Kev, we know what it means to lose control over crucial areas of the state. It happened here under your hero’s (anti)democratic government.

Fordism – the age of mass production.
Post-Fordism – the age of customisation.

Phew! Thank god there’s Kev in Brussels to save us.

Joseph, I agree with you. Kev also avoids to talk about cases like Britain, which did not join the Euro (and I am not saying it should – I have no view). Although they “kept control” over their money supply, they have run huge deficits (thanks to an incompetent or politically dishonest Labour government), have an unbalanced economy (did Kev joke about industry) and are in a deep financial mess. They too have applied QE, which Kev is so much against. And they are running a high inflation. And my view is that in the early part of the 2000s right up to about 2007, they did not maintain any control over the money supply – perhaps for reasons of political convenience.

Kev I try really hard but just cannot manage to read through your fatalistic hogwash on the EU, which is hinged on a grave injustice to collective memory when you say

” we’ve gone totally parochial and people do not even understand what it means to lose control over crucial areas of the State, let alone losing control of their money supply”

People who lived between 1971 and 1987 know exactly what that means even though individuals like youselves try hard to erase that from history!

The EU is not a panacea as no other state is but, drawing some conclusions from comaprtive political development theories will make it stand out for what it achieved in its relatively VERY short history!

Ciccio – I repeat: the EU Constitution and the Lisbon treaty are the same thing. The amendments have since been incorporated into the existing treaties. Today, the volume reads just like the EU Constitution, save the flag, anthem and foreign minister by another name. I know this well enough because I worked extensively on both treaties.

You’re the victim of the usual deception, Ciccio. Tibzax, there are far greater lies standing as pillars of truth. They get away with it because the attention span of the masses is no greater than that of humming bird. They can also count on the corporate media to parrot the lies of governments and supranational institutions in matters that do not fall in the red-blue scuffling pit that stands for ‘democracy’ (e.g., the CO2 scam, a.k.a. the Global Governance Tax… and other ‘conspioracy theories’, such as the conspiracy to sell the Lisbon treaty as if it were a revised EU Constitution).

I think it refers to Henry Ford the car-maker. Perhaps Joseph Muscat will be talking about the car-free day.

Kev, I am aware of what you are saying about the similarity of amendments.

But as far as I understand, the Lisbon Treaty was a fragmented process, which modified existing treaties, so that, as far as I understand, the result was not a clear set of principles.

I believe I had read that this may have been done deliberately, and that consequently, the Lisbon Treaty creates an unconstitutional set of principles (exclamation mark) because it is actually unreadable (more exclamation marks).

In that process, real leadership had been lost. A clear document was not created, and therefore, my perception is that Europe lacks a constitution, which to me means more than the term “treaty.”

I have to add that this does not mean that I am in agreement with the content of the EU constitution (I had only read small parts of it). But that would be a platform to build on.

John, although your observation is right from a historical context, you refer to something that happened 150 years ago and incidentally happened on what I would see as a disagreement on constitution fundamentals – particularly, on slavery.

I am really talking about living memory. My observation, to which you refer, was in fact a question, and I cannot exclude anything. But, in my life, I do not remember anyone ever talking about any states threatening to leave, but, that does not mean that I am not subject to correction. As far as I am aware, there is current agreement in the US on the present constitution.