How our German friends see Brexit

Nice summary from today’s ei newsletter:

In The Times Edward Lucas says the Brexit vote hit anglophile Germans especially hard. We seem to regard leaving the European Union as something like getting out of an unsatisfactory flat-share: too many arguments about the bills and washing up, not enough control over house guests. Move out, move on; sad in a sense, and our new living arrangements may not be quite as convenient, but that’s life. Germans see it differently. For them, the past 44 years were not a flat-share, but a shared life.

That squares with what I hear from my German friends and colleagues.