Brussels Budget Summit Fails; EU in Chaos
It's the Battle of Waterloo all over again -- only with the loss of 50,000 lives.
The British-French financial smackdown has turned into an all-out war, and the EU summit has broken up in chaos.
Check out what various international newspapers have to say. Check out the German Der Tagesspieger, for example:
Tony Blair is right to say that the budget talks should not just be about who puts how much money into the EU's coffers and who gets how much out of them... Do we want to continue spending a substantial section of the budget on structures of the past - in other words, subsidising the agricultural sector?... In light of their stagnating economies, it seems strange for Schroeder and Chirac to believe they know exactly what's best for Europe. Blair has at any rate proved in Britain that he knows more about economics than his opponents. |
Oooooooooooooooo, THEM'S FIGHTIN' WORDS! More international headlines here.
Recall too that at the end, Britain did not stand alone: it found allies in Sweden, Spain, the Netherlands, Finland, Denmark, and Italy. The Franco-German locomotive has gone right off the rails. I don't care how much they try to blame Blair for the failure of the summit -- part of the blame lies squarely on Chirac as well -- among others.
PS -- Check out the Economist's handy graph to see the utterly lopsided EU budget, the heart of the crisis. Here's also a nice PDF of how the EU budget works.
Euro-skepticism is sweeping the Continent. Suddenly it seems that being a Euro-skeptic is chic and timely. Whatever. I was country Euro-skeptic when country Euro-skeptic wasn't cool!