Posted on 12/06/2005 4:30:30 PM PST by Leifur
Czech President Vaclav Klaus and British Member of the European Parliament Daniel Hannan are about to revamp Europe. Unlike Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt they want to do so by putting forward a democratic alternative to the European Union which corrects the wrong principle on which the EU, with its concept of the “ever-closer union,” has been built.
Today and yesterday, 70 people from 28 countries (including Canada and the US) gathered in a conference room of the Paul Henri Spaak building of the European Parliament in Brussels. They were invited by Daniel Hannan, an MEP and a regular Brussels Journal contributor, for the first meeting of the “Congress of Brussels.”
“The leaders of the European Union may still deny it, but last Summer’s ‘No’ votes to the European Constitution in France and the Netherlands have changed everything,” Daniel Hannan said.
“We should be bold in our thinking. Let us go back to first principles. The US was founded on Jeffersonian principles: the idea that decisions should be made by individuals in preference to the government, and by the states in preference to the federal authorities. The EU was founded on precisely the opposite principle: the Treaty of Rome commits its signatories to form ‘an ever-closer union’ and establishes the ‘occupied field doctrine,’ whereby EU jurisdiction is deemed to be established forever in any area in which it has once legislated.”
It is this “ever-closer union” that the peoples of Europe are rejecting because they correctly perceive that the primary democratic unit should be the sovereign state. Only within such sovereign states can the principles of personal freedom, private property, parliamentary democracy and the rule of law be upheld.
This is also the opinion of Vaclav Klaus, the President of the Czech Republic, whom Mr Hannan has asked to patronize the Congress of Brussels. Because the Czech President could not be present in Brussels he had an address delivered to the participants by his chief of staff, Mr Jiri Weigl. According to the President the Dutch and French referendums “revealed the wide gap between the centralistic and bureaucratic project of ‘ever-closer’ Europe, which was pushed forward by the Brussels political elite, and the genuine interests and preferences of the EU member states’s citizens.” He said it is time to halt the “ever-growing regulation of all spheres of life, protectionism, artificial harmonization and unification of everything and gradual dismembering of the sovereignty of the nations.”
Daniel Hannan told the BBC that he hoped future historians would write that “the seeds of the way Europe eventually developed were planted at the Congress of Brussels, 2005.” The participants, from a wide variety of parties ranging from the British Conservatives to Poland’s governing Law and Justice (PiS) and Mr Klaus’s Civic Democratic Party (ODS), also included non-politicians such as journalists and representatives from various free market think tanks.
They agreed that the European Union should not be allowed to become a “Greater Belgium” and that the European Court of Justice (ECJ) should be prevented from becoming the European equivalent of the US Supreme Court. Mr Martin Howe QC warned that the ECJ is already usurpating legislative powers. “By expanding the scope of EU powers, the Court necessarily narrows the scope of the powers of the member states. It reduces (in its own words) the sovereign rights of the member states. It thereby reduces the scope of national law-making where there is a direct connection between the votes of electors; and transfers powers to the EU law-making process where there is no such connection.”
There was also a delegation of Americans at the first “Congress of Brussels.” As Daniel Hannan stressed:
“The anti-democratic and centralising tendencies of the EU are not simply a problem for Europeans – Brussels also exports its ideology. Few people in Washington have thought, from first principles, about what kind of Europe would be in American interests. While the US favours democracy, the EU favours stability. There is no hypocrisy here: the EU is not especially keen on democracy within its own borders, either. It is happy to disregard inconvenient referendum results or even – as when Austria admitted the FPÖ into government – to challenge national general elections.”
The second day of the conference coincided with the election of David Cameron to the leadership of the British Conservative Party. Mr Cameron has pledged to pull his party out of the European People’s Party. The EPP is the group in the European Parliament which consists of the various national Christian-Democrat parties plus the British Conservatives. The EPP favours the concept of the “ever-closer” EU. As an EPP member Mr Hannan could not formally book a conference room in the European Parliament to hold his “Congress of Brussels” because EPP members cannot make room reservations through their group for meetings of a so-called Eurosceptic nature. As a consequence, the gathering could only be held in the European Parliament because the room had been booked by an MEP who did not belong to the EPP group.
If the British Conservative Party leaves the EPP, it can form its own parliamentary group, with the Polish PiS, the Czech ODS and other like-minded parties, to promote the ideas formulated at the Congress of Brussels. This would entail a major realignment of a number of political groups within the EP.
I am propably overly optimistic here, but it is neccasery for us to fight back, even though we the Icelanders are not joining the EU until they take us over by a court decision or something like that.
It is neccasery for us to provide new nations in Europe (and other places) and current ones an alternative to the EU. Optimaly would be the joining of NAFTA and EFTA (European Free Trade A...), the old competing, more free market oriented European bodyvand not based upon the idea of creating a supercountry wich the EU is slowly subjucating through the EEA (European Economic Area) treaty we are subject to.
Would you guys not like to see the NAFTA expanding over the Atlantic, including perhaps the UK, Iceland and other European, and even African countries?
