Why Brexit might be the last chance for the European Union to save itself

Britain may be just the first of many

A broken union.
(Image credit: AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)

In a stunning rebuke of basically the country's entire political establishment, Britain voted Thursday to leave the European Union. The pound crashed hard when the results were announced, and markets are tanking around the globe. Both Northern Ireland and Scotland voted to stay in the EU, and leaders in both places are considering an Irish reunion and an independent Scotland that could get back in the EU. Even Spain is eyeing Gibraltar. In a few years, England and Wales could be all that remains of the United Kingdom.

An immediate search for scapegoats has commenced. Prime Minister David Cameron, who promised the referendum as a sop to rightist factions so he could win the election in 2015, is the clearest culprit. The U.K. Independence Party and its leader Nigel Farage, who has already begun to admit selling the pro-Brexit campaign on a series of outright lies, is another.

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Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.