Council5 : European Council secretly decides on secretive G27 Foreign Policy Process

'This is the beginning of a process for a European Foreign Policy,' declared the President of the European Council, Mr Herman van Rompuy. He was speaking at the curt and unilluminating press conference after leaving the secret conclave of leaders of the European Council on 16 September 2010. It was reportedly a stormy meeting. However the public does not know for sure, because the alleged shouting match took place in private.

The European Council wants ownership of the EU's foreign policy, Mr van Rompuy said. It would be implemented by other European institutions including the European Commission and the External Action Service. Policy declarations covered the Balkans, the Middle East and the Eastern Partnership.

Unfortunately, he did not explain why such foreign policy should be conceived and determined in secrecy. After all, we are dealing with public policy. When it comes to public policy Robert Schuman said that all the Councils and Committees and other bodies should be open to the public and subject to intensive public scrutiny. Economic and political integration must be 'based on a democratic foundation,' Schuman wrote in his book Pour l'Europe, p145.

What we have instead is an attempt to create public policy in secret. That is an oxymoron.

It is also a very dangerous idea. The world is convulsed by major global problems. Secretive banksters involved in trillion dollar frauds have sapped the economy. The legalities of sub-prime loans and toxic packages are still subject to court cases, affecting actions of all political leaders. Will further trillion dollar deals among the financial elites be again conducted in democratic obscurity? Should international budget matters amounting to thousands or millions of euros be subject to democratic scrutiny while those amounting to billions or trillions of dollars not get any? Shouldn't they get a few thousand times more scrutiny?

Other multinational trading companies have larger budgets than many nation States. They thumb their noses at international laws. Is this the time for leaders to make foreign policy without any democratic control?

'We can only be strong if we are united,' said Mr van Rompuy. However, it should be recalled that the European Community and the EU is not the G27. Uniting the leaders in secret (if that can be done) is not the same as European democracy. It is pure inter-governmentalism. It will not bring a coherent foreign policy. It will leave Europe vulnerable and weak.

Firstly, what do European leaders mean by European Foreign Policy? They seem to mean the policy that 27 people plus one chairman make in a closed room as far away from the eyes and ears of democrats as possible. Secret agreements between heads of government do not make Community foreign policy. It has little or no democratic legitimacy, no supranational foundation. It is purely an intergovernmental agreement. And not even that, because the other ministers are banned from the discussion.

The Founding Fathers knew that inter-governmentalism was too fragile for the present dangerous world. The Council-style decree has not been subjected to democratic criticism. It has received no democratic assent. It has not even been debated. Strength comes from public consent after a full debate and democratic law.

Council communiques are not the Foreign Policy of the European Union, that is, the values and interests of 500 million people with their jobs, families, organizations and values. The leaders may think themselves clever. But how can even the greatest brains work out what is in the interest as far as some citizen in the far-off Arctic and the islands of Greece? The idea that heads of government can formulate a foreign policy by themselves simply lacks democratic legitimacy. Unless they show a democratic assent, citizens must conclude there is at least a good possibility they are doing it all for themselves or their own PR glory.

It is Gaullism writ large. Charles de Gaulle said in 1946 that the State must repose on the interest and sentiment of the nation. However he wasn't interested in finding out what that was. He wasn't willing to listen. That was why he was kicked out. Then, ten years later, he seized power again in what another president called a permanent coup d'Etat.

A leader or leaders with flawed character will create flawed foreign policy. De Gaulle thought he was the only one who could decide foreign policy. De Gaulle did not tell his ministers what his foreign policy was .... until he pronounced it. Once this decree was made, his ministers had to rush around and tell everyone how good and great his decisions were. This often strained their "diplomatic skills" to find a positive spin.

He decided without telling his ministers that the United Kingdom, and by implication the candidate countries, Norway, Ireland and Denmark, should not be members of the Community of Europe. He did not tell anyone until he announced it. Not to parliament. Not to the Quai d'Orsay. Not to the foreign ministries of the candidate countries. Probably not to his wife or his dog.

He announced it to journalists, based on a planted question, at one of his fawning press conferences. He decided on another occasion that France should expel NATO Strategic Headquarters from French soil. Because of the reputation of Schuman in foreign affairs, France had gained this prestigious prize, so de Gaulle tried to undo it. It was only recently that France rejoined the NATO military structures. It was de Gaulle's expensive folly.

