Comments for Super Commuter

Comment on The year in pictures by cecelia

cecelia — Sat, 04 May 2013 07:05:03 +0000

sorry – while I generally approve of the use of art to remind us of common values and identity – the EU is an elite project which as we have clearly seen – does not benefit the people of Europe. So since their propaganda of “the EU brought you peace” and the “EU brings you prosperity” has failed – let’s try to con the peons by selling them the idea that we are united by a common artistic sensibility. Frankly – if the EU wants to sell an image – how about using this money to get a plan for job creation going? I suspect that would do more for the EU’s image.

Comment on The year in pictures by Pat

Pat — Fri, 03 May 2013 10:19:06 +0000

Perfect blog piece for a lazy, long weekend in the sun. tks!

Comment on The year in pictures by Steve Van Veen

Steve Van Veen — Fri, 03 May 2013 09:20:29 +0000

Hi Roderick, I don’t normally comment, but I did like this. I think I’d usually be sceptical about the need for a more cultural EU, and definitely about this project for a new narrative, but then I enjoyed the pictures and take your point…

Comment on Grounds for a European global strategy by Hilda

Hilda — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 22:33:31 +0000

Noam Chomsky call this book “Economics in real world.” Book was written by Korean profesor of economics at Oxford Mr Chang: Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism.

You will not miss money for this book, or money back guarantee. He explains everything about globalization and Unholy Trinity: WTO,IMF and World bank.

Look at car. You have car broken but you do not undrestand how system worx. So you must call mechanic to fix it. We all thing, even professor Chang in the book said couple times how he was mislead while study, that we know because they tought us in school. Wrong. They just tought us everything what is good for them to keep status quo.

Comment on Grounds for a European global strategy by jon livesey

jon livesey — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 20:40:08 +0000

This is an interesting analysis of the raison d’etre of the EU, but it really illustrates how many begged questions lurk inside the EU. It also illustrates the difference between saying something exists “to” do this, that and the other, and the question whether it actually *can* do those things.

For example: “…it was again the EU that provided the means for Europeans to accommodate newly-independent eastern states in the form of enlargement and neighbourhood policy.”

Well, haven’t we been here before? When the Russian and Austrian Empires collapsed in 1917-18 a host of new small independent countries appeared, and the League of Nations was set up to “accomodate” them, but within 20 years the big beasts started to move in the forest and one by one they were swallowed up.

And what’s that, you say? the League proved incapable of defending its members? OK, and you think the EU can?

So maybe we’d better stay away from Grand Strategy and concentrate on trade policy, where the EU is going to present the World with a “Gold Standard”.

Well, in the first place, this supposed Gold Standard gets trade all mixed up with some sort of federalist slop. I don’t think we want to aim for a World in which trading with Korea encourages Korea to try to set your food standards or work week.

But perhaps more important, the EU is busy inventing wheels that were invented long ago. The WTO already exists, and is sometimes successful in achieving trading round agreements.

Of course the WTO is sometimes not successful, but do we imagine that if all the main trading countries can’t agree to a trade round sitting in the same room, somehow the EU will inspire them to be more reasonable by its own example? Wouldn’t that require the EU itself to be a bit reasonable?

Comment on Grounds for a European global strategy by Marc

Marc — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 20:09:55 +0000

As long as the French are clinging to the outdated CAP, don’t expect any change from the Eurosoviet Union.

Comment on Island fever by Calvin

Calvin — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 16:22:12 +0000

The supporters of the EU have never properly understood the concept of patriotism, the nation state or allegiance to local democracy. The only view that matters is what flag/country the islanders want and they overwhelmingly want nothing whatsoever to do with Argentina. The people that want a USE seem to think that flags are interchangeable or ‘it doesn’t matter’ and the arrogance of that view is largely why a united states of Europe will never happen.

Comment on Island fever by Calvin

Calvin — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 16:14:37 +0000

The Malvinas/Falklands are called what the people living there want to call them and they overwhelmingly want to stay under UK rather than argentine governance. The same is true of the Gibraltar. Northern Ireland is the one interesting one because the view is split between the population, thus the decades of armed conflict.

Comment on Island fever by Alan

Alan — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 13:38:48 +0000

Forget “Malvinas”, the Falkland Islands do not belong to Argentina, they never have, and probably never will. Likewise, they do not belong to England, nor to the U.K. but they are under protection as Margaret Thatcher so courageously proved. The people who live there are the true owners, and have the absolute right to decide for themselves to whom they will be allied.

Comment on Island fever by John Hickman

John Hickman — Sat, 29 Dec 2012 16:14:48 +0000

The Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese and Filipinos are not making warlike gestures at one another because the islands at issue are tax havens. They are focused on what the islands mean for relative power in the region and on the exploitable hydrovarbons around the islands.