The Republic of Dissent

Sarko slam

No comment necessary after this bit from Charlemagne:

On Wednesday 26^th, when the euro zone holds the second session of its two-part summit, the EU’s 27 leaders will make a point of gathering beforehand. The meeting will last just an hour, and will sign off on the plan to recapitalise Europe’s banks. But because the financial sector is part of the single market, which is an issue for all EU states, and Mr Cameron wanted to make sure that the 27 were seen to take the decision, not the 17.

For now, Mr Cameron does not appear to have a very strong hand. Most of the other euro-outs are committed, legally and politically, eventually to joining the single currency. Mr Sarkozy’s harsh words to Mr Cameron were strikingly spiteful: “We are sick of you criticising us and telling us what to do. You say that you hate the euro and now you want to interfere in our meetings.”

British officials shrug off Mr Sarkozy’s legendary rudeness as a personality flaw. “He never pursues it. He is not interested in texts,” says one diplomat.

It's pouring

Just because the Red Sox broke my heart , I'm using this sugary excerpt from a German's newspaper reaction to  Obama's words on Europe and its euro crisis as a bandage for my deep wound:

The fact that Barack Obama, who is a brilliant thinker, knows full well that things are much more complicated in reality does not help. Indeed, it does the opposite. In the desperate battle for his re-election he'd rather construct myths, such as claiming that the Europeans alone are responsible for the American mess. Not only is this fundamentally wrong, but -- coming as it does from a friend -- it's downright pitiful and sad.

Against constitutional originalism

I agree with this:

The Europe and America we live in are powerful and prosperous confederations built out of a series of successive legislative and institutional compromises that don't always make obvious textual sense, but that did what political leaders needed to do at the time. We should have arguments about whether or not expansions of centralised authorities are bad for the polity. But they should be argued on their own terms, not in terms of what was in the hearts of the people who signed the original treaty a long time ago.

The danger of Europe's fear

Sentence of the day from Wolfgang Münchau: (hat tip : Buttonwood's notebook):

I have never seen Europe's policymakers as scared as I saw them in Washington last week.

I wonder whether fear mixed condescending elitism can lead policymakers to make right or at the very least decent decisions.  I doubt it.

The euro as being too big to fail

The sentence of the day is from a must-read oped by Henrik Müller :

If the euro fails, the Germans will be seen in the end as having been the primary culprits. And rightfully so.

For some reason, I can get myself to be riled up about the state of the euro, but that's because I think that it will continue to work in spite of the failings of the EU because there are, in the short term, only catastrophic alternatives and because the weakness of the dollar, makes the euro too important to the world economy. 

Thus, the euro isn't going to fail because its survival is about much more than Germany and the EU. It is, too use a cliché,  too big/important to fail.

'Europe' failed the Libyan test

On point analysis from Charlemagne:

It is not just the fate of Libyans that is in the balance in the war against Muammar Qaddafi, but the commitment of Europeans to maintain - and, when necessary, deploy - serious military forces. Responsibility to protect requires, first and foremost, the means to protect.

The Europeans failed the Libyan test because they didn't give themselves the means to succeed; they were obsessed with the fear that Libya might become their 'Iraq' or 'Afghanistan.' In short, one of the EU's major problems is that it knows that it has a parent, the US, who may have many children and who may sometimes be irritated by it, but who feels closest to it, most of the time(that closeness will change with time).

The IMF and the Western fix

Gideon Rachman gets this right as he does more often than not:

It does look as if the Europeans, backed by the Americans, will manage to push Christine Lagarde into the job. But the groundswell of protest against the idea of a Western fix – and the accompanying commentary highlighting the shift in economic and political power from West to East and from North to South – will probably ensure that this will be the last time that a European appointment can simply be bulldozed through.
So President Obama is right when he insists “the time for leadership is now.” But Madame Lagarde might add – “Apres moi, le deluge.”

As a true non-believer in the division of the world between the West and the rest, I have to say that it would be more than a disappointment if the new head of the IMF came from Europe, it would be scandalous. Such an outcome would be indicated of the existence of more than a Western fix, but  of a problematic bias within that organization that must be influencing its policies.  Furthermore, I baffled by the fact that Christine Lagarde is a credible choice to be head of the IMF not because she isn't competent, but because she just isn't a good choice for so many reasons, the least important of which is that France isn't entitled to get a second chance at the position after it supported Strauss-Kahn knowing full of  the risks that something could happen.

BHL, Germany and Libya

Bernard-Henri Lévy on Germany's stand on the Libyan intervention (it abstained on the UN security council's vote of  resolution 1973 establishing a No fly zone):

We lost a great deal of time because of the Germans, which is a disaster, mainly for the Libyans, but also for the Germans, who will pay bitterly for abstaining. What happened here will leave a lasting impression in Europe. And Germany will run into problems in its legitimate effort to secure a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. (German Chancellor) Angela Merkel jettisoned all principles of German foreign policy since the end of World War II: There was the principle that something like National Socialism should never happen again. Never again crimes against humanity. Merkel and (German Foreign Minister Guido) Westerwelle violated this pact. This is a serious incident, not a minor detail. (...) Angela Merkel has the worst foreign minister Germany has had in a long time. Guido Westerwelle is a disaster. Immediately after the German abstention, he told your magazine: "Gadhafi has to go." It's really Westerwelle who ought to go, but he doesn't even seem to be ashamed of his decision, of this valley of shame.

