[budududuroiu]

Roberta Metsola's actions this week jeopardise the legitimacy of the EU project as a whole.

It's clear that member countries use the EU as a blame-laundering mechanism to pass domestically unpopular laws, but the forcing of this vote under the urgency procedure that requires absolute majority to reject, on the last EP session before summer break is so blatant that it might awaken people that might've overlooked the structural failures of the EU and finally radicalise them

EDIT: bad wording, it's not that the urgency procedure causes the voting to require absolute majority, it's that an absolute majority second-reading is forced through an emergency procedure which is designed for first readings of legislation that's the implied meaning above

[nick486]

I'm really surprised at the hurry. The EU, and many EU governments, have been ramming through deeply unpopular legislation at a breakneck pace for no apparent reason, lately.

It feels like the last turn in a board game where everyone is busy taking points with no regard for the impact of the decisions on the theoretical next turn - because there is no next turn. Its really weird.

> blame-laundering mechanism

Also, I'm stealing this.

[sReinwald]

> at a breakneck pace for no apparent reason, lately.

This isn't surprising to me at all.

The World Cup is on, and it draws attention away from politics. This has been a pretty common observable pattern for as long as I can remember.

[matly]

At least in some member states, that's a well used pattern when the soccer world cup is on (as in: people are focused on something else). Which at least has been going on in the last weeks.

[strideashort]

The reason is more than apparent.

So long freedom, it’s been nice living in STASI free society for a while. Too bad power attracts the people who will make sure they keep it in their hands.

[marginalia_nu]

Honestly where do you even go if you want to get out from under this? The US was the option, but is clearly circling the drain. The EU is democracy theater at best, a democratic mandate that can be set aside any time it's inconvenient for Ashton Kutcher, and speedrunning the rebuilding of a new Soviet Union. Feels like a matter of time until they start building a new wall to keep you from leaving.

[Avicebron]

In all these places I imagine the people making these decisions are members of the populace. They need to be gently reminded that they are not more equal than others and people do not like their decision-making habits. The way anyone else engaging in anti-social behavior would be reprimanded.

[bigyabai]

Are you going to take your phone and laptop with you? If so, then it doesn't really matter where you're going. You'll be populating multiple surveillance systems regardless of where you choose to live.

[Eueudhsbsj32]

Maybe Latin America. Their governments are generally less powerful and have less resources to enforce laws like this.

[tanseydavid]

> Honestly where do you even go if you want to get out from under this?

Mars is nice this time of year.

[lopis]

Whenever you see people complaining that the EU is "too slow", more often than not it's because they benefit directly from EU rushing things without thinking.

[elictronic]

Multiple active wars on the global stage, huge changes in tariff and job impacts, large scale shipping and oil impacts.

I’m not saying this legislation impacts any of this positively or negatively, but we can’t pretend the prior world order isn’t making some drastic changes lately. Governments are slow to change laws but I would expect much of the current push has actual ties to the larger global shifts.

[attila-lendvai]

for no apparent rason? the way they are preparing to bring the population into a war hardly can be any more apparent...

[bluescrn]

War requires industry. But we've deindustrialised and outsourced the manufacture of almost everything to China.

[throwaway27448]

Gee maybe they should prepare to avoid war then

[bluescrn]

They thought climate change was the next war-level crisis, and worked towards that. They didn't anticipate the Ukraine invasion, or the Middle East blowing up again.

[tetha]

> They thought climate change was the next war-level crisis, and worked towards that.

Did we though? At least in Germany a bunch of anti-climate-change projects and changes have been and are being canceled and we're going back to coal and diesel. It seems we're optimizing to have no results and negative progress at the moment.

[ClumsyPilot]

> They didn't anticipate…the Middle East blowing up again

Yes, interesting that the People dropping bombs did not anticipate blowing up.

Our elites have revealed many flaws recently, but one I did not expect is that they have surprisingly limited intelligence.

[joe_mamba]

That's why the EU is a neutral pushover bowing down to the whims and tantrum of US, China, Iran, India, Turkey, etc. because a lot of their industry, energy, exports/imports are from those countries so any disputes would be devastating to the EU economy.

