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JURIST lays out the planned outline of the latest attempt to revive the European Constitution. In tandem with the actions of Chirac to publicise EU actions that demonstrate a defence against socialisation, the leaders of France and Germany wish to revise the first two chapters and submit these revised parts of the Constitution to referenda in France and the Netherlands.The third chapter would be ratified by the respective Parliaments of the two countries.

Christian Democratic politicians from Berlin, Paris and the European Parliament were holding confidential talks to restart talks on the failed attempt to ratify a constitution for the European Union, according to reports in Der Spiegel magazine.

The group includes German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Jacques Chirac, and other conservative EU leaders, the magazine reported.

This plan will be taken up by the German Presidency of the European Union in 2007. Just imagine the pressure on a British Prime Minister when twenty four have ratified and we have not. No doubt the Liberal Democrats and Europhiles will construct some face-saving routine that allows the politicians to avoid holding a referendum here.

Separate referenda for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland: vote for the Constitution to save the Union?

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The European Union is making soothing clucking sounds to try and calm the outraged Muslim masses with plans of a 'media code of conduct' designed to prevent a repeat of the Jyllands-Posten incident with the 'Satanic Cartoons'.

EU Justice and Security Commissioner Franco Frattini said the charter would encourage the media to show "prudence" when covering religion.

"The press will give the Muslim world the message: We are aware of the consequences of exercising the right of free expression," he told the newspaper. "We can and we are ready to self-regulate that right."

Who is this "we"? Does Frattini think he is speaking for the British and European on-line community? If so then perhaps I can spell out the "consequences of exercising the right of free expression" that "we" are aware of... it makes us free, that is the consequence of free expression. Are "we" clear now? These non-enforcible guidelines are just a worthless sop to people who need to be confronted, not treated as though they have a legitimate argument.

And yet later he seems to take a strangely different stance...

The chairman of World Islamic Call Society, Mohamed Ahmed Sherif told a press conference in Brussels on Thursday (9 February) that the cartoons of Mohammed published first in Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, fuelled extremism.

"Nobody should blame the muslims if they are unhappy about the images of the prophet Mohammed," Sherif said coming out from a meeting with EU justice commissioner Franco Frattini in Brussels. "It's forbidden to create a hate programme to show that the prophet is a terrorist while he's not," he stated, "Don't ask us to try to make people understand that this is not a campaign of hate."

EU justice commissioner Franco Frattini repeatedly nodded and mumbled "yes" in front of cameras and microphones during Mr Sherif's statement.

Mr Frattini also denied wanting to create a code of conduct for journalists reporting on religious matters, as indicated by earlier media reports.

"There have never been, nor will there be any plans by the European Commission to have some sort of EU regulation, nor is there any legal basis for doing so," the commissioner stated.

So in the space of two days, Frattini seems to have done a U-turn and stated his commitment to freedom of expression whilst simultaneously looking like an appeaser. That takes some doing!

Let's hear it for 'nuanced' European diplomacy!

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The drive to revive the European Union's Constitution, after the period of reflection, is proving rather fruitless. Since full ratification will not be forthcoming, the only outcome currently in prospect is a fudged showdown. A combination of vindaloo and Armitage Shanks. Either the Nos will be finessed with opt-outs so that the structural changes will be implemented without too much distress, or the EU will fracture with a move by an avant-garde towards a more deeply integrated European state, a la Chirac.

To avoid their nightmare of fractured EU, the Euro-MPs, Andrew Duff and Johannes Voggenhuber are preparing to fill the breach, parliamentarians riding to the rescue of the forlorn constitution. The two pour scorn on the European Council, as a tool divided and unable to provide leadership. Please note that whilst their quotes may verge on satire, they are authentic and provide a sad testament to the delusional meta-context of Brussels.

"From Europe’s leaders we have had a display of a wide range of simplistic solutions to the crisis," Duff said on Friday.

"From President Chirac we have had a proposal for a piecemeal approach to the constitution and from Nicolas Sarkozy we have had a proposal for a restructured version."

From [the Dutch and UK foreign ministers] Bernard Bot and Jack Straw we have confirmation that the present treaty is finished; from Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel we have him disagreeing with all of these people and then we have the president of Finland disagreeing with Schuessel."

"All their proposals are constitutionally improper or politically quite unrealistic. Some of them are both."

This institutional paralysis amongst the Member States provides an opportunity. The European Parliament can provide leadership and attain its place in the sun:

Both MEPs want parliament to show a clear way forward on reviving the constitution debate in Strasbourg next Wednesday and Thursday.

"We have to decide as a parliament if we are to fill the political space or to be satisfied with being supine parrots of fashion; commentators of the paralysed and confused European council," said Duff.

Voggenhuber argued that there didn’t appear to be any serious EU leadership on the constitution.

"The crisis seems to be getting worse," he said adding, "The question now is who is going to be able to lead us out of this crisis."

"Someone has to take responsibility, someone has to take initiatives. If it's not the parliament, then who is going to take the lead and stand up for the constitutional process?"

It is kind of Duff and Voggenhuber to selflessly burden themselves with this responsibility. But why not leave it to the French and Dutch people? They stood up to the constitutional process, didn't they?

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Tony Blair showed just how courageous he is... he chose to face up to an internal battle based on one idea - the European Union - rather than just doing his job as just Britain's prime minister.

Pity Samizdata.net does not have a catagory for articles called "Treason & Betrayal".

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Seldom in the course of European negotiations has so much been surrendered for so little. It is amazing how the Government has moved miles while the French have barely yielded a centimetre.

- William Hague

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Charles Crawford, the British ambassador to Poland, is in hot water for an e-mail which says several entire true things:

He describes the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) as "the most stupid, immoral state-subsidised policy in human history, give or take Communism".

He also ridicules French leader Jacques Chirac for "nagging the British taxpayer to bloat rich French landowners and so pump up food prices in Europe, thereby creating poverty in Africa".

He also suggests Blair gives EU leaders one hour to make up their minds on the budget because "If anyone says no, we end the meeting. The EU will move on to a complete mess of annual budgets. Basically suits us - we'll pay less and the rebate stays 100 percent intact".

Oh, but he was only 'joking' of course. Riiiight.

Yes, this guy should indeed be fired from his job as an ambassador... he belongs in 10 Downing Street doing Tony Blair's job!

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Britain's government surrenders billions of our money to the EU in return for... nothing much... and that has left the UK government 'isolated' because more was not surrendered.

The gall of the Gauls at insisting Britain's taxpayers stump up even more when they are massively greater beneficiaries of the EU's largess than the UK is breathtaking but far from surprising.

Britain is not even nearly isolated enough from the EU for my taste.

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The US Constitution begins, famously, "We the People...". The European Constitution begins, "His Majesty the King of the Belgians...". That gives you a fair idea of the different spirit of each document.
- Charles Moore

(Hat tip to Taylor Dinerman for pointing out this gem)

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Unbelievable. Blair is actually going to fold on the EU rebate for the UK? Why? What possible advantage could it bring him politically to give away even more of our money to the parasites in Brussels?

What ever happened to:

If we cannot get a large deal, which alters fundamentally the way the budget is spent, then we will have to have a smaller EU budget
- Tony Blair

We were told that the British rebate would only be negotiable if the monstrous EU agricultural subsidies were also negotiable. Yet France et al have give up nothing whatsoever of any consequence, and yet the halfwit in Downing Street is going to give them want they want anyway? WTF?

I must be missing something here.

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Eurostat has concluded that sixteen percent of the population resides in poverty. At a first reading this appeared quite a high figure, perhaps mitigated by the enlargement process in 2004. On closer examination, this statistical sleight of hand concerned the level of social inequality in each Member State. Poverty was measured as that proportion of the population who had less than 60% of the country's median disposable income. Hence, these startling results:

Using a set of micro-data and cross-sectional indicators from national sources, Eurostat determined the percentage of people living in households that have less than 60% of the country's median disposable income to live on. Surprisingly, this indicator for social inclusion is best in some poorer countries, such as the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovenia. The Czech Republic's leadership shows that recent policy plays a greater role in combating poverty than a country's historical background. Slovakia, which was part of the same country as the Czech part of the former Czech Republic for more than sixty years until 1993, has the worst indicators eleven years after Czechoslovakia split.

Being poor does not mean the same throughout the European Union. While a four-person family with an annual purchasing power of 30,000 euro in Luxembourg is already threatened by poverty, a family with 5,000 euro a year in Lithuania or Latvia is just above the poverty line.

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William Heath has another example that even when governments set out to do a Good Thing, it's not necessarily worth it.

Europe's governments, freaked out by how good and free Google is, have knee jerked and spent a pile of money launching an online Euro-library. "We're engaged in a global competition for technological supremacy”, said French President Jacques Chirac about this. "In France, in Europe, it's our power that's at stake”. Let's show them what an intergovernmental steering commitee can achieve, when backed up by a series of working goups.

Predictably enough this was no contest.

Well, Google print is unbelievable. I never asked for it, it cost me nothing, it works very fast and I'm delighted. Euro-lib didn't find anything for me, just crashed my browser (Mozilla).

Euro-lib sounds a bit sleezy, doesn't it? Anyway, William then picks on the Euro efforts to develop a search engine called Quaero widely seen as a potential competitor to Google. (!) Oh dear.

Nobody has ever heard of it (although Google turns up several Quaeros, of course). What next? EC-funded Euromaps? Euromail? Euro-Earth (perhaps just restricted to Europe, and called Euro-Euro)?

Would it be too Anglo-centric to ask: "Can I have my tax back now please?"

We hear you...

Note: William has started another Ideal Government project, this time about Europe, Ideal Government Europe. I meant to blog about it and others already beat me to it. In the sidebar blurb William asks:

Public sector computerisation will cost Europe €88bn in 2005. But did we ever say what we wanted? Are e-government projects designed for citizens? Do we use them? Will they make life easier and meet our needs? Should we trust them? Unless we ask, how can they give us what we want? Thinking and saying what we want is more fun than griping, and more constructive too.

The answer to his questions is a resounding NO from where I am standing and I am not holding my breath at William's or anyone's chance to affect anything to do with the EU, however, can't blame the man for trying to voice his objections when he gets the opportunity to make them to the EU audience and add the bloggers voices to his own.

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The EU Courts have just given themselves the power to impose European criminal laws, by which I mean to decide itself if an offence against an EU regulation is now a criminal matter, even against the wishes of an EU states own government and legal system. How anyone who is even a casual observer of the EU could not have predicted this was on the cards is a mystery to me.

So next time you hear someone tell you that the real power remains, and will always remain, at the national level, perhaps you might like to ask them if deciding if something is, or is not, a criminal matter is a core function of a state's legislative and judicial structures.

If people like Tony Blair and Ken Clarke want to dismantle Britain and make it a European province, well would it not be better if they just said as much and argued why that was the best course of action?

But Foreign Office sources said that, although the judgment raised the possibility of Britain having to create new criminal offences against the wishes of the Government, in practice EU member states would never agree to such a loss of sovereignty.

Any time you hear 'Foreign Office sources' say something will not happen 'in practice', of course that means the opposite is usually true. I expect within 18 months or so Britain will indeed be enacting criminal legislation imposed by European Courts on a regular basis.

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Anatole Kaletsky, the economics journalist who, despite a fondness for Keynsianism, is one of my favourite columnists, believes Italy's departure from the euro and possible re-creation of the lira is a real possibility, one that needs to be taken with deadly seriousness by financial markets. He says the financial fallout from an Italian divorce could be disastrous:

While detailed consideration of these arguments is probably premature, the practical implication is clear: If the possibility of an Italian withdrawal were ever taken seriously by the markets, foreign holders of Italy’s €1.5 trillion public debt would face enormous losses, big enough to endanger the solvency of many non-Italian banks. In other words, the Italian Government is now in a position to kill the euro and wreck the European banking system merely by threatening to withdraw.

I think he is correct. As I said in my last posting about Hayek's idea of competing currencies operating inside the same country, it is folly to imagine that the cult of the all-wise central banker will not come a cropper some time or later. Many Italian entrepreuneurs might be very glad indeed of an alternate store of value if that country does indeed pull the plug on the euro.

Some scare stories deserve to be ridiculed but I think Kaletsky is on to something. Between now and the Italian national polls next year, it would be smart to keep a very close eye on the euro zone financial markets indeed.

(Thanks to the Adam Smith Institute blog for the pointer. It reaches pretty similar conclusions).

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UK authorities may be faced with a bit of a struggle in extraditing a man, now in Rome, for his alleged involvement in the failed July 21 terrorist attacks on the London transport system, according to this report.

So could some nice person remind me what the EU-wide arrest warrant is suppose to achieve, exactly? Oh, er, wait a minute...

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More from the "You couldn't make it up" department. David Carr is fond of saying that the satyrist's trade is hard these days, because reality has a habit of being so very much more satirical.

This is presumably the kind of thing he means:

Slovakia and Hungary are being served notice that the Commission is about to take them to the European Court of Justice for not complying with certain parts of EU legislation.

Apparently, neither country has implemented a number of directives on maritime safety. Slovakia is being warned about having no legislation to do with passenger ships and prevention of pollution.

Hungary has no "availability of port facilities for ship-generated waste". Actually, Hungary has no ports or ships, being land-locked, as is Slovakia. That, apparently, is not the point.

The history of the USSR is repeating itself as farce. EUSSR. And the USSR was pretty farcical to begin with.

Speaking of David Carr and the EU being farcical, whatever happened to Bertrand Maginot. I miss him. The imposition of environment-friendly port facilities on landlocked countries sounds like something he would understand perfectly. It would be interesting to hear his view on this issue.

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It is good to know that in these troubled times, when we feel under attack from terrorist nutters, that those considerate folk in the European Commission have refused to take their eye off the ball.

Vitamin supplements will become more expensive and many health food stores will be closed as a result of an EU directive being upheld. I find it depressing, but not the least bit surprising, that Brussels regulators should feel that ordinary folk are too thick to figure out the risks and benefits of vitamins for themselves. It is a setback for people who want to take charge of their health, and must send a funny message to people who are also constantly urged by our regulators and politicians about the dangers of obesity, smoking, booze and driving too fast.

Even if you are a sceptic about the benefits of so-called alternative medicine, it seems a fairly basic point that the substances one chooses to ingest are none of the State's business. Period.

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I realize that is not the sort of headline Samizdata readers are used to, but the EU politicians voted the right way today.

The European Parliament in Strasbourg has thrown out, by 648 to 14 votes, a draft law for EU-wide software patents. The patent scheme was being pushed by Microsoft and a number of other dominant companies. But smaller software companies like Red Hat opposed the idea, knowing full well it was an attempt to stifle the ability of new companies to enter the software market.

Because the competitive process spurs companies to innovate, EU-wide software patents would have reduced innovation by reducing the ability of start-ups to compete. For Microsoft, the draft law had considerable merit: it would have undermined the ability of the open source software industry to develop products. Frankly, Microsoft is a strong enough competitor already.

In the software industry, programmers are protected by copyright - you cannot legally copy another programmer's work without permission. That protection enables the market to come up with innovative new software. Software patents are a protection too far. Strengthening them with an EU-wide law would have increased the power of incumbents. The European Parliament's decision today is the right one.

Crossposted from the Globalisation Institute Blog.

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Flying swans are the logo of the UK's presidency of the EU over the next six months. Apparently, the UK officials are proud to point out that it is the first time an EU presidency has had an animated logo. I mean, how amazing is that? Watch out Jacques!

The idea is a metaphor for leadership, teamwork and efficiency, which is particularly appropriate for the EU, given the system of rotating leadership. Migrating birds fly in a V formation. This is highly efficient, because all the birds in the formation, except for the leader, are in the slipstream of another bird. Periodically the leading bird drops back and another bird moves up to take its place.

What a load of bollocks! We are talking about a bunch of bureaucrats and appratchiks desparately (at least I can hope) trying to recover their footing which was temporarily disrupted by the recent referenda on the EU constitution. But not everyone thinks the logo is ridiculous, for example the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds likes it:

One of the concerns being tackled in the UK's EU and G8 presidencies, was climate change, which could potentially prevent Whooper and Bewick's swans wintering in this country.

I am having trouble keeping a straight face here. But seriously, how about streching the metaphor a bit and hope it might be the EU swan song...?

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Listening to Tony Blair addressing the EU parliament is a rather strange experience. He calls for reform of spending and recognising economic reality whilst at the same time declaring that he is a 'passionate European' and saying that he supports the idea of an intrusive welfare state.

That Blair's views on the need to 'liberalise' makes him a Thatcherite radical in the eyes of many Continental politicians shows how truly doomed to long term stagnation and irrelevance the EU really is. It also shows Blair's wish to be all things to all people and why in the long run NuLabour cannot help but choke on its own contradictions just as the Tories have.

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...on Waterloo Day, of course.

Addendum...

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This BBC report about the anxieties and arkwardnesses now being suffered by the EU's leaders in the wake of their repudiation by the voters of France and Holland makes fun reading for all those of us who fail to see the point of the EU. What is it for? What good and worthwhile thing can the EU do that could not be done just as easily by the separate nations and governments of Europe with a fraction of the fuss or expense or grief? Why must the nations of EUrope homogenise themselves into one nation? For what? Against whom? The EU's leaders have never explained in a manner that makes simultaneous sense to all of EUrope's people.

Instead, they have tended to fall back on the argument that the EU is inevitable. Yes but is it desirable? That does not matter, because desirable or not, it is happening. It is reality. It is the future. Arguing that it should not be reailty or the future is to indulge in fantasy.

If the EU had a desirable and agreed purpose of the sort that the people of the EU might actually be able to get enthusiastic about – some purpose, I mean, other than that of giving the EU elite a superpower to be the bosses of – that would have made quite a difference in recent weeks. In crisis, all fundamentally effective institutions go to their core purpose. But the EU has no core purpose that its leaders are willing to allude to. All that the EU has is its precious momentum, its inevitability, and if it suddenly looks like it does not have momentum or inevitabitlity, then, in the word's of Germany's Vice President, a certain Guenter Verheugen, "the ground is shaking beneath our feet".

Shake baby shake, I say.

The EUro-momentum will no doubt soon be re-established, and this little democratically induced tremor may soon be forgotten. But while it lasts, I am enjoying it. I can even tell myself that it might be remembered for a while.

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As several people have predicted would be the case, many of the EU's 'great and good' are just continuing with the Great European Integration project as if the French and Dutch NO votes never happened. But it does seem that the shock to the system those votes administered to the torpid media has indeed woken up a few people. It seems that the insects have not noticed that someone has picked up the rock they were under.

With almost Marxist historiography, Eurocrats dismiss the French and Dutch results as the product of "false consciousness". The peoples of those two countries plainly misunderstood the issue. They were really voting against Turkey, or against Raffarin, or against Anglo-Saxon liberalism - against anything, in short, except the proposition actually on the ballot paper.

[...]

During the recent referendums Yes campaigners argued that a No vote would be a rejection, not simply of the constitution, but of the entire European project. Let them now stand by their own logic.

With luck the Euroclass will continue to seriously underestimate the problem and thereby create enough real hostility that the whole European edifice will just start lurching from one political crisis to another until various bits start falling off... preferably UK shaped bits.

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Jacques Chirac has announced that Britain must give up its rebate on its EU contributions as a £3 billion (5.5 bn US dollars) 'gesture of solidarity' with Europe, whilst at the same time adding the France would do nothing of the sort itself when it came to agricultural subsidies.

Tony, not surprisingly, sadly declined Jacques kind suggestion that he publicly commit political suicide in Britain. I guess they never saw that coming in Paris.

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European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso says:

Europe must avoid an ideological war between free-market capitalism and the welfare state after the rejection of the EU's constitution, [he] said on Saturday

Wrong. An ideological war is exactly what we need and it is long overdue. Pick up your spanners then go find some gears to throw them into.

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As soon as the 'unthinkable' becomes thinkable it also, and immediately, becomes sayable as well:

Italy's labor minister called for a referendum to see if Italians want to temporarily bring back the lira after widespread popular discontent over high prices that many blame on the introduction of the euro.

Temporarily?

Meanwhile, rumours that the German government is looking to distance itself from the Euro are being 'officially denied'.

Of course, none of this means that the Euro is going anywhere anytime soon or possibly at all but it would be fun to start a sweepstake on which Eurozone country will be the first to cut and run. For what it's worth, my guess is France.

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European Constitution. 2000 - 2005. R.I.P

The European Constitution died earlier this evening following a short but torrid illness.

The sad passing of the Constitution is unlikely to be a surprise to many people who doubted whether she would be able to recover from the savage beating she took in France last weekend. Indeed, it may prove to have been a merciful providence that she found herself in a terminal condition in the euthanasia-friendly Netherlands where she was emphatically put out of her misery.

For those who witnessed the last few undignified days of her life being dragged ignominiously around the squalid back-streets of Amsterdam, it will be easy to forget that the Constitution began her life as a daughter of the Europe’s elites; a cherished brainchild of the new aristocracy and the bearer of all their hopes and wishes for a secure and golden future.

Her all too brief life started out with glamour and hope and ended with controversy and acrimony. But, what she lacked in longevity she made up for in impact, holding an entire continent in her thrall. She was the ‘It’ girl of Europe and there could scarce have been a single Prime Minister, President, King or Bishop who did not want to walk into a room with her draped across his arm.

But it was her qualities of impeccable breeding that gave rise to resentments as well as plaudits. For everyone that she seduced with her charms, she vexed with her arrogance. For all those that were willing to flirt with her, there were others that feared her embrace. In the end she was brought low by the little people she was born to rule over.

As much as any analysis of the Constitution is possible at all, then the final one must be that she was a puzzle draped in an enigma. Even those closest to her admitted that she was difficult to read and even harder to interpret. Despite all earnest attempts to present her as something coherent and friendly, she remained stubbornly opaque and inpenetrable; a capricious, whimsical, moody, temperamental, volatile, eccentric, arbitrary, erratic, fickle, inconstant coquette whose last act of defiance is to take her unfathomable mysteries with her to the grave.

The Constitution will be greatly missed by her many friends and admirers, and especially those among them who believed her to be the lifetime meal ticket they were yearning for.

Details will be published shortly of all ecumenical, humanist, non-denominational memorial services to be held in Brussels and Strasbourg. No flowers please but send donations to charities concerned with the rehabilitation of clinically depressed Technocrats (of whom there are now many).

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Good on the Dutch.

Dutch voters overwhelmingly rejected the European constitution in a referendum Wednesday, exit polls projected, in what could be a knockout blow for the charter roundly defeated just days ago by France.

An exit poll projection broadcast by state-financed NOS television said the referendum failed by a vote of 63 percent to 37 percent. The turnout was 62 percent, exceeding all expectations, the broadcaster said.

Although the referendum was consultative, the high turnout and the decisive margin left no room for the Dutch parliament to turn its back on the people's verdict. The parliament meets Thursday to discuss the results.

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Dennis McShane, former Minister of Europe, does not appear to have fallen away from the limelight completely, given his recent appearance on Question Time and his subsequent interview for UPI. Cheerleading for Europe with Dimbleby will not tax anyone, but McShane provided some more interesting comments that may cast some light on the current thinking about Europe within the Blair administration, or what backbenchers have to say if they wish to be considered for the next reshuffle.

From the first, McShane makes a point of viewing the French referendum in the faint tones of a realist who accepts a verdict of imprisonment. It is a counsel of acceptance and stoicism, of truth-telling and endeavour; that infamous stranger to the truth, Blairite candour:

"Britain will hold a referendum if there is a treaty to hold a referendum on," MacShane said. "But a French Non means the new Treaty of Rome cannot be ratified. It was always a mistake to call a Treaty a constitution. But a constitution needs the confidence of the people and powerful, united leadership. Europe lacks confidence and effective leadership today so it was not a propitious time to hold plebiscites on the new Treaty. There may be some who hope this Treaty can be made to fly but it would be an insult to France and her citizens to say the Treaty they reject will continue on as a dead man walking. We will have to begin again."

The critique proffered is interesting, since it borrows and begs arguments from the Eurosceptics, in order to incorporate them into pro-EU swaddling. McShane recognises the hostility with which the smaller countries attacked the removal of their representation on the Commission and yet, defends the existing Constitution as a "coherent response" to the problems of the European Union. However, the Constitutional answer (to a question that none of Europe's electorates ever asked) was found wanting. The leaders of Europe could not inspire their voters and the European economy was ruined by:

"... wrong decisions by the European Commission with its obsession on over-regulation and by the failure of the European Central Bank to respond to the economic standstill," MacShane said. "Political-constitutional advances have to be based on economic and social confidence. "

The Eurosceptic critique of the project needs to respond to the flanking movement of pro-Europeans like McShane, who borrow their ideas in order to promote different conclusions. Like some grinning, drooling revenant, that refuses to die, unlike the rest of the reactionaries that pass for social democrats these days, the Third Way has been resurrected as an unlikely combination of welfarism, market economics and environmentalism to provide a new moral backbone for coercion in the name of the public good that is Europe.

"The answer will not be found by the gentlemen of Brussels but by the willingness of political actors in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, Britain and the rest of Europe to rethink out-of-date 20th century economic and social ideology. We need a new 3-way historic compromise between economy, society and environment. Unfortunately we only hear the shrill protectionism and rejectionism of those who know how to say No to the future rather than work collaboratively to build a new Europe."

"I hope this shock will force pro-Europeans to unite and defeat the reactionary forces of the left and right who have unleashed a politics of fear in place of the hope all Europeans need," McShane added.

It is too early to tell if this forms an altered vision of Europe, one that may appeal to moderates and one nation Tories. By acknowledging its current failures, McShane's arguments may provide a pleasing lure for those who argue that the European Union can be reformed. It also gives pointers to Blair's approach in the forthcoming British Presidency of the European Union. As such, the Eurosceptic movement needs to counter conservatives and reformers within the EU, forcefully argueing that such approaches will prove inferior to the development of a free-trading area.

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We have already had people from the commission this morning talking about how they 'interpret' the French vote. What don't they understand? No is no.

If the government in this country or the commission try to breathe life into this corpse, then we in Britain we must have a say to deliver the final blow.

- Liam Fox, Tory Shadow Foreign Secretary

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With the decisive French 'Non' to the EU Constitution, clearly the whole project for European super-statist integration has taken a hit unlike any in its history thus far. In many ways the most significant feature of this is that it has made the intellectual and social disconnect between whole peoples in the EU's constituent nations impossible to paper over. In short, the nation called 'Europe' is seen to be a fiction and the 'inevitable march of progress' has been shown to be an illusion.

So what happens next? The obvious move by Tony Blair is to cancel the UK's promised referendum as being moot now that the process has been derailed. Yet there are already frantic attempts going on by the integrationists to prevent that from happening, on the basis that it would be an admission that the process really is over.

Now this attempt to get the UK to vote anyway is really splendid news and I hope that other people who share my views that the EU is an abomination will remember Napoleon's dictum "never interrupt the enemy when he is making a mistake" as any UK vote will almost certainly be a vote against the EU which will just widen the rift in political cultures between France and the UK.

As I have stated before, unlike David, I wish that France had voted 'Oui' so that Blair could not possibly wriggle out of his commitment to hold a referendum and thus allow Britain to vote 'No', thereby making the UK a virtual 'pariah state' to the French, Spanish and German political elites and as a result making them perverse allies in the effort to disengage the UK from the EU. Oh well, scratch one possible optimistic scenario but the situation is now alive with all sorts of other interesting possibilities.

But it is still hard to see the rejection of the EU Constitution by anyone as bad news. How it will play out remains to be seen but the attempt to sleepwalk Europe into an ever more dystopian regulatory super-state just got a bucket of cold water poured over it. The game is afoot and provided the Tory Party do not go and live up to their nickname name by choosing some member of the Quisling right to lead them, maybe even that collection of risk averse Grandees will realise that taking on the EU is something that can reap huge political benefits. Labour too must be looking at the spectacle of the French power elite being bitten in the arse by millions of common people who want the political system to impose economic and social stasis to a background rap of splendidly unintelligible gibberish from sundry French intellectuals and thinking "there but for the grace of God...". At least some of them must be wondering if the downside of Euro-integration is worth the political risks.

The dismay is palpable. It is hard not to laugh.

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To all French crypto-communists, syndicalists, marxists, trotskyites, leninists, stalinists, national socialists, socialist nationalists, primitivists, Trade Union dinosaurs, student activists, greenie nutters, neo-fascists, old fashioned fascists, quasi-crypto-troglodyte-Pol-Pottist-year zero-flat-earthers, looney tunes and enviro-goons... Merci Beaucoup!!!!

I could kiss every single one of you (but I don't know how to say that in French).

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For what it may or may not be worth, Channel 4 News has just said that a leaked exit poll gives the Non side victory with between 53 and 55 per cent of the vote.

Meanwhile, the EU Referendum blog reports that it has read a document which explains that Non will not actually mean No:

In short, the authors conclude that, in the event of one or both countries voting "no", the ratification process should be neither suspended nor abandoned. They assert that all member states have expressed a commitment to proceed with ratification by virtue of Declaration 30, appended to the Constitutional Treaty. Member states cannot unilaterally or collectively decide to change the ratification process.

Thus, member states which have not already ratified should continue with the process whence, once 20 members have done so, the matter should be referred to the European Council.

In the meantime, the authors caution that "the European Union must not remain paralysed". Rather, they say, "it must continue and intensify its efforts to relaunch its policies, even by implementing in advance, where possible, the provisions of the Treaty that do not meet with open opposition".

Thus, the considered response in the event of a rejection of the constitution should be "full steam ahead". Member states should implement it even faster than they are doing already.

Very helpful. I wish I could be equally helpful in return on this question:

So what, precisely, do we have to do to stop this thing?

I read the EU Referendum blog in the hope of getting answers to questions like that. If they have to ask that, what is the chance that anyone else will have an answer?

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Having been subjected to some robust criticism for my occasional cyncism about the whole modern democratic process, I am actually a little peeved to discover that I am but a mere dilettante:

If the French and the Dutch reject the EU Constitution on Sunday and Wednesday, they should re-run the referendums, the current president of the EU, Jean-Claude Juncker, has said.

"If at the end of the ratification process, we do not manage to solve the problems, the countries that would have said No, would have to ask themselves the question again", Mr Juncker said in an interview with Belgian daily Le Soir.

'No' is not the right answer, you see.

The whole bloody continent is heading for another war. Britain out now.

Sidenote: This Mr. Juncker chappie is the president of the EU? Hands up anyone, anywhere who has ever heard of him!

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French voters go to the polls this weekend to vote on the European Union constitution, with polls so far suggesting that the "no's" will narrowly win and shaft the wretched project, although one should never, ever under-estimate the ability of the political establishment to scare voters into saying "oui". My hope, needless to say, is that the French vote against the constitution and throw a great big spanner in the works and prevent the creation of what will be, explicitly, a European superstate.

It is pointless at this vantage point to guess exactly what will be the impact on British political life if the French do nix the constitution. My rough guess is that Blair will secretly breath a deep sigh of relief, as will the Tories. I also think that the United States will also be glad about a no vote, although I am just guessing.

As Anatole Kaletsky writes in the Times today, the chronic underperformance of the euro zone economy is at the heart of much of that disenchantment (although other issues are important too).

Here's a key graf:

The relative economic decline of "old" Europe since the early 1990s - especially of Germany and Italy, but also of the Netherlands and France - has been a disaster almost unparalleled in modern history. While Britain and Japan certainly suffered some massive economic dislocations, in the early 1980s and the mid-1990s respectively, they never experienced the same sort of permanent transformation from thriving full-employment economies to stagnant societies where mass unemployment and falling living standards are accepted as permanent facts of life. In Britain, unemployment more than doubled from 1980 to 1984, but conditions then quickly improved. By the late 1980s it was enjoying a boom, the economy was growing by 4 per cent and unemployment had halved. In continental Europe, by contrast, unemployment has been stuck between 8 and 11 per cent since 1991 and growth has reached 3 per cent only once in those 14 years.

He has a point, although I am struck by the fact that in France, much of the hostility to the constitution is coming not from pro-free marketeers, as is the case in many respects in Britain, but from those who fear that the process will open up France's high regulated, high-tax economy to the icy winds of laissez faire. The ironies abound.

Of course, the fact of mere voters saying no to the EU juggernaut is unlikely to deflect the mixed assortment of deluded idealists, crooks, place-seekers and sundry camp-followers from trying to advance their aims. But a delicious irony would it be if the land of Bonaparte, de Gaulle and Asterix puts a major block in their path.

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Xavier Méra has a piece up at Institut économique Molinari about the continuing and seemingly never-ending EU vendetta against Microsoft.

Concluding paragraphs:

That is not all. EU spokesman Antonia Mochan observed that the Media Player affair went "beyond the question of its name," which has now been settled. Indeed, Microsoft's rivals complain that the reduced version of Windows is not totally compatible with their programs. The EU's competition department has stated that tests are under way, and an EU source wishing to remain anonymous confirmed the plaintiffs' complaints about compatibility. It is perhaps this aspect, the least widely reported in the Media Player affair, which reveals the most about the validity of the charges made against the IT giant. In fact, if the commission ends up denouncing this state of affairs, it will once again be contradicting grievances it has put forward about Microsoft.

The point of the penalty is that the integrated version of Media Player allegedly damages competitors. Withdrawing it should therefore benefit them. If this is not the case, as they say and as the commission spokesperson suggests, that means these rival software writers are in reality third-party beneficiaries of the Windows Media Player system. It cannot be argued in the same breath that Microsoft both hurts and helps its competitors with the same product. It follows then that we cannot criticize Microsoft both for putting forward a Windows "N" that is "flawed" because it doesn't contain specific Media Player files, and for being an "unfair" competitor with its complete version.

In a trial where logic has not been taken seriously, arbitrary judgement has played a more significant role than reason and experience. As the accusation continues down the same path, the Microsoft case is coming to look more and more like a witch-hunt.

Well, it sounds to me more like that Microsoft, having been ordered to do business differently from the utterly reasonable and beneficial-to-all-except-rivals way that it wants to, may have introduced a little minor self-inflicted sabotage, Atlas Shrugged style, in order to make the EU regulators feel like the prats that they are.

Either that, or they are maybe indulging in that alternative version of sabotage that consists of doing everything you are told and nothing else, which always causes havoc. Few things ruin complicated technological systems more quickly and more completely than pure obedience. Okay, if that is what you bastards say you want, that is what you will get . . .

And I say that they have a perfect right to do all of that. I have always thought that bitching about Microsoft including Media Player in Windows is about as sane as complaining about a car company including hub caps on its cars, on the grounds that this discriminates against disappointed hub cap suppliers. Which it sort of does, but so bloody what?

By the way, the first version of this posting that I stuck up was entitled, in error: "The EU versus the EU (again)". (I decided to change it from "Microsoft versus the EU" to "The EU versus Microsoft", but only got half way.) But maybe this was not such an error. Self destruction is what the EU often seems to be all about.

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For those of you not able to drag your attention from our fascinating British national poll (okay, I'll turn the snark button off now) there is always the European Union to keep us all amused. It emerges that the EU Commission has gotten a bit red-faced after it emerged that two saunas were installed in the new Brussels HQ out of consideration for its Scandanavian staff.

This seems a bit mean. It must be nice to unwind and loosen those muscle pains after a hard day churning out interminable directives and figuring out new ways to shaft Chinese textile exporters. In fact, I would like to make a modest proposal: perhaps all such officials could spend a lot more time in saunas, not to mention theatres, cinemas, restaurants, nightclubs, race courses and football grounds. In fact, anywhere but their own offices.

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This Friday, Michael Jennings will be doing my last-Friday-of-the-month talk, about China. Emergence of, economic miracle, impact on rest of world, and so on.

And, as if determined to assist me in my efforts to publicise this event, the European Union, in the person of Euro-Panjandrum Peter Mandelson, has been uttering anti-Chinese fatuities:

The European Union has called on China to reduce its clothing exports to Europe or else face enforced limits.

That was the warning given by EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson, as he launched an EU probe into nine categories of Chinese textile exports.

Exports of certain Chinese clothing items to Europe have surged by more than 500% since an international quota system came to an end on 1 January.

Heaven forbid that the people of Europe should be allowed to buy really cheap clothes, as much as they want. Clearly this is a retrograde step, and must be resisted.

"Europe" still lectures places like China as if places like China are the Third World, and Europe, obviously, is the first. But this has a very eighteenth century Asia feel to it, to me. Europe can no more prevent itself being swamped by, flooded with, etc. (although "sold" would be a better word) cheap clothes now than Asia could then prevent the incoming tide of pots and pans, cups and plates, and shirts, made in what was then the English workshop of the world.

This nonsense seems all to be based on some Agreement that was signed a few years ago. And it perfectly illustrates the folly of such agreements, which serve only to allow the supposedly protected industries to remain somnolent for a few more precious years, thereby to lose all touch with economic reality beyond the protections behind which they briefly shelter, to the point where the pressure of economic reality becomes so immense that it is impossible to resist, at which point the protection collapses and economic melt-down duly happens.

It also illustrates Public Choice Theory rather nicely. You can be sure that hundreds of desperate European shirt and trouser makers are even now busily conspiring to explain that Mandelson is talking sense rather than nonsense. Meanwhile the people whom Mandelson is trying to harm (everyone else in Europe plus many thousands of poor workers in China) will be too busy with other things to object very loudly. After all, each of us will only suffer a bit, and anyway, what can any of us do if the EU/Peter Mandelson has decided to harm us all, a bit. That is not news. That is Euro-business as usual.

In due course, the benefits to all of us of free trade with China will be concentrated into the hands of a few illegal clothes importers. But the clothes will not be quite so good or quite so cheap.

Reuters reports on the Chinese response here. My thanks to Alex Singleton of the Globalization Institute for the links, via this, which continues to happen at the ungodly hour that was originally promised. Tim Worstall comments on the same story at the Globalization Institute blog, making similar points to mine about the concentration of the (temporary) benefits associated with protection, but the dispersed nature of the costs, and about how previous restrictions have only stored up trouble.

Meanwhile, how else is "Europe" responding to the menace of people working too hard? By having a law against it.

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It is a distinct possibility that the French Left will mobilize enough folks to vote down the EU constitution because, get this, it favours the free market too much. Well whatever, just so long as they vote Non, does it really matter that their reasons are completely antithetical to the reasons most Brits oppose the EU Constitution?

Or does it?

For people such as myself who do not believe that the EU can be reformed, it seems to me that far more damage will result to the EU by a British 'no' than from a French 'non'. Why? Because France is inseparable from the whole neo-Carolingian Franco-German 'Greater Europe' project and thus accommodating French political realities are inevitably what will happen in the aftermath of French rejection of the Constitution. Britain on the other hand is seen rightly or wrongly as peripheral in the long run and thus a British rejection could well lead to the increasingly held view amongst the Europhiles that only with the UK out of the EU, either completely or in effect, can their grand aspirations be achieved... and that sounds pretty damn sweet to me as I want the UK out of the EU altogether.

That said, a French rejection which leads to so extreme a second attempt to draught a Euro-constitution that even the Europhiles in Britain blanche from trying to sell it to the Eurosceptic Brits works for me as well. Only time will tell.

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I attended a one-day conference on the EU Constitution today, drawing together an eclectic mixture of people from all parts of the political spectrum, both British and foreign, and all united on the need to get a decisive No vote in the event that Mr Blair decides to hold a referendum on one (let's pray it is not done by postal vote, god help us). I attended the morning session and drifted home for lunch with my head still ringing with one of the best speeches by a politician I have heard for years.

The politician's name is Steve Radford and he is a Liberal Party councillor in England. His party is the bit that refused to merge with the old Social Democrats and decided to keep the flame of Gladstone, Richard Cobden and Joe Grimmond burning bright. Well, if Mr Radford's performance was a guide, the Liberal Party is a very interesting outfit indeed. He denounced the European Union's economic tariffs most effectively by holding up a bag of sugar and pointed out that the price of the bag is inflated fourfold by tariffs. He denounced the rampant corruption, cronyism and lack of democratic accountability of the EU, a situation which will get only worse if the EU Constitution becomes a fact. He was passionate in making the free market case - all too rare these days, and frequently very funny.

It is refreshing to hear an actual big-L Liberal refer to the anti-Corn Law League and the great campaign to promote free trade by the likes of Richard Cobden. I don't know about all his views on other subjects, but if every member of the Liberal Party were like this man, I'd very seriously consider voting for it.

I hope we haven't heard the last of this gentleman.

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Here are a few items concerning the various ghastlinesses of the EU.

First, a briefing paper from the Instituto Bruno Leoni, by Alberto Mingardi and Paolo Zanetto, about the Microsoft versus EU case. Pdf only, alas, but worth a look.

