Pity Theresa May!

I know it's hard to feel any sympathy for Theresa May -- I mean, nobody forced her to take the damn job -- but let's just think for a minute about how she is likely to be remembered by history. Spoiler alert: it's not going to be pretty.

May has been an awful Prime Minister. Unimaginative and inflexible, mostly humourless and occasionally shrill. Opportunistically called an election to boost her majority of Parliament, only to lose that majority altogether.  Endlessly deferential to the unlovely DUP,  on whose support she depends.  After two years of "negotiations" delivered a Brexit deal that absolutely no-one really likes.  It's a shocking track record, but Theresa isn't even going to have the mild (if perverse) consolation of being the UK's worst PM ever.  Her immediate predecessor, David "the Invisible Man" Cameron, the author of the whole Brexit fiasco,  has a lock on that, possibly for all time.

No matter what happens on March 29 or whenever this whole festering mess comes to a head, a huge chunk of the British population will be unhappy, and Theresa is going to get the blame.

• Brexit on the terms set out in May's deal?  Satisfies no-one -- Brexiteers will see it as "BRINO" (Brexit in name only) while Remainers will be that the deal carries all the costs of just staying in the EU while losing many of the benefits.  

• No deal Brexit?  Fears of near-term shortages of everything from food to medications are real.  For the longer term, companies are already relocating staff away from London to Paris, Brussels and elsewhere as a precaution.  If there really is a no-deal Brexit, expect much more of the same.

• No Brexit at all?  Nigel Farage and others have been shameless about threatening civil disorder if that were to happen.

It's been apparent for some time that only a second referendum, this time with a clear question, is the one course that offers any hope of averting a truly disastrous outcome, but May has steadfastly rejected that possibility.   So, even as we ponder May's likely place in the history books, we should remember that she still has the opportunity to do the right thing, but simply refuses to take it.