The EU : Joined-up politics on the over-arching issue

[Brian]

Hi all.This is where we can have discussion on 'the overarching issue of our time', to quote a one M Heseltine ,which is the only thing this senior Tory has said on the EU with which I agree!

We must be aware that new Labour is like it is because of it's strategic committment to the EU and the military,neoliberal capitalist united states of Europe which the eurocrats envisage.To oppose the EU is not xenophobia or narrow-minded nostalgia,and certainly not anti-internationalist.On the contrary,part of the essence of internationalism is to preserve and defend the democracy ,accountability and popular sovereignty achieved by the labour movement and it's allies over generations of struggle,and to clearly see the EU as a capitalist offensive against this achievement.

It certainly is possible for us to develop a common european home,as Gorbachev described it,but we will not reach this via the EU in Brussels.We will reach this in spite of the Brussels capitalist club,by popular struggle and representation and not by top-down corporate-led social engineering for profit and nothing else.

Over to you,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

The website for people to try,which has links with lots of other euro-realist websites etc ,is the website of the Campaign Agianst Eurofederalism, which can be found at

www.caef.org.uk

This is a membership organisation,open to all,and which exposes the truth behind the euro-bull served up to us by the Establishment media - particularly topical is the so-called euro-constitution,which the eurocrats would like us to believe is 'stalled',even though the rules were or are that if the EU constitution is voted down by at least one member state of the EU (such as France and the Netherlands ,in this case),then it falls.

At caef you will be able to read how the eurocrats and right-wing politicians are moving to get the articles of the 'constitution' onto the statute book by the back door.

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

Let us not forget that new Labour is like it is because, above most other things - and pursuant to it's craven pro-Americanism - new Labour is pro-EU.

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

And,of course,do regularly log-on to

www.spectrezine.org

which is the website of Spectre ,the progressive left forum for all thoroughgoing progressives who know that this European Union is leading us nowhere but to depression and war (and the fascism this will breed),and must be dismantled by concerted action by Europe's labour mvt and it's allies forthwith.

Spectre is part-funded by quite possibly the fastest-growing left party in Europe, the Dutch Socialist Party,which goes from strength to strength and victory to victory, and is an object lesson for the left here in the UK - especially for those who dream of a green socialist party to the left of Labour.

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

Another info source to loo into is the Research Centre for a Free Europe's 'These Tides ' magazine, full of info and contacts for those preparing for the post-EU Europe.The latest issue is on the Undead Constitution.

The web address is

www.ukve.ee/TT_backissues.html

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

And as far as Uk movements are concerned, the broad movement in the UK is the Democracy Movement,whose website is

www.democracymovement.org.uk

this is an excellent website which now details how the demand for a referendum on the EU constitution - 'stalled' though it may be - is now in the top 10 petitions that Brown must now reckon with!

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

An excellent site where you can read a detailed analysis and debunking of the new EU Constitutional Treaty is

www.openeurope.org.uk

which is a great site in which the machinations of the eurocrats are examined in detail and refuted, and there is no time for this like now!

In particular,openeurope find the new constitutional treaty to be identical to the old EU constitution, contrasting with all the eurofanatic bullshitters who tried to reassure us all that the worst elements of the old constitution had been removed...

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

Not that I agree with the sentiments voiced by the business-dominated Open Europe, but it is a comment on the left that one must go to sites outside the left to access the actual European treaties and critiques of them in any detail...

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

The lates issue of Spectrezine is in,in which you can read the latest articles from the online Spectre,one of the leading magazines of the anti-EU,euro-realist left.

You may be interested in the latest review I have written for them, which can be found at

www.spectrezine.org/reviews/precious8.htm

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

the latest spectrezine is out.

To receive spectremail in your mailbox @ once a week, log on to


www.spectrezine.org

and click on the spectremail button etc.

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

The EU has been less than perfect vis a vis US attempts to isolate Cuba,even though European exporters have ignored such blatant attempts to strangle Cuba such as the HB act...

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

and the latest Spectremail is out...

