Elections 3: Arrogant MEPs plan massive Voter Theft
http://democracy.blogactiv.eu/
from David in Brussels.
Tags: attack, cartel, Court, democracy, European Communities, football, illiberal, judge, Justice, liberal, Luxembourg, normal, oligarchy, people treaty, Political, propaganda, referee
Flushed with pride just following the elections, the leader of one of the major party groups made a startling proposal to the press. The new president of the Commission should be one of the newly elected MEPs, he said.
WOOAAHH!! Hold your horses! What about NORMAL people? Not content with the proposals of the draft Lisbon Treaty restricting the choice to party political cardholders, this political party leader is urging the least democratic choice ever proposed for Europe. Only a few hundred personalities are to be eligible. That brings his maximum of the potential candidates to around 0.0001 percent of the population!! Doesn’t that look a bit fixed and fraudulent, even to a politician?
There are two words for this. One is Arrogant. The other is Theft. Politicians have no right to take away from citizens what they have not agreed to in a vote after the people have been given clear details of the proposal. With the rapid declining public confidence in politicians, a move to more open democratization is required. The direction of an illiberal, closed party oligarchy shutting out normal voters and any non-political candidates is exactly the opposite to elementary justice.
Schuman made this clear from the outset. More than sixty years ago, he spoke at great length in many of Europe’s cities about the new concept of European democracy. The concept of supranational democracy covered more newspaper pages and filled more airwaves than probably any other topic in the postwar years. And the Europeans were opposed by such big guns as General de Gaulle and all the other grandiose nationalists (plus a number of disreputable ones too!). Without such a debate and agreement, the result is what is called Political Corruption.
What have governments, what has the present Commission and the present Parliament done to revive and reanimate these great democratic debates on the Community system? When did they last explain to their citizens what supranational democracy is? Are they afraid, or ignorant?
Who agreed to turning Europe into a political oligarchy? Nobody!! Or at least only the self-appointed few of the glorious few hundred cartelists. It’s a sad reflection on politicians today that their knee-jerk reaction is not more power to the people but more power to us politicians!
Reactions at the ballot boxes? An increasing majority of people stayed away from voting. It was not a European election. It was a collection of 27 national elections. It scarcely differed from a national election, except slightly different rules were applied to fix it. It was not a pan-European one, as treaties require. Those who did vote picked a ragbag mixture of groups, many expressing revulsion at how mainstream national parties arrogantly discard referendums they don’t like.
Schuman required that European democracy should draw from the genius of the many different States which had developed their own democracies. They fought such arrogance and political theft. The European Community was to develop into a Continental Democracy of Democracies. National democracies would flourish inside a real, vibrant European democracy.
For those politicians who have forgotten Schuman’s definition of democracy — probably the best ever formulated — this is what he says: ‘What characterizes a democratic State are the objectives that it proposes and the means by which it seeks to attain them. It is at the service of the people and it acts in agreement with it.’
Under the present treaties any suitably qualified and experienced European citizen has the possibility to be chosen as Commission President by the 27 governments acting together in the best interests of their 500 million citizens. You can tell your children: ‘Aspire to be President in Europe. You don’t have to be a member of a political party. You can suggest to all the European people what you think can be done to improve everyone’s lot.‘
The position of the Commission President is there to propose for democratic assent, and within the confines of the treaties, ways and means to make the interactions of the people more beneficial and thus make the people wiser so they can become a more excellent example to all the world. That is the basis of supranational values at the foundation of Europe’s great experiment.
The cartel wants otherwise. In the past de Gaulle wanted to control the Commission. Today it is the party machines, often run by anonymous party bureaucrats. Only 2 percent of citizens have cards. More people go to football matches. Thus having a party card is not normal. The Commission is designed by treaty to be impartial and independent. Political parties are by definition ideological and biased. They are not normal, that is open. Impartiality is what we demand of judges and football referees. It is even more important when the Commission has the main duty to make proposals for the common good of half a billion citizens. You would not expect a judge to make propaganda speeches for a political party inside and outside Court. Spectators don’t want a football referee to be shouting in favour of a political party and penalizing the others.
Do citizens want a Commission to be in the hands of the same obscure party machines who already control the major levers of power? Imagine a Commission making very dubious redistribution of taxpayers’ money – let us just say corrupt practices – and having no checks and balances at all. Both the Parliament and the Council are in their pocket. When it comes to the Commission, governments have a proven bias to selecting their own political kind. Governments far too often do not act as representatives of all the people but as representatives of their political parties.
When did they last suggest a Commission President who was not a party member? You have to go back a few decades. However, almost all States have nominated a normal non-party person from time to time. So don’t let anyone tell you only politicians can fill the post as Commissioner or President. That’s oligarchic propaganda. It’s arrant nonsense. The Council’s score shows a massive prejudice against Normal people and huge self-serving bias in favour of their own Party people. The bad, bad record for party favouritism of governments is a public witness against them. The same Party people also decide in secret on the composition of the Consultative Committees, that should represent European civil society.
What is the democrat to do? The final resort of democracy is a small group of professionally impartial people. That is the Court of Justice of the European Communities in Luxembourg. They are slow. Their custom is not to give rapid decisions but deliberate ones. A recent exception was a sharp rebuke against the Council for secretive, illegal practice after the judges’ patience had worn thin at the Council’s refusal to take democratic criticism and their previous judgements seriously.
Let’s get back to the democratic principles of the treaties. The Commission has to be independent. Parliament’s duty is to make sure that it is. It is not to reinforce bad practice of de Gaulle and others. ‘It is not from {nationalists} like Maurice Barres or Deroulede that we seek our political inspiration,’ wrote Schuman. Nor from their political descendants. Long live normal, impartial people!
Elections 2: Parliament publishes Handbook on ‘How to cheat in the European Elections’
Tags: cartel, cheat, citizen, corruption, Court, democracy, deposit, discrimination, Elections, euprofiler, fines, founding father, fraud, handbook, honest, How to cheat, human, impartial, linguistic, list, Luxembourg, Orange, Parliament, rights, Schuman, signature, Strasbourg, system, vote, voter, William
Want to know how to make sure how all your buddies get re-elected to the European Parliament? Want to learn how to eliminate and confuse any other political parties that have the audacity to oppose you? If your buddies are not happy with just a single vote, do you want to know where they can have ten votes?
All these and many more tips for cheating in the European elections can be found in a recent publication by whom? A secret Handbook by the Mafia? Not at all. The publication comes from the European Parliament itself.
Every time the Parliament goes to the ballot boxes the European Parliament publishes such a Handbook. Naturally it is not called How to cheat in the European Elections. That would give too much away. It is published with a boring cover and given a long and boring title. Its title is The European Elections; EU Legislation, National Provisions and Civic Participation. It is a ‘Study’. It is published by the Directorate-General for Internal Policies. The Department C of this directorate is curiously called ‘Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs.’
Citizens’ rights is a bit rich. It is more about running roughshod over their rights. The Handbook also cheats the reader. Being a Handbook on cheating, it does not give all the tricks on cheating. The earnest seeker for democracy will have to search the web and the blogs for other examples.
Far from criticizing it further, I would like to commend the honest attempt of the author for exposing some facts and abuses. However, a major effort should be made in presenting them to the public. Reform would be even better.
Honestly enough, the publication starts with the treaty provisions from the European Community Treaty.
The European Parliament shall draw up a proposal for elections by direct universal suffrage in accordance with a uniform procedure in all Member States or in accordance with principles common to all Member States. The Council shall, acting unanimously after obtaining the assent of the European Parliament, which shall act by a majority of its component Members, lay down the appropriate provisions, which it shall recommend to Member States for adoption in accordance with their respective constitutional requirements.
Parliament made a few lukewarm attempts to implement this. The Council refused. Then the Council tried to change the treaties to make it even more biased, without much success. That is basically too dishonest. The only people who would benefit from any modification of the original legal duty would be the political parties, of which the governments are the prime representation.
Let’s go back to the Founding Fathers. They had a good idea, which showed commendable honesty and fairness. How would it work? To put it another way: what do citizens expect from a uniform, fair and open electoral system? This is not new territory. The battle for democracy in every country has developed the list of requirements. The system must include:
· The right of any mature citizen to vote.
· The right of any citizen to create a party, peaceful movement or interest group.
· No restrictions based on of educational level, religion, financial standing
· One person, one vote.
· No discrimination by age, gender or race
· No artificial barriers, such as financial requirements, property-ownership.
· No restriction by requiring signed agreement of existing government parties.
The right to vote. Governments, not citizens, say who votes. Some countries limit voters to those over 18 years; others over 16. One area of Europe was not allowed to vote at all. That was because the powers-that-be did not want to have one MEP elected from this small area, close to another Member State. The voters appealed to the Courts against this discrimination and won. The judgement was given, not in the EU’s Court in Luxembourg, but in the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. What a failure of European governments! Of course this situation would not have arisen at all if the governments had obeyed their obligations in the treaties and allowed citizens to create equal rights for all citizens.
