EDITORIAL

Tumult in Europe: Neo-Liberal Paradigm Does Not Function; Instead Great Potential for a New Paradigm

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—In Europe at present, there are many points of instability, and expressions of how the neo-liberal paradigm is a dangerous failure. In Britain last night, for example, Prime Minister Theresa May “won” the no-confidence vote on her in Parliament, but it is a Pyrrhic victory. Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute president, addressed the situation in Europe in her weekly strategic webcast, aired Dec. 12, but she drew out the point that for the overall world situation, it is vital that the United States and China enter into a positive, solid relationship, toward a new world system.

To begin with, Zepp-LaRouche reviewed the wave of revolt in the trans-Atlantic against the neo-liberal economic and political policies of recent years. French President Emmanuel Macron is confronted with the full force of the French population’s rejection of decades of undermining their means of existence. Add to this, the Dec. 11 terrorist act in Strasbourg, so that Macron declared a state of emergency in many major cities. How that will play out with the Yellow Vests movement remains to be seen.

Zepp-LaRouche said that all these events, “shows how the whole situation is absolutely unstable, and that the neo-liberal paradigm, which we have been discussing now for a quite a while, which led to the Brexit, the defeat of Hillary Clinton, the election of the new Italian government, the Yellow Vests movement—all of these are symptoms of the same thing: That you cannot violate the common good of the normal people endlessly in favor of the very rich. And in France, the rage is directed against the very rich, who they say Macron is the President of. That you cannot violate these interests forever without causing earthquakes.”

Look at Britain. Zepp-LaRouche said, “The Brexit vote was a rebellion against the imposition of EU policies, austerity policies, and if you look at the incredible rates of poverty in Great Britain, with the terrible condition of the health system, none of these conditions has become any better, but to the contrary.”

She said of the whole situation, “I think this is foreboding the demise of the EU because the EU has proven itself to be absolutely incapable of reform, and therefore, I think we are in for many more turbulent days and weeks, and possibly months.”

Zepp-LaRouche added to this picture of “utmost instability,” the danger of a financial crash. In this, she singled out that, if there’s a disorderly Brexit, then the big question is what happens to the derivatives markets in the City of London. “And I should just mention one other factor of financial instability, which shows you how dramatic this situation is, is the fact that the shares of Deutsche Bank have fallen to €7.24. Now, it was said that €10 is absolute red line, after that Deutsche Bank goes bankrupt, then that red line was put at €8; now the expectation is that it will be €6.50 soon, and then €5. And naturally, that practically means that Deutsche Bank is insolvent, and the only option is a government takeover because a merger—who wants to merge with a bankrupt bank? And if they would merge it with Commerzbank which is partly a state bank already, which is also reported to be in big trouble, this really shows the Brexit, derivatives market, Deutsche Bank—we may be in for real shocks.”

Zepp-LaRouche underscored the high stakes in today’s policy reactions, and importance of the U.S. interacting with China, by reporting on the remarks of Wang Yi, China’s Foreign Minister, who said at a Beijing conference this week, that, as she paraphrased it, “the whole world stability is really largely dependent on the relationship between the United States and China, because these are the two most important economies in the world, and if they cooperate, then it is good not only for the two countries but for the whole world; if they are on the course of confrontation, not only the two of them will suffer, but so will the whole world.”

In short, “you can really see that the world is divided into two kinds of patterns: One is just trying to keep the speculative system going, which is failing; and the other one is countries which are oriented towards the real economy, and they’re cooperating with China.

“I think people have to choose: Do you want to be on the side of winning the New Paradigm or not, and I think one of the most incredible developments is, that just today and tomorrow, there is the arrival into lunar orbit of the Chang’e-4 mission to the far side of the Moon, the Chinese program which in a certain sense, makes China now the leading space power in the world, because no other country has yet undertaken to go to the far side of the Moon, which requires satellites as relay stations, and it’s a very exciting, new step for mankind in the discovery of how our universe really works.”

U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC

President Trump Invites Mexico’s New President López Obrador To Visit in Washington

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—In his daily press conference this morning, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (or AMLO as he is known) reported he had spoken by phone yesterday with President Donald Trump, during which the two discussed a joint program for regional development to deal with the crisis of Central American and Mexican migration which has adversely affected Mexico and created a crisis on the U.S.-Mexican border.

