"I don't know enough about the people in your political parties to know if they are like the nazis or not. Consider this though. If you want to hold on to your political power and fear someone from the "right" why not go ahead and label them a nazi? If it's true or not. That's the same tactic the NAACP used on Bush. "
It is a classic logical fallacy that just because some people share some property ( like eating grass) that dont make them the same (horse and cow are two different species, both eating grass). It is quite a thing to accuse people of being nazis just because they are "rightwing" or the like.
I don't know the politics of mr. Bush in detail, as I am not from the US. I mostly disagree with his international dispositions though. But naming him a nazi is perhaps a bit too much, eh?
But I do know that Jörg Haider among other dishonorable deeds has spoken at meetings for old nazi soldiers in Austria, calling their participation in WW2 great and so on..
and:
"So, xenophobia has less to do with contact, and more to do with ignorance, fright and manipulations by politicians. After all, if you can appeal to a person's racist fears, you may be able to jack a vote out of them."
I agree. Personally I hope and try to live up to the ideal of an "intellectual", in the sense of being able to take my decisions and vote according to my own consciousness rather than what I am being told as "facts" by others, especially political parties. I hate the idea of political parties with thousands of people agreeing to political programs, with limited space for free thoughts - which goes for parties across the political spectrum, right to left, liberal to conservative, etc...
I agree. Personally I hope and try to live up to the ideal of an "intellectual", in the sense of being able to take my decisions and vote according to my own consciousness rather than what I am being told as "facts" by others, especially political parties. I hate the idea of political parties with thousands of people agreeing to political programs, with limited space for free thoughts - which goes for parties across the political spectrum, right to left, liberal to conservative, etc...</strong><hr></blockquote>
I share your opinion, but you must be aware that if you are alone, there is very little chances to diffuse your idears. I am not a member of any political parties, but i think that there in it a space for free thoughts. Some of these free thoughts if they are appreciates by many others members of the party have a chance to be taken in account. Your personal feeling have very little chance to be taken in account : it is certainly the prize of freedoom.
[quote]French heroes include the guy who bombed McDonald's restaurants and a convicted cop killer (Mumia Abu Jamal).
I'm not attempting to bash France (I have respect for the nation, and I am enjoying powerdoc's perspective), but I think the claims that the United States is racist and morally wrong are just hypocritical when they come from Europe. <hr></blockquote>
Jose Bove did not bomb any McDonald, he damaged one with potatoes in demonstration for anti-globalisation. He's a very smart man, with good ideas.
As for France being xenphobe etc., well you can state just how many statistics as you want, the fact is that I'm a french national because I was born here, but I'm absolutely not white, and in 20 years of living here, I've not suffered from xenophobia or racism. That's my story, and I have no incentive whatsoever to lie about it.
What some people don't understand is that you can't base your understanding of world facts on what you've seen in the media... Passive information has nothing to do with real information. You have to go throough the trouble of educationg yourself, learning about the other countries' traditions, cultures, meeting nationals face to face and not just on message boards etc. I've been lucky enough to be brought up in a very multi-cultural family, I have close parents throughout the world, and have experienced a great many different cultures, the American culture being amongst them.
Some people here also don't seem to understand the EU's foundation is not modelled after that of the US. The various countries will keep their independance, their national indentity etc. The union is more economic than anything else. I doubt there will some day be a "EU president", giving so much power to a single man is not a good idea IMHO.
As for ScottH's remarks regarding the EU countries not knowing what to do anything else than fighting each other... well...
The original question in this thread was - as I understood it - if there was greater benefits than "red tape" bureaucracy in the EU.
I think this question is very difficult to answer, being that there are so many aspects of being in a union like this. For example: there is no doubt that the EU as a whole speaks with a stronger voice than before in international matters after the last few EU treaties were settled, transferring power to the EU bureaucracy. This is potentially a huge benefit for a small country like my own as long as there is one vote per country in the deciding fora. Then again, many people here in Denmark like to vote against stronger union ties and more EU centralisation, instead wanting to keep national sovereignty, because paradoxically 1/12 vote in EU is perceived worse than 1/1 in Denmark..
You're very right about the original theme of my first post, Token.
I'm wondering though what Denmark (and other nations) would think of votes weighted by population. Obviously, this may be way too soon to introduce.
This sort of arguement was HUGE during the writing of the United States' second constitution. Ever state did see itself as a sovereign nation. The comprimise of this conflict was two realitivly equal houses of Congress: one where representation was based on population (The House of Representatives) and another just a straight vote (The Senate). Another result of this however, was a weak federal government, realitivly speaking. A side effect that many wanted, but also one that many did not. Still this history ultimatly lead to the much more federalized government today.