The right to have multiple votes. Here’s how to bias the European Parliament to gain extra influence. Voters are allowed to vote anywhere they have residence. But the votes are not equal. The same voter of a big State can move to a small country and increase the weight of his or her vote by a factor of ten. Thus the same national has either one vote or ten votes depending on where the ballot box is. Of course privileged people having the right to ten votes and thus influencing the political colour of the MEPs in Parliament was of no particular concern while de Gaulle and others had ‘chloroformed’ Parliament’s power and the Council totally ignored its Opinions. But now when the Parliament has a serious voice in a multi-billion euro budget, the voters should be asking to clean-up the patently unfair system. Should the small countries be worried that will losing their over-representation with a one citizen, one vote system? Hardly. The small countries such as Luxemborg have always had a big advantage and they will retain it. The small States are usually the most impartial and most European. They demand fair play among the bullying politics of the big States. In any free vote in a pan-European election, it is inevitable that if the small States continue to emphasize honesty and fairness, and a European common good (rather than national bias), their candidates will always get high representation in Parliament.
Right to stand as a candidate. Governments will tell you who can stand. Some countries say the candidates should be at least 18 and others 21. Some say only 23 year-olds can stand. A good technique to cut out idealistic youths or some rumbustious rebels.
Costs. States can make it a tough struggle to stand as a candidate. Some States require no deposit. Why don’t they all? Others require candidates to find a deposit amounting to 5000 euros or more. If they get enough votes against the stiff, privileged entrenched governmental party competition, they might get the money back. The media is not likely to give them much space to expose their views as it might upset the biggest advertiser, the government. If they don’t win a minimum of votes (also set by governments) and they keep trying they will be penalized each time they do until they learn to stop. They will be stuck with debts. One country has created the astounding wheeze to dissuade candidates by saying that candidates must pay 3600 euros to the State for the cost of printing ballot papers! This is a great tactic to make sure that no candidates from the poor sections of society can stand.
Signature Restrictions. States require candidates to publish names of supporters before they can be recognized as a movement. Such a movement may have to deal with linguistic discrimination resulting in major political problems with governing parties. One Member State says that to stand as candidate only one signature is required. Of course that is not a normal citizen’s signature. It is that of a deputy, that is, a member of the existing political élite. Is it equal for someone who wishes to point out their failings? If the candidate wants to oppose the standing political powers-that-be, he or she has to get a few more signatures. Not one but 250 signatures. Thus we have a measure of how the political parties who wrote the law consider ordinary citizens. One politician (who is responsible both for the benefits and the problems that citizens are experiencing) is worth 250 ordinary citizens.
The value of a Candidate. That sum of one politician= 250 ordinary voters is not worst devaluation of their fellow citizens by incumbent political parties. Other countries require 4000 signatures or even 10,000 signatures in a single constituency. Each time a list of signatures is required, it gives the governmental opponents the opportunity to dispute the validity of the actual signature count. In the worst case they can put pressure on signatories to change their minds.
The irresponsible List system. Some countries have completely done away with the voters right to pick candidates whom the public can hold responsible. They create a list system so that only the party machines can choose the names of the clique who will actually get into Parliament. Thus the party bosses, the big brothers or the big sisters, define who will be more equal than the others. This system was foisted on the public in some cases purely for internal party reasons, to cut out the people — ‘extremists’ — inside the party that the top leaders did not want to see succeed. The List system is fundamentally unfair for a representative democracy. No public protest, no discussion had any effect on this chicanery. The voters where treated with haughty disdain.
Voting NONE OF THE ABOVE is seldom an option. At a time when many voters are disenchanted with the behaviour of politicians, voters should be given the option that the system needs reform. Instead some countries impose fines on those who do not vote for what some voters consider a corrupt cartel. In economics the consumers’ last chance against a cartel is not to buy. A political cartel that does not offer this last option of signalling dissatification is reinforcing corruption. At the very least it builds up frustrations in honest protesters at the lack of choice. Computer voting systems that remove the non-vote option magnify their exasperation.
THE GREATEST LACK. The nationalist governments and their political parties have made great efforts to cut out the European dimension. The Parliament was designed from the beginning to be the house of the representatives of the European people. It would therefore encourage full dialogues and build solidarity. The people and especially the young people are far more European than these grey beards.
Over the course of revisions of the treaties, governments, that is ruling political parties, have made sure that their own political patch, ‘their State’ is protected against any European democrats. The idea of One citizen, One vote is annulled. They created geographical divisions based on retaining power. Each election they get an additional warning. Voter turnout declines. The smoke screen of political parties is having less and less effect on the public.
Why should a voter be restricted by geography in voting for a candidate or even worse for a list system in the place where he or she resides? Why can’t the voter choose the best candidate that responds to his or her interests and policy positions? Are the 27 European governments afraid that voters in all countries may discern an honest and impartial personality, whose reputation has spread across the border? Are they worried if the voters turn in mass to a candidate who has fearlessly fought corruption elsewhere?
Even on the basis of identifying a political choice closer to the voter’s own position, cross-border voting should be possible. After all Parliament is about dealing with cross-border issues. This identity of a non-native candidate in another Member State is quite possible nowadays with innovative web systems like www.euprofiler.eu .
A voter can find amongst all the European candidates the nearest to his own wishes and proclivities. If any voter does so, they might be in for a shock. The same policy and interest position are simultaneously touted by left-wing, center and right-wing parties but in different States. What is a ‘left-wing’ policy in one country is espoused as a right-wing one in another!
When the MEPs arrive in Parliament they will then vote in blocks in great left, center or right-wing coalitions. So the effect of the voter’s careful policy choice is often completely forgotten. Before each vote, the leader of each mega-grouping holds up his hand. With a thumb up or a thumb down, the group leaders act like a Roman emperor giving orders to the troops for the dispatch of a gladiator or Christian martyr.
How did the Founding Fathers design the system to maximize the political responsibility of each member? The members sat in alphabetical order so the unthinking voting in political blocks was impossible. The original democratic system encompassed in the treaties provides the citizen with probably the best system of democracy in the world — provided that the provisions for democracy in Parliament and for civil society representation are taken seriously.
In other words, the party political system is not only showing its age (it started with a political trick under William III of Orange). It is ripe for a realistic European replacement.
To find out how your own country cheats the voter and compare it with the other cheats, refer to the European Parliament’s Handbook below. It would be a good idea to ask the Parliament and Council to replace it by a single electoral system so there is no need for a new edition.
www.europarl.europa.eu/eplive/expert/multimedia/20090303MLT50670/media_20090303MLT50670.pdf
Elections 1: How governments cheat the voters, distort democracy and fix the European Elections
Tags: Britain, bureaucrat, committee, Community, consultation, corruption, Court, de Gaulle, democracy, Economic, Elections, Euratom, Labour, lobby, lobbyist, Manifesto, meat mountains, Mickey Mouse, mills of God, Paris, party, Regions, Rome, Schuman, social, supranational, Swiss, Teitgen, treaty, wine lakes
The legal rules for elections are clear and simple. Anything that diverges from them is a fraud and a cheat. The rules were set more than half a century ago. The founding treaties (Paris 1951, Rome 1957) make it clear how the European Elections should be run in a fair and just manner.
Article 138 of the Economic Community treaty and article 108 of the Euratom treaty say the same thing. The same words exist in the present treaty of Nice. The words were also retrospectively added to the founding Treaty of Paris, 1951. This is to clarify what should have already have been clear to any true democrat in the Paris Treaty’s article 20. That says the Assembly should consist of the ‘representatives of the peoples of the member states of the Community’. (High Authority translation). Representatives of the peoples should of course always be elected on a basis of equality. Note that the main principle is Representation of the Peoples, not of the States or governments or governance systems.
That vital obligation of governments has never been carried out in all Europe’s history. Europeans are left with a distorted and biased system created by and for the governments, that is political party élites.
The Rome treaties say: ‘The Assembly shall draw up proposals for elections by direct universal suffrage in accordance with a uniform procedure in all Member States.’
Universal suffrage, that is a direct vote for members of the European Parliament, only took place in 1979. That came three decades late. Previously the MEPs had been nominated by the national parliaments. In practice this meant that governments could control who was supposed to speak out for European democracy. De Gaulle also made sure that the prestige and effectiveness of the Assembly was reduced to a minimum. That way the Council of Ministers became the illegitimate single controller of the budget. And the European budget could be used to subsidize French farmers, industries and others – who then voted enthusiastically for de Gaulle’s rip-off of the other European taxpayers.
Voters wanting something like democracy had to wait some 30 years from the time of Europe’s first assembly in 1949. That happened only after maximum pressure on the political oligarchy. When in government, political parties wanted to retain the maximum unfair advantage. The mills of God grind slowly but they grind small.
First we should ask the question: What is the purpose of a Parliament in a supranational Community? The treaties say that before any legislation could be passed, Parliament has to give an Opinion (as do the Consultative Committees). An Opinion is an extensive criticism of the Proposal of the Commission. A key feture of the system is that only an independent and impartial body can introduce legislation. That avoids corruption by political interests.
The Commission makes the first step by suggesting an impartial draft law. To do this effectively, it enters into a permanent and close dialogue with all members of organized Civil Society. They have a debating chamber called the Consultative Committee (the Economic and Social Committee and Committee of the Regions). This was specifically created to avoid the plague of shadowy lobbyists we have today. Lobbyists may outnumber all the bureaucrats. Once the law is drafted, the Parliament representing the people, the Consultative Committees (representing organized Civil Society) and the Council representing Member States are to give their own analysis of the measure and point out any shortcomings. Such a system is the most intelligent way to deal with unintended consequences of legislation by bureaucrats.
