Srsly.
They make fun of Gay people or something?
And if you kick them out they'll keep trying to sneak into canada, so please don't.
Quote from: HVC on October 08, 2009, 04:55:06 PM
They make fun of Gay people or something?
And if you kick them out they'll keep trying to sneak into canada, so please don't.
No, their fucking retard of a President is making problems with signing the Lisbon treaty that was already ratified by the Czech Parliament.
At least Czechs are now taking over Poland as the "village idiot of the EU".
I was just going to make a thread on the EU treaty.
But a better thought out one than this.
Will it ever be passed?
The stupid Brits will doubtlessly vote for the Tories then vote no on it thus dooming the EU to forever being the incompetant, bureocratic mess they so hate.
Quote from: Martinus on October 08, 2009, 04:56:38 PM
Quote from: HVC on October 08, 2009, 04:55:06 PM
They make fun of Gay people or something?
And if you kick them out they'll keep trying to sneak into canada, so please don't.
No, their fucking retard of a President is making problems with signing the Lisbon treaty that was already ratified by the Czech Parliament.
At least Czechs are now taking over Poland as the "village idiot of the EU".
Is there something new?
Last I heard he was holding off until the Court challenge was resolved, but since everybody thought that the Court challenge would fail he would be signing it by Christmas.
I confess that I was deeply disappointed by this news, but a quick google hasn't revealed any change to this timetable that I can see.
Quote from: Tyr on October 08, 2009, 04:56:55 PM
I was just going to make a thread on the EU treaty.
But a better thought out one than this.
Will it ever be passed?
The stupid Brits will doubtlessly vote for the Tories then vote no on it thus dooming the EU to forever being the incompetant, bureocratic mess they so hate.
Maybe they will actually be forced to come up with a Treaty in accord with the Laeken declaration, where this latest round of Euro-creep began?
Don't worry, I'm not mad enough to believe that!!!
Besides, once the Czechs and the Poles ratify, Cameron will be boxed in. He'll have no choice but to use the "Out" he's left himself and scrap any ideas of a referendum. Damn him.
I wouldn't blame the entire country for one enormous jackass, even if he is the head of state.
It's been a good 60 years since you Eurotards had a good war, and it's beginning to show.
David Cameron is going to love this. This saves him from actually having to split his party on this issue.
Poland still has Martinus, and is thus the worst. By far.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1217950/So-Ireland-votes-yes-Lisbon-treaty-1000-years-history-ends-like-this.html
QuoteSo our 1,000 years of history ends like this
The creation of a European superstate has moved a step closer, after the Irish people voted to accept the Lisbon Treaty, paving the way for a powerful new President of Europe.
In a result greeted with relief in Downing Street and dismay in the Tory Party, more than two-thirds of the Irish electorate voted Yes in the country's second referendum on the treaty.
The ballot, hailed by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso as 'a great day for Ireland and for Europe', followed a frantic campaign by pro-Europeans to reverse Ireland's overwhelming No vote last year. Now, only Poland and the Czech Republic of the EU's 27 countries have yet to approve it.
Critics say the treaty, which aims to 'streamline' EU institutions to mimic the functions of a nation state, represents the biggest threat to British sovereignty since the invasion of William the Conqueror in 1066.
Tony Blair is strongly tipped to be anointed as the new European President, possibly within weeks, creating a headache for David Cameron as he heads to Manchester for his party conference.
The Conservative leader says a Tory Government would hold a British referendum on the treaty if it had not been fully ratified when the party came to power, but refuses to be drawn on what its position would be if the treaty was already in force.
Here Peter Hitchens looks at why the Irish changed their minds and considers the threat the new European superstate presents to Britain...
Frightened for their jobs, no longer confident in their ability to govern themselves, the Irish finally surrender to Europe. But at least they were allowed a vote
By Peter Hitchens In Dublin
So, out of the smog of dishonesty that has long concealed it, we at last see the true shape of the thing that threatens us.
A great grey Tower of Babel reaches up into the sky over Europe, lopsided, full of cracks and likely to collapse in the fullness of time. But unlike the mythical original, it is complete – even though its builders neither understand nor particularly like each other.
The new European State finally exists and has given itself life – life of a rather Frankenstein sort, but life all the same.
It no longer needs to ask the permission of its member states to act. Ireland, for instance, will no longer be able even to hold a referendum on increased EU central powers.
It has what is called a 'legal personality', so will not need to make future changes by treaty but by acting as the superstate it now is.
Increasingly, the provinces of Europe, which until today were countries, will need its permission to exist at all.