Microsoft stands accused by the EU of daring to supply an operating system that is too good and does too much and has been ordered by the EU to cripple it and to tell all its rivals how it does everything. Microsoft wants to call its crippled version of Windows "Crippled Windows" and the EU says it can't so there and has fined Microsoft Z zillion euros. To add lunacy to lunacy, the EU is now saying that when a multinational corporation wants to innovate, it must convince the EU that its innovation is a good idea. Never mind about convincing mere people. First, Mario bloody Monti and all his rapacious and power-mad cronies and successors have to be persuaded. So now, guess what, the EU is taking a swipe at the iPod. Microsoft said "the iPod is innovative – go investigate that". So the EU duly started an investigation into the iPod! No need for it. No reason. Not necessary. What's wrong with 78s? Hire a gypsy violinist.

I embroidered somewhat there, but only somewhat. The picture that Mingardi and Zanetto draw of the EU is not pretty. Expressions like "shake down" and "sting" are hard to avoid when pondering the behaviour of the EU towards Microsoft.

I would not normally have made myself read right through this piece, because it is too depressing. But I have been told to review it for here, where Mingardi adds some further comment on the case. Apparently Crippled Windows does not work as well as uncrippled Windows. Extraordinary.

And here are a couple of EU-related pieces in today's Telegraph.

Patrick Minford writes about the costs of EU anti-dumping rules. His title says it all: The EU's manufacturing policies are costing us a fortune. He is finishing a book. Thanks to Tim Worstall for that link.

And here is a news report about the EU's efforts to protect the government of Cuba from its dissidents. Do not provoke Fidel, says Louis Michel, the EU "development commissioner".

The EU would do better to concentrate on developing itself. I live in hope that the influence of the recent Eastern European additions to the EU, of countries where they take economic development seriously and seem to have quite a solid grip on what does and does not promote it, will improve the EU. But reports like those above make such optimism hard to cling to.

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Though the pictures seem pretty, as a Christian, I probably would not care for the new book by Gerhard Haderer, an Austrian cartoonist. He depicts Christ as a "binge-drinking friend of Jimi Hendrix and naked surfer high on cannabis." What daring iconoclasm! In 1905, maybe. In 2005, apart from six nonagerian nuns living in enclosed orders and a few hobby-protesters, nobody gives a monkeys.

Yesterday if anyone had made the slightest suggestion that the furore that results from writing such a book qualified a man to be regarded as some sort of martyr for free speech, I'd have retorted that the "furore" had probably been budgeted for to the last euro by the publishers. "Regrettably, Herr Haderer, the market for Christian outrage is not what it was, and we cannot agree to your suggested advance." Or I'd have suggested that if he wants to play martyr he could try it with the Muslims, who are more likely to enter into the spirit of the game.

But by the holy bowels of Jimi Hendrix, the poor little poseur really is in danger of arrest. And do you know why? Because of the European arrest warrant, that's why. An Austrian cartoonist and writer faces extradition to Greece (Greece: why does that not surprise me?) for something he wrote in Austria. I assume that Austria has no law, or dead-letter law, against blasphemy. So he wrote something that was legal in Austria but not in Greece, and now he faces extradition to Greece. He did not even know his wretched book had been published in Greece.

I found this via Public Interest. Peter Briffa points out that when this law was introduced much was said by its sponsors about extraditing foreign criminals to Britain ... and very little about the extradition of British people to foreign countries for "crimes" that might well not be crimes at all in Britain.

Perhaps some legally knowledgeable reader can tell me if there is anything at all to stop this happening to, for instance, a British Samizdata contributor, if the authorities in some foreign capital should take a dislike to something he or she had written.

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The Kyoto Protocol comes into effect today. It is a hollow victory for environmentalists. Over 150 of the world's countries are not participating in Kyoto cuts of greenhouse emissions. Only 35 countries have pledged to make greenhouse cuts. Only two of the EU15 countries are on track to meet their Kyoto commitments. Italy, a signatory to the treaty, says it won't seek further greenhouse gas emissions reductions after 2012.

The European Union is now calling for taxes to be increased on motorists to help Kyoto have a chance. But, as protests in France and Britain have shown, the European public is unlikely to find this acceptable. As a result of the British protest, the Fuel Duty Escalator - where the tax on petrol is increased yearly - was ended by Britain's finance minister Gordon Brown for fear of electoral disaster. So the EU is unlikely to meet Kyoto's requirements - despite the sanctimonious speeches of European leaders.

But the worst part of Kyoto is that it is, quite literally, a waste of money. It will have almost no effect, environmentally-speaking. The result of Kyoto's cuts will be that Europe will be poorer in the future. That will harm Europe's ability to invest in new technologies that will help improve quality of life and the environment. Kyoto gets religious-style worship, but it is bad news for the planet.

Crossposted from the Globalisation Institute Blog.

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British citizens living abroad in Spain, as many now do, may be barred from voting in the forthcoming European Referendum, according to this article in the Daily Telegraph filed a few days ago. I hope the article turns out to be wrong, if only because the margins deciding this vital poll may be quite thin, as I fear during my gloomier moments. There are hundreds of thousands of Brits, many retirees, who have forsaken these shores for sunnier climes to the south. It would be unconscionable but entirely in keeping with how the EU operates, if they were to be denied the chance to have their say.

I have a sick feeling in my stomach that in the year we mark the 200th anniversary of Trafalgar, in which Admiral Nelson vanquished an early form of European transnationalism, the fate of British independence could be sealed due in part to a shoddily run referendum. I fervently hope I am dead wrong and there is high turnout for this poll when held.

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This is an interesting titbit, in today's Guardian:

Peter Mandelson has attacked the BBC's coverage of Europe and accused Today presenter John Humphrys of "virulently anti-European views".

In a letter to BBC chairman Michael Grade, Mr Mandelson, the European trade commissioner, says the corporation has a "specific problem with the anti-European bias of some presenters" and said it was failing in its charter obligation to promote understanding of European affairs.

I seldom listen to the Today show, but it is clear from further remarks of Mandelson's that the Guardian goes on to quote that what Mandelson means by "anti-European views" is "anti-EU" views, which is a typically sneaky piece of EUrophilia. Has Humphrys been denouncing French cuisine, or Italian opera, or German engineering? Has he been saying that the French are all rude, the Italians rotten at driving, and the Germans all crypto-Nazis under a veneer of politeness. Has he been saying bad things about Estonians? No, of course not.

What Mandelson has accused Humphrys of is making EUroscepticism sound convincing, in the following rather interesting way:

The former trade secretary, who was appointed to the European commission last year, says the BBC gives too much coverage to moderate Eurosceptics and not enough airtime to extreme Eurosceptics such as UKIP.

So Mandelson has now become a UKIP supporter. How is that going to look? No doubt it is all part of some cunning plan designed to split the anti-EU camp and present it as all bonkers, xenophobic, etc., but it sounds to me like a somewhat high risk strategy. What if UKIP gets more airtime, in accordance with Mandelson's demands, and uses it to be rather persuasive?

I wonder if Mandelson also thinks that this man should have more airtime?

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... is also sauce for the gander, so the old saying goes.

The preposterous EU proposal to extend the ban the symbols of the German Worker's National Socialist Party that is already law in France, Germany and elsewhere, has prompted a move to also ban communist and socialist symbols.

So now let us also ban Imperial Roman symbols (they were a slave owning political system), Christian symbols (Inquisitions, religious wars and sundry other nastiness), Confederate Flags... oh hell, let's just ban all symbols except the 'peace symbol' and the EU symbol.

Via Rex Curry.

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There is a fine article by Tory MEP Daniel Hannan in the Telegraph called The EU's four-stage strategy to reduce Britons to servitude. It is an entirely accurate and reasonable article about the process of stripping British (and other European national) institutions of power and replacing them with Euro-level institutions.

He finished up with the notion that Michael Howard and the Tories will finally turn things around:

Mr Howard understands this very well. Not only is he a lawyer himself but, as home secretary, he clashed almost weekly with our judges - not least on immigration cases. He must have known that the EU would react as it did to his proposals: indeed, I suspect he was banking on it. He has said before that he wants to take powers back from Brussels but, until now, the issue on which he was planning to go into battle - the recovery of our fishing grounds - seemed rather marginal to most inland voters. Now he has found a casus belli where the country will be behind him.

It has been a besetting British vice that we ignore what is happening on the Continent until almost too late. But, when we finally rouse ourselves, our resolve can be an awesome thing. I sense that this may be such a moment.

But there is just one problem with that. The slide into the Euro-maw did not start under Tony Blair's government. In fact it would be no exaggeration to say that the UKIP would not exist today if significant numbers of Euro-sceptic voters were not sick of being lied to again and again and again by Tory politicians. As I said to a table full of captive Tory grandees when I spoke at an event commemorating the end of Exchange Controls, a great many Tory voters simply no longer believe that the Conservative Party actually wish to conserve the things they care about and I very much doubt that any amount of rhetoric by any Tory will win back the trust of days gone by. Many of those former Tories who joined UKIP did so not just to oppose the destruction of Britain as a separate political entity but also because they truly hate their former party and see UKIP as a way to destroy it by making it permanently unelectable.

So what Mr. Hannan says is all good stuff, but what makes him think people should trust the party of Michael Heseltine, Ken Clark and Chris Patten to actually turn things around?

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I like airplanes, but am rather suspicious of this huge new Airbus that they have just rolled out, handsome though it does look and useful though it will surely be in many circumstances. In particular, I suspect that the A380 is costing Europe a whole lot more than is being officially suggested, and that Boeing decided not to build a similar aircraft for good, loss-avoiding reasons.

Well, I still do not know very much about Airbus finances, but this story certainly backs up the costing-more-than-they-are-admitting aspect:

TSUNAMI-struck Thailand has been told by the European Commission that it must buy six A380 Airbus aircraft if it wants to escape the tariffs against its fishing industry.

I realise that it is carrying the search for a silver lining to absurd lengths to say such a thing, but one good thing about this whole Tsunami horror is that it has brought this EU vileness rather more out into the open than would have happened otherwise. As it is, the combination of nastiness and lack of political sensitivity being shown by the EU is extraordinary even by their low standards. Do they not see that the Tsunami has somewhat changed things?

The Thai trade negotiators, not unreasonably, seem to betting that things are indeed now rather different. They seem to be calculating that, if they simply expose the nature of the deal they are now being faced with by the EU, the EU will back down in the face of worldwide disgust, not least within Europe itself. The Thais will get their aid. They will be allowed to sell their keenly priced fish products without punitive tariffs being slapped on them. And they will not have to buy six of these damned great airplanes unless they decide that they want to. All of which is a lot to hope for, but at least they may get more of what they want than they would have done if the Tsunami had no struck.

The EU Referendum Blog has more on this whole sordid episode:

The aircraft will cost Thailand some £1.3 billion – nearly the amount that all 25 EU members states have pledged in tsunami aid to the whole affected region.

Richard North also points out that Thailand was being shafted before the Tsunami in a similar manner. This is not about the EU getting nasty; it is about it remaining nasty.

But that is the EU, naked in tooth and claw. While workers from across world are on the ground, helping to rebuild the Thai economy, EU officials are also right in there – undermining the basis of any recovery.

And according to North, Thailand is not the only country that is being "encouraged" to buy Airbuses with EU trade policy concessions.

The irony is that by swapping a bit of freer trade for aircraft orders, the EU is agreeing, reluctantly, to do itself a favour. It is agreeing to impose the terrible burden of cheaper goods upon itself. But even when it does good things, it cannot seem to help stirring in bad things, like flogging unwanted airplanes.

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We have said it before, but it bears repetition, that the coming EU referendum campaign will be the first internet campaign in our history and I remain convinced that the material on the net will have a decisive impact on the course of the campaign.

- Richard North, already quoted and linked to by Patrick Crozier as a response to my gloomier posting here

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I find this all too persuasive. George Trefgarne sketches out how Tony Blair could win not only the next election by a mile, but then the Euro-referendum by enough to settle the matter for ever.

Key towards-the-end paragraph:

As the polls start to switch, other arguments are deployed by the pro-constitution lobby, of which the most potent is that the real choice is between ratifying the constitution, with all its disadvantages, or being reduced to a colonial outpost of George W Bush's America. Scare stories are spread that withdrawing would also mean the end to cheap flights to France and Spain. Then, in March 2006, a referendum results in a Yes vote, by 52 per cent to 48 per cent - and Teflon Tony will have done it again.

At the heart of Trefgarne's view of Britain now is the utter and continuing hopelessness of the Conservatives.

I confess that once upon a time I expected that America would be an issue to unite the Conservatives while still dividing Labour. But for many months now the Conservatives have been as split about America as they are about everything else. This means that they will remain a shambles for the foreseeable future, and that they will be in no state to argue persuasively against all that "colonial outpost of Bush's America" stuff, as and when it comes on stream. Even more than now, I mean.

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TF1, a French TV station carries this [link disabled] video report of a debate within France's Socialist Party, concerning the ratification of the EU Constitution. Two campaigning websites each for and against are listed.

The 'No' camp is split with supporters of Henri Emmanuelli on the one hand, a corrupt politician who's main claim to fame was his position as Treasurer of the Socialist Party when many of its leading figures were being caught stealing public funds to finance the Party. On the other side are supporters of Laurent Fabius, part of what was once the reformist wing of the Socialist Party (in the mid 1980s). Fabius himself of course is one of the blood contamination killers, four Socialist politicians who allowed HIV infected blood to be used in blood transfusions, leading to the contamination of as many as 2,000 French haemophilliacs or half the total French haemophilliac population. I seem to recall that there was a screening method that was delayed, on the grounds of cost. Naturally, the politicians escaped punishment, other than a token criminal conviction for "involuntary homicide".

Details of the campaigning sites can be found here.

Sadly, with champions like this, the credibility of a "Non!" campaign would be somewhat stretched. Even in France.

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Tony Blair has given himself until 2006 to win round a sceptical British public to a new European constitution after having signed the ghastly document yesterday in Rome. Whilst nothing is certain in this life and two years is a long time in politics, I think a third term in the White House for Ronald Reagan is slightly more likely than him succeeding on that count.

There will come a day when the obfuscation and doublespeak will finally come to an end and it appears that day will be in 2006. British people have it within their grasp to smash the brittle foundations of the European Union and I hope that there will be many people working to ensure that is exactly what happens regardless of what the apparatchiks of all three main parties want.

I see some interesting times ahead.

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I take my good news where I can find it. The chaos in the EU corridors of power over the refusal by the EU parliament to ratify the proposed new line-up of EU Commissioners may only last a few weeks but hey, a few weeks in which the EU leviathan is unable to act is surely a net gain for humankind.

The fracas has been caused by opposition from PC types to the views of Commissioner-designate Rocco Buttiglione, who said that as a Roman Catholic, he regarded homosexuality as sinful. Well, he also said that he would not allow his moral views to support any laws against homosexuals, on the grounds that what is immoral should not necessarily be illegal. Such issues, he said, should be outside politics. I agree. If this man had supported bans on gay couples or use of State action against them, it would be an entirely different issue, but he said nothing of the sort.

By making that remark, the gentleman actually expressed a central feature of a liberal civil order. Many aspects of human dispute cannot, and should not, be dealt with by the law of the land. It is vital that there should be a space in which humans can disagree on moral matters without having recourse to law to make their views victorious. I support the wishes of gay men and women to get married, largely on the grounds that the State has no business telling us with whom we form binding relationships in the first place (so long as it involves consenting adults). But gay men and women should beware since the campaign to oust Mr Buttliglione as an example of how so-called liberals in positions of power in Europe are not really concerned about liberty, but power.

Where the EU is concerned, t'was ever thus.

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Samizdata readers may have noticed a distinct absence of postings from me in the last couple of weeks. To those who miss my regular outbursts I offer my hearty apologies and the excuse of an unusually heavy workload. To those who rejoice in my absence I say, enjoy it while it lasts for I expect normal service to be resumed quite shortly.

In the meantime, however, I have noticed that the UK Times is carrying a banner headline that is so tempting that I am forced to drive a crowbar into the midst of my packed schedule and prize open enough space to briefly comment:

Barroso calls for help to avert crisis at the heart of Europe.

Don't all rush now.

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The European Court has dispelled any residual doubt that it is little more than a politically motivated tool of the European Commission and continues its slow but steady construction of the means to make investigative journalism impossible in Brussels by ruling that Belgian police could seize Hans-Martin Tillack's computers and records to identify his sources regarding reports on EU corruption.

The Euro-court has made little attempt to hide that is has colluded with EU political interests in a judgement that cuts to the heart of journalists ability to report on wrong doing and corruption by politicians.

Euro-judges accepted commission claims that it played no role in the arrest of Mr Tillack, even though leaked anti-fraud office documents show it orchestrated the raid from the beginning.

Whistleblowing will not be tolerated. The superstate is not your friend.

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If your political antennae have been sensitive to the undercurrents shimmering across the blogosphere, then you will have picked up the few postings alerting readers to the implications of the Civil Contingencies Bill. The dangers of this giant step towards authoritarianism have been publicised far more effectively both by David Carr and on Iain Murray's personal weblog, The Edge of Englands Sword:

Lord Lucas has described the Civil Contingencies Bill as comparable to Hitler's Enabling Act of 1933 which enabled him to transform Germany's Weimar Republic into his own personal tyranny. I have now read it, and I have to say that he is not exaggerating.

Readers could argue that this is an invocation of Godwin's Law and that, by quoting this passage, I have lost the argument. However, this opinion is that of Torquil Dirk-Erikson, "a noted Eurosceptic writer and learned silk". However, in considering the passage of this Act, it should also be noted that the European Constitution has a section on 'civil protection' as one of the coordinating powers for the European authorities.

The Government wishes to push through an updated Civil Contingencies Bill in 2004. It does not mention the EU, but the draft EU Constitution includes 'civil protection' as an area for 'coordinating action' and the current Treaty mentions the topic vaguely. The Bill also enables the creation of arbitrary imprisonable criminal offences. It enables regulations that can delegate powers to anyone or confer jurisdiction on any court or tribunal. This could be an EU body, unaccountable to government or the people.

Although the draft Constitution gives us a veto on a European Public Prosecutor (the Government says it 'currently' sees no reason for one) Blair has said that he opposes permanent 'opt-outs' or being isolated in Europe. Although the amended Bill states that it will not change criminal procedure, the Government is happy for the EU to have over-riding powers to do this via the EU Constitution.

These developments happen at a time when the Government is trying to introduce universal ID cards and a 'population register', and has just announced a national database to carry information on all children, not merely those 'at risk' (Sunday Times, 25.7.04). Again there are worrying parallels with European developments. Amazingly, MI5's website, which is listed in Preparing For Emergencies assures us that "the subversive threat to parliamentary democracy is now negligible".

One giant step along 'Chavez' Blair's road to a 'managed democracy'.

Cross-posted to White Rose.

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As the British Conservative Party starts its annual conference today, I am sure a lot of party activists and Members of Parliament will wonder how they can deal with the threat posed by the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP).

The UKIP pushed the Tories into a miserable fourth place in last week's parliamentary by-election in Hartlepool, a seat vacated after disgraced former Cabinet Minister, Peter Mandelson, went off to Brussels for a cushy job in the EU (no doubt a place well suited to his talents).

UKIP has reversed its policy of not standing in election contests against euro-sceptic Tories. This looks like quite a calculated gamble to me. It means they have gone from being a bunch of slightly eccentric nuisances, as far as the chattering classes are concerned, to something a bit more serious.

The Tories to my mind have lost their bearings in the last six months. The decision by leader Michael Howard to flirt with Bush-bashing anti-Americanism, even to the point of letting colleagues work for the wretched John Kerry, looks like an act of supreme folly. But closer to home, the European issue remains the one the Tories have to get right if they want to survive as a serious political force.

It is going to be an interesting week for the Tories. And I am also looking forward to how the conference is covered by the blogs.

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The hardening of the Frankenreich arteries is now so obvious that it cannot be ignored by even the likes of Will Hutton:

With all eyes fixed on the American presidential elections, the scale of the looming crisis in France and Germany has gone largely unremarked. But it may so change the political geography of Europe that British arguments for and against the EU will be made redundant. A pervasive sense of decline in both countries, only partially justified but none the less virulent, is destabilising not just the structures of the EU - but the political systems of France and Germany.

Only in the Guardian could someone express these views and still be welcomed in polite society. Having a column in that journal is like possessing a magic amulet. Say them anywhere else and you are 'xenophobic, racist and right-wiiiiiinnnng'.

It could all turn ugly; an unratified European Constitution, stagnating economies, new dark nationalist politics and a fragmenting European Union.

It all sounds most ominous. Britain should leave now while it still can, yes?

To imagine that Britain will be immune from this is absurd; what happens in mainland Europe will directly impact upon us as it has throughout our history. What is needed is an understanding that if European states don't hang together they will hang separately - and that because the European Union is the best we have, we'd better make it work.

The citadel is crumbling and the best way to save ourselves is to stand beneath the battlements and wait resolutely for the boiling oil to be poured over our heads.

Mr Hutton may have a magic amulet but that does mean that he is of any use in a crisis situation.

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The European Union was the only diplomatic actor to sound a dissonant note after the atrocities in Russia. Whilst the chaotic information shed some light on the indifference of the Russian bureaucracy, Bernard Bot, the Dutch Foreign Minister, requested information on how the siege was handled by the authorities. Blasted as "odious", "insolent" and "blasphemous" by Russia, the EU has attempted to clarify this request as a mere fishing expedition for information, though it sounded critical, given its release in the aftermath of the atrocity. The BBC provide more information, including the telling note that the EU has adopted their methods by deleting the request from their official statement. Of course, the BBC provide a voice for the "insolent" Europeans.

But Andreas Gross, the Council of Europe's rapporteur on Chechnya, told the BBC he thought Mr Bot actually had a point.

"The Dutch minister was totally right because what we just heard on the news, that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin wants to enforce more security troops, he wants to have a new crisis management, that's not the point," he said.

"They have to understand what the people are who do not share their own point of view. And this is a political task they have to learn.

"And in this sense the Dutch minister made a very, very soft attempt to make them think about this, too," he added.

This is part of a telling pattern in the European Union's response to terror and genocide. There are no sanctions targeted on the regime of North Korea. The EU webpage on external relations with the DPRK shows that no action has taken place since 2002 and that Brussels has proved unable to condemn a regime that shoots, starves and gasses its own citizens in a slow-motion Terror. The entire relationship is a transfer of funds from the European taxpayer to the Korean communists for varied "humanitarian" projects. One detects the shade of Palestine wagging a finger, as another regime with the blood of innocents, is partially propped up with Euros.

The Russians may have shown a traditional indifference to human life. In Europe, it is clothed with the sweet stench of hypocrisy.

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Clearly not satisfied with mere temporal power, some of Europe's ruling elite are now seeking divinity:

A campaign to sanctify the European Union through the beatification of its founding father, Robert Schuman, has run into stiff resistance from the Vatican and now appears likely to fail.

For 14 years investigators under the diocese of Metz have combed through the life of the French statesman to determine whether he merits the title "Blessed Robert", the first step to sainthood.

The drive for his beatification and eventual canonisation was launched by a private group in Metz, the St Benoit Institute, but has acquired powerful backers, including President Jacques Chirac.

I can find no information about the St Benoit Institute but the reference to 'powerful backers' leads me to suspect that they are merely the low-profile conduits for a project which has been germinated at a far higher and more official level.

I seldom comment of matters of religious doctrine or practice because, as someone without any faith to speak of, I do not consider them to be any of my business. However, this is not really about the practices of the Roman Catholic Church or even about the status of the late Mr. Schuman but more about Europe's elite seeking divine provenance for their transnational machine.

Is this how they now see themselves? As apostles of a blessed prophet working to establish a Church of Brussels? Would they prefer to be seen as the 'Annointed' rather than merely a political nomenklatura?

The presses of the European Fourth Estate may ring out furious daily denunciations of 'American arrogance' but I submit that it is next to impossible to find anything more wildly hubristic than a post hoc claim to the benediction of Holy Writ. Close your eyes for a moment and try to imagine the chorus of snorting, braying contempt that would be served up in response to George Bush seeking canonisation of, say, Thomas Jefferson.

I believe it was our friend David Farrer who first coined the term 'Holy Belgian Empire' to describe the European Union. He was joking, of course, and my how we laughed!

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"Gold Plating" is the practice of getting an order (a 'directive') from our masters in the European Union and adding lot of additional regulations to it. Sort of...

"If this arbitrary order has not destroyed your business we will add regulations to it, and we will keep doing so until you are destroyed"...

..."Why are we trying to destroy you?"...

..."Well what else do we have to do, it would be lazy and unethical to just sit in our offices and not do anything".

The British Civil Service is supposed to love gold plating more than any other civil service in the EU. The British Civil Service having long prided itself on being more hardworking an ethical than Civil Servants in other nations (do not even think about bribing a British Civil Servant to save your business - he would rather starve than let you survive).

Examples are tossed about, supposedly a Directive on slaughter houses that started off as about 8 pages in Brussels (EU HQ) was turned in to about 7 pages in France - and about 97 pages in Britain.

No surprise that almost all of the little local slaughter houses closed down.

The BBC (and other such) still has the occasional item about how sad it is the all the local family owned places have gone, and how animals are now taken to great corporate factories (which actually have worse records for the quality and safety of meat). The little places may not have understood the paper work or been able to afford all the special people the regulations insisted they have (such vets - mostly from Spain) - but they did the job better. "Oh the wicked supermarkets" (they get the blame for destroying the "local food" from "local farmers" system that the media claim to love) "and now on to our next story about the need for more regulations concerning such and such".

Well the British Conservative party has promised to end gold plating and if a business thinks that a EU directive has been interpreted more strictly in Britain than in other parts of the EU (or just used as an excuse for another regulation orgy) they will be able to take the matter to court.

Well this is good as far as it goes. The promise to end gold plating is nice to hear (although I doubt the Civil Service would take any notice) and taking things to court might work sometimes - although the British courts (like the courts of most nations) are a mess (and getting worse - as they slowly reject what is left of the old 'out of date' principles of law).

However, it is also a wonderful way for the British Conservative party to look as if they are "doing something" about regulations and "standing up for Britain". After all by concentrating on 'gold plating' the Conservatives duck the issue of whether to defy ANY of the endless thousands of Directives that come out of the EU.

Too cynical? I hope so.

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The Social Affairs Units has a great new digital publication called How to Maximise Your Expenses: Advice to new Members of the European Parliament.

Funny? For sure, but read it and weep.

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The Royal Society has published its government sponsored report on nanotechnology. Professor Ann Dowling, the chair of the working group that wrote the report, produced a positive response in the press release:

The report does not find any justification for imposing a ban on the production of nanoparticles.

However, since these new technologies are uncertain and dangerous, the Royal Society called for the death of a thousand regulations. The Report concluded that all products including nanoparticles should be regulated by EU chemical regulation and the Health and Safety Executive:

Because of their novel chemical properties, the report recommends that nanoparticles and nanotubes should be treated as new chemicals under UK and European legislation, in order to trigger appropriate safety tests and clear labelling. Furthermore they should be approved – separately from chemicals in a larger form – by an independent scientific safety committee before they are permitted for use in consumer products such as cosmetics.

As the EU wishes to implement a new EU Directive (the Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals legislation - REACH) that introduces the precautionary principle to all chemicals produced within its borders, this sounds the death knell for nascent nanotechnology within Europe. The government has obtained the authority of the scientific profession (most of which works within the public sector) to justify conforming with EU regulation.

Will Europeans lynch their leaders when they realise they have been cheated out of an Age of Miracles?

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One of the less trumpeted reforms of the European Union, brought about by the increase in the number of member states in May this year, is the reduction of British European Commissioners from two to one.

The news that arch-urophile Peter Mandelson is to replace both Neil Kinnock and Chris Patten gives me mixed feelings.

On the one hand there will be even less chance of dissent from the urophile orthodoxy. On the other hand one can hardly be too sad at the removal of Messrs Kinnock and Patten and their replacement by only one bureaucrat.

So what else is in the small print that somehow failed to get reported?

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There is a stirring of campaign groups to oppose the EU constitution ratification in France. My latest posting on Combat links to the 'acceptable' opposition groups. To these we could add the far-right, who will no doubt be excluded from the 'official No campaign'.

Our biggest problem at the moment is the total lack of a mainstream anti-EU press. This is not that different from the Maastricht campaign of 1992, and at least the Internet is reducing the organisational advantage to the political establishment. We may also have funding problems, though this is not the concern right now.

At the moment, the main job is trying to establish who can vote and where. The big questions concern foreigners. Can they vote? Can they donate funds to the campaigns? I shall keep posting.

The good news today is a rumour of dissent in the French Socialist Party. The leadership has committed the Party to voting 'Yes', wheras many members would have liked to wait until the text was actually available in September before deciding.

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I swear I was not going to bash the Tories this week!

I was actually trawling the French news and looked forward to writing about some appalling corruption scandal. Well this [link in French] is close enough.

It seems that the European People's Party (to which the British Conservatives belong) has done a deal with the European Socialist Party (to which the British Labour Party belongs) to ensure the election of a Socialist leader of the European Parliament: Josep Borrell Fontelles. In doing so they voted against the Polish former dissident Bronislav Geremek, who if this Communist denunciation is anything to go by, was obviously the right candidate to back.

So all the protestations that the Conservatives would defend British interests are a load of cobblers. These people are an insult to invertebrates.

It gets better, the French report says that the new President of the European Parliament (elected with the support of the European People's Party) is a man who comes from the left-wing of the Spanish Socialist Party and who had to quit Spanish politics because of a series of unfortunate misunderstandings over large sums of stolen taxpayers' money. I seem to recall that this was when the Governor of the Bank of Spain was filmed carrying suitcases of freshly printed bank notes to the Spanish Socialist Party Headquarters. The story was extensively covered at the time in El Mundo, the Spanish conservative daily newspaper. I forget if our new European Parliament President was personally involved (though the discreet shuffling of news reports suggests he may have been), but he certainly had to quit over that affair.

So the British Conservatives are fighting our corner within the European People's Party? Nice one Michael Howard, I know exactly where we stand on the Conservative Party's policy on Europe.

Support hard-core Socialists! Give fraudsters a second chance! Support even more European regulations and taxes! Vote Conservative!

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Unless he was lying on national television again, or changes his mind like he did several times over the Maastricht Treaty, Saddam Hussein's best chum has announced that the French (and colonies) will be given a chance to vote on the proposed European Union constitution.

Lucky, we know all the dirty tricks that can be used in such a referendum campaign, they were all used last time by the Florentine François Mitterand, to get the Maastricht Treaty through. So we shall be campaigning in Guadeloupe, and Martinique, and the Isle de la Réunion, and French Polynesia, St Pierre et Miquelon and New Caledonia, and Wallis et Futuna if necessary to avoid losing by 40,000 votes. Get the Atlas out!

I am starting a voter registration guide among the French refugees living in London. I am also checking whether foreign EU citizens living in France can vote and how to arrange this. My new blog Combat (named after the WWII Resistance magazine against the Nazi occupation) launched today will be tracking the campaign in French.

Instead of the national anthem's "aux armes citoyens!", let us "aux urnes citoyens!"

*"To the ballot boxes citizens!"

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Lord Clarkeltine of EUphoromania, in a minor speech to Moonshine News 24 this afternoon, said that the case for the EEUUGGHH! needed to be made more vigorously, decisively, forcefully and adverbially.

People say that the EEUUGGH! is an undemocratic and bureaucratic monstrosity, said Lord Clarkeltine, which is robbing the people of Europe and enmeshing them in a web of regulatory guff, and threatening to drive them back to a new dark age of economic slump and third class status, just so that a corrupt elite of EEUUGGHH!rocrats can eat free lunches for ever and live in big houses in the countryside. They say that the EEUUGGHH! will end a thousand years of Britain's history as a sovereign nation. They say that the EEUUGGHH! is a pathetic attempt to replace the USA as the top world power which threatens to bankrupt everybody. They say that the EEUUGGHH! should be learning from the recent free market inspired progress of India and China, but is instead making a new EUSSRGGHH! in the Heart of Europe.

I will answer these claims firmly and decisively, vigorously and forcefully answering myth with fact, fantasy with reality, vicious xenophobic mudslinging with cool, clean, clear Vichy Water. No it isn't. No it won't. No it shouldn't. It's jolly nice. And we must say this again and again, time after time, repeatedly and repeatedly. The case for the EEUUGGHH! needs to be made eloquently and forcefully, decisively and realistically, realistically and persuasively, persuasively, and forcefully, and thisly, thatly and theotherly.

Asked why nobody was explaining why the EEUUGGHH! is nice and not nasty, Lord Clarkeltine was adamantly adamant:

I blame the Prime Minister. He promised us that he would con everyone about the EEUUGGHH! but he hasn't done it. Lying bastard. The Prime Minister can explain anything. Why hasn't he explained that the EEUUGGHH! is good? Obviously I could, but I'm too grand. The Prime Minister is ordinary. He should do it.

But what about when the EEUUGGHH! does stupid things?

Yes, Lord Clarkeltine continued continuously, warming warmly to his subjects, people complain about how the EEUUGGHH! is shutting down this or that stupid little industry, like fishing and bread-baking and, you know, mucky things of that sort. The answer, he insisted insistently, is that in order not to get too involved in the EEUUGGHH! Britain has to get more involved in the EEUUGGHH!

All you have to do to get the EEUUGGHH! to change the rules for you, give you money and lunches and a free town house in Brussels etcetera, is swear an oath of undying loyalty to it, vote YES to whatever the EEUUGGHH! says and sing the last movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony every morning and every night. What is the problem with that? We need to be at the Heart of EEUUGGHH!rope, to help it do bad things to all the other countries – and, yes, to Britain too, because one has to be realistic – and then ask the EEUUGGHH! nicely to be a bit less nasty to us and nastier to somebody else. It's inevitable. It's the future. You can't argue against it, so stop it at once.

Lord Clarkeltine also said that the BBC was letting the side down with its relentlessly relentless diet of anti-EEUUGGHH! propaganda. They keep asking questions, he complained complaintively, about just how wonderful the EEUUGGHH! is, and about why the EEUUGGHH! doesn't present itself better and why more and more of the little people still don't like it. The BBC shouldn't be asking questions, Lord Clarkeltine said, sayingfully. It should be supplying answers.

Lord Clarkeltine is an Honorary President for Ever of the Institute For Why We Are Right About Everything, an Assume Tank with offices in London, Brussels and the Sea of Tranquility.

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It takes a lot to make me doubt the benefits of the free movement of people, money, ideas, goods and services. But a new report published by the Centre for the New Europe raises some questions about parallel trade in the European Union.

In today's Wall Street Journal, Stephen Pollard explains the harm that can be caused by the re-exporting of pharmaceuticals from a country such as Spain, where regulated prices are low, sometimes under different labels and with inaccurate expiry dates, to countries where prices are regulated higher, such as Germany and the UK.

Until now my own view has been so what?

If a company sells products in two countries at different prices then an entrepreneurial opportunity may exist for traders to exploit. Demand in the cheaper country goes up, pushing up prices there, and supply increases in the more expensive country, pushing prices down. We may not see equal prices everywhere because there may be other factors affecting costs: land prices, distance, demographic differences, even the cultural acceptability of using medication. But with price controls in the various countries, the market process is subverted: increased demand in Spain does not lead to higher prices and increased supply does not produce lower prices in Germany (except possibly in the 'informal sector').

The EU appears to be promoting the compulsion to sell the same product everywhere in the EU, which is a violation of a person's right to choose to sell or not. So what I would at first glance dismiss as special pleading by a corporate lobby turns out to be an anomaly. The CNE estimates that more than 3 people could be dying every two hours as a result of these regulations.

If the EU really wants freer trade, it should start by challenging the price control systems of its own member states.

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Imagine the European People's Democratic Front.
Imagine their first press release...

We, the people of Europe, hold the following truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. - That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. Unfortunately, we don't consent to a junket-ocracy, which is what the proposed EU will be.

As such, we undertake to occupy and subvert any referendum in Luxembourg, a country with a conveniently tiny voting population of less than 350,000. One residential mailing address (with 50,000 registered residents) later, and the constitution will be consigned, where it belongs, to the dustbin of history.

SlowJoe

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Our Glorious Leader is seeking the Holy Grail of truth:

The political debate over the new EU constitution will be a "battle between reality and myth", Tony Blair has said.

For sure, but from which side of the battlefield is Mr Blair going to lead his charge? The massed ranks of reality or the dark legions of myth? Successive British governments have spent the last four decades lying like tinkers over the European Union, so I think it rather optimistic to expect any defections to the forces of light at this late stage.

For genuine reality-seekers, there is the EU Referendum Blog:

Mr Blair would be very pleased to know that we started the battle between myth and reality some time ago. We have been collecting, analyzing and disproving EU Myths and we intend to go on with that task. As soon as there is a round dozen, we shall send Mr Blair a copy of the collection in either electronic of printed format. We think he might find it useful.

I think he may consign it to the shredder. However, I expect the stout yeomen at the EU Referendum Blog will make their findings available to the rest of us in early course.

I cannot recommend the EU Referendum Blog highly enough. They dissect and analyse the absurdities and the cant of the European Union in meticulous and compelling detail. Right now, it is the most important blog in Britain (after Samizdata, of course!).

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David Smith, the economics editor for the Sunday Times, has a splendid article on his personal blog, Economics UK, about why the Eurosceptic approach is the economically rational one.

Britain’s unemployment rate, on a comparable basis, is 4.8%, against 9.4% in France and 9.8% in Germany. Unemployment stands at under half the EU average. Per capita gross domestic product in Britain, according to a new report from Capital Economics, is higher at $30,200 (£16,440), than Germany’s $29,200 or France’s $28,500.

The economic momentum is with us. Britain has been growing continuously for 12 years, during which time other EU countries have suffered at least one recession and in some cases two. The sick man of Europe has made a remarkable recovery.

Of course the economic argument for Britain being in the EU (as opposed to some EFTA-like agreement) was always tosh. Switzerland anyone? It is now highly visible tosh.

Here on Samizdata.net we may decry the regulatory idiocy of the Labour government but clearly things are even worse in Euroland, and at least if more sovereignty is maintained at the UK level, more of the damage can be undone at the UK level rather than locked in by remote stasis oriented Europe wide institutions. All the EU has to offer is corruption, stagnation and regulation. No thanks.

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I am glad to see I am not the only one who thinks the frequently reported 'sharp exchanges' between Blair and Chirac (or Shröder) are a phoney as a three pound note. Some of the commenters here on Samizdata.net seems to have taken a similar view as has the Daily Telegraph opinion leader article.

At EU summits, there is always a row and always a deal – and the European constitution negotiations did not disappoint. Tony Blair's spin doctors did not quite say, "Gentlemen in England now abed shall think themselves accursed they were not here," but he was, apparently, battling like Henry V against the French and also the Germans. But he signed the constitution anyway, even though last week's election results clearly show he had no mandate to do so. There was something distinctly phoney about the row.

Indeed. The fact having 'rows' with the French and Germans is good for the standing of a British leader hardly needs explaining. Yet the fact is that regardless of the acrimony, the deals still seem to get signed. 'Red line' after red line gets laid down, acclaimed by both supporters and people who should know better: "Thus far and no further!" cries our plucky Leader of the Day. Which of course really means "only thus far this time". Just wait a year or two and the process can be repeated yet again and a little more agreed, once the 'red lines' of yesteryear have vanished down the memory hole.

Forget the rhetoric, if you want to know the truth, just look for the signatures on the treaties. The rest is just so much verbal fart gas.

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Yesterday afternoon, I visited my mother, and elder brother Toby also dropped by. He was a UKIP local council candidate in the recent elections, and did quite well, that is to say about as well as UKIP candidates did in the rest of the non-London southern part of England.

He said a number of interesting things, interesting to me anyway. He said that the EU's accounts have not been audited for a decade (i.e. it is a criminal gang, financially speaking). He said that when canvassing, you do not waste time by arguing. You just say you are from UKIP and say please vote for us, and leave it at that. (Talk about their flowers.) He said that Kilroy had helped UKIP a lot. He said that UKIP had done well in a great doughnut, so to speak, of places which are not London itself, but which are all around London – the South East, the South West, the Midlands, East Anglia. He said that UKIP people and Conservative people get along really well with each other, and that the Conservatives often now talk and behave as if they and UKIP are on the same side, which for all practical purposes most Conservative activists are. (UKIP gives them a stick to beat their leaders with, and an exit if their beating up of their leaders gets nowhere.)

I found all this pretty interesting, although maybe this was because he is my brother, and we have always got on well, and also because I do not now read the newspapers as avidly as I might, every day.

But the most interesting thing Toby said concerned UKIP's money. UKIP has, he said, a lot of money.

Electoral politics is like warfare. You need lots of soldiers, and you deploy them where they will make the most difference. You do not ask these soldiers to convince anyone of anything. You do that with posters and advertisements, which bombard the public with your message, and, just as important, influence your media coverage, which results in the media also spreading your message reasonably accurately and sympathetically. (Nothing like a few full page adverts in a newspaper to get them to cut out the worst of their lies and sneers about you.) UKIP did a lot of advertising before the last lot of elections – plus there was Kilroy of course – and this meant that whereas, when he canvassed a year ago, Toby had to explain what UKIP was, this time all he had to say was: vote UKIP. UKIP, he said, got massive and excellent media coverage this time around – "more than we deserved" was, I think, the phrase he used. Unlike before, when UKIP got a lot less than it deserved. Whatever deserving means, in this context.