I am interested in knowing if all you Europeans think things could go a similar way-- or even if you'd want them to. Also, what sort of conflicts might Europe's general tendency towards a single strong federal government within it's own boarders have with the EU.
1. the EU parliament, with a number of elected national representatives based on population size.
2. The EU commision, consisting of people appointed by the national governments. Their official role is to 'prepare' the laws which the parliament then can take a stand on, but in reality the commision has quite a bit of power. But ultimately the decisions (the EU directives) are made in
3. The ministry council - consisting of the head of state (or one the ministers from various departments) from each country. Each country has a vote here, with some decisions taken by simple majority, but most in votes where everybody has to agree
(excuse me for the simple English, matters are more complicated).
4. They have recently created a special convent with the purpose of reforming the EU decision proces or power sharing, especially under the prospect of the former eastern european countries joining the EU, making the current system potentially quite 'slow' or even more bureaucratic..
In my opinion its going to take a long time before we will see a true parliament making the laws of a European union comparable to the USA. Its a beautiful ideal, but perhaps it will be more difficult to realize than it was in the then relatively young states of North America. It was for example very hard for many europeans to say goodbye to their national currencies recently - my own country voted against joining the monetary union at a public vote last year. Most people here (not me) voted no because of the symbolic value of the coins - a daily symbol of national independence, the "Krone". The germans accepted the Euro in favor of their D-Mark, only because they thought the Euro would retain the same strong position in the international monetary system - now they are really sorry, because the Euro ended up being so weak a currency, and because the germans, again paradoxically, was the first to fail living up to the strict economic criteria for being a member of the European monetary system, which they risk getting punished economically for.
But this is just the words of a EU sceptical dane - perhaps french people are more optimistic about the whole thing??
Token, you also make a good point about the United States being small. They were not large long established nations-- at least one's not with the sort of populations you find in Europe today. So one, the U.S. had a smaller population. Two, because of that smallness, the states obviously had to stick together against other powers (even though some tried to stay out from time to time).
The second point about smallness making states stick together against others is perhaps correct. In relation to the EU, yes, theres is hardly any perceived danger from other external powers. EU is a giant economic and military zone. The "yellow danger" from the population rise in Asia in the 60s wasn't really that great, the Soviet union collapsed under its own burden. All there is left is 1) the perceived "brown danger" from Africa, with millions living under exstremely poor conditions, making it ripe for 'attacks' in various forms on the European zone of wealth. But i think that in the minds of most europeans, Africa is a very distant or even non-existent place, not a real threath, if you see what I mean. 2) the perceived threath of international terrorism that could turn against Europe as well as the US again. This second danger is hardly a EU-only matter to be dealt with. Not that there shouldn't be done anything about it: no one is really safe now, if they in the eyes of potential terrorists possess the symbols of supression, economic power, etc.. The international society has a really huge task ahead of it in the coming years!
"This is unrelated but you guys in europe (well the EU) have until July 2003 to get things taxless over the net."
Yes Outsider, it is funny, this whole international protectionism/free-trade discussion. On another string, in the EU we have to eat gene modified soy products, whether we like it or not, because otherwise it would be violating the free trade of the US... very funny indeed <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" />
<strong>Arakageeta: Thanks for including the 'n' ;-)
We have in the EU three 'houses':
In (growing) order of power
1. the EU parliament, with a number of elected national representatives based on population size.
2. The EU commision, consisting of people appointed by the national governments. Their official role is to 'prepare' the laws which the parliament then can take a stand on, but in reality the commision has quite a bit of power. But ultimately the decisions (the EU directives) are made in
3. The ministry council - consisting of the head of state (or one the ministers from various departments) from each country. Each country has a vote here, with some decisions taken by simple majority, but most in votes where everybody has to agree
(excuse me for the simple English, matters are more complicated).
4. They have recently created a special convent with the purpose of reforming the EU decision proces or power sharing, especially under the prospect of the former eastern european countries joining the EU, making the current system potentially quite 'slow' or even more bureaucratic..
In my opinion its going to take a long time before we will see a true parliament making the laws of a European union comparable to the USA. Its a beautiful ideal, but perhaps it will be more difficult to realize than it was in the then relatively young states of North America. It was for example very hard for many europeans to say goodbye to their national currencies recently - my own country voted against joining the monetary union at a public vote last year. Most people here (not me) voted no because of the symbolic value of the coins - a daily symbol of national independence, the "Krone". The germans accepted the Euro in favor of their D-Mark, only because they thought the Euro would retain the same strong position in the international monetary system - now they are really sorry, because the Euro ended up being so weak a currency, and because the germans, again paradoxically, was the first to fail living up to the strict economic criteria for being a member of the European monetary system, which they risk getting punished economically for.