I have stopped taking BHL seriously on those matters (it took me a long time because often I agree with his conclusions, but never with his argumentation)  because even when he is right, he can't get out of his own way and resist the temptation of self-righteousness.  The fact that he was so involved on Sarkozy's decision to take the lead in Libya worries me not because BHL is an unsavory and unserious character, but because he doesn't understand foreign policy when it becomes about more than postures, grand gestures, and cinematographic heroism.

Gaddafi as the EU's bastard

Interesting point from Nathalie Rothschild,which I admit makes all warm and fuzzy:

In fact, the EU’s fear of unregulated migration has been a trump card for Gaddafi. Assuaging this EU fear has been a way for the Libyan leader to rehabilitate himself in the eyes of the West after years of ostracisation. At the same time, threats to close and open borders have become a way for Gaddafi to hold the West to ransom, as he threatens to block trade deals or relax border controls unless Europe meets his demands. So it is not surprising that Gaddafi gave European nations the ultimatum of distancing themselves from the pro-democracy protesters or facing the supposed opening of the immigration floodgates from Africa. This is a real worry for the EU, which preaches about the virtues of democracy and human rights yet which has no interest in defending freedom of movement.
As we have seen with recent events in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere, when people get a taste for freedom there’s no telling what they’ll do to achieve it.

When I was young, I thought at least that Gaddafi (Gadhafi, Khadafi) had presence, now he is just a caricature of the man he once was, even though it was always a bastard,  but bastards with presence can be inspiring leaders to the blind.

Betraying the tradition of the Enlightenment

I agree with Brendan O'Neill on this:

(...)The great irony of the French government’s restrictions on the burqa in public places, and to a certain extent the Belgian government’s restrictions, is that they have been presented as being in the tradition of the Enlightenment. This is about liberating women from oppression, they say, and therefore it is a good, Enlightened, Voltairish thing to do.

In fact, banning a religious garment is counter to the spirit of the Enlightenment. What these authoritarians forget is that the Enlightenment sprang from a defence of religious liberty. The Enlightenment has its origins, not in any attempt to censor certain minority religious symbols, but in a belief that minority religions, even ones we consider ‘heretical’, should be protected from state intervention, censorship and oppression.

So in calling for the state to restrict a certain form of religious expression, these pseudo-Enlightened censors are doing something that the original men of the Enlightenment would have considered pretty outrageous.

Welcome failure

I agree with Paul Sagar on this:

When Merkel declares that multiculturalism has been a “failure”, she is not only playing to a xenophobic and reactionary gallery, she is also being profoundly short-sighted. Firstly, because she mistakenly focuses only on the day-to-day tensions between different groups that multiculturalism inevitable throws up.

It's incredibly disappointing to realize that Merkel has some Sarkozy within her, which says a lot about the state of the European left for it cannot address issues such as the ones of immigration or law and order without repeating either the errors of Blairism or of Jospinism.

Love means never having to say you're sorry

Via Gideon Rachman, the funniest thing I've read on Ed Milliband's fratricide on his climb to the top of the Labour Party:

I wish Ed Miliband, the new Labour leader, would stop emphasising how much he “loves” the brother whose career he has just destroyed. It’s all very schmalzy and unBritish.

On the other hand, if Ed insists on taking this line, he should really go for it in tomorrow’s leader’s speech. Here is a suggested line - “I love David. I adore him. (Dramatic pause). But that is why I had to destroy him. (Thumps lectern, tear trickles down his cheek). I hope you understand.”Meanwhile if Ed really is getting a taste for putting family ties under maximum political strain, the obvious next move is to offer the shadow chancellor job to Yvette Cooper, who is married to the much more obviously-qualified Ed Balls. That should make for some lively breakfasts in the Balls-Cooper household.

In our times, we sentimentalize politics or whatever else to avoid explaining the unexplainable or the unpalatable. Let's hope that all of this brotherly love stuff doesn't hide a lack of substance or isn't a camouflage for Obama-like feel good, but misleading and irrelevant fluff.

Political identities and crisis of leadership

I disagree strongly with Yascha Monk on this:

In America, the rise of neoconservatism, in both its cultural and foreign policy guises, has masked this crisis of the traditional Right. But in Europe, neoconservatism never won much traction. Neoconservatives, whether their branding is Tory or Labour, have been able to land a few punches in British debates about foreign policy. (The Guardian recently described Tony Blair’s appearance at the latest inquiry into the Iraq War as “a seminar on neoconservatism for slow learners.”) But when it comes to other issues that arouse the passions of their American brethren—like religious education, the (un)truth of evolution, homosexuality, and abortion—the tiny set of true British neocons couldn’t be more out of step with their compatriots. The same holds true all over Western Europe. No major right-wing party is inclined to declare the European version of the culture wars. If it did, the Left would surely be overjoyed. On the contrary, Merkel, Cameron, and Sarkozy got elected because under their leadership the Right has fully endorsed left-liberal views on family, lifestyle, and procreation.

It is easier in Europe or in America to get elected in the Right because the Left doesn't know what it is, but solely what it despises. Moreover, when Mounk asserts that Merkel, Cameron, and Sarkozy have endorsed left-liberal views on family, lifestyle and procreation, I wonder if he knows anything about French politics. The culture wars are well and alive in France. This summer has shown that Sarkozy knows full well that in France you get elected by going right on certain issues and by making them a matter of identity and culture. In short, the Right in Europe is well alive politically and no so much disoriented as it is led by figures who have great frailties.The fact that they found themselves in power in spite of those frailties is in fact a proof of the good health of the Right or rather that it is the Left that is disoriented.