The Commission is required to be as independent, impartial and as well-informed as a judge. The treaties forbid acting for any interest, whether paid or not, including political activity. It is not a European government as it has only the option of making a proposal where the treaties give it the right. It has management of the consequences of such regulations, only where Member States (and civil society and affected individuals, according to the treaties) say it has.
It is essential that such a system exists in today’s world of increasing complexity. It also avoids corruption by nationalist rabble-rousers, political interests with hidden cartels. It also exposes to the full light of open debate any lobbyist bias towards a labour, consumer group or industry or a region.
Under the centralizing fancies of General de Gaulle, it was unthinkable for his grandeur that the French government should be reduced to a mere commentator on a draft European law. He poured scorn on the whole idea of the supranational European Community. He ‘chloroformed’ the institutions. Then he started a major power grab, insisting that only the Council of Ministers could decide the legislation and the money questions. That’s not what the treaties say. It is arrogant to assume that politicians with their limited background can foresee all the problems of all the citizens. And be aware of the real needs of the future.
Thus the Council of Ministers began to dominate often with the active collusion of the Commission. While the Commission still received such Opinions from the other institutions, it promptly ignored them. The Council and the Commission (which served as its secretariat) may not even have bothered reading them. The Council of Ministers thus tried to convert the Communities to something like an uncontrolled and secret intergovernmental organ. What’s more, the Communities produced plenty of taxpayers’ money to play with, including customs tariffs. Thus the vote-hungry national politicians could do secret deals with no controls. The result? Pouring European money into vote-gathering. It became an addiction with meat mountains and wine lakes and massive corruption in southern Italy.
The Parliament had no moral authority. Why? Because the members were nominated by the governments. Just like the Consultative Committees today, (the EcoSoc and the Committee of Regions), they were not legitimately elected. Nor do they represent a European level. The Council in its power grab devalued the other institutions to the point in the 1960s that they looked like a useless appendix. The Community system does not have a democracy deficit but it has certainly experienced democracy theft.
When in 1973 the British, Irish and Danes joined the Communities, the abuse was so flagrant and the system so undemocratic, the Labour Party boycotted the Parliament. That gave the right-wing parties a majority. Not that it mattered at all. No one cared what the Parliament said in its Opinions. They just filled the waste bins at the Council.
Some Continental MEPs however were not only furious at this undemocratic stitch-up, they acted. They appealed to the institution created for this. When the Council went too far and passed legislation without even getting the proper Opinion, some MEPs took the matter to the European Court. Schuman’s legal colleague, Pierre-Henri Teitgen, then an eminent professor of law, ably assisted them.
The upshot of all these scandals was that the governments were then forced to review the ‘chloroformed‘ question of direct elections. As anyone can see from the treaty article quoted above, the governments decided they would only fulfill the first part of the sentence and leave the other half. Curious affliction of partial blindness. That way they could retain the remaining undemocratic powers that General de Gaulle had foisted on the Communities.
De Gaulle had distorted the system but it takes a really honest Statesman to correct it. Most are content with his unjust gains and ‘de-activated‘ institutions. Who will be the first to say: ‘Fellow Prime Ministers, the system is not fair. We and our political party machines are profiting illegally from this distortion. Let us correct it and give more power to the people and organized civil society as the Founding Fathers intended. All our States agreed to this at the beginning when we signed and ratified the treaties.’
So today the world’s largest economic and peace-enhancing union has a governance system unfit for such global responsibilities. It has been sold a Mickey-Mouse substitute. That is like a cheap and nasty child’s watch versus a precision-made Swiss one. Europeans have a fraudulent system that deliberately deactivates what is the best system of democracy yet conceived.
The first questions for voters to ask the political parties are: ‘When are we going to get a single electoral system? How do you plan to go about it? When are you going to reinstate democratic powers for organized civil society? ’ I would be interested to know if there was a single Manifesto that raised the question. So far I have not found one.
To come: The Handbook the EU published on how to cheat in the European elections.
Commission Debate 8: When France said NON to Ireland, democracy, and a European energy policy — a WARNING today about political oligarchy!
Tags: Alain, Britain, Charles, chloroform, civil society, coal, Commission, Community, Constitution, consultation, de Gaulle, democracy, Denmark, energy, Euratom, European, Franco, General, General Secretary, Generalissimo, Greece, High Authority, inactivate, Ireland, Lisbon, Luns, Middle East, Norway, oil, peyrefitte, Portugal, referendum, Robert, Schuman, Spaak, Spain, steel, supranational, treaty
In October 1957 the Council of Ministers asked the High Authority to prepare a general Energy policy for Europe. Why? because Europe was becoming more and more dependent on Middle East oil and this was a highly unstable area. The High Authority was equivalent of today’s Commission in Europe’s founding and pioneering European Community for Coal and Steel. This far-sighted intiative foundered by events a few months later.
General Charles de Gaulle seized power in France. He authorized his loyal aide, Alain Peyrefitte, to draw up a plan to “de-activate” and “chloroform” the three European Communities.
Don’t be deceived by modern rewriting of history that makes out that de Gaulle was some sort of European democrat. De Gaulle quickly showed what type of Europe he wanted. He vetoed the candidature of Great Britain and with it Ireland, Norway and Denmark, not once but twice.
Did he discuss this policy in the French Parliament before he did it? Not at all. De Gaulle just said NON. There was no public discussion, never mind a referendum in France to see if the French people wanted their European neighbours and allies to join. Of course not. This was possibly French people’s most important decision on their future. In fact the Council of Ministers had previously already agreed on Ireland’s adhesion. That did not matter at all.
What is even more astounding was that de Gaulle did not even tell his ministers he was going to make what was one of France’s most important policy decisions! How did he go about this act of saying NO? Well he just said so in a press conference! For the second veto he at least advanced this to a speech.
Was General de Gaulle against the expansion of the European Communities? Apparently not. In spite of his personal Diktat against the most democratic states in Europe, General de Gaulle made it clear in May 1964 that he would like to see Spain, then still under Generalissimo Franco’s dictatorship, inside the Community!
Europe should be grateful that the Community system, created by Schuman was resilient enough that this abuse of democracy did not happen. Europe is not a club for dictators. Good democrats like Joseph Luns in The Netherlands and many others in the small countries of Belgium and Luxembourg made it clear that this was not the Europe they expected. They resisted de Gaulle’s Fouchet Plan in 1961 which had as its main aim to sideline the Commission and turn it into a secretariat obedient to de Gaulle’s personal ‘centralizing‘ wishes. In short, France would be the controlling influence by taking over the Commission. It would no longer be impartial and independent of powerful politicians.
Belgium’s Paul-Henri Spaak was one of the many Statesmen who resisted these bullying tactics. He declared that ‘Europe of tomorrow must be a supranational Europe.‘
When in 1962 de Gaulle openly declared he was against this supranational form of democracy, the European ministers in his own government resigned. In 1965 he refused to send ’his’ minister to the Council of Ministers. That boycott lasted until, after a few months, this empty chair policy began to look ridiculous. The other five showed that democratic solidarity was what Europeans expected. They refused all separate bilateral talks with France. The bully would not attack them one by one. However they were still rather lukewarm Europeans. None of the five other governments insisted that they should have direct elections to the European Parliament as required by the treaties, even if de Gaulle disdained such democracy. Mrs Thatcher, prime minister of the UK, also tried to boycott the European institutions, but it took her less time to realize she was looking ridiculous. It was also ineffectual and against British interests which needed arguments not brute force. The European Community is designed to resist the blackmail or bullying of the weak States by the big powers. Once the five supranational institutions are properly working it will be much easier to reach agreement on major initiatives using these common democratic rules.
What should be remembered is that in a democratic European Community TWO things are important: Nations have sovereign powers and cannot be overridden by other sovereign states ganging up against the small, the weak or the critical. Ireland for example should not be bullied by one or any of the other Member States. France was not bullied when its people voted Non. And it was quite unjust of some French politicians to say that Britain should be thrown out of the Community if its projected referendum (that did not happen) gave a negative vote for the Constitutional Treaty. On that basis, using the same criteria, France should already have left! Secondly the Community system has a deep, democratic consultation system of all interested groups and individuals. A Community is designed potentially as a pure democratic governance system for democratic Member States. De Gaulle abused the first power by saying: “La France, that means ME!” And he blocked all the potential consultation of civil society. They are still “chloroformed” today! Most political parties want them to stay fast asleep, because they will then have unfettered power.
Many other undemocratic acts were committed by governments who vaunted themselves for being democratic. Some personalities wanted to be considered the saviour of the Continent against such imaginary foes such as ‘Anglo-Saxons’. Curious term. This extremely dubious propaganda was a historical anachronism and related to a Celtic people who had been invaded by Romans two thousand years earlier then by Norwegian, Dutch and Danish Vikings and then about a thousand years ago conquered by French Normans! Even after Europe’s sad experience of Hitler’s propaganda machine, thousands of uncritical people took such obvious information distortions seriously in the 1960s. Thanks to the courage of other Members, the Commission did not irrevocably become the mouthpiece of Gaullist policies.
