| Author |
Message |
    
Scott
flint knapper
Username: Scott
Post Number: 964
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 6:04 am: |     |
So the French have voted against the EU Constitution over their rage at Chirac and France's high unemployment rate. Isn't this a bit like cutting off your nose to spite your face? I suspect the Dutch will vote against it too next week. To the Europeans on the board, how critical a set-back is this, or it is all media hype? To listen to some of the commentators here, you would think the Europe was going to disappear off the map tomorrow.
Scott
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Ces gens, Jondalar, ils sourient. Ils me sourient. - Ayla |
Sweetsunray
storyteller
Username: Sweetsunray
Post Number: 643
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 9:08 am: | |
Of course it's not going to disappear from the map tomorrow. That's just hyperbole.
It just means that both the EU institutions and the national leaders of that country have to look within and reconsider the constitution draft, and how they can present the EU as something above national politics, as an institution on its own. It also should make them think hard on the use of these kind of votes.
These type of votes sound so much more democratic, but in reality they're an oversimplification of complex proposals, laws, etc... And eventually, when the politicians don't like the people's yes/no answer, they still do what they think is necessary. European politicians are very adept at turning setbacks into creative challenges of compromise to get back to the negotiation table.
The biggest problem was theoretically allowing companies from the UK, but stationed in France, for example to use the UK's social wage and taxation isntead of following the local French ones.
Of course that's totally unreal. It would create a double reality, or triple, or quadruple, etc...
Everyone has a motive for giving arguments. But only the arguments given matter. |
Kerensa
hunter
Username: Kerensa
Post Number: 362
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 9:56 am: | |
We say - nothing gets eaten as hot as it is cooked -
Nine countries voted yes, one voted no, there are still 15 to go!
And it might take longer than one year for all of them to vote. Time will show! |
Kerensa
hunter
Username: Kerensa
Post Number: 363
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 11:58 am: | |
BTW if our politicians would have let us vote I am sure we would have said NO! Because they did not inform us properly.
I don't see why they want to hurry with the EU Constitution anyway. The EU is not complete yet! |
Sweetsunray
storyteller
Username: Sweetsunray
Post Number: 644
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 5:03 pm: | |
Actually, I think it would have been far better to have had the EU consitution and an alteration of the institutions before they had enlarged as big as they already did.
Everyone has a motive for giving arguments. But only the arguments given matter. |
Snowwolf
bear cub
Username: Snowwolf
Post Number: 43
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 5:46 pm: | |
The problem with the UK is that the politicians have always wanted to be able to pick and choose which parts of the treaties are best for them. Basically what is most likely to get them re-elected are the things that they want.
Things like businesses having to convert to metric were blown out of all proportion in the tabloid press, which mainly seems to focus on the truly trivial instead of actually looking at the real benefits of being full members of the club.
The whole thing with the UK not being part of the Euro is crazy. From a personal example, I have recently started trading as a part-time business on ebay. I am at a disadvantage selling to Europe because of the currency difference. It is apparently quite common for European ebay transactions to be carried out by direct bank transfer, but the cost of this for me as a seller in the UK, means I either have to pass the cost onto the buyer, or it hugely cuts into my profits.
Back to the constitution vote, predictably the No campaign in the UK are calling for the referendum to be scrapped as it's pointless as France have already voted no.
"Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement." Gandalf. (JRR Tolkien)
My Pictures. |
Miisa
flint knapper
Username: Miisa
Post Number: 701
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 6:06 pm: | |
It is annoying, mainly because the French did it in protest rather than because of the constitution itself. But we don't need one immediately, and I think we could get by just fine without one for quite some time. Or have an "unwritten" constitution like the British one.
I think they will go back to the text and change it, hopefully they will simplify it A LOT, as it is currently an incomprehensible several-hundred-page mess. It has a phone number on the cover you can call to ask for help just reading it.
I agree that they probably should have started off small-scale and let it develop from there. All the countries have laws, after all, and relatively similar ones at that.
I love the Euro, though I thought I'd hate it. It is convenient as my sisters all live in Ireland, except for one who is North of the border and thus uses the £.
Black sheep. |
Sweetsunray
storyteller
Username: Sweetsunray
Post Number: 645
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 - 11:06 pm: | |
There's one disatvantage with the Euro... prices are rocketing, almost have doubled in certain areas such as food in 3 years time. Sadly, my wages havn't doubled either... Pay is being indexed, but nowhere near enough to the true economical prices rising. Having to pay it all on a single income I notice it tremendously... and I'm sure bigger families do as well.
Is it a coincidence that in the pub I work at one night a week, I have two other colleagues who have another job? The three of us started working there (yup, black) over the last year. And even if I have a period of an actual full-time teaching position (combining 3 schools for that in 3 networks - state, city and private) I'm not willing to give it up, just to have some financial breathing space (or recupareting from thelack of it over the last months). One, also single, works at a bank full time, in the office... Banks pay well, certainly in the offices. The other studied laws and has a full time job as well.
What was that again? Europeans being lazy? 
Everyone has a motive for giving arguments. But only the arguments given matter. |
Scott
flint knapper
Username: Scott
Post Number: 967
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, June 04, 2005 - 5:50 am: | |
Perhaps you aren't the typical European SSR?