At other times he just popped major strategic policy out in a speech such as when in 1967 on an official visit he cried: 'Vive le Quebec libre!' inciting Quebec to break away from the Canadian federation. His diplomats then had to try to explain what he meant and support the Gaullist policy. Gaullism was foreign policy without the control of democracy.

The Council is now announcing a neo-Gaullist path of foreign policy. It is by decree of the political cartel of the Council. I am sorry to have to tell them that we are dealing with 27 democracies not 27 countries bound in an autocratic Gaullist federation from the Urals to the Atlantic. This is not the time of Charlemagne. It is the new era of supranational democracies.

Secondly, secret foreign policy deals were denounced in recent history as the cause of wars. After World War One, the US President Woodrow Wilson identified as one of the causes of war the lack of open treaties openly agreed. The League of Nations was set up to make sure that treaties and international agreements did not have hidden clauses like the German Rapallo agreement after the war.

Thirdly, foreign policy formulation even by so-called democrats is too often undemocratic. It can be harmful, and even worse. Who knows what the so-called democratic leaders get up to in secret? The Rapallo agreement in 1922 on secret German rearmament was not made by Hitler but by a democratic Weimar government. Germany plotted with the Soviet Union to re-arm against the international community, making it easy for the seizure of power by Hitler.

Should we trust today's so-called democratic leaders? Do they really know what is the common European interest? Are they even working for the long-term benefit of a nation or for the TV news exposure and tomorrow's press headlines?

They wouldn't do anything as sinister as Rapallo, would they? Well, first remember that the German democrats probably thought they were doing good. They acted to support the German armament cartels. Then look at what we have now. The present Middle East policy is typically one of trillion dollar cartels and should be exposed to a full democratic debate.

Those at the European Council were the leaders or their successors who promised that after the French and Dutch public had rejected the Lisbon Treaty there would be a full democratic consultation about the next step. What did they do? They simply brought in the Constitutional Treaty that had been rejected by other means (without further referendums). They merely changed the name to the Lisbon Treaty while the contents stayed practically the same.

The easiest word for this is hypocrisy and there are a lot of harder words I could use. The conclusion is that the so-called democratic leaders simply cannot be trusted to keep their word.

Fourthly, their method proves they are pseudo-democrats, what Schuman called counterfeit democrats. If they had reformed their ways, if they were really democrats, they would have opened the doors of the European Council to the press. They didn't. Why? They did not want the public -- whom they are supposed to represent -- to see their real interests and character. There were rumours and documents in circulation, Mr Barroso confirmed later, that there was sharp exchange of words amounting to a shouting match going on. A very unseemly sight to see on television, enough to frighten the children.

Fifthly, under the Lisbon Treaty there is no democratic or independent parliamentary control worth speaking of. The leaders like to meet in party political conclave before the European Councils, they do not meet with other democratic institutions. They do not meet with the public. Why?

Political parties are the largest lobbyist groups in Europe. They are not very successful in getting public support or even votes at elections. They have little funds, except the money they get from the taxpayers. Yet policy and ideology is pliable enough to accept funding directly or indirectly from the rich and from powerful international corporations, even sovereign funds from abroad. Who is making the policies of the parties? Certainly not the public.

Parliament provides no real forum for debate. It is composed of the same coalition of major parties. It lacks public support. More people refuse to vote than vote for any of its parties. The proportion of people refusing to vote out of disgust or disinterest is increasing at each election.

Why before the European Council do the leaders meet in separate, equally secret groupings as members of political parties, conservative, liberal, socialist, etc? It is to reinforce party political policy, to force it through the European Council. Is this democratic? Consider that 98 percent of the European public are not members of any political party and you will see that this not a representative way to approach a European Council.

It is a political cartel at work. This is the same process used by economic cartels to 'fix' the market and cream off huge illegal profits. Politicians are not going to talk about anything else but pushing through party ideology. That is both unjust and undemocratic. Politics based on ideology is a failed cause. Witness the failed ideologies of the twentieth century. Parties vote in blocks and are now subject to other factors.

Sixthly -- and here we come to another dangerous bit -- secret foreign policy is easily corruptible. The European Commission regularly gives fines of around one billion euros for illegal cartel activities. 'Respectable' US firms and many European ones have had to cough up because they were caught out in illegal activities. If you had a billion euros and wanted to avoid another fine, what would you do? How do lobbyists work? They try to influence Commission officials, maybe MEPs etc.

