"What country are you from?" "Europe."

[Humodour]

Curiouser and curiouser...

 

Sweeping new powers to control the economies of all EU member states were demanded by France and Germany last night as the price of a

[Raithe]

Why does this feel like a continuation of the EU doing it's best to screw over the UK as much as possible?

 

Maybe I'm being cynical. Maybe I'm being a touch "nationalistic"...

But it does seem to feel like over half the things coming out of the EU are designed to give us the short shaft...

[Walsingham]

I have to agree with you, Raithe. I have huge time for the blokes at the sharp end of our cooperation, but the bureaucrats, like Rompuy are just ****ing insanely detached from reality.

[Killian Kalthorne]

That is why you must, from time to time, splat reality, in the form of a frying pan, in the face of a bureaucrat.

[Vilhelm]

Why does this feel like a continuation of the EU doing it's best to screw over the UK as much as possible?

 

Maybe I'm being cynical. Maybe I'm being a touch "nationalistic"...

But it does seem to feel like over half the things coming out of the EU are designed to give us the short shaft...

 

Considering that UK has screwed around with many nations I only think its fair that it gets screwed over from time to time.

 

With love from the nation UK is pushing towards bankruptcy.

Edited March 31, 2010 by Vilhelm

[Walsingham]

Why does this feel like a continuation of the EU doing it's best to screw over the UK as much as possible?

 

Maybe I'm being cynical. Maybe I'm being a touch "nationalistic"...

But it does seem to feel like over half the things coming out of the EU are designed to give us the short shaft...

 

Considering that UK has screwed around with many nations I only think its fair that it gets screwed over from time to time.

 

With love from the nation UK is pushing towards bankruptcy.

 

I'm not clear where you are writing from? Kampuchea?

[Pidesco]

Why does this feel like a continuation of the EU doing it's best to screw over the UK as much as possible?

 

Maybe I'm being cynical. Maybe I'm being a touch "nationalistic"...

But it does seem to feel like over half the things coming out of the EU are designed to give us the short shaft...

 

Considering that UK has screwed around with many nations I only think its fair that it gets screwed over from time to time.

 

With love from the nation UK is pushing towards bankruptcy.

 

I'm not clear where you are writing from? Kampuchea?

 

 

Admittedly, he could be writing from about any former British colony in the world. Or from Portugal. Portugal has a treaty with England which is actually the oldest standing international agreement in the world. The problem is that the treaty is actually a one way street where Portugal has been consistently getting shafted by the British for 800 years. The only mitigating factor is that the Portuguese are blundering idiots.

[HoonDing]

Maybe the UK should simply bail out if they do not like the idea of a European *Union*.

[Raithe]

Maybe the UK should simply bail out if they do not like the idea of a European *Union*.

 

 

We've been trying. Or at least, the general public has. The trouble being half the labour MP's keep trying to slip it around, and keeps sidelining the whole concept of any form of national referendum on it... Which seems to have us having engaged in treaties and signed onto the EU regardless... The LibDem's and the Tories both seem to be mixed on whether they're for or against it..

 

We get the politicians and the qwongocrats who keep saying that x treaty won't limit us, and that it doesn't allow x to happen.. then whoops, a year later something turns up in the fine print that actually does mean x can happen.

(for the slightly non-pc joke, it kind of has the feeling of Chamberlain coming back and waving a paper slip in the air saying "it is peace for our time".)

 

And it's the fun of Europe, so many hundred years of grudges back and forth...

[Humodour]

The problem is that the treaty is actually a one way street where Portugal has been consistently getting shafted by the British for 800 years.

 

What a surprise.

[Monte Carlo]

Krezzie is extremely well-balanced, with a chip on each shoulder an' all. I was born in the sixties, all this imperialism crap is nothing to do with me*, thanks. It's like bashing German forumites for the Blitz - not very helpful.

 

All major UK political parties are more or less settled on the EU question - apart from some tinkering with the minutiae. Personally I want to see the UK re-negotiate our relationship with Europe to it's 1974 iteration - i.e. a Free Trade agreement.