The Mexican President also reported that President Trump had invited him to visit Washington, although he said that it is necessary to first “make progress in advancing the agreement I’m talking about. He invited me and I may possibly go to Washington … but I think there has to be a reason for it.” AMLO said there had been no discussion of a border wall during the phone conversation.

“We had a very friendly, respectful conversation,” AMLO reported, according to ADNPolitico website. “We spoke about migration and the possibility of launching an investment program for productive projects, to create jobs in Central American countries and in our country, so people won’t have to migrate.” On Dec. 10, at the United Nations’ global conference on migration in Marrakesh, Morocco, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard announced that $30 billion would be invested over the next five years in a “Comprehensive Development Plan” for Central America, according to several Mexican dailies.

The Dec. 11 issue of El Sol de Mexico quoted AMLO saying that he had already sent to Washington the text of a possible trilateral investment agreement among the U.S., Canada, Mexico and the three “Northern Triangle” nations of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. The daily also reports that Ebrard continues to hold regular discussions with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on this issue.

China Responds to Trump-Xi Talks in Buenos Aires and Resumes Buying Soybeans

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—Responding quickly following the Dec. 1 talks between Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping to extend the trade détente by another 90 days, China has resumed buying U.S. soybeans, bringing some relief to farmers in America’s heartland. Bloomberg News reports China has bought 1.5 million to 2 million metric tons of American supply over the past 24 hours, with shipments expected to occur sometime during the first quarter, the U.S. Soybean Export Council said, citing unidentified industry sources. China’s state stockpiler Sinograin and its top food company Cofco are planning more purchases, according to people with knowledge of the plan, Bloomberg reported.

Meanwhile, at a press conference in Beijing, Chinese Ministry of Commerce spokesman Gao Feng said China welcomes any U.S. trade delegation to visit the country and is keeping an “open attitude” about visiting the U.S. for trade talks. The two countries’ economic and trade teams are maintaining close contact, discussing the details of trade negotiations and making smooth progress, he said, reported China Daily.

Explosive Developments in Michael Flynn Case: Will Judge Sullivan Finally Right the Ship of State?

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—Late Wednesday Dec. 12th, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan ordered Robert Mueller’s prosecutors to produce all documents relevant Gen. Michael Flynn’s interview by FBI agents at the White House on Jan. 24, 2017.  Sullivan’s order calls for certain FBI documents to be produced forthwith, or immediately, and others to be produced by Dec. 14. This is the can of worms Mueller and the Justice Department have been dancing around since Dec. 1, 2017 when Mueller procured his first scalp, a guilty plea by Trump’s first National Security Advisor Flynn for lying to the FBI at that fateful interview, and for making false statements under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Judge Sullivan is presently scheduled to sentence Flynn on Dec. 18.

There are several extremely significant problems with the Flynn interview which forms the basis of Mueller’s hit job against the General.  First, the interview concerned totally legal discussions between then National Security Adviser Flynn and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kisylak about U.S.-Russian relations occurring during the transition.  The contents of classified intercepts of that conversation were leaked to the Washington Post by an individual or individuals hostile to Trump and that leaking constituted a felony.  Further, Flynn’s name was unmasked in the intercepts, constituting a second felony. Neither extremely significant crime appears headed to prosecution.

Instead, disgraced former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates invented a pretext by which to trap Flynn on a false statements charge, using the classified transcripts of the Kisylak/Flynn conversations to test Flynn’s memory.  To set this up, she claimed, falsely, that Flynn’s conversations with Kisylak were a violation of the neutrality provision of the Logan Act of 1799, a statute which has never seen an actual prosecution and is unconstitutional.

Now, according to the sentencing memorandum submitted Dec. 11 by Flynn’s attorneys, FBI documents show that then-FBI Deputy Director Andy McCabe, since fired, actively dissuaded Flynn from having an attorney present at the interview, and the agent team, which included Peter Strzok, of Strzok-Lisa Page fame, was told not to give Flynn standard warnings about making false statements to the FBI. Instead, the agents were encouraged to deceive Flynn and make him relax, encouraging a jocular conversation between intelligence colleagues.  Nonetheless, according to FBI Director James Comey’s Congressional testimony in 2017, the agents reported back to Comey that while Flynn had misstated certain facts about discussions about Russian sanctions during the interview, they did not believe that Flynn had deliberately lied.