Like warfare, electoral politics takes money. The more you have of it (assuming you spend it properly), the better you will do.

Now here is the interesting bit. In Toby Micklethwait's opinion (this is all it is so make of this what you will) UKIP has now and is going to have in the next few years a lot of money – more, he said, that the other parties. More than the Conservatives? More than Labour? Yes, he said. More than any of the others.

How come? Well, simply, most of the business people of Britain support UKIP. They hate the EU and they want out. Maybe not the big business people. But in terms of the sheer number of businesses, the majority of them support UKIP. The majority of the people whose job description is "Managing Director" want Britain out of the EU.

And these people, says Toby, between them, when you add them all up, have more politics money than anyone else. People in general do not have much spare cash. Labour supporters make a positive virtue out of not having much spare cash. Ditto the Lib Dems, and the Greens. Even (although we did not talk about this – this is an addition to the point by me) the executives of big businesses do not have much in the way of money which they control and which they can dispose of as they please. Big business people used to have a ton of discretionary money, but not any more. No, it is the "small" business folk, the individual capitalists, the people who can afford weekend boats and fancy houses with garages for three cars, and three cars, who have the money. A few thousand from this guy, and another few thousand from this guy – that is how political money is now raised, and UKIP is, at the moment, better at this than anyone else, because these people, of all people, now hate Britain being in the EU – hate it, hate it – and are willing to spend big money – boat money, car money – to damn well buy whatever it will take to get Britain out of the EU.

Toby's UKIP-optimism cannot be rational unless UKIP also knows how to spend its money, and in this connection Toby attaches great importance to the fact that one of the things UKIP has spent its money on is a guy called Dick Morris. Yeah, him. Bill Clinton's electoral strategist. The very same. And Max Clifford, the guy the British celebs or media wannabes/victims all go to when their lives go pear-shaped and they need to handle their media profile with maximum canniness. He has been working with UKIP as well.

Morris and Clifford and UKIP has been (read the final sentence there) noted by the big media, he said. But the simple money thing has not, he said. I said: Can I quote you on all this? Pause. Then: Yes.

I hope he is right. What he is basically saying, to quote Ronald Reagan (and to indulge in a form of grammar that Samizdata's editors now strongly discourage but which I hope they will forgive this once), is: You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet.

I do not know if Toby is right, but I hope he is (thank you Eamonn Butler – see first comment).

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My recent posting on Slovakia contained a scoop and I missed it. The leader of the Slovak governing party's campaign for the European elections tomorrow is former ice hockey player Peter Stastny.

I knew the name (one of the few names in ice hockey I ever knew of), but failed to connect it to the poster boy of the Slovak Democratic Coalition.

From the comments to my last posting, my description of SKDU as conservative-libertarian is controversial. Considering that the new Libertarian Party candidate in the USA was selected because he campaigns on sticking to the Founding Fathers' intentions (nationalized Post Office and all), I stand by my description for now.

What is amusing is the contrast between the Slovak and the Austrian election: the posters in Austria oppose reform, the Slovaks put a celebrity on the poster and bring in massive tax reforms in the right direction. American show-biz versus Austrian corporatism. I know which I prefer.

[Thanks to Tim Evans at CNE for providing the tip-off about Peter Stasny.]

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This article in the Independent by Pamela Schlatterer, described as "UK correspondent for German TV" (what - all of it?), is an amazing combination of illogical muddle and patronising sneering at all those British people who do not want to put up with illogical muddle such as hers. Above all there is her sheer refusal to concede that there might be any rational basis for British loathing, not of Europe itself, but of being ruled by EUrope.

For example, she says this:

Having said that, the last time I met my German and Dutch colleagues for an election meeting – we regularly team up to exchange ideas about the UK and its weird and wonderful ways – there was bafflement at the amount of anti-Europeanism in all parties' election pamphlets. The attitude seems to be that it will not hurt to include a few sentences against Brussels in propaganda, no matter which party you are from.

Yes, and ask yourself why that might be.

We shook our heads at a country that seems intent on denying it is already governed by Brussels in lots of areas. The deep-seated sentiment against being "not independent" has crystallised into Euro-hatred, and even though the Prime Minister prides himself on being pro-Europe, under his leadership, things have got worse.

These mysterious British with their absurd desire to be independent! You silly woman, we British are not denying that we are "already governed by Brussels in lots of areas". We are now well aware of this fact. It is merely that a lot of us do not like it and would like the process reversed. We have had it up to here with that it-will-never-happen-it's-not-happening-it's-happened EUro-rigmarole.

One of the things I personally most hate about the EUropean Union is that, by dumping itself down on top of Britain (with the enthusiastic support of lots of British people) it has caused other British people, understandably disinclined to make subtle distinctions between Europe and EUrope, to hate Europe. But such hatred is caused by EUrope. It is an article of faith among EUro-enthusiasts that EUrope makes for peace and fellow feeling. But a central government – any central government – is just as likely to stir up hostilities between different provinces (each blaming the others for the combined mess) as it is to make everyone like one another.

This paragraph I find especially annoying, because you hear this kind of tosh so often, and because it has been exposed as tosh a thousand times, yet still it comes back. It almost makes me hate Europe myself, if it contains International TV correspondents as stupid as this woman. Have a read of this:

I was raving the other day about a new central London café, which I see as a triumph of European food culture over sad English cafés. I got a bit carried away and exclaimed: "This island could be paradise: with better public services and more European influence on the food."

Here we go again, the relentless confusion between doing something the way some other people do it, and having to be ruled by the same political apparatus as those other people. We do not have to be ruled by EUrope in order to have European style cafés in London, any more than we have to be ruled by China to have Chinese Restaurants. If we want European-style public services, we can install them whenever we want, insofar as we are capable of running them. And if we are not capable of running them, us being a province of EUrope will not change that. Raving is right.

With luck people like Pamela Schlatterer may eventually decide that we British are all so disgustingly anti-European and irrationally hostile to foreigners that we are all of us without exception complete scum who must be completely ejected from EUrope. At which point those of us who want to can get back to liking Europe without having to make those subtle distinctions can do so.

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Britain goes to the polls tomorrow to elect a round of representatives for the European Parliament, for UK Local Authorities and the office of Mayor of London.

Or, more accurately, about one-third of Britain goes to the polls. The other two-thirds cannot be bothered and, while I entirely sympathise with their attitude of non-engagement, it is my intention to buck the trend and cast my vote. I will explain.

I have never even attempted to conceal my contempt for the 'democratic process' as presently configured. In modern parlance, 'democracy' has become a euphamism for the perpetuance of a permanent political class, devoted to conducting their mischief without hindrance, objection or opposition. When all political candidates are required to sign up to a rigidly conformist and hegemonic agenda, the process of voting becomes a waste of time. At best, it is endorsement of the status quo, a rubber-stamped approval for 'business as usual'.

However, I am not averse to using existing mechanisms to achieve ends of which I approve and I would be churlish to deny that there are times when a convergence of circumstances gives rise to interesting opportunities to give that boring, monochromatic old status quo a damned good kicking.

Tomorrow is just such a time for there appears to be something of a headwind building up behind the UK Independence Party. If various well-publicised opinion polls are to be believed, then it is entirely possible that UKIP could shove the execrable Liberal Democrats into third place and possibly even nip the buttocks of the milquetoast Conservative opposition. That makes them a cause worth voting for.

A number of people have been quick to point out that some of UKIP's policies may be regarded as highly illiberal (e.g. they favour immigration controls) and quite inconsistent with a free society. That may well all be true but, that fact is that I simply do not care because their flagship, numero uno policy, nay their raisons d'etre is British withdrawal from the shoddy, cankerous mess of the European Union. The rest does not matter (and, besides, UKIP are probably no more hostile to immigration than is our current Labour Home Secretary).

With all the other political candidates offering a choice between spending squinty-million-billion on the public sector or spending squinty-million-billion-zillion on the public sector, the heretical bad-boys of UKIP shine with the enticing lustre of a semi-buried precious gem. Having endured the slings, arrows, barbs and whale-harpoons of sustained media hostility, they are the ones who are truly up for a scrap. Phooey to all this dull 'consensus', UKIP are riding into town looking for trouble. Even their list of '5 Essential Freedoms' includes 'Freedom from Political Correctness'. I have no idea what they mean by this and, possibly, neither do they but it's fighting-talk and refreshing as a shower of lemon zest.

I doubt very much whether they will ever form a government but this bunch of quarellsome bruisers is squaring up to the effete political establishment and I love them for it. A good result for them tomorrow will have the scions of the media/political nomenklatura running around sqauwking like a load of indignant hens ("abolish UKIP", "abolish voting", "abolish Britain"..."waaaahhhhhh") and for that spectacle alone it would be worth voting for them.

But it is worth voting for them for other reasons too. A solid UKIP vote tomorrow will not herald any revolutions. Nor will it prove the catalyst for any material change either in the short term or possibly at all. It will not even reverse or slow down the disastrous process of political integration in Europe. But what it will do is to puncture the smug confidence of the ruling guard and remind them that they may not always have things quite so under control. It will send a ripple of fear through the corridors of comfortably assumed power and make their cherished orthodoxies look just a little vulnerable. In the words of Jack Nicholson in 'Batman': "This town needs an enema".

Tomorrow we have an opportunity to light a candle instead of just cursing the darkness. I have impotently cursed the darkness for far too long. Now is the time to light candles. Many, many candles.

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Tory leader Michael Howard is now loudly stressing his Eurosceptic credentials' as the Euro elections come closer and it looks like the UKIP will be seriously cutting into the Tory vote.

Of course talk is cheap and the only way the Tory Party is ever going to actually become a genuine (rather than a tactical) Eurosceptic party is if the party's very survival and the jobs and pay checks of its professional politicos is actually put in real, rather than potential, jeopardy... and there is only one way to do that.

Do not reward a decade of duplicity with a mindlessly tribal vote for the Conservatives. If you are going to vote at all, vote UKIP tomorrow.

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That poor man in the straightjacket is having nightmares again. He is crying out in his sleep and banging his head off the walls: [note: link to article in UK Times may not be available to readers outside of UK]

EUROPEAN governments are to scrap dozens of "unnecessary" and "patronising" EU laws and directives under a plan to make the Union less bureaucratic and more in touch with the lives of its citizens.

The "bonfire of the diktats" will put an end to Europe-wide rules on the length of ladders that window cleaners can use, and laws on the materials that have to be used for children’s playgrounds.

The ambitious plan to roll back the rules made by the European Commission, which is being championed by the Dutch Government and supported by Britain, is a response to the growing concern that Brussels interferes too much in daily life, and that more decisions should be left to national governments.

About half of all laws in Britain are drawn up in Brussels and then adopted by Westminster. For environmental legislation, nearly 90 per cent of laws are made in Brussels, with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs threatened with fines if it does not put them into effect. There are 2,500 EU directives in force, with hundreds added every year.

A bit of 'nice-guy' PR for the run-up to the European Parliament elections to get us in a positive frame of mind. It is just a tease really. Seldom have I seen a proposal that is going nowhere on so many levels.

For every regulation they manage to scrap, two more will pop up to replace it. And even if they somehow manage to stop Brussels producing more laws, they will simply be minted at national level instead. That is what governments do. They have no other skills to offer the marketplace.

Persuading government not to enact new laws is like trying to persuade birds not to fly. You cannot change the nature of the beast. You have to clip its wings.

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This is the question exercising the chancelleries of the European Union, as well as the larger horizons of the Beltway. However, one position concerns the elected leader of the free world; the other is the appointed non-entity of the slow-motion car crash vacuuming the vestiges of freedom in Europe.

Who should be the next president of the European Commission? You could argue that the whole enterprise is irredeemably corrupt, and should instill an appropriate reflex: fight or flee. Nevertheless, in the real world, what would be the preferred qualities of any candidate?

Dennis MacShane, Britain's Minister for Europe, has outlined a few:

MacShane said the successor to Commission President Romano Prodi, who EU leaders hope to name at a summit in Brussels later this month, need not be a former EU leader. "He has to be able to communicate a vision of Europe, he has to see himself not as Europe's king but as its servant, and he does not necessarily have to be a prime minister," MacShane said.

"A strong commissioner or a strong minister would probably be the best choice," MacShane said. "A Commission President must also not be seen as anti-American," he added.

The candidate should have strong political experience and international influence; the ability to communicate well; and the desire to draw the United States of America and Europe closer together. As a libertarian, I would prefer to see a political and economic liberal who shows an understanding of and a willingness to argue for free trade and welfare reform, two areas where the EU has failed to progress, with deadly consequences for Africa and Asia.

Do the current candidates fit the Bill? If any reader has ever heard of and thinks that Guy Verhofstadt, Jean-Claude Junckers, Wolfgang Schuessel or Chris Patten are promising candidates, stop reading now and go seek professional help.

The European Union has an opportunity to demonstrate that it will choose the next President of the Commission on merit. That is why these obscure clones from the European parasitical classes should be ignored. They should appoint an American, one person who is more liberal and more right than the current crop: Step forward:

William Jefferson Clinton

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I recently gave a presentation in Bratislava, Slovakia, on the evils of 'competition policy' and the 'entry and exit costs' economic model, which is little more than an excuse for more business-killing government intervention.

My first trip there in 1991 had been as economic and political adviser to that country's Prime Minister when Slovakia was part of the Czech & Slovak Federal Republic (1989-1992). In those days, talking about a single tax band, a competitive advantage of Slovakia compared with Germany, why an independent Slovakia would actally reform better than under Prague tutelage and so forth was often like trying to explain Switzerland to a Pol Pot survivor.

The first photo that I took in 1991 was of the Iron Curtain seen from the Austrian side, a forest of trees leading up to the jagged line of a forest of rotting concrete.

This time on the way back I took a coach from Bratislava to Vienna airport. The following photos show the turnaround.

Slovakia’s ruling coalition: conservatives and libertarians
(photo taken at Bratislava bus station)



This Slovak election poster for the EU parliament
seems to get the message. (Sorry about the
quality but I snapped it out of a coach window
on a bend, outskirts of Bratislava)



Austrian Social Democrats know what they stand for:
No privatisation!
(dotted all over the Austrian countryside North of Vienna)

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Not everyone who reads this blog will be particularly keen to know what the new EUropean Parliament building in Brussels looks like. But if you would like to know about this, I have a posting up at my Culture Blog which starts with a huge aerial photo of the place taken by someone else, and then has twenty four thumbnail photos you can click on to get to bigger photos that I took myself of this vast building when I was myself in Brussels not long ago.

It has taken me more than two months to get around to exhibiting these photos, for which apologies, but I presumably things have not changed that much since I took them. Partly this was because until recently I had much to learn about how to do this – "thumbnails" etc. (merci Monsieur) – and partly it was that, even if you do know how to stick up a mass of these thumbnails, it is still (for me anyway) a very unwieldy process to actually do, and to actually arrange them in a semi-coherent order, especially since this was the first blog posting effort along these lines that I have attempted.

The building is a scarily impressive edifice, or rather, agglomeration of edifices. I really missed not having a wide angle lens. As it was, it was like trying to photograph an elephant in a crowd. All I could do was assemble lots of details (hence the need for lots of pictures), with only occasional views that got the bigger picture, and none of the whole thing.

Which is only appropriate, considering that this is the EU, and that this entire building is itself only a relatively minor part of the big EU picture, which is itself utterly impossible to get in one snap.

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Speaking as someone who is really far too cynical for his own good, I shall believe this when I see it:

Voters in next month's European elections could shock the political establishment by giving the United Kingdom Independence Party more seats than the Liberal Democrats, a poll suggests today.

A YouGov survey for The Telegraph indicates that UKIP, which is committed to British withdrawal from the European Union, is ahead of the Lib Dems among those who are "very likely" to vote.

But I really and truly hope that I do see it.

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This on the midday BBC Radio 4 news:

The Government is resisting pressure from the European Union to introduce random breath tests.

Yes, my ears did not deceive me. Here is the story in writing:

Police should carry out random breath tests as a matter of course, according to the European Commission.

Under existing laws, UK police can only carry out a breath test if they believe the driver has been drinking.

But the European Commission wants all member states to allow its police to carry out random tests.

The Home Office said introducing random testing was "inefficient in catching drink-drive offenders."

Whenever the British Government describes itself as resisting pressure from the European Union, it is a good bet that this pressure will in due course be succumbed to.

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I'm watching Robert Kilroy-Silk on Question Time, and I think he's doing rather well.

Kilroy started out as a Labour MP, believe it or not. But he was never really convincing in the role. The others did not like him, and he sensed that he was not one of them, was my impression. Too keen on personal advancement, and not nearly keen enough on concealing it under a veneer of class solidarity. So he stopped doing that and switched to Kilroy, one of those early to mid-morning mini-amphitheatre televised bore-ins with Kilroy himself as the roving interlocutor.

Kilroy's basic problem with Kilroy was that he seemed to regard everyone present except himself an idiot, a feeling which must have been hard to fight, given that everyone present except himself was at the very least behaving idiotically. (I speak as one who used to appear on this show myself from time to time, until I saw the pointlessness of my ways.) Kilroy tried to conceal his contempt for everyone under a layer of somewhat overdone good humour and what I presume he thought was charm, but what everyone else called smarm.

As his show moved away from semi-intelligent debate into the territory already occupied more entertainingly by Jerry Springer - my mother is a cross-dresser, I want to have a fight with my step-dad, my twin sister is a prostitute and I am a nun and I want to have a fight with her, etc. - Kilroy's manner became ever more off-putting and false and desperate.

But Kilroy-Silk's manner on Question Time was downright … appropriate. Gone was the layer of smarm. And out from under it came this really quite attractive and intelligent man. He used to be hated because he was appalling. Now he will be hated because he is not nearly as appalling as his enemies would like him to be.

Most of us are familiar with the Peter Principle, the one that says that people are promoted until they arrive with a thud at their level of incompetence, at which they then remain for ever. But in politics as in life generally, I think we sometimes observe the opposite process. Sometimes, people arrive at their level of competence, having just buggered about pointlessly for the previous two decades until they reached it. Kilroy-Silk strikes me as a fine example of a man who is now, as a Eurosceptic politician with the right, the duty, and the inclination to speak his mind, at last arriving at his level of competence.

It could turn out that by switching off Kilroy the talkshow host, and unleashing Kilroy-Silk the reborn politician, the BBC has made one of its most important contributions to the EUro-debate, in favour of the NO side.

Please understand that I am talking here about competence, rather than about the rights and wrongs of it all. I generally hate what politicians do, but my point is: some of them do it very well, while others mysteriously run out of steam, seem woefully miscast, and should have carried on with what they had previously been doing.

For the opposite tendency, a perfect example of the original Peter Principle rather than of the reverse version of it which I am here offering: Glenda Jackson. What a fine actress. And what a sad, drab failure as a politician.

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We never saw this coming, did we?

The Government signalled yesterday that it was willing to breach the first of its "red line" safeguards on the European constitution by agreeing to cede Britain's veto over sensitive areas of criminal justice.

The shift in policy raises fears that Brussels could acquire the power to interfere with the common law tradition of habeas corpus, trial by jury, and rules of evidence.

Whereas, until today, nobody had ever thought that possible.

I remember once defining "compromise" as you doing something I want, and in exchange me doing something else I want. Which makes me a bit like the EU. What a horrible thought. Eeeeuuuu!!!

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In France on Sunday, Nicolas Sarkhozy has manouvered the UMP government party into supporting a referendum for the proposed EU constitution [link in French].

The decision to hold a referendum will be taken by President Jacques Chirac (anyone's guess what that will be), but the call by the newly appointed Minister of Finance represents a shift away from automatic rubber-stamping by the French parliament.

Privately Chirac will be fuming. He hates Sarkhozy and fears his possible election in 2007 as President. Unlike the recently convicted fraudster Alain Juppé, Mr Sarkhozy might not feel inclined to whitewash the current President's dubious financial history. Meanwhile, Alain Juppé the UMP party chairman, has endorsed Mr Sarkhozy's call with the qualification: "within the constitutional prerogatives of the President". Mr Juppé no doubt feels it is a good time to roll with his colleague's punches.

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He is back and this time he is pissed off!!

Former Labour MP and TV presenter Roberty Kilroy-Silk has emerged from his brief period of public exile to announce that he intends to stand as a candidate for the UK Independence Party in the forthcoming European Parliament elections.

The UKIP leadership will almost certainly regard this as something of coup and not without justification. They have had a dreadfully hard time getting any public traction for their campaign to get Britain out of the EU altogether and celebrity commitments of this nature can (if not turn the tide) at least help to raise profile.

But what will the Europhile side make of this? Hay, is the answer. Indeed, the harvesting is already underway:

Robert Kilroy-Silk, the politician turned TV presenter who lost his daytime show for insulting the Arab nations, has now joined a group of people who think that continental Europe is ruled by "barbarians".

The former Labour MP, whose opinions have become more right-wing as he has grown older, wants Britain to withdraw from the EU altogether, and to impose heavy restrictions on immigration.

The entire case of the Europhile lobby consists of the wicked calumny that anti-EU campaginers are merely a motley bunch of rabid, red-necked bigots and foaming-at-the-mouth nazi-types who just do not like 'foreigners'. It is the only weapon in their armoury and they wield it with alacrity.

Given Mr. Kilroy-Silk's recent, well-publicised and rather uncharitable outbursts (the nature of which were sufficient, in the current ethical climate, to brand him as an incorrigable racist) his candidacy is going to provide the Europhiles with a big dose of 'see-we-told-you-so' corroboration for their libels. I expect that they will milk this unfortunate and inaccurate conflation for all it is worth.

I hope that good fortune smiles on UKIP and Mr Kilroy-Silk's campaign for electoral success but I do fear that his candidacy will prove to be a propoganda victory for the other side.

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Let us hope that this story, told by Daniel Hannan in the latest Spectator, gets around:

Contemplate, then, the case of Hans-Martin Tillack. Mr Tillack is a respected German reporter who has written extensively about the Eurostat scandal. This convoluted affair really deserves a column to itself but, briefly, it involves allegations that millions of euros have been diverted from the budget by Commission officials. More recently, Mr Tillack had started to investigate the broader failure of EU authorities to act on tip-offs. It was this that triggered the reaction. Last month police swooped on his flat. He was questioned for ten hours without a lawyer, while his laptop, files and address book were confiscated. Even his private bank statements were ransacked.

The raid was ordered by Olaf, the EU's anti-corruption unit. Needless to say, no such treatment has been meted out to the alleged fraudsters. In the looking-glass world of Brussels, it is those exposing sleaze, rather than those engaging in it, who find themselves in police custody. Mr Tillack was implausibly accused of having procured some of his papers by bribery. No formal charges have been brought, and he is now planning to sue. In the meantime, though, the notes he had built up over five years of meticulous work have been seized and his sources put at risk.

The lack of interest in this incident is bewildering. Journalists, after all, are usually exercised by the mistreatment of other journalists. When similar things happen in Zimbabwe, they are the subject of stern editorials. Yet here is the EU intimidating its critics with all the crudeness of a tinpot dictatorship. A message is being semaphored to the Brussels press corps: stick to copying out the Commission's press releases and you'll be looked after; make a nuisance of yourself and you'll regret it. As the EU correspondent of a British newspaper told me mopily last week, 'If they can do this to a German Europhile and get away with it, people like me might as well pack up and go home.'

God help Britain and God help EUrope (and we atheists only say things like that when matters are very serious) if Britain is bullied by its current crop of idiot rulers into voting Yes to the continuing depredations of this pompous, pious, self-glorifying, self-deluding gang of parasites. We must hope that Mr Tillack has big enough balls and eloquent and powerful enough friends for him to end up ahead in the highly dangerous game that he is now playing on our behalf.

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It is almost enough to make me feel sorry for them:

European leaders will meet with intellectuals and business leaders to discuss Europe’s core values in a high-level conference later this year.

EU heads of state and government will be invited to attend a special conference on European values at the beginning of December- an event organised at the personal initiative of the Dutch prime minister, Jan Peter Balkenende.

It is hoped the conference - to be held in the Netherlands - will be the culmination of a half-year long EU-wide debate on the meaning and political relevance of the European idea, initiated by the upcoming Dutch presidency which takes office in July.

Writers, artists, policy-makers and business leaders from all over the world are set to be present at the public event, where up to 1000 people will be able to attend.

If they are harvesting "intallekchools" from all over the world to come to Europe to tell Europeans (a) who they are, (b) what they are supposed to be doing and (c) why they are supposed to be doing it, then said Europeans have, shall we say, some issues with self-esteem.

Mr Balkenende hopes the event will provide an ideological underpinning for Europe.

The only thing the event will produce is several hundred pages of repetative cant and nauseating PC pieties, liberally sprinkled with terms like 'respect' and 'solidarity'.

He recently remarked that embarking on a European discussion on values such as respect, freedom, integration and solidarity would give a "new dynamism" to the reunified Europe.

See, it's started already and if ever anyone tells you that that are seeking a "new dynamism" you can be cast-iron sure that their get-up-and-go has got-up-and-gone. Probably never to return.

What does it say about the great 'European Project' if its political leaders are prepared to prostrate themselves before a gathering of the global great-and-good and admit that they do not have single moral imperative on which to hang their hats?

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Today, May 1st, is a big day for the European Union because today is 'Accession Day' whereupon 10 new countries will be officially enjoined into the Union:

Leaders from the EU's 25 member states are taking part in celebrations, after a night of festivities heralded its historic expansion.

The 15 old members welcomed in Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia at midnight.

Yes, it is celebration time. The 'family' of 15 countries becomes the even bigger 'family' of 25 countries as hands are clasped in firm handshakes across once-inpenetrable borders in a new spirit of continent-wide brotherhood, sisterhood and transgenderhood. Ring out the bells, sound the trumpets and let the cliches flow like a swollen river.

Chief among the consequences that is causing excitement, even outside the usual Europhile circles, is the prospect of droves of fresh-faced and energetic young Slavs who will pour into the cities of Western Europe eager to programme computers, brew coffee and deliver hot pizza to Western Euopeans, most of whom will be quietly relieved that they are being served and waited upon by people who are unlikely to be donating any portion of their wage packets to Al-Qaeda.

I can sympathise with this enthusiasm for I, too, hope that this scenario will come about and, if it does, I expect that it will largely prove to be a very good thing for all concerned.

However, trade is (usually) a two-way street. East may have a lot to offer the West but what does the West have to offer the East. Jobs? Well, in theory, yes, but if the Western Europeans are unwilling to reform their stifling labour laws then a lot of those eager young Slavs are going to cross the continent only to end up burgling in Bremen or pimping in Paris.

But even that does not mean that Western Europe is without something to offer the East, though certainly not workers (unless they are prepared to export their own immigrants). No, what Western Europe has to export Eastwards is a plague of social-worker types (of which the West has vast reserves).

That is the thing about this globalisation phenomenon. It does not just mean the widespread distribution of DVD players and avocados, it also means the widespread distribution of people who make and consume both. So far, so orthodox, so what? This is the accepted view. What is often overlooked is that global trade also means the spread of ideas and (for reasons I simply cannot fathom) it is widely and blithely assumed in free market circles that this inevitably means the the speard of 'good' ideas only. Why?

For a start, there are no good ideas in Western Europe but there is a mountain of 'Very Bad Ideas' and no shortage of people who know how to disseminate them very effectively. Indeed, as I type, there is probably a warehouse full of Very Bad Ideas boxed up, shrink-wrapped and waiting on the dockside ready to be shipped off to Lublijana and Vilnius.

Those poor Slavs and Baltics may well imagine that today marks the end of their decades of totalitarian repression and a gigantic leap towards liberation, modernity and prosperity. HAH! Those poor saps have no idea what is waiting in store for them or what membership of the big, unhappy 'EU' family actually means in practice.

They will soon learn the folly of their ideals when they are invaded by an army of self-righteous busybodies, armed with bogus statistics, sham science and filofaxes full of pre-arranged media and government contacts. Right now, these health-fascists and control-freaks must be goggle-eyed with anticipation at the thought of a whole, new, virgin audience for their peculiar brand of histrionics.

Over the coming years, these once-complacent Eastern Europeans are going to be nagged, hectored, lectured, nannied, finger-wagged, sermonised and relentlessly bullied by a seemingly never-ending parade of dull, obnoxious, earnest, condescending do-gooders whose mission is to convince them all that they are too fat, too thin, too unfit, too rich, too poor, too happy, too sad, too tall, too thin, too bald, too hairy, too thoughtful, too reckless, too drunk, too sober and just too bloody ignorant and criminal for their own good.

By this time next year, the people of the Accession countries will have been told that they smoke too much, eat too much, drink too much, laugh too much, work too much, love too much, hate too much, walk too much, drive too much, breathe too much, talk too much and that they are destroying the planet, abusing their children and not paying anywhere near enough in tax. As well as that they will also learn that they are racist, sexist, fascist, cubist, buddhist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, agoraphobic, arachnaphobic, technophobic and institutionally obese and....SOMETHING MUST BE DONE!!!!

I feel sorry for them I really do. We in the West have had time to get used to the psychosis of the ruling classes but for these unsuspecting Baltic greenhorns, the misery is all to come. In some respects it is actually worse for them because they are hoping for a bright, shiny new dawn of freedom without perhaps the slightest notion of what lies in store for them now that they are about to be firmly welded into the regulatory machine. From New Soviet Man to Neu-Rotic Man in one generation. How is that for bad luck?

If I was them I would alleviate the problem by simply shooting all these invading busibodies on sight but I verily believe that there is some utterly unreasonable law against doing that kind of thing. Instead, I predict that, within five years, there will be a serious political movement in Eastern Europe dedicated to bringing back the Iron Curtain. Not to keep their own people in, mind, but to keep the undesirable Westerners out.

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A mindboggling article on the TF1 (French TV) website.

Apparently, Jacqeues Chirac is dedicating today's presidential press conference to the subject of EU enlargement. The analysis is that this will dillute French influence in the EU, shift the balance of power in a more "Atlanticist" direction, and help bring about back-door free-market reforms.

The French Socialist Party has decided to make the threat of a libertarian Europe (Europe libérale) the main plank of its European election campaign, citing the EU constitution as part of the potential problem. They think it is going to be amended into something terrifying (i.e. good). Especially horrible for the European left is the prospect of cross-border private welfare arrangements: buying private pensions and health insurance without the 'protection' of nationalized welfare monopolies. Get your life insurance in France, health insurance in Germany and your pension in the UK for example.

Jacques Chirac as the agent of Anglo-Saxon capitalists! Priceless.

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Personally I do not know what to make of the referendum we are now promised about the EU constitution. Will the forces of darkness triumph, or will it be: NO!?

Patrick Crozier has no such doubts. In 1975, the verdict was Yes, but this time, he says, it will be different:

1. We know what the EU is like.
2. Then all the main political parties were in favour. Now they are not.
3. Then most of the papers were in favour. Now most of them are not.
4. Then, our economy was a laughing stock. Now it is the rest of Europe that has the problem
5. Then, most businessmen were in favour. Now things are much closer.
6. Although I don't know what it was like then, now there are plenty of celebs prepared to endorse a "No" campaign.

Setting aside the matter of why he thinks Blair has decided to hold this referendum (and here is another explanation), is Patrick right? I want to believe him, but do I?

I have the feeling that the people writing this blog are not quite so confident, or why would they bother?

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Is there simply no end to all the bad news?

Diplomats and leading experts are warning that the "chaotic" European Union is ill-equipped to cope with the biggest expansion in its history.

Shame, shame. A pox on humanity and all its works.

Finnish ambassador to the UK Pertti Salolainen, who said he was speaking in a personal capacity, said: "The EU is chaotic, it has no vision, no leadership and it seems it will have no constitution."

Is there no justice in this wicked world? I do not know how I will sleep at night (speaking in a personal capacity).

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So we are going to given a referendum on whether or not to sign up to the EU Constitution. Or not. Or maybe. Possibly. Not yet, but soon. In principle. In theory. For certain, provided conditions are right.

Lord knows! Like everything else concerning Britain's relationship with Brussels this whole referendum issue is buried deep within a fog of obfuscation, misinformation, confusion and misdirection.

What is certain is that the government/media lie-factory is being cranked up to over-production mode forging weapon-grade children for deployment in the propoganda war ahead ["I think we should be a part of Europe so that we can all live together in peace", said Heidi, aged 10. Yes, it really will be that fatuous and buttock-clenchingly embarrassing.]

So now is to the time for the forces of truth and light to step up to the crease, ready to hit the opposition for six. Among the fearless volunteers are the team behind a new blog called, simply, EU Referendum.

These guys have got the real skinny on the fetid labrynth of EU politics and they tell it exactly like it is. Pay them lots of visits to read, learn, grow and become a better human being.

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According to super-rich, property magnate Will Hutton, we are all Europeans now:

There are strong reasons for Britain to want more than a common market like the rest of Europe, and to try, in the process, to create the European public realm we currently lack. We share, despite a multiplicity of languages and histories, the same core values - a belief in the social contract, an adherence to the idea of the importance of the public realm and shared views that capitalism must be fairly run.

Hutton's Europe: a land of permanent paternalism.

I wonder if Mr. Hutton's tenants have to tug their forelocks and call him 'sir'?

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A team from the EU Commission is hotfooting it off to North Korea in the wake of that 'minor-train-incident-which-never-happened-and-anyway-even-if-it-did-it-was-caused-by-reactionaries':

Development spokesperson Jean-Charles Ellermann-Kingombe said on Friday that a representative from the EU's humanitarian assistance team in North Korea will visit the site late tonight (early morning local time) to assess the situation.

They may have to fly in some emergency directives. But, on to the truly pant-wettingly, hilarious, quote-of-the-week bit:

Asked whether the EU representative would be allowed to get a clear picture of the situation on the ground given the secrecy of the Pyongyang regime and the time elapsed since the accident occurred, Mr Ellermann-Kingombe pointed out that they had been invited by the authorities to visit the site.

"We have no reason to question their intentions", he said.

And probably no motive either.

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Many sound folks are already rubbing their hands with glee at the prospect of the long sought UK referendum on adopting the terrifying EU constitution. The general received wisdom is that the anti-Constitution faction will win and that will be the end of Tony Blair's political career... and certainly if it was held today it is hard to see any outcome other that a crushing victory for the anti-EU side and political ruin for Teflon Tony given that the latest YouGov poll (pdf file) shows only 16% would vote for the UK adopting the EU constitution, 28% were unsure and a whooping 53% would vote against it. Rule Britannia indeed!

But the promised referendum will not be today but rather at a tactical moment of Tony Blair's choosing. People who see this 'surrender' to the idea of a referendum as a fortuitous laps of judgement of epic proportions would do well to ponder the effect that having notoriously Eurosceptic Britain go to the polls will have on the current negotiations with Britain more Federalist European 'partners' regarding the so called 'red line' issues of foreign policy, defence, social security and the British budget rebate.

Knowing that only if Blair can return home with ostensible triumph on those issues will he be able to credibly spin the EU constitution as a 'British victory', the Federalists will be faced with either the complete overthrow of their plans (Denmark or Ireland might be either ignored or finessed, but a British rejection is a rather different matter) or they can settle for a more gradualist victory for their cherished superstate.

Thus the prospects for Tony Blair arriving back and waving a piece of paper with Romano Prodi's signature on it promising 'Euro-peace in our time' is by no means a fantastical scenario... and given the sheer ineptitude of the Tory party and the lemming-like Europhilia of the LibDems, it would be a brave man who predicts with confidence that this would not pull the Euro-sceptic's political teeth.

Yes, with a little luck it could, and hopefully will, all go horribly wrong for the UK government and we could see the dismal Conservative party back in the saddle in Westminster in the aftermath of a Euro-Political meltdown of not insignificant proportions. However the prospects of Blair indeed getting Britain to sign up to a first iteration of the EU constitution if the Federalists play ball is by no means beyond possibilities. And if that happens, it means it is only a matter of time before the other issues are gradually chipped away in the years to follow. At that point there will be nothing left to fight for and I for in will be in the market for some property in New Hampshire. Do not underestimate Tony Blair.

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This Guardian headline is terrifying, coming, as it most definitely does, under the "never believe it until it is officially denied" heading:

UK 'will not bail out EU pensions crisis'.

This denial, on the other hand, might be quite good news:

Mr Brown insisted: "There is no intention of having a European health care system that replaces national health care systems.

My understanding is that, healthwise, they do things rather better on the Continent than we do here, so the fact that we absolutely, definitely, I deny that completely, no truth in that notion whatsoever, are not repeat not going to have a European health system here in Britain, i.e. we very possibly are going to have such a system, is quite cheering. (See the comment 4 on this posting if you doubt the ghastliness of Britain's current arrangements.)

And then there is this:

He reiterated the government's determination to resist any moves towards EU tax harmonisation. "Tax competition makes for a more efficient single market," he stressed.

Things like this are never said until the contrary claim is presented in the form of a question. And that contrary claim is at least as likely to be true as any denial of it.

The EUro-ratchet effect means that it only needs one British politician to relax on any particular issue, usually as part of an attempt to hold back the inevitable on some other front, for the deal to be done.

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Yes, I know, picking on the Guardian is just so easy that it is verging on bad form. It is rather like challenging a small child to a boxing match.

And speaking of small children, I hear the sound of the petulant stamping of little feet:

In our country, in our culture, at this time, any referendum on Europe is a pre-emptive cringe towards the Murdoch press and the tabloids. Forget any idea that the referendum debate will be Plato's Republic in action. It will inescapably be a contest fought on terms dictated by the unelected media rather than by the elected politicians.

This is where the European Union referendum really will be a defining moment. It will mark the extraordinary watershed at which this country's debased, biased and unaccountable media formally take control of the political process. The British media has often claimed that it has greater popular legitimacy than politicians - "It's the Sun Wot Won it", for example. Blair's concession of the referendum marks the moment when politics formally bowed the knee and accepted that claim.

I can visualise Martin Kettle's bottom lip trembling as bashes out every embittered word. For Mr. Kettle and his colleagues, the mere existance of anti-EU opinion is such a towering and monstrous inequity that advance tantrums are required to highlight the plight of the beleaguered federast to the caring world. He will probably start hijacking aeroplanes shortly and demand to be flown to Brussels.

And what is all this guff about 'debased, biased and unaccountable media', as if the Guardian is something other than a national newspaper and, ergo, part of the media? But then thwarted and sulky children often do retreat into consoling fantasy by claiming that their families are not really their families because their real families would not treat them so despicably.

Still, given the perenially low circulation (and their reliance on public subsidy) maybe there is a kernel of truth in the analogy. Nobody likes them, everbody hates them. I think they should go and eat worms.

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This could all be a tease (there have been hundreds of similar reports about a referendum on scrapping the pound for the euro).

The EU constitution in itself may not be worse than what the British version is mutating into. If adopted our choices become a pan-European libertarian movement or a secession.

The latter may not be as easy as the Confederate attempt in 1861 from the USA (less public support in the UK, more heavily outnumbered by the rest of the EU etc). Hopefully such a secession could be more Slovenian than Croatian.

The advantage of a referendum is that it cannot be worse than letting the Prime Minister decide alone.

The disadvantage is that it will only happen once the result is known in advance to suit the government, so that when they win, it can slip through the single currency without a vote (that is what the French government did with the Maastricht Treaty in 1992).

Either way spread the word: by next weekend we could have a live campaign on our hands.

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Nigel Meek draws the attention of readers of the Libertarian Alliance Forum to this leader in yesterday's Guardian. He is right to do so. It is short enough and good enough to be worth reproducing in full, which he does for LAF, and which I do for Samizdata now:

It is difficult to find anything in the European Union more perverse than its continuing subsidy of sugar. It fails every test miserably. It is economic madness since the EU is shelling out hundreds of millions of taxpayers' money - that could be used to reduce its growing budget deficit - to grow crops at a loss that could be better grown elsewhere. It is immoral because subsidies prevent poor countries from growing sugar that would create hundreds of thousands of jobs. It is also unhealthy because it is encouraging the subsidised output of a product that the World Health Organisation, courageously - in view of the vested interests attacking it - says we should be cutting back on.

If the figures - published in a new Oxfam report, Dumping on the World, this week - were applied to any other industry, they would be laughed out of court. Oxfam claims the EU is spending €3.30 to export sugar worth €1, an almost unbelievable support of more than 300% - and that is only part of the elaborate welfare package bestowed on the industry. These hugely subsidised exports are dumped on developing countries, snuffing out potential economic growth that could enable them to work their way out of poverty. All they want is a level playing field. Is that too much to ask for? Oxfam - quoting World Bank figures - also claims that sugar costs 25 cents per pound weight to produce in the EU compared with 8 cents in India, 5.5 cents in Malawi and 4 cents in Brazil. The world price for raw sugar is 6 cents a pound. It is bizarre that European governments reconciled, albeit reluctantly, to call centres being subcontracted elsewhere will not let go of sugar output which, left to market forces, would long ago have migrated to the third world. Sugar producers, with twisted logic, use Brazil's low cost of output as a reason for retaining subsidies on the grounds that it will not be really poor countries benefiting, only the medium poor.