That passport you hold is not British, but European. You are a European citizen. British Embassies abroad are European Embassies - as they already show by flying the EU's meaningless and tasteless blue and yellow dishcloth.
Shouldn't somebody have pointed out that in the recent history of the Continent, yellow stars call up only one dismal image, the mass murder of Europe's Jews?
Anthony Blair, who wrecked his own political party and irreparably damaged Britain in the pursuit of global ideals, is considered a fit person to be the appointed President of this strange new superpower, precisely because he is unfit to lead his own country.
David Cameron claims that he is somehow able to exempt Britain from all these forces by holding a referendum on a treaty this country has already ratified.
But what will he do if we vote 'No'? Does he think we are not subject to the forces that have compelled Ireland to hold the poll again?
Amid all the fuss about London's grandiose new Supreme Court, nobody has seen fit to mention that Britain's real Supreme Court, the European Court of Justice – now sits in Luxembourg.
For most of its members, accustomed to dictatorship, partition, subjugation, occupation, invasion and domination by bigger neighbours, this sort of thing will be familiar. In many ways it will be preferable.
In living memory, their frontier posts were demolished by sneering soldiers and their capitals forced to watch parades of other people's tanks.
Now, the same frontier barriers are dismantled by unequal treaties, and their currencies replaced by the euro. Nobody dies, though much is lost.
For Britain, Europe's oldest continuously independent sovereign state, it is entirely different. It is the end of 1,000 years of history, as predicted by the Labour leader Hugh Gaitskell as long ago as 1962.
What about Ireland, which still lovingly and proudly preserves the bullet marks on Dublin buildings from the Easter Rising against British rule in 1916? How strange that the last gasp of national sovereignty should happen in this odd, quiet way on a wet and windy morning, here of all places.
With a national sigh of resignation, the Irish people have said not so much 'Yes!' as 'Oh, very well then, if you absolutely insist' to their absorption in the strangest empire the world has ever seen.
It is a realm without a throne, ruled by stifling regulation and dull secret committees rather than by a crowned despot. It is supposedly a club of happy equals but actually dominated by a single great power – Germany – whose importance nobody dares to mention, precisely because it is so important.
It is fitting, in a way, that it should be Ireland, which long defined itself as a nation of rebels against its mighty neighbour, that should have held out to the end.
This was never because Ireland's current generation of leaders wanted a fight. On the contrary, the Irish political class sprawls luxuriously on great cushions of Euro-money and have long enjoyed their status as the favoured pet of Brussels.
It is only because of the Republic's cunningly drafted and thrillingly fair constitution that the people of Ireland have been allowed to vote on the matter at all.
And I think it true to say that the first vote, when they said 'No' 15 months ago, expressed the real opinion of the Irish people, who have never liked being pushed around by outsiders.
Remember that they did so in spite of the fact that the entire political establishment and the huge bulk of the Irish media were hot for a 'Yes' vote.
Rather enjoyably, but quite consistently, the anti-British militants of Sinn Fein were among the few organisations who argued for 'No'.
After all, why go to such lengths to expel the British Crown, only to end up as a remote and bought-off province under the Crown of Charlemagne?
At least the British, for all their faults, were actually interested in Ireland, share a language and a culture and much of their history.
In the EU, Ireland – no longer a Tiger – takes its place alongside Slovenia and Lithuania as a quirky, minor possession on the damp and unvisited fringes of the Continent, with almost no voting power.
Shorn – as it is now – of its ability to get in the way, it may find that the flow of subsidies will become much thinner in years to come.
The 'Yes' campaign has been based, blatantly, on a call to cling to nurse, for fear of finding something even worse. And with reason. Ireland's economic crisis is so bad that they envy Britain's relatively solvent state.
Without EU help, they would be worse off than Iceland. And they know it.
Even with EU help, the public sector is unsustainable, overspending by £20billion a year, and the private sector shrivelling in the blast of bankruptcy and negative equity.
Last week, when Marks & Spencer advertised in Dublin for short-term Christmas staff, an enormous queue of respectable, well-dressed and quietly desperate people formed outside the hiring office.
Slogans such as 'Vote Yes for jobs', plastered all over the city, conceal a deeper message that Ireland no longer believes two things.
One, it no longer believes that it can govern its own economy and take responsibility for ensuring its own people have jobs; and two, it no longer values its independence so highly that it is prepared to suffer for it – as it certainly was in the thin, cold pinched days of the Twenties and Thirties.
The ideal of a very Irish, very Catholic state, proudly separate and honestly poor, no longer appeals in the era of Sex And The City.
I suspect a lot of people share the view of Fionnuala Maher, who told the Irish Times that she remembered Ireland before it joined the EU in 1973. 'It was a terrible place,' she said. 'If we don't have Europe, we don't have a bloody hope.'
