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Yes they kept the emotional temperature down. But you could argue too that this is party over country.
But they also backed something that was instantly clear to be very harmful to their voters as May proposed a rock hard Brexit [fnar], so on principle opposing was possible.
Best hope is that the momentum vote proposal on the SM happens, Labour fully backs this (w/o the nativism cakeism of 3/4 freedoms Corbyn is proposing atm no FOM) and elections follow. If Labour backs a vote it will change my opinion on them as it shows they are willing to listen to their members, which is quite important to me, I think democracy is not some sort of "oh every so often we ask you one thing/hold one election".
Tory party just does whatever atm!
JWestland-
I really don't understand your thinking. 'Party over country'? They need to keep the party together to get elected, for the good (as they see it) of the country. 'Opposing was possible'? They opposed what May did from the word 'go', e.g. saying they would immediately guarantee the rights of EU citizens, opposed a 'Tory Brexit', etc.
There may well come a time when Labour can adopt a position on the single market, but I, too, don't think that time has yet come.
Oliver Schick
Well, yes. Once again, it would have been electoral suicide for Labour to say they were opposed to 'Brexit'--there had been a referendum in which a small majority voted for 'Brexit'.
Leaving aside the unclear status of that referendum, by saying they were opposed to 'Brexit', Labour, as supposedly one of the two parties of government, would have said they don't accept the outcome of the referendum. That would have gone down very badly. Even while saying that the party accepted the referendum result, Corbyn still several times said that he was in favour of 'remain and reform'.
As I've said several times before, I think all of this makes sense and has helped Labour keep the emotional temperature low, when 'Brexit' is not their problem despite a sizeable minority of Labour supporters being in favour. Their current position is also for a fairly soft 'Brexit', which given the small majority for it, is probably the best reflection of the referendum result.
The one thing you acknowledge is that their parliamentary minority means they couldn't have won (m)any votes, anyway. Needless to say, it's an unacceptable state of affairs in Parliament and there need to be new elections, but I think those won't happen until boundary changes and voter ID have come in and the Tories can be sure of victory.