When this wave of dishonest nationalism faded out both in France and also in the dictatorships of Spain, Portugal and Greece, the European public began to take a more realistic view of the facts. They were allowed to, because the means of communication, radio and television and newspapers, were no longer the monopoly of the State machine. Propaganda came to be considered as ridiculous against neighbouring States as gossiping against neighbours across the fence. We all have to live together despite the distortions of tin-pot politicians.
But then Europeans are faced with another danger. Politicians and political parties tried to dominate all spheres of Community activity. They want to do in their own sphere of political oligarchy or a cartel what General de Gaulle tried to do in his. Maybe they were jealous. The original treaties were not written by politicians, but by people with deeper sources of wisdom. These early treaties created peace and prosperity unknown in recent times. They were based on democratic principles foreign to the party political disputes of recent centuries. Today’s party politicians show they are incapable of making such an altruistic governance structure. They put their own interests first.
What is new is that all these so-called “revised” treaties are too often written by politicians alone. That is extremely dangerous as the first interest they look out for is their own. And the last two objects of their desire, the Constitutional and Lisbon treaties, provide not only an opportunity but an open invitation to corruption. (See Commission Debates, numbers 2, 3 and 4). The politicians want to make the Commission an exclusive posting for politicians, while the original architects said this should never be the case.
One other thing that also has been conveniently ‘forgotten’ by the latest breed of Commissioners, relates to new treaties. Is it ethical, professional or right that Commissioners should be recommending and lobbying the citizens in favour of new treaties?
Let’s be clear. A new treaty is the business of governments and their citizens. It needs to be discussed and agreed by all interest groups, not just a house of party politicians, that is, parliament.
In the past, the Commissioners avoided commenting on new treaties. Frankly it’s not the Commission’s business until it has been passed democratically. Then the Commission becomes a guardian of the treaty and can defend it in line with natural justice and European values. Incidentally, the Commission’s job is to defend the previous treaties and common justice. It is not there to praise fellow-politicians and to lobby for them. It should criticize governments and politics that try to bring in measures contrary to the original democratic principles and natural justice. This the present Commission has signally failed to do.
It was not a Europe of Generals or Generalissimos. Nor is it a Europe of General Secretaries of political parties.
Commission Debate 7: Only a disreputable Commission refuses to signal the major rejection of Europe’s founding fathers!
Tags: 1950, 9, Benelux, betrayal, Charles, Commission, Community, Constitution, de Gaulle, Declaration, fathers, founding, Germany, Guardian, Italy, Lisbon, May, Paris, political parties, Robert, Rome, Schuman, treaties, treaty
The Constitutional Treaty and the Lisbon Treaty have one thing in common: both want to make the most destructive inroads to the independence of the Commission as a whole, and of the independence of the Commissioners in particular. This is a disgraceful betrayal of European democracy and the principles of Community.
All the previous treaties say that the Commission must be composed of ‘independent and experienced’ persons. They are NOT national representatives. That Commissioners became national politicians was an insistence of nationalists, like the Gaullists. The treaties do not say Commissioners have to be party political members as a condition. It does not say only political parties may chose the name of Commissioners. The latest treaties want to discriminate against normal people, that is, the vast majority of citizens who do not have party membership. Believe it or not, Democracy can exist without party politics. It did for thousands of years!
Whoever the Commissioners were or are now, they have a duty. The Commission is guardian of the treaties. Did the present Commissioners and all other politicians explain to parliaments and to voters in the referendums these facts? Did they show them where in the treaties and why the Commissioners are required NOT to be representatives of their State? Did governments and the present Commissioners explain that being an active politician is against the principles of the treaties? Please submit quotes to info at schuman.info ! Did they explain the following?
The main purpose of the Commission is to act as an honest-broker for all European states, associations and individuals. It is like the person who cuts up a cake, as equally as possible, before the greedy children (governments) choose the portions. Obviously this rôle should not be given to one of the governments, and certainly not one of the big states, known as the bullies of history.
Equally obvious, having a Commission composed only of national politicians is not likely be as good as having decisions made by a college of really fair-minded, independent, non-ideological, experienced persons. The Commissioners should be chosen because they are the most fair-minded, the most honest and incorruptible people in Europe. A bunch of national politicians will bring the decisions to the lowest common denominator after national arm-wrestling inside the Commission. It is mini-power politics and will be scarcely better than the squabbles that take place inside and outside parliaments and the Council of Ministers.
The abuse of placing national Yesmen inside the Commission was the reason that, during the Gaullist period in France, voting had to be introduced inside the Commission. Previously consensus was sought. De Gaulle hoped that a strong politician of Gaullist persuasion could bamboozle all the others (Germany was politically dependent and the others were weaker like Italy, or smaller and therefore insignificant.) It did not work then and it certainly will not with twenty more States now and maybe thirty more in the future. Voting was necessary because as some Commissioners became ideologically biased, politically dishonest and were given instructions from their capitals.
Trying to stack the Commission with national ideologues was a blatant violation of the letter and spirit of the treaties then. It is today. Hallstein and others spoke out boldly then against de Gaulle.
An honest Commission would say so today, loud and clear!
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Commission Debate 6: Proof that the Commission must be independent and that there never were national Commissioners
Tags: Animal, arrogance, big, brother, Commission, Commissioner, Community, debate, democracy, democratic deficit, Elections, EU, Europe, farm, George, High Authority, independent, oligarchy, Orwell, parties, Political, Schuman, surplus
First step: Read the Treaties!
Here’s what Europe’s founding treaty says: “Members … shall exercise their functions in complete independence, in the general interest of the Community. In the fulfilment of their duties, they shall neither solicit nor accept instructions from any government or from any organization. They shall abstain from all conduct incompatible with the supranational character of their functions.” (Treaty of Paris, article 9).
In the next line the treaty forbids the governments from trying to influence the Members. “Each Member State undertakes to respect this supranational character and not to seek to influence the members … in the execution of their duties.”
The present Nice Treaty says much the same thing … with one exception. Nationalists and Gaullists feared or objected to the word, supranational. Supranational democracy was one thing they did not want. Why? It would quickly show them up as less than democratic at home! They therefore caused this word to be struck out at the first revision of the treaties.
It was a futile gesture. The meaning is the same. Supranational means that the Commission is totally independent of all interests. The main text remains. They cut the word but not the definition and the legal obligation. They could not replace it. No government had the audacity to try to substitute it with a phrase that said: ‘Member States have the right to influence a Commissioner especially if the Commissioner is of the same nationality and it is a Gaullist government or nationalist government of that ilk.’ That would be just like saying we have the right to bribe the referee in a football match.
In theory, in law and by agreement in this compact made between all democratic member states, Commissioners remain free to make proposals subject only to their own judgement (which should be based on wide European experience and impartial information) and their conscience. They have to form judgements based on talking out questions of Europe in detail in conjunction with the other members, exercising the same faculties of honesty, analysis and non-ideological deductions.
In practice what is happening today? Governments feel free to act in total disregard to their legal obligations. The governments ask Commissioners to resign and become ministers. The governments have no right to do this. Nor have the Commissioners have any right to take up such a ministerial post – according to the law of the treaties. They also signed a pledge at the start of the term saying that they would take no instructions from a government. What can be more serious as an instruction than if someone says to you: Resign! We will give you another job.
The Founding Fathers in order to stop dead such abuse, wrote into the original treaty that no Commissioner was allowed to take a job, remunerated or not, within three years of resigning or leaving office. Do the present Commissioners have no shame?
Who are these Commissioners replaced with? Why another politician of course. Some countries like the UK have the effrontery of replacing a man with a woman. Effrontery? The UK government explains that they are equal opportunity employers! What! Are only politicians equal? This is right out of George Orwell’s Animal Farm! Everyone is equal but politicians are more equal than others! I imagine our governments could open George Orwell’s eyes on a few other ideas. There are some 60 million people in the UK, and I did not see an advertisement asking qualified people to apply for the job. Please drop me a line if anyone saw it!!
Some 500 million people are watching and judging the Commissioners as to whether they are independent. Some pass the test; others fail. It is far too tempting for Commissioners to assume they must become a champion for a particular interest group or political ideology. For those outside such interest groups, they look as trustworthy as a crooked cop.
For national leaders, selecting the Commission presents them with another temptation. What better place to create high-paid jobs for the political boys and girls that they did not want at home, than to send them to Brussels? The voting public on the other hand has now got a real Litmus test to show whether politicians at home are really honest. Do they insist that the Commission should not be a dumping ground for politicians? Check the record of the last decade since new treaties began to be discussed! In recent years hardly one has passed the test. We are in a period not so much of a democratic deficit but a ‘surplus of arrogance’, as one commissioner called it.
And it is the allegedly democratic political parties who are installing this new big brother and big sister oligarchy.
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Commission Debate 5: Rejoice, you Irish! The Cartel is providing political Kommissars for everyone!