They're trying to avoid any conflict since they have no energy and hard power to counter any confrontations, so they smile and nod to anything happening worldwide or push some stern words about "monitoring the situation" to social media, depending on the situation.

[ClumsyPilot]

This narrative is a fabrication.

EU spends 33% of World’s military spending, once you exclude US. EU spends more on military than China.

How much do you need to spend to defend yourself, 60% of the world?

Mind you, many western weapons, like stinger and javelin, cost more than their weight in silver. Sounds like a scam

[ajsnigrutin]

And then stop people from being able to afford cheaper stuff from china (without european middlemen) by implementinh a 3eur customs fee on an 1eur phone case!

[budududuroiu]

That's a good thing. We complain about lack of industrialisation. China has historically protected their fledgling industries, if we want industrialisation back, we need to as well, to the detriment of mindless consumption of cheap stuff

[ajsnigrutin]

But we want cheap stuff, we don't have unlimited money.

This law didn't open a phone case factory in europe, it just made the 1eur case cost ~5euros (vat is paid on customs too). The only alternative is to go to a local mall and buy a case there for 10-15euros, and it's the same chinese case, just more expensive, but the reseller pays a lot less tax, since they can buy 100 cases for 1eur and still pay just 3eur of customs on them.

So I, the consumer get 300% customs on that 1eur case (+vat on huge customs fee), while the mall kiosk gets 3% customs fee, how is that fair? And how will that build a phone case factory in europe?

Why not build the factory first instead? Have it make 2eur phone cases, and then the price raise would make me buy the european one, but for now, it's just makes me pay more for the same chinese stuff, and I can't spend the leftover money for a local beer at a local bar anymore, so stuff actually made in europe.

[throw-the-towel]

That's what Trump says. You'll be tired of winning!

[AngryData]

Politicians don't gain their position by being smart and down to earth.

[greenavocado]

They will rapidly reindustrialize when the first shots are fired. The EU's goal is the strategic defeat of Russia. What the common people think or want is irrelevant. All environmental and climate legislation that gets in the way will be waivered indefinitely until the war is over 5+ years of drone warfare and 100s of thousands dead.

[bluescrn]

The drone war will be quite limited by chip production.

And once the chip fabs have been bombed, civilisation is set by by decades, and may end up fighting a lower-tech war.

[elictronic]

There are thousands of strikes per day today. The chips needed to control a drone are not the same high cost ones needed for data centers or otherwise. Older fabs work just fine and countries can just eat into their other industries.

Beyond this, if you start attacking neutral fabs you lose out on anything from them. Your expectations are quite a bit off if you think striking fabs stops a conflict.

[greenavocado]

There are many fabs using "last year's" fab processes for defense purposes. Wouldn't be surprised if they had quick and easy way to set up fabs for chip weapons production in bombed out buildings and warehouses. Defense doesn't need civilian fabs. In the end, we, the civilians, stand to lose tremendously.

[anonzzzies]

These chips are not the latest nvidia etc: false like this are relatively easy to set up compared to fabs that make the chips you seem to be thinking about.

[AngryData]

Once the chip fabs get bombed much of modern society collapses and insurrection and civil uprising becomes everyone's #1 concern. Politicians are just too stupid to realize this because they live in a protected bubble of fantasy land where nothing they do usually ever directly effects them.

[xorcist]

> The EU's goal is the strategic defeat of Russia

This does not even make sense as a conspiracy theory.

Had "EU" wanted to hurt Russia there were was a thousand ways to do that. But they didn't. Instead they traded and built infrastructure. Most EU countries saw Russia as a partner before they invaded their neighbour in the most gruesome way possible.

If anything, the EU should have reacted sooner. It was shameful they didn't. You can't really pretend like nothing while an all out war is taking place on the same continent.

[joe_mamba]

>They will rapidly reindustrialize when the first shots are fired.

By WHO?! Russia is still stuck in 1/4 of the Ukraine and fear mongers make it sound like they're about to reach Paris any day now.

[dismalaf]

War is less imminent now than ever. Ukraine has caused a ton of damage to Russia and at this point the Kremlin has more to worry about than EU countries (pretty much every Russian government ever is brought down from within).

No, leftist governments in the EU have failed to provide prosperity and failed in all their promises, now they're going for total control to try to stay in power.

