May you live in intersting times

[Fragony]

Chinese proverb.

Let's face it, the EU only has a few months.

The Dutch referendum isn't anything small (I thought it was I was wrong), the brexit is well on it's way, and hopefully a nexit as well, which really is a possibility. Both a brexit or a nexit will probably don't happen but the rules will be changed. Eastern-europe no longer has any patience with EU, they don't like to be told what to do again. Expected by political thinkers the EU would fall in 2020. I think it's just a matter of months. Musings and thoughts please.

edit, times of course

[Gilrandir]

Let's face it, the EU only has a few months.

Expected by political thinkers the EU would fall in 2020. I think it's just a matter of months.

Too many experts predicted the disintegration of Ukraine in 2014 "along cultural/linguistic divides" and later the collapse of Russia under the pressure of sanctions. Complex systems are resistant enough to carry on, especially if efforts to preserve them persist.

[Snowhobbit]

I thought the EU had already collapsed after the Greek crisis, or the Spanish Crisis, or the Italian Crisis? No? What about the Portuguese crisis? Surely it collapsed in one of those already? ;)

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I thought the EU had already collapsed after the Greek crisis, or the Spanish Crisis, or the Italian Crisis? No? What about the Portuguese crisis? Surely it collapsed in one of those already? ;)

It's not a case of one collapse killing the EU, it's crisis after crisis gradually whittling away at the foundations.

If you look back eight years to 2008 you can see that after each crisis the EU is just a little bit worse off, a little bit less "in this together".

It took the better part of a thousand years for Rome to fall, we shall not be so lucky.

[Husar]

I don't like the advertisement in the title.

It took the better part of a thousand years for Rome to fall, we shall not be so lucky.

Everything was slower back then, you couldn't even buy a game, then pay and receive it right away from a country 6000km away. You also couldn't travel to a country 6000km away in 6-7 hours. You also couldn't buy and sell shares of a company 20 times within one single second, or rather, have a machine do that for you...
And the water you drank and the fish you ate back then didn't contain as much plastic either.
We have become so much faster at destroying things by now, just ask Hiroshima and Nagasaki or the cellphone someone replaced for a newer model after a year.
On the bright side, our GDP is also much larger than that of the Romans and we take better care of the unmployed and (most of) our slaves.

[Fragony]

Can you fix the advertisement for me please, I can only edit posts

[Fragony]

It's not a case of one collapse killing the EU, it's crisis after crisis gradually whittling away at the foundations.

If you look back eight years to 2008 you can see that after each crisis the EU is just a little bit worse off, a little bit less "in this together".

It took the better part of a thousand years for Rome to fall, we shall not be so lucky.

The EU seems to know only one perspective, if the EU screws up we need more EU. The proverbial snake that feeds on it's own tail. Things are NOT going to improve with these idiots handling things. I so very much hope that England will blow things apart. Everybody here already knew that a no vote was going to be just ignored, oh she said no but I thought she really wanted it.

EU fu&die please, Europe does not need the EU it's a continent not a country like the US. Fuck. Off. Excuse my French of German what was it

[Sarmatian]

Offering an outside perspective, the most recent polls in Serbia show that only 30% (and some change) of the population is in support of joining EU.

Usually it was much higher, ranging between 50% and 75%.

The weird thing is, all major parties support joining EU and it is a major part of their platform. Only right wing nutjobs are against it, and all together they can scrape between 10-15% of the vote.

EU is definitely in crisis and the only thing keeping it together is lack of viable alternative. In most countries there simply aren't any major political parties who are in favour of leaving EU. Sure, there are Tories in Britain, but even they are more in favour of a different status for UK within EU than pulling out completely.

EU will survive in some way, shape or form, especially the economic part. It's the political aspect that is in question.

[Lizardo]

The political union and the Law making that is imposed on EU countries has got to go and I think the Currency as well.

[Fragony]

We can introduce our own currency and buy euro's with it, shouldn't be all that complicated. European government must die.

@Sarmatarian, Geert Wilder's Freedom Party wants to leave the EU and is by far the biggest party in the polls at least. I think that they can do business with the socialists, that might sound odd but they have a lot in common. They both are socially very leftist and they both don't want any trouble with Russia

[Strike For The South]

So you're telling me politicians couldn't undo multiple generations worth of cultural and linguistic differences?

I am Jacks complete lack of surprise.

[Crandar]

To be precise, the Chinese phrase is a curse, not a proverb.

Fragony, you can edit the title by clicking the edit button and then choosing the go advanced option.

[Snowhobbit]

It's not a case of one collapse killing the EU, it's crisis after crisis gradually whittling away at the foundations.

If you look back eight years to 2008 you can see that after each crisis the EU is just a little bit worse off, a little bit less "in this together".

It took the better part of a thousand years for Rome to fall, we shall not be so lucky.