Tags: cartel, chauvin, Commission, Community, Constitution, democracy, democrats, diplomats, Elections, engineer, flag, Hirsch, History, Irish, June, Justice, Kommissar, Lisbon treaty, Mayer, Monnet, nepotism, politicians, referendum, Reuter, Schuman, scoundrels, supranational, vote
In what amounts to a political cartel, European leaders have insisted that the Irish people cannot be trusted. This autumn the Irish will have to vote again. They expect the Irish in general and each voter in particular to behave like a schizophrenic. They must grovel and say they were wrong when they voted No to the Lisbon Treaty in June 2008. European leaders expect the average Mr O’Flaherty and his good wife to proudly boast in their local pub that they have seen the light and have now voted Yes when last year they told everyone in the pub they had resolutely voted No.
In all probability, this attempt by the political cartel to override democratic decision-making will fail. I have predicted this already last year.
The political cartel believes it has fixed the vote. I call the leaders a cartel because that is exactly how they are acting. In the economic area when a firm or group of firms does not believe in the free market, it fixes the supply to increase profits. They manipulate other aspects to conspire against the consumer. In the political sphere our leaders apparently do not believe in the free market of ideas. They need extra-legal powers of persuasion to manipulate the free market. The rejected Constitutional Treaty, cut up into amendments so no one would read it and called the Lisbon Treaty is the same disreputable operation. With an oligarchic political power grab so close, some politicians consider anything is worth a try. They throw morality overboard together with the clearly expressed public disapproval of their shenanigans. Hardly worth a peanut. Some have even declared publicly how much they are looking forward to benefiting from the plethora of new jobs that the new treaty will afford to their class. They are quite willing to blacken the name of any poor soul who opposes them. Many politicians are expert in this. A serious debate is a different matter.
Example: What would you tell your grandchildren about when you deceived Europeans by making them submissively accept what French, Dutch, Irish (and many others given the chance) had clearly rejected? How do you claim that Europe is a great democracy, a beacon in the world, that the children should be proud of their history of the fight for justice, when the Lisbon Treaty is the product of such squalid, dishonest, secretive manipulation of cut and paste? How will this debauched episode against European democracy plotted in a secret conclave by so-called democratic leaders in denial of all the promises made at Laeken go down in the history books?
The problem is the Irish. The politicians say that the Irish have to vote again and therefore we must give them some sweeteners or bribes. To read the press, this is a familiar area for many politicians. The only really substantial political bribe is that which will proclaim that all Member States should have their own national Commissioner. Any other verbal declaration will be revealed as useless in the media as none will change a comma in the Lisbon Treaty. With no great evidence, they say the Irish were afraid of ‘losing their national Commissioner.’ That was not necessarily the incumbent Commissioner who had not read the Lisbon Treaty before the last referendum. Hardly anyone could explain how it could work or recall why the original Community worked so well.
It was the French Presidency that came up with this neo-chauvinism at the European Council last year. Shame on the French! The French President looked so pleased with himself, the press might have thought he personally had discovered Charles de Gaulle’s tricolour underpants!
What a stroke of genius! In a democracy every Member State should have its own political Kommissar. Exclusively, a politician of course! No ordinary people are allowed. It seems incredibly neglectful of the Founding Fathers but some Commissioners (even though they were experienced democrats) have not even been politicians! In fact the Founding Fathers insisted that early Commissioners should not be active politicians at all! It just shows how lacking in brains the Founding Fathers were. For nearly 60 years, apparently none of them had thought of such a brilliant idea! And what’s more, some of them were French, like Schuman, Reuter, Monnet, Mayer, Hirsch. They had included former prime ministers, brilliant engineers, subtle communicators, great lawyers and diplomats etc. To believe the French Presidency none of them had the genius to consider having a politician from each State to be their Commissioner!
What a nonsense! What an irresponsible act of the European Institutions, especially the Council of Ministers, not to explain to their people and to the Irish how the Community SHOULD work. Why did the Council not provide an elementary history lesson of European integration? It would make clear why there should never be such thing as a ‘national Commissioner’. And if the Council thought that the Irish voted No for this reason, then they were wrong. They twigged that the Lisbon Treaty is unworkable rubbish made up of conflicting ideas with a long list of conflictual job descriptions for the Cartel’s boys and girls.
Let us start by dispensing with two myths.
Firstly, no treaty in all the history of European integration says that any State should even have a national representative in the Commission. Secondly, seeing that is the case, it follows that no treaty says that a State’s representative should be an ex-politician, disgraced politicians, retired politician, temporarily exported politician or any politician of any size, shape, colour, form, gender or age.
The treaties say the reverse. They say with a unanimous voice that entire Commission should be INDEPENDENT. They say the members of the Commission should take absolutely NO instructions from any government of which they may or may not be a national. Thus any Commissioner of French nationality should not take or solicit instructions from the French government. Can everyone even a politician understand that? Nor should the Commissioners ‘solicit instructions’ from any group, whether political party, commercial group, or any form of association. Is that clear? The members of the Commission should be INDEPENDENT. Each and every Commissioner should act in the general interests of the Community. Any ideological, political, sectoral, regional, commercial or professional or national interest is ruled out. The Commissioner should be be as pure and above suspicion as the cleanest judge in the fairest Court.
The treaties are so clear that it is a wonder that anyone could have the slightest doubt. It should be a source of amazement and wonder to behold the present European Commission. It is stuffed to the gunnels with national politicians!! A lot of them are active politicians! Further there are 27 of them — whose nationalities correspond exactly to the nationalities of the 27 Member States!
Who has the impudence to place national politicians as their members of the Commission? No one but Europe’s ‘democratic’ national leaders, apparently democratically elected, of 27 democratic governments! Many have university degrees in law and politics. These are the people who should be policing the treaties to see the articles are respected! Are any of them honest? It would take only ONE to say: ‘Hey wait a minute fellow prime ministers. What we are doing is WRONG. The treaties say that we should not be doing this! The treaties say — and good, democratic governance demands — that the number of Commissioners should be reduced to the absolute minimum. We only allowed 27 because of the great enlargement and the treaty says we must reduce them. You know all this dishonest flag-waving and political nepotism will brand us all as political scoundrels. We have more Commissioners than the Chinese have ministers!‘
I, and many European citizens, are still waiting for that honest man or woman to open his mouth.
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Danger! Avalanche of dollars! Or how you should love, not beggar your neighbour!
Tags: 1946, autarky, Barak, billion, Community, Connally, crisis, devaluation, dollar, EU, euro, European, Finances, Hitler, honest, Hussein, interdependence, John, manipulation, minister, monetary union, money, morality, Nixon, Obama, oil, public finance, reserves, rip-off, Robert, scam, Schuman, sound, speculation, Treasury, trillion, USA, weapon, Werner
Get ready for a new crisis — the transatlantic monetary avalanche. This will be the result of President Barak Hussein Obama’s policy of pouring some 4.5 Trillion dollars into the US system. The aim is to buy out toxic assets created by toxic financiers and decades of toxic government policy.
The problem is that it is likely to have major unintended consequences for Europe. It is not clear whether the US administration has fully considered the non-US consequences … or even cares.
That may sound harsh. But much of the origin of the crisis dates from this persistent Beggar my neighbour attitude. In fact the origin of the Euro derives from wishing to avoid being taken for a ride by careless and self-serving US administrations.
In 1971, USA took the dollar off the gold standard. This was the last of a series of events where major currencies had done the same thing. Forty years earlier Britain had taken Sterling off the gold standard. It put the pound on the dollar standard which was on the gold standard. Then in the 1960s the politicians tried an official bank gold price and a separate free market gold price. This didn’t work. So when Nixon realized that the Federal Reserve had been printing too much money, he simply took it off the standard that reminded him he was doing something naughty. A standard is unwanted if you have a bad conscience. Whether gold is the best standard is one question. Not having any standard at all but the judgement of bank officials and politicians is quite another one. The USA had become the virtual world Central Bank without any control of most of the people on the planet who used it.
Nixon’s decision meant that USA could print as much money as it wanted. But as the USA had the world reserve currency and gold became just a metal, there was no real restraint. The Europeans complained. With good reason: international trade demanded proper standards. The US was behaving like the grocer that kept his thumb on the scales or used false weights. The US was paying Europeans for their real goods and services; they were getting paper dollars of declining worth, they said. The Europeans worked hard to provide real goods and services: the Americans had the monopoly on the dollar printing press. They could use it at will.
The Americans’ answer? Nixon’s Treasury Secretary John Connally responded famously: ‘It is our currency, but your problem.’ In other words, you have found out we are tricking you, but we are the only people with a scale or money in town.
The peculiar thing about currencies is that they normally exist in two forms. Internal and external. Pounds Sterling are used in the United Kingdom. They are issued by the Bank of England. However some people used to hold a lot of pounds abroad, especially gold sovereigns. British ex-patriots may use them between themselves. Countries of the Commonwealth may also use pounds for trading because the local currency is so weak and deteriorates so much.
This works the other way as tourists may have experienced. If Europeans bring back a wallet of weak, tourist-country currency from abroad, it will shrink in value. It may even be devalued several times by the currency’s central bank without their knowing it.