This leads to another issue: Whether the accounts of this interview were altered by Mueller’s team. In the sentencing memorandum, Footnote 23 reveals that the operative FD 302, the FBI account of this interview used by Mueller’s team, was dated Aug. 22, 2017, seven months after the Flynn interview.  In a very interesting article in The Federalist today, Margot Sullivan makes a convincing case that the original FBI interview notes, which had been produced right after the interview itself, have been disappeared and a new version of the interview concocted, possibly far less exculpatory to Flynn.

Congress has been trying to get the same documents now ordered to be produced by Judge Sullivan for months.  They have been stonewalled by Mueller and the Department of Justice.

Adding to the stink here, Flynn’s plea was taken by a different Judge, Rudolph Contreras who, it has subsequently been revealed, was a friend of disgraced FBI Agent Peter Strzok. Immediately after he took Flynn’s plea, Contreras recused himself from the case.  Judge Sullivan then took over. Flynn’s plea was procured after Mueller threatened to indict Flynn, his son, and business partners for Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) violations involving Turkey, destroyed Flynn’s reputation, and after Flynn was forced to sell his house to pay the legal fees necessary for competent representation in the jungle of Special Prosecutor and Washington metropolitan area prosecutions.  Prior to Mueller’s criminalization of FARA in the Flynn and other cases, FARA violations were almost never prosecuted; instead, violators were allowed to cure the problem civilly.  Here the so-called false statement seems to involve Flynn not disclosing, to Mueller’s satisfaction, how much Turkey controlled Flynn’s lobbying activities, even while those activities themselves were disclosed.

Judge Emmet Sullivan provokes outright fear at the Department of Justice because, in the corrupt prosecution of Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens, he upheld the law and unearthed, through an almost unprecedented judicially-ordered inquiry, massive and deliberate government misconduct, resulting in a reversal of Stevens’ conviction.  While the development reported above is extremely promising, it is unclear how it will develop.

Finally, we emphasize the determinative political issue concerning General Flynn which has largely disappeared from the legal landscape.  Flynn was targeted for elimination by British intelligence starting in 2014 because of perceived softness towards Russia, and because he knew where the bodies were buried in the overt Anglo-American support for terrorists in regime-change operations throughout the Middle East, inclusive of the Arab Spring.  He had called out the Obama Administration on both perfidies.

Was Michael Cohen Brainwashed (i.e., Deprogrammed)?

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—While much can be said about the schlemiel Michael Cohen, one aspect of this character, in his present witness for the prosecution costume, strikes this writer [Barbara Boyd, LaRouchePAC] and leads me to ask the title’s question. It is located in the following excerpts from his bizarre sentencing allocution in federal court on Dec. 12:

“I take full responsibility for each act that I pled guilty to, the personal ones to me and those involving the President of the United States of America. Viktor Frankl, in his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, he wrote, ‘There are forces beyond your control that can take away everything you possess except one thing, your freedom how to choose how you will respond to the situation.’ Your Honor, this may seem hard to believe, but today is one of the most meaningful days of my life…. I have been living in a personal and mental incarceration ever since the fateful day that I accepted the offer to work for a famous real estate mogul whose business acumen I truly admired…. It was my own weakness and a blind loyalty to this man to which led me to choose the path of darkness over light…. Recently the President Tweeted a statement calling me weak, and he was correct, for a much different reason than he was implying. It was because time and time again I felt it was my duty to cover up his dirty deeds rather than to listen to my own inner voice and my moral compass. My weakness can be characterized as blind loyalty to Donald Trump, and I was weak for not having the strength to question and refuse his demands. I have already spent years living a personal and mental incarceration, which no matter what is decided today, owning this mistake will free me to be once more the person I truly am.”

