The Week Democracy in Europe Died
"[B]elieve me," writes our own James Delingpole below, "however bad you think things are in the US right now, being in Europe, even on the periphery, at the moment is like standing on the prow of the Titanic and watching the iceberg approaching."
According to Janet Daley of the London Telegraph, last week the iceberg struck.
Democracy went down in a blaze of glory last week. Both the German Bundestag and our own House of Commons put up one hell of a fight against the dying of the light. Maybe history will record that fact in an elegy on the demise of the great 18th-century experiment in government by the people: they were eloquent to the end. Because at the end, eloquence was all they had....
So this is where we are. The agreed EU “stability union” triumphantly paraded before the media in Brussels will have the power to approve or disapprove budgets of countries in the eurozone – that is, to vet and police them – before they are submitted to the elected parliaments of those countries. In other words, parliaments which are directly mandated by, and answerable to, their own populations will not control the most essential functions of government: decisions on taxation and spending. Even without the ultimate institutions of economic and political union, which still elude the EU, actual power over fiscal policy will be taken from the hands of national leaders. And if, as a voter, you cannot influence your prospective government’s tax and spending policies, what exactly are you voting for...?
Far from being an antidote to the ideological delusions of the past century, a trans-national superstate is the same sort of utopian, unnatural, ahistorical folly that earlier generations attempted to foist on the recalcitrant populations of Europe. Its doctrine of “co-operation” is simply coercion by another name. It relies on unswerving belief and enforced conformity, just like all the “year zero” political movements that ended in totalitarianism and terror in the past. The one hope is that the great mass of the people, unlike most of their political leaders, seem to understand all this quite clearly. It remains to be seen whether they will have to go out on the streets to make their case.
A respected columnist in one of Britain's most sober journals, speculating, quite seriously, on whether Europeans will soon take to the streets.
Astounding.
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Oct '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Virtually every word of that commentary could apply to the US feral government over riding the 50 states via unfunded mandates and innumerable other intrusions upon the constitutional republican form of government that we started out with.
And there is little doubt that the taking to the streets is also in our future.
May '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Take to the streets? It seems to me that the masses of Europeans (I mean those who don't up sticks for the US) are much more likely to believe that lying low and hoping for the best is the only thing to do.
Look how they reserve most of their practical outrage for politicians like Geert Wilders and Ayaan Hirsi Ali who disturb the illusions by mentioning unpleasant truths in public.
Appease, appease, appease, delay action, until violence breaks out. That's the history, and it's looking a lot like the future too.
Mercy.
May '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Part of that "unswerving belief and enforced conformity" involves the denial of our need for God and the deliberate marginalization of Christianity in society.
Secular legalism is no match for fundamentalist Islam.
Sep '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
They can take to the streets all they want. The European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) doesn't have any more money than Greece or Portugal or Italy. They spent the future and now the future is here. Once they're done chanting and burning, they'll have the same amount of debt plus a lot of broken glass and smashed buildings to clean up.
I must have missed something, because to me, it looks like the EFSF is just a shell game, moving responsibility for the debt from Greece and the banks to a mythical entity called the EFSF.
May '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Having spent about 8 years of my adult life among three different European countries, I must say that the notion of self-government seems to me practically non-existent there in comparison with America. Politics is for professionals schooled to be bureaucrats. There's a lot of cynicism toward politicians, but nothing like the kind of moral resistance we still have here.
And here it's weak enough to almost induce despair.
I think our best hope remaining is an act of God.
May '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
American and European nations are equally doomed to tyranny, political disintegration and war. It's not just recent political policies which have utterly abandoned reality, but our entire cultures at their foundations. We don't have the time to correct our basic belief systems and restore our governments to lawful, sensible institutions... even if we had the will, which the majority of Americans obviously don't.
Hence, my general absence from Ricochet these days. There doesn't seem to be much point anymore.
God willing, it will all crumble sooner rather than later. The longer this nonsense endures, the more terrible its consequences will be. May God guide us when the power goes out for good and the barbarians are set loose.