The simplest solution would be to abolish all agriculture subsidies, even though it would, in the short term, hurt a minority of poor countries that might lose out to the likes of Brazil. Once exceptions are granted, then everything is up for grabs, and trade and talks would be dragged down by interminable bargaining. If complete abolition is deemed impracticable in the short term, then at the very least Europe should commit itself at once to the complete abolition of all export subsidies, direct and indirect. Apart from the huge relief it would bring to poor countries, it would also restore Europe's long-lost moral leadership.

It would take more than one measure of this sort to "restore Europe's long-lost moral leadership", but if such an unattractive delusion is what it takes to get rid of these vile and murderous subsidies – yes murderous, because economic failure is a matter of life and death, especially when inflicted upon the very poor, then so be it. Apart from that, I see nothing here to disagree with.

I posted here last summer about this blog. It is still going strong, and the ideas embodied in it still seem to be having an impact.

A cynical attempt to reach out to the pro-free-trade blogosphere, which has to get a nod from the real operation, the Guardian itself, otherwise it just looks ridiculous? Maybe, but who cares? And I am sure that Mr kick-AAS means every word of it. Ancient proverb say: window dressing often take over shop. What matters is that this kind of thing is being said, right across the political spectrum.

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Europhile, n. (pronounced "yew-ro-file") Person or institution with an enthusiasm about the merging of the European States into a single State, usually regardless of any other considerations. A Europhile is often reluctant to be identified as such, especially when he is a politician.

Urophile, n. (pronounced "yew-ro-file") Person with an enthusiasm for being subjected to showers of urine. A Urophile is often reluctant to be identified as such, especially when he is a politician.

Now it would be easy and gratuitous of me to imply that both are one and the same, but this is obviously unfair.

One is a harmless pervert who engages in fantasies in private that involve no coercion against other people. The other is a dangerous pervert who conspires in private, and who needs to be exposed and subjected to public embarrassment.

The 'e' makes all the difference.

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Nothing any political body says can be taken at face value. On that point I doubt many would demur. In days gone by when the state had a large measure of control over information flows, this was only to be expected and was easier to do. In modern times, this is a bit harder to pull off and requires 'spin' and other psycho-media exercises in obfuscation to muddy waters, confuse issues, bamboozle and generally misdirect people from politically inconvenient facts. Nevertheless, in this information rich interconnected world in which we now live, one can but marvel that some political creatures seem to act as if they operate in a universe in which the official pronouncements carry the same weight they did in, say, the 1920's.

A remarkable and even bizarre example of this is the summary which has been attached to the factual European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia's report on anti-semitism in Europe. This EU publication comes out against the screamingly obvious backdrop of Islamic youths running rampant in some communities in many countries. And the summary of this report states what exactly?

The largest group of the perpetrators of anti-Semitic activities appears to be young, disaffected white Europeans

Huh? I mean, did they expect that no one would actually read the actual main text? The report clearly says that by far the major source of 'anti-semitic' (meaning anti-Jewish) violence is other semites... Muslim ones.

Now back in the bad old days when I used to spend time whiling away the hours in the offices of a management consultancy, I recall during one large project the company's managing director urging us to use particular care crafting the six page executive summary of what was a consulting report that stood about three feet high when stacked on a table, because "in reality, no one who matters will ever read the report, they will just skim the summary" (the client, by the way, was the BBC).

Perhaps this baleful ethos has now become the received wisdom in the EU's administrative corridors as well, thus motivating the political masters who oversee such things before they are released to conclude that if they spin the report's summary to direct ire at the usual darlings of the collectivist left (which is to say the collectivist so-called right), no one will actually read the report and realise that a tiny marginalised group of politically invisible shaven headed moonbats with an Adolf Hitler fetish is not the main problem.

To anyone actually reading the whole report its should be clear that the problem is a far larger group of politically highly visible Muslims who are hypersensitive to criticism, even when it is just a statement of demonstrable truth. My suspicion is that the reason for this odd official behaviour is that once the true nature of the problem permeates the consciousness of the pan-European tabloid reading public, entire rickety networks of axioms lovingly constructed and nurtured by several generations of moral relativists could come crashing down like two falling skyscrapers colliding with ugly reality. The issue at hand is not just the small minority of violent Muslim youths, but a broader Euro-Muslim society from which they spring which always suffixes its own criticism of anti-Jewish acts with "but...".

However confronting that would imply that hard political choices lie in the not so distant future. Furthermore, it suggest accepting that whilst races may be equal, societies are certainly not. The two divergent strains of western social evolution are reaching the point at which the differences cannot be papered over. The old blood-and-soil volk is thankfully dead and either we are moving towards a series of legally enshrined cultural ghettos defined by collective rights (multiculturalism) or we are moving towards an melting pot culture of eclectic individual styles and preferences revolving around an emergent common social core (cosmopolitanism). This is not the sort of stark discussion many people want to have amongst either the Paleo-Conservative right or Transnational Progressive left.

Now at first flush, the 'Transnational Progressives' should not see cosmopolitanism as a bad thing, what with their 'let's all come together and sing Kumbayah' ethos. That is until you realise that the whole Tranzi value set is about coming together within the context of a series of mediated political collective 'cultures' and not an individual roll-your-own approach to culture. People who come together but insist on singing 'Rule Britannia' and then think nothing of watching a St. Patrick's Day Parade followed by a nice Vindaloo Curry not only do not compute, they are dangerous if they actually define themselves that way: they (we) are Marx's hated 'rootless cosmopolitans', free from the predictable and ostensibly stable sociological stasis that societies which make a fetish of custom have.

What is more, the cosmopolitans are the evolving expression of the post-tribal extended order about which Hayek wrote. Cosmopolitans, far from being an unintelligible social babble to each other in reality revolve around the same core social values, the same ones which have enabled capitalist trade and several property to flourish. It is the extended order's ability to foster trust and exchange amongst strangers from outwardly dissimilar people's which so threatens the mediated collectivist social model, the same mediated collectivist social model leads to such absurdities as an inability to harshly criticise the Muslim and Euro-Muslim culture which even according to the body of the EU's own report spawns violence against European Jews, not to mention other wider issues such as high unemployment due to an unwillingness to assimilate.

That admission that some cultures are simply less advanced and of less objective value, unable to provide either liberty or affluence, throws into question the whole concept of both relativism (clearly some cultures are not as successful at dealing with reality as others) and collective rights (if some collectives are based on monstrous assumptions, enshrining collective rights enshrines monstrous assumptions) upon which the Tranzi edifice is constructed. That is not a path for discussion which many of the people who preside over regulatory statist systems feel comfortable going down. The real but tiny fascist lunatic fringe has been designated the scapegoat of choice a la the fictional 'Emanuel Goldstein' in 1984: the target of officially sponsored hate. Moreover, any attempts to just use objective social reality to figure out what is going on has to be discouraged or where will it end? Perhaps people might stop believing what they are told by the establishment! I am open to alternative explanations of this strange institutional behaviour however.

The designated badguys



Just misunderstood gardeners!

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More Tsarism, this time of the Euro variety:

European Union leaders agreed yesterday to rush forward a clutch of EU-wide surveillance measures and created an anti-terror "Tsar" in response to the Madrid bombings.

The list of counter-terrorism measures pushed by Britain, France and Spain at a Union summit in Brussels include plans to retain mobile telephone records, e-mail and internet data indicating the time and address of all websites visited.

White Rose has further EUro-reportage and links about similar EUro-stuff, here and here.

This report also illustrates the point that EUrope is not just a machine to enable foreigners to muck the British around, it is also a machine to enable to British to muck the foreigners around: a sort of universal substitute empire for all the old European imperialists. Having been made to stop tyrannising over their previous imperial possessions, the tyrannising classes have switched instead to tyrannising over each other's nations. Bad luck on the rest of us, but there it is, these people have to have someone to tyrannise over.

Meanwhile, proof that when the Euro elite wants something, it just beavers away until it gets it:

A new summer deadline for agreement on the EU constitution has been agreed by European leaders, putting renewed pressure on Tony Blair and his non-negotiable "red lines".

Mr Blair had seemed content for the troubled constitution to slip off the agenda after December's summit ended in deadlock. But a new deadline for agreement on the document has been set.

Although, when the time comes that the people who want EUrope to fall to bits are finally in the ascendancy, they will have the perfect precedent for saying: "We are going to keep on destroying this thing until we succeed, and will ignore all counter-opinions, of, e.g. voters, because these opinions are anti-historical and do not matter. We are doing what we know to be best. Our opponents are deluded. That's what the founders of this thing did when they started it, and we are merely following their inspiring example."

Trouble is, by the time that happens, those people may be even nastier.

I will read this piece by David Carr to cheer myself up.

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Good news from today's Guardian, which just goes to show that big news can sometimes come in the form of something bad just very quietly not happening:

Tacit confirmation that joining the single currency is off the political radar until after the next election came today as the "No" campaign confirmed it was ceasing to campaign actively.

The group insists that a "steering committee" will monitor the government's plans on the euro, but that last week's budget now means that a referendum would not be before spring 2008 at "the absolute earliest".

In his budget statement last Wednesday, Gordon Brown announced a "rolling assessment" of the case for euro - but last June told MPs that only one of his "five tests" had been met.

The sixth test – can they get us damn voters to agree to it? – was always the test that mattered. I don't know anyone who believes that any of the other five matter as much as that one. (Come to think of it, I doubt if I know anyone who knows what all these tests are.) And because those New Labour people didn't take all the chips they won in 1997 and throw them straight back onto the table and bet them all on the abolition of the pound Sterling, right then, there is a very good chance that Britain will retain its national independence indefinitely, with its separation from the 'eurozone' eventually mutating into separation from 'Europe' itself. I can hope.

As a libertarian I wish we Brits could cherry pick. I wish we could welcome all these Eastern European immigrants who are about to flood in and who want to work, but not take all the idiotic and mean-minded regulations and 'harmonisations'. (And maybe history will cherry pick exactly that arrangement for me, eventually.) Which might explain why in other parts of Europe the libertarians are all gung-ho not only for 'Europe' but for the very Euro itself. In Brussels last week, I heard tell of a Swedish libertarian who voted 'No' in the Swedish referendum and who was damn near ostracised by the rest of her tribe. In Sweden, 'Europe' is what is going to dismantle their over-bloated welfare state. 'Europe' is Thatcherism.

However, the fact that 'Europe' may be a better bet than Sweden for Sweden doesn't make it a better bet than Britain for Britain, so I am still pleased about the indefinitely postponement of the Euro in these parts.

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This article by young Freddie Sayers in the latest Spectator can be simply summarised. The EU is boring, and it is especially boring to Youth.

The youthfulness of Freddie Sayers is not something I am pointing out gratuitously. He makes much of it himself, when he writes things like this:

Sooner or later, the EU institutions will realise that they cannot shape trends, but are in fact subject to them. I believe the European Union will gradually become less relevant: the lack of interest in my generation practically guarantees it. The passion that the romantic vision of a united Europe once provoked was the result of a world-view which we cannot understand. When Michael Howard spoke in Berlin in February, he recalled how in 1963 he had been ‘one of the half million people who thronged in front of the Rathaus Schoneberg to hear President Kennedy give his famous address’; Sìle de Valera also told me how influenced she had been by General de Gaulle’s vision of Europe.

But these memories mean nothing to us. The old view of Europe, formed by a memory of intra-European war and the prospect of a new power block to counterbalance the US and Soviet Russia, is simply no longer relevant. I can’t remember the Berlin Wall falling down; the second world war seems ancient history. Sìle de Valera pondered why it is that young people feel ‘active and engaged in global politics, but it is harder to engage them at a more local level’. Perhaps we feel more like citizens of the world than citizens of Europe? The European Union has had useful and constructive results — freer travel and trade, cultural exchange programmes — but there is no reason for young people to get excited about it. We see these as the quite normal modern activities of any friendly civilised states, whether America or Italy. The whole idea of a particularly European vision is out of date, passé.

The trouble with Sayers saying all this, but not saying any more than this, is that however much the EUropean Union becomes less "relevant" in the eyes of its younger victims, it is still in fact in business. The EU boring? Well, so is a steamroller. But if the steamroller is steamrolling all over you, merely calling it boring is hardly the response that will actually stop it, now is it?

What is needed is a generation who have become sufficiently excited about the EUropean Union, to the point where they choose to stop it, and perhaps even reverse it.

Of course the EUro-enthusiasts would rather that the youth of EUrope shared their EUro-enthusiasm. But in the absence of support, they can proceed with their project in the absence of enthusiastic opposition.

I am not accusing Freddie Sayers of having foolish feelings, still less of reporting on the feelings of others inaccurately. On the contrary, that he is interested enough in the EU to write this piece about it, even - as he most entertainingly reports - travelling to a fatuous EUro-junket in Ireland that nobody else gave the slightest attention to, suggests that he at least is not indifferent to the progress of the steamroller.

So on the contrary, I think we should keep our eyes open for what else this young man writes.

And I wonder, is he the same Freddie Sayers as the one in this?

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In what is a splendid testament to the sense and wisdom of Irish youth, when the EU held a conference for young people in Ireland (free registration required)... how many young Irish people turned up?

None.

Clearly they had better things to do. How very, very, very, splendid.

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Slowjoe has spotted something calculated to start teeth grinding here on Samizdata.net

The Register talks about an attempt by the EU to railroad through the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive.

It appears to give the 'rights holder' carte blanche... almost the right to set up a private police force.

The interesting thing is that the rapporteur did an end-run around any debate. She also happens to be the wife of the head of Vivendi Universal.

Slowjoe

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It will come as no surprise to anyone with a 100+ IQ and a modicum of knowledge about how the world works that Robert Mugabe and his murderous kleptocrats have appropriated more that £100 million (US $190 million) in aid sent to Zimbabwe by Britain and the EU.

As that was only to be expected, I cannot say it adds significantly to my loathing of the Mugabe regime. What does fill me with utter contempt is that the people responsible for this utterly predictable outcome still allowed the money to be sent in the first place.

As I have previously argued many times before about foreign aid, to send money for ostensibly humanitarian aims to a nation governed by a tyranny is to become the logistic support arm of that tyranny: insulating the regime from the economic (and hence political) consequences of its actions and thereby indirectly, but in a very real sense, making the regime more likely to survive than would otherwise be the case. That is true even if the humanitarian aid does indeed reach the people and projects it is targeted at.

This however is even worse than that. To send aid to Zimbabwe is to underwrite the tyrannical Mugabe regime directly as according to the latest report, 89% ends up in the pockets of Zimbabwe's rulers rather than being spent on the humanitarian objectives for which it is intended. Thus not only can the people who sent the money not bask in their delusions that they have at least done good for those who benefit from the worthy projects, they might as well be buying weapons for Mugabe's police and paramilitaries, not to mention making the bankers and shopkeepers in Zürich rather happy. They are directly supporting the tyrants with large cash injections.

As I disinclined to believe that the people in charge of the governments and agencies in question do not know full well where the money is going to end up, that makes them knowingly supporters of the regime. Which means they are supporting this:

Hilary Andersson, of the BBC's Panorama programme, reveals how thousands of youths are being taught to rape, maim, torture and kill in Zimbabwe's terror training camps - and now Robert Mugabe intends to make the camps compulsory for all the country's young men and women

[...]

A former official with the Ministry of Youth, Gender and Employment Creation that oversees the camps, explained the government's thinking. "You are moulding somebody to listen to you, so if it means rapes have to take place in order for that person to take instructions from you, then it's OK," he said. He was so horrified that he left his job with the ministry in disgust. Rape is just one of the ways camp commanders are able to turn their charges into unquestioning automata. The training methods vary from camp to camp, but the pattern is consistent.

If all that was happening was that the Guardian reading classes were getting a warm fuzzy glow because they were supporting British tax money going to 'help stamp out poverty in the third world', then that would be bad enough, given the reality of what this distorting flow of cash really does. But as Zimbabwe slowly morphs into an inept 'North Korea Lite', the platitudes and wilful ignorance of some are now directly funding truly monstrous horrors and misery because they are too damn lazy to think the whole issue through.

Of course if our political masters did not know this was going to happen when they decided to send huge chunks cash to a place like Zimbabwe, then they are naive to the point of idiocy and have no business being in charge of vast amounts of other people's money to begin with.

So which is it?

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You would have to be deaf, dumb and blind (or read nothing but the Guardian) to have failed to notice that there is rather a large constituency in Britain whose feelings regarding the European Union lie somewhere between dislike and loathing.

As a consequence this would presumably lead the leader of the opposition Tory Party to firmly align his troops with the Euro-sceptics, correct? I mean, there is no way in hell that he would sign up the Tory Party to be a member of a group within the European 'parliament' who had a charter objective that included "the realisation of a United States of Europe", right?

Anyone who sees the Tory Party the solution to Labour marching Britain into a bureaucratised regulatory pan-European dystopia is deluding themselves. There is opposition to the EU within the Tory Party but they are not the people in charge, and the LibDems are even worse than Labour.

But of course the Tory Party can talk a fine Euro-sceptic game when it suits them, but then they can also talk a fine 'we are the party of low taxation' game when it suits them. It is a delight to hear someone making the moral case against high taxation.

Except of course, 'white man speak with forked tongue'...he does not actually mean it. The Tories talk about the importance of civil society and yet you will look in vain for a list of state functions that the Tory party intends to amputate to actually stop the regulatory gangrene killing off civil society.

Don't support the Tory Party... you will only be encouraging more of the same. And of course if you like the state of civil liberties under 'Big Blunkett', you will just love them under Michael 'a touch of the night' Howard.

Until there is a meaningful choice, do not vote for anyone or you will be deluding yourself that you are making any significant difference.

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Amidst the voluminous analysis and comment about the Middle East, the part it played in the Cold War seems seldom mentioned of late. But, from the 1950's right through to the end of the 1980's, the Israeli-Arab conflict was, at least in part, an important Cold War battlefront, fought out between two proxy antagonists.

But, everything old is new again:

The primary goal of the EU is the internationalisation of the conflict in order to underline the need for its own mediating role. Here is the prevailing European view: The longer the conflict continues and the deeper it gets, the more evident is the incapability of the US to moderate a peace process. The EU thus concludes that both sides are in need of - ironically speaking - the good uncle from Europe to resolve this conflict with European democratic and ecological values, its welfare state and civil society. How good for both sides that there is Europe and how bad for the world that one side, and this is Israel, is affording a wild west type of policy in the style of the US.

The need for a solution only exists as long as the war continues. This is why the EU does not want the conflict to end before it gains a major role. And this is why the EU does not wish the PA to give up too early and why the EU is strengthening the PA. The EU is getting up to the cynicism of stirring up a conflict that it supposedly wants to see resolved by financing one side. This is the inherently inhuman purpose of EU humanitarian aid in the region. The Palestinians are playing the ugly role of being the cannon fodder for Europe's hidden war against the US. It can be noted on the sidethat this is not considered an anti-Arab policy by those who otherwise easily use this word.

This is an excerpt from a longish but thoroughly fascinating article written by German Green MEP, Ilke Schroder. If she is correct (and I must say that the facts on the ground do somewhat bear her out) then it appears as if the European Union has stepped into the role once played by the old Soviet Union.

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Although the EU is expanding eastwards, clutching more of the nations of Eastern Europe to its regulating breast on May 1st, only Britain and Ireland will actually be welcoming the people of those countries as residents.

Britain and Ireland may soon be the only two states willing to open their doors entirely to the 73 million people joining the European Union in May. Countries such as Sweden, Holland, and Denmark, which initially pledged to let migrants from the 10 new states work freely in their countries from day one have changed their minds. They fear an influx will drive down wages and overload their welfare systems. Per capita incomes in the ex-Communist countries are just 40 per cent of EU levels.

Privately, EU diplomats say the Poles, Czechs, Slovaks and others are ideal guest workers. Well-educated, they bring fresh blood and dynamism to an ageing Europe. If they stay, it is usually because they inter-marry. Their "migration profile" is starkly different from Muslim groups, who studies suggest are resistant to assimilation and who prohibit their children marrying into the host society.

Vitajte v Londyne!

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I have been meaning for some days to add to this posting here about Denis O'Keeffe's translation of Benjamin Constant's Principles of Politics Applicable To All Governments the information that this book is not just available directly from its publisher but also, for a mere £15 from the Institute of Economic Affairs, where Denis O'Keeffe spoke briefly about the book last week. And while at the IEA website I also came across a recent IEA publication, entitled Friend or Foe? What Americans should know about the European Union, co-authored by IEA Director John Blundell and Gerry Frost.

The IEA is an important institution with a massive amount of momentum built up from five decades of publishing about and arguing for classical liberalism and the free market. What is says will definitely count for something. This particular publication is 44 pages in length and is downloadable in its entirety as a pdf file. The following is its conclusion:

Such are the huge disparities in economic, technological and military power and the prevailing trends that the ambition to create a unitary European state as a countervailing force to the United States is doomed, but its pursuit continues to the detriment of the economic and security interests of both North Americans and Europeans. Nevertheless, having endorsed the project for half a century, many Americans seem reluctant to withdraw their support. Some evidently believe that while their original expectations have been disappointed, the process of European integration is so well established that any reappraisal of US policy towards the EU would produce more problems than it would solve.

That approach fails to take into account both the influence that the US could still bring to bear and the fragility of the political project now approaching fruition. In our view, the attempt to bring about 'ever closer union' will ultimately have to be abandoned, either as the mounting economic and political price of integration becomes more widely grasped, or because Europe's supra-national institutions break down.

Rather than wait for either to happen, the interests of the US would better served by a policy which sought to strengthen the position of those within Europe who recognise that the continent is proceeding down an historic blind-alley and wish to pursue other possibilities. It is surely time that American policymakers were more candid about the inevitable implications of particular EU measures.

In the security field this would mean making it clear that, however, finessed, current plans for an autonomous European defence capability are not compatible with US interests and that the EU should not expect to make use of NATO assets as of right. It should also make plain that, however finessed, a common European foreign and security policy would mean the end to the sharing of intelligence with its UK ally because this entails too high a risk that such information will be passed to the enemy; we have long passed the stage at which behind-the-scenes warnings on these matters can be expected to produce results. If, as the British Prime Minister suggest, international terrorism and weapons of mass destruction are the greatest present threats to British interests then Britain cannot lightly put at risk a relationship which is essential to dealing with both these problems. As a result of the Prime Minister's current high standing in the US, the risk of a breach between Washington and London would seem presently appear slight. In the long run, however, hard-headed calculations about America's national interests are likely to prevail.

A new US approach would also make clear that states that chose not to join the EU, or which came to have doubts about its value, would not be pushed into membership or discouraged from leaving. Moreover, there is surely something to be said for encouraging those with political values and outlook which are threatened by the European political project just as, during the Cold War, US foundations once backed private publications and organisations in Europe supporting democracy and the market economy. One obvious candidate for support is the "Anglosphere project" championed by the US entrepreneur and writer, James Bennett. Bennett's central proposition is that the Anglosphere is defined neither by race or language but adherence to customs and values that form the core of the English-speaking nation's culture: individualism, the rule of law, respect for contracts, and the elevation of liberty to the first rank of political values. As Bennett has demonstrated, these societies provide the most favourable conditions for the creation of cooperative institutions in trade, defence, science, and technology, and, by virtue of their flexibility, are the best placed to exploit new economic and political challenges and to cope with external shock. The task of policy makers is to provide a sympathetic framework of law that allow such societies to flourish and to desist from the kind of interference that prevents them from doing so.

Lacking the flexibility of Anglosphere, it is difficult to be sanguine about how well the rigidly top-down EU will cope with the political pressures that will inevitably come when the public discovers that it has been deceived into placing its trust in an economic and political order that offers little in the way of prosperity and political accountability.

While America ponders such matters, the choices facing Britain are more urgent and acute. For decades it was possible for many to believe that, as long as the country positioned itself more or less mid-way between Europe and America in terms of public philosophy and economic outlook, minor adjustments could be made according to circumstance and all would be well. It is now obvious that the innately anti-American and anti-democratic character of the EU mean that, in as far as it was ever viable, that option is no longer available. For Britain therefore, the lesson ought to be clear. The more it is absorbed into the European project the more it will distance itself from self-government and the more it will be excluded from the huge economic and technological successes for which it is qualified by history and culture.

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A lovely interlude in the Telegraph yesterday:

Romano Prodi, the European Commission president, accused Britain and other member states yesterday of betraying the historic goal of EU expansion by depriving Brussels of the money needed to make enlargement work. Mr Prodi said he was mystified as to why some countries were proposing to reduce the ceiling on payments to the EU budget when the continent was about to unite "for the first time in history".

First time in history? How about Charlemagne? Napoleon? Hitler?

Britain and five other EU nations have challenged the Commission to reduce the maximum share of national budgets that Brussels can spend from 1.24 per cent of GDP to one per cent. How revolutionary...

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Will the German embassy protest, one wonders? Hardly the spirit of reconciliation.

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Most of our readers probably know Tony Robinson best as the much put-upon Baldrick at the bottom of the Blackadder pecking order. He has cunning plans, but they don't work.

However, last night I watched a Tony Robinson effort that was slightly more substantial than one of Baldrick's plans, and an interesting sign of the times in this United Kingdom of ours, namely a couple of Channel 4 TV shows about the history of the British monarchy.

I missed the early part of the first of the two hour-long shows that airedlast night, but my understanding is that in the first, Mr Robinson started out investigating Richard III and ended up by satisfying himself that the current official Royal Family is descended from a deception, in the form of Edward IV.

Edward IV was born in 1442, having been conceived the regulation number of months before that in Rouen, France. Both the circumstances surrounding that birth, and the gossip which it immediately gave rise to say that Edward IV's biological father wasn't the King of England that he should have been, but was instead a French soldier whom the Queen had a brief fling with. Edward IV looked nothing like his official dad. More fuss was made when his younger brother was born than when he was. There's a line in Shakespeare's Richard III alluding to the gossip to the effect that Richard III's rival was a bastard. And so on. Robinson even had himself a bona fide historian on hand to back this up with some new documentary evidence which further proved that the king was nowhere near Rouen when he should have been to be Edward's biological dad.

It is possible – not likely but possible – that there will be an explosion of comments on this posting from people we don't usually hear from, because believe it or not, the rights and wrongs of whether or not Richard III was or was not the Bad Thing that Shakespeare, Laurence Olivier, and now Ian McKellen, have portrayed him as remains a live issue among a certain sort of rather eccentric English person. The argument goes that Richard had the Princes in the Tower killed, not because he was a swine and wanted the Real Monarchy out of the way, but because he considered it his painful but patriotic duty to put and end to a couple of nationally disruptive fakes.

So, having satisfied himself that our actual monarchy isn't our real monarchy, in the second of his two programmes, Robinson proceeded to chase down who our Real Monarch now is. To cut a long story short, this real King of England is a bloke called Mike Hastings, who left England to live in Australia in his teens, has had a great life there, and who actually voted for a Republic in the latest Aussie referendum on that subject. (I'm only making this up if Tony Robinson was too.) Mike and his disbelieving and frankly rather suspicious not to say rather contemptuous daughters were shown chuckling over it all, when Robinson arrived to visit him with a film crew. Although, it's fair to add that Mike did take his ancestry seriously enough to possess his own chart, which luckily confirmed all of Robinson's conclusions about his ancestry.

It was a thoroughly enjoyable programme, and on the whole Robinson didn't try to make too much of things. By their own rules, the monarchs of England aren't as kosher as they would like. If those rules had worked out differently, things would have been different. That was what he was really saying. His main conclusion wasn't that Queen Elizabeth II should now be knocked off her throne. It was that we live in a rum old world.

After these shows ended, I went a-googling, and discovered the usual killjoy response to all such startling revelations, to the effect that This Is Nothing New:

I don't see anything there that hasn't already been thoroughly discussed here. Am I missing something?

Short answer: the Queen is Queen because of the Act of Settlement, not because of her descent from any Plantagenets, Tudors, or Stuarts.

If it could be proved that she wasn't legitimately descended from the Electress Sophia, then there would be something to talk about. But the chances of that are approximately nil. (DNA evidence wouldn't do it: legitimacy is a matter of law, not of biology. Not that I have any reason whatever to think the Queen is not descended from Sophia.)

And the Act of Settlement happened way after 1442 (in 1701), and on its own would appear to end this as a serious live issue, so to speak.

However, with my googling I also discovered something else, which is that Tony Robinson is a bigger cheese on the left hand side of current British politics than I had previously realised.

This makes sense. The real political punch that this programme packs is that it is yet another little tiny chip off the edifice that is the British monarchy in particular, another squirt of urine into the swimming pool of the Old Story of British history. It was a very small but definite dig in the ribs for all the sort of people who, until very recently, used to rule this country, by one of their successors – by one of the New Establishment, you might say. The Old Establishment got to be that by inheritance. The New Establishment who rule us now is a meritocracy, in its own eyes anyway, rather than a strictly hereditary class in the old sense. Others who don't love our New Establishment might prefer to call it something more like a Mediacracy or a Mediocracy or some such insult, but the point is, there has been a social discontinuity in recent British history, which is reflected in what often looks like a conscious effort by the New Establishment to piss all over the past. Robinson is no part of that, but he is clearly not averse to revising it.

It is only recently that the Royal Family have been declared fit subjects for serious regardless-of-where-it-leads investigation. I can remember when saying they were ridiculous was like saying that homosexuality is an abomination now. Forty years ago, I don't believe that TV shows like these would have been allowed to make it to our screens. Which is precisely one of the reasons why these programmes was made and shown now. (Another reason is that they were very entertaining.)

Personally I don't base my sense of Britishness, or Englishness, in any way whatsoever on whether Queen Elizabeth II is the rightful air to her throne. And if it weren't for the argument now raging about the sovereignty of my country as whole, in the form of the argument about whether Britain should be reduced to a clutch of little Euro-provinces, I would be an unambiguous anti-monarchist and pro-republican myself. However, given that debate, I have become more of a royalist than I've ever been before.

Because those who do take our Sovereign seriously tend also to take the sovereignty of our country seriously, these programmes will ever so slightly demoralise some of the people who now care about British sovereignty. And for that reason, ever so slightly, they demoralised me, despite being very entertaining, and indeed because they were so entertaining. In other words, although the idea of toppling the current Queen is not serious, these were still serious programmes, in the sense of still having a sort of current political agenda. (Metacontext?)

At the end of the second show, for example, Robinson tossed in the notion that had there been no bastard Edward, Britain might have remained catholic country, by which I assume he meant Roman Catholic. And Roman Catholicism is deeply embedded in the EUropean project, to the point where it almost makes sense to put that the other way around.

Robinson. Is that a Roman Catholic name I wonder?

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Last night, while wandering through Soho to a dinner party, I encountered these posters, in Berwick Street. Luckily I have taken – Perry de Havilland style – to carrying my Canon A70 digital camera with me at all times, so I was able to snap them. (Some other snaps of the Oxford Street Christmas lights were not nearly so successful, unless you are heavily into abstract impressionism.)

I do not know who put them up. Searching for visuals on the net is a lot harder than searching for strings of words or for organisations. For example I could find no trace of this poster here.

Still, a pleasing straw in the wind, I think.

There is a huge irony happening here, I think. Like it or not, there is a widespread – not universal but widespread – opposition in Britain to the Iraq war, and now to the presence of victorious British troops staying out there to try to win the peace. The opponents of this effort have done a great deal to spread the idea that Mr Blair is a man not to be trusted, and a man who doesn't listen to public opinion.

True or not, this charge, it now seems to me, is getting around, and is spilling over into the EUrope debate. The sense that, in matters EUropean also as well as Middle Eastern, Blair is pushing a personal and misguided agenda in defiance of the opinions or interests of his fellow countrymen, is becoming more and more dug in. Iraq = Blair can not be trusted and won't listen = Britain being in EUrope is dodgy too. The key to this series of public opinion dominoes, so to speak, is that there is a great non-political slab of people who, unlike the leftist opponents of the Iraq war and Iraq peace, are willing to apply the same thinking both to Iraq and to EUrope (and to everything else Mr Blair is doing or not doing), in sufficient numbers to make a difference.

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When it comes to anti-capitalist activism, the papier-mache puppet brigade are merely a bunch of blowhards and wannabes.

The true professionals are the ones who are not just chanting about it, they are actually doing it for real:

Euro-MPs awarded themselves a 30 per cent pay rise yesterday with no loss of their office perks.

Pay for British MEPs is to jump from £55,000 to £72,000 overnight, severing the link with their Westminster colleagues for the first time.

Must be a reward for all their increased hard work and productivity.

Spain's MEPs will double their salaries. Hungarian or Latvian MEPs will rise into the top tier of Europe's elite when they join the EU next year while their national colleagues must limp along on £6,500 and £7,600 a year respectively.

For all those people who are at a loss to understand why the satellites of the former Soviet Union are so eager to sign up to the Belgian Empire, now you know the answer. The loyalty of their political classes is bought and paid for.

Each MEP receives a tax-free £108,000 a year for staff expenses - used by almost half the British delegation to pay spouses, children and immediate kin, often doubling the family income.

The moonbats may be a reliable source of comedy, but they are not the real threat.

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Belmont Club has a couple of fascinating entries that mesh well with my last post on the tranzi menace. Collect the set!

I was particularly struck by the Club's take on the immediate post-9/11 tranzi reaction:

The curious antipathy of the Germany and France towards unilateral American action following September 11 was driven not by a sudden revulsion for American culture, but by the loss of something they deeply coveted: the means to exercise supranational police power under the aegis of international treaties. In the days following Osama Bin Laden's attack on New York, hopes ran high in Paris, Berlin and Moscow, that America in her grief would deposit her strength in the hands of the "international community" who, thus armed, promised to put a stop to terrorism and uproot its causes. To provide the violins, the capitals of Europe expressed the utmost sympathy for the American loss and deluged embassies with flowers and letters of support. "We are all Americans now". For a moment, matters hung on edge, the most critical instant in modern history. Then the haze passed, and America shook the expectant, extended hand and said "I'll take care of it myself". The response was immediate and incandescent. The internationalists rounded on America with as much hatred as the sympathy they had professed mere moments before.

As always, Belmont Club's full analysis of the prospects for the future shape of international order are worth pondering. The Club posits a bottom-up New World Order founded on common law that contrasts sharply with the top-down command-and-control vision of the transnational progressives.

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The transnational progressives have a new power grab underway - their attempt to seize control of the trial of Saddam Hussein and move it to the ICC or some other "international court." I think it would be a very serious mistake to indulge the tranzis on this issue, as it would serve to validate and legitimize the most noxious pillar of their ideology.

The transnational progressive movement has a consistent theme: that governments should be answerable primarily to some overarching international authority, rather than to their own citizens. The pernicious (and unstated) part of this theme is that last phrase - the tranzis never state, and may not even recognize, that as governments become more accountable to outside authorities, they become less accountable to their own citizens.

The EU project is certainly an attempt to implement this ideal, as was last year's attempt by the UN to control US foreign policy and military apparatus in the Iraqi, campaign. Readers will, I'm sure, be able to multiply examples, as the tranzis are nothing if not consistent in their top-down approach to accountability and control.

For the tranzis, the problem of rogue or abusive governments is not that such governments are too powerful and/or insufficiently accountable to their own citizen/subjects. After all, the source of legitimacy for this lot is not the consent of the governed; rather legitimacy can apparently only be conferred from above. Thus, the creation, from whole cloth, of international institutions such as the UN or International Criminal Court, so that there is a higher, transnational, authority to judge and confer legitimacy on the doings of national governments.

Of course, being made answerable to the "international community" (read: other governments) comes at the cost of being accountable to your own citizenry. This is the reason that the whole tranzi project is fundamentally corrupt, and corrupting. In my book, consent of the governed is the only source of legitimacy. Period. Discussion over. Turn out the lights as you leave. The tranzi project is corrosive of the consent of the governed, because it substitutes the consent of other governments for the consent of the governed.

The whole meme/dynamic is on full display in Iraq right now. The tranzis and their project are the long-term enemies of liberty, my friends, as much as or more so than your penny-ante domestic politician.

Many thanks to Tacitus for his rather more brutal assessment of the tranzi attempt to shove the Iraqis out of the way and seize control Saddam's fate, which got the juices flowing this morning.

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The French Government has reacted with fury to the news that Saddam Hussein has been captured by US forces.

Speaking to reporters in Paris this evening, the Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, denounced the arrest of the former Iraqi leader as 'an act of international piracy':

"Saddam Hussein has been kidnapped by America. You cannot simply seize and detain people without proper negotiations. The Americans should have given more thought beforehand. This situation requires the careful application of justice not cowboy tactics"

His words were echoed at a meeting of EU Ministers in Brussels this evening. Speaking on behalf of the assembled ministers, Dutch Commissioner Willy Van Der Pimp issued a warning to the Americans not to 'go it alone':

"If the Americans think that they alone can administer justice, then they are very mistaken. The international community will not tolerate being ignored in this fashion. Europe has a vital role to play in deciding the future of Saddam Hussein"

The Council of Ministers will meet again tomorrow in emergency session to draw up an action plan.

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But still under sentence of death.

That is why I have such mixed feelings about the apparent breakdown of talks to finalise an EU Constitution:

European leaders are playing down the scale of divisions at their Brussels summit that made it impossible for them to agree on a constitution for the EU.

The can play it up, down or any way they damn well please. This is not the end, merely a brief setback. There is far too much vested interest in this wretched process for it to be simply left at that.

Nor has this impasse been brought about by anything as welcome as reflection or second thoughts. Assuming any of the participants have ever read this monstrous charter, it is probably a stretch to assume that they have even given it a first thought. No, the bandwagon has been brought to a grinding halt by an intractable bunfight over their respective looting voting rights:

Negotiations broke down over how voting will work when the EU expands from 15 to 25 members in May.

Poland and Spain insisted on keeping voting rights already secured, while France and Germany want a system to reflect their bigger populations.

Glueing an entire continent into a permanent state of indenture will have them feverish to sign the dotted lines but fail to stroke their egos sufficiently in the process and they will make a brave stand. I have long since passed the point of expecting reason or common sense to prevail; there is not enough of either of those qualities among Europe's political classes to fill a thimble. But at least their over-arching need to all get their snouts in the trough has worked in our favour (albeit for now).

But, lest we forget, Mr Velveteen (and his huddle of Vichyites in the Foreign Office) is no better. He simply cannot wait to get this whole train back onto the tracks:

Tony Blair insisted, however, that the humiliating inability of heads of government to get beyond the first items on the summit agenda did not spell doom for the constitution. "We have got to find a way through. We have got the time to do it," he said.

If Mr Blair gets his way this country will cease to exist in any meaningful or material sense. We will have been delivered up as a mere component of a big, despotic, inescapable dirigiste asset-stripping operation. This is what he wants and he wants it more than anything else.

But why? Why does he want to assassinate this country? What is impelling him and this cadre of political fixers to want to drive a dagger through our hearts? If we can find the answers to those questions then maybe we have a means of turning this stay of execution into a true and lasting victory.

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I am reminded of an old, inscrutible Oriental saying: time is a slow but fair judge:

Less than half the population in the European Union's member states now support the EU project, according to polling results yesterday.

The latest Eurobarometer to be released this week found that just 48 per cent of EU citizens viewed membership as a "good thing", down from 54 per cent last spring.

Britain was by far the most negative state, with positive feelings tumbling to 28 per cent, but even the French were below half for the first time after months of battles with Brussels over tax cuts and illegal aid to ailing firms.

How long until George Bush scores a higher approval rating among Europeans than Brussels does?

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Just how long will the European Union last? Unarguably it is well dug in. Will it hang in there just long enough to condemn an entire continent to a painful and lingering death?

Few people are prepared to confront such a possibility or even entertain any such notion. Fortunately, one of those few is Ruth Lea:

The tectonic plates of the global economy are shifting. After a gap of several centuries, India and China are re-establishing themselves as major economic heavyweights. China, in particular, is becoming the "workshop of the world" and its economic rise will be as significant as the USA's arrival on the global scene in the 19th century.

We may complain as jobs are "exported" to these emerging colossi but, whether we complain or not, this seismic shift is occurring and we cannot ignore it. The need to remain internationally competitive is becoming ever more critical for all the "western" economies.

I have little doubt that the US, with its "can-do" entrepreneurial attitudes and enormous economic power will continue to make the grade. But I am increasingly unsure that this can be said about the major euro-zone economies or even, in my darkest moments, Britain. After all, over the past five to six years, Britain has been slipping down the competitiveness league tables compiled by the World Economic Forum and the International Institute for Management Development reflecting higher taxes, heavier regulations and poor public services.

Government policymakers, while singing the praises of enterprise, competitiveness and high productivity, have undermined them all. The EU's regulatory zeal has undoubtedly played a significant role in damaging British competitiveness. Over the past six years, one of British business's greatest complaints about Government policy has been the rapid increase in the number and complexity of employment regulations.