However the most effective means to influence policy is to influence either the government minister or the political party the minister belongs to. Then the minister becomes, wittingly or unwittingly, an advocate of an industrial group or labour union or consumer group. Thus democratic control is especially needed to determine what happens inside meetings of ministers. A minister can easily convince or delude him- or herself. He may think that what he is advocating is good for an industry and is good for the country. One American politician, an industrialist appointed Secretary of Defence, said that 'For years I thought what was good for the country was good for General Motors and vice versa'. That sort of thinking is shortsighted self deception.

Seventhly, how should foreign policy be composed? Foreign policy should be totally inclusive of all sections of society. Is this possible, critics may ask. Certainly, but only under a supranational democracy. All policy issues must pass through five democratic institutions who should be subject to democratic accountability. Each institution should check the others. A real European foreign policy should be organized in the following fashion. The citizens have to permit a European foreign policy first in one sector. That sector has to be designated for its importance. The Commission in full dialogue with all sections of organized civil society identifies what is the specific guideline that should be promoted as policy. It agrees to an overall framework, whether an Energy Community, a coal and steel community, or a transport community. This has to have the full assent of the all the people. (The weakness of the Lisbon/constitutional Treaty system is that it tries to include all sectors and it does not have popular assent, having ignored the referendums.)

Specific parts of the foreign policy are defined by acts of European law that are democratically agreed upon by the five supranational institutions. For example, one strand could be based on a regulation that identifies the reduction of Carbon or energy use in manufacturing, or forbidding the use of a dangerous product. It might ban a chemical product as dangerous or carcinogenic.The foreign policy would be that no such chemicals should be imported into the EU by foreign firms. It could define methods so that Europeans would not be endangered by imports.

The Community approach requires that principles and values are defined in law. Any citizen, organisation or institution has the right to challenge any violation against these European values in any court of the land.

That is a universe away from the neo-Gaullism that the European Council is trying to promote.

European Council: the burqanistas 'reveal' the Minutes of their secret Meetings!

Ever wanted to know exactly what happens INSIDE the European Council? How did the President of France respond to the British Prime Minister or the German Chancellor's suggestions? Do you want the griff on how the Maltese Prime Minister or the Luxembourg Prime Minister said that a discussion was totally unacceptable to the interests of his country? Wouldn't it be revealing to know how leaders actually think they can share out public money and decide how it should be spent?

Imagine for you (as an individual, or as a group or company), your vital interests are at stake. They are now being affected in the policy workings of your country and the EU. Maybe you also are experiencing many cross-frontier and global complications and these subjects are on the agenda of the European Council. Wouldn't you like to know how the topic was being discussed in the European Council?

If for example the industrial plant where you worked had been closed down in Ireland, and then you heard that the same multinational was receiving EU funds for opening up a similar plant in one of the central or east European States (with reduced payroll costs), would you not like to know how this sort of deal was being cut?

This involves jobs, livelihoods, public money and European policy. That is what European democracy should be all about. Schuman defined democracy as being at the service of people and working in agreement with it. Note agreement by the people, not just their so-called representatives. Do leaders act as Statesmen or do they think the EU is at the service of a cartel of political parties and their own careers?

Perhaps you are interested in knowing how governments can bring in a treaty while ignoring what the people say in referendums. Party machines are increasingly important. The Lisbon Treaty was forced through by parties rather than the free vote of Members of Parliament. They were whipped in line by party officials, sometimes without giving the parliamentarians a second even to read the treaty in full.

What are the leaders up to next? How do the heads of government react when the Commission proposes (now that it is composed exclusively of a cartel of paid-up members of their political parties) that European funding should be disbursed even more bountifully to political parties? For example, providing for more parliamentarians, giving them a bigger budget, larger staffs and naturally higher salaries. The EU has far more Presidents now than ever before. Of course the heads of government are also likely to benefit from this largesse, (it provides a retirement option). It will as well help their friends and buddies in their parties.

The public might want to know if those present at the European Council are behaving predominantly as party leaders or ethical champions. Are they honestly fighting potential corruption or leading it? Are they too party hacks, anxious to help themselves and the party first, their country second and the European common good a distant third?

This is no minor matter. We are not dealing here with pennies. This is not a parish council. We are dealing with potentially multi-million euro sums. Misuse of public funds by government leaders for party political purposes is no less criminal than the local Mafioso or landowner bending the rules in a village council.

