Conrad Black weighs in at the CATHOLIC HERALD. Excerpts from the article:
The immediate reaction to the Brexit vote in the international media and financial markets illustrates again the complacency and vacuity of the governing elites of the West.
. . . Margaret Thatcher, was pushed out of office by her own party for warning that precisely what has happened would happen . . . . The lady was right from the start, and this is in large measure, her victory.
. . . the Americans have to expel the sclerotic cynics clinging to the furniture and glued to the walls of the great houses of government like limpets, but don’t have to wrench back the right to self-government from foreign hands. The British have the leadership required in place and at hand, but they have to disentangle themselves from the corpse of Euro-inertia.
The idiocy of the currency speculators and money managers will subside quickly. The European treaty and the incomprehensibly turgid Constitution of the European Union provide for two years of negotiation. Despite the initial purposeful response of the ciphers in Brussels, who are not elected, are not responsible to the so-called European Parliament or the EU’s constituent nations, and are not answerable to anyone, they will cave like jelly to try to keep Britain in.
. . . The real casualty is the Brussels tyranny. It has got away with regulating everything down to the slightest details of small businesses-the Germans want to be loved in Europe, and as they are the strongest country in Europe and are accustomed to regimentation, they live with it. The French, Italians and other Mediterranean countries regard almost all politicians as worthless crooks and poseurs and generally ignore all regulations, so they don’t really notice. The little countries see Europe as the way for their own leaders to become powerful by assuming high positions as compromise choices between the large countries in the pan-European government. The British don’t like it, but were drawn in because they thought the Euro-train was leaving the station and they had to get on board.
. . . American Democratic administrations have always misjudged issues of Britain and Europe. Kennedy tried to subsume British and French nuclear forces into Nato under American command, Carter and Clinton and Obama have all been desperately trying to push Britain into Europe, from a glib, ahistorical reflex that it would make everything less complicated.
Brussels has been exposed in its infirmity. A common market will remain. The Euro-federalists will group around Germany (Austria, Netherlands, Czechs, Poles, and Baltic and Scandinavian countries except Norway), and adopt or retain the Euro. The Mediterranean countries, including Portugal, will desultorily follow France, which will be less dyspeptic with a change of government next year, And the East European countries will advance toward one of the blocs at the best speed they can attain. Britain will revert to measured cordiality, balancing interests as it has done since the rise of the nation state in the time of Henry VIII, invoking American assistance as it did in the last century, if the European balance tilts dangerously. This is unlikely now, in a nuclear age and with a relatively content and placatory Europe.
If Britain really does leave Europe, the economic consequences will be neutral all round, though the United Kingdom will be stronger without the dead weight of Euro-Danegeld as placebos to labour and small farmers (for notorious historic reasons). The hysteria of the last few days will pass like a summer shower. Britain, as it has often before, is leading Europe out of a well-intended cul-de-sac of undemocratic socialism to a future that works.
No comments:
Post a Comment