And, as if right on cue, yet another set of Brussels-mandated employment regulations comes into effect in the UK today.

I like to think of myself as a reasonably articulate man but even I am struggling to find the language sufficient to convey the bone-headed stupidity of this:

From 1 December, employers will be liable for tackling discrimination against employees, agency and other workers on grounds of sexual orientation (whether heterosexual, gay or lesbian or bisexual).

From 2 December it will also be unlawful to discriminate on the grounds of religion, religious belief or similar philosophical belief.

Why the one-day delay? Did they think it would provide an opportunity for everyone to shout "You Buddhist bastard" across the office one last time before such uncharitable sentiments become actionable?

And just what are 'similar philsophical beliefs' supposed to be? Atheism? Satanism? Communism? I bet capitalism is excluded.

Indirect discrimination can arise if the employer operates working practices or policies or rules which have the effect of disadvantaging people of a particular sexual orientation or religion or belief, unless they can justify them.

Employers who have yet to consider the implications of this new legislation should do so without delay.

They will need to review a range of policies and internal processes (ranging from recruitment through to the provision of remuneration and benefits packages and the conduct of disciplinary and grievance procedures).

Just as important will be to look at the often unwritten rules and arrangements which govern the day to day conduct and management of staff within the workplace.

For example, do catering and social arrangements create any disadvantage for those with special dietary requirements or who do not consume alcohol on religious grounds?

Do holiday arrangements adequately cater for those wishing to take annual leave to coincide with religious festivals and how are these to be dealt with when they clash with business needs?

It will not be enough for employers to pay lip service to these new regulations, by adding references to religion, belief and sexual orientation, in their equal opportunities policies.

Employers should give active consideration to the impact their workplace practices may have on their staff and encourage openness so that concerns may be raised and addressed.

Is that all? Anything else? Are they quite sure they haven't left anything to chance? As if our commercials concerns aren't already creaking to breaking point under the weight of bureaucratic red-tape, this whole, heaping, helping of adult babysitting has been shovelled into their laps as well.

If neurotic, hyper-sensitive, mischievous, gold-digging employees are already a ticking bomb in any organisation then the EU has just lit the fuse. Not only have such people been given pretty much carte blanche to wreak their worst but employers (who will, not unreasonably, fear the worst) will have to exercise such despotic control over their own employees words, actions and thoughts that every workplace is going to resemble a re-education camp. And they have they eye-popping nerve to say:

The spirit of the legislation is to encourage tolerance and consideration amongst work colleagues.

Deliberately and wantonly engineered fear and paranoia is much closer to the mark. Which will be followed by poverty and rapid decline as exhausted employers, staring ruin in the face, decide to up sticks and piss off to Asia where they will not be slowly asphyxiated by a permanent ruling class who will sorely miss them once they have gone.

Or perhaps they won't. Perhaps their myopia is so advanced and deep-rooted that, even while the economy crumbles around them, they will furrow their brows, scratch their heads, shrug Gallically and spend their dying days huddled around candlelight, eating dry biscuits and wondering how on earth it all went so wrong.

But, over to Ms Lea again:

Unless attitudes change, regulatory burdens are lifted and more free market policies are adopted, Europe's future is bleak, especially when the demographic factors are considered.

A change of attitude?! Don't anybody hold their breath. The kind of people who cooked up this latest regulatory loon-fest are unlikely to be persuaded by anything as unsophisticated as merciless reality. I do honestly believe that they will go sailing gently into the eternal darkness of oblivion, wailing pathetically about the unfairness of it all and blaming their predicament on capitalism, George Bush and the Jews.

Over to Ms.Lea, finally:

In a recent report, the Paris-based Institut Franais des Relations Internationales concluded that, unless the EU changed its policies, it "will weigh less heavily on the process of globalisation and a slow but inexorable movement on to 'history's exit ramp' is foreseeable." And the constitution will help it on its way. It really is no laughing matter.

It is for the Chinese and the Indians. They will be laughing all the way to the bank.

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The past is not another country, it is another world.

Remember all that strutting triumphalism of the EU enthusiasts? Remember their blustering certitude and stainless steel non-stick bravura? The European Union was unstoppable, invincible and the wave of the future. It was an historically-inevitable behemoth gearing up to straddle the globe and lock all of mankind into its eternal Bonapartist embrace.

Soon there would not be so much as a single molecule on the face of the earth that would not be regulated by Brussels. Resistance was futile and dissent was pointless. It was written in stone. The European union will conquer the known universe!

That was then.

This is now:

There is no doubt that 2004 ought to have been a great year, the year East Europeans became full members of a revived, streamlined and more democratised European Union. Instead, Europe is in its worst shape for years.

There is only so much battering, criticism and friendlessness any institution can take before it breaks. Europe is no different.

Victory is within sight. Just one, big, final push and we can send the whole rotten edifice crashing down.

[My thanks to Peter Briffa for the link.]

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Exactly a week ago, last Friday evening, I attended a discussion at the home of CNE boss Tim Evans, one of his Putney Debates. Alex Singleton spoke eloquently about what a fine thing free markets are and how difficult it is for the government to do as well.

Also present at the discussion was a long-time friend of London libertarianism by the name of Bruce. Bruce has been living in Spain for the last decade or so, but is now back in London, and during the discussion he said something very interesting which stuck in my mind, and which I now realise deserves the attention of this blog.

For as along as I can remember, whenever we've met up, Bruce has been telling me that the Spaniards have had a much more sensible attitude towards the EU than the British, which is that if they don't like any particular EUro-regulation or EUro-imposition, they just ignore it. Why, he would ask, can't the British just learn to do the same? That's a sentiment I think we've heard here quite a lot also, whenever we've been arguing about the nuances of the EU.

This time, however, he said something different. Apparently, in Spain, a class of pestilential busybodies who take EUro-stupidity seriously is starting to form and to make its pestilential presence felt, and the Spaniards are starting to notice this, and to get rather fidgety. To put it another way, instead of the sensible Spanish practice – of ignoring all this EUro-nonsense and just carrying on baking bread, fishing for fish, being a bit rude to the occasional ethnic minority, driving as they please, dodging VAT, and so on and so on, the way they always have – spreading to Britain, the British practice, of taking all such drivel seriously, on account of it being the law and all that, is now spreading to Spain. And my guess would be, this tendency isn't confined to Spain.

This official bEUrocratic infestation process, if it is indeed happening, strikes me as a lot more significant than the grumbling that is now occurring throughout the Euro area about inflation, because this 'inflation' could just be a one-off effect from the switch from the local currencies to the Euro. Yes, prices have gone up a gut-wrenching amount, and a lot more than is being officially admitted, but presumably that effect will calm down, and in due course be forgotten. But this hideous tribe of meddling EUro-despots look like being a permanent and ever-growing presence, and the hatred of them seems likely only to grow and grow.

I don't have any links to stories which might back up any of this, but of course commenters may well be able to correct that omission.

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Low cost airline RyanAir is a subject that gets mixed feelings from this blog's different contributors. Their latest problem is an EU ruling that affects their French and Belgian operations from the British Isles because the preferential rates offered to RyanAir amount to a state subsidy (funny how state subsidies to farmers do not seem to get the same response, eh?) because the airports in question are all state owned:

The airport is owned by the Walloon regional government, which approved grants worth an estimated £5 million a year to subsidise landing and handling charges and marketing costs. Ryanair pays a landing fee 85 per cent lower than the list price. However, since the airline's arrival, the annual passenger "throughput" at Charleroi has risen eight-fold to nearly two million, sharply boosting the local economy.

[...]

Managers say they would adopt the same approach for other publicly-owned airports. Negotiations are already under way with a dozen private alternatives. Some European countries, such as Italy, Germany and Sweden, have a significant number of non-state airports, but not France.

The solution is screamingly obvious. Privatise all the frigging airports in Belgium and France and the problem goes away! Duh.

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And quite eminent men to boot:

A powerful cross-party group of peers will seek today to begin a national debate on whether Britain should stay in the European Union by demanding a parliamentary investigation into the economic benefits of membership.

Their action reflects a growing feeling in the House of Lords that withdrawal from the EU might be preferable to signing up to a new European constitution that would erode British sovereignty.

They may not get the debate they want as it is highly likely to be scuppered. Even if they get the debate they want it may not produce the result they want. And even if it does produce the result they want said result will have no legal or political effect whatsoever.

But it will have an effect, albeit a marginal one.

To date, the idea of British withdrawal from the EU has been unthinkable in any respectable circles. It is the Great British Political Taboo. Discuss our relations with Europe by all means and criticise the EU if you must but suggest we pull out?!! Are you mad?

But the problem with taboos of this nature is that they will not bend so they can only break and it only takes a few people to start thinking the unthinkable before they begin to look fragile. If people start saying the unthinkable (and keep saying it) then it is only a matter of time before the cracks begin to appear.

We are not there yet. Not even close. But if more people just keep talking publicly about withdrawal then that emboldens others to do the same and eventually the drip, drip effect begins to eat away at the consensus. What starts as a few whispered heresies can grow into a chorus of raucous disapproval.

So, more and faster please.

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De Great White Colonial Adminstrator, Tony Blair, him be most worried about stirring up de natives:

British diplomats have appealed to France not to hold a referendum on the new European constitution to avoid embarrassing Tony Blair.

One high-ranking British official has privately told senior French diplomats that it would be "unhelpful" to Mr Blair if Jacques Chirac, the French president, decided to go ahead with a poll in France.

Massa Blair, de Great White Bwana From Across De Seas must jealously guard his God-like status among de native chillens.

Mr Blair said: "In my view, because it does not involve a fundamental change between the member states and the European Union, I do not believe that we should have a referendum on this issue."

De Great White Chief Has Spoken! But....

The proposed EU constitution would create a permanent EU president and EU foreign minister to speak on behalf of Europe. It would also give the EU new powers to harmonise legal systems across Europe, and end the national veto on home affairs issues, such as asylum and immigration.

Aha! So Blair Sahib he speak de truth! Now we serve de Massas in Whitehall but when de new constitution come to pass, we just serve de Massas in Brussels. So no fundamental change den!

Great is de mighty wisdom of de White Bwanas From Across de Seas.

[To de reader named 'cats.whiskers', a big 'Asante' for dis link.]

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It is hard to know what to make of this:

Gordon Brown celebrated his return to politics yesterday by firing a shot across the bows both of Brussels and Tony Blair. Perhaps the Chancellor has found the time while on paternity leave to read the 250 pages of the draft European constitution. Mr Brown evidently does not agree with his neighbour in Number 10 that the constitution is a mere "tidying-up exercise". On the contrary, he is obviously alarmed by the text agreed by the constitutional convention, which extends EU competence into areas of economic policy hitherto jealously guarded by the Treasury.

The only thing I am sure of is that it does not mean exactly what it says. My tentative take on it is not that Brown dislikes a regulated economy/society per se, but rather than he insists on being the one doing the regulating. The guy is hardly a free market capitalist after all and neither is he much of a nationalist. Maybe he feels that as Kinnock already has his snout highly placed in the EU's trough, there will not be room enough for another 'big beast' such as himself and thus he is stuck with maintaining his looting rights via obsolescent old Westminster.

Alternatively, could it is just a ploy to demonstrate that there is a 'vibrant Euro-sceptic wing in the Labour Party' and thus forestall natural Labour supporters from feeling they have to vote a revitalised (ha!) Tory Party under Count Drac... Michael Howard, given that Brown is making it clear that "Labour is not entirely in the pocket of Brussels". Are Labour's strategists really that clever though? Not sure.

Cynical? Moi?

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I have been struggling to find a slick way to use the phrase the 'gobbledegook' in this sorry little saga but however I stack it, it still sounds clunky.

Let's just say, as ye sow so shall ye reap. [From the UK Times.]

TURKEY farmers are barricading their premises to prevent the spread of a savage disease after Brussels banned the only drug that can eradicate it. Ten million turkeys being reared for the £100 million Christmas trade are at risk from blackhead (Histomanos meleagridis), which can destroy entire flocks.

The disease, which enters the gut of birds and attacks their liver, has broken out in France, Germany and the Netherlands and farmers fear that it will be carried into Britain by migrating birds. East Anglia and Kent are particularly vulnerable.

Two predictions:

1. It will transpire that this drug was banned as a result of ferocious lobbying by the enviro-mentalists.

2. The EUnuchs will try and find some way to blame this whole farrago on the Americans in general and George Bush in particular.

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The Sunday Telegraph reports on yet another example of the EU 'standards':

It was reported last week that an Austrian farmer, Johann Thiery, had been fined and threatened with prison for selling "apricot marmalade" made from a traditional Austrian recipe passed on by his grandmother. Under EU rules "marmalade" can only be made from citrus fruit. Sternly defending Mr Thiery's punishment, a European Commission spokesman said: "The law is the law."

Next day Pedro Solbes, the EU's economics commissioner, was reported as defending the right of France and Germany to run up huge budget deficits, in flagrant breach of the Growth and Stability Pact. "Given the circumstances we face," he said, "it would be unwise to follow the letter of the law."

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Last week I linked from White Rose to this piece by Jemima Lewis in the Telegraph, because it contained some stuff of White Rose relevance about using technology to enable parents to keep track of their kids.

But, as commenter Mark Ellott pointed out there, this Telegraph piece also contained some interesting reflections on the teaching of history, provoked by the increasing annoyance being expressed by Germans about Britain's continuing obsession with the history of Nazism to the exclusion of any other sort of history.

Our Education Minister, the big-eared Mr Clarke, has been using his big ears to listen to his German opposite number Edelgard Buhlman, tell him that:

… our fixation with Hitler is leaving British teenagers with a distorted view of German history, and a violent prejudice against the Teutonic race.

A lot of the problem, says Lewis, is that children don't learn history dates any more. I think she's probably right. When I was about eight or nine I had a vast set of history dates dinned into me – with my enthusiastic cooperation I should add – and I've been fascinated by history, all history, any I could lay my hands on that was fun and made any sense, ever since. My only regret is that the list I imbibed wasn't bigger and more global in its scope. I should guess that much the same applies to many of the regular readers of this blog. How can you understand history without getting a handle on the basic stuff that it happens in, namely time?

Yet this boringly chronological approach to history teaching was, Ms. Lewis tells us, abandoned in the 1970s for a more pick-and-mix, bring-it-alive and never-mind-when-exactly-it-happened approach to history, and the only bit that kids now want to pick is The Nazis.

This is not a matter of opinion, but of fact. An Ofsted report earlier this year confirmed that British pupils spend more time learning about the Nazis than any other period of history. Meanwhile, one survey after another suggests that our broader historical knowledge is dying out. The statistics are hair-raising. More than half of Britons are unaware that America used to be a British colony; 55 per cent believe that Elizabeth I introduced curry to this country; 17 per cent of teenagers cannot even guess in which century the First World War took place.

Never mind the Tudors and the Stuarts and the Industrial Revolution and the Suffragettes, what we want is Hitler!

Now that they can – and do – choose to spend almost every lesson poring over the evil deeds of history's most infamous homicidal maniac, the evidence suggests that they love it. As one teacher bemoaned last week: "If you try to avoid him, the pupils say: 'I was only doing history to study the Nazis.' " But a diet of unleavened Hitler is no good for anyone. We need to see the broader sweep of things.

But for me there is a huge irony here. For ask yourself this: why is Mr Clarke so anxious to de-Nazify the teaching of history in Britain? And why are German politicians making such a fuss about this issue? I'm sure that part of the answer is that they just are, and that as time goes by, the thing just gets more and more embarrassing and uncouth.

But I think that the EU is involved here. If a generation of Brits has now grown up thinking that "Europe equals Hitler", that could be the popular opinion half of a British pincer movement against British EU provincehood, the other half being British elite hesitations. For as long as the "bloody Huns" view of history was confined to the old geezers who had actually fought against the Huns, then that sentiment could simply be left to die out with the old warriors. But now, it turns out, this sentiment is not dying out. The kids hate the Huns too! Indeed, that's the only thing about the past that they're sure of.

We are told again and again that British public opinion is now unchangeably against British becoming a province of the new EUropean nation that they are busily forging on the continent, to the point where this public opinion might not merely vote against the EU constitution if granted the opportunity, but actually vote for such an opportunity in the meantime. Where did this opinion come from? Might the "Hitlerisation" of British history teaching not be one of the big the culprits?

Ms. Lewis says that "a diet of unleavened Hitler is no good for anyone". But if you are the type, as I am, who believes that Britain should shake itself free from EUro-provincehood, might you not reckon that the collapse of that more nuanced and informed and less melodramatic presentation of History – of History with lots of history dates and with that "broad sweep", as Ms. Lewis terms it – turn out to have been … rather a good thing?

How huge an irony would that be? The very people who have worked hardest to beat British national pride out of Britain, namely the teaching profession and the theorisers of teaching who have been guiding them, have ended up with a kind of History that says only one thing: Germany bollocks!! Don't want nothing to do with them bastards!!! As a result these anti-historical history persons, mostly rabidly pro-EU on anti-British grounds, could be achieving what looked impossible as recently as only a decade ago, namely the saving of Britain from permanent EUro-subjugation.

Lefty bastard enemies of British History, we hail you, the savours of British national independence.

Or, as Instapundit would say: Heh.

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What a sorry state of affairs, when we are reduced to hoping that the Queen of England, a monarch, will prove to be the bulwark of liberty against the encroaching EU superstate.

The Queen is growing more concerned about Tony Blair's plans to sign a European constitution that she fears could undermine her role as sovereign.

The Telegraph has learnt that Buckingham Palace has asked for documents highlighting the constitutional implications of the EU's plans to be sent to her advisers.

It is believed that the Palace's concerns focus on whether the Queen's supreme authority as the guardian of the British constitution, asserted through the sovereignty of Parliament, could be altered or undermined by article 10 of the draft text.

This states: "The constitution and law adopted by the union's institutions in exercising competences conferred on it shall have primacy over the law of the member states."

Many MPs say that this will rob the House of Commons of its ultimate authority to override decisions and laws made by the EU.

I love that "many MPs." I mean, it isn't like they are making their interpretation up out of thin air. Isn't that what the damn thing says in so many words?

So, fill in this American on what, if anything, the Queen can do to toss a spanner in the works. I tend to believe that liberty is preserved when power is dispersed through competing authorities. Does the old girl still have the stuff to make a difference?

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So much for European unity:

Seven out of ten German voters would reject the euro if they were given the chance, a new poll has shown.

Maybe surprisingly, it is younger Germans that are the most eurosceptic, with 73 percent of 18-24 year olds saying they would reject the euro.

The poll also showed that French voters would reject the euro, but by a much more slender margin (approximately 51-49). This has provoked fears that French voters may use a referendum on the Constitution to voice their concerns about the euro.

Nothing surprising to me. The European Union is yesterday's solution to the day before's problem. It is a sullen, unloved political dinosaur fixed only by a combination of political inertia and the career-ambitions of a cossetted technocratic cadre. It is doomed.

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More 'social justice' from Brussels.

[From UK Times]

WITH business-class air fares paid and an all-day limousine service on tap, Euro MPs had only to pay for the taxi home after dining out in Brussels’ vaunted restaurants. Now they have eliminated even that small cost.

Blithely ignoring charges of "moral corruption", MEPs have voted to give themselves an allowance of up to €50 (£34) a week to cover the cost of getting back to their Brussels pads after the free limousine service ends at 10pm.

It's the concern for the poor and needy that makes European politics so progressive.

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I believe this is not the last story of this sort we will see coming out of Brussels:

[Robert McCoy] has worked for the European Union for more than 30 years. His friends regard him as an upright and loyal bureaucrat, keen to uphold the EU's name against its critics, whether in Brussels or back home in Britain.

Yet Robert McCoy must steel himself before he walks the corridors of his own EU institution. If he is lucky, senior colleagues at the glass and concrete headquarters of the Committee of the Regions - a Brussels talking-shop for local government representatives, set up under the Maastricht Treaty - merely ignore him, turning their heads ostentatiously as he passes.

If not, he may be on the receiving end of abuse. "Gestapo! Gestapo!" angry fellow workers once taunted him. One manager spat on the floor as he walked by, friends say.

As the Telegraph reports Mr McCoy's offence - as it was apparently regarded by some EU staff and politicians - was to stumble upon, investigate and then seek to correct a series of financial irregularities within the Committee of the Regions (CoR), whose annual budget is €38 million (£27 million).

Last week, Romano Prodi and Neil Kinnock insisted that since EU commissioners were ignorant of Eurostat's problems until this year, they could not be held responsible for what happened earlier. The frauds, and the culture that permitted them, were a one-off and had long since ended, Mr Prodi assured MEPs during a tense closed-door meeting in Strasbourg on Thursday.

In a devastating letter to a senior MEP, seen by The Telegraph, Mr McCoy details his three-year campaign to stamp out suspected fraud within the CoR, and his vain attempts to persuade senior managers to summon outside expertise to investigate the problems.

His inside account, and documents obtained by members of the European Parliament's budgetary control committee, reveals an approach by some EU officials which helps explain how at least ?3 million (£2 million) could disappear from the coffers of an organisation like Eurostat without anyone noticing - or complaining.

I felt that I had repeatedly hit a brick wall in my efforts to do my job. I have nowhere else to turn, having exhausted all administrative and political avenues available to me within the CoR.

After Mr McCoy sought the official attendance sheets to make a spot check on the signatures, the Secretary General angrily rebuked him. "Robert, I am very displeased with this affair," Mr Falcone wrote in an e-mail which has circulated among MEPs. "The Financial Controller is not the police." One can only speculate why the officials in charge reacted with hostility rather than reward his for a job well done. McCoy comments:

We now know that there have been huge problems at Eurostat over many years, caused by the same kind of culture that I have encountered at the CoR. Who knows how many other EU institutions are similarly affected?

A rather late and rude awakening for Mr McCoy. The rot goes to the heart of the institution, there can be no perestroika.

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ATTN: THE SAMIZDATA TEAM
FROM: THE HONOURABLE PRESIDENT
OF THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION, ROMANO PRODI

Dear Sir/Madam,

Good day Sirs. I hope my letter does not cause you too much embarrassment as I write to you in good faith and the transaction is of mutual benefit. Based on the contact address given to me by a friend who works at the Nigerian chamber of commerce attached to your embassy in my country.

Please excuse my intrusion into your private life. I am Romano Prodi, the appointed President of the European Commission and my friends and I are in danger of losing a lot of money due to vindictive investigators and their friends in the media who are bent on ruining us financially. Consequently, my friends in the Commission have asked me to seek for a foreign partner who can work with us to move out the total sum of €75,000,000.00 ( seventy five million Euros), presently in their possession.

This money was of course, acquired by my friends through hard work and enterprise. The Swiss government has already frozen all our accounts in Switzerland, and some other countries would soon follow to do the same.

This bid by some political rivals to deal with this my friends and I has made it necessary that we seek your assistance in receiving this money and in investing it on behalf of our behalf. This must be a joint venture transaction and we must all work together. Since this money is still in cash, extra security measures have been taken to protect it from theft or seizure, pending when agreement is reached on when to move it into a secure and anonymous territory pending on our agreement.

I have personally worked out all modalities for the peaceful conclusion of this transaction. The transaction definitely would be handled in phases and the first phase will involve the moving of €25,000,000.00 (twenty five million Euros).

My friends are willing to give you a reasonable percentage of this money as soon as the transaction is concluded. It will, however, be based on the grounds that you are willing to work with us and also all contentious issues being discussed before the commencement of this transaction. You may also discuss your percentage before we start to work. As soon as I hear from you, I will give you all necessary details as to how we intend to carry out the whole transaction. Please, do not entertain any fears, as all necessary modalities are in place, and I assure you of all success and safety in this transaction.

Please, this transaction requires absolute confidentiality and you would be expected to treat it as such until the funds are moved out of Europe to where you intend to receive them.

In compliance with this you are to forward to me the following details: your complete names and addresses, confidential telephone and fax numbers, bank account details and all relevant account numbers. This is to enable me perfect all the necessary documentation with the security firm and move this money across to your country of choice.

Please, you will also ignore this letter and respect our trust in you by not exposing this transaction, even if you are not interested.

I look forwards to working with you. Thank you.

Truly Yours

Romano Prodi.

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Please, prepare yourselves for a shock. Sit down on a comfortable chair and secure that goldfish. For I'm about to rock your world. Yes, friends, some EU corruption has been discovered within the gilded halls of Strasbourg.

I know, it beggers belief, but there it is. Millions of €uros have apparently been diverted into slush funds to pay for holidays, freebies, and extravagant dinners. So, who are the thieves? This money was allegedly stolen by the EU's own number crunchers. Whisper it quietly to your friends, but apparently they left no audit trail, too! Quelle horreur! And some of the money stolen was used to form a volleyball team! Crikey.

I was sitting on the train, this morning, minding my own business, and this story hove into view. It was such a non-event, such a non-story, that at first it completely passed me by. For I was under the mistaken impression that the entire EU budget already was a giant slush fund, for useless bureaucrats such as Neil Kinnock to dip their greedy snouts into. But I was wrong. Apparently, it is just the EU number crunchers who are corrupt! Thank goodness for that. I've been labouring under a misapprehension, all this time.

Fortunately, EU officials have said a full judicial inquiry will establish whether senior number crunching staff have indeed stolen EU funds. No doubt the results from this inquiry will be swift, and the punishments severe. Let's hope they make some of these naughty number crunchers fly business class, for a change, rather than first class. For at least a whole week. They deserve nothing less.

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I don't know about Denmark but it sounds as if there is something rather rotten going on in the state of Italy according to this report in the UK Times:

ROMANS are to be offered cut-price family meals in a novel attempt by the city’s authorities to curb inflation that has plagued Italy since the introduction of euro notes and coins at the beginning of last year.

The scheme, called Shopping Sport, starts on October 1 in the city’s 140 street markets. Stallholders will be asked to offer shoppers a basket containing enough ingredients to make a meal for four people, including meat or fish, vegetables and dessert, for €12 (£8.34).

Restaurants, bars, hairdressers, garages, plumbers and supermarkets have also been asked to join the campaign. For example, restaurants will be expected to offer a starter, a pizza and a pudding for €12 — and it should be possible to get a morning cappuccino and croissant for €1.50 (£1.05). The authorities will publish a list of the businesses taking part.

Begging your pardon and all that, but doesn't that sound an awful lot like price-fixing?

Newspapers run stories almost daily on the "real" inflation rate, which some put as high as 30%. Even everyday items such as bread and milk have risen by 16% and a bus ticket by 29% since December 2001, according to Consumer’s Contract, a group that lobbies for consumers’ rights.

Italians voted with their purses last week, staging a consumer "strike" in which as many as 40% of people were reported to have taken part in some areas. Further action is planned around Christmas. Some shops also shut for the day in a sign of solidarity with their customers.

And doesn't that sound an awful lot like galloping inflation?

So galloping inflation and price-fixing. Isn't that precisely the kind of Banana Republic economics that the introduction of the single currency was supposed to banish?

[My thanks to The Philosophical Cowboy for the link.]

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Polly Toynbee poses the agonising question of the day:

Why are citizens everywhere dangerously inclined to stick two fingers up at Brussels if given the chance?

Because citizens are dangerous, Polly, they're so dangerous. Stop giving them all these chances.

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I feel a bit like the photographer sent to take snaps of village wedding for the local newspaper and who came back saying that there wasn't story, because the bride didn't show up.

I decided to check out the other BBC website (the tax-funded one) to see what convulsions the anti-euro vote from Sweden had caused.

The result was this rather unbalanced series of postings, supporting the Swedish NO result.

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At the risk of inviting opprobrium, I must admit that the murder of Anna Lindh did have me reaching for the tin-foil to wrap around my head.

Even with the solid support of the entire Swedish political class, the 'yes' camp was still trailing the 'no' camp in every single opinion poll and it did briefly cross my mind that a 'heroic sacrifice' might have been arranged to swing the vote. The stakes here are certainly high enough.

But, on balance, probably not. Political assassination is common enough in Europe not to have to ascribe a conspiracy to this one. Even if there was more to her murder than meets the eye, it didn't work. The Swedes voted 'no' to the Euro.

On any reading this is a blow for the EU project and the coming weeks will see a deluge of federast seething, threatening and whining. Their will has been thwarted and that it just intolerable. They will even try to float the notion that the result of the Swedish referendum was 'undemocratic'. I also expect the Swedish government to begin agitating for another referendum to get the desired result but, given the margin of the 'no' victory, they may not get away with that.

Quite aside from all the furore and recriminations that are bound to follow, I wonder if this could be the catalyst which leads to the unravelling of the whole project. It isn't very likely but neither is it altogether impossible. In fact, I quite like the idea of a 'Euro-Watch' sweepstake: who will be the first to bail out of the Euro?

For the record, my money (sterling!) is on the French. The Germans will stick with it because they have always had an emotional investment in the European project. It enables them to be 'Europeans' and thus serves to expiate their guilt about being German. They will endure a lot more economic pain before they begin to think the unthinkable.

But not the French. For them, the EU has always been about advancing their national interests. All the kumbaya mummery about a united Europe is just window-dressing to disguise the self-serving reality. If it looks like wrecking their economy (or, more particularly, it begins biting into the privileges of the political class) the French will simply dump the Euro and swan off to look for another boondoggle.

Not inevitable by any means, but possible. In anticipation, I would like to extend my thanks to the Swedish electorate. They may just have done us a great favour.

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It's around 8 pm London time, and so far the result is only in the form of exit polls, but it looks, touch wood, as if Sweden has voted NO to the EUro.

An exit poll suggests that Sweden has narrowly voted to reject the euro, in a referendum days after the killing of Foreign Minister Anna Lindh.

The Swedish television poll of 7,000 people gives the No side 51.8% to the Yes side's 46.2%.
Preliminary results are expected at 1930 GMT (2130 local time), one-and-a-half hours after polls closed.

Lindh was the main face of the Yes campaign, and her stabbing in a Stockholm department store appeared to trigger a last-minute sympathy vote.

Anna Lindh murdered. The Swedish establishment united in favour of the EUro. Yet still they couldn't bully it through.

The establishment here is anything but united if favour of the EUro, so this result means that Britain is that much more unlikely to be joining it in the foreseeable future. So this is a big blow to the entire project.

I've been watching a EUro-yes-man on the TV saying that if Britain stays out of the EUro, that means that we'll be in the same silly position as we've been in for the last fifty years, namely playing "catch-up". We will eventually, grudgingly, joining a EUro-institution which we had very little part in shaping. But that's a double-edged argument, because there is another way for Britain to be more decisive about the EU as a whole. We could get the hell right out of it. We wouldn't be playing catch-up then, would we? The chances are, if the EU doesn't meanwhile improve its economic policies, that we'd be the ones they'd then be trying to catch up with. Which is why I've never understood this argument that non-membership of the EU, or of the EUro, will diminish Britain's power. Do you reckon that Sweden today is having no major impact upon the European Union?

Did Hong Kong, by "staying out of China" for so long, have no influence on China, just because its political bosses didn't constantly share dinners with Red China's bosses and constantly get told what to do by them, in exchange for the occasional "concession", concerning, I don't know, not locking up dissidents for a few more years? Did Hong Kong, by "going it alone", thereby deny to itself "power"?

Meanwhile Estonia, in contrast, is definitely voting YES to joining the European Union as a whole, by a big margin. Having visited Estonia for several days about twelve years ago, I know all about that place. They were dead set on getting into the EU then, and on paying whatever was the price of entry, basically to protect themselves against any future that Russians might one day dream up for them. So it's no surprise to me that this is still their majority attitude now. And if they don't get any protection against Russia, they'll leave the EU and look for another club to join.

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There has not been much discussion in the blog world that I have seen of late about the British government's apparent fierce determination to make us sign up to the proposed EU Constitution. While we ponder the difficulties of trying to establish some form of piece and liberty in Iraq, we ought to think a bit more about the threat to our liberties nearer to home.

Unlike some EU sceptics and foreign policy isolationists, I don't elevate national sovereignty into some kind of religion. The only sovereignty I recognise is that over my own person. I take the practical view that if we are to try to reverse the trend towards ever bigger government, it will be even harder to achieve such a task at pan-European level than at the national one. In the UK we do - in a rough fashion - have a shared political tradition, a common language, and a broadly similar culture. While multi-lingual political unions are conceivable, they are not, as far as I can see, easily sustainable without a lot of positive factors such as shared cultural and economic interests, and so forth.

The fine print of the EU constitution is not the sort of thing to get voters charged up. But I have a sickly feeling in my stomach that unless the process is stopped very soon, we will wake up to find that the juggernaut of the State is even more resistant to control than ever before. Time is running short.

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As mentioned by R. C. Dean in an earlier article, the fact that EU policy is a major contributor to poverty in the Third World is finally starting to attract the attention it deserves. Many of Samizdata.net's contributors have written in the past about the true price of protectionism and just who pays it.

Well now the The Centre for the New Europe has released a devastating paper that shows the claims of the Euro-statist elite to care for the world's 'have-nots' for what they are: complete lies

Key Findings

• 6,600 people die every day in the world because of the trading rules of the EU. That is 275 people every hour.
  
• In other words, one person dies every 13 seconds somewhere in the world - mainly in Africa - because the European Union does not act on trade as it talks.
  
• If Africa could increase its share of world trade by just one per cent, it would earn an additional £49 billion a year. This would be enough to lift 128 million people out of extreme poverty. The EU's trade barriers are directly responsible for Africa's inability to increase its trade and thus for keeping Africa in poverty.
  
• If the poorest countries as a whole could increase their share of world exports by five per cent, that would generate £248 billion or $350 billion, raising millions more out of extreme poverty.

The complete paper can be downloaded from the main CNE site

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The Grauniad (of all papers) continues its libertarian crusade for free trade, slamming the EU's continued protectionism of ag markets:

The European commission yesterday launched a ferocious attack on poor countries and development campaigners when it dismissed calls for big cuts in Europe's farm protection regime as extreme demands couched in "cheap propaganda".

In a move that threatens to shatter the fragile peace ahead of next week's trade talks in Cancun, Mexico, Franz Fischler, the EU agriculture commissioner, said Brussels would strongly defend its farmers.

Note the condescending tone of the EUnik leading the charge on this one. Is it something they actually screen for? Is it in the water in Brussels?

"If I look at the recent extreme proposal co-sponsored by Brazil, China, India and others, I cannot help [getting] the impression that they are circling in a different orbit," Mr Fischler reporters.

"If they want to do business, they should come back to mother earth. If they choose to continue their space odyssey they will not get the stars, they will not get the moon, they will end up with empty hands."

Perhaps the big plus for free traders in all this is that this issue is not being posed as multinational corporations v. defenseless working class slobs (as antiglobalism is usually set up in the US), or as noble social democracies v. the evil capitalist US, but rather is put forth as poor and starving people v. coddled and protected industry.

Still, its a shame that it looks like the Doha round of negotiations will wither on the vine.

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I am a skeptic of opinion polls but they have their uses. A recent poll suggests that Swedish voters are so far likely to say no to the single currency in the forthcoming referendum on whether Sweden should or should not sign up to The Project.

Notwithstanding the occasional wrinkle in official economic data, it seems pretty clear that the "core" nations of Euroland - Germany and France - are mired in economic difficulty and their labours are hardly likely to make it easier for the Swedish political elite to sell the euro to their electorate.

Meanwhile, the Daily Telegraph reports that the ongoing wrangle about whether UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and his government "sexed up" the dossier about Iraq WMDs has so damaged the public's perception of Blair that a referendum on the euro looks farther away than ever.

Here's hoping.

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Our good friend Dr.Sean Gabb is currently in Sweden where he is exercising his estimable talents (by invitation, I hasten to add) in support of the campaign against the Euro.

Like Britain, Sweden is actually a member of the European Union (remember, it's a process not a club) but has yet to ditch its currency (the Crown) in favour of adopting the Euro currency. That could all change next month as a result of a national referendum on the issue and which has divided opinion in the country along by-now familiar lines; most of the political, managerial and media elite are strongly in favour but are battling against widespread grassroots scepticism.

It is into this confrontation that Sean (as well as Dr.Madsen Pirie of the Adam Smith Institute) have stepped and from where Sean has written this report:

Adlon Hotel, Stockholm, Monday 25th August 2003

With Mrs Gabb, I am in Sweden for two reasons. The first is to address the summer conference of one of the main libertarian movements in Scandinavia. The second is to help strengthen the no campaign in the closing stages of the Swedish referendum on the Euro. It was my intention to write a long account of the things seen and done during this past week, together with observations on the Swedish people and their architecture and language. But I am presently short of time, and the glare of the television lights has dimmed all else but the events they illuminated. I will write at more length when back in England. For the moment, though, I will concentrate on the second reason for my visit.

Late last year, the Swedish Prime Minister - some vain creature whose name escapes me, but who likes to get himself photographed in company with Tony Blair - decided to try pushing his country into the Euro. He announced a referendum, and doubtless imagined that a year of campaigning would so wear out everyone else that he would have his way in the end. Sadly for him, though most of the parties and media and most of the Swedish establishment in general were in favour of giving up the Crown, the Swedish people have so far shown unwilling. With three weeks to go before the vote, the opinion polls continue to report strong opposition. The yes campaign seems to have more money and a better co-ordination of effort than the diverse coalition of movements against joining. But truth and greater commitment have so far been decisive.

Not surprisingly, the campaigners for a yes vote have descended from vague generalities - peace in Europe, more investment and jobs in Sweden, and so forth - to specific falsehoods. The claim at present is that Sweden cannot escape the Euro, since just about every country in Europe either is a member already or is about to become one. Even Britain, they insist, will join within the next few years. This being so, Sweden has no choice.

It was with these claims in mind that one of the more vigorous groups campaigning against the Euro - Medborgare Mot EMU, which is Citizens Against Economic and Monetary Union - decided to bring over some British Eurosceptics to explain that Britain was in fact very unlikely ever to join. This group is led by Margit Gennser, a former Conservative Member of Parliament in Sweden, and has Erik Lakomaa as its Campaigns Director. Together, they chose to invite me, Madsen Pirie of the Adam Smith Institute, and Bernard Connolly, former civil servant with the European Commission and author of The Rotten Heart of Europe. We made our presentations this morning at the Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, before an audience of bankers and politicians and virtually all the main Swedish media.

We began at 10:00 am. After a brief introduction by Professor Kurt Wickman, who was chairing the meeting, Madsen Pirie went first. What I like most about listening to Madsen is that beneath the entertaining surface of what he says is a logical structure of argument that lets whatever he says be reconstructed from memory days or even months after the event. I first noticed this at a conference in 1988, when I was able to sit down two days after he had introduced us to the concepts of an internal market and diversity of funding in the National Health Service - dull stuff now, but exciting when explained by one of the people who had just helped think of it - and write three pages without a single note. Today was no exception. Madsen began thus:

"I was first in Sweden 35 years ago. While I was here, you changed from driving on the left of the road to driving on the right. I well remember the endless confusion during the weekend of the change - the traffic jams, the young men and women with their yellow jackets and flags, and the general excitement of the change.

"In retrospect, all Sweden got was to put itself at a disadvantage in a car market that still includes, Britain, Japan, India, and various other important places. I am here again during what may be a process of change, and I can tell you this with pretty near certainty - whatever you may decide in the next few weeks, British driving will continue to be on the left and its politics on the right."

He now moved to explaining the "five tests" set by Gordon Brown - that is, the political device for ruling out British membership of the Euro until it could be shown not to be bad for the economy. This had not been shown. He dwelt on the considerable differences between the British and European financial economies. For example, 70 per cent of British families owned their homes. 80 per cent of mortgages were advanced under variable rate agreements - that is, payments rose and fell with changes in the lending rate set by the bank of England. This was often very unlike the rest of Europe, where people either rented or bought on fixed rate mortgages. In Europe, a change of interest rates could take 18 months to have an effect on consumer spending. In Britain, the change was almost immediate. This made the activities of whoever is in charge of monetary policy far more important in Britain that elsewhere.

Again, he said, the British economy was far more open and flexible than those on the Continent. Even after six years of Gordon Brown, Britain remained by European standards a country of low taxes and light regulation. This had allowed the country to attract up to 40 per cent of all direct inward investment to the European Union as a whole. "In terms of geography" he said, "Britain is just off the coast of Europe. In economic terms, it is somewhere in the mid-Atlantic - half way between Europe and America." Nothing that might seriously damage these facts could be considered.

From this, Madsen passed to the political consequences of joining the Euro - how it would increase the regulatory pressures from Brussels. He concluded:

"At the moment, let me assure you, there is an 80 per cent probability that Britain will not join the Euro. If you vote no to the Euro next month, that probability will rise to 100 per cent. Voting no will not leave you isolated in Europe."

Madsen spoke for about 15 minutes, which was just right for the audience. I saw two campaigners for the Euro looking concerned as they discussed his speech. Next, I spoke. For those who are interested, a recording of my speech will soon be somewhere on the Internet. For those who cannot wait, or do not care to endure my loud, flat voice, what I said went roughly as follows:

"Dr Pirie has explained very convincingly the reasons why, on both micro and macroeconomic grounds, Britain will not join the Euro. I will now explain why, on political grounds, this will not happen.