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

In a very important new Spectremail, Steve McGiffen outlines how the excellent Dutch Socialist Party is fighting on behalf of the majority of Dutch people, who rejected the EU Constitution and also reject the so-called Constitutional Treaty.

Thus the Dutch SP distinguishes itself from the disgraceful pro-EU crawling of Dutch MP's ,who have just ridden roughshod over the wishes of the Dutch people - and signalled the real interests they represent - by denying the Dutch a referendum on the new 'treaty'.

Sign up to Spectremail at

www.spectrezine.org

yours,

Brian Precious

[Dugsie]

It's a great debate you're having here Brian.

Why don't you post something on Compass ? You might find someone to disagree with you about the EU, or even to agree with you.

[rob9443]

As far as Europe is concerned, I have come round, with immense reluctance, to the idea that there should be a referendum on whether Britain should leave. I used to be a knee jerk pro European and detested the Eurosceptics throughout the Nineties. It took a long time for me to wake up to the utterly reactionary nature of the monetarist Maastricht Treaty.

People such as Tony Benn who took a principled and democratic stand may have been in strange company, such as Theresa Gorman and Norman Tebbit, but they helped to cause immense problems for Major's Tories. If Labour under John Smith had opposed Maastricht it is quite possible that Tory rebels would have supported a no confidence motion against Major and Labour would have come to power in 1993-4.

It was probably always a mistake for Britain to join. Had we listened to de Gaulle and stayed out Paris and Berlin might have succeeded in setting up the federal state by the mid Nineties based on a Rhineland model of capitalism rather than the Anglo American free market. There were moves to set up European company law which would have provided for workers representation on the board, but the UK government killed it. It is not surprising that Washington supported British membership of Europe, our government has consistently succeeded in lowering standards on behalf of big business.

Enlargement was supported by the British government for the good reason that New Labour conservatives now have allies among the reactionary East European countries who are hostile to the left and instinctively pro American because of their resentment at Soviet rule. The whole aim was to weaken and dilute Europe. Paris and Berlin should never have allowed either Britain or Poland to join until the social democratic federal state had been established. It could then have forced the East Europeans to stop undercutting them with lower standards of welfare and workers rights by restricting access to the West European market.

De Gaulle was right. England has been nothing more than a Trojan Horse.

Were there to be a referendum on UK membership of the EU the right would be in deep trouble. The City and big business want to stay in but Little England Tories are hostile for nationalist reasons. The hypocrisy of many Tory Eurosceptics would be exposed: they don't actually want to leave the EU and know perfectly well that this new Treaty is necessary to make enlargement work but love to stir up English resentment at a supposed undemocratic conspiracy by New Labour.  Win the referendum in the teeth of the Murdoch press and Labour would no longer have any reason to fear either Cameron or Rupert.  Lose it and at least we would be free to get rid of regressive taxes like VAT and go in for state aid for what's left of our car industry.

I don't suppose Gordon Brown is likely to take advice from Red Pepper but if he were to hold a referendum on membership of the EU he would have a very good chance of destroying Cameron, whom he clearly detests

[Brian]

Cheers Rob.A lot of things in your post!
I will say that i do not think the EU was ever going to turn out any other than the way it is now.The EU is a child of the US and was and is a vital part of the apparatus of the cold war.It's ideology was enunciated back in 1952 by European Movement founder Jean Monnet,who expressed open contempt for democracy and working people when he said that the European state should be built up gradually and surreptitiously ,so not to draw attention to itself from the mass of the people.

The EU's agenda is privatisation at home - such as the post-office, the railways and foundation hospitals -and imperialism abroad - recall that already a group of UK and French troops have occupied part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to protect the regions largest gold mine ,UNDER AN EU FLAG.

yours,

Brian Precious

[Brian]

Cheers Dugsie- indeed i have found someone who posts intelligently re the EU, and lo and behold he broadly agrees with me!

bp

[treborc]

Who is he, he might be a EU spy.

[Brian]

yes, treborc, we must be ever-vigilant!!!

yours,

bp

[Brian]

The latest Spectremail is out,

sign up at

www.spectrezine.org

yours, 

BP