THE phrase “uncharted territory” has been deployed often these last two years by Brexit-weary commentators and political reporters. They reach for it when other words simply fail them or are considered too raw for mass consumption. What they really mean is that the English political classes are behaving in a manner characteristic of the aliens in the sci-fi masterpiece Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. What was deemed to be bizarre and improbable one week becomes the new normal the following week.

As it becomes clearer with each passing month that the chief Brexiteers simply did not possess the merest Scooby about a negotiating strategy for leaving the EU, jaw-dropping revelations have become so commonplace that we now consider them mundane. The Irish border question jeopardising the sustainability of thousands of businesses in Northern Ireland as well as a peace process that remains fragile: I’m sure we’ll work something out.

READ MORE: Leave campaign ‘cheated’ to win the EU referendum

The revelation that the Leave campaign was officially cheating: nothing to see here. That the two main pillars of its campaign – the NHS £350 million and the prospect of being swamped by Turkish immigrants – have now been acknowledged by Leave chiefs as lies: all’s fair in love and war. That millions of us could be at risk from dodgy food and dodgier medicines: we’ll come to some arrangement. That convoys of British lorries will be stranded at European checkpoints thus paralysing our food production chain: we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. That the UK Government is already making plans for a state of national emergency unprecedented since the Blitz: it’s just a precautionary contingency measure. Yet the most astonishing revelation came from the lips of the organ-grinder himself, Jacob Rees-Mogg, in a radio interview last weekend. In it he was asked if he would resign in the event that the UK would begin to suffer a post-Brexit economic apocalypse.

The National:

In the week that it was announced that his hedge fund was continuing to expand its activity in Ireland to indemnify itself from, you’ve guessed it, a post-Brexit economic apocalypse, this multi-millionaire effectively stated that this would be unnecessary because the consequences may play out for 50 years or so before we can conclude with any certainty whether Brexit has been a bad thing. Rees-Mogg’s response neatly encapsulated the callousness and indifference that lies at the heart of Brexit and inspires its chief architects. There is absolutely no risk attached to Brexit for Rees-Mogg, Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and those who have backed them in this mad enterprise. They and their families possess the financial resources, property portfolios and family connections to insulate them when the effects of Brexit begin to hit those who were duped into voting for it on a carousel of lies. What do they care?

IT'S A DOG FOOD SALESMAN'S LIFE
LIKE many others I was amused to learn that a Unionist Think-Tank (I think this one could be called a fish-tank) called These Islands has tried to take down Andrew Wilson’s Growth Report. I now make that three Unionist think-tanks/propaganda units we have on the go. These Islands’ debut was not an auspicious one. It failed to quantify the effect of Brexit in its predictions of a new stone age for an independent Scotland.

The National:

This is like analysing your country’s chances in the World Cup while failing to factor in the likely performances of Germany, France, Brazil and Argentina.

Keep taking the tablets, lads.

BANNON'S DARK VISION MUST BE RESISTED BY ALL
STEVE Bannon, former chief strategist to Donald Trump, is perhaps the only man on the planet that can make his former boss look a fey and bloodless liberal. If you think Trump is scary behold some of Bannon’s messianic bampottery.

Bannon has been conducting a mini European tour seeking out suitably compliant audiences and broadcasters to disseminate his ideas of an extreme right-wing uprising throughout Europe. He is the man who called Hillary Clinton “a fucking bull dyke” and who dismissed all movements for social justice thus: “They’re either a victim of race. They’re victim of their sexual preference. They’re a victim of gender. All about victimhood and the United States is the great oppressor, not the great liberator.”

The National:

Last week he spoke of his plans to establish a foundation in Europe to spread extreme rightwing propaganda to the extent that it becomes the mainstream. He has already begun to form alliances and partnerships with Nigel Farage, Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National in France and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.

The extreme right have always preyed on the social problems of society’s poorest by telling them blame the poor of other nations and races as a means of opposing the liberals in power.

As they do so they rake in profits in speaking engagements, media enterprises and publishing ventures. They forge a narrative of “the little people” grabbing back power from the liberal elite but in reality use this to keep them enslaved by encouraging them to turn on each other and to hunt down ethnic, sexual and religious minorities. They despise weakness and so despise those whom they purport to admire, the blue collar communities in the rust belts. In Bannon’s vision and Le Pen’s and Orban’s the little people are fit only to be used to bring about a society where only the fittest get to survive and where weakness is defined as anything that doesn’t at first seem normal.

THE MISSING LINK
I AM being encouraged to spruce up my social media offering, in particular my rather scrofulous presence on LinkedIn, the virtual business platform. After my brief excursions to LinkedIn I’m often left feeling professionally subdued and with an overwhelming feeling of inadequacy. I often feel that to take a step beyond its virtual walls is to enter a parallel universe filled with boundless optimism, unicorns and rainbows.

The National:

A new language has evolved full of “outcomes”, “digital transformation” and “change dynamics”. Everyone is smartly dressed, running businesses and speaking at conferences. I’m knackered after 15 minutes on LinkedIn.

Each minute I spend on this network I feel as if I’m running for a bus that I’ll never catch. I saw this offering last week: “Smartling makes the world’s digital content truly multilingual. We make it easy for global brands to automate and optimise their translation process and strategy, so they can localise and personalise the customer journey across channels.”

I had to go for a lie down after that one. My social media guru says that my change process could take some time.