Well, with the Lisbon Treaty a new situation arose. Instead of all meetings of heads of government being legally 'informal' and therefore secret, (as de Gaulle wanted it), they now have a sort-of legal status (if you consider the Lisbon Treaty to be legal).

All institutions have to publish the Minutes of their meetings. Minutes mean to a normal person a useful, succinct summary that covers all the important discussions and contentions. The Minutes have a role beyond that of the conclusions of their deliberations. They should reveal whether all the members of the institution are doing anything dubious behind closed doors. For example, if all members of an institution decided to give themselves pay rises or do something illegal and one member objected, then the Minutes would reveal there was a dispute. The conclusions would only reveal whether the member who objected eventually fell in line  --after threats and menaces -- as happened under de Gaulle. Arm-twisting is not visible in the Conclusions.

The Lisbon Treaty made the European Council a new institution. So it has to produce Minutes in the same way as the local town council has to. That is a democratic norm. The European Parliament publishes a verbatim record of its debates. It publishes its criticism and proposed amendments to legislation. The Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of Regions publish theirs.

The reason is simple. Democratic accountability. The people can judge afterwards who was right in their arguments, who was speaking perhaps covertly for special interests, who was being obstinately doctrinal or ideological, and who just had bad judgement. They can also see cartels of block party voting and very few individuals willing to state their opinions.

Now the European Council is legally obliged to publish its Minutes too. The first meeting of the new European Council under the Lisbon Treaty was on 10 and 11 December 2009.

I requested a copy of these Minutes. No reply. I wrote to the Ombudsman and then re-applied.

Six months later I learned that the Council had considered the matter. The documents, which had been declared LIMITED circulation, would be opened to me, and the public. (Why are not all such documents from this so-called democratic institution not classified as PUBLIC? )

Now I have a copy of the Minutes to peruse at my leisure. Have I learned anything new? No. The minutes simply say that the European Council met, that it agreed to the Agenda, and that it issued a Conclusion/ communiqué (or not as the case may be).

Of course even the great Gaullist guardians of secrets cannot always control politicians sucombing to human frailties like being open from time to time. The underskirt of a couple of democratic items were exposed from under the Council's voluminous skirts of secrecy. Or should I call it the Council's burqa of blackout?

As an additional gem they added an Any Other Business item about a couple of letters, incidentally dealing with the changes to the Lisbon Treaty. But of course from behind the Council's closed doors no detail of any debate about this essential matter of democracy escapes.

Consider this ingongruity. The real Minutes would expose the nature of the Council. If they didn't debate Lisbon Treaty changes, that would indicate a paucity of democratic debate and autocratic tendencies. Cartels do not have to debate. They fix money and supply questions. If they did debate the Lisbon Treaty amendments, why are the public not allowed to know about what they said? Why the democratic blackout?

For the enlightenment of all I enclose the substance of the Minutes.

1. Adoption of the agenda

The European Council adopted its agenda (document EUCO 4/09).

2. Approval of the conclusions

The European Council approved its conclusions (document EUCO 6/09).

3. AOB

Further to the submission by the Spanish Government of a proposal for the amendment of the Treaties as regards transitional measures concerning the composition of the European Parliament, the European Council approved the draft letters to be addressed to the President of the European Parliament and to the President of the European Commission respectively (document EUCO 2/09 + COR 1).

This farce arises because of a conflict of interests, democratic and anti-democratic. The framework of the European Community system is a legal system, based on democratic principles. That means that the people should know what the European institutions are up to. The founding fathers insisted that people have a legal right to have the opinion of the Council on record. Non-democratic leaders over the past years since the inception of the Community sixty years ago want to hide their deals and prevent democratic accountability. They want to play the national champion and hide European reality from their voters.

Like the Gaullist, Francoist, Salazarian or Greek military autocrats, -- or the People's Democracies of Soviet-controlled Europe -- the present government leaders and ministers still seek to reduce their legal, democratic obligations to a minimum. The Party knows best Today it is the Party Cartel who wants you to think it knows best. The above Minutes you have what the Cartel presents as the minimum information requirement that they think they can get away with.