Look at France, as soon as Le Pen was cleared to run for the presidency they start talking about anti "misinformation" laws...

[eagleal]

> War is less imminent now than ever

You can always make your enemy. Current rearming efforts really remind historians of WW1 arm races.

At some point once so much interests and offers are at stake, that creating the demand is inevitable and just a matter of time.

[throwaway27448]

It's true. Rearming and mobilizing troops will cause a reciprocal reaction in your neighbors. Whether or not war is or was imminent is irrelevant; europe will manifest it regardless.

[geysersam]

Are you calling Macron a "leftist"? It does help your argument because it's a tautology that "the leftists failed to provide prosperity" if the entire political spectrum counts as such.

[gambiting]

I don't share this outlook, sadly - given that military figures especially around the Eastern side of EU keep saying military conflict with Russia is "inevitable" in the next 4 years. Of course - they are in the military, their job is specifically to look at the worst case scenarios. But I wouldn't be so sure the risk is not there.

[dismalaf]

I do think there's the possibility Russia attacks a NATO country in an attempt to save face. I don't think they have the manpower or equipment to sustain an assault that would require any level of mobilization from EU countries.

[anonzzzies]

Apparent? Unless Russia attacks there will be no war, it is not the US who willy nilly attacks others.

[shevy-java]

> I'm really surprised at the hurry.

Well, once you realise that the so-called "EU parliament" is nothing but a lobbyist group (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qatar_corruption_scandal_at_th...) it is no longer surprising. To me nothing here is surprising, neither the hurry nor any slowness.

Lobbyists are winning the war.

[quotemstr]

> ramming through deeply unpopular legislation at a breakneck pace for no apparent reason, lately

It's only a matter of time before EU-skeptical opposition parties achieve absolute majorities in critical EU constituency states. They're aware of this fact and are trying to adopt as much of their agenda as possible in the time they have remaining.

[znpy]

My guess is that with non-left political movements on the rise better surveillance tools were needed to prevent them from winning the elections around europe.

I really don’t but any other reason, as other tools (legal and technological) are already in place.

[omnimus]

If you look at who voted for chat control approval you would find that it's majority the currently in power centre right parties. The more far right or left you go the more likely they were against. It's like the one issue where AfD, die Linke and Greens are aligned. That suggests that it's most likely hard lobby that bribes the established class.

Nt being able to scan personal communications would break big tech platforms main monetisation strategy (selling peoples data).

[dxuh]

None of these will be used to attack the far-right parties on the right though. They barely investigate those parties in the individual countries, but they focus more on the moderate left already.

[AngryData]

To me it seems like the minority would be far more interested in implementing surveillance tools so they can target the majority in order to try and gain and maintain power.

[coldtea]

>with no regard for the impact of the decisions on the theoretical next turn

They know the impact of the decisions: more power for them as bodies.

[HeartStrings]

The reason they do this is preparation for war. Also, foreign influence bots and hostile active measures.

[cess11]

It's a US data pump, and the EU is a bunch of vassal states. That's the hurry, shutting down the data flow because the permissive legislation runs out is not allowed.

[throwaway27448]

I think that's a little naive. This sort of legislation is much more useful in terms of managing the local population and what they are allowed to talk about than it is in terms of profit—except, I suppose, in the sense that holding companies liable for what is said with their software is unprofitable.

[cess11]

I didn't mention profit.

[throwaway27448]

Why mention the US if you're not referring to the GDPR?

[inferniac]

>for no apparent reason, lately.

for some godforsaken reason left-lib parties in europe think accepting infinity migrants forever is the most important thing to do

this is becoming more and more unpopular with the voters, leading to right wing parties surging across europe (Denmark, which has an immigration restrictionist left wing government doesnt seem to have an issue here, true mystery)

obviously the solution here is total control of the internet, so that you can suppress dissent

[dminik]

Denmark was one of the main countries pushing for Chat Control 2.0 ...

[Thraway198]

In Canada, there's been a lot of talk about how immigration, "broke the Canadian consensus," around immigration as a good thing.

The problem is, there never was a consensus around immigration. The Liberals own stats prove that. What there was was a consensus around multiculturalism and tolerance.