For such people, the EU is completely identified with the personal liberation and individualism that in Britain is linked with the Sixties cultural revolution.
That may be a mistake. The ascent of the EU happened to coincide with several decades of unheard-of prosperity and growth. But the EU did not cause that prosperity, though it claims to have done so.
It was based on American Marshall Aid and helped along by American and British willingness to spend heavily on defending Europe against the USSR, while most of the EU nations kept their military budgets small.
The EU also cannot guarantee that Europe's prosperity will go on forever. With so many member nations, many of them devastated by decades of Marxist misrule, its capacity to hand out subsidies is running out.
The credit crisis has not finished yet, Western Europe is fast running out of its own energy supplies and the shift of economic power to the Far East is speeding up, not stopping.
The European nations have not worked out how to deal with the enormous Muslim minorities which they have encouraged to settle on their territory and which increasingly demand the right to live according to their traditions.
Nor can they stop the slide of the manufacturing industry towards the regions where labour is cheapest.
Germany, still in a sort of post-traumatic shock over the cost of absorbing the Communist East, may not forever be willing to share a currency – and so a joint bank account – with the poorer and less well-run nations of the Eurozone.
The remnants of Yugoslavia are turning out to be much harder to absorb than anyone thought. Russia, sick of being pushed around, has made it aggressively clear that it wants no more Western interference along its borders, and will bite hard if crossed. Turkey, fobbed off for decades with promises of membership, may turn very nasty indeed if – as is likely – the pledge is broken.
The moment of political unity, schemed for since the Rome Treaty in 1957, comes just as all the old problems of the European Continent, economic, political, religious and social, begin to re-emerge in new and tricky shapes.
We in Britain, like Ireland, have constantly been warned that by staying out we would miss the European train – always depicted as a luxury express bound for a pleasant destination and more or less under our control.
Now, as the whistle blows, the doors are locked and the Eurotrain at last jolts out of the station, we look around us and see threadbare seats and through grimy windows glimpse an unfamiliar and unpleasant landscape, and when we ask where we are going, the crew tell us that from now on, that is their business, not ours.
:bowler:
Quote1,000 years of history ends like this
One could only hope so, for what a horrid, violent and nasty 1000 years it has been.
Particularly rich to see the Daily Mail, of all publications, romanticizing the Easter Rising.
I must admit, given Sinn Fein's completely understandable attitude, that I have never been able to comprehend the SNP's European policy. Why are they so hot for an "independence" they intend to give away the next day?
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on October 08, 2009, 05:40:58 PM
Quote1,000 years of history ends like this
One could only hope so, for what a horrid, violent and nasty 1000 years it has been.
Particularly rich to see the Daily Mail, of all publications, romanticizing the Easter Rising.
Wait, what is this ending? What happened 1,000 years ago?
Quote from: Zanza on October 08, 2009, 05:33:06 PM
Quote
At least the British, for all their faults, were actually interested in Ireland, share a language and a culture and much of their history.
:lmfao:
I wonder if the Mail will have the balls to print that article in the
Oirish edition of their rag.
I'm now even happier to have voted yes than I was already.
Quote from: Cerr on October 08, 2009, 06:33:05 PM
:lmfao:
I wonder if the Mail will have the balls to print that article in the Oirish edition of their rag.
Why?
Its true.
Hell, the Irish love to make a big song and dance over their thousand year rule by the evil English.
Quote from: Tyr on October 08, 2009, 06:45:24 PM
Quote from: Cerr on October 08, 2009, 06:33:05 PM
:lmfao:
I wonder if the Mail will have the balls to print that article in the Oirish edition of their rag.
Why?
Its true.
Hell, the Irish love to make a big song and dance over their thousand year rule by the evil English.
I didn't know the English spoke Gaelic.
Quote from: Agelastus on October 08, 2009, 05:42:14 PM
I must admit, given Sinn Fein's completely understandable attitude, that I have never been able to comprehend the SNP's European policy. Why are they so hot for an "independence" they intend to give away the next day?
Scottish nationalism is based entirely on watching Braveheart. They hate England with all their hearts, but they need a real country to pay for their laziness.
Really, it's similar to the modern Irish, who don't appreciate that every good thing about their country is because of England and English rule.
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on October 08, 2009, 05:11:28 PM
I wouldn't blame the entire country for one enormous jackass, even if he is the head of state.
You ain't kidding. :D
Quote from: Razgovory on October 08, 2009, 06:55:23 PM
I didn't know the English spoke Gaelic.
We don't.
