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A historic day: I agree with the French

15 comments on A historic day: I agree with the French

A historic day: I agree with the French

: The French resoundingly defeated the European Union constitution. I didn’t much like it when it came out. Says the International Herald-Tribune:

With nearly 83 percent of the votes counted, the French Interior Ministry said the no camp had 57.26 percent, compared with 42.74 for the yes….

Turnout was estimated at more than 70 percent, far exceeding other recent elections in France. The final figure was expected to surpass turnout in the referendum on the Maastricht Treaty 13 years ago that paved the way to the euro.

“It’s a big no,” said Bruno Jeanbart, director of political research at the CSA polling station. “It’s a twin protest vote against the government and against Europe.”

It’s about trying to turn Europe in to a faux nation. It’s about protectionism. It’s about Europe thinking it is a world player when it is no longer. And it’s about a bad constitution that made up for in bureaucracy what it lacked in vision.

15 responses to “A historic day: I agree with the French”

  1. ted Avatar
    ted

    Excellent George Will article on the topic
    Europe At the Precipice

  2. Gary Johnston Avatar
    Gary Johnston

    “It’s about Europe thinking it is a world player when it is no longer.”
    Gee, someone should have told that to Jack Welch after the EU killed his Honeywell deal.
    (Seriously, though – I think this is only a minor setback for the EU, which tends to rewrite these referenda again and again and again until they pass. But if it puts a stop on the “EU Juggernaut Will Destroy Us All” books for a year or so, that’d be nice.)

  3. Josh Avatar
    Josh

    I feel bad for Europe actually, they needed the EU to make themselves half as important as America. Now their tender egos will be further deflated.
    No I don’t care very much.

  4. Jack Avatar
    Jack

    Just how many times have you been to France recently, Jeff? – I don’t think you know what you are talking about, except that your last name is French (Gervais).
    Money talks, which is why the Euro is stronger than the Dollar.
    The outcome of this referendum is that Europe will be more dominated by ‘old Europe’ and Turkey will not get in, something that I thought you didn’t want – or is this just schadenfreude on your behalf that things are a mess?
    The EU is about trying to create a multicultural federation, to end the possibility of the tragic conflict of the last century.
    For the EU, this is a crisis point rather like it was a crisis point when the south tried to secede from the union in the US, thinking that it was a faux nation. Would you have sided with the confederates and called interstate trade protectionism?
    I suspect you are just anti-Europe for emotional rather than rational reasons.

  5. JimmmyThe'C' Avatar
    JimmmyThe’C’

    Gary: you sound like Valery Giscard d’Estaing. He’s going to try and try again. It just won’t work. The French People have spoken with their vote. 300 pages, T. Jefferson must be spinning in his grave over this one Constitution.
    Josh: Europe is not going to fall apart. It’s that the government of the various countries didn’t want to listen to the PEOPLE! Now the elected members ‘must’ listen to the people. The egos of the citizens won’t be deflated, the egos of the governments will be.
    Jack: The Dutch ran the Gilder against the Euro and lost. The Euro is down in Europe. Only against the Dollar is it higher; thats because the Asians keep buying them and that in turn keeps proping it up to inflated heights – the fall is coming. The EU is not at a crisis point its more like a crossroad; they must listen to the citizens which they didn’t.

  6. Jersey Exile Avatar
    Jersey Exile

    Jeff,
    I have no choice but to dub you a “Euro-Eeyore”.
    Why are Iraq’s nation-building ups and downs growing pains, but a united Europe’s inevitable missteps fatal flaws in your book (and why is it so important to you that Iraq succeed at the great democratic experiment and the Europeans fail?)?
    You may recall that our own country went through a trial-and-error period–in many ways the Articles of Confederation were as laughably bad as the EU Constitution is in its current form.
    Weren’t we trying to turn the United States into a faux nation? Weren’t we all about protectionism at the time? Weren’t we still thinking we had the status of a colonial empire behind us when in fact we had just severed our ties with the motherland?
    Make no mistake–a united Europe *will* happen, and it will be a real global force in both the political and economic arenas, despite what you and the other Euro-Eeyores have to say about it. Would that Iraq had a similarly bright future to look forward to…

  7. HA Avatar
    HA

    Jack,
    Europe is in a state of economic stagnation and demographic collapse due to its failed “social model” which is nothing more than recycled Marxism. The EU as envisioned is like the USSR without gulags and armies. An improvement, I’ll admit, but still a disaster waiting to happen.
    It used to be said that Turkey was the sick man of Europe. Well today, Europe is the sick man of Europe. And France is the tumor from which the Marxist disease metastasized. With 10% unemployment, no-growth economic policies, and with alienated, un-assimilated and violent Arab/Muslim colonies ringing their cities, the future of France is bleak. Balkanization comes to mind. They deserve what they have coming too.
    Lefties love to craft a utopian narrative for the EUSSR. Yeah, right. And Cuba has great health care too.

  8. Esme Vos Avatar
    Esme Vos

    The EU Constitution has 320+ pages. They expected people to wade through this thick document filled with legalese and a few nice sounding phrases that mean absolutely nothing. I’m a lawyer and I found it very taxing to go through the entire thing. Having a glass of excellent Bordeaux did not help at all. Worst of all is the question that people here in the Netherlands will have to answer tomorrow – do you like it? Yes or no? What kind of question is that? Do I like what? Which part? There’s 320 pages for heavens sake and numerous clauses, some of which I agree with and others I don’t. Why doesn’t the EU ask me and my fellow voters what we REALLY want?
    The referendum is a complete waste of time and a total insult to my intelligence and the intelligence of everyone else who is being asked to vote tomorrow. The leaders of this country and those in charge in the EU have shown nothing, absolutely nothing but contempt for us. No, we’re too stupid. Yes or no is good enough for us.
    Here’s what they were counting on. They were counting on us voting YES, like a bunch of zombies, so that they could then go on and do whatever they wanted to do (example, awarding themselves and their political party cronies even higher salaries and nicer perks). And if we complain, they’ll say, “oh but you voted yes in a democratic referendum.” Bah!