What shines through here are the histrionics. They are very typical of former members of alleged cults who have been “deprogrammed” by anti-cult kidnappers and practitioners. Frankl’s psychological theories, much quoted by deprogrammers, stem from his experience in the Holocaust. Trump Tower certainly is not a concentration camp. Otherwise, here and elsewhere Cohen has taken to describing himself as a lost slave ordered to engage in a string of crimes by a charismatic authoritarian. For anyone familiar with his previous biography, this is obviously false. His wife’s family includes a doctor who rendered services for the Lucchese organized-crime family. Cohen went to the finest schools and had a partnership at a major New York law firm, before positioning himself to be hired by Trump. His side taxi-medallion business, which netted him millions, involved partnerships with felons. His side real estate transactions involved millions in cash to undisclosed buyers, raising the specter of money laundering. None of these had anything to do with the $500,000 per year he received in his job for the Trumps.

In the 1986 LaRouche case, Boston prosecutors, overseen by Robert Mueller, revealed in discovery documents that former member witnesses used by the prosecution had all been “deprogrammed.” Studies of this process have shown, definitively, that memories are altered in this process. Salacious and fictitious memories and legends are created, and, most important, the heightened suggestibility produced by the process allows for transference of responsibility for actions, real or fictitious, to the person targeted as the malevolent force.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Week-Long Initial Talks in Sweden To End the Brutal Yemen War Yield Some Success

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)— Yemen’s warring parties have agreed to withdraw all forces from Hodeidah governorate and its vital harbors, as part of a wider eventual ceasefire agreement, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said on the concluding day of talks held in Rimbo, Sweden. In a briefing before talks closed, Guterres said the ceasefire agreement covers all of Hodeidah governorate and demands the withdrawal of all forces, from both the city and Hodeidah’s main port. “In the harbor, the UN will assume a very important monitoring role, and in the city, order will be maintained by the local forces,” he stated, referring to forces recognized by the Yemeni government.

He said that he expects forces will start withdrawing “within days” from three key ports in Hodeidah governorate, before both government and rebel forces begin disengaging in the city. The three ports named by the UN head were Al Hodeidah, Al Salif and Ras Issa. They are the main entry points for food and aid shipments to Yemen, the U.A.E. daily The National reported.

“The UN will play a role in the port. And this will facilitate the humanitarian flow of goods to the civilian population, and it will improve the living conditions for millions of Yemenis,” Guterres said, Al Jazeera reported.

Rebel negotiator Mohammed Abdel Salam told reporters that the Houthis are happy with what was achieved in the consultations, and said rebels have agreed in principle on a UN role in Sana’a airport, which would include carrying out safety and inspection checks.

Guterres pointed out that the agreement is a limited success, since there has not yet been an agreement on a ceasefire in the rest of Yemen beyond Hodeidah. An agreement on Sana’a airport was expected within a week, he said. A next session of talks is to be scheduled.

THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

Ecuador Officially Joins the Belt and Road Initiative

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—During his three-day state visit to China, Ecuador’s President Lenin Moreno signed a Memorandum of Understanding to officially join China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Under the previous 12-year administration of President Rafael Correa, Ecuador and China had forged very close relations, and China invested heavily in major infrastructure projects, which had a very positive impact on the country’s economic growth.

Moreno served as vice president for part of Correa’s term in office, but after taking office in May 2017, he distanced himself from Correa’s policies, and sought a closer relationship with the United States. Measures taken by Moreno have also complicated the situation of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, whose asylum in Ecuador’s embassy in London is now jeopardized.

Nonetheless, like an increasing number of developing-sector heads of state, the Ecuadoran President clearly recognizes that joining the Belt and Road Initiative is the only way to guarantee his country’s future. He has also expressed interest in joining the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. His three-day state visit, in which he met with President Xi Jinping, Premier Li Keqiang and Li Zhanshu, Chairman of the National People’s Congress 13th Standing Committee, among others, was characterized by great warmth, and the signing of many bilateral cooperation agreements in infrastructure, agriculture, information technology, “new energy,” and environmental protection.

The two Presidents signed a final communiqué which emphasizes that these agreements were made “in the framework of the Belt and Road.” The two agreed that in today’s “complex and changing international circumstances,” the best path is to strengthen collaboration to “build a new kind of international relations based on mutual respect … cooperation and shared benefits.”