It is a case of people always crying that the EU will fall *now* because *this crisis* is so bad and there is no recovery from it. I think you should be more concerned with the collapse of the UK given the support for independence in Scotland, which is greater than the support for leaving the EU proportionally. The way that the debt situation has worked out was largely inevitable since the member states retain full autonomy over how they manage their finances. How you think the EU can manage the Greek state budget without the legal ability to do so is beyond me.

[Snowhobbit]

The political union and the Law making that is imposed on EU countries has got to go and I think the Currency as well.

So you want to save the EU by removing all that makes it the EU?

In order to save America we must remove the federal system of governance and let each state go their own way. Also I think we need to remove the bad influence of the supposed lizard overlords.

[Pannonian]

So you want to save the EU by removing all that makes it the EU?

In order to save America we must remove the federal system of governance and let each state go their own way. Also I think we need to remove the bad influence of the supposed lizard overlords.

The EU began as an EEC.

[Snowhobbit]

The EU began as an EEC.

Yes, and? The UK began as England. Does this mean we should revert to an absolute monarchy? How would you propose to organize trade in a way that would not have the exact same consequence as now in terms of trade regulation in international conventions or such, but at a much bigger expense and hassle in terms of negotiation?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I don't like the advertisement in the title.



Everything was slower back then, you couldn't even buy a game, then pay and receive it right away from a country 6000km away. You also couldn't travel to a country 6000km away in 6-7 hours. You also couldn't buy and sell shares of a company 20 times within one single second, or rather, have a machine do that for you...
And the water you drank and the fish you ate back then didn't contain as much plastic either.
We have become so much faster at destroying things by now, just ask Hiroshima and Nagasaki or the cellphone someone replaced for a newer model after a year.
On the bright side, our GDP is also much larger than that of the Romans and we take better care of the unmployed and (most of) our slaves.

All true, but you know exactly what I meant.

The fall of Rome, like the the fall of the EU, was a long drawn-out process and nobody realised it had happened until centuries later.

Snowrabbit may think the EU "hasn't fallen" because he looks at each individual event and nobody says after "well, EU's dead now". What he doesn't appreciate is that the EU is tilting towards its end, and will fall if the tilt is not corrected.

[Snowhobbit]

All true, but you know exactly what I meant.

The fall of Rome, like the the fall of the EU, was a long drawn-out process and nobody realised it had happened until centuries later.

Snowrabbit may think the EU "hasn't fallen" because he looks at each individual event and nobody says after "well, EU's dead now". What he doesn't appreciate is that the EU is tilting towards its end, and will fall if the tilt is not corrected.

Philippus Flavius Homoerectus might think that the UK is as strong as ever. What he doesn't appreciate is that the union of the United Kingdoms is tilting towards its end, and will fall if the tilt is not corrected. Ireland is gone, Scotland is trying to open the door to leave and Wales might not feel there is much in it for them anymore.

[Greyblades]

Enjoying the pre-referendum jitters are we?

The Scots are seeing with the Oil price drop how screwed they'd be if they had voted yes and they have at minimum 20 years before they get another go. Northern Ireland is still experiencing the afterglow of being the most loyal province in the empire and the welsh don't have either the will to leave or the GDP to support the level of welfare they currently employ.

Also, I'd be more concerned with your own estate if I were you.

[Snowhobbit]

Enjoying the pre-referendum jitters are we?

The Scots are seeing with the Oil price drop how screwed they'd be if they had voted yes and they have at minimum 20 years before they get another go. Northern Ireland is still experiencing the afterglow of being the most loyal province in the empire and the welsh don't have either the will to leave or the GDP to support the level of welfare they currently employ.

Also, I'd be more concerned with your own estate if I were you.

Were you responding to anyone or do you normally address a whole room as a singular individual?

What jitters? If UK votes to leave then UK will after negotiations (or on their own if those drag out) and that's that. That is the choice of the electorate of the UK. It will still not mean the end of the EU. All this constant crying about how the EU is dying is rather tiring, we can go look back at history and I'm sure we will see plenty of talk about how the UK is dying as united kingdoms starting to divide (they already have their own parliaments and certain levels of autonomy), the empire is already dead anyway. That Scottish parliament has a majority support for independence fyi.

My house is just fine, no loans and low costs makes my financial concerns a lot easier. Or were you coyly trying to insinuate something else? I suggest you speak up instead of trying to make lame insinuations not relevant to the topic at hand. If you have any concerns about Sweden (and whatever independence movement you have clued in on) then I suggest you raise those questions in a relevant thread.

[Pannonian]

Yes, and? The UK began as England. Does this mean we should revert to an absolute monarchy? How would you propose to organize trade in a way that would not have the exact same consequence as now in terms of trade regulation in international conventions or such, but at a much bigger expense and hassle in terms of negotiation?

The difference is that no-one wants to revert to an absolute monarchy, but there are many who would be happier with less power in the centre. Political and fiscal unity is demanded by a single currency. But why should there be a single currency in the first place? Many of the demands for greater control from the centre, aka Germany, can be traced back to what a single currency based on the Deutschmark entails. If more protracted and expensive negotiations are the result of less central control, many would be okay with that price. Europe did okay in the past when the EC was more of an EEC and less of an EU.

