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They will never stop. It's the EU salami tactics, they proceed "slice by slice" until you realize it and then it's usually too late. I wish they would devote so

They will never stop. It's the EU salami tactics, they proceed "slice by slice" until you realize it and then it's usually too late. I wish they would devote so much time to actual problems and make EU again a big leader (e.g. look at the speed we are getting vaccines now).

ginko 6y ago
This isn't 'the EU'. It's the Council, i.e. the national governments.
- baxtr 6y ago
  How do you define the EU exactly?
  - ginko 6y ago
    The EU is a union of countries. It's the entire body including all its citizens. There's several governing bodies within the EU and people should understand the political process within it and be specific. How often do you see Americans blaming the USA for some new legislation?
    - soco 6y ago
      I have the feeling that some EU citizens aren't exactly aware that THEY are the EU, and listen instead to antagonizing outsider stories (Sputnik, whatever you name it). There were EU elections last year and the measures taken today are drafted by those people elected one year ago. Same for the council members - they were voted in the respective national elections. Next time folks pay better attention when you vote. Or whether you vote.
      - fogihujy 6y ago
        The resolution was made by the EU Council, not the parliament. The EU Council is not voted upon as such, and it consists of the heads of state/government from all member states. Once this reaches the parliament, on the other hand, there will be a lot of concerned citizens contacting members of parliament in order to voice their opinion.
        soco 6y ago
        You must agree that the heads of state/governments get there following democratic elections, thus directly influenced by the voters of respective countries. In Europe at least. So the same popular influence is still there, just via a different channel.
        fogihujy 6y ago
        Definitely. However, depending on where you live, the head of state/government may very well have gotten ~20% of the local votes, and their politics may therefore be without majority backing. The EU parliament is a different story though, and if your representatives (assuming they got enough votes to get in, of course), can be held directly accountable for how they cast their votes. The prime minister/president, on the other hand, might not have gotten your vote to begin with.
        soco 6y ago
        I'm not sure I get your point. S/he definitely got somebody's vote to get there, if not mine then of the other folks across the street.
        fogihujy 6y ago
        I was replying to a post saying that EU voters should be more careful about whom they vote for. I'm saying that the EU voters aren't under direct control over how the council is formed, and so it's more important to apply pressure to MEP's in the European Parliament rather than trying to do something about the council. It's the parliament's job after all...
  - modo_mario 6y ago
    The issue is that "the EU" is not a homogenous block and so the parliament and/or commission can be against this. In this scenario it's national governments working trough the EU so some will call that EU and others not. These same differences are a thing in other very important scenarios like during the Greek financial crisis where a lot of people in parliament or the commission might've seen that the short term pain is what needed to happen or even before that urged to get a banking union but the ECB is dominated by it's national counterparts who all tried to lose the least and thus lose more as a whole. Which can make it all seem very schizophrenic and makes it so you can claim it's good or bad depending on which voices to listen to. At the end of the day tho it's mostly the national governments that held the rains there but here the parliament can simply block this.
    - Vinnl 6y ago
      Additionally, the Council sets the general direction, but the Commission is the body that would actually need to propose legislation, and the Parliament then needs to approve it, AFAIK. The Council (i.e. the leaders of the national governments) meet at least four times a year, whereas the Commission is more akin to a regular government (but for the EU) and the Parliament with a regular parliament (but for the EU).
- Emma_Goldman 6y ago
  What a bizarre claim. The Council is the heart of power in the EU. It is there more than anywhere else that the fundamental political decisions of the bloc are made. The EU is more like the nineteenth-century Concert of Europe than you might realise.
  - ginko 6y ago
    Yes, but that's what the enemies of European integration wanted. We could have had a proper constitution for years now with a hugely strengthened Parliament and a directly elected president but some people didn't want that. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    - djbebs 6y ago
      The enemies of integration didnt want this. They wanted the eu gone wholesale.
    - Emma_Goldman 6y ago
      1) That's irrelevant to the question at hand: that the Council is an integral part of the EU, and so the actions of the Council can appropriately be called actions of the 'EU' 2) It's not especially helpful to frame what is practically possible in politics simply in terms of what people 'want'. Regardless of what you want, there are pretty hard legal, economic and political obstacles to democratising the EU that have to be taken seriously in any strategic assessment of the situation
dandanua 6y ago
It's similar to how Russia moves its border in some countries https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uie3Nfecs9k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uie3Nfecs9k Little by little

ginko 6y ago

This isn't 'the EU'. It's the Council, i.e. the national governments.

