After Brexit, more Exit referendums coming! It may bring Democracy to Brussels!

End of Europe’s entire political civilization? It’s coming soon if Britain leaves the EU. So says Mr Tusk, the President of the European Council. He told the German newspaper Bild.
What a pessimistic, black forecast! All the more astounding when Europe could be on the brink of its greatest Golden Age in its history! What would it take? Just some honesty in respecting letter and spirit of Europe’s founding Treaties that brought Europe’s long peace! An Exit catastrophe is a self-inflicted political wound. Politicians might learn from a few catastrophes! They might retrace the true principles of Democracy that Robert Schuman and the founding fathers enunciated in the Community Method and the Great Charter of the Community ! Real democratic cohesion among 28 democracies would make it the driving force of the world!

“As a historian,’ Mr Tusk told the German newspaper Bild, ‘I fear Brexit could be the beginning of the destruction of not only the EU but also Western political civilisation in its entirety.”

Brexit vote would provide a major boost to radical anti-European forces who he said would be “drinking champagne”.
Why is it so dangerous? “Because,” says Mr Tusk, “no one can foresee what the long-term consequences would be.” Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker too is expecting a “catastrophe” if Britain leaves.
Maybe it is a warning that the end of Machiavellian, neo-Gaullist politics is in sight! Huzzah! Politicians try all the roads and leave the only honest one till last! Failure and Catastrophe is staring at them like a hungry lion! What are these leaders facing?
Multiple EXIT referendums. GREXIT, now BREXIT and in fact EUREXIT. A cascade of EXITs are on the horizon, regardless of what UK voters decide. It’s not just UK’s UK Independence party and a large faction of its Conservative party. France’s National Front, Germany’s Alternative and Italy’s Five Star parties all want a new deal with Brussels. And all the others too. They want OUT.
Now isn’t that a little extraordinary. The European Union is supposedly a union of 28 Democracies. But no one wants the Brussels Politburo version of Democracy.
You don’t need a doctor to tell you:

‘Brussels is sick!’

If all the alternative parties formed a network it would be them not the EPP (Christian Democrats) and Socialist cartel that would be running Brussels. It would be a ‘Get me out of here!’ coalition. A democratic vote would put a colourful array of parties in control. All they had in common would be:

‘We don’t like the carve-up of political powers illegally run by the Politburo in Brussels. We don’t like political cartels! We don’t want rule by Decree! We want open government! We want a free market of ideas! We want Freedom!’

So what is the EU Politburo doing about the multiple coming crises? Has it fired up the press about the key democratic reforms it is introducing? Has the Brussels political class even identified the key failures of democracy?

• a crazy, democracy-destroying currency, the euro, without the democratic safeguards that Schuman and the Founding Fathers warned were essential,
• a dictatorial policy that encouraged bombing in Syria and Libya (one government went to war without a government in place!)
• that now expects the European people having ignored the deaths, rape and enslavement of Christians, to accept millions of refugees, some potential, others committed Islamists and terrorists,
• a governmental system that no one can sack,
• a politburo that turned the most perfect concepts of European Democracy outlined by Robert Schuman upside down and made the Soviet-style People’s Democracies look good by comparison.

What did Schuman say about closed door Councils of Ministers?

“The New Europe must have democratic foundations. The Councils, the Committees and the other organs must be under active supervision of public opinion.” (Pour l’Europe, p145.)

Has the Council responded to the urgent public call for transparency? Has it set as a priority open sessions to ensure impartiality and to rebuild trust with the public? Time is short. Urgent action is needed, not only in Old England but across the Continent where anti-Brussels movements are filling the streets with thousands upon thousands of protesters.
Have these catastrophic dangers set Brussels ablaze with a new zeal for democratic reform?
A few days ago I attended a Council of Ministers press conference. The press room was empty. I was the only journalist there. Not for the first time.
Was it an important Council? You judge.
The Ministers dealt with:

• the Internal Market (a point of controversy in the UK referendum debate)
• Industrial policy, the digital Single Market strategy
• Quantum technology, high performance computing
• Better Regulations to strengthen competitiveness
• Product Safety and market surveillance
• the Posting of workers Directive,
• Space policy
• Boosting of mobile broadband services.