The romantic Mannschaft

Alexander Osang on the Mannschaft, German football team at the South African World Cup and why its players were the ambassadors of a new Germany:

There was something soothing and liberating about watching this team play, and it was even more soothing and liberating to see the expressions of joy on the players' faces. They embraced each other when Klose, who had been out of form all season at Bayern Munich, finally scored a goal again in the first World Cup match, and the team hugged him as if he had just recovered from a long, serious illness. Klose later said that Podolski wouldn't let him go -- and that it was a nice feeling. They all seemed like boys having a fantastic time on a school outing. Löw thanked the players he substituted, and they thanked him, an act that was not a gesture but an expression of need. Everyone trusted everyone else. The most German of feelings that this team triggered was romanticism.

Having read and listened everything that was written and said about les Bleus, French football team and its South African debacle, I have realized that it is always easy to made footballers representatives/scapegoat of their country's successes or its ills because it is easy and because in both cases, the analogy and the analysis are convenient and so pleasurable for the ones making it weather their intent is to praise or to criticize violently and too often unfairly.

To come back to the Mannschaft, it is undoubtedly that its image is new and young, but I wonder whether that visible change is indicative of lasting and profound social transformations within Germany, in other words, if the Mannschaft different because Germany is different or just because it had to change and to adapt to the realities of football to remain the Mannshaft, that is a consistently good national football team.

The euro and salvation

Interesting assertions from Václav Klaus, the Czech president in an Oped in the Wall Street Journal:

It is evident that the euro—the European single currency—and the currently proposed measures to save the euro do not represent any "salvation" for the European economy. In the long run, it can be saved only by a radical restructuring of the European economic and social system. My country had a velvet revolution and made a radical transformation of its political, economic and social structures. Fifteen years ago, I sometimes joked that after entering the EU we should start a velvet revolution there as well. Unfortunately, this ceases to be a joke now.
The Czech Republic has not made a mistake by avoiding the membership in the euro zone.

Klaus's view about the euro not being a salvation is going to become the predominant view for European countries, which are yet to join the euro (and those whose economy will have to go through austerity measures) and will now take into account the Greek example. I'm just wondering how long this trend is going to last. My guess is that it doesn't depend on the EU, but on the health of other currencies, particularly the dollar

The price of the European Monetary Union

I agree with Václav Klaus, the Czech president on this:

To summarize, the European monetary union is not at risk of being abolished. The price of maintaining it will, however, continue to grow

The constant announcement of the death of the welfare state

The statement of the early morning is Gavin Hewitt's commenting on the measures, which  European governments are taking to solve the euro crisis:

What is being forced on Europe is a cultural revolution. It marks an end to an ever-expanding welfare state that some defined as the European way of life.

At the beginning and in the middle of each crisis faced by a European country or by the whole continent, there is always the pronouncement made with gusto and with Fidel Castro like flashy manliness that the welfare state is either going to die or being curtailed drastically. That only lasts until governments realize that Europeans, with the possible exception of the Brits,aren't Americas and actually like their welfare state even if it is cumbersome, expansive, and expensive.

Germany and its parent-child relationship with the eurozone

This bit from Charlemagne about the Germans' increasing frustration with the eurozone isn't surprising:

Germany is fed up of paying more than any other country into the EU budget, and being taken for granted. Germany feels unfairly attacked in this euro crisis. Mrs Merkel's government thinks it is outrageous that it is taxed with euroscepticism for insisting on tough conditions before bailing out members of the euro who caused their own problems. Germany is just trying to defend the law, monetary stability and taxpayers across the union, we keep hearing.

The Germans' relationship with the eurozone's countries resembles the one of a parent with an adult child who is still living at home and not doing enough to help because s/he doesn't have to and believes rightly that the parent will never kick her/him to the curve. The relationship doesn't usually change until the parent gives an ultimatum and follows through if nothing happens. To put things less creatively, the trouble of the Germans is that they are persuaded that they need the euro and therefore that state of mind of believed dependence German impotent or at least limits its choices.

Forgetting or ignoring the bloody history of communism

Quote of the morning from Claire Berlinski:

No one talks much about the victims of Communism. No one erects memorials to the throngs of people murdered by the Soviet state. (In his widely ignored book, A Century of Violence in Soviet Russia, Alexander Yakovlev, the architect of perestroika under Gorbachev, puts the number at 30 to 35 million.)
Indeed, many still subscribe to the essential tenets of Communist ideology. Politicians, academics, students, even the occasional autodidact taxi driver still stand opposed to private property. Many remain enthralled by schemes for central economic planning. Stalin, according to polls, is one of Russia’s most popular historical figures. No small number of young people in Istanbul, where I live, proudly describe themselves as Communists; I have met such people around the world, from Seattle to Calcutta.
We rightly insisted upon total denazification; we rightly excoriate those who now attempt to revive the Nazis’ ideology. But the world exhibits a perilous failure to acknowledge the monstrous history of Communism.

Germany's impotence

I almost agree completely with Henry Ferrell on this:

Germany would like to see an economic government which mostly consisted of other countries adopting harsh fiscal retrenchment combined with extensive oversight.
This isn’t going to happen, much as some German economists might like it to. Germany simply doesn’t have the bargaining power to pull it off. Its threats to expel recalcitrant countries from EMU are now very obviously non-credible. Furthermore, Germany has just demonstrated that it is willing, however reluctantly, to bail others out if the crisis hits. So Germany is left with the unenviable realization that (a) its future economic and political fortunes are linked to EMU, but (b) it doesn’t have the leverage to force others to take measures that it sees as necessary to avoid crisis. This means that it needs carrots as well as sticks to persuade other countries to become less profligate. The only policy tool that I think Germany has is more money – and more specifically, spending money along with other rich member states in countries like Italy and Greece as a quid-pro-quo for reform of taxes, revenue-raising, labour markets and educational systems, which would make these countries more economically prosperous over the longer run, and less likely to pull Germany along with them into further crises.

