2012 Nobel Peace Prize

[giblets]

The EU parliament itself is an incredibly undemocratic joke. There are over 750 MPs--how can anyone hope to have a voice in a legislature so large? That's almost twice the size of the US legislature--for only about 40% more people. And the US legislature is already undemocratic in a lot of ways.

How can a legislature be undemocratic if legislation requires a majority of the votes?

Hold on, is the US an incredibly undemocratic joke? How can anyone hope to have a voice in a population of over 300 million?

[Zevico]

I agree with you.

Case closed. Heck, might as well just lock this thread and maybe even shut down the Poly servers.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

The whole basis of the EU is largely undemocratic because many of its core concepts are fundamentally unpalatable and would not pass democratically. Free trade, free movement, and some degree of harmonized regulation are fantastic but when you start moving in the direction of "United States of Europe" that's getting a bit ridiculous.

Great. But what about the peace?

The EU parliament itself is an incredibly undemocratic joke. There are over 750 MPs--how can anyone hope to have a voice in a legislature so large? That's almost twice the size of the US legislature--for only about 40% more people. And the US legislature is already undemocratic in a lot of ways.

Great. But what about the peace?

[notyoueither]

i think that most people in europe support honest friendship, co-operation, free trade and free movement of people between the nations europe. that is certainly my position. in fact, it is what we already have.

however, this push for more integration, for economic and political union, enjoys far less support. the EU and the countries within it, are very afraid of asking their people directly about this. when people have been given a chance to vote on the direction the EU is taking, their reaction has been lukewarm at best. i'm very concerned about the likely results of imposing a political structure on top of people who don't support it.

Free movement of people means you need to start linking social policy. That means you need to start thinking about transfers from rich to poor. That means you need to start pooling political decision making. That means that you need to start...

Pretty soon you end up with a common currency. Recent problems are more the half baked and incomplete integration such as bank regulation and deposit assurances, the central bank not being a lender of last resort, mickey mouse accounting in the periphery, etc.

One of the major problems of the world ATM is that the European economy is stuck in labour with the infant half in and half out while the midwives are squabbling about what to do.

[kentonio]

I used to be very anti-EU but watching Europe's transformation over the last decade has been quite incredible. All those countries have started to develop common bonds that are pretty great, and with the globalization of travel, the old rivalries and hatreds are really dying out. So many young people have now worked and lived freely in other European nations that the idea of a European war seems absolutely farcical. I'm not sure quite the same attitude could have been reached without that freedom of movement.

[Aeson]

That could be accomplished with something more akin to NAFTA.

Yes, imagine all the jobs that could be created if all European nations started building walls along their southern borders. Probably so many new jobs that they'd have to start hiring illegals who made it over the wall they were building. I don't know if any of the northern European nations need cheaper cheese. If not, smuggling butter to Norway may be the closest they could come to our American system.

[Kidlicious]

How can a legislature be undemocratic if legislation requires a majority of the votes?

Hold on, is the US an incredibly undemocratic joke? How can anyone hope to have a voice in a population of over 300 million?

He's trying to make a states rights argument. He wan't us to go back to only 13 states. That would be democratic according to him.

[Dr Strangelove]

1900 - 1945 : 70 million killed in 2 world wars. 1946 - 2012 : no wars and over one quarter of the world's population freed from colonial rule. Case closed. Thanx EU!! You rule .....your own people!

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

How can anyone hope to have a voice in a population of over 300 million?

Make enough money and buy yourself a PAC. Duh.

Alternatively raise/bundle enough money.

[C0ckney]

Free movement of people means you need to start linking social policy. That means you need to start thinking about transfers from rich to poor. That means you need to start pooling political decision making. That means that you need to start...

why? your line of causation is not at all clear.

currently, countries set their own welfare policy, but have to provide welfare on the same terms to other EU citizens. it's not a perfect system of course, but it works well enough.

Pretty soon you end up with a common currency. Recent problems are more the half baked and incomplete integration such as bank regulation and deposit assurances, the central bank not being a lender of last resort, mickey mouse accounting in the periphery, etc.

the euro has been a disaster, especially for the poorer countries, as we are now seeing. countries have surrendered the ability to set their own interest rates and control their own currency. it hardly needs to be pointed out that having one interest rate for 15 very different economies is a recipe for trouble. the same is true for having a single currency. it means that countries which need to become more competitive like greece, ireland, portugal and spain, instead of lowering interest rates and depreciating their currency, have to instead go through an 'internal devaluation'. this means that wages are reduced, living standards fall, demand collapses and unemployment soars. it's a vicious cycle.

this is not the first time in history we have seen this happen. people who liked the gold standard leading up to and during the great depression, would love the euro today.

One of the major problems of the world ATM us that the European economy is stuck in labour with the infant half in and half out while the midwives are squabbling about what to do.

what is true is that one solution to the various crises in europe would be a fiscal union. this in effect means a political union. however, there is a huge political problem with this. nobody has asked the people of europe if they want this and they need to be asked and give a clear answer if any such union is to have political legitimacy.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I used to be very anti-EU but watching Europe's transformation over the last decade has been quite incredible. All those countries have started to develop common bonds that are pretty great, and with the globalization of travel, the old rivalries and hatreds are really dying out. So many young people have now worked and lived freely in other European nations that the idea of a European war seems absolutely farcical. I'm not sure quite the same attitude could have been reached without that freedom of movement.

