Tag: EU

EU-imposed social change

This is what happens when a nation gives up its national sovereignty to authoritarians determined to destroy the social fabric:

David Cameron suffered a humiliating reverse last night when more than half his MPs rejected his 11th-hour appeals for support for same-sex marriage. On an extraordinary day in the Commons, 134 Tory MPs took advantage of a free vote to oppose the plans. Only 126 backed the legislation, with 35 abstaining.

But with the help of the majority of Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs Mr Cameron saw the measure passed easily, by a margin of 400 to 175. The first gay marriages are likely to be conducted within 12 months.

Cameron is nothing but a water-carrier for the European Union.  Like the Republicans in the Senate, his role as a “conservative” is to conserve the changes that are imposed by the progressives, in this case, the dictates of the unelected European Commission.  As with the other member states of the EU, the UK is no longer a democracy, not even a quasi-democracy, but a pseudo-democracy that is nominally governed from London but is actually ruled by Brussels.

The gay marriage debate has very little to do with literal homogamy, as the paltry number of “married” gays in the various states where it is legal tends to demonstrate.  It is symbolic, a legal demonstration of the fact that what was once Christendom is now post-Christian, and a rejection of traditional Western civilization.  It’s not a step forward, but rather, a step back into ancient pagan darkness.  It is ironic that those who decry Islam as a return to the 7th century are actually complaining that the Muslims don’t go far enough; “progressives” want to take the world back more than two millennia.

I invite those who claim this act will “strengthen marriage” to consider the empirical data.  Name a nation where legally legitimizing gay “marriage” was followed by a statistically significant increase in the marriage rate.

No, don’ go

I find it interesting that despite all of the bluster from the pro-EU forces in Britain, which insist that Britain desperately needs the EU and would be little more than the Falkland Islands floating in the Atlantic without it, it is the EU that is betraying precisely who needs whom:

Britain could become a ‘second-class’ member of the European Union under plans floated in Brussels yesterday.  An influential group of European federalists, who want to see Brussels given even greater powers, is suggesting the UK is relegated to ‘associate member’ status.  The move would see Britain remain part of the single market but freed from much of the social legislation and bureaucracy associated with full EU membership….

The Union of European Federalists is expected to set out its plan for Britain in a draft EU treaty in the spring.  British Lib Dem MEP Andrew Duff, who heads the group, said the proposal would create a new category of membership to ensure Britain did not leave altogether. 

It’s not about trade, in the end, it’s about control.  The EU no more steals the sovereignty of its member states for economic purposes than Nazi Germany invaded Belgium for the chocolate.  It is much the same with the United States.  For all that the left-liberal parasites claim, on the basis of tax revenues, that the big government states are producing a disproportionate share of the national wealth and they would be better off without the small government states, they will quite literally kill large quantities of people to prevent them from leaving the Union.

Whereas the average small government individual would quite happily pay to see New York, California, and the New England states exit it.  This, and not the pseudo-statistical bluster, makes it entirely clear who is parasitic on whom.

Il cavaliere ritornera’!

I think we can all admit that Italian politics are more entertaining when Silvio is involved:

Former Italian Prime
Minister Silvio Berlusconi said on Saturday he would run to become the
country’s leader for a fifth time, confirming his return to politics
after months of indecision.

I will be throwing a Bunga Bunga party tonight to celebrate la buona notizia.  And on a more serious note, this tends to indicate that Italy will be leaning towards exiting the Eurozone.

I’d call that a two-for-one

By voting for independence, Scotland will automatically leave the EU:

Scotland ‘would have to apply to EU and lose UK’s opt-out after separation’ Scotland would have to apply to the EU and lose the UK’s opt-out from the euro if voters back separation in the forthcoming referendum, the European Commission is claimed to have confirmed. In what would be a significant blow to Alex Salmond, the commission is said to
have drafted a letter to a Lords committee rejecting his claim that Scotland
would automatically inherit the UK’s membership.

Of course, the European Commission is lying, as it usually does.  I guarantee you that if Scotland voted to leave the UK, the EU will claim after the fact that it is still an EU member.  These guys know they didn’t get on the fascist gravy train by forcing fewer people pay their economic protection money.

The only reason they are discouraging the Scottish vote for independence from the UK is because without the Scots, the English and Welsh Euroskeptics will have a majority.

Speaking of Scotland, you can get an interesting perspective on secession and Scottish history from my interview with Thom Hartmann yesterday.  I’ll be posting a transcript sent in by SL soon.

Lest you think we exaggerate

As Daniel Hannan points out, all that is missing is the swastika.

