Stratfor writes that 2017 will be the year that determines the fate of the EU:
By this time next year, the eurozone could be defunct. Despite the small chances of it actually happening, the fact that the collapse of the currency union is even possible speaks volumes about the size of the problems Europe faces. Since financial, economic and political crises descended on the Continent almost a decade ago, Europe has endured many difficult moments. But 2017 will be the most important year yet for the continuity of the eurozone as political and economic risk reaches the bloc's very core in Germany, France and Italy.
You know my view. The EU can die with festering boils.
UPDATE: Will the EU make an orderly exit virtually impossible?
The flashpoint is likely to be the EU’s estimate of Britain’s financial liabilities following Brexit, covering everything from money already pledged to the union’s budget to the pensions of retired bureaucrats. The estimates in Brussels are that the UK will be facing a bill of €50bn-€60bn.
As I've noted, if the legal entanglements are already this difficult to sever, the British should be grateful they are getting out now--and other Europeans should heed the warning of what the EU will do to keep you in.
And I imagine the Russians are marveling at the tremendous mistake of their Soviet predecessors of relying on tanks and fear to hold their empire together when unfunded pension obligations might have been a far more effective restraint on an impulse for freedom.
