I liked your post very much, Walkabout and the falacy of the EU was born precisely from where you said, from the utopia of being viable to put 28 countries together, twenty eight different histories, different interests, different geopolitical influences, different all. It never was and there were already several warnings on that respect. The war on Iraq was perhaps the most notorious but there were several others thru times and right now the refugee thing is the most important but there are several others in the shadows but nevertheless present. The Russian sanctions, for instance.

All in all I'm in agreement with what you wrote. Let me put a small note on something you wrote at the end of your post.


Since the beginning I've always had the implosion of the European Union as a matter of when, not an "if" thing. For a long time I hoped that from the rubble it would be possible to recreate the EEC which, indeed, was a good thing. Nowadays, although I am still hopeful, rationally I don't see it happening. It's a sort of wishful thinking, let's call it that. With time countries and societies developed resentment against each other due to perceived injustices. In certain country pairs this grew way too big to allow any sort of Union in the near future. Even a mere commercial union. And that I regret.

Let me ask you one thing just for my personal clarification. I ask it for it looks like possible from everything you've written on this topic. Are you communist? Even new-age communist like the sorts of Syriza and Podemos?

Seriously?

It's a shame for those who don't wish to consume the large mammal.
There is a great amount of material in there concerning the issues.
In fact, it deals with every single issue that has been discussed in here so far + quite a few more.

Nor do I agree with every single POV contained therein, but the folks who put that together did an amazing job in both the research and the drafting of the book.

Meanwhile, I came upon this just tonight:

The European Union has "legal personality" since the Lisbon Treaty entered into force on 1 December 2009. That the EU has legal personality is a prerequisite for the EU to join the European Convention onDr Human Rights (ECHR).
(from wikipedia).
Legal Personality is an important principle of all manner of laws, criminal, civil/contract/commercial.

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Dave

Best not mention this in front of the UK public before June 23:-
Is Brussels killing the Paris climate dream? | Climate Home - climate change news

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Dave

In that respect, Napoleon was right - traditionally, it takes brute force to bang together the heads of established nation states or other societal entities.
(my earlier post about the USA civil war, the establishment of a single form of government for China and the USSR refers).

Today, the EU, via the ECB and the Euro experiment that remains in progress, is using economic warfare to beat the southern Europe countries into submission.
What happens if that fails is yet to be seen: the Euro experiment continues.

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Dave

You have a much closer example in the heart of Europe, the unification of Germany by Bismarck. From the start of the customs union between the German States, the Zollverein, to the effective unification under Prussia required three wars: the Schleswig-Holstein Question War (between Prussia and Austria on one side and Denmark on the other), the Austro-Prussian War and, finally, the Franco-Prussian War in which the remaining states resisting unification under Prussia lost their main backer, France, when this was defeated in 1871.


The Euro is an example of the application of the utopia. Northern and Southern countries have radically different approaches to money. A German and a Portuguese see money in radically different ways. For Germans (and others) money is something that you earn, conserve and invest in order to multiply the original amount. For Portuguese (and Greeks and others) money is something that when you have it you spend it in order to live the good life. The problems surrounding the current trouble in Southern European countries arise mostly because of this. The likes of Portugal, Greece, even Spain and Italy did not know how to live with a strong currency given that their whole recent history had been lived with the cycles of devaluation-inflation. When, all of a sudden, these countries started living with a strong currency they really didn't know what to do with it so they did what they knew better: borrow and spend. It was not surprising, at all.

I started writing about the possible bankruptcy of Portugal around 2000, 2001. Already then with what was being done it was clear where it would lead.

The only time in the last 200 years when the Portuguese lived with a strong currency was during the Salazar dictatorship and it worked under that regime. Even so the PTE wasn't nearly as strong as the Euro but strong, nevertheless, compared with what the PTE became in democracy. With each party having to earn (read, buy) votes among the populace there was financial and economic insanity and it quickly collapsed. In 1973 1 USD equaled around 24 PTE. In 1980 it was around 1 USD for 50 PTE. In 1985 around 170 PTE. From then onward it appreciated slightly and when of the introduction of the Euro the exchange rate hovered around 1USD for 150 PTE.

Good examples of the split personality of the EU.

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Dave

The Germans spoke the same language, had similar cultures and still didn't manage to bring Austria, half of Switzerland, a chunk of the Czech republic etc. onboard. The successful federal states start with an almost empty landscape.

Andy

If we go behind in history, the German States, at times including Austria, at times not, had been under some form of union, at times looser, at times tighter, since at least the VII Century with Charlesmagne. Then they had the Holy Roman Empire, the First Reich. Even with this ancestral closeness, a full political union as we know it nowadays (which, even though, it's much looser than most European countries regions), the one done by Bismarck (Second Reich), required several years and three wars.

