WITH THE LOWEST EU VOTER TURN OUT IN DECADES, MEMBER STATES MOVE TO FORM FEDERAL CONFEDERATION
by John Charlton
(Oct. 30, 2009) — The European Union or EU, as it is popularly known, is about to take a dramatic political step, when the Lisbon Treaty is ratified by all the member states; and event that is expected this fall, when the Czech Republic agrees to its terms.
What is the European Union and what effects will the Lisbon Treaty have? Most U.S. citizens are in the dark, and apathy is the primary motive. But the consequences are important enough for all Americans to take notice this fall, as the formation of a federate EU will be a historical marker to judge the maintenance or fall of the post WWII American hegemony.
Which Countries are members of the EU?
The EU comprises currently all 27 sovereign nations of Western Europe: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, plus two Mediterranean island nations: Malta and Cyprus.
European nations which are not members are: Norway, Switzerland, Serbia, Macedonia, Albania, Croatia, Bosnia; and 3 former Soviet Union states: Belarus, Moldavia and the Ukraine.
A few tiny states are also not members: San Marino, Andorra, Lichtenstein & Vatican City state — mostly because of their traditions of political independence and the costs of membership. Iceland, which is geographically associated with the European continent, is also not a member; but applied for membership on July 23rd of this year.
What do Europeans think of the EU?
The EU recently held elections for seats in the EU Parliament in Strasbourg, a French city on the German border, in the historically contested once german-speaking region of Alsace. Voter turn out was a miserable 43% the lowest in the history of EU elections.
Conservatives and anti-immigration parties won gains in nearly every member state.
Generally, the concept of EU is highly praised and supported in Northern Europe, where interest in politics rather than religion is dominant; suspect and ignored in Southern Europe, where Christian traditions remain strong.
Most Europeans believe a centralized government has as much to offer as it risks to endanger: benefits are a uniform system of laws and regulations, to promote economic development and growth; risks are the imposition of secularist and masonic ideas on member states where citizens have stronger Christian ideals.
Most controversial of the actions of the EU have been the forcing of member states to accept laws permitting abortion, unnatural marriage, and a litany of other socialist and secularist laws to break down the Christian morals of their citizens.
The EU also has garnered a lot of criticism over its failure to recognize in law the distinctive statue of religious groups, and the Christian heritage of the continent; while at the same time opening the doors to Islamic immigration. The EU has protested the tax-exempt status of the Roman Catholic Church in Italy, and the Greek Orthodox Churches in Greece; to the dismay of those member states.
In summary, most Europeans believe that the EU has been and is an instrument for France and Germany to impose their political and social control on the rest of the continent.
The Lisbon Treaty and how it will Change Europe
The Lisbon Treaty was signed on Dec. 13, 2007, as a proposal, but has not yet been ratified, due to the failure of the Czech government to accept its Bill on Human Rights, which would allow disenfranchised Germans, who were expelled from Bohemia after WWII to make legal claims to their property which the former communist government in Czechoslovakia confiscated as war reparations. The Czech supreme court will decide the case on Nov. 3rd.
The ratification of the Lisbon Treaty will create the offices of President of Europe and of High Commissioner. The former as chief executive, the latter as a Foreign Minister for the united member states.
The Labor Party has been criticized severely, recently, for its participation in secret talks to establish the office of High Commissioner. Tony Blair, a long time Bush ally as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, was considered until recently a likely candidate for President; until nations like Poland strongly objected on the basis of his liberal views. Blairs conversion to Roman Catholicism last year was widely seen as a political ploy to bolster his candidacy in Southern and Eastern Europe, but was condemned by rank-and-file Church members as a fraudulent act.
The Lisbon Treaty is not a constitution, but a series of amendments to The Treaty of the European Union. Ratification of the former will make the latter a legally binding document on the states, and establish a Charter of Human Rights which will form the basis of the laws of the EU. This Charter of Human Rights will outlaw the right of member sovereign states of passing laws in contradiction to its alleged principles of liberty.
How the EU Charter of Human Rights differs from our Bill of Rights
This Charter of Human Rights will be nearly universally binding. The United Kingdom agreed to the Lisbon Treaty only on the basis of opting out of the Charter’s alleged rights regarding labor unions; Poland opted out on certain social rights (sodomy and abortion), on the grounds that they conflicted with the Christian traditions of the nation. The Czech government was granted this week an opt out for land claims from exiled Germans.
Some aspects of the Charter outlaw crimes against humanity: such as the cloning of human beings
But the language of the Charter is as fuzzy as its ideology. This is seen in its preamble, which opens thus:
The peoples of Europe, in creating an ever closer union among them, are resolved to share a peaceful future based on common values.
Conscious of its spiritual and moral heritage, the Union is founded on the indivisible, universal values of human dignity, freedom, equality and solidarity; it is based on the principles of democracy and the rule of law. It places the individual at the heart of its activities, by establishing the citizenship of the Union and by creating an area of freedom, security and justice.
In short, almost nothing is defined, and the Charter seems both incapable of defending individual rights as it seems useful in the hands of bureaucrats to squeeze more and more power out of the system, for state control of every day life.