Wednesday, December 07, 2011



The European Commission's answer to the Eurozone crisis

Foreign dictatorship. Yes, really:

The European commission could be empowered to impose austerity measures on eurozone countries that are being bailed out, usurping the functions of government in countries such as Greece, Ireland, or Portugal.

[...]

A confidential paper for EU leaders by the EU council president, Herman Van Rompuy, who will chair the summit on Thursday and Friday, said eurobonds or the pooling of eurozone debt would be a powerful tool in resolving the crisis, despite fierce German resistance to the idea.

It called for "more intrusive control of national budgetary policies by the EU" and laid out various options for enforcing fiscal discipline supra-nationally.

This is madness. All it does is swap economic instability for political instability. We're already seeing in Greece that people will not put up with austerity for the sake of the bankers when imposed by an elected government. Imagine how they'll react when its imposed by foreign officials in the interests of a foreign power, without any suggestion of a democratic mandate.

Europe's great achievement has been to spread democracy from the Atlantic to the Baltic. Now they want to throw that away, while releasing the most toxic forms of nationalism from their box. And all for the sake of the banks. If Europe goes down this path, then the European Project might as well be over - because it will no longer be worth supporting.