The event summarized the work of two Council of Ministers meetings.
If you had seen any footage of the press conference, you might have been aware that besides me asking a question, there were quite a number of smartly dressed men and women present. Were they journalists? Not at all. The loudspeaker system had asked for officials to come into the press room so that the ministers and Commissioners would not be embarrassed. The Council cameraman could then show that the press room was not empty. I was thanked for asking a question. Guess why!
Phantom democracy! This sort of facade is the Public Relations equivalent of the Potemkin village. It is a farce, a veneer. It is what Schuman denounced as counterfeit democracy! A poor effort to show that the public is interested in the “Brussels Democracy”. A similar sort of lethargy enveloped the Soviet bloc’s “democracies” but that could be stirred up by Communist party rallies and intimidation.
In Brussels it only emphasizes the rancid smell of decay and distrust that surround the circus of 50-odd politicians deciding behind closed doors the future of 500 million citizens.
Why this distrust? Why the lack of public confidence?
Any one curious to find the reason has only to turn to the Treaties — the compact made between politicians and the public.

Lisbon Treaty, TEU Article 16: The Council shall meet in public when it deliberates and votes on a draft legislative act.
Lisbon Treaty, TFEU: Article 15: The European Parliament shall meet in public, AS SHALL THE COUNCIL when considering and voting on a draft legislative act.

Why isn’t the Council open and public like the European Parliament and the Consultative Committees?
That in fact was the essence of my question to the Commissioners and Minister. The Councils refuse to hold public meetings. As a sop to their legal obligations, the Council has started streaming minor aspects of some Council meetings. Instead of informing the public, they video-stream a few minutes, here and there, when Ministers vote. Sometimes they add some other boring bits, especially those the public is less interested in. Who would want to have the privilege of listening to on-off snippets when the ministers vote. But not much else.
Politicians want to keep matters secret and non-controversial.
And they are right. Hardly anyone views these snippets except the bureaucrats. Who besides eurocrats watches them? No one really knows. The only statistics seems to relate to the Luxembourg presidency of 2015.
One of the most important Councils is ECOFIN, on Economic and Financial Affairs. It deals with the euro and the potential collapse of the euro and economics of Greece and the EU. How many people wanted to view the Council’s snippets, do you think?
The average was 252 live viewers. (That figure probably includes the civil servants in Brussels and around the EU). A similar number viewed the recorded version. Of the five EcoFin Councils, one two-day meeting on13/14 November, amassed only 54 viewers.
The average time of live-streaming of the Councils, formal and informal, is less than an hour per Council. Thus the public has no idea of what is being decided in their names, behind closed doors. Would anyone except a civil servant want to watch a movie which kept being switched on and off while the screen must be activated all the time? Would you sit patiently for a few minutes to see a voting exercise while a one or two day Council was being held?
This excessive “video exposure” was clearly traumatic for secretive ministers. That is why governments invented the European Council. There they can talk about anything — whether home insulation or global energy policy — without the slightest whisper of what they discuss leaking to the public. Video live-streaming is totally forbidden for European Councils of the Heads of Governments.
Secrecy in government is one of the surest ways to destroy the TRUST of the public. Another most effective democracy-destroyer is for politicians to insist on a treaty that several Member States have rejected in referendums. The Constitutional Treaty was rejected by the Netherlands and France. Six other States were due to hold referendums from the Czechs, Denmark, Ireland, Poland, Portugal to the United Kingdom. Brussels cancelled these referendums! It also told Sweden to forget about discussing it in Parliament.
So what was the Brussels Politburo’s solution? They passed the same rejected text, now called the Lisbon Treaty, without letting the people have a referendum. That is a major affront to Democracy that it will be hard for the Brussels Politburo ever to live down!
The political class in each country forced through a ratification without in some cases even letting parliamentarians read it. Only Ireland insisted on a referendum. It rejected it in 2008. They were told to vote again. Under great economic and political pressure they voted again in 2009.


This is exactly the opposite from the principles of the Great Charter of the Community that Europe’s Statesmen signed on 18 April 1951. This said that only measures adopted by the free will of the people could be acceptable in Law.
Almost every conceivable aspect of the democratic action of Schuman’s five supranational institutions that define a Community, have been corrupted by the political class.
What was introduced as the most perfect democratic system is still suffering from neo-Gaullists of the little tin-pot dictators.
How should a democracy work? Its major principles involve free discussion and assent on the goals to be achieved and the means to achieve them. That’s how Schuman defined the process. He added one further element. Both the goals and the means to achieve them should be clearly agreed as involving the service of the people.
In 1972 I sat in the Press Gallery watching as the UK’s Parliament debated and passed a Bill of Parliament to join the three European Communities. Both chambers, the Commons and the Lords, were required to decide after multiple, open debates. Brexit or similar action in other States will require a further Act passed by Parliament. The Courts also have to advise that there is no legal impediment. The Sovereign has to give Assent to the Bill to make it an Act. Only then can the British Prime Minister, if necessary, write a letter withdrawing the UK from the European Union. Complications and legal objections are many. The membership of Euratom governed by Brussels institutions remains to be resolved as a separate issue.
The Brussels Council of Ministers should learn that it is not the sole institution of Europeans. Nor can it rule 28 democracies and 500 million people by secret decree.