Neither do a majority of the Irish.
QuoteIrish is the main community and household language of 3% of the Republic's population (which was estimated at 4,422,100 in 2008). Estimates of fully native speakers range from 40,000 up to 80,000 people. Areas in which the language remains the vernacular are referred to as Gaeltacht areas. The Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs estimated in 2007 that about 17,000 people lived in strongly Irish-speaking communities, about 10,000 people lived in areas where there was substantial use of the language, and 17,000 people lived in "weak" Gaeltacht communities; Irish was no longer the main community language in the remaining parts of the official Gaeltacht. However, since Irish is an obligatory subject in schools, many more are reasonably fluent second-language speakers. Furthermore, a much larger number regard themselves as competent in the language to some degree: 1,656,790 (41.9% of the total population aged three years and over) regard themselves as competent Irish speakers. Of these, 538,283 (32.5%) speak Irish on a daily basis (taking into account both native speakers and those inside the education system), 97,089 (5.9%) weekly, 581,574 (35.1%) less often, and 412,846 (24.9%) never. 26,998 (1.6%) respondents did not state how often they spoke Irish. Complete or functional monolingualism of Irish is now restricted to a handful of elderly within more isolated Gaeltacht regions as well as among many mother-tongue speakers of Irish under school age.
In fact, although I will have to look the references, I am fairly sure that use of Gaelic as a first language has actually declined since independence.
The passage referred to it as past tense (supposedly when the British ruled Ireland) during those times I don't think the majority of Irish spoke English.
Quote from: Razgovory on October 08, 2009, 07:38:32 PM
The passage referred to it as past tense (supposedly when the British ruled Ireland) during those times I don't think the majority of Irish spoke English.
Actually, the relevant part of the sentence quoted is in the present tense. Grammatically speaking, the sentence should have been split in to two, in my opinion, as he starts in the past tense but then strays in to the present ("share" instead of "shared".) :P
:worthy: Vaclav Klaus
Quote from: Razgovory on October 08, 2009, 07:38:32 PM
The passage referred to it as past tense (supposedly when the British ruled Ireland) during those times I don't think the majority of Irish spoke English.
When the 'British ruled Ireland' (rather when Ireland was part of Britain) the majority spoke English also. It wasn't so clear cut as today but nonetheless it was.
But anyway, it's quite clear there that they're speaking in the present tense since its about the Brits having a interest in the Irish referendum.
God you guys are touchy about this ain't you?
We share the same language as Britain, why won't you all fall into lockstep with us and become our official second class island? :lol:
Quote from: Razgovory on October 08, 2009, 06:08:19 PM
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on October 08, 2009, 05:40:58 PM
Quote1,000 years of history ends like this
One could only hope so, for what a horrid, violent and nasty 1000 years it has been.
Particularly rich to see the Daily Mail, of all publications, romanticizing the Easter Rising.
Wait, what is this ending? What happened 1,000 years ago?
In 1009, for the first time in recorded history, a London town crier invented some stupid piece of gossip to rile up the yokels, thus beginning the long and storied tradition of schlock yellow journalism of which the Daily Mail is a proud inheritor.
Kick the Brits out.
Klaus is one person, and will be out of politics in a couple of years. The Brits will continue to sabotage European integration for generations to come :bowler:
Klaus probably is a fool but worse still, he waited until the day after the Irish referendum to announce new demands. That shows an awful degree of bad faith, and on top of that, he hasn't made public exactly what does he want added... I don't know about you, but I'm starting to wonder if in past generations our forefathers had to suffer so many clowns in world politics (if the answer is yes, I finally understand why Bismarck always seemed either exasperated or exhausted).
Regarding Britain, I think this whole mess about the 'Constitution' has buried forever the idea all of Europe can advance exactly at the same pace towards a common target. 27 countries can't do that, there will always be someone shouting 'No' here, there or over there. Rather, the future will see more changes like the Euro or the Schengen group, in which the core countries that want real integration don't wait for the others or indeed be interested in their position.
And yes, I think the time has come for Britain to have a referendum not on the Treaty but on belonging to the Union. Either 'in' or 'out', but being 'in' and always opting out and trying to stop the others from doing anything new must be terribly uncomfortable. As things stand now they are making me admire De Gaulle stance on this matter, if a bit grudgingly.
For the record, Poland just signed. :swiss:
Quote from: Alatriste on October 10, 2009, 05:44:30 AM
Klaus probably is a fool but worse still, he waited until the day after the Irish referendum to announce new demands. That shows an awful degree of bad faith, and on top of that, he hasn't made public exactly what does he want added... I don't know about you, but I'm starting to wonder if in past generations our forefathers had to suffer so many clowns in world politics (if the answer is yes, I finally understand why Bismarck always seemed either exasperated or exhausted).
