The Joy of being a European...

[Drake Tungsten]

No sir, I believe I like them more when smiling and churning out 450000 tonnes of hello kitty merchandise annually. There's something about the whole "throwing the bayonetted corpses of dog filth manchurians into a mass grave for the Emperor" thing I'm not too comfortable with

Good point. Opium Wars v. 2.0 it is, then. Let's break the gunboats out of mothballs and get to work on those spheres of influence.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by paiktis22
However Spiffor I think you're a bit romantic. Don't forget that since EU's inception the final word on all major decisions rested on the member states, on a national governmental basis.

I don't forget it. And I think it's bad, and it has been bad since maybe the 1960's. That the national governments have power (what the jargon calls "Intergovernmental Europe") has been obsolete for decades, and it only continues because the geezers at the helm want to keep their petty power.

And the parliement isn't a solution either if you care to look at the M&A rules. It scrabbled Bolkesteins plan in 2001 propably due to pressure from the industries.

Sorry, I don't know of this case, and I'd be happy if you could tell me about it. For having worked there, I know the EU Parliament is a farce that gets very little done (actually, it gets many useless things done, but that's another story), except for voting the budget. But the day it becomes a real powerful Parliament is the day it'll become serious and professional.

[Bereta_Eder]

Obviously it can be said that the pact has problems. If you see the votes of the council ministers you'll see that most voted against (hence the overule of the Commission). Besides I see nothing wrong in giving a bit of space to Germany and France, if it wasn't for them there wouldn't be an EU. Spiffor's assertion about being powerful, that is true, but that they escaped for being powerful is not so true. The safety valves guarantee that both countries can be outvoted by a relative coalition of the other MS (not even counting the UK). The council of ministers actually decided against the pact not "in favor" of France and Germany I think.

[Imran Siddiqui]

And people wonder why the UK refuses to join the Euro at the moment!

Exactly what I thought. Funny that those who said the EU was just dominated by France and Germany were right all along.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by DAVOUT
But when everybody agrees that the pact must be reformed, it would have been questionable to condemn, *pour l'exemple*, two countries which are in a situation not anticipated when the pact was written.

What is so specific in France's and Germany's current situation? Both countries are experiencing a more or less 0% growth rate, and the pact anticipates situations of mild and strong recessions.

[Bereta_Eder]

Originally posted by Spiffor

I don't forget it. And I think it's bad, and it has been bad since maybe the 1960's. That the national governments have power (what the jargon calls "Intergovernmental Europe") has been obsolete for decades, and it only continues because the geezers at the helm want to keep their petty power.

Bad or not but it is reality And in one way or another it has worked out so far. Of course I'm in favour of it being reduced to ridiculously low proportions. But that's a proccess that takes time.

Sorry, I don't know of this case, and I'd be happy if you could tell me about it. For having worked there, I know the EU Parliament is a farce that gets very little done (actually, it gets many useless things done, but that's another story), except for voting the budget. But the day it becomes a real powerful Parliament is the day it'll become serious and professional.

I've also been to the parliement on a number of occasions. Of course it's more or less toothless. However it provides for aminimum of an extra "democratic" shot. However in the M&A rules of 2001 by Bolkestein it voted against the rules which would have taken down nearly all the barriers for croborder mergers and aquisitions. The Commission's plan was the paragon of liberation, harmonization and unification of the european financial market and was aimed at spurring crossborder mergers. However many MS have protective barriers up so that they can protect their industries from a take over by a foreign company. Like France or Germany with Volkswagen or other countries too amonst them the Scandinavian ones with Sweden and Ericsson. What happened in 2001 is that the parliement which is supposed to be a supranational body and push for further integration shot down the commission's plan. Now, the council of ministers shot down the plan again and in its place approved a watered down version which will let MS decide for themsleves if they'd bring down the protective barriers to hostile aquisitions

[DAVOUT]

Originally posted by Spiffor

What is so specific in France's and Germany's current situation? Both countries are experiencing a more or less 0% growth rate, and the pact anticipates situations of mild and strong recessions.

Did you forget the American boycott directed specifically against these two countries, and designed to hurt them as much as possible?

[Al B. Sure!]

may i ask something about you europeans? you're saying that if a country goes into deficit, it has to pay more money to the EU as a fine?

[DAVOUT]

Originally posted by Albert Speer
may i ask something about you europeans? you're saying that if a country goes into deficit, it has to pay more money to the EU as a fine?

That is why the US cannot join the Euro, the fine would be too high.

[Spiffor]

Albert:
Yes.
We Euros are geniuses, did you forget?

(But it's true nonetheless . You cannot imaine how moronic the European economic policies are)

[Bereta_Eder]

AS, yes. But the fines were meant as a financial discipline doctrine so that you wouldn't raise your deficit. However with some countries that have growth stagnation at the moment, one way of spurring growth is through public spending.

[Kropotkin]

Is anyone suprised?

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Kropotkin
Is anyone suprised?

[A great silence fills the thread as everybody is waiting for an innocent soul that says "yes" - but an innocent never shows up]

[Bereta_Eder]

Not surprised 'cause we're jaded
Seriously though, policies are being tried, the pact DID have beneficial effects, I know they had for Greece since it got us to get our act together and stop being so irresponsible, not that we're not still, but we are less, just check our 20% inflation some years ago and now it's only at 3% more or less not to mention our surplus or our considerable growth rate.
What I mean is the pact has good and bad results. Depends on the case. It's being tested in practice like all policies and will be evaluated for what it actually does. Wether it will be changed or not we'll see but the fact that the majority of the council ministers voted against it, could allude to what's ahead.

[VetLegion]

Regarding the "toothless" EU parliament. I don't know much about it. But recently I followed a process of reforming European legislation about intelectual property. The bill that was proposed was very easy on patent requirements and allowed for source code of computer programmes to be patented.

Through intensive lobbying efforts, european open source and other communities managed to convince enough MPs and modify the bill so it excluded code patents.

This works the other way too, if relatively weak communities can psuh through something like that, imagine what big corporations do there on a daily bases