The one caveat here that there may come a time when it might not be worth it for the Germans to keep on bailing other eurozone's members, which may lead them to start questioning whether the euro is a plus for them if it doesn't provide their country with any economical stability and if its costs outweigh its benefits. To put it more succinctly, Germany has no choices as long as the euro doesn't become an hindrance to the growth of its economy and as long as it considers it the only alternative to its goals to be a power in Europe and elsewhere without its recent history becoming a potent obstacle.

French consistency

Another reason to read Charlemagne:

You have to admire French consistency. Whether the right or the left is in charge, they have been pushing for exactly the same thing for years and years: a two speed Europe, and a mechanism that would force other members of the EU to raise their taxes and social costs so they no longer undercut those of France.

Well, the reason for this consistency may be that French national interest doesn't change when it comes to Europe whether the left or the right is governing.

Lib-Dems = Tories

Pic of the morning is about the political state of Britain (via). I disagree with its message for I think that Nick Clegg had no other alternative since Labour had the arrogance to believe that it was better off in the opposition to give the Brits the opportunity to realize that they are the best. Not choosing Cameron would meant choosing the political wilderness for Nick Clegg in the sake of purity, which is what political fundamentalists do usually when they are not willing to shoulder the responsibilities that come with power .There is no question that Nick Clegg's choice is risky and not the best so is politics and he took a chance to give his party the chance to become something other than the serf of  disdainful masters and his country the one to move on from Blairism (it is about time). The culprits here are Labour, the Blairites and Gordon Brown for governing and campaigning without imagination and something other than marketable and flashy humility.

I'm happy that Nick Clegg isn't François Bayrou.

Shallow decisiveness

I disagree with this:

The eurozone is bailing out a member state that has borrowed irresponsibly and seeking to counter speculative attacks on the currency. But it is doing more than altering its policy. It is also changing the nature of the ties among its members states. The creators of the euro, and not only its critics, foresaw that monetary union would ultimately require national governments to cede budgetary powers. A decisive step towards that union has now been taken. The taxpayers of the stronger states, specifically Germany, are liable for the profligacy of the weaker. This is the way that a currency union works.

The problem for the eurozone is precisely that the Greek crisis and the response of the individual states answered none of the essential questions. The focus has been on avoiding the worst and on putting the existential issues on the back burner not to add a political crisis to the economical one. In short, nothing has changed. Eurozone countries are still doing solely what's in their best interest and that reality is a problem for the euro in the long term given the fact that the interests of the members of the eurozone are going to differ a lot more in the future for the intangibles haven't changed and for there is still going to remain a big gap for example between Germany and the rest of the eurozone. 

Prime Minister Cameron

My take on the end of the British spectacle is that Labour is as gutless as the Democrats (they still are) were in 2000 when because they were tired of Gore and centrism, they let Bush come to power without putting of much of fact. Their calculation was that he would never last and that four year out of the White house with a bad American president would be beneficial to their party. My point isn't that David Cameron is George Bush, but rather that Labour had been in power for so long that it assumes that it will get back on top fast when it has burned all of its witches and Cameron has proved to be as bad a prime minister as he is a campaigner.

For different take on the election, read Massie, Sagar, and Hagley Road to Ladywood. Boy, I hope that David Cameron becomes a decent prime minister in spite of his views and makes Labour regret the day that they dismiss too casually the opportunity, one,which they didn't deserve to change history and Nick Clegg finds a way to last.

America is Greece

Interesting assertion from Paul Krugman:

Now, the complaint from the right about any effort to do anything about mass unemployment is that it’s turning America into Greece.

My only issue with Krugman's assertion is that he begs the question, which is whether there is anything that America can learn from Greece. I have the strong suspicion that there is.

Three losers

I agree with Gideon Rachman's take on the results of the British election:

But, one of the strange aspects of this election, is that - in a way - all three leaders have lost.

After all, how can one conclude that there are any winners when it is the Lib-Dem, who had less than 60 MPs, who get to make to decide who will the next prime minister, a choice that the Brits didn't/couldn't/wouldn't make. What a pitiful circus!

Fraternité to mask fear and impotence

Marc DeGirolami has a convincing rebuttal of Jean-François Copé's, the majority leader of the France's parliament, op-ed in the New York Times justifying the intent of his party to pass a law banning the burqa. Sugary excerpt:

It would be more honest of Copé simply to admit that France (like much of Europe) feels itself and its Western culture under threat by Muslims and their ways.  Copé does not want to ban the veil because he feels a fraternity with that population, or because he is acting with a view to their own "real" happiness, a happiness which they just can't see right now (oh, but they will!).  He wants to ban the veil for reasons which satisfy the French and the Belgian majorities because he wants to stigmatize what he deems to be a condemnable way of life -- to punish people whose ways of life he finds inimical to the survival of French culture. 
To put all of this in the language of "fraternity," and to claim, as Copé does, that this legislation "is aimed at no particular religion and stigmatizes no particular community," or that it is really aimed at helping his fellow man, is the worst sort of self-deluding lie.  It is doubly false.  First, Copé does not feel fraternity toward the Muslims whose practices he aims to criminalize.  He feels enmity toward them.  And second, if he really wanted to make them happy, he would let them do as they wish -- rather than imagine that he actually knows more about what their religion demands of them than they do. 

