FOLLOWING THE EUROPEAN UNION

nimh wrote:

I remember the last time a strand of ideologues passed their economic theories off for nothing much less than historical law and scientific fact

You must be talking about the classical liberals of the Victorian era, who indeed have an impressive amount of historical precedent and empirical facts going for them. Not the least of those facts is that Hong Kong, a non-democracy which stayed on the path of laissez-faire, has become a more affluent, and arguably more attractive society than its former master England, which strayed away from it. So what is your problem?

Oh, you're talking about Marxism and Leninism -- the ideology that ignored reality in favor of class warfare from the very beginning (see Marx's On the Jewish question), and which persistently imprisoned and killed scientists for truthfully reporting their experimental evidence, rather than toeing the party line? Sorry, that doesn't refute my point. Just because oppressors call their ideology science- and fact-based, that doesn't make it so. And Marxism, unlike classical liberalism was never informed by anything even close to peer-reviewed science.

The point in my earlier post was that reality isn't subject to majority vote -- not that a system that's not based on majority vote must be based on reality.

0 Replies

Thomas wrote:

So what is your problem?

My problem would obviously merely be that, even if the proponents of the economic recipes you subscribe to should have distinctively more historical precedent and empirical facts to refer to than the marxists of old, that still doesn't make their views anything like as uncontested as you make them out to be, submitting them as the equivalent of mathematical law. Trying to pass them off as such is understandable only from a perspective of partisan passion (which I do not necessarily disapprove of), but not something you're not going to be called upon.

(This time I got the double negative right, I think.)

Note: I'm not looking for an in-depth discussion of the theories themselves - I myself obviously know too little of economical theory to be able to argue any of it. But just enough to know that the discussion about the relative value of this or that "recipe" hasn't quite reached the "end of history" stage yet. Basically, what the value of the macro-economic equivalent of pi is is still under discussion.

0 Replies

Nimh, To put this oin a more concrete basis, -- do you believe that the Western European nations can sustain their current social welfare programs without worsening the problems of unemployment and low growth - all with aging populations? Do you believe that if Chirac succeeds in excluding "Anglo Saxon" ideas, he will be able to reduce the unemployment and other consequences of global competition that so disturb the French?

0 Replies

nimh wrote:

Note: I'm not looking for an in-depth discussion of the theories themselves - I myself obviously know too little of economical theory to be able to argue any of it. But just enough to know that the discussion about the relative value of this or that "recipe" hasn't quite reached the "end of history" stage yet. Basically, what the value of the macro-economic equivalent of pi is is still under discussion.

Fair enough, and maybe I shouldn't have gotten off on this particular tangent. The point I am trying to make does not depend on classical liberalism being right, and Marxism being false. It depends on the fact that the continental European welfare state either is or is not sustainable, independent of what the majority of voters is thinking. As it happens, I believe that it is not, and that it is reality, not phoniness, that causes East European leaders to revert to free-market policies even after winning elections on social democratic platforms. But even if the situation was reversed, my point stands: if I was wrong, if the welfare state was sustainable and necessary, and if the majority of voters demanded laissez-faire for some reason, it would be a good thing for politicians to do what's right even against the will of the majority.

0 Replies

Thomas wrote:

It depends on the fact that the continental European welfare state either is or is not sustainable, independent of what the majority of voters is thinking. As it happens, I believe that it is not [..]

But even if the situation was reversed, my point stands: [..] it would be a good thing for politicians to do what's right even against the will of the majority.

(Hope I didnt butcher your quote too much in editing)

Yep. This was basically my point.

There is what the majority of the people want - expressed in a referendum or an election or what not.

Those who believe that what the population wants is simply wrong, may hope that the government will do what's right and necessary (to their eyes) anyway, even if that means ignoring the popular preference.

Because for sure - I won't dispute this - the majority is not always right.

But that's all we're talking about. The continental European welfare state either is or is not sustainable, and you believe it is not. I believe it is. The dominant economic school tends toward the "unsustainable" analasys, but it is hardly uncontested. You believe that the necessity of adapting to an ever more free-market model is a matter of natural or scientific law, and you have the right to believe it is.

This bit of "unmasking" claims of fact and (natural/scientific) law as the matters of conviction they really are is necessary, if only because they are made so habitually. IMF-type free market policies are presented and prescribed as a matter of fact - of the natural order of things that one just has to adapt to - when in fact it is one of ideology. I'm not saying that they are submitted without thorough reasoning or illustrations of evidence - but a school of thought/policy it nevertheless remains, countered by others.

Aside from that, however, another question poses itself here. At first I wrote, in the paragraph above, that of course those who believe that what the population wants is simply wrong, will hope the government does what's right anyway and ignore the popular preference. But that's not really that self-evident. It is really kinda the reasoning that got us in this mess in the first place.

