Clegg, who initially appeared to back the PM’s summit veto, only to later declare he was “bitterly disappointed” and feared that Britain would become a “pygmy in the world”, justified his no-show by saying “I would have been a distraction if I was there."

For The Independent, traditionally close to the deputy PM’s Liberal Democrat party, this was “Clegg’s day of rage”. The prime minister and his deputy, the London daily writes -

… are at odds over whether the Government should move quickly to rebuild bridges with the 26 other European Union countries after Britain was left isolated at last week's Brussels summit.

[…] Both Conservative and Liberal Democrat ministers admit the Coalition faces the biggest crisis since it was formed last year.

For EU-sceptic the Daily Mail, Clegg’s “histrionics” are nothing short of “cowardly” –

Nobody expected Mr Clegg or the obsessively Europhile Lib Dems to be thrilled by Mr Cameron walking away from the Franco-German led talks in order to protect the City and other vital national interests... [But] the brutal reality is that … Mr Clegg exposed himself as a weak man.

The Mail also scoffs at the notion that the spat could lead to a Lib-Dem walk-out that could topple the coalition.

The polls point to annihilation if they walk away now and, besides, they like their ministerial cars too much.

… it looks like the Big One, the moment when a government in London exercised the famous British veto on an important EU matter and withdraws to the margins of the European Union, thus ending 50 years of more-or-less consistent policy.

Britain, he argues, has withdrawn back to the “splendid isolation” it celebrated as an empire in the 19th century. “So is today's isolation splendid or miserable? Is it better or for worse?”:

Yet I do not hear the sound of champagne corks or celebration among British Eurosceptics. Beware of what you wish for, is a wise saying. Who knows what happens now? But Europe, for all its follies and failings, has become a scapegoat for weaknesses that are really our own. We may be about to rediscover that awkward truth. It was why we joined in the first place.

The record-breaking revolt by 81 Tory MPs exposed the party's continuing destructiveness over the European Union.

Having formerly campaigned for a referendum, or at least a return of powers from Brussels back to Westminster, the PM struck a europhile note while addressing MPs in the House of Commons:

It's not the right time, at this moment of economic crisis, to launch legislation that includes an in-out referendum. When your neighbour's house is on fire, your first impulse should be to help him put out the flames, not least to stop the flames reaching your own house.

However, according to a Guardian poll published on the day of the vote, many Britons believe the Channel an adequate firebreak. With an overall 70% of voters wanting a vote on the UK's EU membership, forty-nine per cent of voters said they would use the referendum to leave the EU, as against 40% who prefer to stay in. Veteran columnist Polly Toynbee is furious. For her, European…

… patience with our obnoxiously arrogant, selfish and disruptive behaviour is truly remarkable. We want everything, give little, complain ceaselessly and tell monstrous lies about the club we all run together. Yet usually they sigh politely at the EU's spoilt child as we indulge in one tantrum after another.

A sentiment echoed by Steve Richards at The Independent, arguing that Conservative Eurosceptics were proposing “a fantasy referendum about a fantasy ‘Europe’.” The EU, he writes:

… is a flexible fantasy that comes to the fore to wreck governments every few years. The real European Union is bureaucratic, lacks clear lines of accountability and evolves erratically. Yet for all its problems, Europe is worth having and being part of, more so now than when Britain joined in the early 1970s. […] [Nevertheless] it is probable that a future significant change in Europe will be tested by a UK referendum. In the current climate, such a referendum would be lost, which means a UK government is unlikely to be in a position to endorse further integration of any kind.

For the Daily Telegraph, this week has seen two “David Camerons in action.” In Europe, the first one “has led from the front, standing up to France’s Nicolas Sarkozy, who professed himself to be “sick” at seeing the eurozone lectured by a country that had the good sense not to join.” However, the Tory friendly daily criticizes- 

A prime minister who tries to prevent his own party from expressing an unfettered opinion – one shared by a significant proportion of the public – is straying into dangerous territory. […] Wilfully alienating a large part of your parliamentary support is not a sensible tactic when you are embarking on a protracted diplomatic struggle in Europe.

Conservative daily The Times' leader criticises the muddled thinking over the motion itself:

The motion demanding a referendum had three options: stay in the European Union, leave it altogether or renegotiate the terms. The sponsors of the motion appeared to have no view on how a referendum with three options would work and they were unable to say what they actually meant by renegotiation. […] [However], a resettlement of this country’s relationship with Europe is long overdue. That moment is coming. But it is not now and it is not on the confused terms that fell before Parliament.

“Scandal over EU betrayal,” leads the Daily Express, which has spearheaded a vehement campaign for complete withdrawal from the EU – the fount, in its opinion, of all evil. In its leader it complains that the “wishes of the British people have been trampled upon.” Nevertheless -

… this Commons debate marks a turning point in Britain’s attitude to the EU. Now the escalating crisis in the Eurozone and the rising interference by Brussels in our laws and way of life mean that our continuing membership is no longer accepted as an inevitability. The battle continues.

On October 2, however, British PM David Cameron rejected calls for an “in/out” referendum on EU membership. Cameron indicated a Commons vote would not affect his government's policy – “a referendum would only be held if Britain signed a new treaty which transferred more British sovereignty to the EU.” In blunt terms, the PM said, “I don't want Britain to leave the European Union.” However, the Express argues that the “groundswell” of Tories for a split with the EU is “a stark message” for Mr Cameron.

On April 17, nearly 20 percent of Finns voted for a eurosceptic party opposed to financial support for Eurozone countries in difficulty. A year before the presidential election in France, the leader of the National Front, Marine Le Pen, has every chance of making it through to the second round. Her programme: dumping the euro, protectionism and closing the borders. In the Netherlands, under pressure from the popular Geert Wilders, the government is going after tougher conditions for residency for foreigners, including nationals of the European Union. And it is partly to limit electoral damage that Angela Merkel has tightened up the conditions for German participation in stabilising the euro zone.

For the last fifteen or twenty years the anti-Europeans have been on the margins and extremist parties were a problem primarily within national borders; even the crisis caused by the Jörg Haider party taking seats in Austria’s government had few ripples across Europe. But today, in contending for power or as players that cannot be shut out from national governments, these groups, which are attracting more and more voters, are weighing heavily on the overall functioning of the European Union.

Not federal enough to act in a coordinated manner or to remain independent of the political calculations of member states, and yet too federal to build close links to citizens, the EU finds itself in an unprecedented bind: the political trend that is developing flies in the face of what, ever since the Second World War, it has considered its values ​​– and what seemed to be the inevitable course of history. For our national and European leaders, the challenge is an immense one.

A Eurosceptic right now exists that considers the EU “a dictatorship.” The cleverest, he argues, “cloak their supposedly commonsense credos in reasonableness.” During a recession, however, such groups show their true colours and “identify foreigners as part of our problem and suggest we should brand them with coloured cards.” No-one has been fooled, however, argues Murtagh, in what, to an Irish readership, is a clear allusion to anti-Lisbon treaty Libertas’ failure to win seats in Ireland.