"You can never under-estimate the vanity and stupidity of politicians - look, for example, at your own Prime Minister. However, what politicians usually want above all is a quiet life. It is perfectly obvious that trying to get Britain into the Euro will give no one in government anything but trouble.

"As in Sweden, there must be a referendum before Britain can join the Euro. The first difficulty with this will be the question. This will inevitably cause an argument. No matter how fair the questions seems to one side, the other will claim bias. Probably, the matter will end up in court, and there is no certainty of what the Judges will rule. The politicians may well find themselves going into a referendum with a question not of their choosing.

"Then there is the matter of funding. The State will give money to both sides, but this will be greatly supplemented by wealthy activists. The result will be a disadvantage for one side. This might also end in court.

"Though the Government might win all cases brought against it, the mere fact of being taken to court would make many of the electors suspect they were being tricked - and this would incline them to vote against joining even if they could think of no other reason.

"Then there is the matter of public opinion. For years now, there has been an overwhelming majority against joining the Euro. No campaign is likely to change this. Most likely, the Government would lose. In theory, it could stay in office having lost a referendum. But the moral damage would be immense, and it might destroy the Government.

"Even assuming a victory, there would be trouble. In the first place, the opponents of entry would not just go away. They would make loud accusations of cheating. Many would turn out to even louder street demonstrations. Some might even start campaigns of civil resistance. In the second, whatever government took us into the Euro would be made to accept the full blame for the next recession. At present, we all know there will be a recession, but no one seems much inclined to blame Gordon Brown. After all, the Conservatives won elections in 1983 and 1992 as the country was bottoming out in very deep recessions. They lost an election in 1997 about half way through one of the most spectacular booms in British history. Since Margaret Thatcher retaught us our economics, we have learnt to regard politics and economics as largely separate matters. In the Euro, we would blame the politicians for any recession. They took us in, we would insist. The Euro caused the recession, we would assert. We would crucify them.

"So what is in it for the Government? The answer is nothing. Tony Blair might look for some reward in Europe - the Presidency, perhaps - but what about Gordon Brown and Jack Straw and David Blunkett, and all the others who would expect to stay behind and live with any resulting mess?

"One should never say never. But assuming some understanding of their self-interest, the various members of the British Government have no reason to lift a finger to get the country into the Euro. It will not happen.

"Now, I was warned before giving this speech that - to quote John Cleese - I should not mention the War. I do not think I have. But if I have, I do not think you noticed."

I put in this rather odd final point because some other British Eurosceptics had recently visited and had given credibility to the yes campaign by insisting that the European Union was exactly the same as the Europe intended by the German National Socialists. It seems that most Swedes know the scripts of Fawlty Towers by heart, and we decided to throw in the reference so we could head off the usual boring questions about paranoid xenophobia and whatever. It got a big laugh and a round of applause.

Next came Bernard Connolly. He spoke at much greater length- nearly an hour -and concentrated on the details of which he was a master and Madsen and I were not. He spelt out the corruption and incompetence at the heart of European decision making, giving examples of how economic decisions are made for political ends, and how these are made to work no matter at what cost to productive and allocative efficiency. It was a speech worth hearing, but was too long and involved for me to retain the full threads.

Then there was questioning from the floor, but this produced nothing new and is not something I feel any duty to report.

I will not report the comments I received. But I know I did a good job. I looked smart in my suit. I spoke clearly and fluently. I conformed closely to the Madsen Pirie school of public speaking - "stand up, speak up, shut up". I also handled a long interview for the television rather well. I had been willing to bet money that no one in the Swedish media would have bothered to find our who I was. But the researchers had been set to work, and I faced a polite grilling about the Candidlist, about the Libertarian Alliance, and about my reasons for not wanting laws against drinking and driving. I answered all questions honestly and dully - that is, I killed any story that might have been under construction. My experience is that straight answers are always the best. This was no exception.

The efforts today of the three British visitors - and mine were less than a third of the whole - have tended to help the no campaign in Sweden. We have not in ourselves made a great difference. But we have helped to knock down the claims that Britain is about the join the Euro, and that Sweden ought to hurry to avoid being left out.

I would normally be dubious about getting involved in the internal politics of another country. But referenda on the Euro are a different matter. The European Union is a threat to all the peoples of Europe. In the face of this common threat, we help ourselves by helping each other. I am sure the Swedish politicians do not intend to take no for an answer in this referendum. As in Denmark and the Irish Republic, their intention, if they lose, is simply to keep holding new referenda until they get the answer they want. However, this may not work. The Euro is an economic disaster. All the promises made in its favour have come to nothing. If the Swedes vote against joining, the British will not even be asked. If Britain stays out, the whole project may begin to unravel.

The Europhiles often call people like me "narrow little nationalists". We are encouraged to visit other member states of the Europe Union, and to get involved in issues of common importance. We are told to learn that our fellow citizens of the European Union are people just like ourselves, with similar problems and similar hopes. Well, I have taken that advice - and I hope its results will not be pleasing.

The phrenology of the debate appears to be virtually identical all over Europe. The only argument consistently employed by the federasts is that submission to the Euro and a federal Europe is inevitable so you might as well just plunge in right now and get it all over with. The remainder of their presentations consist of nothing except glib, re-hashed and disposable lies, smears, threats and distortions.

It is for this reason the success of the 'No' campaign in Sweden (and Denmark, the other EU country to resist adoption of the Euro) has bearing for us in Britain and vice versa. If the Swedes vote 'no, it incisively punctures the 'resistance is futile' argument of the 'Yes' campaigners and without that argument they have next-to nothing. By similar token, the Swedes may be more likely to vote 'no' if they are convinced that the British will stay out too.

What we have here is a form of European unity; just not the kind of unity that the federasts have in mind.

I believe the recent opinion polls put the 'No' campaign in the lead but the forces ranged against them are better-funded and are not above resorting to every dirty trick in the book in order to get their way. So the former need all the help they cant get. I hope that the very act of publicising this to a wider audience contributes something. Anybody wishing to lend their support to the 'No ' campaign can do so by visiting their website.

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Following on from Brian Micklethwait's earlier post, the likelihood of a Euro-poll in the current UK parliament, is looking increasingly distant. However, as this related Telegraph leader article puts it:

... sincere euro-fanatics need not despair entirely, for the proposed European constitution would make the question of euro membership largely redundant. Under its terms, Brussels would "coordinate the economic and employment policies of the member states" ... In such circumstances, the right to mint our own currency would be like Scotland's right to print its own banknotes today: symbolically important, but no guarantee of economic independence. Perhaps Mr Blair is playing a longer game than we think.

So in John Prescott's future 'Europe of the Regions', governed by the European Constitution, we could get 'co-ordinated' into the euro currency zone with or without the needless inefficiency of a referendum on the matter. We may not lose the pound, but one pound sterling could be devalued by the ruling European junta into being exactly equivalent to one euro, and then pegged there indefinitely until the day finally arrives for the assumption of Emperor Blair to the throne of Euro-topia. The need for any currency, of any kind, will then disappear, of course, as we all collapse into each others' arms in a brotherhood of love and not-for-profit compassion.

Though saying that, if I were Tony Blair one hundred percent of my thoughts would be concentrated on my getting just to the end of this week, never mind the possible future glories of my imperial splendour. But he's a slippery customer; I would never put anything past him.

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On the face of it this is good news for those of us who don't want Britain to join the Euro:

The pro-single currency campaign, Britain in Europe, faces an exodus of staff, including the expected departure of Simon Buckby, the man who runs it.

The resignations have been prompted by frustration at the Government's failure to take the lead on euro entry and a sense that the campaign had "lost its direction" after the Government's assessment of its five tests for entry in June.

But there is a bit more to it than a campaign for something bad getting into a mess, which on the face of things would obviously be good. After all, this is a report from the Independent, which is not exactly anti-Euro.

Until recently, pro-Euro-ites have been paralysed by their belief that they ought not to say anything too critical of the Blair regime, on account of the Blair regime being so popular. But now the Blair regime is getting less popular. So now, pro-Euro campaigners need to separate themselves from Blairism. If they already want to, they now can.

The crisis has prompted the board of Britain in Europe to try to distance itself from the Labour government and return to its roots as a cross-party alliance.

It is felt the campaign will be better able to put its point across if it is not seen as a Blairite organisation, afraid of taking the lead where the Government will not.

Arguably, the reason why the case against British involvement in the Euro has been put even as forcefully as it has – you can argue about how forcefully that is, but at least that case has been put – is that the people putting this case have not bothered themselves about what effect this might have on the popularity of the Conservatives, there being no Conservative popularity to affect. They have just plugged away, communicating as best they could with the actual people. If anyone accused them of splitting the Conservatives in the process, they have just said: So? The pro-Euro people now look as if they are being pushed by events into doing the same smarter thing themselves, which is actually to argue their case in public, something which they have been notably reluctant to do for about the last thirty years, with the prevaricating results that they now so belatedly lament.

The reason why this pro-Euro organisation is now in difficulties is because it has been over-run with Blairites, who have been more concerned with keeping the Blairite policy of masterly Euro-indecision in place than they have been concerned with questioning that policy. But now their formerly willing – or just resigned to their Blairite fate – footsoldiers feel able to be publicly pissed off at all this Blairite vacuity, as they were formerly not able to be, and are leaving. Hence the "crisis". This may weaken Britain in Europe, but it will probably strengthen the campaign for Britain adopting the Euro.

The point is, there is now liable to be a much more vigorous public campaign saying that Britain ought to adopt the Euro, instead of merely the endlessly repeated claim that it is going to anyway, so what's the point in arguing about it?

Which could be rather a pity. Because once these people decide to take part in the Euro-debate, there is at least the possibility that you will win it, and actually persuade enough British people to be in favour of it, as enough British people presently are not.

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How frightfully decent of those splendid chaps at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office to set up an online-forum to enable the riff-raff to contribute their thoughts and ideas on the proposed EU Constitution.

Registration is a pre-requisite to participation but at least it appears to be cost-free (which is a lot more than anyone can say about participation in the EU itself).

So, is this a genuine effort to solicit and publicise pro-Independence opinion or a potemkin facade calculated to provide a veneer of legitimacy to a decision that has already been made behind doors welded shut?

Another website established by the Foreign Office may hold just a few clues.

[My thanks to Emmanuel Goldstein for both links.]

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This afternoon I stopped off at my local branch of the Sainsbury's supermarket chain to get something for dinner. I picked up a prepared ham and mushroom tagliatelle to heat up in the microwave when I got home. However, I like a lot of cheese on my pasta, so I headed off the the cheese section looking for some parmesan. I walked past all the cheeses in the store, and couldn't see it. I then walked past all the cheeses again, and still couldn't see it.

On the third pass, I saw a sign on the shelf which said

Sainsbury's Parmesan is now Sainsbury's Italian Grated Cheese. Same product, new pack.

Yes, it is the type of EU law Gabriel Syme was talking about recently, in which the EU has been drawing up lists of geographical (and other) names used for food products, and has been insisting that the names be used only on food produced in that exact place. Cheese that does not come from the Parma area can no longer be called parmesan.

Now, this is problematic, because as I use the word, "parmesan" is a name for a particular type of strong flavoured hard cheese. Yes, it is named after Parma where a lot of such cheese is made, but I personally have no expectation that something called "parmesan" does actually come from there. I do expect that it will be hard, will have a particular flavour, and that it will taste good on my pasta. (If a cheese does come from Parma and does not satisfy these requirements, then I do not think it should be called "parmesan").

I have no difficulty with a law that requires it to be clear on the packaging whether a "parmesan" cheese comes from Parma or not. There is already another more specific name for cheeses that do, which is "Parmigiano-Reggiano", and I have little problem with this name being restricted to cheeses from Parma, because it has never become generic. Really, though, if the word has become so generic that there is no intent to deceive about the origins of the cheese, then banning all use of the word otherwise is going too far.

I think that geographical names are like any other trademarks. If they are not defended, they can be lost. And if they are lost, they cannot be retrieved. And this present EU policy overreaches badly.

The law is ridiculously extreme. Not only can you not say that cheese that is not from parma cannot be called "parmesan cheese", you may not use the word "parmesan" in any wayon the packaging. You cannot say that it is "parmesan style" cheese. You cannot say that it is "Similar to permesan cheese". You cannot even say that "This is not parmesan cheese". You are reduced to things like "Italian grated cheese", which doesn't really get the message across. There are lots of cheeses made in Italy, and virtually all of them can be grated, but most of them are not what I want. Supermarkets are allowed to put up signs saying that the name has changed but the product is the same (as I mentioned) but only for a finite time. Basically though, it just amounts to protection. I want to buy some parmesan style cheese. I don't care if it actually comes from Parma. However, the new regulations make it impossible for me to find any such cheese except the one from Parma, so that is what I buy. Or at least that is the intention.

The EU is enforcing such rules internally, because they can then argue for similar rules to apply outside the EU, and the EU believes that there are more such names in Europe than elsewhere. "We respect trademarks of this kind within the EU, and you should therefore respect our trademarks outside the EU, and prevent non-EU farmers from using European geographical names on their products". They may or may not get other countries to go along, depending on whether the other countries value the EU as an export market. Ideally, they would like these rules written into the WTO. Presumably their hope is that consumers in the US, and Australia, and elsewhere will buy their cheese rather than some other product if it has the more famous name on it rather than the other name.

So it sounds bad? Well, if I was David Carr, I would say that yes, it sounds bad. And that is because it is bad. In fact, it is even worse than that. However, I am not David Carr.

This policy does demonstrate the EU's protectionist and bureacratic instincts, but it ultimately assumes that consumers are stupid. And they aren't. For EU farmers to benefit, these name changes would have to stop consumers actually buying the products that they are buying now. And I don't think they will. I actually bought the "Italian grated cheese" and not the much more expensive "parmesan" and although I had a sign to help me, I might well have figured it out even if I hadn't. Certainly after three or four trips to the supermarket I would have figured it out. If there are high quality, cheaper products with different names on them, then consumers will find them. If they are not allowed to use an existing generic name, then eventually all that will happen is someone will make up a new one. It may even be that in ten years time the French or European farmers are actually disadvantaged by the fact that they use the old name.

In fact, I can give a good example where this has happened already, from the world of Australian wine.

Many of the best red wines in Australia are made from the grape variety that is known in France as syrah. Until recently in Australia, two names were commonly used for the grape variety. One of these was hermitage, and the other was shiraz. Both of these are actually geographical names. Hermitage is in the northern Rhone valley, just south of Lyon, and Shiraz is in Iran. Both places are connected with the grape variety in question. It appears that it originated in Shiraz, and was at some point brought to France. Some of the most famous wines French wines made from it are in the Hermitage area.

French authorities claimed that if Australia kept using the hermitage name, then Australian wines would be confused with French wines from Hermitage, and that Australia should therefore stop using it. Australia agreed (although given that the most famous and expensive Australian wine that had the hermitage name on it is today more expensive and famous than any French Hermitage, then it is debatable whose reputation would have been hurt if there had been confusion). Australia now exclusively uses the shiraz name on its wines made with this grape variety. (There presumably aren't a great many winemakers in Shiraz to object). Australia has marketed its shirazes very successfully in Europe, particularly in Britain, and Australian shiraz sells for a significantly higher price than French syrah. In short, by selling and promoting a high quality product with a new generic name, Australia has actually done better than they would have done if they retained the old one. Ultimately it is not the name on the product that matters, but the quality of the product. Ultimately, regulating the names of products is much less damaging than regulating the products themselves, because consumers can still buy them. And focusing on the name and not the product is always, in the long run counterproductive. I read yesterday in the Times (to which Samizdata does not link) about a French winemaker producing for the British market who put the grape variety "shiraz" on the labels of his wine. Now there is nothing dishonest about this, as the wine was indeed made from that grape and the name is a generic name used in Australia, South Africa, Argentina and elsewhere. Sales immediately doubled. However, the wine label police told him to stop it, as EU law requires that French wines use the French name syrah and not the Australian name shiraz. Once he did this, sales dropped by 60%. So much for protecting French names).

Plus, annoying your customers is never a good idea.

And that's ultimately how I feel about the EU's moves on this issue. In the long run it is likely to be more damaging to them than to anyone else. But in the short term it is really annoying, and frankly rather patronising.

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The European Commission is to fine Bill Gates' Microsoft Corp for what it claims is the firms' continuing misuse of its 'dominant' market position and will force it to change how its Media Player software is distributed, according to Reuters.

I don't want to get into the complex issues of whether Gates has or has not 'abused' his market position in any way but rather address the core issue: does Bill Gates and his colleagues have a right to exploit the source code they have created, or not? If Microsoft cannot do so, what is the point of intellectual property rights and patents? And how does the Commission judge if a firm X holds a 'dominant' position in a particular market? Is it claiming that Microsoft salesmen force to us to buy their products at the point of a gun? Surely not.

Using alternatives to Micrsosoft's products may be - and often is - inconvenient. Ask any computer user. But unless the EU, the U.S. Justice Dept or any other bunch of property-right grabbers can show that a firm forces us to use its products, such claims should be treated with scorn. Just because a firm is very big, as Microsoft unquestionably is, does not by itself confer coercive power on such a firm. Of course such firms can try to acquire this by screwing privileges out of government, but that is a separate issue.

Bill Gates is not everyone's idea of a victim, and frankly he is not the most endearing of business leaders. That, however, is besides the point. He and his colleagues created a source code. Over the years, and due to some savvy business decisions, they have made this code the basis of a hugely successful business. Obviously this is mighty troubling to some, even those who may claim to be in favour of free enterprise.

The EU is telling Bill Gates, "Don't get too big for your boots, and certainly don't get too successful".

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The Telegraph reports that Britain is to reopen attempts to change key sections of the proposed European constitution despite warnings by its chief author that this risks undoing months of painstaking negotiations.

The Government will issue a White Paper in early September setting out its 'red lines' - the issues that it will not compromise on - in the final round of bargaining for the constitution that will be launched by European Union leaders in October. Senior officials said the issues include a determination to remove a mutual defence pact that would undermine Nato, clauses regarded as a backdoor attempt to harmonise taxation, and proposals for an EU public prosecutor.

For once the Conserative opposition sounds almost reasonable. Bernard Jenkin, the Conservative defence spokesman, said:

They said the constitution was just a tidying-up exercise. They have realised late in the day that it's much more than that. Even if they win on their red lines, they have already given much more away, not least the principle of having a constitution in the first place.

Mr Jenkin maintains that, despite phrases ostensibly respecting countries' obligations to Nato, the draft constitution would give the EU primacy over the transatlantic alliance. It is not yet clear how far Britain will resist the proposals to create a common defence policy.

Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the former French president who presided over 16 months of debate at the European Convention, has warned all sides that tampering with the text risks creating a free-for-all.

And we wouldn't want that, right?

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It is a central plank of federast propoganda that the European Union is the only way to stop conflagrations like WWI and WWII from happening again. I have always regarded such pronouncements as specious self-delusion. Indeed, certain features of life in wartime Europe are beginning to re-appear, such as austerity, rationing and empty shelves:

Gardeners were banned from buying dozens of pesticides from yesterday under new European rules. The 80 gardening products, mostly lawn treatments, have been withdrawn from the shelves. They can be used until the end of December.

They include many sold by major retailers including B&Q, Asda and Do It All, and are being banned alongside 135 agricultural products.

Thus we are saved from the cataclysmic horror of law treatments. Household cleaning products are probably next.

Nor is this the end but merely the beginning for what we are seeing is the EU's 'precautionary principle' in action. As a result, thousands of chemicals used everyday, domestically and commercially, now have to be subjected to an exhaustive and expensive testing procedure to ensure that they post not the even the merest smidgeon of a hint of a suggestion of a risk to health. This is despite that face that, in most cases, these chemical products have been used for years, even decades, without anyone growing three heads as a consequence.

For many, particularly smaller scale, producers the cost of compliance means bankruptcy so they simply withdraw the products from sale. Result: a gradual emptying of shelves.

And who, exactly, is behind it? As if we couldn't guess:

Friends of the Earth welcomed the move but raised doubts as to whether the outlawed pesticides would be disposed of properly. The environmental pressure group also claimed some products were not covered by the ban despite being proven to damage human health.

Yes, the enviro-mentalists. Europe's 'jihadis'; they may be self-righteous creeps with faces one can never can tired of punching but they have managed to secure themselves a svengali-like grip on the minds of Europe's Cardinals.

By this time next year, Samizata articles will be written on papyrus scrolls and distributed to our readers by mule-train.

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The European Commission has drawn up a list of 35 food and drink brand names including Champagne, Bordeaux wine, Roquefort cheese and Parma ham that it wants to reserve for EU producers. A Commission official explains:

We're trying to recuperate the exclusive use of such names in the WTO. We've been usurped of the names and we want them back.

Please note the use of the majestic plural.

The agriculture negotiations are one of the sticking points in the wide-ranging trade talks, pitting the EU variously against the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and Argentina. Those countries accuse Europe of trying to introduce trade protection on farm goods through the back door: As the Deputy Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Jon Dudas puts it:

It appears that the EU is asking the U.S. government, U.S. producers and U.S. consumers to subsidise EU producers...so that EU producers can charge monopoly prices for their products.

No element of surprise there as the EU needs to find new ways to pay for the newly 'reformed' Common Agricultural Policy...

EU member states are currently chewing over the list. Greece has demanded the inclusion of feta cheese while France wants an extra seven products added including Beaujolais wine and Calvados brandy. Member state trade officials must agree the list by the middle of August.

Well, there is always hope as EUcrats are not known for agreement and ability to meet deadlines...

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An urgent memo to the people whose job it is to monitor so-called 'greenhouse gases': there appears to be more than enough hot air over Central Europe to keep the Kyoto balloon aloft:

Russia came under pressure from the European Union at the weekend to ratify the Kyoto protocol on greenhouse gases, amid fears that Moscow's commitment may be wavering.

Yes it is probably 'wavering' because the Russians (in common with everybody else) know that the Kyoto Protocol is a bad idea which has been touted as the solution to a non-problem. If the Russians have got any sense they will consign the whole boondoggle to the shredder.

The protocol, which is backed by the EU but opposed by Washington, needs the support of the Russians to reach the threshold of backing required for it to come into force. Although Moscow announced last September that it would ratify, it has so far failed to do so, raising fears that the entire international effort to combat climate change could be stalled.

The keyword here is 'fear'. Not fear of environmental catastrophes or other such fantastic nonsense, but a (justified) fear among Europe's political elite that their dirigiste economies will not be able to compete in a truly global marketplace.

Altero Matteoli, the Italian Environment Minister, called for enhanced cooperation with the US and Russia, as well as with emerging economies,such as India and China.

'Cooperation' is a euphamism for 'submission' and what Mr.Matteoli and his ilk require is for potential competitors to hobble themselves with pointless and damaging regulatory burdens that slap a lid on industrial and technological development. The only other method of halting decline is root-and-branch reform of the Europe's stagnating economies and that is not going to happen.

Kyoto is not about 'saving the Earth' or 'improving the quality of life' or any other enviro-mentalist nostrums. Kyoto is a deeply dishonest contrivance; a device for propping up an arcane and protectionist 'old' Europe.

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Barely a working day goes by when I don't read some nauseating editorial in some left-of-centre organ warning of the 'dangers' of becoming more like America and demanding even greater integration into Europe.

Europe, you see, is more attuned to concepts of 'social justice' and therefore kindler, gentler and more humane. A place where those vulgar 'market forces' are tamed and brought under 'democratic control'. Yes, Europe is an altogether more civilised model of society.

Except that I think we now have pretty incontrovertible proof that the European 'model' is actually a long, drawn-out extinction event:

Fertility rates across Europe are now so low that the continent's population is likely to drop markedly over the next 50 years. The UN, whose past population predictions have been fairly accurate, predicts that the world's population will increase from just over 6 billion in 2000 to 8.9 billion by 2050. During the same period, however, the population of the 27 countries that should be members of the EU by 2007 is predicted to fall by 6%, from 482m to 454m. For countries with particularly low fertility rates, the decline is dramatic. By 2050 the number of Italians may have fallen from 57.5m in 2000 to around 45m; Spain's population may droop from 40m to 37m. Germany, which currently has a population of around 80m, could find itself with just 25m inhabitants by the end of this century, according to recent projections by Deutsche Bank, which adds: "Even assuming (no doubt unrealistically high) annual immigration of 250,000, Germany's population would decline to about 50m by 2100."

This is what happens when children are taxed out of the family budget. And it gets worse:

A recent report from the French Institute of International Relations predicts that, by the middle of the century, the EU's GDP will be growing at just over 1% a year compared with more than 2% in North America and at least 2.5% in China. The EU, the report gloomily concludes, faces a "slow but inexorable ‘exit from history' ".

I really do recommend that the whole article be read in order to fully appreciate that Europe's political classes are standing hip-deep in merde. Nor are there any easy solutions to which they can turn. Radical reforms are politically impossible and even cranking up the immigration rates by several orders is not going to save them. If the host population is dying out then the newcomers are not so much 'immigrants' as replacements; the demographic equivalent of a blood transfusion. Out with the old and in the with new. Still, there is a possibility that the 'new' Europeans might have taken on board the object lesson and realised that socialism is suicide. Perhaps that is the solution after all.

So Europe will probably try to muddle through its demographic problem. There will be some pension reform, a bit more immigration, more family-friendly policies, higher taxes, growing fiscal problems for many governments and slower economic growth. With luck the European Union will avoid or postpone a really huge economic crisis. But the political and economic renaissance of Europe that was predicted at the European convention is likely to be stillborn.

Yes it really was as recent as a few months back that my ears were assailed with all those triumphal, confident proclamations that a 'United Europe' was soon going to overtake the USA as an economic power. I laughed my arse off. Now I almost pity them.

The future is not bright. They don't need shades.

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Following the recent diplomatic spat between Italy and Germany, the EU Commission has moved to ensure that there is no repetition of such unfortunate incidents with a 'Draft Directive on Cross-Border Insults'.

The new directive sets out a regulatory framework which will, in future, require all citizens of all EU countries to follow appropriate guidelines before publicly uttering any sort of cross-border insult.

The guidelines provide:

1. Any insult which includes reference to national stereotypes can only be directed against a person or persons who is/are permanently domiciled in or citizens of the country to which the said stereotype is applicable. Insults may not be directed at persons who are merely resident in such countries.

2. Insults which include reference to multiple stereoptypes such as 'Arrogant beachtowel-hogging Schnitzel-brained Kraut metalbasher' and 'Pizza-munching dago wop greaseball monkey' shall first obtain a written approval to utter the insult from the appropriate licensing body in the jurisdiction in which the insulter is a citizen or permanently domiciled.

3. For the purposes of enforcement of these provisions, each member state of the Union shall establish an appropriate licensing body.

4. In the case of a person wishing to utter a cross-border insult for reproduction in any print or electronic medium they must first provide a draft copy of the proposed insult to the proprietors of the said medium not less than three days before publication of the insult is due. This is to ensure that fair representations can be made by the person or organisation against whom the insult is directed.

5. In the case of general insults or non-national stereotype abuse, the words used by the insulter must be words or terms that are recognised as being of an abusive or insulting nature in at least one or more Union member state. The use of Americanised insults such as 'dickwad', 'dog-breath', 'asshat' and 'freakazoid' are strictly forbidden as being inconsistent with European cultural values.

6. Once a cross-border insult has been uttered (in accordance with these provisions) the person or organisaton against whom the insult was directed shall have a right of reply. In order to permit such right to be exercised the insulter shall allow a period of at least seven days before uttering any further insults.

French EU Commissioner Bertrand Maginot expressed his satisfaction with the new rules:

"We cannot simply allow insults to be traded in this uncontrolled cowboy fashion. If they are not subject to proper democratic control they could disrupt the harmony of European institutions."

Critics of the new rules say they do not go far enough as insults that remain within national borders are still totally unregulated. However, a Commission sub-committee is expected to convene early next year to examine methods of regulating domestic insults as well.

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BBC reports that the European Commission president, Romano Prodi, has been summoned by the European parliament to answer questions on a growing fraud scandal in the EU's executive.

The EU's administrative commissioner, Neil Kinnock, has revealed that up until 1999 there was a relatively extensive practice of setting up secret and illegal bank accounts. Millions of euros are thought to have disappeared.

Mr Kinnock told a parliamentary committee on Wednesday there was evidence this "utterly reprehensible" practice was continuing.

As a result, he has ordered an immediate inquiry into other Commission departments and is sending a fraud questionnaire to the European Commission's most senior officials to assess the extent of the problem.

Are we surprised? No. The growing number of scandals emerging from the EU hints at deep-seated fraud and corruption. Soon it will perhaps become unnecessary to produce an argument against the EU. Just recording it's blunders should do the trick...

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The Telegraph reports the Treasury reacted angrily to a European Commission proposal for simplifying the VAT regime across the EU that would give tax breaks to the French while penalising British parents. Frits Bolkestein, the EU's Dutch tax commissioner, admitted that the tax on children's clothing could rise to 17.5 per cent - the British rate of VAT - but that the move was necessary to end what he said was unfair economic distortion.

The scheme unveiled yesterday is part of the continuing attempt by Brussels to force through tax harmonisation - standardising tax rates across the EU. Gordon Brown has rejected the suggestion, claiming that taxation is a matter for national parliaments.

The Commission scheme to "streamline" VAT would abolish zero-rating on children's clothes and shoes in Britain and Ireland, ending the permanent opt-outs the countries secured when they joined the EC in the 1970s.

But following intense lobbying by Jacques Chirac, the French president, for a special exemption on restaurant bills, the Commission proposes to cut VAT rates for French diners from the present 19.6 per cent to as low as 5.5 per cent. Also, the Dutch will retain a zero rate for their cut-flower industry and the Italian media empire of Silvio Berlusconi will be spared VAT on broadcasting.

One official described the horse-trading behind the scenes as shameful.

Isn't it interesting that a Dutch commissioner, a French director-general, and the Italian presidency all got what they wanted?

Quite.

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Infoworld reports that the European Commission announced plans to combat spam yesterday, promising "concrete action" by October.

Research commissioned by the European Commission shows that by the end of this summer more than half of all the e-mails in the union will be spam. Erkki Liikanen, European Commissioner for Enterprise and the Information Society announced confidently:

Combatting spam has become a matter for us all, and has become one of the most significant issues facing the Internet today.

Yes, spam is annoying but let's get things into perspective... In the typical bureaucrat fashion, you first build up a problem and then you solve it and bask in the glory of central control...

The EC promised that the concrete action would focus on effective enforcement based on international cooperation among different countries. It would also include technical measures for countering spam, and raising consumer awareness of the issue.

I wonder how this will be achieved. More monitoring, more data pooling and generally more interference with ISPs and private companies.

The Commission's plans are designed to coincide with a new law on data protection that forbids unsolicited e-mailing. This directive is due to be transposed into the statute books of the 15 European Union member states in October.

Great. What we need is another directive forbidding this or that. And pray, do tell how will they enforce that...?

Under the data protection law, e-mail marketing will only be allowed with prior consent from the recipient. This "opt-in" approach does, however, permit marketing companies to target their existing customers.

Yes, a good idea, but why does it have to be regulated from the top? How gracious of the EC to permit marketing companies to target their existing customers. Arguably there is a widespread 'conning' of customers by many Web firms promising that they will not share private information and then selling or renting their customer lists anyway. But as this article indicates customers and markets are a much better way of handling this kind of issue than a bunch of bureaucrats in Brussels.

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A quite splendid editorial in the Telegraph from George Trefgarne:

If Mr Blair signs the European constitution - which he seems determined to do - it will, as far as I can see, be the end of Britain as a serious independent power. It will also lead to the gradual redesigning of our institutional framework.

The euro beckons. Taxation and regulation would increase as we tilted towards the European social democratic model. Judging by the woes of Germany and France, economic growth would be lower and unemployment higher.

I can add little except a recommendation that the whole article be read in order to fully appreciate the monumental folly that Tony Blair seems determined to commit.

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[EU for Britain has] been more like getting mixed up with the mafia. First it's an innocent poker game, then some girls show up, then you need to borrow some money, next thing you know a beefy fellow in a string t-shirt is giving your kneecaps a non-therapeutic massage, and you're wondering, "Hey, I just wanted to play a little poker. Where did these concrete overshoes come from?"
- T. Hartin's comment on a Samizdata post

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Reuters reports:

A future European Union constitution will include a flag, an anthem, a motto and a Europe Day, despite British reticence about such state symbols.

The 105-member Convention on the Future of Europe decided at its final session on Thursday to add a reference to the symbols of the 15-nation bloc, due to be enlarged to 25 states next May, in a draft constitution submitted to EU leaders.

The official EU anthem is the "Ode to Joy" from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, the flag is the dark blue banner with 12 yellow stars in a circle, and the motto is "United in Diversity", not dissimilar from the first motto of the United States, "e pluribus unum".

Europe Day is May 9, commemorating a historic speech by French Foreign Minister Robert Schuman, one of the EU's founding fathers, proposing the creation of a European Coal and Steel Community. [emphasis added]

Oh no, we are not imitating anybody!

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The Telegraph reports that Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the man in charge of drafting Europe's first constitution, admitted yesterday that the much-trumpeted removal of the word "federal" from the text changed nothing and was merely a ruse to shield the British government from criticism. The former French president said the cosmetic change that did not affect the shape or character of the future EU or lessen the transfer of real power to Brussels.

I knew the word federal was ill-perceived by the British and a few others. I thought that it wasn't worth creating a negative commotion, which could prevent them supporting something that otherwise they would have supported. So I rewrote my text, replacing intentionally the word federal with the word communautaire, which means exactly the same thing.

So much for the British government's insistence that the EU constitution will not lead to a European superstate. Downing Street has hailed the removal of the word federal as its biggest triumph in the 18-month long drafting process. Giscard d'Estaing also moaned:

It's a campaign by people who want to destroy Europe, which is something that's very negative and counter-productive. But I was not convinced they were really influencing the British people.

The 'patrician' Frenchman is right about our desire to destroy Europe or at least the bit that insists on dragging Britain into it. Such efforts do appear to be if not counter-productive, certainly rather ineffective so far. However, if we could make him right about the influence on the British people…

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In response to another European Directive, the supine government of Her Majesty, will later today impose Workers Councils upon all companies employing 150 workers, or more. In 2008, the same regulations will apply to all companies with 50 workers, or more. No doubt, now this principle has been established, it will apply to my hiring of a single plumber, in the fullness of time.

Employers will be obliged to consult these councils on any change of company ownership, or on any change in the numbers of staff employed by the company; no doubt, this workers' control will ultimately govern every minute decision taken by any employer, as the ratchet tightens itself further. This will, obviously, usher in a period of wealth, happiness, and economic harmony, as they currently possess in the rest of the mainstream EU. Like in Germany, and in France, for instance.

It seems now, that when I hire someone, by the hour, to carry out a task for me, not only do I have to compensate them, at an agreed rate, for the disutility of their labour, but I also become in thrall to them. I have to ask them whether I can suspend their employment, offer them less cash per hour, or sell my own property. Excellent. This won't encourage me to invest offshore, invest onshore using more capital-intensive robotics, or sack more workers until I get down to a maximum of 49 people, or whatever the next minimum is. It won't do any of that, no. It's all been thought through.

It also offers another splendid opportunity we cannot afford to miss. As the EU expands to the east, taking in countries such as Turkey, Cyprus, Siberia, and so on, the word European becomes increasingly redundant. We could replace the whole phrase with Union. But this single word looks a little lonely, by itself, a little doubtful. To give it some added strength, let's uniquely identify what kind of union we have, by the addition of a description of its dominant economic philosophy. This gives us, the Workers Council Union. (You may be able to guess where this is going )

Now, as we expand to the east, we need to make our Russian brethren (or comrades), feel a little more included. They've always felt a bit out on a limb, so I think we should take this opportunity to make them feel more at home. So let's rename this new improved Union, in their honour. (This also takes us away from the evil English language of the American capitalists.)

So the Workers Council Union becomes the Rabochiy Sovyet Union. Which looks good so far. But brainstorming it even further, isn't this now a little bit too long? And isn't that pronunciation a little difficult, particularly for the Germanic tongue? In the words of Jeremy Clarkson, yes. I think so. So let's shorten it, and simplify that pronunciation at the same time, killing two birds with one stone. Et voila, we have arrived at the perfect social democracy we have been trying to achieve for all these years. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you, please, a round of applause, the new Soviet Union!

At the risk of emulating the Roman Republic's Cato, who added Carthago delenda est! (Carthage must be destroyed) to the end of every speech he made, or letter he wrote, I think I'm developing my own personal version. The sooner we are out of the EU, the better. It really cannot come soon enough.

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Silvio Berlusconi has crossed the line. It was bad enough that he is wealthy businessman and not a bureaucrat. His right-of-centre views are distasteful but containable. Even his support for America could be overlooked in the circumstances.

But, now, Berlusconi has gone too far. He has brought disharmony to Brussels and insulted a left-wing Eurocrat. That is beyond the pale. That is unforgiveable. Now he must be destroyed:

Even if he is voted out at the next election, the damage that has been done to Italian democracy will be difficult to repair. Should he remain in office, the prospects are grim indeed. It is time Europe woke up to the threat Berlusconi poses. He is not just another rightwing politician; he represents the greatest challenge to democracy anywhere in Europe.

As evidenced by this frothing-at-the-mouth, hysterical denouncement in the Guardian, the lefties have struck up the cogs, wheels and pistons of their considerable propoganda machine to churn away at full steam and not stop until Berlusconi has been drawn into the mincer and disposed of.

This is not going to be allowed to simply blow over. You cannot commit the ultimate crime of cocking a snoot at the Euro-left and expect to get away with it. Over the coming months the left will deploy the entire range of their customary demonology against Berlusconi in the same way they have deployed it against George Bush. In fact, Berlusconi is now the George Bush of Europe.

Signor Berlusconi has got a lot of money and a lot of moxy but what he needs most of all now is a set of brass balls. I hope he has got those too.

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The EU will shortly announce its plans to more strictly regulate the Budget Airline industry. After decades of nationalised "flag carriers", which in Europe priced out ordinary consumers from regular air travel, world-wide Thatcherite reforms of this important transportation industry drove prices down, and greatly increased the numbers of destinations and budget price options; this brought a stagnant European industry more into line with a vibrant US.

But those heady days seem numbered under the forthcoming EU regulations. These, of course, will be written by many in a corrupt organisation regularly claiming 1st class weekend airfare expenses, from Brussels to home, without the need to produce either receipts, or even without the need to take the flight.

Instead of the consumer placing their custom where they will, with different competitors, and companies building up individual loyalty and trust in their brands, the EU has decided, in its wisdom, to crack down its regulatory whip.

For those passengers bumped off over-booked flights, compensation levels will be doubled; some claims for compensation may even be several times the original low-budget fare. The new measures will also introduce enforced compensation for delays, whether the fault of the airline or not; indeed the industry claims 75% per cent of delays are caused by the failures of the various European air traffic control systems.

Many of the companies involved, such as Ryan Air and Easyjet, have complained bitterly about this planned interference in their market. They argue that if travellers want both low fares and compensation, they should protect themselves through the purchase their own travel insurance. But it seems the EU will have its way.

Once again consumers are to be treated as mindless cattle, with an inability to make their own travel choices, change their purchasing decisions, or risk the uncertainties that low-fare travel inevitably brings with it. What's really sad, is that many consumers in this dirigiste continent will agree with the plan; what many of these supporters won't realise however, until it's too late, is that they will also pay for it.

It seems certain that fares will rise sharply, to cover the airline insurance necessary to fulfil compensation claims, and the courts will be swamped with form-waving compensation-culture vultures trying to bleed the industry dry. Marginal destinations, such as the many which have recently sprung up in France and Spain, servicing holiday-home Britons, may also be dropped altogether, as their slim potential profits will fail to cover the possible compensation costs or necessary insurance.

So, thanks Big Brother EU. Where would we be without you?

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The European Union's 15 member nations have introduced a value-added tax on digital sales to residents by non-European companies. By 3rd July, non-EU companies have to register with European tax authorities to levy, collect and remit the VAT on sales of various digital goods and services. A directive issued by the EU in May 2002, mandates companies that do not have a physical presence in an EU member nation to assess the tax at the rates charged by the countries where individual customers are located.

Computerworld reports that this imposition has forced many U.S. businesses to undertake months of legal and technical preparations. The VAT in the EU countries ranges from 15% in Luxembourg to 25% in Denmark and Sweden and as a result, some U.S. companies have had to choose between two costly alternatives: updating their e-commerce systems to track sales and initiate VAT payments at the various rates, or setting up new operations in one of the member countries so they can apply its tax rate to all digital sales throughout the EU.

Scott Pendergrast of Fictionwise, an e-books seller, said it would not have been economically feasible to invest in a European operation. Instead, he is preparing to collect the tax in different countries, although reluctantly.

