The results in Britain’s referendum on its membership of the European Union are in. And what a result. Britain has voted to leave, by a margin of 52 percent in favor, or over 1.2 million votes. Prime Minister David Cameron announced his resignation Friday morning.
No pollster saw this coming. Nor did almost any of the Brexit campaigners. The evening opened with Nigel Farage, the leader of the U.K. Independence Party, announcing that he thought he’d lost. Everyone else thought the same way. And everyone was wrong.
In the end, it was northern England, a traditional working class heartland of Labour, that won it for Brexit. This wasn’t simply a victory for the majority of the Conservative Party who wanted to leave. On their own, they would have lost. They won because the workers agreed with them.
It’s far too soon to know how the polls turned around. But they didn’t have to be very wrong on the numbers to get the outcome totally incorrect. Whether it was shy Brexit support, a sample that didn’t quite get enough northern workers in it, or simply the unknowns deciding they wanted to leave, it was enough to turn the tide.
There were lots of reasons to vote for Brexit. And there were reasons to vote against it. But the decision was taken in a democratic referendum, in which over 72 percent of eligible voters participated. And that kind of democracy was the best argument for Brexit.
Ultimately, the British people made up their own minds. They were told throughout by President Obama, by Cameron, and by a whole range of international organizations that they had to remain in the EU. And yet they decided to leave.
http://nation.foxnews.com/2016/06/24/win-britain-brexits-victory-democracys-victory
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