I have to agree with that. The idea that one can freely move between borders and work whereever there is a job kind of breaks down the old nationalistic impulse. Everything seems to be far more integrated so why think your country is the best, when where your country ends and the next one begins is slowly disintegrating. It's quite a fantastic experiment (the United States used to be called a "grand experiment" with many European monarchies thinking it'd be doomed to fall quickly).

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I'm loving the response from blogs. This is a great one-

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/10/13/eus-winning-the-nobel-peace-prize-widely-seen-as-a-tasteless-joke/

Full Comment’s Araminta Wordsworth brings you a daily round-up of quality punditry from across the globe. Surely, it’s a joke? That was the response of many on learning the European Union was this year’s winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

The award comes after a year of tumult in financial markets and on the streets across southern Europe. German Chancellor Angela Merkel visiting Athens this week was greeted by banners equating her with the Nazis.

EU leaders have failed to grasp the nettle on the eurozone crisis. By forcing nations like Spain and Greece to borrow from private lenders, they have condemned millions to unemployment and penury.

“[The decision] mocks us and what we are going through right now,” said Chrisoula Panagiotidi, 36, a Greek beautician who lost her job this week. “All it will do is infuriate people here.”

It has also infuriated some people in northern Europe, including Norwegians who are doing very nicely outside the EU and have no desire to join it. As Alister Doyle and Vegard Botterli report for Reuters,

Some of the fiercest objections … came from Norway, home of the prize.
The country is not in the European Union and voted twice against joining. Friday’s announcement reopened political divisions and prompted calls for a review of how the committee that chooses the laureates is appointed.
“The Nobel Committee shows itself as being out of step with the Norwegian people,” said Akhtar Chaudhry, a vice-president of parliament and a member of the Socialist Party which opposes EU membership for Norway. “The Norwegian people have rejected the EU as a concept, but yet we reward it with a Nobel Peace Prize.”
Ian Dunt at politics.co.uk pours scorn on the committee’s contention the EU is the only thing that stands between Europeans and continent-wide war.

The prize reflects how profoundly cut off from reality European supporters have become. It’s quite something to watch news footage of riots in Athens this week and conclude this project is promoting peace.
The idea the EU is all that stands between us replaying World War Two is deeply foolish. It pays no attention to the rarity of western capitalist democracies going to war with one another.
In actual fact, it is the EU which creates hatred between nations because of the tensions inherent in its formulation. Despite the surreal utopian dreams of its defenders, people still associate strongly with the nation state and the linguistic, cultural and historical contexts it represents. It feels profoundly unjust for nations to find themselves losing sovereignty while EU officials studiously refuse to give them a vote on further integration.
The Daily Telegraph’s Tom Chivers thinks the award is a spoof or maybe a plot to annoy right-wingers.

[D]oes this confirm at last that the prize’s organizers have stopped worrying so much about whether the recipients are actually deserving, and instead decided simply to pick people who will annoy right-wingers?
I mean, come on. In 2009, Barack Obama while the ink was still wet on his inauguration documents. In 2002, Jimmy Carter (“History’s greatest monster!”). Now the EU, even while the Greek public are burning Nazi flags for Angela Merkel’s visit. In 2007, Al bloody Gore … Next year, will it be George Monbiot? Or possibly me? Do I need to start getting a speech together? “I’d like to thank Antonio Gramsci and the Frankfurt School…”
Mind you, using the Nobel Peace Prize for cheap laughs has a long and proud tradition. After all, political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was awarded it.
John Lichfield at The Independent believes the Nobel Prize Committee is sending a message to Brussels — and it’s not one of congratulation.

[T]here is no popular fervour anywhere for a more federal Europe. No country – not Germany, not France – is prepared to shift democratic control to Brussels or Strasbourg. Thus, the EU, in the midst of its worst-ever economic crisis, also faces an acute resurgence of its near-permanent existential crisis. What is it there for? How should it be run? Why is an institution devoted to democratic values so undemocratic?
In bestowing the 2012 Peace Prize on “Brussels,” the Nobel Committee is urging the EU to answer these questions before it is too late … The Nobel message is addressed to those countries which used to be the cornerstones of Europe – Germany, France, the Netherlands, Italy – but now risk allowing the project to collapse through selfishness and inadvertency.

Does it occur to these writers that objecting to this award on the grounds that the economy's cocked up is a bit like objecting to the same award being given to Mother Theresa of Calcutta on the grounds that she couldn't give a decent blow job?

[Hauldren Collider]

Mother Theresa's blowjob ineptitude hasn't led to rioting. The EU's economic insanity is directly responsible for much of the hardship in Europe.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Mother Theresa's blowjob ineptitude hasn't led to rioting.

Words that can only ever be uttered by a callow youth who's never had elderly Albanians diving for his crotch.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Does anyone have any figures on the death toll arising from these apocalyptic continent-wide riots? I'll hazard a guess that it's about 6 in Greece, and none everywhere else.