 

The EU was started by men desperate not to repeat WW2, a worthy and noble aspiration. It has now morphed into something rather different: a bloated, unaccountable corporatist monster.

 

Of course, in the UK, we shaft ourselves by complying with all these stupid rules. I gaze wistfully over the Channel to our French cousins and can only admire with green-eyed envy at their ability to completely ignore any EU diktat that doesn't suit them.

 

Cheers

MC

 

 

*Although some of it was jolly good, obviously.

Edited March 31, 2010 by Monte Carlo

[Zoraptor]

I'm not clear where you are writing from? Kampuchea?

I'd take a stab at Iceland.

 

The problem is that the treaty is actually a one way street where Portugal has been consistently getting shafted by the British for 800 years. The only mitigating factor is that the Portuguese are blundering idiots.

Come now, if it weren't for the brits (or the ever under appreciated russkies) you'd be speaking francais and saluting le roi Junot.

[Humodour]

Krezzie is extremely well-balanced, with a chip on each shoulder an' all. I was born in the sixties, all this imperialism crap is nothing to do with me*, thanks. It's like bashing German forumites for the Blitz - not very helpful.

 

All major UK political parties are more or less settled on the EU question - apart from some tinkering with the minutiae. Personally I want to see the UK re-negotiate our relationship with Europe to it's 1974 iteration - i.e. a Free Trade agreement.

 

The EU was started by men desperate not to repeat WW2, a worthy and noble aspiration. It has now morphed into something rather different: a bloated, unaccountable corporatist monster.

 

Of course, in the UK, we shaft ourselves by complying with all these stupid rules. I gaze wistfully over the Channel to our French cousins and can only admire with green-eyed envy at their ability to completely ignore any EU diktat that doesn't suit them.

 

Cheers

MC

 

 

*Although some of it was jolly good, obviously.

 

It was a drunk joke you patriotic bastard. I love the Brits, and I don't give a toss about any of the modern-day claims of 'imperialism', but you guys are more than willing to act selfishly when it suits.

[Walsingham]

As much as one can get worked up about these things I'm genuinely sorry to hear you think The Empire has been shafting Portugal. And noot just because Portugal is quite rocky and I worry about our national danglies. I thought we'd been the least well publicised allies ever, and have been greeted as such on numerous occasions by friendly portugees, who are happy to assume I'm a short, less nose-ridden Duke of Wellington.

[Pidesco]

This is all talk about history you know. Obviously I have no problem with individual Englishmen.

 

Also, be aware that in Portugal everyone is taught in school how we and the English have been the best of friends forever and ever without many details.

 

Never mentioned are the dowry of huge strategical value in an idiotic royal marriage, or the completely unbalanced trade agreements of wine for cotton. Or the Port wine monopoly production practically offered to the English. Or the completely disregard of any respect for their Portuguese friends in the scramble for Africa.

 

Again, though, Portuguese leadership has almost always been composed of incompetent twits. The last proper leader the Portuguese had was almost 300 years ago.

[Monte Carlo]

^ Old chap, I presume all of these things are down-payment for your liberation from old Bonie, and why you are still speaking Portuguese rather than French.

 

Of course, my historical knowledge of the Peninsula war comes almost exclusively from watching old episodes of Sharpe, usually late at night as an apres-pub treat. So I might well be talking out of my arse for a change.

 

Zut alors!

 

MC

[Raithe]

Now, I'm willing to admit I might be partially mistaken... but from what I understand, a lot of the various European countries use legal systems are actually based around the old Napoleonic Code.. While the UK never did. So a lot of issues with the EU has been the clash of those two styles of systems.

 

Kind of like how the French spent years talking about how they had high safety standards for MOT (but didn't enforce those standards) while the UK has lower standards but rigidly enforces them.

Note how much fuss was caused a few years back when after several accidents involving French lorry drivers, the UK stopped incoming Lorries and gave them mechanical checks according to the French standards.. and the French truckers went on strike due to how many failed...

 

It's the joys of totally different attitudes.