Immigration itself, was always split evenly among three camps in Canada: those who want more, those who want less, and those who think we have the right amount.

Trudeau & his fake leftist brigade many have ruined multiculturalism for a large portion of Canadians, permanently.

[spwa4]

The promise (for the non-insane majority) was that immigration was going to save our economic bacon. That's the orthodox economist viewpoint after all.

Well, it didn't.

The minimum anyone would have to accept is that the economy went to shit while mass immigration was happening ... (in both EU and Canada). So I guess you don't have to accept causation, but they were happening simultaneously, so this reaction by the population is justified in that sense.

[Thraway198]

I agree that it's justified. SOME immigration is needed in order to save "duh economy," but what we got instead was economic warfare against workers.

[modo_mario]

It's not even that some migration is need to save the economy. You'd need pronatalist policies or you're going to be doing that "some immigration" for ever and ever.

[wolvoleo]

> for some godforsaken reason left-lib parties in europe think accepting infinity migrants forever is the most important thing to do

This is completely BS. Nobody wants to let in unlimited migrants. This is not a goal of anyone, including the left-most left. In fact on the left we are very aware that our welfare systems can't support unlimited people.

The left wing parties just wish to honour existing international treaties which we have signed to allow genuine asylum seekers. There's processes in places to determine whether they deserve this. The right just want to turn their boats back as they approach (pushback) which is literally illegal.

It's important to realise though that asylum seekers are not the root cause of most of our issues even though they are portrayed as such by the right in deflection from the real issues. For example here in Holland the biggest societal issue is the farmers who pollute too many nitrogen compounds and that causes housing projects to be put on hold. The number of asylum seekers has been steadily decreasing over the years.

But farmers make up a huge piece of the right wing so they'll never take ownership of the problem. Better to deflect on someone else.

[yolo3000]

Numbers are going down, but in my area there are now 4 buildings with asylum seekers. Started with a hotel, then an office building, then some newly built expensive houses that were first up for rent and now rented for asylum seekers, and now another office building. Honoring existing treaties out of principle can also be put on hold when the situation changes.

[sunshowers]

From what I can tell, a big part of the problem in Europe is that people seeking asylum are prohibited from making a living (due to widespread belief in the lump of labor fallacy) and so have to be dependent on welfare.

[wolvoleo]

Yes and when a government tries to do something about that (like Spain granting temporary permits so they can work and pay taxes) it angers the right even more.

[akimbostrawman]

>asylum are prohibited from making a living

This is exactly how we got here. We allowed them to work to make temporary asylum permanent migration.

[wolvoleo]

If they are only asylum seekers, it means they are still in the validation process.

Unfortunately the hard-right has also defunded that process for many years, and have thus created this problem themselves. The agencies tasked with figuring out if asylum seekers have a legitimate claim are overwhelmed with all the work. This is purely a self-created problem (intended to gaslight the population in there being a huge 'immigrant problem').

[bluescrn]

> The left wing parties just wish to honour existing international treaties which we have signed to allow genuine asylum seekers.

But these are treaties are no longer fit for purpose, as can be seen by the boatloads of mostly young male economic migrants turning up in the UK to 'claim asylum'. People who've got thousands of euros to pay the small boats traffickers.

If they were refugees fleeing war or other dangers, you'd expect a lot more families - women, kids, the elderly - to be making the journey.

(Of course, legal migration to the UK is vastly higher than illegal arrivals. And this is the larger issue putting pressure on housing, healthcare, transport, and more. But the small boats are a glaring example of a broken system being exploited)

[graemep]

The UK's system for processing applications is:

1. highly inefficient: its slow and badly run. 2. seriously considers applications that clearly false - people from Canada and the EU do not need to claim asylum! Those numbers are tiny but it illustrates a winder spread problem. people who feel safe enough to return to the country they "fled" on holiday also clearly do not have a genuine claim. 3. It fails to provide a route for a lot of people who do have a genuine claim - e.g. religious minorities in the Middle East.

It is no longer true that the numbers of legal migrants are vastly higher because the government have decided that they need to cut the numbers of immigrants and the easiest way to do this is to cut legal immigration.