And so the Dutch have rejected it as well, it would see over domestic politics and protest as Miisa so aptly points out above. Is this a case of cutting off your nose to spite your face?
Scott
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Ces gens, Jondalar, ils sourient. Ils me sourient. - Ayla |
Sweetsunray
storyteller
Username: Sweetsunray
Post Number: 648
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, June 04, 2005 - 10:49 am: | |
Let's not forget the Spanish said "yes" with 40 million people.
Everyone has a motive for giving arguments. But only the arguments given matter. |
Kerensa
hunter
Username: Kerensa
Post Number: 367
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, June 06, 2005 - 8:27 am: | |
I agree with Joschka Fisher especially about the history of Europe and the anxieties of people.
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,15 18,358905,00.html
Is Europe in a crisis?
No, says German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, the EU is not about to collapse. He says it's time for the electorate to vote on Europe-wide candidates running on Europe-wide issues. But it won't be easy. "You have to deal with the resistance of centuries," he says.
Following the failed European constitution referenda in both France and Holland this week, people across the continent are wondering, "What next for the EU?" Concrete proposals are, for the moment, few and far between.
But on Thursday evening at the American Academy, located on the beautiful shores of Lake Wannsee in Berlin, German Foreign Minister and EU cheerleader Joschka Fischer, offered his thoughts on the meaning of the No votes and his ideas for a possible way forward. Business as usual, he says, is not an option.
.....
.....
.....
"We are talking about 1,000 years of European history. We are talking about different languages, different cultures. We are talking about over 500 million people. We are talking about very successful nation states and nation states with terrible histories like my own country. We are talking about the old European state system with its prejudices, fears, concerns, and very different traditions. To bring that together, you have to deal with the resistance of centuries....
"This is the first time in German history that we are embedded in a peaceful Europe without any threat from outside and without threats from us to our neighbors. It's the first time that we are in a sustainable and structurally peaceful situation and this offers new opportunities. 60 years of peace also means 60 years of wealth accumulation and we are in a situation where we can, and must, reduce the role of the state. But on the other hand, we have a tradition where the state guarantees much more than it does in the Anglo-Saxon tradition.... It's about very deeply rooted traditions. And to break up these traditions in a peaceful way is the new challenge we are facing." |
Cavebear
flint knapper
Username: Cavebear
Post Number: 2062
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Monday, June 06, 2005 - 4:50 pm: | |
Reading about the difficulties of the EU in it's consolidation efforts is much like reading about similar events in the past. The 13 original states of the United States went through a similar difficult time of negotiating differences among their various state cultures. Indeed, one could point to the current resistance to the US adjusting its laws and culture to the larger global community as a similar struggle.
As Italy and Germany consolidated their various regions into unified governments more recently (and I mean in the 1800's, not 1900's), I expect that Europe will work its way through these current problems.
Joschka Fischer's point "that we are embedded in a peaceful Europe without any threat from outside and without threats from us to our neighbors" goes for all of Europe. This opportunity should not be wasted. Future events will certainly bring new threats, and a united Europe would be a powerful force for international peace and development.
Sometimes, the fact that everyone is heading in the same direction is more important than the direction itself. As long as individual rights are not repressed, stability is a very good thing for most people. I hope that Europe continues its consolidation efforts, taking the best ideas of each nation. And I hope that draws the US along with it, the better for everyone to respond to global problems.
I just hope that George Orwell's '1984' isn't at the end of this path... |
Kerensa
hunter
Username: Kerensa
Post Number: 372
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 17, 2005 - 9:41 am: | |
It doesn't look good. Schröder might not be the chancellor much longer and who knows what the CDU/CSU will do if Ms.Merkel becomes chancellor.
And France and England were always a bit different. 
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,15 18,360770,00.html
EUROPEAN UNION EARTHQUAKE
The Fruitless Search for Rebate Compromise in Brussels
By Charles Hawley
This week's European Union summit was supposed to provide a possible way out of the constitution crisis. Instead, it has descended into an embarrassing tit-for-tat on the union's budget. Neither France nor England is willing to budge. And nobody seems to know what to do next.
Back on May 1, 2004, when the European Union went from a cozy 15 members to a crowded 25, there was, amid the wild celebration east of the Oder River, an undertone of concern. While widespread support for EU enlargement existed across the continent, one continually stumbled across worries that the future club would be too unwieldy to agree on much of anything.
Turns out, those concerns missed their mark. It only takes two to erect a roadblock. And in this case, those two don't come from the new members from the East -- rather from more established western EU denizens...
... |
Cavebear
flint knapper
Username: Cavebear
Post Number: 2076
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 17, 2005 - 6:46 pm: | |
Maybe someone could help Blair and Villepin reconcile their differences. Let's see... Bush could warn both of them that the CIA has advised him that they both have WMD and he might plan to "do something" about that unless they "do something" to improve the stability of the EU! |
Kerensa
hunter
Username: Kerensa
Post Number: 373
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, June 18, 2005 - 7:29 am: | |
 Cavebear! what an idea!
Nothing was solved at the meeting in Brüssel.
But nobody thought it would be easy to "put 25 states under one hat".
Especially because there are a few prima donnas amongst them
. |
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