  9. HA Avatar
    HA

    HA – sounds like you are brainwashed. Gulags and armies? Because of zenophobes like you those are words associated with the US now, you ‘are hurting America’.Anyways:
    “Europe is in a state of economic stagnation and demographic collapse due to its failed “social model”
    Who is the largest exporter in the world, HA? Is Is it the US?, China? or Europe? – Actually, HA, Germany alone is the world’s largest exporter in this stagnant economy.
    And for this failed social model, lets pick France your ‘bete noir’ (that’s French for scares rednecks, HA). France has a higher life expectancy, education level and lower crime rate or ethnic split in crime rate than the US.
    See http://www.nationmaster.com
    So what does one choose: health, wealth and happiness or ignorant bliss like HA, who is terrified of a society like Sweden.

  10. HA Avatar
    HA

    Jack (assuming that is you),
    I’m terrified of the US adopting EUSSR style social and economic policies (as the Democrats want) and becoming as dirt poor as shitty little doomed countries like France. From Nationmaster:
    US GDP/Person: $35991.96
    France GDP/Person: $25888.77
    And every year, the gap widens as the US economy continues to grow at a healthy pace, and the French economy continues to stagnate.
    Even the damn Irish are richer than France.

  11. Rich Avatar
    Rich

    I don’t understand your disdain for Europe. And I’m even more surprised by the vehemence of some of the posts. “Dirt poor as shitty little doomed countries like France”? Where do the angry undertones of this kind of sweeping, simplistic analysis come from? For every statistic proving American greatness, I could find one showing French superiority. All depends on how you measure greatness: GDP/person or percentage of people with health insurance. Unemployment rate or quality of freeways. House prices or cellphone coverage. Obesity or nuclear power.
    Europe isn’t America. And no single European country is 100% European. The inherent ambiguity of Europe sure seems to bother Americans who like their world to be black and white, cut and dried.
    Europe isn’t a global player in the same way the US is, but that’s because Europe is still at the concept stage. It’s not a nation yet. The US, however, has been a full-fledged nation for a couple centuries now. The irony is that Americans (and many Europeans) percieve Europe as “old” and America as “new”, while in fact, the opposite is true. The countries of Europe may be old, but the EU is a mere baby.

  12. HA Avatar
    HA

    Rich,
    I don’t understand your disdain for Europe.
    Have you read the history of the 20th Century?
    America bailed out France in WWI. We liberated Western Europe in WWII. We reconstructed Europe with the Marshall Plan. We conducted the Berlin Airlift. We won the Cold War in spite of the appeasement of the European elite. We supported German reunification. We ended the Balkan conflicts that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia. Europe is free, peaceful and prosperous for one reason, and one reason alone – the expenditure of American blood and treasure over the better part of a century.
    And when America could use some support against the Saddam regime in a post 9/11 world, the two greatest beneficiaries of American blood and treasure – France and Germany – instead support Saddam. And when we depose Saddam and could use their support during reconstruction, they tell us to go to hell.
    France in particular is a nation of backstabbing whores. France is not an ally. France is an enemy nation that uses proxies like Saddam, Iran, China and Arab terrorists in their long-term effort to weaken America. Disdain doesn’t begin to express the loathing I have for France. Hatred is more like it. The grass hadn’t even grown on American graves after WWII before France began plotting how to undermine American interests.
    Every disasterious political ideology since Marx has come from Europe. Marxism and its mutations of National Soc-ialism and Communism ended in ruin. Now Europe wants to build Transnational Soc-ialism and impose it on the US through international institutions like the UN, the ICC and Kyoto. This will end badly too in an accelerating negative spiral of Balkanization and relative – if not absolute – economic and demographic decline. America must not join them in their folly.
    Europe is always wrong, and America is always right. It is remarkable how the stereotype among leftists of the suave, sophisticated and nuanced European manifested itself in spite of a century’s worth of evidence of overwhelming, monumental European stupidity. It is incomprehensible how such profound stupidity can co-exist with such supreme arrogance.
    Note – I had to put the dash in soc-ialism because Jeff’s filter doesn’t like the world c-i-a-l-i-s. Good grief.

  13. Rich Avatar
    Rich

    Then you should be happy they voted no. With a little luck, Europe will crumble, and they’ll all starting fighting again. Then America’s righteous leaders could spew out the reasons you cited above for not doing anything until they all killed themselves (except maybe the Brits). Then the US could come in and take over the whole continent. End of Europe as a problem. Death to backstabbing whores and destruction of the birthplace of all the world’s ills. The scariest thing is that you’re probably reading this while nodding your head in approval.

  14. Tim Avatar
    Tim

    Rich, you’re on to something there. We could instill a new Marshal Plan called The WalMart Plan.
    Just go in and pave the whole country. Just cover up all the history and intellectual thought…some of which actually gave rise to our great country. Send the Arabs back to Arabland. Build a big fence on the shores of the Med Sea. Privatize the health care system. De-regulate the nuclear power industry.
    Then we can make all the surviving Euro’s wear hair shirts and flagelate in thanks for freeing them from their own stupidity three times in the last 100 years.

  15. HA Avatar
    HA

    Rich,
    Whatever. I’ll just point out that your comment contains no rebuttal.