[wolvoleo]

Well, don't forget some of these wars are caused by us. The Western countries invaded Iraq under false pretenses so Dubya could make his Halliburton buddies happy. As a result and pure neglect to form a legit democratic government after the war a power vacuum ensued which caused the rise of ISIS which contributed to the war in Syria. Which directly caused the mass migration on foot from Syria.

In this way we do have responsibility towards them. The migration from Africa is a different issue but it is already possible to quickly reject asylum-seekers from known-safe countries.

> Of course, legal migration to the UK is vastly higher than illegal arrivals. And this is the larger issue putting pressure on housing, healthcare, transport, and more.

Well exactly but nobody is talking about that. Everyone is talking about the asylum seekers. Which are only a small part of the issue.

And the pressure on housing is very multifaceted. A lot of NIMBYism when it comes to new construction, and boomers who have invested in the housing market and don't want to see their investment evaporate by more supply on the housing market. So the parties backed by those with money are always obstructing new construction and other means to make housing cheaper. This is a much bigger problem when it comes to housing than those few apartments granted to asylum seekers.

[rangestransform]

Moral responsibility is not real responsibility that can be enforced at the point of a gun by anyone or any nation, and so this responsibility does not have to be assumed

[graemep]

> The Western countries invaded Iraq under false pretenses

True, but I would say the current refugees are not those who most need refuge. Religious minorities who are the most threatened by ISIS are under-represented.

> it is already possible to quickly reject asylum-seekers from known-safe countries.

It does not happen though. it happens in the end, but the system in ridiculously slow and inefficient.

> And the pressure on housing is very multifaceted. A lot of NIMBYism when it comes to new construction, and boomers who have invested in the housing market and don't want to see their investment evaporate by more supply on the housing market.

That is true.

[ClumsyPilot]

> at a breakneck pace for no apparent reason

So many reasons: unpopular wars in the Middle East, repeated embarrassments in international arena, domestic unrest, decadent elites…

[natebc]

Didn't Steve Bannon do a tour in Europe recently to dispense some of his strategy?

This smells like him, honestly.

[superloika]

> it might awaken people that might've overlooked the structural failures of the EU and finally radicalise them

Haha, no. As long as there is bread and circus, nothing wil happen.

[attila-lendvai]

well, bread is running our at beakneck speed...

that's the reason they are busy igniting a war by the time the defaulting begins, so that there's some external boogieman to blame instead of them...

[riddlemethat]

This removes circus from the children.

[throw-the-towel]

Children are politically irrelevant.

[bluebarbet]

This comment does not add any value to the discussion.

PS: Sorry, but "haha nothing matters" cynicism does NOT add anything to the discussion. In fact it straightforwardly breaks a whole bunch of HN guidelines: "Be curious", "Don't be generically negative", "Don't be snarky", "Don't post shallow dismissals", etc. This forum is supposed to be better than the R-site.

[SalemSaberhagen]

Yes it does. Your comment does not add any value to the discussion.

[theodric]

Many of us find it difficult to be relentlessly positive as we watch organizations that constantly paint themselves as the epitome of democracy act in a way counter to the repeatedly-expressed will of the people. I cannot smile my way into fascism.

[random3]

OK, but what does that have to do with the suggestion that saying “nothing will happen” adds no value to this conversation

[coldtea]

If it's indeed the case, it adds more value than 100 comments explaining non-happening course corrections, and revolts, and backlashes they believe we'll see.

It's useful to add some cynicism in the mix (or in this case, pragmatism)

[tenthirtyam]

I think I'm one of those to whom you refer (except that I'm already "awake", or at least I like to think so). I'm normally pro-EU but this chat control is anathema to me. I'll be voting anti-EU in future I think.

[vaylian]

> I'll be voting anti-EU in future I think.

You shouldn't go that far. Simply don't vote for the EPP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_People%27s_Party_Grou...) in your country. They are the driving force behind this. Other parties have mostly voted against this (depending on the country)

[trinsic2]

I'm wondering when we will get the hint that voting isn't fixing these problems. our systems of government appears, to me, that they have been taken over by special interests. If we want things to change, we have to get involved. I'm sure that looks different for everyone but we clearly need people we can trust in government institutions.

