appease the xenophobic isolationists but will functionally be unchanged and life will go on as normal until Russia tries to destroy us all for some reason.

Leaving article 50 uninvoked was a wise choice by Cameron, it puts the responsibility and the blame on what will probably be a Brexit supporter who ends up in the office and I suspect that the process will be such a shitshow that they will do their cause more harm than good, the fact that the economic impact was literally instantaneous also helps, as there is no doubt about who precisely is responsible, something extremely unusual in politics.

Politics tends to return to the status quo, and that is what I believe will happen here as well, in the long run it may even encourage progress in the other direction, it's just a shame so many people have to be hurt and scared in the meantime.