BREXIT and Euratom: Two different treaties should safeguard Europe's Democracy

Whatever the outcome of the UK’s referendum on the EU, the UK will not leave the Brussels institutions. That is a good thing for world peace because it means that democracies will have a stronger means to fight dangerous Islamic nuclear proliferation. Let me explain.
The EU’s founder, Robert Schuman, at the time of the Soviet A-bomb detonation in 1949, conceived a plan to make nuclear war “not only unthinkable but materially impossible.” A decade later the European Atomic Energy Community or Euratom was born.
What is the reaction of the European Atomic Energy industries to the UK Brexit referendum? The European Commission refuses to give a clear idea of the repercussions of a BREXIT leave vote. The Lisbon Treaties define the European Union. The European Atomic Energy Community which has practically the same institutions is defined by one of the treaties of Rome, 1957.
What will happen if the UK voters elect to leave the European Union on 23 June 2016? Are the industries themselves working on the basis that the UK will remain a full member of the European Atomic Energy Community with all the privileges and duties so appertaining?
I have been unable to elicit an adequate reply so far from the main Forum on Atomic matters, ForAtom. Why? A multi-billion industry is at stake! Nuclear produces 27 percent of the EU’s electricity. The industrialists, it seems, do not wish to raise their heads above the parapet. Brexit is such a controversial topic, it will shake the whole of Europe.
The UK referendum question does not include membership of Euratom. In Rome in 1957 Western European Governments signed two treaties. One treaty of Rome was for the Economic Community, EEC. The EEC has since been expanded into the European Union. The second Rome Treaty was for the European Atomic Energy Community, Euratom. It remains separate and intact except for minor changes. The two are connected only by protocols.

UK electricity production

The UK Government has announced the EU referendum procedure with the question confirmed as being
“Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?”
I posed some more questions to Foratom:

• What is the nuclear industry’s position on the possible UK exit of the European Union, based as it is on the Lisbon Treaties.

• What are the repercussions of leaving the EU?

• Does it affect UK’s membership of Euratom (European Atomic Energy Community)?

FORATOM replied:

“We maintain a neutral stance when it comes to the possible UK exit of the EU.
As far as your question regarding the impact of the Brexit on UK’s membership of Euratom is concerned, Art. 50 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU) is the only provision regulating the exit of a Member State from the European Union. It refers to “The treaties” (§3). Therefore, our understanding is that if a Member State decides to leave the EU, it must withdraw from all the Treaties (TEU, TFEU and Euratom). However, the UK may want to negotiate to remain a member (or any other kind of association) of part or all of some of the policies like the internal market, fisheries, competition law and why not Euratom.”

That sounds like a spoon-fed answer from the European Commission. Is this true?



No. The idea that Euratom is included in the exit clause of the Lisbon Treaties is false.
Article 50 deals with the TWO Treaties of Lisbon. They are called the Treaty on the European Union, TEU and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, TFEU. The TEU AND TFEU are referred to in Article 48 as “the treaties”. Art 48 is the context for ‘treaties’ of art 50. No other treaties are mentioned here.
The Euratom treaty is not mentioned in all the articles of TEU or the TFEU. There is no reason or legal permission for including Euratom in any part of article 50 or the text of TEU or TFEU.