[Snowhobbit]

The difference is that no-one wants to revert to an absolute monarchy, but there are many who would be happier with less power in the centre. Political and fiscal unity is demanded by a single currency. But why should there be a single currency in the first place? Many of the demands for greater control from the centre, aka Germany, can be traced back to what a single currency based on the Deutschmark entails. If more protracted and expensive negotiations are the result of less central control, many would be okay with that price. Europe did okay in the past when the EC was more of an EEC and less of an EU.

The argument that something began as something else and so should return to what it used to be is the exact same as I used. Are you sure that nobody at all wants to revert to an absolute monarchy btw? ;)

Political unity on some level was already in place before the common currency was made. A single currency holds quite a lot of benefits other than for Germans wanting direct control, it makes it much easier to conduct trade and transactions etc if there is a shared currency. It makes it easier to have freely moving capital within the currency zone etc. There are drawbacks of course, but you didn't ask for those.

Sure, Europe was not a horrible mess before the EU when it instead had the EEC. However the goal of the EEC was always to develop it into something like the EU is today, but even more integrated. But Britain was better off with the Empire than it is today. So when is the British Army returning to occupy India?

[Pannonian]

The argument that something began as something else and so should return to what it used to be is the exact same as I used. Are you sure that nobody at all wants to revert to an absolute monarchy btw? ;)

Political unity on some level was already in place before the common currency was made. A single currency holds quite a lot of benefits other than for Germans wanting direct control, it makes it much easier to conduct trade and transactions etc if there is a shared currency. It makes it easier to have freely moving capital within the currency zone etc. There are drawbacks of course, but you didn't ask for those.

Sure, Europe was not a horrible mess before the EU when it instead had the EEC. However the goal of the EEC was always to develop it into something like the EU is today, but even more integrated. But Britain was better off with the Empire than it is today. So when is the British Army returning to occupy India?

A single currency makes it easier to move goods. But it also necessitates similar economic and fiscal conditions. Which patently do not exist across the single currency zone.

And I note that you've resumed your shtick of hostile irrelevant questions, aka your "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" line of questioning.

[Snowhobbit]

A single currency makes it easier to move goods. But it also necessitates similar economic and fiscal conditions. Which patently do not exist across the single currency zone.

And I note that you've resumed your shtick of hostile irrelevant questions, aka your "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" line of questioning.

Yep, there were failings both in setting up appropriate regulation and enforcing the rules made for the currency to work. Both Germany and France ran bigger deficits than allowed as I recall?

Well, you might not have recieved a proper education, but that question is a classic rhetorical question. But since you liken it to the proven historical fact, are you saying it is a proven fact that certain members of .Org beat their wives?
I am simply asking, if we should always return to the past when things are better, when do the men start loading up the ships? I might go vacationing in India this year, so the timing is crucial for me to make sure I don't get caught in the crossfire.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Philippus Flavius Homoerectus might think that the UK is as strong as ever. What he doesn't appreciate is that the union of the United Kingdoms is tilting towards its end, and will fall if the tilt is not corrected. Ireland is gone, Scotland is trying to open the door to leave and Wales might not feel there is much in it for them anymore.

You missed the Scotland referendum so let me give you the basics. England doesn't really care all that much any more - it's up to the Scots, Irish and Welsh is they want to go. They moan so much we might well be happier without them. Economically all three are a drain on the English finances due to the Barnett Formula and the only real logistical difficulty is with Scotland leaving - because we'll have to find somewhere else to put our nukes.

Realistically, Independence for all three is probably inevitable, complete home rule certainly is, because the devolved administrations have put them on the same path as the Dominions.

[Gilrandir]

England doesn't really care all that much any more - it's up to the Scots, Irish and Welsh is they want to go.

AFAIK, Cameron urged the Scots not to leave, and he is English, isn't he? England may pretend it doesn't care, but I believe it does.

[Greyblades]

What he means is PVC, a few people he knows and a couple of article writers/comments he reads dont care anymore.

Serious the only one actually testing our patience is Scotland, wales hasnt really done anything and Northern Ireland is more happy to be in the UK than even England.

[Pannonian]

What he means is PVC, a few people he knows and a couple of article writers/comments he reads dont care anymore.

Serious the only one actually testing our patience is Scotland, wales hasnt really done anything and Northern Ireland is more happy to be in the UK than even England.

Wasn't there a poll a couple of years back that showed NI Catholics to be more eager to be part of the UK than the English were?

[Greyblades]

If i were to guess have something to do with the republic going through a rough patch lately, with the catholic percecution over and the prejudice receding, the option of a second Ireland, with the (comparatively) economic stability of a great power, is starting to look rather inviting.

[Rhyfelwyr]

As a resident Scot on this forum, I can say that Brexit is more likely to happen than Scottish independence. Support for the SNP has always been higher than support for independence - a lot of people vote for them as a protest vote.

I hope that these ongoing crises will cause the EU to be scaled down and return more to the functions of the EEC.