Peace for our Time II.
Posted on 11/17/2011 9:17:26 PM PST by DeaconBenjamin
Germany has drawn up secret plans to prevent a British referendum on the overhaul of the European Union amid concerns it could derail the eurozone rescue package.
German chancellor Angela Merkel is expected to tell David Cameron that Britain does not need a referendum on EU treaty changes, despite demands from senior Conservatives for more powers to be repatriated to Britain.
The leaked memo, written by the German foreign office, discloses radical plans for an intrusive new European body that can take over the economies of beleaguered eurozone countries.
Germany is also preparing for other European countries, which are too large to be bailed out, to default on their debts. German plans to deal with the eurozone crisis may involve erosion of national sovereignty that pave the way for a European “superstate” with its own tax and spending plans set in Brussels.
Britain would be in a new outer group of EU members who are not in the Euro. Mr Cameron will travel to Brussels and Berlin for negotiations with Mrs Merkel amid growing disagreement over how to deal with the eurozone.
The Prime Minister is exasperated by German refusal to provide more financial help for Italy and other struggling countries amid concerns that the crisis is having a “chilling effect” on the British economy. Mrs Merkel yesterday said she expected Mr Cameron to “examine a stronger involvement with other countries” once the eurozone crisis had been resolved.
The eurozone contagion is threatening to spread to Spain and France. Yesterday, the price of Spanish government borrowing reached the “brink” of crisis.
Amid protests in Milan and Turin, Mario Monti, Italy’s unelected “technocrat” prime minister unveiled sweeping austerity reforms. Mr Monti warned that a break-up of the single currency would take eurozone economies “back to the 1950s” in terms of wealth.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Hey Monty...try "back to 1950's spending" instead.
dire.
German Chancellor trying to boss around the British Prime Minister . . . what was that movie called again?
Peace for our Time II.
Cameron is a wuss. He should order a referendum just to spit the Germans.
It may come sooner or later, the Germans might be able to arrest the fall for a short time, things will possibly get better once the recessions ends and people will forget... but long term this Euro dream will end.
The Germans can't force the cultures of Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain to conform to her value system. This is in reality a “cultural” issue. Everything South of the Alps is a lost cause. Eventually this will implode on itself if not today, then in 20-30 years.
Southern Europe will revolt and go its own way. The only way the EU Commissars can impose iron-fisted rule from Brussels is to suspend democracy throughout the European Union. EU bureaucrats have to destroy Europe in order to save the vaunted Euro.
needing a vote and voice in a organisation just to say no to most things while threatening to leave while not really wanting to leave because of the negative economic effects has always been a difficult position for the prime minister but now it is a mess.
The situation has changed and now Cameron may find himself in a situation where Merkel might say then leave and good luck at all i have real problems to solve.
The last thing a brisith PM needs is a honest debate about that where reality faces emotions economic leaders the average people and a conservative PM who would need to declare himself.
The UK needs to leave the EU or traditional British freedoms - like the right of the British people to choose their own Government will be lost forever. Don’t think that what the EU pulled off in Athens and Rome can’t happen in London. It and can and will if nothing is done to stop the loss of national sovereignty among Europe’s nations to Brussels. The writing is now on the wall.
Wait, this asshat is "exasperated" because Germany does not want to bail out Italy in order to make things easier in Britain? WTF?
Greater European Co-Prosperity Area - The last time this was tried it all ended badly.
A referendum about leaving the EU will create a very painful debate and will show the real mess the UK is in since 1973.
You have a clear opinion congratulations but the last thing Mr. Cameron wants and needs is to be forced to to the same.
The difference is to the last 40 years is that the situation is serious today that nobody within the Eurozone will give a ... about the special british situation.
So the fear is that at some point Cameron will be forced to make a clear and ugly decision.
britain’s getting bitch-slapped by the continent.
Which actually could be a good thing to make room for an anti-socialist party in Germany. But Merkel's on a political suicide mission.
The moochers will try to hang on too, because after all they want to keep milking that cow. Germany as France will try to float their Euro and want them in too because after all this is about open markets, volume of markets, harmonization of rules and taxes etc. They don't want to see this sink.
Unlike NAFTA, the Euro’s went to a complete integration (typical with their way of thinking - centralize everything and have a bureaucrat and government administer it) and this simply does not work may in be China, the former Soviet Union... Culture/history matters and Europe may want to deny it, but if the controlling mechanisms were removed, the Serbs would start wiping out the Bosnians tomorrow. It's simply a big lie held together by smoothing things over, denial/suppression/ignoring, and compromise. But the Greeks will be the Greeks even if they use a Euro as their currency. For example: http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2010/results Will giving them a Euro as their money make them less corrupt? How about if they sign some agreement or contract?/sarc When they formed their Euro zone they never really considered the impact of culture and simply plowed forward with some pan European dream where they were going to push every other nation into the square German hole, buying them off along the way, which ain't gonna work. They all want the benefits like every social welfare recipient does, but no one wants to pay the price or really change who they are and how they do business, and that's why it will fail. But the Germans are stubborn and stoic, so they will fight this out till the bitter end, because “cutting your losses” is not something they are good at doing.
The Euro’s would have been smarter had they formed a smaller but more viable economic zone where you have greater cultural ties, rather than grow this beast into something unmanageable with highly diverse cultures.
Britain today smells like roses compared to the rest of Europe because of their more conservative stance and not adopting the Euro. Years past they were mocked and made fun of for NOT going to a Euro, by staying a little bit on the sidelines as the rest of Europe headstrong drove with full force into this Euro and complete economic codependent harmonized/integrated market with one currency, Brussels being the centralized power etc etc etc.
No one will of course today come out and say that maybe their caution was prudent, but it was.
Here’s the real question and NO ONE is asking this.
Will any agreement, some contract, speech or special aid package really change how a nation like Greece, Italy, Spain or Portugal operate both as a government and all the way down to the individual?
Truth is, the same problems they have today are issues that were there when the Italians had their Lira, the Greeks their Drachma and the Spaniards their Peseta.
The answer is obvious. So the rest is simply eyewash and more smoothing over, denial, etc...
These problems simply come to light when you have economic hard times because the shell games politicians and big central banks play work when economies are roaring.
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