"Brussels" - whether it be the Commission or the periodical summits of national government heads - has for years now all too often gone down the "better not ask them" road. As in that quote JW posted: they dont know about it, and if they knew about it they wouldnt like it - so better not ask them. But there's only so far you can take a country or continent down the "we know better" road, ignoring what people really want and implementing what you think is necessary, instead - even if you really, sincerely believe it is. Because if you take that too far, you'll get other problems that will bite you in the back instead. Political apathy and alienation is step 1. Protest - and swelling ranks of the far-left and the far-right - are next. With all the nastiness and disorder that might bring.

Sometimes, perhaps it is better if one does listen to the popular voice for once, even if you do think its wrong. If only to avoid worse.

0 Replies

I agree with Nimh that systematically ignoring the popular voice, even if one may be correct in his views, is not an effective tactic in the long run. One must either shape it or follow it.

However, I do not agree that current Western European welfare states are sustainable. That is not a matter of competing political theories, (which I agree cannot be proven with finality}. It is, instead a matter of rather simple arithmetic. Moreover there are excellent recent examples of cause effect and remedial actions that confirm the dynamic.)

0 Replies

Translation from press agency report:

Quote:

Danes are now against, too

COPENHAGEN - In Denmark, too, there is a majority against the European Constitution now. In an opinion poll this week 39 percent said they were against the constitution and 30% said they were in favour.

[..] In the previous poll of Greens, last april, 34,3 percent still had been in favour and 26 percent against the Constitution. The Danes hold a referendum about the Constitution on 27 September. Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen says he does not want to suspend it, despite the rejections of France and The Netherlands.

0 Replies

TA similar article from the English verison of Copenhagen Post online

Quote:

Danes abandon EU treaty
03.06.2005

Support for the new EU treaty is waning in Denmark after Dutch and French voters rejected the treaty earlier this week. 40 percent of voters are against the treaty, compared with 31 percent who plan to say yes

Denmark has turned against the new European Union constitutional treaty. Three opinion polls reveal Danish attitudes toward the new EU treaty shifting dramatically since Dutch and French voters rejected the treaty earlier this week.

According to a survey conducted by Greens for business daily Børsen, 39.5 percent of Danes would vote no for the treaty, compared with 30.8 percent who would vote yes. Undecided voters still make up 29.7 percent of the population.

Just last month, Greens found that naysayers represented only 26 percent of the voters, while 34.3 percent of the population expected to vote yes on the treaty.

The Danish People's Party, which opposes the treaty and has called upon the government to call off Denmark's referendum on 27 September, found encouragement in the new figures.

Morten Messerschmidt, the party's spokesman on EU affairs, was pleased with the change in public opinion.

'You can't count your chickens before they are hatched, but this is great news. I think the government should follow the Danish People's Party proposal about not holding a referendum. It seems pointless, since there isn't anything to vote on, now that France and Holland have said no,' said Messerschmidt.

Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller tried to downplay the importance of the new results.

'This change isn't surprising considering the dramatic developments in France and the Netherlands. But opinion polls go up and down. If you get shocked by such things, you shouldn't be in this business. It cannot be true that when opinion polls go up, you hold referendums, and when they go down, you cancel them,' said Møller.

0 Replies

Blair gives up on his EU dream

Tony Blair has given up on Europe as an issue worth fighting for, senior allies of the Prime Minister have told The Sunday Telegraph. A leading Blairite cabinet minister made the admission last night as the European Union descended into deeper turmoil, with doubts surfacing over the future of the single currency.

Mr Blair, who will seek to shift the focus of his administration on to poverty in the Third World this week during talks with President Bush, has told his closest allies: "Africa is worth fighting for. Europe, in its present form, is not."
.
The signal is an astonishing U-turn for a leader who said three years ago that the euro was "our destiny" and who announced a British referendum by proclaiming: "Let the battle be joined." But one of his closest allies said that Mr Blair no longer believed that putting Britain at the heart of Europe could be his legacy: "Europe is back to the drawing board. Africa will become more important."

Mr Blair flies to Washington tomorrow to try to secure support for proposals to tackle poverty ahead of next month's G8 summit in Gleneagles. But the Prime Minister is unlikely to be able to divert attention completely from the chaos over Europe's future.

The crisis widened beyond the document alone, with a media offensive being mounted to bolster the euro after German officials and an Italian minister openly discussed its possible demise. In the first rumblings of a call for the franc to be reinstated, Nicolas Dupont-Aignant, a member of Mr Chirac's ruling UMP party, said: "France, Italy and Germany would be in a better state without the euro. However, I don't believe we should ditch it now.

