Text 29335, 71 rader
Skriven 2012-05-31 19:58:54 av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
  Kommentar till text 29320 av Ward Dossche (2:292/854)
Ärende: Dutch parliament officially rejects ACTA
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Ward Dossche wrote to Robert Bashe on Thursday May 31 2012 at 17:43:

RB>> Many people here consider that simply "snooping", and such efforts
RB>> give the Pirate Party plenty of voters. As well as increase the
RB>> number of people who consider the un-elected EU "commisioners"
RB>> (German: "commissars" - comes closer to the truth) political
RB>> dictators without a mandate from the EU electorate.

WD> That is nonsense, Bob.

Which part?

The one about "snooping" and the upsurge it gives to the Pirate Party?

The part about the "commissioners" not being elected? They're appointed by the
member governments without direct participation of the populations and thus
definitely have no mandate from the EU electorate unless you want to count the
_very_ indirect mandate through the local governments - which often enough make
decisions that are not supported by their populations.

I don't see the "nonsense".

WD> The EC Commissioners are accountable for their deeds...

To whom? Certainly not to the electorate of their home countries, much less the
EU electorate as a whole. At most to their home governments, but no government
is going to discipline it's own commissioner unless he/she has been calght
stealing silver spoons from the Commission dining room (any maybe not even then
unless it gets into the media).

WD> ... and there is a broad difference between "commissioner" and
WD> "commissar".

I'm aware of the difference, but the comparison is hardly frivolous in view of
the near-absolute power of such non-elected politicians. The EU Parliament,
which is at least an elected body, even though the members are generally second
stringers or losers of elections in their home country, and not really the best
the EU has to offer, has more to say now than it used to, but decisions are
still far from democratic and basically are still made behind closed doors by a
handful of people.

RB>> So we'll see whether the EU can overturn legislation of a member
RB>> state parliament or not. It certainly wants to try.

WD> The EU cannot, but the EC can ... and the fines for non-compliance are
WD> a matter of public record. Germany helped put them in place so they
WD> know what's coming.

Germany was also the first to break the "stability pact", although it
practically insisted on it in the beginning to sooth the inflation fears of the
Germans at home. No sanctions were applied, although these were agreed on. I
might add that France soon followed suit, and sanctions were similarly not
applied. So what will happen is a matter of conjecture - all we know is that
anything that happens will be decided behind closed doors and the affected
populations will not have a say in the matter.

But to sum up, I was wondering years ago how the EU was going to deal with the
constitutions of the individual countries, and whether some EU - pardon, EC
directive could actually come into force although it conflicted with the
constitution of a member country. I still can't see member countries simply
changing their constitutions at the whim of some appointed politician in
Brussels. And I don't believe in "sanctions" that may be agreed with great
fanfare - but are then not applied.

We'll see. My personal ardor for the EU has cooled considerably in the last
10-15 years. The idea was good, but the implementation has been lousy.

Cheers, Bob

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