New Eurasian Rail Links: China-Turkey Middle Corridor and Afghanistan’s Lapis Lazuli Corridor

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—There are new developments in Eurasian rail corridors. A new rail connection between Turkey’s major city of Istanbul and Lianyungang in northeast China was initiated in late November, taking freight along the Middle Corridor through China, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia, in a trip lasting 20 days. This Middle Corridor was launched to provide an alternative to the northern routes of the New Silk Road, which take cargo through Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus, thence into Europe at Poland. The Middle Corridor runs from China to Turkey, which provides another gateway to Europe via the Black Sea. The Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway was opened in October 2017, providing the missing link on the route.

Today Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani, at a ceremony in the western city of Herat, formally inaugurated the Lapis Lazuli Corridor, saying the route enables Afghanistan to send its products to Europe and other parts of the world. He called it a “milestone” in Afghanistan’s connectivity policy. Ghani thanked his nation’s international partners including Turkmenistan, Turkey and Azerbaijan, which, along with Georgia, signed the Lapis Lazuli Agreement in October 2017 with Afghanistan.

The Lapis Lazuli route begins in Afghanistan’s northern Aqina port in Faryab province and Torghandi in western Herat province, and will run through to Turkmenbashi in Turkmenistan. From there, it will cross the Caspian Sea and link the Azerbaijani capital of Baku to Tbilisi, Georgia and Georgia’s Black Sea ports of Batumi and Poti. It will then connect with Kars in eastern Turkey before linking to Istanbul and Europe, TOLONews reported.

SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE

The Chinese-Built Longest Suspension Bridge above the Arctic Circle Opens in Norway

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—Halogaland Bridge, also referred to as the Arctic Mega Bridge, over the Rombaksfjord, which connects Narvik with neighboring towns, and is part of the European Route E6 highway, has been opened today in Norway, thanks to the Chinese contractor Sichuan Road & Bridge Group (SRBG), Global Construction Reviewreported. The bridge has a 1.6 km span, making it the longest suspension bridge north of the Arctic Circle and the fifth longest suspension bridge in Europe.

The bridge provides a significant shortcut on the European route E6 highway—the main north-south road through Norway and the west coast of Sweden. The Chinese firm delivered the steel constructions and was responsible for the mounting of the bridge, which took more than five years to build, reported RT.

New Major Setbacks to Nuclear Power in Europe

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—Once again in Europe, nuclear power generation plants received further setbacks when a study by the French Environment and Energy Management Agency (ADEME) has concocted an economic case for “renewable energy” is stronger than that for new nuclear reactors, dealing a blow to plans by the French government and energy company EDF to build a new generation of European Pressurized Water reactors (EPRs), Global Construction Review reported.

The ADEME report lied that: “The construction of an EPR in 2030 would require €4 billion to €6 billion of public support. In the longer term, the extra cost of developing a 2-4GW EPR-based nuclear sector would be at least €39 billion for the nation. Against this, the costs of renewable generation could fall to between €32 and €80 per megawatt hour by 2060, compared with about €100 today,” wrote GCR. The report makes no mention of government subsidies for “renewables,” in its cost figures.

At the same time in England, the word is out that Hitachi is considering scrapping plans to build its £14 billion Wylfa Newydd two-reactor nuclear power plant in North Wales, because of soaring costs. The decision has not been made yet. Hitachi’s board will meet this week to discuss the increasing costs and further action on the project, according to reports in Japan. A decision to pull out of the North Wales nuclear power station project would be a major blow to the British government, which hoped to build a next generation of reactors, GCR reported.

India Will Test a New Opportunity for Space Experiments, Using Spent Rocket Stages

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—Many years ago, American engineers proposed, instead of throwing away Centaur upper stages after their fuel is spent and they have delivered their payload to orbit, that they be outfitted to be platforms for experiments. The project was never funded, and upper stages of rockets still become “space junk.” Now, for the first time, the India Space Research Organization (ISRO) will use the empty upper stage of a rocket, to carry experiments from scientists and students. In a technology demonstration in January, a rocket’s spent upper stage will be outfitted with batteries and solar panels.

