Europe and the Tories Wagging the Dog

[amateur51]

I

That the single currency has nearly destroyed Greece and is causing major problems elsewhere is what those like me foretold. The current "answer" to it, will fail, and that's a tragedy, and it's because less than perhaps a hundred people haven't the guts to say "we got it wrong", but instead say "we will never allow it to fail " - irrespective of the cost in jobs and lives to those whom we are supposed to serve (but they never state the last bit!)

Until you & others of your ilk accept that Goldman Sachs had a deliberate and pivotal, if discreet, role to play in the mismanaged entry of Greece into the Euro, it is pointless continuing this aspect of the debate as you are not addressing the full picture.

[Stunsworth]

That the single currency has nearly destroyed Greece and is causing major problems elsewhere is what those like me foretold

If Greece hadn't been in the Euro things would have been much worse for them than they are at the moment. The Drachma would have plummeted in value, that would have caused inflation to soar, and unemployment would be far higher than it is now. No doubt 'the colonels' would be taking an interest in the political situation too.

[teamsaint]

Kernelbogey,
i won't quote your whole response, as that tends to get out of hand !
I agree that the government have no mandate whatever for a referendum. Sadly this doesn't stop governments these days.

By "Exporting our wars", I am trying to make the general point that we are still involved in military action , but perhaps it's more "palatable" to be involved in wars thousands of miles away. Certainly much of it is US led, (and IMO driven hard by interest groups such as arms, oil and banks).Our governments have been willing participants. its just a much wider question than peace inside European boundaries.

[MrGongGong]

I agree that the government have no mandate whatever for a referendum. Sadly this doesn't stop governments these days.

They have no mandate .

There was a referendum ......... done and dusted

[aeolium]

If Greece hadn't been in the Euro things would have been much worse for them than they are at the moment. The Drachma would have plummeted in value, that would have caused inflation to soar, and unemployment would be far higher than it is now. No doubt 'the colonels' would be taking an interest in the political situation too.

I'm sorry, I completely disagree with that. For one thing, it would have been impossible for Greece to borrow on the international money markets at the very low rates enjoyed by eurozone countries during the boom years, since the drachma was a much weaker currency and not apparently underpinned by the ECB. Greece would certainly have had other problems and would not have been immune to the banking/property crisis that built up, but it is far less likely that it would have been as badly affected as it is now, unable to generate growth, unable to devalue, forced into an austerity regime that imposes shocking levels of poverty and shortage.

[gurnemanz]

I have little economic expertise and do not expect my views to count for much in this debate but I am inclined to take seriously the views of those business leaders who recently warned that EU exit would create damaging uncertainty. I feel instinctively that the UK is better off as part of Europe and being active and positive in Brussels policy-making rather than just jeering from the sidelines. The retrograde attitudes, boorish behaviour and crude populist propagandising of UKIP only serve to confirm my pro-European standpoint. Despite many decades of Americanisation of our culture and more recent EU influence, I am convinced that we in the UK are strong and confident enough in ourselves not to have to worry constantly about losing our independence and identity, as seems to be the neurotic obsession of UKIP and others. I frequently travel to France and Germany and do not notice this pre-occupation over there - which suggests that it is not a necessary consequence of EU membership.

[Beef Oven]

At least Tony Benn has the integrity to be opposed to the EU on the grounds of lack of democracy AND is in favour of getting rid of the Royal Family, Bishops in the House of Lords and Hereditary peerages ............ really wealthy people don't give a toss about what cars they drive unless they are particularly interested in cars !

Or put another way - MrGG says 'at least Tony Benn's ideas are similar to mine'

[Beef Oven]

I have little economic expertise and do not expect my views to count for much in this debate but I am inclined to take seriously the views of those business leaders who recently warned that EU exit would create damaging uncertainty. I feel instinctively that the UK is better off as part of Europe and being active and positive in Brussels policy-making rather than just jeering from the sidelines. The retrograde attitudes, boorish behaviour and crude populist propagandising of UKIP only serve to confirm my pro-European standpoint. Despite many decades of Americanisation of our culture and more recent EU influence, I am convinced that we in the UK are strong and confident enough in ourselves not to have to worry constantly about losing our independence and identity, as seems to be the neurotic obsession of UKIP and others. I frequently travel to France and Germany and do not notice this pre-occupation over there - which suggests that it is not a necessary consequence of EU membership.

This post started well, but quickly went downhill.

[MrGongGong]

Or put another way - MrGG says 'at least Tony Benn's ideas are similar to mine'

Actually they aren't
but at least he is consistent .............

