This is part of the problem - people have convinced themselves that no deal can be mitigated by a series of mini deals. But why would the EU offer that? (In their shoes I'd wait until queues of lorries had paralysed the M25 and the UK came begging).
You see, the thought that the EU might actually be planning this worries me deeply.
Whatever you think of Brexit, and whatever you think of issues like the lies told by Boris Johnson et al, or the funding of the Brexit campaign (and let us not forget that Cameron's government spent 7 million on the "remain" campaign), it was a democratic vote, by a nation with a functioning democratic system.
I think Juliet Samuels in the Telegraph is insightful on this one:
"I didn’t vote for Brexit. I thought – and still think – that it’s a strategic mistake that makes it harder to defend British interests. And God only knows our Government has hardly made the best of it."
"The EU, meanwhile, would discover whether it is a voluntary association of democracies or a gang of states who boycott any nation that decides to leave. That is the implicit threat of its negotiating position. Either surrender land, or we cut off planes, food, medicines, electricity and so on. In the good old days, such a threat would be considered an act of war. How lucky it is, then, that the EU is a peace project."
My feeling is that while the EU is certainly not obliged to dig us out of the hole, they should not take the extra step and threaten to heap the soil in on top of us. I can't see that anyone could seriously think that effectively putting the UK in a state of siege was a reasonable negotiating tactic.