[zelphirkalt]

Yeah, this is also a step too far for me. The EU has also done good things, like GDPR, right to repair, fining big tech again and again ... but it rarely follows up as much as it needs to.

The problem is though, that countries in the EU by themselves are economically not powerful enough, to hold up any ethical values against the giants US and China. So we need some alternative to the EU, some other union, that at least contains the economically most powerful EU countries, so that we have enough economical weight, that the other big players cannot simply push us around. Currently, the EU seems to be hellbent on losing its support. But how to prevent that other union to go down the same road?

Anyway, it seems clear, that we can no longer allow EU decision makers to make rules for us. They are not to be trusted.

[anonzzzies]

The alternatives are also not to be trusted: if the EU falls we will have war between EU countries and hitlers and francos back in their seats but now with mass AI; Hello Frank, we detected in your email sent 21 years ago that you made fun of Mr Klein, his son, our glorious leader, has auto signed the documents for you to be sent to NeoWitz where you will spend the short remainder of your life.

[LtWorf]

> I'll be voting anti-EU in future I think.

You mean the far right that talks about EU all the time and loves when EU does things like this?

[ImJamal]

AfD doesn't support this. I don't know about other right wing parties.

[Vinnl]

To understand whether/to what extent this is brazen, I'd be interested to learn the reasoning why urgency procedures are possible, and in particular, why the apparent majority against shouldn't have been enough, and what is needed to classify something as urgent.

[budududuroiu]

Afaik, EU rules provide for urgent procedure only for proposals at first reading, while here it was used to compress a second reading vote and skip committee, just perfectly timed for the last sitting before recess.

The absolute majority seems to be an anti-paralysis instrument, where the onus is on the Parliament to reject something put in motion by the Council. I think the the asymmetry is that a vote to trigger the urgency procedure only requires a simple majority, whereas a rejection of that same legislation requires absolute majority.

To my reading, this reinforces the idea that Parliament is designed to be more of a rubber stamp for the Council.

[Vinnl]

Thanks. Do you know then why of the majority that voted against today, enough people voted in favour of the urgency procedure?

[coldtea]

Saving face before (saying "see, I voted against") then doing what's asked of them by the lobbyists anyway where it's less apparent.

[Vinnl]

Sure, but I'm interested in a steelmanned explanation before judging.

[CrisMystik]

The urgency procedure is not the issue here, the problem is that this was Parliament's second reading, and the treaties (article 294 TFEU) say:

> Second reading

> 7. If, within three months of such communication, the European Parliament:

> (a) approves the Council's position at first reading or has not taken a decision, the act concerned shall be deemed to have been adopted in the wording which corresponds to the position of the Council;

> (b) rejects, by a majority of its component members, the Council's position at first reading, the proposed act shall be deemed not to have been adopted;

> (c) proposes, by a majority of its component members, amendments to the Council's position at first reading, the text thus amended shall be forwarded to the Council and to the Commission, which shall deliver an opinion on those amendments.

[Vinnl]

It was the second reading, but was it also treated as such? (Because if so, it sounds like this would have been a rejection?) If not, what is the steelmanned reason for doing so?

[CrisMystik]

Yes, it was the second reading; because of that, the motion for rejecting the Council common position was not approved, since it received a majority, but not an absolute majority, of votes

[__turbobrew__]

I don’t understand how a governing system requires a majority to reject a change to the status quo. The status quo must be maintained unless a majority decides to change the status quo.

It is the equivalent of having a gas pedal in a car that is fully activated unless you put your foot down.

[CrisMystik]

The urgency procedure has nothing to do with the absolute majority requirement. It's necessary because, in the second reading, the Parliament should have an absolute majority to reject or amend the Council (i.e. the governments of the member states) position but only a simple majority to approve it

[miroljub]

Yes, this basically means the EU pushed a new censorship regulation using lawfare tricks without ever having a majority vote for the proposal.

If it's not a dictatorship, a regime, a shithole, a kleptocracy, or whatever name they use for a government they don't like, I don't know what it is.

[budududuroiu]

The regulation was rejected today with 314 votes against, 276 in favor, and 17 abstentions, but because of Metsola's lawfare that classified this regulation as under an "urgent procedure", an absolute majority was required to reject.