What strikes me most about the arguments used to ban the burqa is they are both illiberal and ahistorical. They glossed over the fact that throughout history liberal societies have faced greater and more legitimate threats and have never been able to resolve existential or identity issues by using laws. The most dangerous thing that the drive toward burqa's bans is highlighting is that the descendants of Voltaire and other great philosophers no longer know how to win ideological and political arguments and are therefore forced to act as if laws exist to cement identities and to stifle debate thus embracing falling the paternalistic urge to decide for their societies to remain as it is without having to convince and to teach. In short, Jean-François Copé and the others are acting as if there have never been any evolution in French and other societies and if it is solely necessary to say that the burqa is unacceptable to make it .

German trade and the eurozone

Tony Barber on German trade and  the eurozone:

(...)since Germany’s reunification in 1990, German trade has become increasingly less dependent on the rest of the eurozone.  In 1991, what is now the euro area absorbed 51.3 per cent of total German exports.  This fell to 45.1 per cent in 1998, just before the euro’s launch.  It went down again to 43.7 per cent in 2007.
German trade is less and less integrated with the rest of the eurozone in terms of imports, too.  Contrary to popular myth, the volume of imports of goods and services has expanded far more in Germany (48.1 per cent) than in France (39.5 per cent) since the euro’s debut in 1999.  But Germany is increasingly buying its imports from countries outside the euro area.
The obvious conclusion is that German businesses see ever more promising opportunities in trading with China, other Asian countries and the US than with many of their counterparts in Europe.  Why should this be so?  It comes down to the cost of rebuilding eastern Germany after reunification and the loss of competitiveness that this astronomical financial burden inflicted on German companies.  They regained international competitiveness partly by grinding down domestic labour costs, but also by turning to cheap non-European suppliers for their inputs.

This reality shows that the economies of the eurozone are very different and that those reasons, countries have therefore not only different interests, but also different objectives when it comes to the euro. The fact that Germany is less integrated in the Eurozone matters not only because it is its most populous country and its strongest economy, but also because it means that the Germans more than others cannot afford the euro to become weak even if it may help the group. In short, if the Greece crisis isn't solved and if there is any type of contagion, there is going to be more tensions between Germany and the others and more importantly a discussion about the reduction of the size of the eurozone to protect the euro.

The Greek crisis is an existential one for the euro

Quote of the day from Gilles Saint-Paul :

(...)it is somewhat disturbing that we are now asked to pour money into Greece to "save the euro" (while the British, who have no stake in the euro, are spared that burden). Besides the fact that apart from Germany, the other large Eurozone economies (France, Italy, and Spain) are barely in a better shape than Greece, and besides the moral hazard effects of the intervention, it makes little sense to prolong a monetary regime which is actually one of the reasons why those countries are in trouble.

The political ability to inspire

I disagree with Paul Sagar on this:

What gives the successful political leader his or her appeal, and thereby power, is precisely what Weber identified: the ability to inspire unquestioning belief. That neither Cameron, Clegg nor Brown presently possesses an outright lead is a testament to how little belief they inspire, and hence what poor political leaders they really are – even if Brown showed yesterday that he could have been something more.

Our times are ones where the electorate and the political and social context aren't the same as it was when Max Weber wrote  and that makes all the difference. Elections have become about glitz, television, and the ability to look and to sound good. The point isn't that Cameron, Clegg, and Brown are the best candidates to ever run for the British prime ministership; it is rather that the British electorate, as any electorate in a liberal and modern society, given the context and the times it evolves in, is looking for style that can masquerade as substance and make them feel good about who they are without requiring them to sacrifice and to make life-altering changes to their way of life.

The end of Gordon Brown

I feel probably the same as this young Brit about Gordon Brown except that it has nothing with him, but everything to do with the fact that he reminds me, and I suppose too many Brits, of the worst of Tony Blair without been able to bring something new to the table or even to remind people of why they trusted Blair for so long. Politics is unfair (via, h/t)

German nationalism and Greece

On point comment from Charlemagne on the bad press that Germany and Angela Merkel for their toughness during the Greek crisis:

To me, it is grossly unfair to say that mainstream German political debate is nationalist. It is true that German tabloids have said harsh things about Greeks in recent weeks, and leading German politicians have made intemperate remarks about throwing Greece out of the euro zone against their will. But I think this is about clashing political cultures, not a clash between one volk and another.
But for those who believe this euro crisis can only be fixed by the deep, EU-level integration of economic and budgetary policies, it is a neat intellectual trick to say that those who disagree are are acting out of nationalism, selfishness and—oh, go on—heartlessness.

It is easy to point the fingers on Germany because of recent history and the prejudices that it has created. The trouble is of course that such finger pointing is making it difficult to ask essential questions one of which is whether the EU and the IMF are actually providing permanent solutions or solely putting a bandage on a serious and existential issue to delay unavoidable and deeper adjustments and contain any possible contagion.

Keeping the Tories out and voting for the lesser of two evils

This argument from Paulinlancs arguing that people should vote for 'Labour' just to keep the Tories out shws that Labour has already lost the election:

Labour may have done bad things, but a next Labour government will not be ANYWHERE NEAR AS REMOTELY DAMAGING to us all, and especially to the working class, as a Tory government.
You don’t have to support Labour’s track record to support Labour at this election.  It’s enough to want to keep the Tories out, and the way to do that is generally to vote Labour (I accept there is a tactical voting issue in some places).  Voting for TUSC, or RESPECT, or the Greens, will not keep the Tories out.  It’s not rocket science.