If you are a native of the tourist country, you may not notice this. After a currency devaluation, a box of local biscuits still costs the same the day after devaluation. If you are living outside the country, you may say: ‘Ouch! I wish I had changed that into my own currency instead of bringing it with me.’ The devaluation has immediate effect as a loss of value.
The Nixon-Connally attitude tried to divorce morality from money supply. The attitude caught on fast. Generations of Americans worked out a number of ways to fiddle the books. This involved not only speculation on commodities like oil and stocks. Is there a simple indicator that shows that oil spikes are not due to a free market but manipulators and speculators? Well how do you explain that the prices of oil always went up on a Monday and came down a bit before the weekend, except of course on public holidays! Other scams like Enron involved fiddling the books. Some created specious mathematical models for plutocratic investments like Long-Term Capital Management. They nearly wrecked the economy. Politicians wanted to get more votes so they manipulated the mortgage market. They put place-men into mortgage firms to provide unrealistic, non-commercial (sub-prime) home-loans to the poorest people who were also voters. Junk bonds and derivatives became a new growth scam. Some of these paper loans became too obviously worthless. No problem! Wrap up a package of many practically worthless derivatives and give them AAA ratings. So four or five decades after Nixon/Connally these governmental attitudes, magnified by many others beggaring their unnamed neighbours have become a world crisis.
Conclusion: All the population, from poorest to the richest, have been trying to defraud each other. Worse, too often this is government policy.
The Europeans had their own very similar problems. A longer history in fact and often worse. France, Germany and Britain and the other countries had had the same toxic experience of ‘beggar my neighbour’ policies. But then the European Community fixed this with one central idea. We are all interdependent on each other. Beggar my neighbour policies have the effect of coming back and hitting you in the head. Schuman said in creating the Community his aim was to ‘detoxify‘ relations between European States and peoples. That is a moral stance. Thus in the 1970s they started seriously to envisage a common currency. The Werner plan for a common currency by 1980 was derailed by the two periods of the Arab oil weapon, each with the quadrupling of oil prices. Europe’s massive reserves were wiped out.
It was not until this millennium that the Euro saw the light of day. While not based totally on community principles, they put in place most of the rules that Schuman formulated when Minister of Finance from 1946 onwards. Schuman initiated the period of French recovery known as the thirty glorious years. Under the most adverse conditions, he balanced the budget (for the first time in a generation), reduced debt, arrested the inflationary spiral and put gold on the free market. Thus France had common indicators, standards, for everyone to see who was cheating. It was an old-fashioned idea called Honest Money. Trust, trade and prosperity can take place once people have confidence in the money. Later less scrupulous politicians rued the fact that their cheating, devaluations and inflation, became so publicly known.
Consider what is happening now. The USA has exported its paper dollars across the entire world to pay for its lack of savings and the selfish profligacy of the population in general. Of all the dollars emitted by the Federal Reserve only 30 per cent circulate in the US. Some 70 per cent of all dollars are export dollars. In other words, the rest of the world has a wallet full of tourist currency: There is no control for the wallet owner about its lasting value. Worse everyone knows it will drop like a pancake. The Federal Reserve has now declared that it will pump out paper dollars on a scale unknown in history.
In September 2008, the total number of dollars on the Fed’s books was just under 850 billion. But 70 per cent of this circulated abroad and only about 250 billion circulated inside the USA. President Obama will now increase the monetary mass by and enormous amount reaching 4500 billion dollars (4.5 trillion) by the autumn.
However, who wants these tourist dollars outside the USA? Major dollar reserve holders like Russia and India are already selling their dollar reserves, others are expected to have to do the same. Some Arab oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia are going into current account deficit. That would make it unlikely that they will become big dollar buyers later on.
So what will happen to the sudden Niagara flow of dollars unleashed on the world? Most will go to the USA domestic market. This will see a huge increase from the 250 billion to something between three and nearly four trillion. That is anything between a twelve and seventeen-fold increase in money supply. In this confetti economy this torrent of liquidity is supposed to wash out the toxic assets. Unfortunately the US authorities only have ordinary mops for the task of reducing the supply afterwards. The toxic assets, the product of speculation upon leveraged speculation, are hardly likely to be great treasures.
This tsunami of dollars mainly in the US will have major consequences for the European Community system. First it devalues the dollar of our principal trading partner. In the short term, we should remember the adage: Buyer beware! But also that we are in the same boat together during the tsunami. Do we need more liquid or another plan? Is America ready to learn the lesson that Europeans learned with the European Community that united sovereign democratic states? If the US will take note of European history at least we have a chance to solve this dilemma.
Schuman wrote: ‘For all the countries that fought the last war, the big problems that grip us today have an international character and now escape the economic and political control of even the most powerful countries.
‘Supply of raw materials, questions of manpower and unemployment, the agonizing problem of refugees, displaced persons and overpopulation, the modernisation of our industrial and agricultural equipment, international exchange and currency stability, cyclical problems of shortages and overproduction are just some examples. In all these areas nothing lasting or worthwhile can be done in isolation as when a State is reduced to its own resources. National self-sufficiency which allowed Hitler to prepare war is impracticable today.’
The question is: How? We are all guilty of trying to rip off or beggar our neighbour. Politicians need to look again at the ORIGINAL Community system. They should apply its founding principle of reconciliation and honesty in public affairs.
Commission Debate 4: Look who is giving away the Keys to the European Home and leaving the back door open to Burglar-Cartels!
Tags: acquisitions, Armstrong, bananas, bank, banking, barbed, bathroom, beer, Britain, chemicals, coal, Community, Competition, Creusot, economics, Europe, European, explosives, fittings, France, Germany, Hitler, IG Farben, iron, Krupp, Lisbon, mad, mergers, nickel, patents, Robert, Russia, Schneider, Schuman, science, shells, Stalin, steel, Stumm, Sweden, toxic, treaty, trusts, Union, USA, Verdun, Vickers, war, Wendel, wire, world, WW1, WW2
Ignorance of history brings repetition of errors, sorrows and subjugation. For lack of vision the people perish. Weary of war, worn out by forced labour under Hitler and Stalin, with populations exterminated by so-called ‘science’ gone mad and toxic ‘modern economics’, surviving Europeans after World War Two wanted a sane and just solution. They wanted a real democracy. Relying on eternal principles of justice, honesty and esteeming one’s neighbour, Robert Schuman proposed building a fortress against war and evil, a palace of peace for prosperity. He provided an outline plan for real democracy.
Today’s politicians want to reform the system. How? By opening up the back-door of the fort to rapacious foes. Either by ignorance or lust for power, the political class think they will make friends by writing on the walls of the palace (that does not belong to them alone): “Welcome burglars!” or “Come in all you gangsters!”. Do they think evil does not exist? They want to overturn the Community system that can reform the mad economics we are still suffering from! They are offering to supply the keys to the treasury and all the rooms to our worst enemies! Instead they should be dealing with their obligations and democratic duties in the treaties. The haven’t dealt with some for more than FIFTY years now!
Why did Europe create the Community structure? What was the problem it solved? How was it solved?
The political parties show no inclination to answer these questions. The fact that the founding fathers insisted on creating the European Commission — a body unknown in other governance systems — is one clue. The second is the founders’ insistence that it must be independent of all private interests, including, even especially, the political parties. The European Community was designed to make war impossible. The solution in simple terms was that a Commission must exist and be INDEPENDENT.
What was the war/ economic/ moral problem that happened around the time of the Schuman Proposal in 1950 to make it necessary?
Before WW1 industrialists in cartels made a laughing stock of governments. The iron and steel barons in different countries created an armaments cartel. These so-called patriotic firms worked together to fool governments. One firm created an armour-piercing shell, another in collusion developed an armoured steel to defend it. A third (or the first) created a shell that would penetrate the new armour and so on. The first firm persuaded one country to upgrade its armies and navy with new weapons. Then it declared that it needed a new defensive steel to defend it. And so on. This cartel of arms manufacturers led to the arms race. Who were these rascals who milked French, British, German and other peoples of their taxes to build up armies?
They were the great patriotic names of national industries, Schneider du Creusot of France, Armstrong, Vickers of Britain, Krupp, Stumm of Germany, Terni in Italy and major firms in USA and Russia. They colluded to dupe governments in the armaments ring. Not only did they create armies; they fomented wars between their client states abroad. Selling arms to two potential foes seemed good business. The second usually buys more than the first! Who was evil? The foes or the merchant? Then came the consequences, like giving fireworks to unsupervised, untrained children.
The result? British were massacred by British weapons in Turkey. Austrians were killed by Austrian bullets fired by Russians. Krupp supplied munitions to 52 countries who used them against Germans and their allies. During the war German barbed-wire defended the French from German soldiers at Verdun. British nickel for German shells was supplied via Sweden directly or exported as Swedish arms for Germany. After the war, UK’s Armstrong Vickers paid Krupp for the use of Krupp patents in all the shells that they manufactured. The victims of the shells were not considered in this deal.
In the period between the first and second World Wars, cartels were controlling the European economy in many other areas, including chemicals, patents and petroleum. These had a stranglehold as the most vital products in the world for industrialized countries.