Ps. The man furthest to the left on the picture in the original article is an Icelandic parliment member from my party, the Independence party, a conservative-liberian-christian democratic-libertarian party, the biggest party in Iceland with around 40% of the vote.
I should propaply point out the most interesting part propably for you guys from the article:
-There was also a delegation of Americans at the first “Congress of Brussels.” As Daniel Hannan stressed:
“The anti-democratic and centralising tendencies of the EU are not simply a problem for Europeans – Brussels also exports its ideology. Few people in Washington have thought, from first principles, about what kind of Europe would be in American interests. While the US favours democracy, the EU favours stability. There is no hypocrisy here: the EU is not especially keen on democracy within its own borders, either. It is happy to disregard inconvenient referendum results or even – as when Austria admitted the FPÖ into government – to challenge national general elections.”
The abowe comment was supposed to be for you, I took your names from Tigers... list of European interested folks, hope it´s ok. Pleace discuss the article and make others possible interested aware.
europeans are starting to see what the EU really is. A liberal elitist socalist organization constructed to force everyone in Europe to conform to their narrow views and try to act as some obstructionist force against the US.
France doesn't want to pay to have an army, so they will get the EU countries to pay for it all and massively subsidize french farmers with all their cut of the pie.
The EU is a friggin joke. Was never going to work.
I agree with you, except from small Iceland, it does not seem like as a joke at all, but as a horrific looming threat coming over the horizon. Of course it does not work economically, but it stamps around and can be dangerous for democracy and independence of the individual, for the USA, for Christianity, and for what is good and right in the world.
Hell, when the EU has a big budget shortfall, it will just pick a USA company to sue claiming monopolistic practices like Microsoft or Wall-mart and try to nail them for a couple billion.
Their typical MO. Destroy anything that resembles an economy and then tax and sue the hell out of everyone to try to keep the house of cards up.
Iceland is not part of the EU and newer will. But in order for us to be able to stay outside it, we need to have some alternative to lean against. Some alternative to trade with, to have security partnership with and a political ally against the encroachment of the EU. And the US is the only alternative possible. So please rethink your stance and take our outright hand, others will follow if the alternative will provide itself.
The UN would quicly drown the small Iceland, but hell the leftist would take it open armed, and it would be a serious blow to us on the right side.
I hope that Iceland never joins the E.U.
I do not think it would be advisable to reopen NAFTA. It might not be approved, again. However, we are happy to negotiate bilateral free trade agreements. What are you selling/buying? It is interesting to hear that you feel threatened by the EU. I had not heard of that before. Brussels is bossy. That's for sure. Can you join NATO?
Elohim, I hope so too. And I also hope that the UK, and other countries will leave the EU soon.
Sarasmom, I think I can understand your frustration somewhat. But I also am a little frustrated when our allies, specially in the US, can not look under the surface when watching other nations. Just like in the US where you are struggling with each other politically in what direction the US should head as a country and society, we here are in the same struggle.
So it is just normal for us, on the right side of politics, who are constantly in the position of defending the US actions, to look to the US for advice, cooperation and help. Specially to other like minded, that is right winged, people in the US. Remember that the EU is a such cooperation of the left institutionalized to beat us on the right. They are the ones mostly villifying the US, they do not represent us all.
ClaireSolt, I do not know what you mean by reopening nafta again, are you talking about the Free Trade Area of the Americas?
I think we have good tradings between us, although I am not sure what the legal status of that is, weather there is a free trade agreement or somekind of agreement. But we are selling you fish in big quintities, aluminium and intelectual material, and, although the EU is trying to divert all of our consumer good buying to the European nations through its various rules and regulations, the history of trade between the US and Iceland since the War is to long and well established, although under threat.
We are a founding memeber of NATO although not having armed forces ourselfs. And that treaty and the bilateral defense agreement between us is the basis for our ability to remain independent from the EU. That is what this is about, the EU is expanding and trying to take over more and more of the elements of a full fledged country. We have an exsperience of loosing our independence to a foreign, continental power, we are not going to go through that again, that is the threat, and because of the nature of the EU, that threat is very real.
You probably ned to build an army to defend yourselves.
Have you ever heard about a city of just under 300 thousand people having their own army?
Many would say we could not afford to built one, but it is not that simple. The leftists would want us to take a pacifist stance and not have any armed forces at all. Except maybe the old Soviet one, or today a EU force, it depends on your shade of red/leftism.
If the US would go, the European faction would become much stronger and it would be able to convince people we must join the EU, or to beginn with, get their forces here and bring us thus more into the influence of the EU. Then we would lend on the wrong side of the fence if a rift would occur between the US and the EU.
We could at least newer handle our own air defences, but it is part of the NATO agreement that every country will be protected with air defences. But we are taking more responsibility for our own defenses, increasing the role of the Coast Guard and the Police, specially the Viking Team (same as SWAT) as can be seen in the Wikipedia article about Iceland:
"Sérsveit Ríkislögreglustjóra
The Special Operations Unit of the National Commissioner of the Icelandic Police, The Viking Team, is similar to Germany's GSG-9 and Britain's SAS, a small and well trained group of operatives. The unit handles security of the state, anti/counter-terrorism projects, security of foreign dignitaries, as well supporting the police forces in the country when needed.