baxtr 6y ago
How do you define the EU exactly?
- ginko 6y ago
  The EU is a union of countries. It's the entire body including all its citizens. There's several governing bodies within the EU and people should understand the political process within it and be specific. How often do you see Americans blaming the USA for some new legislation?
  - soco 6y ago
    I have the feeling that some EU citizens aren't exactly aware that THEY are the EU, and listen instead to antagonizing outsider stories (Sputnik, whatever you name it). There were EU elections last year and the measures taken today are drafted by those people elected one year ago. Same for the council members - they were voted in the respective national elections. Next time folks pay better attention when you vote. Or whether you vote.
    - fogihujy 6y ago
      The resolution was made by the EU Council, not the parliament. The EU Council is not voted upon as such, and it consists of the heads of state/government from all member states. Once this reaches the parliament, on the other hand, there will be a lot of concerned citizens contacting members of parliament in order to voice their opinion.
      - soco 6y ago
        You must agree that the heads of state/governments get there following democratic elections, thus directly influenced by the voters of respective countries. In Europe at least. So the same popular influence is still there, just via a different channel.
        fogihujy 6y ago
        Definitely. However, depending on where you live, the head of state/government may very well have gotten ~20% of the local votes, and their politics may therefore be without majority backing. The EU parliament is a different story though, and if your representatives (assuming they got enough votes to get in, of course), can be held directly accountable for how they cast their votes. The prime minister/president, on the other hand, might not have gotten your vote to begin with.
        soco 6y ago
        I'm not sure I get your point. S/he definitely got somebody's vote to get there, if not mine then of the other folks across the street.
        fogihujy 6y ago
        I was replying to a post saying that EU voters should be more careful about whom they vote for. I'm saying that the EU voters aren't under direct control over how the council is formed, and so it's more important to apply pressure to MEP's in the European Parliament rather than trying to do something about the council. It's the parliament's job after all...
- modo_mario 6y ago
  The issue is that "the EU" is not a homogenous block and so the parliament and/or commission can be against this. In this scenario it's national governments working trough the EU so some will call that EU and others not. These same differences are a thing in other very important scenarios like during the Greek financial crisis where a lot of people in parliament or the commission might've seen that the short term pain is what needed to happen or even before that urged to get a banking union but the ECB is dominated by it's national counterparts who all tried to lose the least and thus lose more as a whole. Which can make it all seem very schizophrenic and makes it so you can claim it's good or bad depending on which voices to listen to. At the end of the day tho it's mostly the national governments that held the rains there but here the parliament can simply block this.
  - Vinnl 6y ago
    Additionally, the Council sets the general direction, but the Commission is the body that would actually need to propose legislation, and the Parliament then needs to approve it, AFAIK. The Council (i.e. the leaders of the national governments) meet at least four times a year, whereas the Commission is more akin to a regular government (but for the EU) and the Parliament with a regular parliament (but for the EU).
Emma_Goldman 6y ago
What a bizarre claim. The Council is the heart of power in the EU. It is there more than anywhere else that the fundamental political decisions of the bloc are made. The EU is more like the nineteenth-century Concert of Europe than you might realise.
- ginko 6y ago
  Yes, but that's what the enemies of European integration wanted. We could have had a proper constitution for years now with a hugely strengthened Parliament and a directly elected president but some people didn't want that. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  - djbebs 6y ago
    The enemies of integration didnt want this. They wanted the eu gone wholesale.
  - Emma_Goldman 6y ago
    1) That's irrelevant to the question at hand: that the Council is an integral part of the EU, and so the actions of the Council can appropriately be called actions of the 'EU' 2) It's not especially helpful to frame what is practically possible in politics simply in terms of what people 'want'. Regardless of what you want, there are pretty hard legal, economic and political obstacles to democratising the EU that have to be taken seriously in any strategic assessment of the situation

dandanua 6y ago

It's similar to how Russia moves its border in some countries https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uie3Nfecs9k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uie3Nfecs9k Little by little