It's nonsense to claim Russia influenced the Brexit vote

Q: How many Remainers does it take to fix a light bulb? A: Why should we fix it? It’s Russia’s fault it’s broken

An old joke; I think the original concerned Arabs and Israel, but then there are numerous parts of the world where all manner of events are attributed to historic enemies. I remember a few years ago, after reading an article about how Poles tended to think the Russians were behind everything bad, a journalist explaining that this is the historic result of being ruled by tyrannical regimes, low social capital and little trust in government. That’s eastern Europe for you; luckily we north-west Europeans, with our long history of open government and self-rule, were not susceptible to such second-world paranoia.

What a difference a few years make, with the White Scare now obsessing the centre-left across the western world, seeing the Russians as behind everything, and giving that economic basket case far more credit than it is due.