The argument isn't wrong, but it is paternalistic, disrespectful to voters, and not very convincing. It argues that Gordon Brown , his record and the one of his party in power don't matter because the Tories will always be worst. It is a little bit like a student been close to failing an important exam who stops to argue to the judges that the test doesn't matter because they know who is the smarter, and exemplary student and that therefore they don't have to pay attention to anything else. The bigger point is that Gordon Brown let this election become one about change and cannot argue that change doesn't matter because it is worst than the present when he has failed to convince the Brits that he is change.  Voters don't like to hear that they don't have any choice and that they are stuck between choosing the plague and the cholera, that is between an illness that hurts them, but gives them a chance to survive and one which will kill them.

The last debate

I haven't yet had the chance to watch the last debate of the British Election for I've been back from Chicago for less than two hours. Yet, I'm not surprised to read that most analysts including Alex Massie, Jonathan Freedland, Nick Robinson and Iain Martin believe that David Cameron won for Brown has already lost, Nick Clegg is no longer looking fresh, and Cameron has been at this for too long not to know how to win a post-debate debate in the media. In any case, to the contrary of most, I don't wonder whether Cameron can't close the deal, but whether Nick Clegg will fade. I have the strong suspicion that Clegg's fate is intertwined to Brown's ability to convince traditional Labor voters not to punish his party for his inadequacies given the fact that he won't be the next prime minister and that voting for Labor therefore just means saving the furniture now that the house is gone

The markets are bad

Quote of the midday from Charlemagne:

(...) it is striking how press reporting in bits of Europe starts from the position that markets are up to no good.

America is married to Europe for the better and for the worst

Walter Mead on the Greek crisis and the fact that it affects not only on the European Union, but also America:

It is tempting and superficially agreeable for Americans to gloat about Europe’s troubles.  After all, every time something goes wrong in American domestic or economic policy, European elites and journalists are quick to gloat and find fault.  After listening to two years of stern and self righteous lectures about the ‘failure’ of the American capitalist model, many Americans who deal with the Europeans are quietly enjoying the spectacle of the smug Europeans writhing in helpless indecision and pain over the continent’s self-inflicted wounds.
But bad news for the EU is bad news for us too.  Irritating as a strong EU can be, a weak and divided Europe is much worse.  A peaceful, prosperous and geopolitically boring continent that exports tedious platitudes about global governance is a far better place than any other Europe we have seen in modern times and American national interests are in no way enhanced by economic and political instability in the Mediterranean — to say nothing of Ukraine and Turkey.
Europe’s problems end up in the American in-box.

I'm wondering whether the Greek crisis isn't a welcome one for America as long as it doesn't get out of control and doesn't last too long, but dents simply the threat that the euro has become to the dollar by making it again seem as the only safe global currency. The point that I'm making is that although the US is married to Europe, their relationship remains one where power is everything because it determines its directions, its parameters and most importantly the obligations that each party has to one another and how open the relationship can be. The weaker Europe is without being in a state of complete disarray and while remaining state, the more Obama is able to set his own agenda by focusing on Latin America and Asia without any tangible consequences.

Cameron, Clegg, Blair, and political brands

Interesting  take on the two front runners of the British elections David Cameron and Nick Glegg from the Virtual Stoa  (via):

I’ve never had much time for Cameron and Clegg, with Cameron modelling himself on Blair, and Clegg on Cameron. But what the election campaign is bringing out is the extent to which Cameron was only ever offering the most fraudulent impersonation of Blair, and that it’s because of this that the Clegg-as-Cameron strategy is working out so very nicely for the Liberal Democrats.
The reason Blair was far more successful as a centrist politician than Cameron is managing to be is that he went out of his way to humiliate the Left of his party in public as a part of his move to the right. He chose to pick fights that he really didn’t have to fight, with the result that it made it all much easier for former Conservative voters to think that it was safe to vote Labour after all.
Cameron, by contrast, has made a lot of centrist noises, and he’s done various things that the Tory headbanger tendency doesn’t much like (stuff on the website about tackling homophobic bullying in schools, running more women candidates or candidates from ethnic minorities in winnable seats, banging on about the environment, usw), but he’s never seriously tried to stage a meaningful fight with the party’s Right, to lure them out into the open, and to slap them down in public.

David Cameron is trying to impersonate Blair because he can't impersonate Thatcher without scaring everyone or rather reminding them of John Major. I believe that he has trouble taking on the right of his party because it doesn't like humiliation or even confrontation as the left of the left does because it reassures it of its intellectual superiority. As to Nick Clegg, his choice given that Labor has been governing for more than 13 years can't be to look at the left, but to rather look as David Cameron would be looking if he was sure to be the future prime minister. The goal is to make himself look not as a unsettling novelty or a risky change candidate, but as a bold, but reasonable one that would give the Brits change without taking their country back to the Eighties or to even the Blair years. In short, the point is that people like toxins in politics if they make them feel good and politicians tend to go back to what has worked before.

Spanking and the Council of Europe

Ed West on the desire of the Council of Europe to have countries ban spanking to obey the European Convention on Human Rights:

Most parents do not smack their kids, but smacking is not abuse, any more than neglecting your children’s studies, letting them get overweight, spoiling them or smoking around them is. All of those might be examples of bad parenting, but they are not abuse, and there is a fundamental and important difference. It is the crucial distinction between what is wrong and what is illegal.
In a free society, the state does not interfere in the nursery any more than it interferes in the bedroom. That the Council of Europe seeks to do so is fundamentally sinister, creepy and totalitarian, and very un-British.