Apr '11
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Right on, raycon.
That Fascist technocratic impulse was demonstrated by NC Gov. Perdue's call to suspend elections so the Congress could concentrate finding economic solutions without the distractions of voter opinion. On reflection, I don't think it was an idiosyncratic gaffe. I think she had been detailed to run the idea up the flagpole to see how many people saluted. Obama and his supporters have introduced the idea of by-passing Congress several times. Obama is careful to do it negatively, but his supporters aren't.
A side note: I searched for "governor perdue delay elections". In the first two pages of Google results, only two mentioned she is a Democrat.
May '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
I hate to argue against the direction of any of Peter's posts, but aren't we exaggerating the continent's democratic traditions? Elections there have always been about reshuffling the same deck of professional politicians. Only the UK has a true, ancient democratic tradition. That's where the real tragedy is playing out, as the Mother of Parliaments dies.
May '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Take to the streets? It's over. Those who would have possibly taken to the streets have taken to to North America, Australia, or Israel. Europe is a lost continent. Stick a forchette in it!
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
I agree with the sentiment, but one cannot equate the American situation with that in Europe. Whatever its faults, the federal government is subject to direct elections by the American people; the European Union is not directly elected (except for the nearly-powerless Euro Parliament). In the US, activist judges and independent agencies sometimes threaten democratic rule, but a determined electorate could keep them at bay. The problem in the US is a crisis of federalism, not a crisis of democracy.
Aug '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Just another signpost on the road to oblivion...
Oct '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Adam Freedman
I agree with the sentiment, but one cannot equate the American situation with that in Europe. Whatever its faults, the federal government is subject to direct elections by the American people; the European Union is not directly elected (except for the nearly-powerless Euro Parliament). In the US, activist judges and independent agencies sometimes threaten democratic rule, but a determined electorate could keep them at bay. The problem in the US is a crisis of federalism, not a crisis of democracy. · Oct 31 at 9:46am
The "crisis of federalism" is, in fact, the end of constitutional republicanism. Direct democracy is part of that failure, thanks 17th amendment.
Jul '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
You may well be right. My preference is to go down swinging working with the Tea Party. In any war there is fog, we may find our way through despite ourselves.
Every generation has slugs, the slugs hardly ever decide anything, and when they do they can often be effectively countered. It's Soros and his like that are genuinely dangerous. There are a million ways to inflict chaos and horror. The good news so far has been that the people inclined to seek them lack the knowledge to do so, and the people with the knowledge are disinclined to use it.
Apr '11
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
raycon, was that a feraldian...er Freudian slip? "US feral government?"
I think you're onto something there.
Apr '11
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Peter Robinson:
When they only ever vote for access to other people's bank accounts are you certain they hold the maturity to live under a democratic government?
This is a sad moment for the Europeans, certainly. However they did it to themselves.
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Soft despotism, democracy's drift . . .
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Somebody should write a book about it.
Dec '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Peter Robinson
Somebody should write a book about it. · Oct 31 at 12:00pm
Another reminder of my unfinished reading.
Mar '11
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
Daniel Hannan makes the same point in The New Road to Serfdom. Europe's going to become the USSR, but the gulags are going to be the Aldous Huxley sort: SOMA, the feelies and centrifugal bumble-puppy. At least until it becomes part of the Caliphate.
Dec '10
Re: The Week Democracy in Europe Died
When the French went to the barricades because the retirement age was being raised by 2 years I knew Europe was really nuts. The average life span has increased by over 15 years since the retirement age was set. Slightly adjusting the retirement age was a simple fix for a long term problem. That people's blind sense of entitlement made them revolt over something so trivial made it so clear how mashugganah (sorry for the technical term) the Europeans had become.
I think Sarkozy may be a good bellwether for the future. If he can weather the storm and stay in power maybe Europe can muddle through. If the electorate jumps back into the Socialist pig sty, I'm not sure what's going to happen but it isn't good.