Is it ironic that “Irony” and “Hubris” are Greek words?

A mere ten years ago, the “European Union” was congratulating itselff on expanding from fifteen nationa to twenty five nations. Mostly by moving East, which really annoyed the Russians, who consider Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania….not to mention, Poland to be within its “sphere of influence”, the awful term that imperialists use to justify military intervention. How can Russia react? Well maybe a few nervous people in the Baltic where ethnic Russians do not have full citizenship rights. Meanwhile in Ukraine…..

The strange thing about the first manifestation of the Common Market (1957-1972), Luxembourg, Belgium, Netherlands, France, Italy and Germany) was that it looked a little like the Holy Roman Empire of previous centuries. The expansions into southern Europe (Greece, Spain and Portugal) were to embrace the new democracies, getting over the Military Junta, Franco and Salazar. The move to the South looks as stupid as the later move to the East. “Europe” is now at odds with the Greek Government, recently elected and will soon be at odds with a new Spanish anti-austerity government.

And isnt “Democracy” a Greek word?

“Hubris” is basically the consequence of misplaced self-confidence. And surely the Greek Gods who used it in Mythology have seen it in Brussels in recent years. The experiment of uniting Europe is in tatters.

Having over-reached themselves, the Eurocrats is Brussells find themselves at diplomatic war with Greece. The main player is Chancellor Merkel of the German Fourth Reich. Ok …”fourth reich” is just an insult…Germany is a democracy also. It merely wants to protect its citizens as much as the Greeks do.

But when a “big” nation takes on a “small” nation, there is only one result. When a “big” democracy takes on a “small” democracy, there is only one result.

For nearly five decades now, we have been sold the incremental notion of “one Europe”. It nas been united politically but never emotionally by Stealth.

There are Europhobes, Euroskeptics and Europhiles.

But even, the Europhiles fall back on economic arguments. Is there really a significant number of people in Europe, who love “Europe” more than they love being a citizen of Portugal, Germany, Finland, Poland, Ireland or Greece? I doubt it.

Asking Greece…or more accurately DEMANDING that Greece takes an unrealistic proportion of pain so that Europe ….or more accurately its banks dont have to….is both undemocratic and unlikely. Almost sixty per cent of Greeks under thirty are unemployed. This means it will be generations before there is any real improvement in Greek living standards. Greece have already negotiated a four month delay in financial support being withdrawn. But the Spanish electorate is watching.

And the Irish electorate go back to the polls within a year. By common consent, Europe has patted the Irish Government on the head and congratulated it for implementing austerity which means Ireland has quickly regained a measure of economic sovreignty. The nightmare is nearly over. Yet a dilemna remains. More austerity so that Greece gets more relief. Or the realisation that at least some of the austerity of the previous five years could have been mitigated.

So the question is not “is the European Dream over?”. That question is settled. The question is now whether its a hard or soft landing.