For some reason, I'm not outraged about this superfluous polemic, but that's probably because I'm not a parent and because I'm still sore from all the spanking that I got when I was a child.

Bad people politics

The quote of the day is from Nick Cohen:

(...)with the possible exception of the BNP, the Lib Dems are indeed the most unscrupulous campaigners in politics, the only party to my knowledge that has taken stolen money from criminals and then refused to return it to its rightful owners. Meanwhile, you do not have to be a deranged militarist to look at the Liberal Democrat front bench and suspect that they would, if they could, leave Afghan women to the mercy of the Taliban and feel very pleased with themselves as they did it.

Another Change election

I'm disgusted by the empty and flashy word that is 'change' during political campaigns. Change i used as a way to avoid talking about substance and to camouflage troubling policies, but Jonathan Freedland is right when he reaches the following conclusion:

(...)with Nick Clegg repeating the accomplished performance of the week before – means the two largest parties now have to accept that they are in a new kind of contest from now till polling day. Any hope that normal service would be resumed has gone.
For Labour, that should prompt a radical conclusion. A government in power for 13 years cannot hope to win an election that is now all about change. Instead its best hope surely has to be to maximise its core vote to prevent a collapse into the low 20s on percentage points, a defeat even more absolute than that of 1983.

I don't see how Gordon Brown can defeat both Clegg and Cameron in an election when change is the buzz word because  everything that he does looks old and just reminds people that Labor has been in power for a long time

Britain, Europe, Brown, Cameron and Clegg

Gavin Hewitt summarizes the positions of the three main candidates to be the next prime minister of Britain

The debate came down to this: the Conservatives will resist any new powers going to Brussels. The differences between Labour and the Liberal Democrats over Europe are slight. They believe the EU delivers a string of benefits in dealing with common problems.

Something tells me that the European policy of the next prime minister will be lukewarm and careful not mater who wins because the result of his election will be too tight for the winner to ignore the fact that the Brits don't feel that warm towards Europe.The form might be different, but the substance will be the same meaning that the tone will be Thatcherian and the meat not very much different from the one of the policies of the Blair-Brown governments.

A reason to resist Nick Clegg

Chris Dillow offers reasons not to vote the Liberal Democrats and thus for Nick Clegg. The most convincing of Dillow's reasons is the following:

I have many more arguments with Labour policy, and yet I feel an instinctive fondness for the party that I don’t towards the Lib Dems.
One reason for this is that I’ve never been sure what their core principles are. At best, this reflects the tension between Orange Bookers and tofu-munching eccentrics. At worst, it’s manifested itself in a mere search for a gap in the market between the two main parties, and the tendency to tell voters on the doorstep whatever they want to hear.

It is in that sense that Nick Clegg reminds me most of Obama, you hear what you want to hear and you have to wonder what he really believes and whether there is more beef to the change candidate than cheese and air. The fact that the campaign is really short compared to the one in America helps and hurts Clegg because he has to rely solely  on image to seduce on voters by providing them with just enough substance so not as to turn them off and to convince them he is not a lightweight while offering them enough sweeties with charm to get to them to marry him even though they don't know him very well. Thus, Clegg is hoping for a coup de foudre, but the trouble with love at first sight is that the awakening can be rough and lead to a brutal separation.

UK Debate II: Gordon Brown can't win

My take on the second Britain election debate is that Gordon Brown cannot win because Nick Clegg's presence hurts him. David Cameron looked good, but I don't think he has sealed the deal but I thin that he helped by Clegg in he same way that John Edwards helped Obama during the Democratic primaries debates by reminding voters that how much they want change and that Brown is the status quo. Alex Massie has an interesting take on the debate. His conclusion is that Gordon Brown won narrowly. Massie is too close to the trees to realize that for Brown to win, he has to be better than both Cameron and Brown, Cameron only has to be better than Brown, and Clegg is the wild card for he is trying to convince the Brits to go against their history by trusting him enough to vote for him, which means remaing both fresh and steady. 

Berlusconi as a reality TV star

On point analysis from Alexander Stille on Berlusconi and the reasons for his longevity in spite of the uncountable scandals that never seem to make him unattractive to the majority of Italian voters:

Berlusconi has transformed the political life of a major nation into a kind of reality TV show in which he is star, producer, and network owner: he is the ultimate “Survivor,” who will lie and cheat to kick others off the island as well as “The Bachelor,” distributing roses to a group of beautiful young women. Consider that Berlusconi’s approval ratings are consistently higher than Barack Obama’s. As The Daily Beast pointed out recently, Obama’s TV ratings and poll numbers have gone down in lockstep as his health care legislation has been weakened and unemployment has remained high: “The fact is he had 49.5 million listeners to [his] first speech on the economy. On Medicare, he had 24 million. He’s lost his audience…. He has plunged in the polls.” Berlusconi, facing public scandals similar to those of Tiger Woods and John Edwards, has kept his audience.
Berlusconi has understood that contemporary politics is a permanent campaign. In the old days, a US president campaigned for six months and governed for three and a half years. Obama rather quaintly followed this old-fashioned model, working largely behind the scenes to promote health care and other legislation, while the Republicans held the stage, claiming that the Democratic plan imposed “death panels” and socialized medicine. Berlusconi would never have let that happen.