[Beef Oven]

Actually they aren't
but at least he is consistent .............

Very easy to be consistent when you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth, in fact you can be whatever you want to be. Anthony Wedgwood Benn decided to be 'Tony, guardian of the working man'.

It makes me shake with anger - so much so, that the chip nearly fell off my shoulder.

[french frank]

This post started well, but quickly went downhill.

Can your own view be expressed perhaps more persuasively in something longer than a brief one-liner? I imagine you didn't appreciate the opinion of UKIP?

The only point in gurnemanz' post that I am doubtful of, is whether the UK can retain its cultural identity, the threat being from the US, of course, not the EU.

[MrGongGong]

Very easy to be consistent when you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth, in fact you can be whatever you want to be. Anthony Wedgwood Benn decided to be 'Tony, guardian of the working man'.

It makes me shake with anger - so much so, that the chip nearly fell off my shoulder.

So are you really going along with the dodgy verse of "All things bright and beautiful" ?
Blimey you kippers really are stuck in the fantasy past

is it a "hot chip" ?

and you know what mr Lydon said about anger

[kernelbogey]

[....]But what is your explanation for the rise of nationalist movements throughout Europe (of which UKIP is only one manifestation)? What do you think should happen about the eurozone and how the EU should change, if at all? Why is the EU so unpopular, not just in Britain but in other parts of Europe, especially in the Mediterranean countries, and what can it do about it?

I believe that, sadly, tribal solidarity, of which nationalism is another form, is a natural default position. By natural I mean also primitive or, if you like, pre-industrial; this is my view although I can't back that up scientifically. We were all Europeans when credit was cheap, you could keep borrowing (e.g. on a credit card) against the value of your house, even if you didn't remortgage, and if you were smart you could fly to Spain for less than £100 return per person. Most of that is gone and with it a general sense of prosperity. It is in these circumstances that nationalist parties swell their membership.

In the case of Greece, although I have no first-hand knowledge of conditions there, it's clear that the mandarins of the EU, and German politicians are seen as behind the fiscal, economic and political crisis. People turn to Golden Dawn, the police become more and more powerful, and immigrants are reviled. Most of the same happened in Germany in the 1930s, with consequences that are well known. There and then the scapegoats were the Jews, hellishly tarnished by Nazi politicians with all manner of manipulative sins and economic malice. I don't know to what extent the Greeks can see their own laissez-faire economic habits - huge state bureaucracy, tax evasion and corruption - as also to blame. I know Italy rather better and I have witnessed how all that has simply been widely accepted with a shrug and a self-satisfied smile.

The rise of UKIP seems to me to be just BNP and EDL light, and Farage a more 'reasonable' politician, and the Tory right wing is not far behind in a similar kind of regressive conservatism where fantasising about a sort of English [sic] Shangri La of warm beer, morris dancing and the sound of leather on willow and [insert cliches at will here] can be achieved by demonising 'Brussels', immigrants from east European nations, other manifestations of Johnny Foreigner.

I will mull your second question and return to it later if I can - this post is more than long enough already .

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

the posh boys are playing fast and loose, and i thinkare in so deep they have no idea how dangerous their game is ..... it is all based on micro tactical calculations ...but a Scottish Independence referendum and an EU Referendum could well turn out to produce a Little England nightmare with Farrage impersonating a North Korean Dictator ... with the entire debate ignoring the future needs of these islands and their people in the coming years and no debate on economic and social principles, knowledge or culture, just yah boo as per usual ... with tired ideology being shouted louder and louder .... the whole political system in the uk has its head firmly stuck in the past, in the ideas that do not work; in the illusory sense that we are an autonomous island and an autonomous people ......

as it presently operates the EU is dangerous, misguided and elitist in the worst possible way .... how might we develop a radical agenda for the solidarity of the european people and their governance? .... against this question all else is rerunning the arguments of Dacre versus Big Business; Freemason Little England versus corporate agglomeration .... a plague on both .... is it possible in this country to develop new thinking and sentiment about ourselves and our future? or must we leave it to the rattling skeletons on the Tory Back Benches and the posh boys?

[amateur51]

The only point in gurnemanz' post that I am doubtful of, is whether the UK can retain its cultural identity, the threat being from the US, of course, not the EU.

I wonder if the recent spate of shootings in USA with their attendant howls of justifiable outrage, plus the most recent event where a teacher talked the would-be gunman 'down' might push the US politicians towards a reform of firearms legislation such that certain aspects of America's culture were transformed to the benefit of all