"But either it is reformed, and the central European Bank kick-starts growth by lowering interest rates and pursuing a more American-style monetary policy, or the euro will explode in mid-air."

The governor of France's central bank, however, rushed to the euro's defence. Christian Noyer said that the currency was "in no way under threat" following its fall in value since the No votes of the past seven days. He dismissed as "absurd" the idea of a temporary withdrawal from the euro by individual states. "The euro is a solid currency which brings us a lasting guarantee of stable prices and thus the maintenance of purchasing power for our wages and savings," he told Le Parisien newspaper.

The markets have been slowly adjusting to the possibility of the break-up of the euro, with the spread between government bonds in different countries widening. Last night, John Redwood, the leading eurosceptic Tory MP, said: "You can't have a single currency without a single government. They are in a mess because they have only done half of it and they are now discovering in a painful way what that means."

Source

0 Replies

I dont get the sudden furore over the euro. For months on end now we've heard griping about how the euro was too "hard", how the expensive euro, compared to the ever falling dollar, has made times tough for European industry and put a brake on economic growth. And now suddenly we're supposed to panic because its falling?

And did I really hear this Martoni guy from the Lega Nord calling for the return of the lira?! Are we talking about the same lira? The notoriously unstable, worthless Italian currency, that lira? <confused>

0 Replies

Confused are you, eh, nimh? How very European Twisted Evil

0 Replies

timberlandko wrote:

Confused are you, eh, nimh? How very European

Timber, when I've time, I will collect your quotes about the Euro Laughing

0 Replies

Timber - you should know better than to call NIMH's confusion "European": you know he never talks to conservatives in the EU.

The talk about a demise of the Euro is smoke and mirrors (as is the neocolonial "Africa" Blairite campaign); both are designed to distract attention from the real end-run to forever block Turkey's candidacy - by finally discovering the map, which shows it's not in Europe at all - while opening the door to Ukraine - as per selfsame map, perfectly qualified to join the EU:

_________________________________________

Summary of article (in German):

Angela Merkel's party in Bundestag proposes quick approval for Ukraine negotiations for EU association, final and definitive "no" to Turkey's membership (fact not noted in the US / UK press)

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/0,1518,358754,00.html

Current government's (SPD) parliamentary leader calls maneuver "scurrilous" - no I'm not making this up:

""Skurril" fand das nicht nur der parlamentarische Geschäftsführer der SPD....."
_______________________________________________________

You read it here first <G>

0 Replies

"Wot are we going to do now, Gerhard?"

0 Replies

Although Switzerland is not an EU member, it's quite interesting that they approved today joining the European passport-free zone, abolishing checks on the country's border by 2007.

An even much larger majority were in favor of granting more rights to same-sex couples, according to final results of a two-issue national referendum - which will be certainly another negative point for the conservatives here. :wink:

0 Replies

I see that HofT's spell of spite-free posts was predictably short-lived ...

Of course and again, she knows nothing of who I know or talk to or not, but such petty facts have never yet gotten in her way when the opportunity of a put-down presents itself (which to her, it seems, is pretty much always)...

ohdearohdear

0 Replies

If NIMH DID speak to EU conservatives (as I, for one, do) then he would KNOW what was just posted about the question in the Bundestag.

That leaves 2 possibilities:
(1) He genuinely doesn't know what the Euro fluff is about - ergo he never speaks to conservatives, or even reads about what they're actually doing, or,
(2) He does know, and is deliberately obfuscating the truth with uncalled-for personal remarks about other posters who simply state documented facts.

If there is a third possibility please post it here, I'd like to know about it Smile

0 Replies

Walter - clarification on your post ref. Swiss referendum: the Swiss approved no "EU-wide" passport-free zone, only "Schengen" zone. As you know that's much more limited than EU as a whole.

0 Replies

Final to Walter - have to leave again soon: the "conservatives here" don't necessaritly support what you think they do. I, for instance, support the Swiss policy of providing free heroin to registered addicts in controlled medical facilities.

It keeps them from risking death from "street" heroin (cut with anything from baby powder to rat poison), getting hepatitis or AIDS from used needles, plus keeps the crime rate down as they're not driven to steal in order to pay "street" prices for heroin - not to mention it effectively bankrupts illegal heroin traffickers.

Conservatism includes many issues which you also support, Walter, like animal protection, so please Vorsicht in future Smile

0 Replies

HofT wrote:

Walter - clarification on your post ref. Swiss referendum: the Swiss approved no "EU-wide" passport-free zone, only "Schengen" zone. As you know that's much more limited than EU as a whole.

But includes non-EU countries as well :wink:

0 Replies

FOLLOWING THE EUROPEAN UNION

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know