The Viking team has five main squadrons: Bomb Squadron that specializes in explosives; Boat Squadron that specializes in operations on sea and water, diving and underwater warfare, and boat operations; Sniper Squadron that specializes in sniper warfare, entries, and close target reconnaissance; Intelligence Squadron that specializes in anti-terrorism intelligence, surveillance, and infiltration; and Airborne Squadron that specializes in airplane hijacking operations, skydiving and surprise assault operations, and port security.
Members of the Viking team were deployed in the Balkans as a part of an operations lead by NATO, and some members have been deployed to Afghanistan. The Special Operations Unit used to be under the command of the Reykjavík Chief of Police; however, in 2004, a new law was passed that put the Viking Team directly under the National Commissioner of the Icelandic Police."
Sorry Sarasmom, my post abowe was supposed to go to you to, I was just noticing my error.
Iceland ciding with the US in Cold War, and before that the WW2 was mostly my party´s doing, the Independence Party. If the Communists had had their way, we would have got an Soviet military base. Most of them have newer conseded to this, but their propaganda and protests against the US base was to get rid of it, of course to be able to replace it with a soviet one. But long after the disapearence of the Soviet base they are still protesting it, some on a ground of pacifism, others to replace it with a future EU forces.
Iceland population is only 300,000?
You should look to the UK fishing industry as a reason not to join the EU.
Yeap, miss Claire, we are passing the 300 thousand barrier just these days. We were only about 78 thousand in the beginning of last century, after having doupled from the middle of the preceding one and I beliewe we were around 150 thousand when the US army came here during world war 2 (before Pearl Harbor). At one point there were about as many US and Allied soldiers here, as there were Icelandic males, leading to understandable struggle about Icelandic women.
So our abilities to have our own military are not realistic. Our independence was possible because of the US protection, and if we loose that, we are bound to loose our independence again. It is better to be a US satelite state than a far outlying region within the cetrally, undemocratilly controled Euroland of EU´s future.
elohim, yeah, that is one of the biggest reasons most people in Iceland do not want to join the EU. My party f.e. had a commercial before last elections, that sounding just like an BBC news congratulating us for joining the EU, and it said that today the Spanish and other countries fishing fleet had congrulated us also and would steam straigth to Iceland.
We do not want to loose control over our fishing waters as our fishing industry would suffer, just like the UK´s and many other countries has, but it is also because of nationalistic/patriotistic issues, lack of democracy within the EU and our history of being once before under foreign control, just like the EU is essentially.
You offer a very interesting perspective on the EU. I think of Icelandic women as dazzlingly beautiful. Don't you also have geothermal free heat for everything?
Thank you, it is interesting for me to hear the views of Americans, specially the right winged ones, I often identify myself with. Sadly, and I am not talking about you, they often seem not to be able to see past the fact that my country is part of Europe or something like that.
Many of them are beutiful, like girls all over the world. One of them is participating, to the excitment of the nation in Miss World today. I guess one of the reason many foreigners talk about how beutiful our women are, are because many of them are blond, and/or with blue eyes. But as both of these features are regressive, they will not be so in one or two generations if they turn their interests to foreigners of more dark complexions. If that is good or bad I can not say.
Other reason could be good general health and good education, and specially they tend to be rather young when participating in many activities wich only older girls tend to do in other countries, that is, they dont just look young, they are young. But Clare, are you not a woman?
Our geothermal heat is not free, but it is in relative abundance in most of the country, so it reduces our energy costs greatly and thus increasing the living standard here by many factors. I think I heard once that if we would have to heat everything with imported oil/coal, our heating cost would be five times what it is today.
Two thirds of all our energy usage comes from renewable energy, both geothermal and hydroelectric (from waterfalls), we have ability to increase it greatly, but it would cost us more of our untouched natural beuty, so we will have to be careful when increasing our energy production. We use it to get big energy using productions, like aluminium companies here, most of them are American.
The rest, one third, is the energy we use in transportation, cars, ships (our big fishing fleet) and airplanes (whose fleet is also big), and that energy needs to be imported. Not because we don´t have enough energy to use on these, but because there is not available good enough technology to store it well enough, cheaply enough and small enough to use in transportation vehicles.
That is one of the reasons we are participating in many companies mission of producing hydrogen economy here in Iceland, we are essentially making our country a test ground for that technology. Sadly that technology is not yeat good enough to compeet with gasoline. And maybe it newer will, as biodiesel technologie is propably surpassing the Hydrogen technologie, and it will be easier to produce it and use within existing infrastructure.
Sorry for going astrai from what we were talking about, this was just something I needed to get of my chest. Pleace tell me your and yours perspective on the EU, on Iceland and the future of energy issues.
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