With a firm 53% of the people voting No, the Emerald Isle has set back the unelected Eurocrats of Brussels' grand scheme to make all of Europa their personal fiefdom. The people of Ireland were unsure of what Lisbon offered them since even their new Prime Minister had blissfully stated he had never read the whole treaty. Now there is a ringing endorsement for EUnification.
Voters were even more disenchanted with a Treaty that nobody understood and that even Prime Minister Brian Cowen said he hadn't read properly.
Maybe it wasn't just because no one in Ireland understood the future implications of Lisbon, but they fully understood what has already occurred under the watch of the currently formulated EU bureaucracy.
This wretched document does nothing about EU corruption or waste, the disgrace of the Common Agricultural Policy, the ruinous fisheries policy or the embezzlement that is being covered up, as we reveal on Pages 30-31 today, in a European parliament riddled with sleaze. No wonder the Irish rebelled.
Or perhaps there were other factors that drove the average Irish citizen to vote no.
Despite reassurances, there was a real concern, too, that European judges would eventually force a secular ethos on Ireland, bringing in abortion through the backdoor.
In other words, there was a belief that the sovereignty of individual nations was being diluted by power-grabbing, unelected, unaccountable, secretive bureaucrats.
After this latest setback, what do the Eurocrats have to say? They will strive to work around the Irish no vote to more centralise Europe under the European Union banner. I get the feeling the fools in Brussels think they can make the Irish problem vanish if they offer enough bribes to Irish politicians. That did not work this time with Lisbon so its very doubtful it will work in the future. And if people like the French Foreign Minister do carry out threats of reprisal against Ireland, all it will do for the Irish is confirm what a flaming cock-up the whole EU concept is. So who knows if the EU pushes too hard, perhaps the Celtic Tiger will get so annoyed it pulls out of the EU and kicks all those European fishing trawlers out of its sovereign waters.
What the folks in Brussels and capitals across the continent should do right now is objectively assess why Lisbon, the Constitution of 2005, Maastricht, Nice I, Nice II have all encountered opposition or outright rejection. Not repackage again what has failed to pass in Ireland, France, and Holland as something to trust their lives with. Like what the US Founding Fathers in 1787 did when they met to amend the Articles of Confederation, they recognized the Articles were not working and set about creating a more perfect union. It seems they got something right since the United States is still around. Perhaps those across the Atlantic could learn something, assuming those in Brussels can look beyond their little perks. Which at this stage is assuming a lot.
2 comments:
The most demanding and thankless offspring of the EU has' no 'to the Treaty of Lisbon and it paralyses the European mechanism. I cry in my corner while on a Dutch Internet unprecedented jubilation reigns. According to the responses from Europe and Brussels-haters in the Netherlands has the brave Ireland carried out a heroic, democracy a service and the Brussels fascism (real, here and there to read!) Is stopped.
This irrational distaste for an entity that, despite all its imperfections, our prosperity, welfare and peace has brought, remains surprised me. It's the Irish 'no' nothing heroic, just a poor lack of realism. In the course of the nineteenth century ran the (beautiful) island empty. Emigration seemed to many the only way to escape from a country that its own residents could not feed. Everything was better than poverty and hunger suffered by vaderlandse soil. The population slonk of 7 or 8 million to a paltry 3 million. When Ireland was a member of the EEC in 1973 was still the poorest country in Western Europe.
The story is familiar: after 35 years of membership and a sloppy 60 billion euros in European aid and subsidies, Ireland is one of the most prosperous countries in the world. This status was the land of the 'no' on its own strength can never achieve. It happened thanks to the concerted efforts of the European partners and their wonderful momentum of solidarity. Now the Irish rich and volgevreten, they obviously have every right to bite the hand that once fed them. Opportunisten have always been. Yes, but I already hear, you can not criticise European institutions or convention, because you're ever heavily subsidized? Yes, but if I no 'campaign in Ireland overzie, this seems in part from fear, protectionism and sometimes lies to be built.
The most ridiculous arguments during the campaign by the 'no' camp argued. Thus, the Treaty of Lisbon the detention of children over three years, forcing Ireland to Participate in wars and help legalize abortion. The Irish Labour leader Eamon Gilmore called it 'no' campaign 'hysterical', based on unfounded allegations according to which the treaty "our abortion, euthanasia and same-sex marriage will bring." Step than from the EU but equal, I would say, and no more stop hand. And for all those Dutch people who agitated yesterday feestvierden: ga please cooperate with those 'enlightened' Irish begin a new union and try to get the French (who, like the Dutch voted against the European Constitution) to get. A Europe of different speeds is perhaps the solution. Then it may seek new union of its three cheerful snail's pace.
Trouw, I sense in that first sentence you think the EU is the father of all countries in Europa. Very much like Kronos? Or Zeus?
I see you failed to mention how Ireland slashed its tax rates in your litany of why Ireland should be grateful to the EU. Either mention all the facts or don't even go there.
The fears about Ireland being roped into a pan-European military or abortion via the back door could have been alleviated if supporters like Ireland's own Prime Minister had read all of the Lisbon treaty and thus stood ready to explain things. I have tried to read Lisbon and its the most gotterdamerung exercise in obtuse language that requires lawyers to translate. If I had read a renter's agreement written like Lisbon, I would have walked away and not signed it. All we heard from the Irish politicians was vote for it. All the Irish heard from Europe was vote for it or else. Never was it clearly explained the benefits for Ireland.
Funny you should mention the Netherlands, have you stopped smarting over how your own government shorted your national currency to switch to the Euro? How about those farm subsidies to France, still happy about them? Or England's opt-outs from the EU?
That is the biggest problem with this whole EU. Buried in all these documents are too many 'speacial deals' that are bribes to get countries to sign away their sovereignty to unelected bureacrats living in Brussels.
They need to start with a clean sheet of paper. This time not try to morph a series of trade agreements into a pan-European government ruling 500 million people.
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