I think paying it is ridiculous, and it's unfair for a foreign government to make me a tax collector. I have enough trouble keeping track of the the U.S. tax code.

Others are questioning the ability of the EU to enforce the tax on the grounds that European courts would not have jurisdiction over them. Jon Abolins of Taxware, an e-commerce software developer, has been advising companies not to do so, because there is speculation that EU countries might not fight to protect the intellectual property rights of sellers that fail to collect the VAT.

There is so much wrong with this picture one does not know where to begin. First, of all, taxing on-line transactions is not specific to the EU, merely another thieving hand of the state. Secondly, the EU approved the VAT plan after content providers based in Europe complained that they were at a competitive disadvantage because they already have to collect the tax. A classic interference of the political into the economical, so beloved of the EU commissioners. Thirdly, in a typical EU fashion the law is ambiguous as to how companies are to determine the location of the buyer and near unenforceable by the vendors. They will spend hundreds of thousands hard earned profits on installing systems designed to assess and collect the VAT and on third-party vendors tracing the IP addresses of their customers.

And, if the EU governments feel they are not getting enough, they can send the tax authorities after the companies for not collecting the taxes for them. Welcome to the EU, the land where business is just another branch of the state.

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Ever since the US implemented software patents, the EU has been determined not to be left behind. According to an item in Debian News:

"More on European Software Patents. An article at ZDNet UK says that the EU bureaucrats aren't even considering the numerous anti-software patenting opinions out there. According to a well-connected lobbyist group, they have determined there will be patents, and the only question is what kind."

Software patents are a very bad idea as many have discovered in the US. They put a fence around parts of mathematics. Even worse, the government guardians of the fencemaking are not familiar with the field and its' literature and are vastly understaffed to boot. This has led to some gawdawfully silly (and economically destructive) patents being granted.

Within the last couple years BT tried to claim a patent in the US on hyperlinks1. This was shot down after a massive search by the open source community. It ended with the web publication of a late 1960's lecture discussing the idea.

Virtually everything in well done programming is "obvious" when you get "there", down to the core of the problem at hand. Two top programmers given a reasonable time to attack a complex problem will very likely find large sections of their work very similar if not almost identical.

A program in a well formed language is equivalent to a mathematical expression. Such expressions are in most cases transformable into each other.

The Debian News cited article can be found here

1 = 01/07/2000 NewScientist p017 "The Net Strikes Back: BT tries To Patent links"

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I don't give two flying figs about Silvio Berlusconi's business dealings be they murky or otherwise. All I know is that he is just about the only European political figure with personality:

Mr Berlusconi lashed out when socialist Martin Schulz accused him of an alleged conflict of interest over his Italian media empire.

Does this qualify as 'lashing out'?

"I know there is a man producing a film on the Nazi concentration camps," Mr Berlusconi said, "I would like to suggest to you the role of Kapo (guard chosen from among the prisoners) - you'd be perfect."

Naturally this left all the po-faced EUnuchs clucking like a lot of indignant hens. Expect a draft directive on inappropriate insults any day now.

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I think that Hermann Rorschach was really onto something with that little inkblot test of his. If two different but apparently sane people can look at the same picture and see two entirely different things then perhaps that goes at least some way explaining ideology as well as psychology.

A perfect illustration of this lies in the response of British socialist bloggers to the plans for the regionalisation of England. This is the plan to divide England up into nine entirely artifical 'sectors' and give each its own assembly with regulatory functions. The details of this project are currently being thrashed out by the Office of Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott.

Over on the left, this is an eagerly awaited development. One of the new kids on the left-block, Farringdon Street, waxes lyrical:

The northwest is going to have a referendum on a regional assembly. This is a development that should be greeted with alacrity. While its chief protagonist in central government John Prescott hardly has a reputation as a constitutional iconoclast, devolution is vital to the reconstruction of British politics.

Power is to concentrated, the agenda to London centric. The regions especially those furthest from the capital need their own champions. We must increase the sheer amount of political muscle deployable in London and Brussels to advance the regional interest.

And he is far from alone in his enthusiasm. It is sincerely shared by the rest of British left all of whom appear to be getting moist-knickered and dewey-eyed over what they are trying to present as 'decentralisation'.

Now, if this really was a process of decentralisation it might have some merit. At the very least it would be worthy of further discussion. But this is not a process of decentralisation. Not even to the smallest degree.

However, as in a lot of debates about administration, there is a germ of a genuine problem here. Britain is a grossly overcentralised country with every decision that matters being made in London and then applied nationwide. We are, in effect, a City-State.

This is an issue which should and could be addressed but if the term 'decentralisation' is to have any meaning at all then it must entail the devolving down of real political power to local level. That is not at all what this process is about. Casting my eye over the proposals (such as they are) there is plenty of creepy management-speak about 'best practice' and 'reaching out' and 'partnership' and 'joined-up government' but will the new assemblies be able, say, to abolish Income Tax? Or raise Income Tax? Or pass their own laws that run contrary to the desires of Whitehall? Will they be able to declare their respective regions a 'free tade zone'? Or Legalise drugs? Will they be able to tell the EU Commission to stick their directives where the sun don't shine?

The answer to all of those questions is 'no'. This is not a devolution of power and decision-making, this is a retrenchment of power at the top; a mere administrative reshuffle to create yet another fantastically expensive tier of labyrinthine bureaucracy in what amounts to nothing more than giant job-creation scheme for technocrats, busybodies and form-fillers. Nobody is going to gain more control over their own lives and no community is going to have any more local power bestowed upon it. It is just another greasy pole for the social-working class to climb up.

And it would be bad enough if that is all they were. But that is not all they are because although Mr.Prescott may have been charged with implementing this grand scheme, he is merely obeying orders. The real drivers behind this are in Brussels. The regional assemblies are being created as civilian Gauleiters in order to ensure that the laws and directives of the EU Commission are administered and enforced at local level and to jockey with each for the chunks of redistributed largesse handed out by the various arms of the Euro-state. Their job is not to represent the will of the people to those in power, it is to ensure that the will of those in power is applied to the people.

If that's 'decentralisation', then I'm the Dalai Lama and even for people who have faith in democracy, surely this is the very antithesis of democracy.

I hope I am right about that Rorschach thing and that the problem for my compatriots on the left is merely one of perception. It would certainly be instructive to know for sure whether their time-honoured battle-cry of 'power to the people' was sincere or merely a ruse. Because if this kind of thing is what they want, then they are not merely misguided, they are downright sinister.

[My thanks to Harry Steele for the link to the Farringdon Street blog.]

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The trouble with people who 'come in from the cold' is that they have unfortunate tendency to bring some of that coldness with them and, every so often, they just cannot help but drop a little of it into our lives.

Take, for example, Christopher Hitchens, a man who has been widely (and justifiably) praised for the excoration of his former leftist colleagues since the WTC attacks. But reports of defection from the dark side may well have been exaggerated if this infuriatingly superficial and condescending bit of Euro-fawning is anything to by:

The Turkish Cypriots did not mount mass demonstrations against partition because they had any romantic idea of the European dream.

They just didn't want to be confined in a little sweat-shop state, forced to do business in the mainland Turkish lira, and kept away from a prosperity that they could see taking place on the other side of the wall.

See, the Turkish Cypriots want to embrace Europe so why are we Brits being so stubborn? Who is Mr.Hitchens trying to kid? The Northern (Turkish) sector of Cyprus has been the subject of official sanctions imposed by just about every European country since it was established in 1974. If the Cypriot Turks are, indeed,wallowing in a 'little sweat-shop state' then Europe is the cause of their misery not the cure.

For them, "protection" and "protectionism" became the
same thing - another name for stagnation and isolation.

'Protectionism' does indeed mean 'stagnation' but membership of the EU does not mean the abolition of protectionism. It simply means writing protectionism across a whole continent. It is exchanging the almost non-existant risk of 'Fortress Britain' for the racing, inescapable certainty of 'Fortress Europe'. A bad idea does not get better by simply inflating it.

In order to join this club, you had to have a political
democracy and free movement of labour and capital

No, in order to join this club you have to submit to the will of the Commission and agree to trade according to their incomprehensible ziggurat of rules and regulations.

Does anyone doubt that the relative peace between Britain and Ireland, now reduced to irritating discussions about constitutional details, is the result of London and Dublin being members of the same prosperous customs union? There's nothing left that's worth fighting over, and the "border" has become an economic irrelevance.

The free trade between Britain and Ireland was established by a bilateral treaty that long pre-dates the EU.

Former enemies like Hungary and Romania, Croatia and
Bosnia, Greece and Turkey, are competing to meet the "criteria" which Little Englanders so despise.

Oh yes, we're back to the 'Little Englanders' slur. In case of desperation, break glass and immediately deploy baseless insult. Why doesn't he just call us 'cavemen' and have done with? And the 'criteria' which the Croatians and others are 'competing' to meet are a pantheon of hurdles and regulatory impositions constructed in order to ensure that the one thing they can never do is compete effectively with France or Germany.

The anti-Euro campaign in Britain, which so ostentatiously waves the banner of "our history" seems, in fact, to be appallingly ignorant of it. Do we imagine that a few miles of dirty water truly separate us from the fate of our "continental" neighbours?

The fate of our 'continental neighbours' that we have managed to avoid are the fascist or communist tyrranies that have convulsed that place every two generations or so and left a charnel house in their wake. Does Mr.Hitchens imagine that it was a 'few miles of dirty water' that kept us safe from those darkest nightmares? Or was it our Anglo-Saxon traditions, our civil society and our common law. You remember those, don't you Mr.Hitchens? They are the things that have truly kept this island safe and yet even now are being jettisoned in favour of corpus juris, top-down elite rule and a sheaf of grand-sounding 'rights' that turn out, on closer examination, not to be worth the 100% recycled paper they are printed on.

If Mr.Hitchens doesn't belive this he should take some time to examine the list of countries that have managed to make it through the 20th Century without violent revolution, despotism or foreign occupation. It is a depressingly short list but includes only two European countries (Sweden and Switzerland). Is history trying to tell us something here?

Or that we can remain indifferent to their attempt at a
coalition? Name one disaster in British history that did not result from getting this wrong.

No, because we have tried to do anything this stupid before. I can, however, name a disaster in the Balkans that resulted from getting this wrong.

This doesn't just cut out the middleman and the
currency-trader if you are a tourist. It compels each country to take a wider interest than its own into account.

Note that Mr.Hitchens does not appear to have shed his anti-bourgeois sentiments just yet.

Now I am supposed to care whether the Queen's head is on a piece of paper or a coin that I only need to pay my non-electronic bills?

WHY is there not a fleur-de-lys on my international bank statement? How can I live with this national shame? Don't be silly, in other words.

Yes, it's all so silly. So silly and petty and beneath him, don't you know. Why are these silly, pettyfogging bores making such a fuss about whose face appears on our banknotes? It's all silly and preposterous. Mr.Hitchens is clearly aiming his sentiments to the appeal of the patrician party set and, if he had made a point about all fiat currencies being artificial to some degree, he would have had something.

As it is he seems to want us to believe that the whole issue is one of symbols, as if things like legal systems and constitutions are just irritating details best left to our betters. No, best we cast aside such prosaic nonsense and float with Hitchens through the sun-dappled, cafe-strewn boulevards of 'New Europe' air-kissing theatrically to the lilting melodies of Mozart and soaking in La Dolce Vita mixed with the sensous aroma of fresh French coffee.

Ahh, what a dream. Only it is the utopian fantasy of the kind that have bedrugged English intellectuals for the last Nth generations. But you can't cherry-pick from this package,Mr.Hitchens. You cannot just extract the bits you like and leave the rest. No, you sign up to the whole deal or you leave and had he had been keeping up with the current events, including the terrifyingly creepy totalitarian tendencies of the neo-communists in Brussels, the whole big fuss over banknotes wouldn't seem quite so petty after all.

We have a chance to be one of the serious members of a
burgeoning community, and to help create a system that doesn't answer to Washington or to Moscow, and the umpteenth government to be faced with this ancient but obvious question is cravenly seeking yet "more time".

This man is positively dripping with outmoded canards. Why is answering to Brussels any better that answering to Washington or Moscow? If that was the only choice I know which I would opt for. But the real truth is that independence is not just an option but our very best option and, contrary to fashionable belief, that independence is tantalisingly within our grasp if only the political will existed to reach out and grab it. That depressingly short list I refer to above also includes Britain; an independent Britain and, by doing the right thing now, we can stretch our proud record of achievement into the 21st Century and beyond. If that isn't a real dream worth fighting for then I don't know what is.

Much has been made of the apparent conversion of Christopher Hitchens to the cause of common sense and reason. I, myself, have been unpersuaded and it looks as if my instincts were right.

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Or is the headline France satisfied with EU deal on farm subsidies somewhat worrying? If it was "France absolutely livid about EU deal on farm subsides", then we might be getting somewhere. However, that doesn't seem to be something we ever see. If France was absolutely livid, there wouldn't be a deal.

(via Eldan).

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European Union agriculture ministers have agreed radical reforms to the controversial system of paying subsidies to farmers. They promise to slash the monstrous bill of 43bn euro ($50) that EU countries' taxpayers have to foot in order to subsidise ehem...French... ehem... farmers.

EU farm commissioner Franz Fischler, who first proposed the reforms, said the accord marked "the start of a new era" and would fundamentally change the 45-year old Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

Is this encouraging? We do not think so. And neither does the BBC. Shock, horror. Cast your eye over the deal and note it has as many (loop)holes as Swiss cheese (which, by the way, is produced without EU subsidies). I would like to draw your attention to the point 3.

1. Abolish most of the subsidies that reward farmers according to how much food they grow.
   
2. Farmers will receive a single payment, rather than grading the amount of money in line with the amount of food produced.
   
3. Individual countries will be able to stick to the old system if there is a risk that the new system would lead to the land being abandoned.
   
4. The prices at which the EU intervenes to support farmers are to be cut in key sectors, including milk powder and butter
   
5. Countries like the UK, which want to press ahead with more radical reform, are allowed to do so.
   
6. Direct payment for bigger farms will be cut to finance the new rural development policy, promoting the environment and animal welfare.

So the end of EUcrats meddling in agriculture in nowhere in sight. The 'reform' is merely a cosmetic rejuggling of CAP's inefficiencies and vast bureaucracy induced by the wide-spread criticism of the policy for distorting global trade and hurting poor countries. The subsidies have been the key sticking point in agreeing the next round of global trade talks directly opposing the EU child-like and visionary drive for 'global influence' as a counterpart to the US.

Yeah, like that's gonna happen.

It's a typical EU compromise which gives and takes a little from everyone and creates terrible difficulties for those who have to implement it.

Guess who said that? Gerd Sonnleitner, head of Germany's farmers union. He got that right but I doubt he will see the light on the other side of the EU fence.

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Mr Prodi is not amused. The UK government's decision on the euro had disappointed him. Oh dear. He probably can't wait to get his hands on UK affairs himself.

The EU chief also reckons that it was a signal of deep political problems. He is right there. The EU has deep political problems. No wait, he meant the UK - it appears that he doubts the wisdom of the direction our reverent Tony Blair has taken over the euro.

Prodi acknowledged that Tony might have had a tough time winning a referendum but he said he did not know whether the prime minister's decision was due to political wisdom or a lack of courage. Of course, Prodi does not worry about referendums, you just keep having them until they say 'yes'.

And finally, Mr Prodi warns that Britain cannot remain half in and half out of Europe. Oh good. Let's get out then...

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Never mind San Francisco or Hampstead, Brussels is the true home of the radical student left. Still as committed as ever to the anti-ismism crusades of the 1980's, they continue to dig away at the foundations of our 'bourgeois values'.

Seems they have just struck another seam:

The Commission is in the final stages of drawing up a directive to ban sex discrimination, with implications for the media, advertising and insurance industries.

The draft directive, revealed in Tuesday's Financial Times, would leave it to the courts to decide whether programmes or advertisements were sexist or "did not respect human dignity". An explanatory note says: "The purpose of this provision is to avoid throughout all forms of mass media all stereotypical portrayals of women and men, as well as any projection of unacceptable images of men and women affecting human dignity and decency in advertisements."

The law could have profound implications for institutions such as Britain's topless Page Three girls in The Sun newspaper and vast swathes of Italian television. Advertisers using sex to sell could also be affected.

If it wasn't so offensive and inappropriate, I'd say that they've just discovered a motherlode.

The real devil in this detail lies with the apparently reasonable proposition to 'leave it to the Courts' thereby providing a fig-leaf of objective justice. Actually, though, this is a charter and blessing for looney-left activists to drag any number of advertising agencies and media companies through any number of Courts on pretty much any pretext they damn well please (as these things are usually drafted in the widest and vaguest possible terms).

However, in practice, this will only need to be done once or twice for the wicked capitalists to get the message and, in order to avoid the risk of a ruinous lawsuit, start censoring themselves. That is the ideal solution because why bother with all that messy and troublesome enforcement business when life is so much easier for the ruling elite if everyone just internalises their own repression.

The European Union: if it didn't exist, we would not have to invent it.

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One of the more feeble but less important things about the euro is the actual design of the banknotes. It was decided early on that the notes would show pictures of bridges, supposedly to symbolise "the close cooperation between Europe and the rest of the world". However, due to the fact that there were not going to be enough notes to show a picture of a bridge from each Euro-zone country, the notes were instead designed with pictures of bridges that don't actually exist, but which resemble (in terms of style) bridges that do exist somewhere in Europe. (To my eye, a remarkably large number of them resemble real bridges that are actually in France, but that might be just me). So, rather than drawing attention to the great cultural treasures that do in fact exist in the euro-zone, European money instead gives us a sort of homogenised blandless.

(Euro coins have one common side and one side that the country that would issues the particular coin into circulation can do what it likes with. Just as with the state quarters in the US, which the states got to design, the quality of the designs is variable).

In any event, it was nice to see on the front page of this morning's Times (which Samizdata does not link to) that the people who design British coins do not go for such blandness. From 2004 to 2007 Britain (assuming it does not join the euro) is going to release a series of four new pound coins showing great British bridges.

Of course, issues of everyone getting their turn come into this, too. As England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland all use the same coins, one of the four coins has to feature a bridge from each of the four constituent countries of the United Kingdom. (Curiously, the situation with the pound is the precise reverse of that with the euro. All of the UK uses the same coins, but England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland all have different banknotes).

This is where we get to the interesting part, which is the choice of bridges on the coins. Choosing for Scotland and Wales was undoubtedly very easy. Benjamin Baker's Forth Bridge and Thomas Telford's Menai Strait Bridge are so famous that it can't have taken more than a moment to choose them. As for Northern Ireland, we have the rather more obscure Egyptian Arch from the Belfast-Dublin railway. Sadly, there are no really famous bridges in Northern Ireland, so we have to make do with what we have. I would rather a more famous bridge from somewhere else in the UK on the coin, but I guess Northern Ireland has to get a coin.

As for England, we have the very new Gateshead Millennium Bridge. This choice doesn't impress me greatly, as I think the new bridge is more a piece of urban decoration than a piece of important infrastructure. (It illustrates that with modern super-strong materials, engineers and architects designing urban footbridges suddenly have immense freedom to be playful with the design of such bridges, as almost anything they can imagine has suddenly become technically possible and affordable. This is an interesting story, I am all for urban decoration, and I think the bridge is a very good example, but am not sure that this bridge is the right choice for a series of coins that celebrates great bridge building.

So what would my choice for the "England" bridge be?

Well, the two most famous bridges in England (besides the unspeakably ugly Tower Bridge in London) are Abraham Darby's Ironbridge in Shropshire and Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol. The Ironbridge is beautiful, and was utterly revolutionary when built. This would be my choice. The Clifton Suspension bridge is a great bridge built by Britain's greatest engineer, but is very similar to the Menai Strait Bridge, and the Menai Strait Bridge was built first.

However, if you were to choose the Ironbridge as the fourth bridge, then you have chosen four bridges built between 1779 (The Ironbridge) and 1890 (The Forth Bridge). This isn't that surprising, as this is the era during which British engineers led the world. However, I am guessing the coin designers decided they wanted something more contemporary for the fourth bridge. In the 20th century, bridge design came to be more and more dominated by the Americans, but British engineers still did some impressive things. As I see it, there were three major movements in the design of long bridges. One of these developments was the steel arch bridge. One of the most important examples of this type was designed by British engineers, but unfortunately it is in Australia. There are one or two examples of this type of bridge in the UK - most notably the Tyne Bridge in Newcastle, but there are much greater examples in Sydney and New York, so this has to be ruled out.

Bypassing the second for a moment, the third major movement in 20th century bridges was made possible in the 1980s by the same invention of new super-strong materials that gave the designers of pedestrian bridges their new freedom to exercise their every whim. This same materials revolution led to the cable stayed bridge becoming the most economical type to build for spans of up to about 1000 metres. Sadly, though, there are no particularly good examples of the type in the UK. The longest is the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge at Dartford, and the circumstances of the location prevented this from being an especially pretty bridge. In any event, the bridge was not particularly long or innovative by international standards. (There is a stunning example of this kind of bridge across the mouth of the Seine in France, however. If real bridges were being used for euro notes, I would definitely nominate this one. In fact they have put an imaginary bridge that looks quite like it on the 500 euro note).

So what have we left? Well, the second and most important 20th century movement for long bridges was the long span suspension bridge. The first two of these to be built were in the United States: the George Washington Bridge in New York and the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. However, there are three major bridges of this kind in the United Kingdom. The Forth Road Bridge is in Scotland, right next to the more famous rail bridge, so it doesn't qualify for the English coin. (Also, it wasn't a particularly innovative bridge, for reasons I will get to in a moment). The Humber bridge in East Yorkshire had until very recently the longest span of any bridge in the world (the record is now held by the Akashi-Kaikyo bridge near Kobe in Japan), and is a good piece of engineering, but not an especially exciting one. In any event, the amount of public money wasted on this fairly pointless bridge was so great that the Treasury is unlikely to want to constantly reminded of it.

The third long span suspension bridge in the UK is the First Severn Bridge, near Bristol. This bridge has a story.

In the early 20th century, suspension bridges got longer and longer, and their decks got thinner and thinner. This all went well until 1940, when the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in Washington State shook itself to pieces. It was then realised that the aerodynamics and resonance properties of bridge decks were not as well understood as engineers had thought. For a while, this problem was solved by attaching a thick metal truss to the bridge deck to make it rigid. However, this was expensive in engineering terms and looked ugly. (The Forth Road Bridge has such a truss, which is why I described it the way I did earlier).

Eventually, though, engineers did figure out the aerodynamic and resonance properties of Bridge design, and the Severn Bridge was the first long bridge built with a thin deck after the problems were properly understood. It is for this reason a significant bridge, as well as being a particularly beautiful bridge, especially at twilight, In my opinion it is the best bridge built in Britain in the 20th century. If not allowed the Ironbridge, this would be my nominee for the bridge to put on the "English" coin.

Except the Severn Bridge probably doesn't qualify to appear on any of the four coins. The Severn Estuary marks the boundary between England and Wales, and while one end of the bridge is in England, the other is not. Personally I would still put it on the English coin, and insist that it had been chosen to emphasise "the close cooperation between England and the rest of the United Kingdon". But the bureacracy probably couldn't cope with this.

Despite all this commentary, I do like the design of the new coins, and very much look forward to actually seeing them in circulation. This is one more (relatively unimportant) reason to vote against the euro.

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Here is a quote from an opinion piece by David Heathcoat-Amory MP, the Tory party representative on the convention, published in the Telegraph:

No one in the convention doubts the scale of the undertaking or the huge implications for the way Europe is governed - except, apparently, the British Government, which is completely isolated in maintaining that the new constitution is just a "tidying-up exercise". In the convention, this caused bafflement and then some hilarity. Peter Hain, the government representative, belatedly declared a number of "red lines" on proposals that he wants removed, such as majority voting on foreign policy, social security harmonisation, and interference in criminal justice procedures. But if these issues are so important to the Government, how can it just be a "tidying-up exercise"?

The truth is that the European Constitution founds a new union, with a single unified structure and legal personality. The existing structure, which secures the rights of member states to make their own decisions and collective arrangements about foreign policy and criminal justice matters, will disappear. The EU will have "exclusive competence" over trade, competition rules, common commercial policy, fisheries conservation and the signing of all international agreements.

Please read the whole article, it's terrifying in its clarity. To be honest, I don't know which bit I find more scary. The one about the changes to the UK legal system:

The EU's proposed criminal justice powers are particularly striking because they allow for harmonisation of national laws and procedures by majority voting. This obviously goes to the heart of domestic policy, particularly for a country such as Britain with a distinctive common law tradition, including jury trials, habeas corpus and rules of evidence that differ from those in most other EU countries.

Or the one about foreign policy:

Foreign policy, which is at present decided between national governments, will change completely. The new foreign minister will "conduct the Union's foreign policy". There is provision for majority voting on policies recommended by the foreign minister.

None of the above is new and has been bemoaned on Samizdata.net many times, but it gets more frightening as the process of EU imposition on the UK progresses…

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The proposed EU regulation of blogs and other forms of Internet speech being suggested by the Council of Europe (a quasi-governmental think-tank whose views have inordinate sway with the EU's policy making elite) is very revealing about what lies at the heart of The Great European Project.

Steven Den Beste has written a rather good article on why the press is treated differently than broadcast media which use the finite resource of the electromagnetic spectrum. One can argue that as the EM spectrum is finite, it is reasonable to share out its use and as clearly not everyone can set up a radio or TV station, some rules to prevent the use of the media from becoming over mighty are justified. This is not quite how I see that issue myself but the contention is far from absurd.

One can even make the far less supportable assertion that because in reality setting up a newspaper is far beyond the means of most people simply because it is so expensive, the state should regulate the press, at least to some extent. Not surprisingly I flatly reject this notion and think the only defence individuals need against the established press are laws against libel. However the thinking behind this sort of regulation is at least easy to understand and can, if you accept the state as an essentially benevolent neutral institution (which I certainly do not), be seen as a way to prevent abuses of power by an over-mighty media corporation given the vast asymmetry of access to public opinion between a newspaper and an individual.

But when the Council of Europe start urging the EU to regulate blogs like this one, it should be clear that none of the arguments which can be applied to broadcast media and or the press apply here. As I mentioned in my previous article on this issue, if you have a cheap computer and a crummy modem, it still only takes about five minutes and no money whatsoever beyond your dial-up or broadband connection charges to set up a blog. There is no asymmetry of access to the public involved here. Granted, setting up an effective blog is another issue entirely, but simply getting viewable grievances in front of blogosphere eyeballs is simplicity itself.

So if anyone can set up a blog, and there is no finite resource in need of being allocated 'fairly' and there are no de facto capital related barriers to 'market' entry, what are we to make of this Council of Europe proposal to regulate us?

If I had to pick a single word to describe the root of this move to intermediate the state between on-line free speech and on-line readers, it would be Communitarianism. The notion at work here is much the same as that which I discussed when I rebutted Peter Hain's ideas for a totally political 'society'. If I write something and plonk it on the Internet, I cannot compel someone else to read it just as they could not have compelled me to write it in the first place. Yet the notion of a freely offered opinion via an almost universally available medium and a freely choosing reader assumes that individual choice (mine as writer and yours as reader), rather than some collective political will, is an acceptable basis for social interaction.

What the people at The Council of Europe find so offensive is that this simple process (I decide to write, you decide to read (or not)) is totally non-political. If you read my article and decide to leave a comment, and I decide to delete that comment, and you then decide to start your own blog to decry the things I write, where is the 'political community' in all this? Nowhere of course, because the actions described are purely social. There is no use of the collective means of coercion by either me nor the disgruntled reader. You do not get a vote on what I write and I do not get a vote on what you read... and if you start up a blog of your own to criticise me, I do not get a vote on what you write either and if I leave comments on your blog pointing out the errors of you ways, you can delete them if you choose to.

The understanding that civil society (the several actions of affinity and dis-affinity) and the political sphere (the control the collective means of coercion) are materially different is hardly a new observation. Yet it is the refusal to accept this by people who see force (politics) as the only legitimate means of interaction which lies at the heart of attempts to legally impose certain forms on how people express views on the Internet. It is not about enabling wrongs to be righted, or giving voice to the voiceless, or sharing the means of expression. As blogs are more or less free to set up and the Internet has essentially infinite in capacity to support them, that argument is simply a bare faced lie. This proposed regulation is just a particularly overt example of how the power elite in Europe will not tolerate anything which disintermediates the state because to deny any role for politics in something is to deny them any role. After all, they are not threatening to ban us (provided we comply with their directives), they are just demending we stop acting as social entities, following the customs and manners of the Internet, and start acting as political entities, comporting ourselves according to the politically formats laid out by the superstate's expresion of what they see as the collective will.

This is because if there is one thing communitarians hates above all, it is being ignored and excluded. A communitarian thinks not only is my business everyone's business, but the plurality has the right to use political interaction (which means force backed law) to vote on my every action... there is no real 'private life' to a communitarian, just a political one. In a quite literal sense, popularity is mandatory: you may only do what a plurality allows you to do.

In a perverse way, this policy proposal by the Council of Europe is almost good news: if they want to go to the effort to regulate us, that means they think we humble bloggers actually matter in the overall scheme of things. Our voices are being heard and the powers-that-be do not much care for the discordant non-state approved tune we are singing. Splendid.

Resistance is not futile. We will not be harmonised.

(18) (51)

People in the US, who take notions of Freedom of Expression and Private Property for granted, will be astonished by the latest steaming pile of wisdom to emerge from the clenched cheeks of our European would-be masters. Declan McCullagh reports:

The all-but-final proposal draft says that Internet news organizations, individual Web sites, moderated mailing lists and even Web logs (or "blogs"), must offer a "right of reply" to those who have been criticized by a person or organization.
With clinical precision, the council's bureaucracy had decided exactly what would be required. Some excerpts from its proposal:

• "The reply should be made publicly available in a prominent place for a period of time (that) is at least equal to the period of time during which the contested information was publicly available, but, in any case, no less than for 24 hours."
  
• Hyperlinking to a reply is acceptable. "It may be considered sufficient to publish (the reply) or make available a link to it" from the spot of the original mention.
  
• "So long as the contested information is available online, the reply should be attached to it, for example through a clearly visible link."
  
• Long replies are fine. "There should be flexibility regarding the length of the reply, since there are (fewer) capacity limits for content than (there are) in off-line media."

It's pretty zany to imagine that just about every form of online publishing, from full-time news organizations to occasional bloggers to moderated chat rooms, would be covered. But it's no accident. A January 2003 draft envisioned regulating only "professional on-line media." Two months later, a March 2003 draft dropped the word "professional" and intentionally covered all "online media" of any type.

Read the whole article.

So what is the message to the EU I mentioned in the title? Simple:

We will not comply

We have a comments section on samizdata.net in which people can and do comment about what we write, but access to that comment section is at our capricious discretion. If we decide we want to IP ban someone or want to delete their remarks from our comments section because we think they are offensive, or even if they are not offensive but we just bloody well feel like doing it because we have a headache, then we bloody well will. This is our private property.

We are already hosted on a server in the USA and I am quite confident our hosters would tell the EU where they can stick any demands to yank us off the net because we decline to submit to political moderation of the form our free speech takes on our private property (i.e. the server space we rent from them). If we have to go entirely pseudonymous and log onto Samizdata.net in order to post via 'dead drop' servers rather than submit to EU regulation of how we manage the information on our blog, then that is exactly what those of us who post from within the rapidly emerging EU tyranny will do. We utterly reject political moderation of free speech in civil society. This is not about giving people a voice but rather about replacing social interaction (which is what true free speech is), with political interaction mediated and mandated by the state.

If these regulations become the law of the EU (as seems likely), we will not obey, we will not cooperate, we will not accept that anyone has a 'right' to reply on our blog. Do you think we have said nasty things about you and want to reply regardless of our unwillingness to let you use our comment section? Fine...go to blogger.com, sign up (for free), click on 'create a new blog' and voila... you have your own blog on which you can scream about how those mean old Samizdatistas 'done you wrong' to your heart's content.

And if the EU says we have to let you comment... tough shit, it ain't gonna happen. The people who write for Samizdata.net all now live next door to Samizdata Illuminatus, in Arkham, Massachusetts.

 

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Having been involved in British libertarian circles since I was in my late teens about 18 years ago - god that makes me feel old - I have gotten used to the charge that the likes of us are crazed dogmatists. In Britain's notoriously anti-intellectual culture, being interested in ideas, and worse, ideas which question the need for most of what governments do, is to be branded as a dangerous nutter. (Mind you, having read abusive comments directed at yours truly by various LewRockwell.com types, I feel almost quite moderate and middle-of-the-road these days.)

Step forward Aidan Rankin, who in The Spectator magazine, charges that eurosceptics within the Tory Party and among libertarian circles are the "new Trotskyists," every bit as militant and dogmatic as the old left. In a way, that is a backhanded compliment of sorts because it shows that folk like Rankin are at least becoming aware of our existence, even though they prefer to construct straw men for the purpose of easy knock-down pieces rather than describe us more accurately. Anyway, let us fisk:

On Europeans and other issues the Tories are still impeded - not by indecision as in the recent past, but by an insidious ideological rigidity, a right-wing version of political correctness.

Huh? Really? Has the Tory Party, in recent years, called for, say, total withdrawal by this country from the EU? No. But to read Rankin you would assume that to be the case.

Public scepticism about the single currency is matched by the lack of public support for Eurosceptic campaigns. This is because even to sympathetic observers such campaigns appear so often to be bitter and bigoted.

He has half a point. I think the eurosceptic lobby would do better to focus on the essentially illiberal nature of the EU rather than on the fact that is being run by vile Frogs, etc.

He then turns his gaze from Europe to other issues. Here we go:

"Libertarians, whose influence in conservative circles is growing, are free market fundamentalists.

We think that the market, which is a place where sovereign individuals freely transact and deal with one another, is better than any other form of human order devised, such as state planning. Fundamentalist is a boo word.

Like Marxists of the most dogmatic kind, libertarians reduce the individual to homo economicus: the man or woman as a mere unit of production or consumption, without any cultural reference points.

Complete Bull. Many libertarian thinkers, of which Ludwig von Mises was an outstanding example, did not reduce Man to a "mere" economic being. Rather, he used the insights of economics to help show how human beings behaved. Libertarians understand that people seek to acquire and keep values, including non-material ones, and that in an open society, such action will produce things like markets.

Libertarians combine economic purism with a naive commitment to counter-cultural values.

Speak for yourself, ditto. A perusal of the literature should show Rankin that libertarians often value things like marriage and other institutions, which are the opposite of "counter-cultural", presumably in the way Rankin means it. What of course he objects to is the fact that libertarians insist that membership of institutions be voluntary.

Like the politically correct Left, libertarians believe in open borders and the abolition of immigration controls.

I take it Rankin believes in immigration control. And anyway he overlooks the fact that libertarians like me would only support totally open borders if the Welfare State were to be abolished first. I would also support the right for states, or even better, private communities to sell rights to citizenship for a price and even trade them on an open market.

At its most extreme, it (libertarianism) celebrates family and community breakdown as forms of liberation, or drug dependency as consumer choice.

Speak for yourself, ditto.

They [evil libertarians] oppose with revolutionary ardour any public money for faith-based institutions, single-sex schools or regiments, or anything not "open to all.

By George, I believe this man has been paying attention. Actually, I am even more extreme than that. I oppose spending of public money on schools, be they co-ed or whatever. Let schools of any type exist, funded by consenting adults. Libertarians do of course differ between minarchists who favour some kind of tax-funded spending on courts and the armed forces, and anarcho-capitalists who do not.

I could Fisk some more but you get the general drift. Aidan Rankin is a conservative, I would guess, and obviously deeply alarmed at the libertarian meta-context.

He should be.

(1) (14)

Here are extracts from a letter by Geoff Bean, an English dairy farmer, addressed to Steve Williamson, a "Special Enforcement Officer" of the agency in York. The York farmer bought builder's rubble to make repairs round his farm, but received a letter stating that since his land did not have the benefit of a Waste Management Licence, this depositing of "waste" was in clear breach of the law and requesting that Mr Bean submit to a formal interview under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) to "establish" his involvement in this unlicensed waste management operation.

I am in receipt of your pompous and ill-informed letter. How dare you write to me in such terms, as if you were addressing a common criminal.

The "waste" for which he had paid good money was about to be put to valuable use replacing the floor of a barn and resurfacing his farm tracks.

Were I a one-legged homosexual Afghan refugee/terrorist living on the welfare state, you and your ilk would not dare write in such a manner for fear of having all the human rights lawyers in creation round your necks, but as you are speaking to an honest, hard-working and overstressed Englishman, you appear to think you can behave like all too many of the vast and ever-increasing army of totally useless, non-productive, arrogant and bloody-minded officialdom, who are now only too successfully doing more damage to this once great and free nation than was ever achieved by Adolf Hitler.

Mr Williamson repeated that Mr Bean must submit to interview "under caution". Mr Bean agreed to spare some of his valuable time to assist Mr Williamson in his "futile attempt" to justify his "bureaucratic red tape", but reminded him that, since slavery in this country had been abolished, he would expect reimbursement at "£150 an hour or part thereof, plus VAT".

That's the spirit!

But rejoice ye not, since whether Mr Bean will face criminal charges for his breach of EU law, the agency cannot yet comment...

From Sunday Telegraph's Christopher Booker's Notebook

Update: If you think this is outrageous, you might want to share your thoughts with Mr Steve Williamson himself. And while you are at it, why not to cc his boss, the regional director Mr Andrew Wood. We have done a bit of research and think these email addresses will work, given the format of the Environmental Agency emails.

(0) (32)

I don't know whether we have just signed up to a new EU Constitution or not. Strange as it sounds, I truly have no idea. Judging from the opening paragraphs of this Telegraph report, it's already a done deal:

To the strains of Beethoven's Ode To Joy, the Convention on the Future of Europe proclaimed agreement yesterday on a written constitution for a vast European Union of 450 million citizens bringing together East and West.

Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the chair of the 105-strong body, held up a text that he said could be offered proudly to prime ministers next week as a permanent settlement for a free and democratic family of nations.

So is that it then? Are we now all Euro-serfs? Has the knot been tied, the deal been struck and all the irons shoved deeply into the fire? If so, well that was pretty sneaky of them, wasn't it.

On the other hand, further down in the same article, there is room for doubt:

EU governments will have their chance to chip away at the 224-page text in an intergovernmental conference running from October to next spring, although Mr Hain said the essential architecture is now written in stone.

That sounds like there's still room for an argument, doesn't it? Though perhaps not much argument. More like wiggle room.

Well, I must confess I'm stumped. Like every other Euro-project it's all camouflaged in double-speak and drenched in high-concept gobbledegook. Maybe salvation lies in the hope that possibly the EUnuchs don't understand it either.

(1) (38)

And of course I am sure he does not particularly care what I think either. In an article titled Europe and Liberalism, he notes that Ramesh Ponnuru has praised him for changing his mind about the European Union.

Sullivan now thinks the European Union is not such a good thing as he once thought and both he and Ponnuru have finally noticed that having the EU completely swallow Britain is also not in the national interests of the USA. In fact that Americentric utilitarian observation seems to be the entire basis for their opposition to The Great European Project. Massive regulatory statism? Dramatic erosion of due process? Ever higher taxes? 'Fortress Europe' trade barriers with the rest of the world? Spectacular corruption? Higher unemployment? No... the reason to finally start glaring at the EU across the Atlantic is to preserve the UK's ability to support the US in foreign policy matters and to work for US interests from within the bastions of Fortress Europe.

This narrow utilitarian argument seems to be what has brought Sullivan to stop being a cheerleader for the EU without much of a nod to the idea that maybe the EU is bad for Britain. So whilst I am happy to see a fairly influential commentator like Sullivan stop arguing Britain should embrace the EU even more deeply, he has nothing whatsoever to contribute to the British domestic debate on the subject. In fact, the stated views of Sullivan play to anti-American sentiments within Britain so harmoniously that I really wish he would just shut the f**k up.

To argue that the reason Britain should not allow its national sovereignty and identity to be submerged by Europe is because it does not suit the United States, is to put many of the people who dislike the EU in Britain in rather a quandary. Many such folks dislike the EU because British interests matter far more to them that those of the EU... and for exactly the same reason they are also highly suspicious of the USA, seeing it as subordinating 'our' interests to 'their' interests. For an example of anti-EU sentiments allied to deep and festering suspicion of the USA, you need look no further than Air Strip One. I see little value in Sullivan actively kicking the none-too-tight lid off latent anti-Americanism with statements like:

Keeping Britain both in the [United States of Europe] and outside of it militarily, diplomatically, and monetarily should become a prime U.S. objective in foreign policy. Without it, the United States could lose its most valuable military and diplomatic ally.

But the fact is almost no one who actually (in theory) gets a vote on the subject, not even Atlanticist enthusiasts like myself, think US interests are more than passingly germane when trying to argue against Britain sleepwalking to the gaping maw of that half-dead and half-mad leviathan called the European Union.