[raverbashing]

I wonder if the abstentions are counting "missing MEPs" or MEPs present but who did not vote

[b3orn]

The EU parliament has 720 representatives (at the moment 719, one seat is vacant apparently), so 113 representatives didn't show up for the vote. The absolute majority would've been reached with 361 votes.

[omnimus]

And there were a lot of them. Some i assume just couldn't give a fuck and are on vacation. The others for sure did it to help approval while keeping "clean" to their audience.

[inigyou]

Chat Control 2.0 is the censorship regulation. Chat Control 1.0 just legalized what Facebook was doing anyway.

[budududuroiu]

Sure, then just let the normal legislative process run its course, no need to bleed political capital and get an already polarised electorate to hate the EU even more by shoving this legislation through in this way.

[logifail]

> no need to bleed political capital

I'm not sure the EU needs to worry about political capital in the way that many national and regional governments do. Power moves through negotiations between institutions, party groups, lobbyists, activists, and heads of government rather than through anything voters can trace. If one is being unkind, it's basically backroom deals all the way down. Naturally, the EU has more respectable terms for this sort of thing, like "trilogue".

Look at how the President of the European Commission got her job in 2019 - there was an election campaign in which major parties presented lead candidates for the post and she wasn't one of them, then post-election - ta da - she's nominiated for the post and there's a confirmatory vote in the Parliament on which the ballot paper had precisely one name listed - hers.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48853746

https://www.alamy.com/16-july-2019-france-france-straburg-a-...

[jltsiren]

That's how multi-party parliamentarism usually works. A minority is not allowed to choose the leader just because they are a slightly larger minority than the others.

Because no party has an outright majority, there are weeks of negotiations after the elections, as the parties try to find a compromise acceptable to a majority. Once a deal has been reached, the parliament votes to confirm it. If the vote fails, the parties return to negotiations.

Von der Leyen was chosen to head the Commission, because she was an acceptable compromise. All lead candidates had been tried before her, but all of them failed to obtain majority support in the negotiations.

[logifail]

All the European Council's negotiations were private.

No public hearings, no public votes, not even any public parliamentary debates(!) about different candidates for the Commission. This is indeed "the EU way", trying to find compromise via party-family bargaining ... in private.

> All lead candidates had been tried before her, but all of them failed to obtain majority support in the negotiations.

The Parliament didn't actually get to vote on any of the other candidates, did they?

[budududuroiu]

I agree, my point about political capital was about the overton window shifting to allow a more mainstream EU-skeptic platform for national parties, platforms which up until recently were easily labelled Russophiles or European traitors for US money.

I was aware that VDL obtained her role by routing around the Spitzenkandidaten process, but I was never aware that her confirmatory vote was done in this way.

Her unpopularity at home also reinforces the idea that unpopular politicians can be sent to Brussels, because "in Brussels, you can't hear them scream".

[dbdr]

It's absolutely legitimate to be upset. However, identifying a lawfare trick in a close vote to a dictatorship is serious hyperbole. I'm afraid that's counterproductive.

[miroljub]

Close vote?

They passed a regulation with 276 votes in favor, 314 votes against, and 17 abstained. The minority decided instead of the majority.

If this is not a dictatorship, what is it then? In any case, it has nothing to do with the democracy.

[dbdr]

My point is that this was a minority of 46.7% making that decision (because of a technicality that has been pointed out already). In a dictatorship, a minority of 1 against a million or more makes all the decisions. Even though you can say 46.7% and 0.0001% are both below 50%, it's missing a lot of nuance to claim they are of the same nature.

[techpression]

They've been doing this with unpopular votes since the inception of the EU, nothing new and people definitely haven't woken up, unfortunately.

[lyu07282]

Its honestly a bit sad that this in particular got people up in arms on social media, nobody gave a single shit when they sacrifice millions of people and entire nations on the periphery to their death cult of market orthodoxy.

The media is barely covering it at all, the sheep are well asleep, online some just lucid dream about the democracy they never had.