Other countries had similar histories. The unification of Italy is a tale of wars throughout the centuries. Even Switzerland as we know it today was a work in progress since the XIII Century up to the Congress of Vienna in 1815 when finally its borders were recognized. And it goes on and on.

Similarly several countries (Britain for starters) have separatist regions in their countries. The Brits with Scotland, the French with Corsica and French Basque Country, the Danes have the never ending story of the Faroe Islands and, of course, there isn't even the need to mention Spain and Belgium.

These (and others which I didn't mention) are the societies which the EU «utopises» to blend together under Nation Europe. It's crazy, It has always been crazy, it will be crazy for as long as it lasts.

Very recent commentary is shown below, abstracted from the website above, about the options open to Draghi.

The ECB governor has gone for the second option; the negative in all senses = -0.4% rate of interest.


The pointless option open to Dragula is yet more QE. I’m told even he now accepts this isn’t going to have any effect, but he will continue with QE anyway, as sounding doubtful about it would cause a selling panic and drop the euro by six points. As the US and Japan found, heroin is great at first, but then you need it to feel normal. Once detox is necessary, there is only cold turkey and diarrorhea.
The negative would be to plunge the pendulum further down the conversion of Zirp into Nirp pit. This is the expectation now, so as with so many of these ‘policy’ statements, Dragnet must do this at least. I posted last weekend about why this is a terrible idea, and that more or less guaranteed it being adopted.
The foolhardy but entirely sensible approach would be to tell Schäuble, the Bundesbank, Drizzlebang’s f**kwitted eurogrope and all the other austeritistas to grow up and accept the need for a change in strategy. While I do think that very unlikely indeed (for political, not economic, reasons) I did learn yesterday that Draghi is likely to drop in a reference along the lines of “we must look to sovereign governments for new ideas about economic stimulation, the monetary toolbag being empty” – albeit not quite that bluntly…..although that would be accurate: the only monetary solution left open to Signora Dragqueen is to bring down all the Monets lining the ECB corridors, and flog them off

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Dave

The only other strategy possible is to normalize interest rates, end APP and end TLTRO. As a matter of fact there is a very strong case for the ECB to do so under its statutory mandate. This would, of course, spell the immediate (within six months maximum) bankruptcy of Portugal, Greece, probably also of Spain and Italy, and the exit of these countries from the Euro. There aren't many takers for such action. No one wants to go down in history as the responsible for the implosion of the Euro and of a few other things with it, the European Union among them.

One note about austerity. What has been called austerity in some countries is not austerity at all. It's merely going back to living within ones means. Several countries lived on credit for several years. That is over so they have to adapt their expenditures to their earnings. There is always the alternative of bankruptcy but since the XVI century the results of such have never been all that great, at least in the short term. Of course one can always argue that if Germany donated money to this and that countries the problem would be solved (at least for a decade) but I really don't see German taxpayers being happy with their money being donated to societies which don't know how to govern themselves.

I mentioned a while ago that we are due to get a visit from Pres Obama to tell us how it will be best for the USA if the UK remains a member of the EU.
Here's the analogy:
The American Union? | Matt Ridley

Abstracted from above:
"Most Americans I know think Britain would be mad to leave the EU, but that’s because they think the EU is like Nato or Nafta or the Organisation of American States — a club of nations bound by a treaty. They think it is a trading bloc. They do not appreciate that it is a common government, run by a common bureaucracy and answerable to a common court system."
footnote;
And since 2009 it now has "legal personality", as per an earlier posting.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_personality

Nor do many Brits know about these aspects.

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Dave

Unfortunately, I very much doubt that detailed deconstruction of the follies of the Euro machinations will win much interest in the referendum debate - within project FUD it would serve no purpose.
Certainly, the ECB has broken lots of its' own rules to the point of illegality, and no one gives a damn.
During our current referendum discourse I have yet to hear anyone of our great and good, via our MSM, get even near to serious discussion about the future of the Eurozone.

Perhaps post in the HUBB pub thread that relates to the economic crisis which will remain extant across Europe and everywhere else no matter what comes of our referendum?

Certainly so.
Personally, I have spent a life time living within my means but some of my relatives have seen things differently - as you say, it's the same with nations; it's the credit card analogy.
Such diversity is great when we are visiting countries (and for that matter living/working elsewhere) but "banging their heads together until they submit" can only end in a very ugly way.

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Dave

A female angle, by a Ukipper:-
Why women should vote to leave the EU

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Dave