Take a close look at this promotional poster. Notice anything? Alongside
the symbols of Christianity, Judaism, Jainism and so on is one of the
wickedest emblems humanity has conceived: the hammer and sickle.

I found to be potentially significant in the semiotic sense that this imperial rump of the former Christendom not only has the hammer-and-sickle at the top, but symbolically places Christianity below Communism and Islam, while also featuring a large Star of David.  The primary question the poster raises, however, is what importance the Dallas Cowboys could possibly have for the EUSSR?

Europe is SERIOUSLY bankrupt

This award by the Nobel committee strikes me as the equivalent of desperately rooting through the couch, searching for change to pay the repo man:

The European Union was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, providing a feel-good moment for the economically distressed bloc at a time when its post-national vision is losing traction at home and abroad.  The accolade comes as the financial crisis threatens the EU’s signal achievement, the euro, and the rise of powers such as China, India and Brazil challenges the European model of rules-based cooperation with nation-states handing sovereign rights to a central authority.

“This is in a way a message to Europe that we should do everything we can to secure what has been achieved and move forward,” Thorbjoern Jagland, head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, told reporters in Oslo after awarding the 8 million- krona ($1.2 million) prize. “We have to keep in mind what has been achieved on this continent and not let the continent go into disintegration again. We know what it means: the emergence of extremism and nationalism once again.”

The Peace Prize has always been about mindless optimism.  But it used to concern itself with actual deeds and accomplishments.  Now, with the recent awards to President Barack “Seven Wars” Obama and the Euzis of the European Union, it looks more like the triumph of deranged wishful thinking than anything else.  And it does tend to confirm the opinion of long-time EU skeptics who always believed the purpose of the Union was to leash the German military rather than build a common market.

I found this to be the most cogent take on the absurdity: 

“Giving the EU a peace prize is at best premature, like knighting Sir
Fred Goodwin in the middle of the mad boom. We have no idea how the
experiment to create an anti-democratic federation will end. Hopefully
the answer is very peacefully, but when Greek protesters are wearing
Nazi uniforms, and Spanish youth unemployment is running at 50 per cent,
a look at history suggests there is always the possibility of a bumpy
landing.

Daftest of all is the notion that the EU itself has kept the peace.
It was the Allies led by the Americans, the Russians and the British who
defeated and disarmed the Germans in 1945. The German people then
underwent the most extraordinary reckoning, transforming their country
into an essentially pacifist society. The EU had very little to do with
it. Throughout that period it was Nato, led by the Americans and
British, which kept the peace in Western Europe.”

Fear of lack of failure

Daniel Hannan points out what the Eurocrats really fear:

Eurocrats are especially concerned that Greece might leave the euro – but not for the reason you might think. Their worry is not that Greece will sink into a state of Levantine poverty: that has already happened. No, their true fear is that, after a few wretched months, Greece would bounce back, using its newly competitive currency to price its way into the markets and export its way to growth. If that were to happen, other countries on the periphery of the eurozone, also struggling with an over-valued exchange rate, might try something similar. The whole euro project would unravel faster than you could say ‘Jacques Delors’.

Eurocrats often liken the EU to a bicycle that has to keep moving forward or topple over. A ravenous shark that has to keep swimming or die might be a better simile, but never mind: the point holds. Any rolling back of the single most important integrationist project would call the whole enterprise into question.

This is why it is unlikely that Greece will actually leave the Euro or the ECB and IMF will follow through on their threats to cut off their loans to the Greek banks in the short term. Tsipras has already publicly stated that Greece has enough money to keep its workers and retirees afloat if it stops paying its creditors, so if the loans don’t come through, they’ll simply default. Since the entire purpose of the various bailouts and rescue plans was to save Greece’s European creditors, not Greece, the EU doesn’t actually have any real leverage despite all of its posturing. While this has been obvious from the start, none of the Greek politicians were willing to say anything about it in public because the two major parties are both bank-owned. Tsipras and Syriza are not, or at least, not yet, so the game of chicken continues.

The EU was always an illusion of power and progress, so the fiction will have to be maintained until the very end of the Euro and the EU alike. The Greeks have seen through it, the question is when the rest of Europe will do so. So, as Hannan points out, the one thing the EU absolutely cannot afford to happen is for Greece to default on its sovereign debt, leave both the Euro and the EU, and begin an economic recovery. And that is why Jean-Claude Trichet, the former head of the ECB, is proposing the forcible takeover of the Greek government. He suggests giving the EU the power to declare a sovereign state bankrupt and take over its fiscal policy, further illustrating how the EU is little more than the Third Reich with banks instead of tanks.