As it happens, these documents showed that the government leaders have not succeeded in smothering all discussion in their minimalist Minutes. A newcomer made a request that according to the Gaullist burqa rules should not be in the Minutes. It reveals a little bit of a real discussion, even an inkling of democratic debate. It was from someone who was naively used to the democratic use of Minutes as a public record, not a means of obfuscation.

Ad item 4 on the agenda
Stockholm Programme

Statement by M. Lawrence Gonzi - Prime Minister of Malta on the Stockholm Programme recalling the declaration tabled by Malta at the Justice and Home Affairs Council of 30 November 2009.

I would like to make a couple of comments about the Stockholm Programme. The Presidency is to be congratulated for getting unanimous agreement on the text. This does not mean to say that we do not have concerns about the implementation of some of its provisions, especially those relating to new obligations in the immigration area. Malta made a declaration on the matter at the Justice and Home Affairs Council of 30 November 2009, and I would like to recall and reaffirm this declaration while requesting that this statement I am making today be entered in the minutes of this European Council in accordance with Article 8 of the Rules of Procedure. It is therefore particularly important for us that the text is not re-opened."

It is democratic buffoonery to add one or two isolated items of a debate, while leaving out the context, debate and response. Either these are normal Minutes or they are not. If not, the Burqanistas of the Council should tell the Maltese Prime Minister that he should shut up, he should not think that these are Minutes like those of the Cricket Club and, above all, this European Council is not a democratic institution.

The Council should come clean and say: 'Rules of Cricket, nor those of the Minutes of commercial companies, any other councils or any other free association of free Europeans don't apply democratically to us.' They should then publish the Lisbon rules.

Have the 'democratic' leaders taken their democratic responsibilities seriously? Obviously not. And to the world at large as well as the European public, the new European Council of the Lisbon Treaty is becoming the worst example of undemocratic practice.

This in no way conforms to the principles of democracy and the explanations of democracy that Robert Schuman wrote about. Schuman called such practitioners, DEMOCRATIC FRAUDSTERS.

It is doubly a farce because the officials at the Council offices and also government officials have need to know what the European government leaders have actually said. The unofficial minutes are therefore circulated among these officials. They are also made available or 'leaked' to journalists and others. However they are not available to the general public. WHY NOT? They are usually recorded by a public official whose salary is paid for out of public taxes. It is triply a farce because Schuman said that the Councils (like the Parliament and Committees) should be open and thus supervised by public opinion.

In the Community system the Council of Ministers is just one of the five democratic institutions -- all have to respect the rules of supranational democracy.

The Council still thinks it is above this law. Imagine if we had such a record of the debates in Parliament or the Consultative Committees. They would say the Institution met, it approved the agenda, and it issued a communiqué. What sort of democratic accountability is that?

As Schuman wrote, European democracy also involves the elimination of those things that are obviously anti-democratic. Democratic and ethical standards should be set by leaders. Unfortunately it usually comes about after public demonstrations, revolution, Court cases and open rebellions, following the persistent abuse of governments.

It is high time that the leaders of 27 democracies consider the loss they are creating to European prestige, values and standing in the world:
Your idea of European democracy would be a disgrace to a local tennis club.

14. European Council publishes orders for public to STAY OUT!

In December — when no one was looking — Member States governments adopted their Rules of Procedure for the new Lisbon Democracy. You missed it? No wonder. This ‘agreement’ was definitely not agreed in public, for the public by the public in a public meeting place in Brussels.

It was all done more or less by post. (Written procedure). It says

Done at Brussels, 1 December 2009.
For the European Council
The President
H. VAN ROMPUY

Done? The public certainly have been. The first of December 2009 is another black day for European democracy.

The newest institution of so-called European democracy confirms that the EUROPEAN COUNCIL wants to be SECRET. It is a way to get rid of the pesky press. The politicians can control the news-hounds like Pavlov’s dogs with ‘off the record‘ news feeds. That makes managed “democracy” so much easier.

Article 4 inset 3 says Meetings of the European Council shall not be public. (OJ 2.12.2009, L 315/51)

It does not say; Occasionally tired and delicate heads of government, after a long trip to Brussels, need some privacy. Nor does it say: As a democratic institution we will eventually open our doors to the public and the press as the Founding Fathers said all such European institutions should be.

It says that the rules preclude any of the Public EVER getting in.

This is the latest sad retreat from the Community democratic system to irresponsible intergovernmentalism. It is the last fling of effete Gaullism. Politicians like making their deals in the dark, away from public light. The ruling political cartel does not want any one to meddle if such a democratic institution or individual wants to argue with secret intergovernmental deals.