Such mindless ideologies, incorporating the technological search for greater destruction and the correspondingly toxic economics, were no advantage of the European people either as workers, consumers of the goods or even the industries, which were destroyed by bombs of steel and coal-based chemical explosives. It brought blood, toil, sweat and tears. The cartels were at the origin of worldwide calamities, modern slavery and extermination programmes. Cartels — that is ‘respectable’ businessmen, entrepreneurs and industrialists — leased slave workers from Hitler’s SS and their comfortable, white-shirted accountants estimated they would die after nine months’ starvation work. The SS got a few marks a day for each. The European slaves got nothing but death.
Cartels in general lead to a rip-off, sometimes even blackmail, of the consumers, exploitation of workers and huge uncertainties for industrialists who were also cheated by each other and by other cartels.
In 1951, things changed for the better. The European treaty of the Schuman Plan created the world’s first international anti-cartel agency. That was at first confined to coal and steel. Coal was not only the major source of energy but also the feedstock for the chemicals industry. Iron and steel output statistics set the measure for an industrialized nation.
These anti-cartel and anti-trust powers were gradually extended to some but not all aspects of Europe’s single market. Those years marked the most prosperous in Europe’s history. That was accomplished because the Commission as the anti-cartel buster remained INDEPENDENT of the interest groups (whether industries, unions or consumers). It repulsed control from any interest including political parties and national governments.
Today, while petroleum, patents and chemicals still define western societies, the information economy predominates. Cartel problems remain. Cartels on these and everything from beer, bananas to bathroom fittings cheat the customer.
So what are political parties doing about assuring the independence of Europe’s anti-cartel agency? They are doing EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE of what they should be doing. They are opening up the post of anti-cartel referee of the Single Market to the highest bidder! They are thus selling cheaply Europeans’ liberty.
This is not just selling the office of a free-market judge, it is far more lethal. The Lisbon Treaty proposals about the Commission become of existential importance when one turns to the Commission’s rôle as Europe’s anti-cartel agency. Robert Schuman’s original innovation — that the Commission should be totally independent of party politics — was essential to correct pre-World War abuses. Why? Because the same powerful coal and steel cartels involving Krupp, Schneider, IG Farben, Thyssen ‘bought’ political parties, banks and newspapers. The massive inter-penetration of shareholdings, banking, acquisitions and mergers, made it difficult for citizens and governments to know how they were being taken for a ride and by whom. It still does. That’s why it was clear to Schuman after WW1 that a new system of democracy was urgently needed. This would give greater powers to civil society.
Such interests subsidized political parties directly or covertly. With multiple industrial, financial and economic instruments, they were able to control policies in line with their essential interests. The steel-making de Wendel family or Schneider, owned major publications and was customarily represented in Parliament, in multiple companies and at the Bank of France as one of the ‘Regents’. What qualifies a rich steel magnate more than a poor but honest economist to run the money supply?
In Germany where they had some of Europe’s best resources it was much worse. Trade took the form of forced barter, little different from blackmail. The steel and armaments industry was not only seen as representing national interest; it was also the means to control the entire European economy.
A worldwide empire of cartels under IG Farben with some 400 German cartel firms and 500 foreign firms under its control, became the world’s most powerful chemical and energy trust. Patents and restrictive trade agreements became the instruments for global dominance. Then the cartels came up against a political gangster named Adolf Hitler. It is still not clear who won.
Fritz Thyssen’s book is entitled: ‘I paid Hitler’. The armaments, steel and coal barons believed they could control any political party, including the Nazis. The international cartels led an independent life, made their own judgements, often totally devoid of morality. Even at the height of WW2, they had powers to seriously hamper war production in the USA and elsewhere. They built their own privatized concentration camps. IG Farben constructed one at Auschwitz. Many other firms asked the SS to lease them slave labour; it was rarely forced on them. Cartels did survive after Hitler committed suicide and millions died. At the end of WW2, some of these industrialists (who ended up with trivial periods of imprisonment) said they wanted to fight another war within a couple of decades!
Cartels do not serve customers they exploit them to death. Given a chance they employed the vilest slavery. The public, their customers, suffered not only price hikes from cartels, but the ravages of two world wars. The weak link in combating cartels was and remains the political parties. It is a crazy idea to subordinate the Commission, the anti-cartel agency, to political parties. Given Europe’s history it is criminal.
THE LESSON OF HISTORY IS THAT ‘INFLUENCING’ POLITICAL PARTIES IS EASY-PEASY FOR ANYONE WITH MONEY OR CORRUPT POWER. That seems to be a universal law from England’s seventeenth century to this day. Any political party will tell you about how powerful interest groups corrupt political parties, but usually only about its opponents or in a neighbouring country!
Thus the selfish and ignorant reforms now before us are undermining the very Community on which we depend for safety, peace and prosperity.
How will Europe, its entire economy and all Europeans be exposed to dangerous threats under the proposed Lisbon Treaty? The two or three political parties who can control the Commission will be so tempting a target to any powerful or moneyed group, they will become practically an open INVITATION to CORRUPTION. In fact any cartel from lamps to lifts will make an effort to manipulate them. And yet citizens may not even be aware that they (and the Commission therefore) have been taken over by alien interests.
Under Schuman’s original system this would be practically impossible, because the Commission and other bodies would come under too much democratic scrutiny and legal action!
You can read the details in my letters to
- all Members of the European Commission,
- all Member States representations,
- the President of the European Parliament and members of the Constitutional Committee,
- the Presidents of the Economic and Social Committee and the
- Committee of Regions.
An answer to what is probably Europe’s most serious problem is URGENTLY required. This is a FATAL FLAW in the treaty. It is due to ignoring the principle of SEPARATION OF POWERS in the five democratic institutions of the European Community.
I am still waiting for a reply to the letters! (All the presidents and other addressees are of course members of political parties.)
Today the problem is not just for one industrial group to dominate a part of the Continent of Europe. What is at risk is that an internal or external group will seek to undermine the Commission, the world’s first international anti-cartel agency. Controlling the Commission, even covertly, is tantamount, to controlling the largest commercial entity in the world! This fatal flaw will expose us all to dangerous external attack, as lethal as a military defeat.
Today, Europe is vulnerable to major foreign energy entities (oil and gas) with multiple billions, even trillions of dollars at their disposal. Some, like sovereign state funds, are particularly dangerous because a handful of people control them with little supervision. Many multinationals also seem to be a law to themselves. Then there are many private, leveraged operations, bringing together clandestine financial operators in the secrecy of their internet webs.
In the past it was the Ruhr coal barons who controlled prices for the special coking coal used in steel-making, and hence had a throttle-grip on the entire economy. Do Europeans wish to sell their heritage, lives and interests to Russian gas interests or Arab oil? But the threat does not only come from the traditional sectors of energy. Other specialized cartels too would like to illegally exploit Europe’s wealth — see www.schuman.info/Warning.htm .
Take the example of the information economy. One US multinational was recently fined 900 million Euros. It had not only created a software cartel but had refused to obey both the Commission’s anti-cartel decisions and the European Court judgement, which confirmed the Commission judgement telling it to stop this illegal practice.
If you were the boss of such a multinational and even less scrupulous than Microsoft, would you prefer to pay fines totaling multiple billions or spend just a few millions ‘fixing’ the election of the European Commission president and hence controlling the policy of a world economic super-power? Europe’s first treaty made clear that the Commission President has to be of such sterling character of honesty, independence and impartiality that he would not buckle under pressure. The office must be proofed against corruption engineered by any powerful ‘public relations’ campaign. That is precisely why the office must be held by the most honest and independent, experienced person available among all European citizens.
We are faced with much more intense globalization now than last century. Under present treaties, anyone of proven honesty and solid character among Europe’s 500 million people could in law be chosen as Commission president. It is still possible. Honest lawyers, businesspeople, engineers, professors, NGO leaders could apply. The Commission must be stronger to oppose new global hegemonies.
Tomorrow with the proposed reform of the Lisbon Treaty, discredited political cartels will pick the president. They will short-list the public’s choice to two or three individuals. These compliant candidates are selected via opaque political machines, vulnerable to ‘deals’ political, ideological, financial or otherwise. That is, if the Lisbon Treaty is ratified by all 27 States.
NOW YOU KNOW A LITTLE MORE ABOUT HOW THE COMMUNITY BROKE CARTELS AND COMBATED EVIL, WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO TO STOP THIS IGNORANT FOLLY? THE BLOOD OF EUROPE’S DEAD CRIES OUT FOR YOUR ANSWER!
In the next debates we will deal with proposals about electing the Commission, not in secret but as one should expect in democratic states, worthy of the name.
Commission Debate 3: The global DANGERS that Europeans face from self-centered, ignorant party machines
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The greed and covetousness of the political party machines will put all Europeans citizens at risk. The new political elites want to undermine the Community system of supranational democracy. By attempting a selfish power-grab, this narrow-minded minority of Europeans is threatening the European economy — and much besides. More than ever, Europeans need a real Community approach to global problems.
One clear example is the financial crisis. This cannot be solved by a top-down approach, as it might in the nineteenth century. Hoping that massive infusions of money will wash out toxic assets from a corrupt system is futile when the system itself is morbidly unhealthy. Another case is the Energy/ Climate Change crisis. This too requires the full mobilization of all citizens. The science may be right and verified but human greed remains a factor than planning won’t eradicate by fiat. No party political programme has resources, the independence or brain-power to solve the extreme complexity of these problems. Human ingenuity will selfishly unravel even a plan for planetary survival. Illegitimate party political control of European institutions is likely to make many matters worse with unforeseen consequences, corruption and low-level compromises. This approach is inadequate for the twenty-first century’s infinitely complex society.