It seems Sullivan is no fan of the social/cultural Anglosphere meme. What with him being a party political right-statist (a Republican) and only a passing commentator on things like objective rights and moral philosophy, I suppose it is not all that surprising to read him taking a highly collectivist 'American national interests' view of pretty much everything, but then this is precisely why his views are of little value in any positive way to people outside his American national collective.

I would argue that the Anglosphere does exist as a cultural vibe, but it is something that can be made a great deal weaker precisely by attitudes like Sullivan's. The underlying cultural basis for UK political support for US actions in Iraq sprang from these very real Anglosphere notions. Yet if I thought the United States government was working to keep Britain inside a United States of Europe (just not too far inside) for its own interests and at our expense, which is to say working against people like me who are calling for the UK's complete withdrawal from the EU, then I would be bulk purchasing US flags to burn in demonstrations in central London... and if a relentlessly Atlanticist Anglosphere person such as me thinks that, one can only speculate what less pro-American segments of popular opinion might think.

If the US government wants Britain as an ally, fine. But if it wants to sacrifice individual British people as political cannon fodder to mitigate the effects of EU power? Want to know where you can stick that? I will continue to regard US civil society as having many admirable qualities and still feel an Atlanticist affinity to it regardless... but at that point the US government loses its 'lesser evil' status for me and becomes just another enemy on every level as the last basis for having incidental common goals vanishes.

(0) (6)

I am sick to death of the BBC, I really am. How anybody can even try to suggest that it is an objective news source is beyond me. The paranoid, ranting, 'Little Englander', anti-EU, xenophobic mentality is clear for all to see:

The 12-nation eurozone is in even worse economic trouble than previously thought.

How can this be anything but complete garbage? It is high time that the BBC was exposed as the extreme right-wing, capitalistic, Bushista, warmongering propoganda tool that it really is!

(1) (24)

HMG is being high-handed, undemocratic and arrogant. That is the view of the British tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail on the refusal by the government to put the issues of the EU constitution and joining the single currency to the British public in a referendum.

In response, they have been running a campaign in the form of a 'People's Referendum' which gives members of the public an opportunity to let HMG know how they feel and demand a formal, legally-binding referendum of these issues. The campaign ends at midnight tonight.

Whilst I can wholly sympathise with the sense of outrage and injustice that has driven this 'voxpop' campaign, I have chosen not to participate because, strange as it may sound, I do not want a referendum.

I do not wish to be too harsh on the organisers of this campaign or the proprietors of the Daily Mail. They are being far more proactive in advancing the debate in this country than just about any other organ of the fourth estate and, to the extent that the eventual result provides a bellweather of public opinion, it may prove useful in terms of boosting moral. But, tactically, to demand a referendum on these issues is to play right into the hands of the enemy.

I say this because with a government which is committed to the EU project, coupled with the ability to write out a blank cheque to enable them to realise their vision, a referendum is anything but the level playing-field that too many people fondly imagine it to be. There are loads of ways that the result can be pre-determined and HMG is almost certain to employ every single one them.

First off, the 'yes' campaign will have access to unlimited tax-payer funds while the 'no' campaign will have to rely on voluntary donations from their supporters. The (state-owned) BBC propoganda machine will be put into overdrive and current sceptical non-state media sources will be bought off or bullied into switching sides. Organised indepenence campaigns will be infiltrated with people who will start making nazi-type noises to the press at the right moment, thus giving the impression that the 'no' campaign is merely a fig-leaf for a scarey national socialist movement and, every day of the campaign will see dark, ominous op-eds in various established media outlets warning of the 'dire economic consequences' of a 'no' vote.

Added to all this, of course, is the distinct possibility that the actual voting figures themselves will be diddled. I wouldn't put it past them. Even if that were not the case and, by some miracle, the 'no' campaign won a slim majority, we all know what happens next. Yes, that's right, just as in Denmark and Ireland, we would have to endure another referendum in order to get the 'right' result.

In short, the referendum on the Euro and the Constitution will be as rigged as an 18th Century tea clipper. If the independence movement has put all its eggs in the referendum basket, then where does it go from there? The answer is nowhere. Having been spiked by the appearance of a 'democratic consensus' we will have no choice but to watch helplessly while Mr.Blair abolishes our country with a flourish of moral authority.

That is why I will not join in the voices calling for a referendum. I choose, intead, to demand complete British withdrawal from the EU and not to settle for any less. It is the only position which cannot be bargained away, compromised or outflanked.

Neither this nor any other government has the right to sign away the sovereignty of the British people and I do not accept as legitimate any show of hands which purports to provide it with the authority to do so. I demand independence and I will accept no substitutes.

(0) (31)

A new EU directive, that goes into effect on July 1, will require all Internet firms to account for value added tax, or VAT, on "digital sales." Computerworld reports how overseas Internet retailers may see their European profit push derailed by one of the oldest drags on business: tax.

The effect of the law will be an additional 15 to 25 percent levy on Internet transactions such as software and music downloads, monthly subscriptions to an Internet service provider and on any product purchased through an online auction anywhere in the EU.

The VAT tax is not new burden for European dot-coms that have been charging customers VAT since their inception. Their overseas rivals though have been exempt, making foreign firms an obvious choice for the bargain-hunting consumer. David Melville, general counsel of UK ISP Freeserve, a division of French ISP Wanadoo, rejoices:

It's a massive competitive disadvantage. It's good to see at last it being eroded.

Freeserve has lobbied furiously for the past two years to get the loophole closed, saying its chief rival AOL UK, the Internet unit of AOL Time Warner, saved 150 million pounds ($249.7 million) in tax payments over the years.

Shock, horror! How about lobbying the EU comissariat to abolish the internet sales VAT in the EU instead?! I thought not.

For example, on eBay, a UK seller will pay six pounds to list an automobile and 35 pounds for real estate, both 20 percent increases that include the UK's 17.5 percent VAT charge. Some analysts predict that the new tax will decreases sales in the short term, which will hurt American dot-coms such as eBay and Amazon, given their expectations of higher growth in their overseas business.

But European firms feel justice have been done.:

The old way certainly gave non-EU companies a leg up during a very crucial stage in the development of the market.

Please note the assumption that it is acceptable for governments to meddle with competitive markets and 'equalise the race'. The EU businesses behave in a way that is not surprising, they are happy to see their overseas competitors weakened, however, I fear their victory is rather Pyrrhic.

(0) (8)

Citizens of the Czech Republic, about to vote in the referendum on their country's entry into the EU, were shocked to find in their inboxes yesterday an email from their Prime Minister. Is this e-politics? They do not think so and they certainly are not impressed. The Prime Minister spamming, er, addressing the nation.

A Czech blogger comments on AcidLog:

I don't know who thought up the campaign, but I know that if a commercial product were marketed this way, the company would be doomed.

He also provides the text of the email. Judge for yourselves:

Dear citizens,

The moment of a serious decision is close, which should be made by each of us confidently and independently. It is a decision that is beyond the boundaries of the everyday political disputes and squabbling. We are deciding the future of our country for decades. Those who say that the decision we make this Friday and Saturday is a 'draft' one are wrong. This is not the case. The referendum is binding and the result will determine whether the Czech Republic enters the European Union or whether it will chose a long period of isolation. Every one of us has experienced a moment in his life when an opportunity was missed and it never came back.

Vladimir Spidla
Prime Minister

Although the blogger intents to vote yes, he lists a number of arguments used by the anti-EU campaigners: the EU's murky financial management, scandals regarding selection of agencies (presumably refering to allocation of EU contracts), the idiotic pseudo-documentaries on TV insulting the viewers' intelligence, the scandal with real EU citizens (perhaps some local affair), leaflets full of newspeak and arguments notable by their absence and concert by one of the divas of Czech pop.

Despite the obvious sarcasm, it seems that the level of anti-EU campaigning in the 'New Europe' is pitifully inadequate. They have a lot to overcome as the EU propaganda gives a powerful incentive to the average Czech citizen. Tomas Kohl explains:

People from UK or abroad know little about the quality and range of arguments presented here to convince the public to say Yes. Instead of focusing on heavy issues like economic and monetary policy, questions about sovereignty, foreign relations, the government plays the game of nonsense issues and tries to lure us with sweet promises of a better tomorrow.

Following are the main selling points of the ongoing pro-EU propaganda, paid by taxpayers:

The borders will disappear, people will be able to travel freely
We'll be able to study in EU countries for free
We'll be able to work anywhere in the EU
We'll get a large chunk of money from Brussels
More security

Tomas's appeal to the British is touching:

I just pray the Brits won't accept that damn Constitution that is coming their way. Britain has been the most prominent power player holding Europhile madmen from doing the worst things for some time. If they lose, we can elect conservative party in 2006 and it won't matter anymore. Guys, wake up!

Yeah, let's wake up and do something... It might be a good idea to notice the countries that we know so little about and care even less. After all they did come out in support of the Anglosphere, incurring the wrath of Chirac in the process and jeopardizing the candies he was graciously considering handing out to them. The civil societies there are still very fragile and without a heavy-weight ally they stand no chance against the EU Federasts.

Another Czech blogger sums up his thoughts on the issue in a graphic succinctly named "Entry to the EU".

(1) (38)

The mainstream news outlets in Britain are abuzz tonight following today's statement from Chancellor Gordon Brown that now is not the right time for Britain to abandon sterling and adopt the Euro. Dressed up in the mawkish tinsel of lovey-dovey Euro-warmth, Mr.Brown told the nation that, with great reluctance, he must rule out adoption of the Euro because his 'economic tests' have not been met.

Cue shrugs, eyeball-rolls and 'whaddaygonnado?' sighs from Mr.Brown and a chorus of booing, hissing, spitting and puppy-kicking from an assembled throng of federasts in both Parliament and the nations newsrooms. It is all a pantomime, of course. Blair and the rest of the executive want to the Euro with the kind of slavering intensity with which an alcoholic needs a shot of gin. The so-called 'economic tests' that must be met beforehand are purely a fig-leaf to mask the fact that they cannot convince an increasingly skeptical and surly British public to go along with them. The very nano-second the government thinks it can win a referendum on the issue the 'economic tests' will have miraculously been met.

But let no-one be fooled into thinking that Euro-geddon has been postponed. Beneath the blizzard of high-falutin' fiscal gobbledegook being whipped up by the 'meeja' talking heads, an even more sinister tentacle of the Belgian Empire is slowly and quietly coiling around us.

Some thanks are due to the Daily Telegraph for the timely publication of two articles about the colossal danger to liberty in this country posed by the Europe-wide Arrest Warrant, a legal instrument designed to 'harmonise' justice within the EU but which will, in fact, strip British citizens of every single one of their time-honoured protections:

When the warrant comes into force next year court hearings will be a formality and the requesting country will not have to present evidence of a well-founded case. Nor will the accused be allowed to argue that he will not get a fair trial. It has been a long-standing principle in English law that extradition would not be allowed to a jurisdiction where the procedures were considered unjust.

The Government says that because the rest of the EU has signed up to the European Convention of Human Rights, their judicial systems can be considered fair. But most other EU countries do not have habeas corpus or trial by jury and, as in Ms Daniels's experience, can reactivate a legal case years after it was apparently brought to an end.

From next year, any prosecutor in Europe can issue a warrant for the arrest of any British citizen on mere suspicion of having done something which is not even a crime in Britain. Said citizen will then be subject to arrest by British authorities and then sent to the said prosecutors country where they can be held without trial almost indefinitely while the prosecutor investigates the alleged crime.

Yet speaking out against this monstrosity is almost unknown here. Like everything else about this rotten project, HMG has assured everyone that it is merely a 'procedural tidying-up exercise' while assiduously avoiding any discussion of the terrible track record of Europe's 'justice' system.

The Telegraph goes a stage further and offers a case study:

Teresa Daniels, from Aylesbury, Bucks, was arrested by Scotland Yard detectives last week on an international extradition warrant linked to a conviction for drug trafficking imposed in Spain six years ago.

Miss Daniels, 30, had thought that the case was closed. But she was "absolutely staggered" when three police officers arrived at her mother's home last week to arrest her.

Miss Daniels account of her original trial is equally scarey:

"I could not speak Spanish and no interpreter was present. I was asked just five questions and was in court for only 90 minutes. I assumed I was there as a witness against Antonio, not as a defendant."

Fortunately for Miss Daniels, the EU Arrest Warrant does not come into force until next year so a British Court can still block the extradition if they think it is unjust or unfair. But not for long:

"If the European Arrest Warrant had been in place, Teresa would already have been put on a plane to Madrid. This is the danger we are fighting against. Yes, the extradition procedures need speeding up, especially to deal with terrorist cases. But we are going too far, too fast."

"Terrorist cases", my foot! The EU criminal code sets out all manner of vague 'crimes' which European prosecutors can pursue, including 'xenophobia' and 'racism' and other such terms drawn so widely and so ill-defined that, in effect, justice is at the subjective caprice of any European poobah with an official stamp.

Next year will mark the end of a thousand years of common law protections, Habeas Corpus and trial by jury and the strongest thing any member of our own political classes can say in opposition is 'We are going too far, too fast'.

I keep thinking of the 350,000 or so British and Commonwealth citizens who sacrificed their lives in World War II. If only they could have known just how wickedly the freedom they died defending was going to be betrayed, they would have stayed in bed.

(1) (40)

Former Italian prime minister Lamberto Dini, one of the people drawing up the new European Constitution on the EU Convention on the Future of Europe, has flatly and explicitly contradicted British ministers who claimed that the new constitution is only a 'tidying up exercise'.

Anyone in Britain who claims the constitution will not change things is trying to sweeten the pill for those who don't want to see a bigger role for Europe

If this constitution is adopted by Britain, control of much of how the state intrudes into society will be placed in a power centre far more remote and less amenable to the British public's democratic influence politically. It is nothing less than the wholesale disenfranchisement of Britain, talking a moderately effective democratic system of accountability (albeit a long decaying one) and replacing it with European-wide 'democracy' that in fact places vastly more power in remote bureaucracies.

Although I never doubted that Tony Blair was simply lying through his teeth, can anyone now doubt that what the Labour government is saying is intentional falsehood pertaining to altering the most fundamental underpinning structure of the British state?

If the Tory opposition was capable of rational analysis, they would start realising that Blair has torn up the rule book and soon rolling back the tide of statism will simply be beyond the legal power of British politicians. If the Conservative Leader was to stand up in Parliament and say "a future Tory government will simply abrogate this constitution on Day One and repatriate democratic accountability to the British people", then there might be some grounds for thinking they had actually decided not to just be Labour Party Lite as they blather on about 'good public services' and tolerate the likes of Chris Patten in amongst their numbers.

What I find so exasperating is the Tory's refusal to think outside the box. Will they just meekly accept that once the primacy of the EU is complete, they will just have to adapt into their allotted role as a European style 'Christian Democrat' Party of the statist centre in return for a place for their snouts at the Euro-trough? Perhaps so. The Conservative Party is a noxious organisation so I cannot say I am surprised, but unless they quickly rediscover their radical roots, Britain as a self-governing entity is finished regardless of the lies to the contrary (just see the remarks of our honest enemy Lamberto Dini).

Unlike most of continental Europe, there is a significant anti-statist element in the mainstream of British society... I don't mean people like me, who are essentially out on the 'lunatic fringe', but the sort of people who Maggie Thatcher tapped into in her excitingly radical but maddeningly inconsistent way. Once this swathe of society finally realises that they no longer have any meaningful outlet for their political aspirations, I wonder if they will just be content to shrug and surrender to the Europe wide majority who favour regulatory top-down statism? I think not.

The Labour Party and all who support Euro-wide statism have seen the way to put all the bits about the role of the state they value beyond British politics: their vision of regulatory statism is about to be locked in and in future, politics will just be about factional pleading for a share of the monies appropriated from the remaining productive sections of the economy. The only antidote to this is for anti-EU politicians to simply refuse to cooperate. The Tory Party would be more useful if they simply walked out of Parliament and declined to return unless the constitution is completely gutted (which of course will never happen). After all, so what if Labour used that opportunity to pass all manner of nasty laws? They have such a large majority they can do that anyway and so it is only by radical action that the Tories can de-legitimise what is being done... i.e. by provoking a constitutional crisis because we are bloody well in one already!

2. The Member States shall facilitate the achievement of the Union's tasks and refrain from any measure which could jeopardise the attainment of the objectives set out in the Constitution.

If anti-EU activists ever manage to start mounting effective resistance to the EU and actually undermining its authority, do you seriously doubt that laws suppressing what we say and do will not follow?

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OK, so I Googled for federast too. And yes, we are the first result and we rock. Whatever.

But unlike this commenter, I looked beyond the second result and look what I found. A record of Parliamentary debates dated 20 Apr 1999 (column 687) that shows that "federast" was not used by David or Perry for the first time (sorry guys, but this is worth it).

I have reproduced most of the debate as I think it is interesting to see what discussions our 'representatives' were having in 1999 about the EU:

The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Ms Joyce Quin): The Government are in favour of a European Commission that is efficient, transparent and accountable. The independent experts' report revealed a catalogue of deficiencies in the Commission's internal structures and practices, but the resignation of the Commission gives us an opportunity to ensure that, in future, the Commission carries out its functions more effectively and makes much better use of taxpayers' money. The Berlin European Council took a decisive step towards that by agreeing the nomination of the new Commission President.

Mr. Blizzard: Does my right hon. Friend share my view that the only sensible words ever uttered by the noble Baroness Thatcher were that "advisers advise, Ministers decide"? That is the principle that underlies the civil service in this country; should it not also be true of the European Commission? Will the people of this country not accept more readily the institutions of the EU if they are confident that decisions are taken by democratically elected Ministers, rather than by unelected bureaucrats? Will my right hon. Friend use this opportunity to press for reform of the European Commission that brings about that state of affairs?

Ms Quin: The Government have tabled a number of proposals for reforms. It should be emphasised that, in European decision making, the elected Council of Ministers has the final say and is responsible for making final decisions; that is a system of which we approve. As for the accountability of the European Commission, a great deal can be done to improve matters in terms of its relations with both the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers, and we have made proposals in that respect.

Mr. Bercow (Buckingham): In backing for the presidency of the European Commission Mr. Prodi, who says that economic and monetary union and political union are two sides of the same coin, why can the right hon. Lady not admit in Britain what is widely acknowledged on the continent--that Mr. Prodi is a committed "federast", who is determined to create a single defence policy, a single economic policy, a single foreign policy, a single immigration policy, a single social policy, a single constitution, a single Government and a single state called Europe?

Ms Quin: First, I remind the hon. Gentleman that the appointment of Mr. Prodi at the Berlin Council was linked firmly with Commission reform, and that is why he received the support of all member Governments. Secondly, the hon. Gentleman obviously has a short memory. I am not sure whether he was in the House when Romano Prodi's predecessor was appointed, but I remember the press coverage at the time about the fiercely federalist Jacques Santer, who was the Conservative Government's appointee.

Mr. Bill Rammell (Harlow): Does the Minister agree that, in taking forward the essential reform process, we must establish a mechanism whereby individual acts of proven misconduct against individual Commissioners can result in their disciplining or dismissal? We should not always have to take the nuclear option of forcing the entire European Commission to resign.

Ms Quin: My hon. Friend makes a very important point. We must not only move ahead in appointing a new Commission, but consider the terms and conditions that govern such appointments in order to address some of the issues to which my hon. Friend referred.

Mr. Michael Howard (Folkestone and Hythe): Mr. Prodi has declared his intention to use his presidency to create a single economy and a single political unity; yet the Foreign Secretary said recently that the Maastricht treaty was a high water mark of integrationism. How can those positions be reconciled?

Perhaps, we should warn Mr John Bercow, MP about the company he keeps...

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With Orwellian double-think, the preamble to the European Convention begins with a quote from Thucydides:

Our Constitution is called a democracy because power is in the hands not of a minority but of the whole people.

So should we not vote on it?

It is about as 'democratic' as the Warsaw Pact Treaty.

Paul Staines

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1. skeptic, sceptic, doubter -- (someone who habitually doubts accepted beliefs)

... so in reality we are not truly 'eurosceptic' as we do not 'doubt' the harmful nature of the EU, but rather we regard that as axiomatic. What is more, we have nothing against Europe per se, it is the regulatory statist political entity called the European Union we abominate. Hell, I used to work for the EU which probably explains why I dislike it so much: I know how it really works.

Scepticism seems to imply 'doubt'. We have no doubt whatsoever.

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[SCENE 26. Int. LUCY's bedroom. Night.]

Open on shot of bedroom wall opposite the bed. There is a large mirror hanging on the wall. In the mirror we can see the reflection of LUCY and JOHN making wild, passionate love in the bed. Camera turns down and pans across bedroom floor, past assorted clothes discarded hastily in the fenzy of mutual lust. LUCY's cries of climax drown out JOHN's heaving grunts. Camera closes in on bed as JOHN rolls over. Both are glistening with sweat and breathless.

LUCY: That... that was... fantastic!

JOHN: Yeah... great. You were great.

LUCY: Do you know what I want now?

JOHN: What?

LUCY opens the top drawer of her bedside table and produces two large carrots.

LUCY: Want one?

JOHN: Oh, you bet.

LUCY hands one carrot to JOHN who begins to munch it manfully. LUCY nibbles her carrot, savouring the little bites.

LUCY: Mmmmm... I just have to have a carrot after sex.

JOHN: Yeah. Nothing beats a post-coital munch.

LUCY: So, am I going to see you again?

JOHN: Well, now that Sheila and I have split up... I reckon so.

LUCY: Why did you two split up anyway?

JOHN stops eating his carrot and looks away, trying to hide his shame.

JOHN: She... she was a celery-freak!!!

[END]

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There are many pleasurable benefits in writing for a blog such as this, not least of is revelling in the quality of our readership. This being the case, I can think of no finer endorsement of our efforts than that we attract thinkers and writers of the calibre of Andy Duncan, a regular reader who has produced an analysis of the strategy behind the EU project that I cannot possibly leave languishing at the bottom of a heap of comments where it currently resides.

Andy's hypothesis is so startlingly good, not just because of the thought that has gone into it but also because he admits to having once been a 'creature of the night'. We can therefore safely assume that he knows whereof he speaks. So let him speak:

I'm unsure as to your political orientation, but if you were a follower of Karl Marx's fallback idea of creating a social democratic Utopia, via the ballot box rather than via the bullet in the back of the neck, how would you do it? Putting my devout Marxist hat on, (and I was such an idiot, until well after my 30th year), this is how I would do it:

Marxist Hat ON

• I would base myself in my philosophical homeland of Germany and France, the roaming ground of Hegel, Marx, Napoleon, Kant, Sartre, and other assorted violent destroyers and idiots.

• I would pretend to be democratic, having seen honest revolutionaries fail in Russia and elsewhere.

• I would slowly subvert democracy, steal or distort the language of liberty to throw off my accusers and enemies, and gradually form an unspoken aristocracy of fellow travellers. What better than to call this a "liberal" elite, to really turn white into black, and make two plus two equal five? :-)

• I would gradually raise taxes, intervene, cause capitalist failure through regulation, thereby allowing myself the excuse to interfere even further, raise even more taxes, etc, etc, until at least half of the economy was in my hands (though 40% will do nicely).

• I would take over the schools, with other fellow travellers, and educate children away from capitalism. I would never ban non-state education, as this would raise too many alarm bells, but would gradually tighten the screw to make it less and less palatable, either financially or "morally".

• Once secure in my own domain, I would link up with other like-minded fellows, and form a "common market", gradually moving towards a "community", then a "union".

• I would remove all defended borders, using the language of liberty (free market, trading partners, etc), I would then start linking further countries together one by one, as their social democrat governments topple capitalism bit by bit, through ever increasing statism, the failure of each new control, leading to ever more controls. Lovely.

• Using that favorite Marxist phrase, "The Inevitability of History", I would then start taking direct control of these countries, tiny increment by tiny increment, so that the ratcheting process is barely noticeable. This process would be never-ending. Capitalists are so smug, living off the backs of the workers and the fat of the land, that they'll never notice anyway.

• We'd slowly introduce ID cards, remove habeas corpus, juries, and all the other paraphenalia of a failed history, which would get in the way of later true command socialism. The People decide the laws, and who is in need of re-education (and I will represent the people).

  One day, without even knowing the exact day, the People will wake up free from capitalism, into a perfect state run by the workers, for the workers, with me and my friends in temporary control until the state withers naturally away (though this may not be possible until we'd extended this Nirvana across the face of the globe, and removed all potential aggressors - eg. The United States.)

  The lesson of history has taught we Marxists that we must be less direct. We must sneak up from behind, and use every capitalist trick we can to prevent the enemy from seeing our subterfuge. We must hire as much of the workforce as we can, to get them to vote for us, we must blame supra-national organisations, or capitalist greed, for all the bad things that happen, we must talk continuously of the "Inevitability" of our destiny. And then, when we finally slough off the evil of capitalism, the People will be truly grateful, for we will have delivered them into a world of peace, opportunity, and freedom. The birds will sing, and choirs will form spontaneously, singing Hallelujah. Before we burn down the churches, of course. Except where they're really pretty (and I will be the judge of that.)

  Marxist Hat OFF

  Well, that's how I would do it. Does the process outlined above remind you of anything? Again I ask you, if you were to try to create a socialist utopia, in Europe, how would you do it? I would suggest it would not be too dissimilar from what has actually happened.

  But aside from all that, the most worrying aspect of the Euro constitution is not all the fancy-dancy detail, about which ex-President can do what shilly-shallying to whom. It is the absolute central removal of the right of a future British parliament to repeal this dangerous Act, whatever it's to be called (I would suggest the treaty is signed in Nuremburg, to give it a really evocative title.) This Constitutional Act's signing, by the Queen, will make it illegal for her, or her successor, to repeal it. As she will be passing that legal right upwards to Brussels. That is why it so fundamentally changes the unwritten constitution of this country (that any parliament may repeal the acts of any other previous parliament), and that is why it is so dangerous, and why we absolutely must have a Yes or No referendum on it. Or just plain abandon it.

  As long as a future parliament can remove and clean up the mess Tony Blair and his useful idiots have created, this country stands a chance. Once he makes himself and his gang a permanent feature, as this move is surely intended to do, and we can't get rid of socialism, we've had it; better book those German lessons and get used to being free to do whatever it is you're told to do.

  Forget the detail, concentrate on the main big point. This constitutional move is irrevocable. That means one of two things. It will either last forever, or there will be a war. Assuming that nothing ever lasts forever, that means a war. That's how wars happen. Go and buy a history book if you don't believe me.

  To all of my idiot irrationalist Marxist friends reading this, with whom it's not really even worth debating the price of fish, as your brains are such mush, Valery Giscard d'Estaing really has made all this a bit obvious. Couldn't he have waited until we'd been shoe-horned into the Euro, when it would've seemed less obvious? But that's socialism for you, always failing, always another generation of idiots waiting to give it yet "another" try. Vive le UK! ;-)

A Guide to Marxist Subversion as supplied by a former marxist. As weapons in the armoury of liberty go, this has to rank as one of the sharpest. I defy anyone to read through this without experiencing the hackle-raising chill of eerie recognition in the universal policies of modern Social Democrats and I know that I was far from the only one who saw the handprints of Herbert Marcuse and Antonio Gramsci all over them.

Well, we may have been right. Andy Duncan has set out and codified in the enemies battleplan in all its gory detail and we must thank him. Knowing how the enemy intends to wage war is essential to defeating them.

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David Carr asked:

If there are any talented graphic designers out there perhaps they might want to grasp this opportunity to design a symbol that will, from now on, represent the 'Country formerly known as Britain'.

...and sure enough, a reply has come from the arse end of the Anglosphere.

Oh joy.

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In the last few days Britain has been depicted as the Paradise (soon to be) Lost in the clutches of the Federasts. Hope has been expressed that the British public may stir eventually and oppose Blair's finishing touches on handing over the country's sovereignty. The word "bovine" has been mentioned in descriptions of the UK public and the adjective is excruciatingly close to the truth.

Only with a public as sleepy and 'tolerant' of the destructive antics of its politicians and bureaucrats as the British public has been, a particular breed of Homo politicus characteristic to these isles could have evolved.

The species, known as Bureaucrat idioticus can be found in most governmental bodies, with highest density around local councils. In the last 50 years, it has adapted to a change in its original natural habitat from large forested ministerial departments to smaller, murkier quango marshlands.

It belongs to a larger family of Homo collectivicus, sub-group Homo nonsensicus, indigenous to Great Britain, a genetic dead-end variation on Homo socialist (see below).

However, the most famous branch of Homo collectivicus family is Homo communist, spread around the globe in the last century but currently experiencing an evolutionary hiatus.

The ubiquitous Homo socialist, another influential branch, occupies the same evolutionary niche in its biological family as the cockroach in the insect family. Finally, the recently prospering Homo transnationalis has made some headway to the top levels of the British public institutions, the Government and the Courts.

In the last decade, the Bureaucrat idioticus has been inter-breeding with Bureaucrat corruptus (its continental variety, as well as with its closely related Bureaucrat sanctimonis), which resulted in a virulent Bureaucrat federalis whilst facilitating deeper and wider entrenchment of Homo transnationalis in Great Britain.

Oh, we are so ready for the EU primeval soup!

Note: The 'family tree' for Homo Liberalis (original meaning) to follow.

(6) (145)

If there are any talented graphic designers out there perhaps they might want to grasp this opportunity to design a symbol that will, from now on, represent the 'Country formerly known as Britain'.

The instrument of conquest, the draft EU constitution, was presented in Brussels today. For those of your with the time and fortitude all 148 pages (yes, 148!) of this document can be found here.

Fortunately, the Telegraph has an edited version which sets out the 'money' clauses (the ones that British federasts would rather nobody spoke about). Among these are:

Article I-2: The Union's values
The Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, liberty, democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights.

These values are common to the Member States in a society of pluralism, tolerance, justice, equality, solidarity and non-discrimination.

Meaningless, empty prattle that might have been drafted up by the editorial team of the Guardian. What 'solidarity'? What does that mean? And 'equality'? Does this mean Mao suits for everyone? If not, then what? And why on earth the prohibition on 'discrimination'? Discrimination just means 'judgement'. Are we supposed to live without it?

2 The Union shall offer its citizens an area of freedom, security and justice without internal frontiers, and a single market where competition is free and undistorted.

Which means that Anglo-Saxon common law and Habeas Corpus are out to be replaced by Napoleonic Code and Corpus Juris.

The Union shall work for a Europe of sustainable development based on balanced economic growth, with a social market economy aiming at full employment and social progress.

Semi-planned economies with rigid labour laws and an omnipresent dead-hand of state.

It shall contribute to peace, security, the sustainable development of the Earth, solidarity and mutual respect among peoples, free and fair trade, eradication of poverty and protection of human rights and in particular children's rights, as well as to strict observance and development of international law, including respect for the principles of the United Nations Charter.

Euro-sclerosis for the whole world!!

Article I-5: Relations between the Union and the Member States 1 The Union shall respect the national identities of its Member States, inherent in their fundamental structures, political and constitutional, including for regional and local self government.

2 The Member States shall facilitate the achievement of the Union's tasks and refrain from any measure which could jeopardise the attainment of the objectives set out in the Constitution.

The potemkin clause. This is the one the federasts will refer to in an attempt to rebut concerns over loss of sovereignty. As per usual, they will be lying. It only says that 'national identities' will be respected, not sovereignty which is clearly abolished by Part 2 of the clause.

Article I-6: Legal personality The Union shall have legal personality.

So no question that this is any longer about 'co-operation of sovereign states for mutual benefit'. The EU will exist as a formal entity separate from the national governments.

3 The Union shall have competence to co-ordinate the economic and employment policies of the Member States.

4 The Union shall have competence to define and implement a common foreign and security policy, including the progressive framing of a common defence policy.

Need I add more?

The Union shall have exclusive competence to establish competition rules within the internal market, and in the following areas: monetary policy, for the Member States which have adopted the euro; common commercial policy; customs union; the conservation of marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy.

Shared competence applies in the following principal areas: internal market; area of freedom, security and justice; agriculture and fisheries excluding the conservation of marine biological resources; transport and trans-European networks; energy; social policy; for aspects defined in Part Three; economic and social cohesion; environment; consumer protection; common safety concerns in public health matters.

Well, that just about covers the lot. Even the term 'shared competence' only means that national governments decisions can only extend to areas not covered by Brussels and since Brussels legislates for pretty much everything that doesn't leave a lot of scope.

The Union's competence in matters of common foreign and security policy shall cover all areas of foreign policy and all questions relating to the Union's security, including the progressive framing of a common defence policy, which might lead to a common defence.

Member States shall actively and unreservedly support the Union's common foreign and security policy in a spirit of loyalty and mutual solidarity and shall comply with the acts adopted by the Union in this area. They shall refrain from action contrary to the Union's interests or likely to impair its effectiveness.

The end of an independent British foreign policy and independent British security. Goodbye 'special relationship' with the USA. Goodbye Britain as a sovereign nation.

There is more but it is all more of the same. In short, it is the foundation of the 'Superstate' that the federasts have always gone to great pains to tell us was never on the table. Of course, the same people will re-double their tactics of lies, smears and evasions in order to try to muddy the waters long enough to smuggle all this through.

And I can sort of understand their sense of urgency. After all, this is the fruition of the Jacobin dream of a whole world unified, ordered and under total state control, where executive power is both unaccountable and unchecked and where nobody will be able to do so much as change their socks without first obtaining bureaucratic approval.

As for Blair, well all I can say is that you can pretty much dismiss all the plaintiff, indignant denials emanating from his office. His grand proclamation (that he has convinced the Convention to drop the word 'federal' from the document) is a pure piece of political theatre, designed to give the British the impression that he is not signing away this country's independence. The truth is that the 'federal' was never going to be included in the first place because it is superfluous. The document as drawn is sufficiently breathtaking in scope and ambition without the need to rely on 'trigger' words.

The constitution is due to discussed at an EU Heads of State conference planned for 2004. Tony Blair will perform the usual pantomime by going to Brussels, pretent to exact 'concessions designed to preserve our sovereignty' and sign up to the whole package in return for what he earnestly hopes will be a shot at the Presidency of 'Europe'.

Blair's ambitions are not unopposed. Fortunately, there are signs of uncomfortable stirrings among the famously bovine and indifferent British public and even in the ranks of the usually-useless Conservative Party. The calls for a referendum on the new constitution are growing and will not be silenced. Blair wants no such thing. He knows he will lose and the one prospect neither he nor his federast toadies cannot entertain is the British people getting an opportunity to interfere with the 'democratic process'.

So, a thousand years of independence and the struggles against Phillip II, Napoleon and Hitler will all boil down to the next 12 months of struggle against Blair.

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Britain has no future outside of the European Union. That's what the federasts keep telling us. That is the specious lie they've been peddling for years now. I can only assume that these people manage to sleep at night by consuming a quantity of sedatives fit to bring down a horse.

We have touched upon this issue before, but it is so significant that it bears practically no end of reiteration. Put simply, the EU is dying:

2050, the working population of the USA will have increased by more than the entire present working population of Germany.

EU 15, in contrast, will have lost almost as much working population by 2050 as the entire present working population of Germany.

Remaining EU 15 nations are projected to suffer losses in working population ranging from the manageable (France, minus 8%) to the catastrophic (Spain, minus 35%, Italy, minus 41%).

Tell me, what future is there in marrying a corpse?

[My thanks to Emmanuel Goldstein for the link.]

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A referendum on joining the Euro will cause "all-out internal civil war"

I never referred to... [civil war] in the Labour Party. Calling for a referendum... would launch a long civil war in the UK with everyone fighting everyone.

[Source: BBC News at Ten, BBC online]

Oh well, that's all right then.

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I'll bet that the EUnuchs are beside themselves with glee now that they have managed to co-opt the Pope:

Just three weeks before the EU membership referendum in Poland, Pope John Paul II has recommended that his compatriots join the European Union.

Sure to be seen as a benediction by many in Poland. Does the Pontiff not realise that the EU is the work of the Devil?

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Once in a blue moon I stumble across a story that appears so contrary and so bizarre that I honestly do not know what to make of it.

In fact, I had to stand up, breath deeply and take a walk around my apartment just to make sure I wasn't dreaming when I read that the Israelis have expressed an interest in joining the European Union:

"In principle, the minister thinks a possibility exists for Israel to join the EU, since Israel and Europe share similar economies and democratic values," said a spokesperson for Mr Shalom before adding, "it doesn't mean he is preparing the dossier for applying tomorrow".

MEP, Marco Pannella, of the Transnational Radical Party is said to be heading the campaign for Israeli membership and claimed on Tuesday that Israel does not exclude submitting an application for full membership during the term of this government.

Alright, no binding promises on the table but just the idea that this is even being floated at quite high-level raises a whole bevy of questions without, as far as I can tell, a single satisfactory answer.

First of all, is either party serious? For the EUnuchs it may be. They have made no secret of their ambitions to expand their sphere of influence over the Middle East and North Africa. But do they really think that they are going to be able to cope with the...er local difficulties?

And what about the Israelis? I can see the appeal of access to European markets for their industrial and agricultural output but have they stopped to contemplate the cost of the greatly increased regulatory burden that would be imposed on them? And what about defence and foreign policy, both of which would eventually have to be decided in Brussels? Not even for a fleeting second can I imagine the Israelis being willing to hand over their security to anyone, let alone the EU. Do they honestly imagine that the Belgians are going to come riding to their rescue should the need arise?

On the other hand, maybe it is not serious at all, in which case, what are the Israelis up to?

No, I'm afraid it's all a big mystery to me but then the opaque and shadowy labyrinth of international relations often are. Searching for solid intelligence amidst the power-plays, hidden agendas, ulterior motives and nuanced positions is enough to drive anyone to the edge of madness and I am not prepared to go that far.

I am just intrigued.

And, by the by, who the flaming hell are the 'Transnational Radical Party'? I have never heard of them and I can't be bothered to go googling for an answer but let's take it as read that I don't like the sound of them one little bit.

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The election results from Belgium are the usual mess: there are two sets of political parties, which hate each other on linguistic as well as political grounds. Because of proportional representation, this means a compromise of morals, beliefs and meaning.

At this time it is not clear whether the French speaking socialist leader will agree to let the Flemish speaking socialist become the new prime minister, or whether the Flemish free-market liberals will do a deal with the Flemish socialists and retain the leading position in government.

Either way, it looks like more cuts in public spending and taxes, with the outgoing coalition partners (the Greens) having taken a big electoral kick up the backside. The Flemish Greens, appear to have lost all their seats to the Vlaams Blok, a party which campaigns for Flemish independence and against 'mass-immigration'.

The next government will continue to implement the Euro-bank's economic policies (a big improvement on any Belgian policy since ... who knows?). This means that the opposition nationalists combine breaking up Belgium and effectively the European Union. With any luck, next time the Belgians vote the European Commision will have to pack up and move to Warsaw.

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Last night, on Have I Got News For You, a British TV comedy quiz show held in high regard, one of the regulars, Ian Hislop, who also edits Private Eye (but who presumably pays rather less attention to the Private Eye home page), launched a spectacular attack on the European Union and on the idea of Britain being any part of it. The gist of it was that Europe was being dealt a new constitution by a man (Giscard d'Estaing) who would be in prison if he were British. "It's as if Jeffrey Archer was in charge of Europe."

Left wing comedian Mark Steel tried to take the sting out of the attack by implying that Hislop was attacking all French people. ("And how about those bloody Italians, crooks all of them, …" etc.) He played the xenophobia card, in other words. But Hislop wasn't attacking all French people and saying they were all crooks, just Giscard, and, in general, the kind of people who become French Presidents. He steam-rollered right over Steel, not least because this is Hislop's home turf and both he and Steel knew it.

I can't remember much of the wording of the attack, and I don't have it on tape. But in any case, it was the ferocity and the protracted nature of it that was astonishing, rather than the details. Everyone else looked rather embarrassed. Ian, easy boy, you can't say this kind of thing on TV, BBCTV, BBC comedy TV, said their faces (but not their mouths). But he just raged on regardless.

To Americans who may doubt the significance of all this, Hislop is a much loved figure in Britain. For years now, he and Paul Merton have been swapping gags and banter on HIGNFY, and whenever Hislop has been on the receiving end, he has taken it like a good sport. As editor of Private Eye, Hislop has been involved in savaging many dishonest and unpopular public figures – Jeffrey Archer being only one of many, and unlike politicians, he is considered honest. Whether this is true is beside the point I'm making; the point is, he's a considerable British personality. So when he lays into the EU as a racket run by racketeers in a manner fit to bust, that has got to count for something, public-opinion-wise.

You had the feeling that Hislop has been waiting for the right moment to throw all his chips onto the table and make his anti-EU pitch, and if that's right then it is very interesting that he reckons now to be the moment.

One other thing. I say that I don't have this on tape. By this evening, assuming all goes well, I will have it on tape, because the show is being repeated tonight on BBC2 TV tonight, at 10.05 pm.