Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Valmy]

& that's why it, like TPP, will fail.

Huh? TPP doesn't involve Euros.

[Zanza]

How does the American constitution regulate a case where the federal government would like to do a treaty on something that is not covered by the powers invested into US congress, but rather lies with the several states?

It doesn't happen.  The treaty power is conferred on the federal government, and the federal government can enact enabling legislation even if it would normally be outside the competence of the federal government (because it is "necessary and proper" to the treaty).  In addition, Congress has the power to regulate international commerce, which is interpreted broadly as basically anything that impinges or relates to such commerce.

Okay, the "necessary and proper" clause is obviously not part of the Lisbon Treaty. That's a massive difference between the reach of federal power in the US and EU.

[Valmy]

The EU is not a federation, it is a confederation. So they have to do everything all Swiss-like.

[Josquius]

The EU is not a federation, it is a confederation. So they have to do everything all Swiss-like.

Switzerland is a fairly decent comparison actually, since you've cantons the size of small towns alongside major cities and their hinterlands.
The Swiss work on a double majority with their cantons though, one can't block everything.


One thing that particularly annoys me about this Belgium blocking the free trade treaty thing, is that in the run up to the referendum the Brexiters kept trotting out the bullshit that Europe could force Britain to do things we didn't want and we had no say in it. That if everyone voted against us (which they do all the time in the mind of the Kippers) we'd be screwed.
.....and now they are using this recent incident as an example of the EU being crap because Belgium can just suddenly veto something.
The logical dissonance drives me nuts.

& that's why it, like TPP, will fail.

Huh? TPP doesn't involve Euros.

Guess he means TTIP. Way too similar acronym.
Which is definitely going to fail. The UK were the main ones wanting it - though again UKIP played their disgusting false flag games to trick idiots into thinking it was something being forced onto us and it would mean the NHS would be privatised and all sorts of rubbish

[Admiral Yi]

Blows my mind that Heathrow only has two runways.

[Zanza]

The EU is not a federation, it is a confederation. So they have to do everything all Swiss-like.

It's not a confederation either. In Facebook terms, you would select "It's complicated" to describe it. 

The classification of the EU in terms of international or constitutional law has been much debated. It began life as an international organisation and gradually developed into a confederation of states. However, since the mid-1960s it has also added several of the key attributes of a federation, such as the direct effect of the law of the general level of government upon the individual[77] and majority voting in the decision-making process of the general level of government,[78] without becoming a federation per se. Scholars thus today see it as an intermediate form lying between a confederation and a federation, being an instance of neither political structure.[79] For this reason, the organisation is termed sui generis (incomparable, one of a kind),[80] although some argue that this designation is no longer valid.[81][82]

The organisation has traditionally used the terms "Community" and later "Union" to describe itself. The difficulties of classification involve the difference between national law (where the subjects of the law include natural persons and corporations) and international law (where the subjects include sovereign states and international organisations). They can also be seen in the light of differing European and American constitutional traditions.[81] Especially in terms of the European tradition, the term federation is equated with a sovereign federal state in international law; so the EU cannot be called a federation — at least, not without qualification. It is, however, described as being based on a federal model or federal in nature; and so it may be appropriate to consider it a federal union of states, a conceptual structure lying between the confederation of states and the federal state.[83] The German Constitutional Court refers to the EU as a Staatenverbund, an intermediate structure between the Staatenbund (confederation of states) and the Bundesstaat (federal state), consistent with this concept.[84] This may be a long-lived political form. Professor Andrew Moravcsik claims that the EU is unlikely to develop further into a federal state, but instead has reached maturity as a constitutional system.[85]

[Hamilcar]

The EU is not a federation, it is a confederation. So they have to do everything all Swiss-like.

Switzerland is a fairly decent comparison actually, since you've cantons the size of small towns alongside major cities and their hinterlands.
The Swiss work on a double majority with their cantons though, one can't block everything.

Spot on. There are many ways in which minority opinions and constituencies are protected, but there are no vetoes.

[Zanza]

I don't really know enough about Switzerland but I think the EU is more comparable with the pre-1848 Switzerland then the modern federal state.

[The Minsky Moment]

The EU is not a federation, it is a confederation. So they have to do everything all Swiss-like.

It's not a confederation either. In Facebook terms, you would select "It's complicated" to describe it. 

Because it is a transitional design that was intended to become a federal structure, but didn't.

[derspiess]

Blows my mind that Heathrow only has two runways.

With the goddamned fees and taxes you pay there oughtta be 40.

[derspiess]

Made it on to a plane.  ITS HAPPENING

[garbon]

Next we hear he got on a plane to Lesotho.

[mongers]

Next we hear he got on a plane to Lesotho.

[derspiess]

At least there, they know how to treat women right.

[/derspiess]

[CountDeMoney]

despeiss is going to come back with a souvenir snow globe from his ritual circumcision.

[derspiess]

FACT: I can pronounce "Lesotho" properly. Fact.

We also lost satellite TV once we got over Nova Scotia so I can't watch the World Series