From: feyeleanor	Date: June 15th, 2008 02:44 am (UTC)		(permanent link)

Well it's been a constitution and then a treaty, so chances are it will next come back as convention or some other hokum that will allow them to waste more money on trying to impose a byzantine arrangement on all and sundry.

The very fact that the Irish ministers who were campaigning in its favour had never even read it, as is the case with the majority of those who supported it here in Parliament, just shows what a horrendous lack of true representative democracy the whole of Europe is currently suffering from.

We elect these people to do the job of scrutinising laws and treaties, and of representing our interests. How do they reward the trust we place in them? By trying to foist an EU super state on us without even asking our opinions.

And on the rare occasions when EU voters are asked to vote directly on this and give it two fingers, our representatives go on about how we don't understand and need to leave it to their judgement.

It's just sickening.

	From: feyeleanor	Date: June 15th, 2008 02:35 am (UTC)		(permanent link)

Too true.

Regardless of one's viewpoint on Federalism or a Grand European Project of some form, if it's not being driven by a desire to serve the actual needs of the people of Europe no such project will ever succeed in the long term. And if the people aren't consulted, it probably won't even make it out of the starting gate...

The fact that eighteen nations have ratified the Lisbon Treaty without even consulting their electorates, whilst here in the UK we're being denied a referendum that our current government promised as a manifesto commitment says everything that needs to be said about the democratic legitimacy of the current EU.

It either reforms, or it dies. It's a simple as that.

	From: marymc	Date: June 15th, 2008 11:15 am (UTC)		(permanent link)

EXACTLY.

Isn't it maddening? And they KEEP acting as if we have just committed some great selfish injustice, when the population of the rest of Europe probably feels the exact same. Barossa is so smarmy and disgusted with us. I'd love to know how his own people really feel.

In fact, in general online searches for Lisbon Treaty, I'm finding much more support for the NO side than the YES side overall. Just an interesting note...

	From: feyeleanor	Date: June 15th, 2008 04:34 pm (UTC)		(permanent link)

I don't personally know anyone who's expressed their support for the Lisbon Treaty, any more than the Constitution. Both were couched in the obscure legalistic language that we've come to associate with the EU, and the overall tone of debate has tended by the YES campaign has been along the lines of "trust us, we know best". Electorates are rightly dubious of this sort of argument as they get more than enough of it in national politics.

But I suspect the average Eurocrat knows deep down that a United States of Europe isn't a popular concept with the majority of EU voters and that that's why referendums are becoming increasingly few and far between. They basically don't trust us to act in what they consider to be our own best interests and assume that any time they don't get their own way it's because we the people are too dumb, too obstructionist, too wedded to our supposedly old-fashioned view of nationality. Unless we agree with them wholeheartedly we're not true Europeans.

Then of course there are those who've spent so long negotiating complex opt-outs for their own nation that they can no longer view their end result impartially, not to mention those with their noses in the EU trough who don't really care about the end result so long as the gravy train keeps rolling.

It's all very depressing if you think about it, which is probably why most people try not to...

Of course difficulties like this are manna from heaven for people like me who are naturally Eurosceptic and really want the community to be nothing more than a free market for goods and services without any pretensions to statehood. The longer all this wrangling goes on the easier it is for us to make our case that peace and prosperity flow from trade rather than centralised control.

Not that a NO vote is in any way an endorsement of our views, but it is at least proof that there is still more than one possible future for the European Community and that her people are open to debating it.

Edited at 2008-06-15 04:35 pm (UTC)