Pulling out all the stops

The ECB and the EU are desperately trying to figure out how to jettison Greece without causing the entire Fourth Reich project to collapse:

Because it is one thing to predict the inevitable when one doesn’t have a PhD in Economics, it is something totally different when it comes from the likes of Goldman Sachs (Huw Pill and Themistokis Fiotakis to be precise). In this case, that something is what happens at T+1, T being the inevitable (there’s that word again) point where payments from the ECB to sustain the zombified Greek patient, all of which go to ECB funded entities anyway, stop. The biggest concern is that, as we suggested first thing this morning, the ECB is now engaged in a fatal game of chicken, whereby it is forcing Greeks to vote “Pro Bailout” (something that just dawned on the FT), in exchange for continued funding, because unlike last year when the threat of a referendum resulted in the termination of G-Pap, now there is no leader who can be sacrificed, and Europe has no real leverage over the people who have lost so much already, aside from threatening a full out bank system collapse. However, this could very well backfire as more and more Greeks pull their money out, not wanting to find out who blinks first as it would be their money that could be locked up in perpetuity, in essence making the ECB threat into a self-fulfilling prophecy. And as Goldman says, “If confidence is lost and a run on banks occurs, the implications are hard to assess.” Well, as ZH warned yesterday, this is already starting. Again from the FT: “Athens-based bankers said withdrawals exceeded €1.2bn on Monday and Tuesday – 0.75 per cent of deposits – as President Karolos Papoulias failed in two final meetings with conservative, socialist and leftwing leaders to form a national unity government.” Or double what was suggested yesterday…

Don’t assume that this straw will definitely be the one to break the camel’s back. I expect them to pull a few more rabbits out of a few more hats before the entire edifice collapses. But regardless of whether they’re able to keep Greece, Italy, and Spain in the fold for another year or two, the long-term trend is clear.

The cracks widen

The French half of Merkozy is now out and the Greek technocrats get demolished:

Greek voters dealt a blow to eurozone hopes that Athens will stick to its austerity commitments as parties opposing more cuts, including neo-Nazis, won almost 60-percent support in an election Sunday. According to updated exit polls, the two main parties suffered heavy losses, with the conservative New Democracy and the left-wing Pasok getting just 32.0 to 34.5 percent between them, down from 77.4 percent at the last polls in 2009.

This should end the can-kicking in Europe, but we’ll see. It’s pretty clear whom the global elite fears most, as the Golden Dawn did two points better than its projected 5 percent despite being falsely painted as Neo-Nazis. The charge is particularly ridiculous as Greece was occupied by the Nazis during World War II, and if anyone can be reasonably described as Neo-Nazi, it is the unelected dictators in the ruling European Commission. Things could get very interesting if the Dutch and Irish elections maintain the theme of rejecting the EU and IMF architects of the European financial system.

The long night of nationalism is over

How can the Greeks be blamed for turning to hard-core anti-immigrant parties? They have not been given any other choice besides national suicide:

Reeling from a vicious financial crisis that has cost them pensions and jobs, Greeks have been turning away in droves from the mainstream politicians they feel have let them down. Another political force is trying to tap the void, with blunt promises to “clean up” the country….

Black-clad Golden Dawn members have been storming across the campaign trail across Greece, stopping to chat at cafes and shops, handing out fliers promising security in crime-ridden neighborhoods – and vowing to kick out immigrants. Greece’s borders, they say, must be sealed with land mines to stop illegal crossing into a country that became the entry point for 90 percent of the European Union’s illegal migrants. Authorities estimate there are about 1 million migrants living in this country of 11 million. Appealing to populist sentiment, Golden Dawn has been gathering donations of food and clothing to deliver to the needy while pledging to make politicians accountable for the crisis. Ordinary Greeks are struggling under tough conditions demanded for rescue loan deals that have pushed the country into a fifth year of recession.

Given that the mainstream parties have sold them out to foreign banks on the one hand and African immigrants on the other, then installed an non-democratic government, Golden Dawn is now the only option left for the Greek electorate. And if the ruling mainstream parties respond by attempting to violate Greek self-determination, they’ll be responsible for the violence that will inevitably ensue. What we’re seeing here is that democracy has always been a means to the mainstream rather than an end in itself. Make no mistake, that applies to the USA every bit as much as it does to the Greeks, the only difference is that since there is no American nation, Americans have tolerated a much larger immigrant invasion, in proportional terms, than the Greeks are willing to accept.