Brits would much rather have a closer economic relationship with EU than US

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Never commenting about the US and what Americans do to one another does have the advantage that one can choose to ignore completely what American Conservatives say about anywhere and anything with no qualms whatsoever.
 
On one side you are implying how Europe is NOT imperialistic. That it is rather America who is imperialistic.
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Both are undoubtedly imperialistic. The EU is but not because it forces European countries to stay within the union. It serves to aid European countries in exporting capital and also acts as a means to safeguard Europe from the consequences of its imperialistic actions abroad. See the way that the EU uses countries like Turkey (and, briefly, Libya) as a dumping ground for immigrants trying to enter the continent.
 
Yes, and Brits voted overwhelmingly to leave the EU.

So, we are nowhere on the subject and from scram news? Yes, I really know their polling, household word.
 
Vouthon said:
Political union affords judicially protected “ rights ” that no bilateral trade agreement between sovereign states can grant a person
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Whether some European Court agrees or not, I don’t. Not terribly long ago, a manufactory of which I am aware had a dispute with a Canadian concern. It had to do with a provision in the Uniform Commercial Code concerning shipping. The Canadian party actually sent a Canadian lawyer here to argue that party’s case. As would be the situation with a lawyer from another state, she had to have in-state co-counsel. But she made her appearance and argued the case. Among other things, Canada’s UCC and that which prevails in the U.S. are essentially the same.

Every “advantage” you mention could be managed by treaty without everyone submitting to superstate governance. I personally doubt today’s Europeans are as warlike as pro-EU people sometimes suggest they are, but that’s a judgment perhaps Europeans are better equipped to answer than am I.
 
(name removed by moderator) . . .
The shame of it, imagine telling foreigners about how their nations work and their capabilities and political movements in them. That would of course never happen in the US . . .
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Funny (name removed by moderator).

I was thinking just the opposite.
The shame of it, imagine telling foreigners about how their nations work and their capabilities and political movements in them. That would of course never happen in Europe . . .
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Regular_Atheist on the EU (and wromgly about the US) . . .
Both are undoubtedly imperialistic.
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I disagree with part of that but I will remember that you admitted to this EU imperialism Regular_Atheist.

Covfefe
 
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Why would I ever say otherwise? The EU is a capitalistic institution, its whole purpose is to facilitate free trade and the free movement of capital. It should be destroyed.
 
Regular_Atheist on the EU . . . .
It should be destroyed.
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@Vouthon?

You’re up. What do you think about that?
Is that how YOU feel about the EU too?
 
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Cathoholic said:
You’re up. What do you think about that?
Is that how YOU feel about the EU too?
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Obviously not, I am a vocal supporter of the EU and of European integration / a United Europe. My colours are there for all to see. Just look at my profile pic.

@Regular_Atheist is a Eurosceptic and has always been open about the fact that he rejects the EU for being a capitalistic, free-market oriented polity designed to facilitate the movement of capital, goods, services and labour across the continent.

I view the EU as being more of an entity committed to social market economics but I also support free trade (no tariff or regulatory barriers arising from differences in standards between European states) and economic integration, so I back the Union for many of the same reasons Regular_Atheist rejects it.

We have both been candid for years about our respective political positions, so I really don’t know why you’re probing us about them now?
 
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Vouthon . . . .
I back the Union for many of the same reasons that Regular_Atheist rejects it.
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Thanks for your (name removed by moderator)ut Vouthon.
 
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People thought the same thing in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars. Within a half century it was all bubbling over again.
 
Ridgerunner said:
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niceatheist:
People thought the same thing in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars. Within a half century it was all bubbling over again.
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I’m thinking Europeans today are better than that.
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And they are better than that because of the political and economic integration. The whole point is to make war inconceivable, to get rid of the power dynamics that dominated the Continent for centuries.
 
niceatheist said:
And they are better than that because of the political and economic integration. The whole point is to make war inconceivable, to get rid of the power dynamics that dominated the Continent for centuries.
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You really haven’t proved this. History is, moreover, replete with civil wars that go a long way to disproving your thesis.
 
Ridgerunner said:
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niceatheist:
And they are better than that because of the political and economic integration. The whole point is to make war inconceivable, to get rid of the power dynamics that dominated the Continent for centuries.
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You really haven’t proved this. History is, moreover, replete with civil wars that go a long way to disproving your thesis.
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I’m not sure what civil wars have to do with this. Churchill made his speech in 1946, which was enormously influential, in that it recognized the longstanding rivalries that had plunged Europe into a series of bitter wars that began with the rivalries between France and the various iterations of the Holy Roman Empire. In fact, the Protestant Reformation took hold in Germany in no small part because France was covertly supporting Reformers, and the entire reason was to destabilize the Holy Roman Empire. Then there are the brutal series of general European wars, starting with the Thirty Years War and culminating in the bloodshed of WWII.

Each one of these wars signaled the core problem; the rivalry between France and Germany, and that rivalry lasted centuries, right up until the Second World War. But Churchill had it right, that rivalry was the very heart of the issue. So long as Germany and France were competitors, so long as they were vying for advantage, it would inevitably lead to new conflicts. Centuries of evidence lay before you. Within 65 years of the end of the Napoleonic Wars, a united Germany immediately set about undermining France, leading to the Franco-Prussian War and France’s capitulation. And that was only the opening salvo of what was to come a half century after that.

Integration has lead to peace, it has made two rivals who spent centuries working overtly and covertly to undermine each other, to finally become partners. And economic integration requires political integration at some level. You can’t have open borders and a common market, you cannot create that European Community, without a high level of integration. The Framers of the US Constitution knew it, which is why on top of a Federal government, they also put in the Interstate Commerce Clause. Without that clause, and indeed that was the problem with the Articles of Confederation, Congress was a hostage to the states.

So if it worked for the US, why are you so against Europe traveling the same path?
 
And it worked afterwards. Reconstruction was a dastardly and shifty process, but within a few decades, the Union was stronger than it had been before. The Civil War underscored the necessity of Federal leadership, just as four centuries of conflict demonstrated France and Germany, and the other European states, needed to integrate.
 
The Civil War demonstrated the superiority of Union resources and nothing else. There is no particular reason to believe the Confederacy could not have been a stable state had it been allowed to leave the Union.

But one thing is for sure. The U.S. was considerably more warlike after the Civil War than before. The same was true of German unification. Simply consolidating states does not, in itself, prevent war.

But given the current military weakness of the European states, and the unlikelihood they will devote significant resources to their armed forces in the foreseeable futureI would say any war among them would be very unlikely. But that’s not due to being ruled from Brussels or Berlin or wherever the power center is.
 
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