Another reason for Berlusconi's persistent success is the poor state of the Italian left, which has never been able to stay unified long enough to keep him out of politics. In short, Berlusconi is helped by the fact that his opposition has never been able to take advantage of his 'imperfections' and of fertile political terrains because it was too busy destroying itself.

Out of touch

I'm not a Brit, but I am still appalled by how out of touch Lord Pearson, of the United Kingdom Independence Party, is.(via) What is he doing on TV?  That's the kind of people, smart operatives keep in the background especially when there is an election going on.

New Europe as a self-satisfying delusion

Another proof that Mary Dejevsky lives in another world:

New Europe was the neat formula coined by Donald Rumsfeld in aid of the Bush administration's war effort. The "old Europeans" disliked and derided it, as it suggested that Europe was more divided over the Iraq invasion than it actually was. But they could never deny its grain of truth. There was indeed a split between those who signed up to the Bush crusade for democracy in foreign parts – not least because of their recent history – and those who saw the same campaign as a misuse of military might.
But that was then. Now that Poland and Russia are making up, East and Central Europe have lost their appetite for fighting US wars, and the Obama administration is eschewing the whole idea of special relationships, it could be time to lay this irritating concept to rest. Six years after the European Union completed its greatest single expansion, the divisions are neither as sharp nor as resentful as they were.
Even as "new" Europe blends with the old, however, could it be that a new breed of rather different "new" Europeans may be arising in that least likely of places, here in Britain? There are reasons to doubt, but suddenly, too – for us pro-European dinosaurs – to hope.

My reaction this paragraph and to Dejevsky's article is that pro-Europeans like too much the politics of hope instead of dealing with the reality, the fact that inadequate institutions and the lack of ambition, of pragmatism, of political courage and the refusal to acknowledge that countries have different interests is crippling the European Union. The point is that Eurocrats like Dejevksy like fantasies, grand ideas because they make them what I'm started to believe they like to be: optimistic dreamers instead of being builders and leaders. It seems clear to me that Dejevsky is enamored with the idea of "new Europeans"  who will do what their elders couldn't  because it is an empty dream that doesn't cost her anything or rather require nothing more than hopefulness. Ah, if life were that easy, I would have already capitulated to Obamania!

Europe hearts Nick Clegg

Pertinent assertion from Tony Barber:

(...) as Clegg rides high in the polls, Europe has a big beaming smile on its face - but it is doing its best to hide it, for fear that British voters spot it and punish Clegg accordingly.

I wonder if all this focus on Nick Clegg isn't going to halt his improbable march to Downing Street.

Nick Clegg as the new Princess Di

Interesting stuff from Iain Martin on the new hysteria around Nick Clegg:

But similarly to Diana, hailing from the English aristocracy, Clegg is a creation of the political class he wants to shake up. Remember, Clegg is a professional politician who, after Westminster and Cambridge, was schooled by the Brussels elite. He then became an MEP and an MP. He is a rebel only in that he wants to smash the system and rebuild it so that it operates in his favor, but he has much in common with the opponents he attacks.
Like Diana in death, Clegg is now also beyond criticism — which entrenches his new popularity. The two leaders of the main parties are petrified of being seen as being unfair to “Nick.” They fear looking mean and out of step with these dramatic shifts in public opinion. If they attack him directly, they vindicate his claim that the two big parties are scared of their duopoly being challenged and are getting desperate. If they treat him with more respect, he continues to grow in stature.
In a sense, however, it’s not really about Nick Clegg — charming bloke though he is. He got himself, brilliantly, in the right place at the right time. But he’s just the vehicle.

For some reasons, the more I read articles comparing Clegg to Princess Di to make the point that he is a lightweight or no worthy to be prime minister, the more I hope that he win because it is transforming the British election into a pop event since politics, substance seem to be overlook by the fluff and he anxiety of he many over why might happened if Nick Clegg happened.

Sarkozy and Lady Ashton

Funny and indicative of the problems with the structure of the European Union r rather of the lack of power of 'Europe's foreign minister':

Europe's under fire foreign minister Catherine Ashton has today denied that she was given a stern lecture in how to do her job by Nicolas Sarkozy.
The French president was said to have grilled Lady Ashton, a Labour Party peer whom many consider woefully unqualified for her job, at a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris.
To add insult to injury, most of the dressing down was said to be in French - a language which Lady Ashton has frequently been criticised for not being able to speak very well.

I for one don't Lady Ashton's denials. Sarkozy is too much in a bad mood to resist the temptations to scold, to say things with finesse, somebody who is more impopular and weaker than him.

The implausibility of Eurabia

Riveting stuff from Eric Kaufmann on Europe and the unlikelihood for it to have a Muslim majority in the next two centuries:

I don’t foresee a Muslim-majority Europe in this century or in the next. Why? Mainly because Muslim birthrates are plunging both in Europe and the Muslim world. Already, Iran, Tunisia, Turkey, Azerbaijan and several other Muslim countries have replacement-level fertility or below. In the UK, Bangladeshi and Pakistani fertility has halved in a generation and is now under 3 children per woman. This means their long-term growth will begin to tail off. The other part of the equation is the rise of non-Muslim immigrant groups (African and West Indian Christians, Hindus, Buddhists and other Eastern faiths) who are also increasing and therefore making Europe more plural and, in the process, rendering it harder for Muslims to increase their share of the population.

I'm not sure that this information will reassure either Mark Steyn or Christopher Caldwell because their belief in Eurabia has become a question of faith and history shows that it is fruitless to reason with the fanatics.