Talking with the Times of India, on Dec. 11, ISRO chairman K. Sivan explained the program: “Normally, the last stage of a PSLV rocket, after releasing the primary satellite in space, becomes dead and categorized as debris…. Now, we are working on a new technology where we will give life to this ‘dead’ last stage of PSLV … for six months after its launch. This rocket stage will double as a satellite. This will be the most cost-effective way to perform experiments in space, as we don’t have to launch a separate rocket for the purpose.”

ISRO will make an “announcement of opportunity” in a few days, Sivan said, to invite proposals for different kinds of experiments.

COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

‘No Exit’ in London

Dec. 13 (EIRNS)—Theresa May won her vote of no-confidence yesterday from the Conservative Party backbench MPs (“backbenchers” are MPs who are not in the government), but the 200-117 vote was closer than she expected, and it leaves Britain’s government with no exit and no options. (Indeed, the 117 “no-confidence” votes included the majority of Tory MPs who are not getting a supplementary paycheck from the May government, for instance, as Parliamentary Private Secretaries.) And May was only able to get her 200 votes by promising, first, that she would resign before the expected general election in 2022, and second, also promising to renegotiate the Brexit agreement she had just reached with Brussels, so as to ensure that Britain would someday be able to leave the European Customs Union, as the British voted to do, rather than remaining in it, possibly forever, at the pleasure of the EU. (This is the issue of what the media confusingly call “the backstop.”)

This leaves no exit, or “huis clos,” as in Sartre’s play of that name.

First, May’s so-called Brexit agreement cannot pass Parliament—probably no “Brexit” deal she could negotiate could pass Parliament. Tory “no” votes will certainly exceed 117; Labour will be instructed to vote “no,” although some Blairites will support it anyway; and 9 of the 10 Ulster Unionists which vote with May’s government coalition, will vote “no.” Yet at the same time, Parliament has voted that Britain will leave the EU in March 2019—and all the “experts” are insisting that to leave without an agreement, or “no deal”—would create an unparalleled national disaster.

Second, can the Tory Party replace May with a pro-Brexit leader from within and carry on?  Clearly the leading such challenger, Boris Johnson, has not gotten the support to do so, or maybe he really doesn’t want the job either. And such challenges are supposed to start with an internal Tory vote of confidence—but the next such vote is now off for a year.

A second referendum? Labour and Tory Remainers have asked for a second referendum to overrule the first one, but the idea is so crooked that its support is limited.

Cancel Brexit altogether?  Some have suggested it.

Call a general election?  Under the Fixed-Term Parliaments Act, general elections occur at five-year intervals unless the Commons votes to call one by a two-thirds majority before then (as in 2017), or Parliament votes no confidence in the Government, and then fails to reverse such a vote within 14 days.

But the trick here, is that after their disaster of 2017, no Tory, whatever their other views, wants a general election. For instance, Jacob Rees-Mogg, the head of the Euroskeptical “European Research Group” of Tory MPs, the man who deliberately triggered yesterday’s internal, Tory vote of no-confidence in Mrs. May, has repeatedly said, “I will not vote against the government in a vote of no confidence under the Fixed-Term Parliaments Act.”

A look at today’s morning headlines in Britain reflects how Pyrrhic May’s victory was in yesterday’s vote.

The Guardian: “Tory Coup Fails. But Scale of Rebellion Damages May.”

The Times: “May Scrapes Home,” writing: “A wounded Theresa May limped home from a vote of no confidence yesterday … the margin was far less than No. 10 had hoped for and will fail to heal the [Tory] party’s splits over Brexit.”

Financial Times: “May Survives Brexiter Challenge but Margin Fails To Quash Revolt,” and highlights May’s “vow to step aside before election.”

Daily Telegraph: “A Vote To Remain, but When Will She Leave?” May’s former Chief of Staff Nick Timothy also wrote that in the aftermath of the vote, May “lives to fight another day, but her deal is dead as a dodo.”

The Mirror: “It’s Lame Duck for Christmas,” writing May’s “goose is cooked,” and that she only survives the no-confidence vote “by promising not to fight the next election.”