[sunshine-o]

What should worry everybody is the big picture (trying to abstract from politics, ideologies and specific situation). In recent years we had:

- Europe is now at war with Russia (neighbor)

- Its relationship with the US is rapidly deteriorating (main partner, de facto protector)

- Its relationship with China is also rapidly deteriorating

- It is getting very antagonistic with it own citizen and some individual member countries (such as Hungaria or Romania recently)

So there are a lot of justifications in each case but the overall picture is worrisome. You can't be antagonistic with everyone.

There is a reason why the North Korean regime is still around, they never forgot they need to keep a good relationship with at least one powerful ally.

[lyu07282]

Isn't it interesting that if you remove the US from that list, it all aligns with US foreign policy? How fortuitous that EU interests just happen to coincide so well with our American friends.

[zelphirkalt]

US is now allied with Russia though. Or at least its president acts as if it was.

[lyu07282]

Then you are not paying attention, he satisfied his Murica-First Cult like a circus clown. The US is the biggest arms dealer in the world, the Europeans are delivering weapons from their stockpile to Ukraine, then the US is filling those stockpiles up. Works like clockwork, just like under Biden, there is no actual change in policy towards Russia/Ukraine.

[ClumsyPilot]

> - Its relationship with China is also rapidly deteriorating

For which there is no good reason and which is extremely stupid

There has been zero aggression from China towards Europe and zero chance of military confrontation.

Most of the sanctions that were implemented under pressure from Us have backfired on Europe (but not so much on US)

European politicians are going around the world and telling India not to trade with Russia while Israel trades with Russia, etc.

[koiueo]

> There is a reason why the North Korean regime is still around

Nukes

[onemoresoop]

EU is doing some concerning moves but, looking at your points, Russia attacked Ukraine. EU is not at war with Russia, only supporting Ukraine.

Second, the relationship with US is deteriorating due to Trump. As a matter of fact all US relationships are deteriorating for the same reason. Where have you been the past years? Im not going to bother to respond to the following points because you mix some reality with propaganda and seem to live in a paralel reality.

[wolvoleo]

Yeah US is threatening to invade and take over Canada, Greenland, I mean no wonder the alliance is no longer strong right?

And the internal struggles are indeed a problem, this is due to the extreme right which has completely taken over America (and is sponsored by Russia). It was good to see the Hungarians came to their senses but it's worrying that the EU doesn't have a mechanism to expel countries.

The problem is who do we ally with that we can trust now. Russia and America obviously not. Canada yes but they're not big. China just serves its own interests, they will never care about a partnership. They just want our money to buy their products, nothing else.

I think South America is another potential one and the EU is trying to connect there with eg Mercosur. But America is sponsoring the extreme right there too as you can see in Honduras and Colombia recently. And in Venezuela of course.

[graemep]

There is a considerable history of the US wanting Greenland:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_United_States_acquisi...

> The problem is who do we ally with that we can trust now.

"We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow." ― Lord Palmerston

There are lots of possible allies, but no one single ally to depend on. India to counter balance China, Canada to have an ally in North America, etc.

> it's worrying that the EU doesn't have a mechanism to expel countries.

Or it can become a federal state.

[wolvoleo]

Well yes the US has wanted it but never actually threatened to invade it before.

And no I don't think it's a good idea for Europe to become a federated state. The US' current situation shows how bad that could turn if the wrong person is elected.

At least we have the national governments here as a safeguard and we can also leave the EU if needed.

And yeah I didn't name India as a possible partner because they're too close with Russia. The EU is trying to make some deals with them but it's a bad idea while Modi and the BJP in general is in power in my opinion. They're similarly bad to minorites as the Chinese.

[graemep]

Is there an unambiguous and credible threat?

The US actually occupied parts of Greenland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_United_States_acquisi...

> And yeah I didn't name India as a possible partner because they're too close with Russia.

Offer them a better alternative

[tartoran]

Right wing populism is growing in EU as well. That is also sponsored by Russia but also by Trump/Vance etc..

[u8080]

It is popular because governments are failed to address legitimate issues and gaslight population.

[tartoran]

But the populism doesn't address the issues either and and their incoherent points will make things worse. Just look at the US for example.

[throw-the-towel]

EU is at war with Russia, just that both sides are too cowardly to say it openly.

[tempfile]

They didn't attribute any fault to these patterns, just said the pattern itself is concerning. It is bad for the EU to be mistreated by the US!