The new Rules say:

Without prejudice to the provisions on public access to documents, the deliberations of the European Council shall be covered by the obligation of professional secrecy, except insofar as the European Council decides otherwise.

And of course they won’t. It will take all 27 to say Yes. They will flip coins to take turns for each one to say No.

Europe’s new democracy — after ten year’s of the public’s resistance — will be like getting sardines, squeezed together in the dark, out of their can. It will require a legal can-opener.
The European Council may authorise the production for use in legal proceedings of a copy of or an extract from European Council documents which have not already been released to the public in accordance with Article 10.

Why should the Council be the only institution that remains an absolute disgrace to what should be the greatest democratic organisation in the world — the grouping of 27 democracies of Europe?

The European Parliament has open debates. It is a model for the world.

Despite some hesitations at the start (that is in the 1950s) the Consultative Committees — the nascent debating chamber for organised civil society — are open to the public.

The Economic and Social Committee is open.

The Committee of Regions is open.

The Commission is one of the most open institutions in the world.

The Court of Justice is open.

…. And the Council of Ministers ??? Hardly.

Now the European Council, too! SECRET!

While the European Council was not a real, legal institution, that is was not really an institution in the treaties, it could get away with the political equivalent of murder. It is still murdering democracy.

We now have the extraordinary sight of the President of the European Parliament attending the European Council — and he is made mute by the Council’s lack of democracy. The President of the European Parliament usually does things openly and before the cameras and a forest of microphones. When he addresses the European Council, no cameras are allowed. Radio journalists and their mikes are chased out. The public is excluded. A text may be produced. But the public and the press have no idea how the ‘lords and masters‘ of the European Council react or respond to the suggestions, criticisms and commentaries about their actions from the representative of Parliament.

In short the new rules have gagged Parliament.

General de Gaulle — who wanted to destroy European democracy — would be well pleased. His hand has made Parliament behave like a naughty schoolboy going to see the headmaster. De Gaulle thought that having to speak in a democratic debate in public was demeaning and undignified. He did not like giving reasons for his actions. He did not even tell his ministers what French policy was until he announced it. As for Europe, he preferred the ‘empty chair‘ ; he was not very much in favour of having any minister go there unless it was to collect money for wine lakes and beef mountains. Nor did he like a display of his henchmen arm-twisting and bullying the smaller States of Europe. The blood on the carpet might upset little old ladies. De Gaulle insisted that the Council should firmly shut its doors to the public.

All democratic chambers should be open to the public and the press, unless the public can be convinced there is a valid reason why they should not be. That is a basic principle of democracy. From the time when Celtic tribes assembled to debate matters in public, it has been so for a few thousand years.

And don’t give me that ‘Oh, if the Council is open to the public, they will talk in the corridors.‘ Parliamentarians talk in the corridors. But they have a debate in public.

Why? So that there will be a public record of what they say, how they say it, and why they are moved to say it. Only when the public — let us call them voters or their democratic masters — can have this evidence of their motivation, reasoning and quest for European justice, can they judge them. And fire them, if necessary. Maybe even congratulate them on occasion.

That is democracy. It is quite different from Gaullist autocracy. Had we forgotten? Schuman defined democracy as being ‘At the service of the people and acting in agreement with the people‘. Lincoln said it was ‘government of the people, by the people and for the people.‘ The new Lisbon system is now defined as being SECRETLY for the secretive politicians, by the secretive politicians and for the secretive politicians; people stay OUT, referendums and public opinion are of no consequence to us. Please go away and be ruled in silence.

If you don’t agree with me, please leave a comment telling me where and when the public had a democratic debate and agreed that the Council and now the European Council should be SECRET.

At the moment I feel quite free to speak out so boldly. At the Council offices, no one will be listening or reading this commentary . They’re in the middle of a cat-and-dog fight about who is in charge. Is it the Spanish national presidency or the President of the European Council? Then there is the latest debacle. The US President does not want to attend a Summit with Europe until he knows whose hand to shake first. In the Council the European cartel are still arguing about who is responsible for making Europeans look like a bunch of fools, and not only to the Americans over the EU-US Summit. The undemocratic cartel running Europe has made European government look ridiculous to the wide world.

These so, so, embarrassing matters shall not be open to the public.