> As a British citizen, I'm appalled by the sentiment expressed here. It flies in the face of the ideas and values upon which the EU was founded. Isn't that th

> As a British citizen, I'm appalled by the sentiment expressed here. It flies in the face of the ideas and values upon which the EU was founded. Isn't that the point, though? UK just said "no" to half a century of following these principles - making sure there are consequences means protecting EU ideals, not harming them. Sure, in practice there will be plenty of replacement treaties - but for EU _and_ for those principles it's quite ok if UK ends up 6th or 7th economy instead of 5th. We're not talking about bankrupting anybody here.