But this is just the words of a EU sceptical dane - perhaps french people are more optimistic about the whole thing??
i haven't any fear about the future of the euro, even if the rate change versus the Dollar is not very high, he will be still stronger than Franc or even Mark (germany is temporaly in a little crisis).
however , the move to the euro is not so easy , we do not know what prizes means, we still think in francs and then convert especially for the big prizes. According to specialist it will take one year or more , to be easy with the euro.
Comments
"I don't know enough about the people in your political parties to know if they are like the nazis or not. Consider this though. If you want to hold on to your political power and fear someone from the "right" why not go ahead and label them a nazi? If it's true or not. That's the same tactic the NAACP used on Bush. "
It is a classic logical fallacy that just because some people share some property ( like eating grass) that dont make them the same (horse and cow are two different species, both eating grass). It is quite a thing to accuse people of being nazis just because they are "rightwing" or the like.
I don't know the politics of mr. Bush in detail, as I am not from the US. I mostly disagree with his international dispositions though. But naming him a nazi is perhaps a bit too much, eh?
But I do know that Jörg Haider among other dishonorable deeds has spoken at meetings for old nazi soldiers in Austria, calling their participation in WW2 great and so on..
and:
"So, xenophobia has less to do with contact, and more to do with ignorance, fright and manipulations by politicians. After all, if you can appeal to a person's racist fears, you may be able to jack a vote out of them."
I agree. Personally I hope and try to live up to the ideal of an "intellectual", in the sense of being able to take my decisions and vote according to my own consciousness rather than what I am being told as "facts" by others, especially political parties. I hate the idea of political parties with thousands of people agreeing to political programs, with limited space for free thoughts - which goes for parties across the political spectrum, right to left, liberal to conservative, etc...
.ditto.
<strong>in reply to:
I agree. Personally I hope and try to live up to the ideal of an "intellectual", in the sense of being able to take my decisions and vote according to my own consciousness rather than what I am being told as "facts" by others, especially political parties. I hate the idea of political parties with thousands of people agreeing to political programs, with limited space for free thoughts - which goes for parties across the political spectrum, right to left, liberal to conservative, etc...</strong><hr></blockquote>
I share your opinion, but you must be aware that if you are alone, there is very little chances to diffuse your idears. I am not a member of any political parties, but i think that there in it a space for free thoughts. Some of these free thoughts if they are appreciates by many others members of the party have a chance to be taken in account. Your personal feeling have very little chance to be taken in account : it is certainly the prize of freedoom.
I'm not attempting to bash France (I have respect for the nation, and I am enjoying powerdoc's perspective), but I think the claims that the United States is racist and morally wrong are just hypocritical when they come from Europe. <hr></blockquote>
Jose Bove did not bomb any McDonald, he damaged one with potatoes in demonstration for anti-globalisation. He's a very smart man, with good ideas.
As for France being xenphobe etc., well you can state just how many statistics as you want, the fact is that I'm a french national because I was born here, but I'm absolutely not white, and in 20 years of living here, I've not suffered from xenophobia or racism. That's my story, and I have no incentive whatsoever to lie about it.
What some people don't understand is that you can't base your understanding of world facts on what you've seen in the media... Passive information has nothing to do with real information. You have to go throough the trouble of educationg yourself, learning about the other countries' traditions, cultures, meeting nationals face to face and not just on message boards etc. I've been lucky enough to be brought up in a very multi-cultural family, I have close parents throughout the world, and have experienced a great many different cultures, the American culture being amongst them.
Some people here also don't seem to understand the EU's foundation is not modelled after that of the US. The various countries will keep their independance, their national indentity etc. The union is more economic than anything else. I doubt there will some day be a "EU president", giving so much power to a single man is not a good idea IMHO.
As for ScottH's remarks regarding the EU countries not knowing what to do anything else than fighting each other... well...
I think this question is very difficult to answer, being that there are so many aspects of being in a union like this. For example: there is no doubt that the EU as a whole speaks with a stronger voice than before in international matters after the last few EU treaties were settled, transferring power to the EU bureaucracy. This is potentially a huge benefit for a small country like my own as long as there is one vote per country in the deciding fora. Then again, many people here in Denmark like to vote against stronger union ties and more EU centralisation, instead wanting to keep national sovereignty, because paradoxically 1/12 vote in EU is perceived worse than 1/1 in Denmark..
I'm wondering though what Denmark (and other nations) would think of votes weighted by population. Obviously, this may be way too soon to introduce.