Yes, although people's definition of clowns varied from country to country (in his later life, many people considered Bismarck wearing and exasperating.
Quote from: Alatriste on October 10, 2009, 05:44:30 AM
Regarding Britain, I think this whole mess about the 'Constitution' has buried forever the idea all of Europe can advance exactly at the same pace towards a common target. 27 countries can't do that, there will always be someone shouting 'No' here, there or over there. Rather, the future will see more changes like the Euro or the Schengen group, in which the core countries that want real integration don't wait for the others or indeed be interested in their position.
That began with the Euro as much as Schengen. I think the idea that everybody could move at the same pace was dead before the Constitution.
Quote from: Alatriste on October 10, 2009, 05:44:30 AM
And yes, I think the time has come for Britain to have a referendum not on the Treaty but on belonging to the Union. Either 'in' or 'out', but being 'in' and always opting out and trying to stop the others from doing anything new must be terribly uncomfortable. As things stand now they are making me admire De Gaulle stance on this matter, if a bit grudgingly.
I couldn't agree with you more. At the moment, polling would suggest my position is the majority one in the country (of those who give a positive statement of their intentions) but it would be nice to have the issue settled, hopefully decisively, one way or the other.
And since I do not subscribe entirely to the "Humphrey Appleby" view of Europe, I must admit I find much to admire in De Gaulle's original stance.
The entire history of European integration is multiple-speed so I don't see a problem continuing like that in the future. That said, for important institutional reforms like this, unanimity is obviously required.
Interestingly that article was by Peter Hitchens, Chris's little brother and mirror image. Peter's a right-wing, isolationist, arch-traditionalist - as the article shows.
Quote from: Martinus on October 08, 2009, 04:56:38 PM
At least Czechs are now taking over Poland as the "village idiot of the EU".
Not quite :console:
They elected one nutty President. The Poles elected nutty twins as President and Prime Minister. The sheer freakiness of political twins will take a long time to live down :console:
Quote from: Alatriste on October 10, 2009, 05:44:30 AM
Klaus probably is a fool but worse still, he waited until the day after the Irish referendum to announce new demands. That shows an awful degree of bad faith, and on top of that, he hasn't made public exactly what does he want added...
I read today that he wans assurances over the Sudeten and that the germans kicked out back in the day won't be able to claim their posessions back. Don't know if it's serious or not, though.
Quote from: The Larch on October 10, 2009, 10:36:47 AM
Quote from: Alatriste on October 10, 2009, 05:44:30 AM
Klaus probably is a fool but worse still, he waited until the day after the Irish referendum to announce new demands. That shows an awful degree of bad faith, and on top of that, he hasn't made public exactly what does he want added...
I read today that he wans assurances over the Sudeten and that the germans kicked out back in the day won't be able to claim their posessions back. Don't know if it's serious or not, though.
I think it is about German gay married couples coming back to steal our land and adopt good Polish and Czech children (by taking them away from their good, heterosexual, catholic parents) to raise as the next generation of Teutonic homos.
At least that's what I got from PiS* broadcasts.
*The party that, according to David Cameron, is not homophobic.
Quote from: Sheilbh on October 10, 2009, 07:26:59 AM
Interestingly that article was by Peter Hitchens, Chris's little brother and mirror image. Peter's a right-wing, isolationist, arch-traditionalist - as the article shows.
I noticed that as well. I figured that's why it was so disconnected with reality.
Quote from: Martinus on October 10, 2009, 11:11:39 AM
Quote from: The Larch on October 10, 2009, 10:36:47 AM
Quote from: Alatriste on October 10, 2009, 05:44:30 AM
Klaus probably is a fool but worse still, he waited until the day after the Irish referendum to announce new demands. That shows an awful degree of bad faith, and on top of that, he hasn't made public exactly what does he want added...
I read today that he wans assurances over the Sudeten and that the germans kicked out back in the day won't be able to claim their posessions back. Don't know if it's serious or not, though.
Czechs are pretty much secular, atheist by Radio Maryja standards :lol:
I think it is about German gay married couples coming back to steal our land and adopt good Polish and Czech children (by taking them away from their good, heterosexual, catholic parents) to raise as the next generation of Teutonic homos.
At least that's what I got from PiS* broadcasts.
*The party that, according to David Cameron, is not homophobic.
I was talking about Poland. Klaus's position is about German land, whether gay or straight.
P.S. Learn to use quotes. If you want to comment on my post, don't put your comment in the middle of mine. :P