Party political hierarchies encourage hasty, ‘efficient’ decisions, usually leading to unanticipated disasters. Only a Union based on an intense, open debate and the firm agreement at the levels of individuals, all associative organizations of civil society and national governments has any hope of dealing with such all-pervasive dangers. It needs to be based on fair, European rule of law. Europe’s now dozing institutions need to wake up. be active and analytical, and assume their legal role in the original treaties.
The cracks in the replacement system, the top-down approach, are now under increasing strain. Their incapacities are becoming daily more apparent. The ever-more frequent European Council Summits with vaporous results are an obvious danger signal to the public. The leaders cannot solve the problems by international or even inter-governmental measures alone.
To solve European and global problems, Europe needs more democracy, not less. The disdain of the party machines and their ignorance of the original principles of Community democracy of the 1950 treaties will leave all 500 million Europeans in grave danger of economic and political subjugation. This is even more dangerous now in a globalized world with ruthless international entities eager to control from without or devour the Community from within.
The Founding Fathers designed European Communities in the 1950s to avoid wars among member states. www.schuman.info/ceca.htm But they also saw the grave danger that their economies could be taken over piecemeal by powerful foreign entities. In war they had seen the depths of raw, evil, human nature. www.schuman.info/Strasbourg549.htm For this they designed powerfully democratic institutions.
Self-assured politicians have over recent years selfishly tried to whittle away the independent pillars of dormant European democracy. They seem to think they are smarter than these great democrats who founded the most prosperous, peaceful Community and re-established vibrant democracies in all the founding Member States. Modern politicians seem to be little aware of the dangers the founding fathers faced and courageously tackled. These dangers included those identified as the root cause of two world wars.
The so-called reformers are ignorant of the European system, the Community. This Community is Plan Z, Europe’s last chance. It stands out like white against black to all the other national or European plans for peace over two thousand years. All the rest brought war and destruction.
How do I know the party machines are ignorant? Am I being too hard? Well I have never seen one ‘reformer’ politician properly explain what exactly is a supranational democracy. Who most recently told the public how the original Community is supposed to work? No wonder! Ministers are often quoted as saying they do not understand it. Which so-called reformer explained how their proposals will improve its dynamic structure by bringing more democracy to its five institutions? Has any politician of recent date initiated a system that makes war impossible elsewhere in the world?
Let’s ask them an easier question. If they reluctantly concede the facts that the Schuman Plan brought Europe an extraordinary peace and prosperity, why haven’t they described, scientifically and academically, how such a model works and could do the same throughout the world? Even the Commission does not explain how the system was originally designed to work. It would embarrass the present political Commissioners!
A further proof of this ignorance is the practical record. When it comes to the democratic ground rules in the European treaties, the very basis that they now want to change, they have shown no inclination or desire to respect them. Why? Because it will set them on a path for an ever-widening democracy, in Europe and at home!
We have seen in the previous Debates that (1) for more than fifty years governments have been refusing fair elections under the single statute specified in the treaties; (2) these unfair election results distort power structures; (3) the proposed Lisbon Treaty would legitimize an irreversible power-grab by party machines of the Commission; (4) the proposed treaty worsens these distortions and encourages corruption by ruling party machines because NO CORRUPT Commission President will EVER be sacked by the Parliament; (5) a morally fused Commission and Parliament will encourage corruption, try to marginalize legitimate opposition, while encouraging extreme groups with monetary hand-outs.
This was de Gaulle’s system: ignore the European Parliament, subsidize important voting groups in France with European taxpayers’ money to encourage uncritical compliance. It ended in the riots and revolution of 1968. Germany was forced to pay as his price for political rehabilitation. Supported by corrupt Italian and other governments for decades, the agricultural budget with its massive subsidies to voters remained as secret as the nuclear programme. Why? Because the CAP and much of the money flowing ceaselessly to Italy’s south for ‘structural reform’ was corrupt. When these people ‘chloroformed’ the institutions in the 1960s and 70s, the Mafia got fat. The poor stayed poor.
One would have hoped the public had learned a lesson: ‘Chloroform’ the European Community democratic institutions at your peril. You will end up breeding secret committees, secret money networks, and a level of political corruption that is still with us today.
In their wisdom and understanding of human nature, the Founding Fathers of the European Communities created five independent institutions that would assure, justice and democracy in Europe. www.schuman.info/supra5.htm It would make war impossible. They succeeded in spite of the corrupt politicians. In their system all States were equal and none was able to use power politics of the strong to dominate the weak.
Politicians who replaced the Statesmen over the last half-century have endlessly tried to subvert those institutions for their own selfish purposes. The present threat is the attack on the independence of the European Commission, the central institution of the supranational Community system. De Gaulle failed to put the Commission under French national control as a secretariat. The other States had a few statesmen with the sense to insist that the Commission must remain independent. France had its European resistance figures against a return to power politics too.
The present threat comes from a more diverse source, party political machines. They want the Commission as a secretariat in their own sullied hands. They learned the lesson from De Gaulle who had only the powers of one centralized Gaullist State. He could not succeed against the solidarity of the other smaller democratic States. Perhaps, say the party bureaucrats, a multi-pronged attack by all political parties together will succeed, where he failed.
By one perspective they are smaller than the Grand Charles and the French Fifth Republic — they represent only two percent of the population who have party cards. But on the other that two percent includes party members who control the government machines and have enormous influence in society. They promise a plethora of new jobs for the party boys and girls, career prospects, to water the appetite of the more flexible and less-than-scrupulous party followers.
The crux of their proposal is that the European Commission should give up its last pretence of independence. It should be fused to party machines. For what purpose? The ‘reform’ will remove any restraint on budget control.
Who designed this open invitation to corruption? The political drafters of the proposed Constitutional Treaty and Lisbon Treaty foolishly wanted to stitch in the yah-boo, confrontational politics like they have in the trough at home. That’s a 17th Century distortion of democracy. The Community system is a 21st Century super democracy. For Europe it would be like trying to stitch a pig’s head on a human body. Such ideological shouting matches were NOT part of the revolutionary Community system. Instead the original concept requires that the Commission should be an honest broker. The Community works on the basis of pragmatism, tried and tested steps to acquiring wisdom.
But the politicians had invented a clever ruse so beneficial to themselves that even when the Constitutional Treaty was roundly defeated in referendums, they insisted on the same thing in the Reform/Lisbon Treaty. This time they said: No referendums, wherever party machines can stop them. Only one court said NO.
How did the parties explain this power-grab to the public? They said that they wanted the EP elections to attract more public attention. Party politics would make the issues more controversial, they said. They wanted to reverse their decline with public trust. Fewer and fewer Europeans wanted to vote.
So much for high principles! But why don’t people vote? They are disillusioned by tales that politicians are corrupt. One recent scandal alleges a score of multinationals ran an expenses-paid ‘lobby office’ inside the European Parliament. Another, about MEPs’ assistants, involves millions of Euros. MEPs are refusing to publish other, apparently more explosive, auditors’ reports. If the Parliament won’t come clean on rumours involving millions, why should voters trust the ‘usual suspects’ to elect a political pal as Commission President dealing with billions? Their pal would be in cahoots with the political machines. Impartiality and budget control would go out the window.
These billions are taxpayers’ money that will be lavished at home and abroad to fulfill the myopic, ideological goals of a party machine that has taken power in parliament and has thus gained and even more valuable prize — the Commission.
Why do I call the politicians myopic? Firstly the potential instruments of democratic solidarity to solve such problems lie in the letter and spirit of the original treaties. The political class has not only ignored and bad-mouthed these principles.They offered no viable alternatives. They want the alternating competition of the trough.This is barren, even destructive. It is Plan A. There is little chance of having a lasting, honest solution either to the financial crisis or the coming environmental catastrophes by means of the Constitutional Treaty or the Lisbon Treaty.
The instruments in these treaty ‘reforms’, the product of best brains of party machines, are totally inadequate for the gravity of today’s problems! Governments have already returned to secret talks behind the walls of the Council building in the vain hope that inter-governmental agreement will be forged with the democratic control shut out. Vain hope! Our disaster!
The public is being taken for a ride, like an emergency patient being taken to hospital. You are diagnosed with serious brain and heart damage (Commission) and renal failure (Parliament). Arms and legs are broken (organs of Civil Society). What’s more you are blind and need a delicate eye operation (the secretive Council meeting behind closed doors). Arriving at the operation room, you are told that the surgeon is to be … your family butcher. He knows all about body parts, at least in a dead pig. He also knows how to make a soup of the meat (fusing legally independent organs together). But does he know how a human body works and what is needed when it is seriously sick?
Unless the politicians can provide a proper diagnosis and show adequate training, the warning is to keep far away. You are better off without the butcher, unless you want to be part of someone else’s soup!
The next debate will deal more about specific acute global problems that would follow from the party political power-grab of Europe’s democratic institutions.
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