This sort of arguement was HUGE during the writing of the United States' second constitution. Ever state did see itself as a sovereign nation. The comprimise of this conflict was two realitivly equal houses of Congress: one where representation was based on population (The House of Representatives) and another just a straight vote (The Senate). Another result of this however, was a weak federal government, realitivly speaking. A side effect that many wanted, but also one that many did not. Still this history ultimatly lead to the much more federalized government today.
I am interested in knowing if all you Europeans think things could go a similar way-- or even if you'd want them to. Also, what sort of conflicts might Europe's general tendency towards a single strong federal government within it's own boarders have with the EU.
(edit: left a n of of Token's name!)
[ 02-13-2002: Message edited by: Arakageeta ]</p>
We have in the EU three 'houses':
In (growing) order of power
1. the EU parliament, with a number of elected national representatives based on population size.
2. The EU commision, consisting of people appointed by the national governments. Their official role is to 'prepare' the laws which the parliament then can take a stand on, but in reality the commision has quite a bit of power. But ultimately the decisions (the EU directives) are made in
3. The ministry council - consisting of the head of state (or one the ministers from various departments) from each country. Each country has a vote here, with some decisions taken by simple majority, but most in votes where everybody has to agree
(excuse me for the simple English, matters are more complicated).
4. They have recently created a special convent with the purpose of reforming the EU decision proces or power sharing, especially under the prospect of the former eastern european countries joining the EU, making the current system potentially quite 'slow' or even more bureaucratic..
In my opinion its going to take a long time before we will see a true parliament making the laws of a European union comparable to the USA. Its a beautiful ideal, but perhaps it will be more difficult to realize than it was in the then relatively young states of North America. It was for example very hard for many europeans to say goodbye to their national currencies recently - my own country voted against joining the monetary union at a public vote last year. Most people here (not me) voted no because of the symbolic value of the coins - a daily symbol of national independence, the "Krone". The germans accepted the Euro in favor of their D-Mark, only because they thought the Euro would retain the same strong position in the international monetary system - now they are really sorry, because the Euro ended up being so weak a currency, and because the germans, again paradoxically, was the first to fail living up to the strict economic criteria for being a member of the European monetary system, which they risk getting punished economically for.
But this is just the words of a EU sceptical dane - perhaps french people are more optimistic about the whole thing??
[ 02-14-2002: Message edited by: Token ]</p>
Yes Outsider, it is funny, this whole international protectionism/free-trade discussion. On another string, in the EU we have to eat gene modified soy products, whether we like it or not, because otherwise it would be violating the free trade of the US... very funny indeed <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" />
<strong>Arakageeta: Thanks for including the 'n' ;-)
We have in the EU three 'houses':
In (growing) order of power
1. the EU parliament, with a number of elected national representatives based on population size.
2. The EU commision, consisting of people appointed by the national governments. Their official role is to 'prepare' the laws which the parliament then can take a stand on, but in reality the commision has quite a bit of power. But ultimately the decisions (the EU directives) are made in
3. The ministry council - consisting of the head of state (or one the ministers from various departments) from each country. Each country has a vote here, with some decisions taken by simple majority, but most in votes where everybody has to agree
(excuse me for the simple English, matters are more complicated).
4. They have recently created a special convent with the purpose of reforming the EU decision proces or power sharing, especially under the prospect of the former eastern european countries joining the EU, making the current system potentially quite 'slow' or even more bureaucratic..
In my opinion its going to take a long time before we will see a true parliament making the laws of a European union comparable to the USA. Its a beautiful ideal, but perhaps it will be more difficult to realize than it was in the then relatively young states of North America. It was for example very hard for many europeans to say goodbye to their national currencies recently - my own country voted against joining the monetary union at a public vote last year. Most people here (not me) voted no because of the symbolic value of the coins - a daily symbol of national independence, the "Krone". The germans accepted the Euro in favor of their D-Mark, only because they thought the Euro would retain the same strong position in the international monetary system - now they are really sorry, because the Euro ended up being so weak a currency, and because the germans, again paradoxically, was the first to fail living up to the strict economic criteria for being a member of the European monetary system, which they risk getting punished economically for.
But this is just the words of a EU sceptical dane - perhaps french people are more optimistic about the whole thing??
[ 02-14-2002: Message edited by: Token ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
i haven't any fear about the future of the euro, even if the rate change versus the Dollar is not very high, he will be still stronger than Franc or even Mark (germany is temporaly in a little crisis).
however , the move to the euro is not so easy , we do not know what prizes means, we still think in francs and then convert especially for the big prizes. According to specialist it will take one year or more , to be easy with the euro.