On the other hand, the Council of Europe and the Convention of Human Rights etc, and NATO are mentioned in the Lisbon Treaties’ articles.
There is more logic in including NATO and Council of Europe than the Euratom treaty within the ambit of Article 50. Does this mean that all these treaties must be rescinded too? Is that what the Commission is also getting at? Obviously not. It has no authority to even mention NATO’s Treaty of Washington or the London Statute of the Council of Europe. The EU has no say-so over their memberships.
Euratom is only mentioned in protocols — one of which merely re-affirms Euratom’s existing privileges, Protocol 7. The signatories agreed also that Protocol 35 about the Constitution of Ireland should be attached to both Euratom and Lisbon treaties separately. Hence it is clear from this instruction by government ministers that the Euratom Treaty was treated separately and as a distinct entity from the Lisbon treaties.
Both these protocols –the one on privileges and the other on the Irish Constitution — indicate that Euratom must be treated as a quite separate treaty. The NATO Treaty would more arguably than Euratom be included within the ambit of the exit clause of Article 50, because it is referred to by name. Obviously neither are included.
What happens if, in spite of this evidence, the European Commission insists that UK must leave Euratom? The European Commission would be deciding for itself that a LEAVE EU vote meant that UK must also leave Euratom. That seems to be in total contradiction with the legal facts. It would open up a great, long legal dispute at the Court of Justice in Luxembourg.
Would the Atomic Energy industry agree to closing down all the duties and privileges, finance and funding, legal and regulatory powers implicit in the British membership of Euratom on the basis of this dubious logic that it is included in Lisbon treaty’s article 50? What happens to the Community ownership of fissile material? What happens to Euratom agencies and establishments? What would be the future for JET, the Joint European Torus, that produced clean fusion energy and could help solve Europe’s energy dependencies?
The Euratom treaty for good reasons of nuclear security does not have the equivalent of an exit clause. That is related to the twin concepts at the heart of Euratom.
Firstly it is designed to encourage the peaceful uses of atomic energy. That implies that it should discourage the non-peaceful, warlike uses of atomic bombs. Euratom is essentially a non-proliferation treaty, although politicians fail to act on its potentialities. The atomic bombs are not themselves the major problem. No more than Howitzers or blunderbusses, airplanes or satellites. A computer hacker can arguably cause more harm and damage than a bomb. Should computers be banned? The issue that will render blunderbusses and nuclear bombs, chemical and bacterial weapons peaceful is true Democratic control. Canada armed with all these weapons is no threat to world peace. Neither is Switzerland. Why? Because of democratic control.
Iran on the other hand is a gigantic threat to world peace. Why? It does not have a peaceful ideology, nor democratic control. It wants to wipe out Israel and conquer the world for a Shi’ite Mahdi, its own version of a warlike Messiah. Ayatollah Khomeini declared: “we will stand against the whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all {unbelievers}.” The instigators of the Pakistani nuclear bomb declared their ultimate goal as an Islamic Atomic Bomb.

The second key aspect of the Euratom treaty that helps insure peace is the article 86. This says that all fissile (that is nuclear) materials designated inside the treaty are Community property.
That is the ultimate way of controlling the atomic bomb. No one nation has a monopoly of the dangerous bomb material. If any one Member State of the Euratom Community turned to dictatorship and decided it wanted to wage war on a neighbor, it would find the procedure difficult. It would only be able to produce a few bombs and all its neighbours combined would be able to vastly compete with it to restore democracy.
That is why the UK referendum should be about Democracy not some obscure economic issues everyone has forgotten about. It is also the reason why Euratom does not have an exit clause. Because the longer Euratom lasts the more fissile material will come in Community control and the more the democratic imperative of the European people will manifest itself against the Machiavellian distortions of democracy caused by the Brussels elite.
True democracy is based on God-given supranational values like honesty, fairness and justice and truth. There is no limit to such values, or to the time required for humans to reclaim them.
The Euratom treaty has no exit clause. Article 208 explains why.

“This Treaty is concluded for an unlimited period.”

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EU Leaders praise Machiavelli ahead of UK Brexit Referendum

1, June, 2016

On the eve of UK’s referendum, why are European leaders praising Machavelli? Why are people so increasingly fed up with the European Union? Why has the credibility of Brussels plummeted to rock bottom?
New anti-Brussels political parties are springing up across Europe like mushrooms in a dark place. Why can’t Brussels re-light its democratic torch for EU’s 28 democratic Member States?
Europe’s BIG question is not the UK referendum, but

“”When Will Brussels obey the TREATY Rules Schuman provided to make Europe perfectly Democratic? “”

The impartial European Commission, independent of governments, parties and lobbyists, was the key institution that brought a lasting peace to Europe. It was designed to epitomize Fairness and Honesty.
No more! Under the latest Machiavellian system, no Briton will ever be allowed to become the President of the European Commission. Nicolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) witnessed the brutal methods of Cesare Borgia (1475–1507) and his father, Pope Alexander VI, known for his nepotism, immorality, killing the innocent and funding his many mistresses and adulterous children. The Borgias tried to bring Central Italy under their possession, using as pretext the defending of Church interests. ”Machiavellism” is widely used today to describe unscrupulous politicians. Robert Schuman was a keen student of history. The last thing that he thought was needed for peace in Europe was the skulduggery of Medieval politics and strife.
In Rome a few days ago, this anti-democratic poison was highly commended by a trinity of EU presidents! This Politburo is now the Machiavellian fixer of Europe. It is composed of the EPP (allegedly the European Peoples Party or the Christian Democrats) and Socialists. The Politiburo has proved itself neither Christian, nor democratic and not interested in European solidarity! It is focused on political nepotism to control the levers of power.

Mysteriously the Commission President is said to be ”elected” without a single ballot slip saying he is a candidate! No one in the UK voted for Mr Juncker or the so-called runner-up. Mr Schulz, with equal illegitimacy and political nepotism, got the second prize of the European Parliament!
The Politburo calls the system the Spitzenkandidat system. It is hardly attuned to attract the voter on the street in Liverpool! It combines Machiavellism, party nepotism for the Politburo, and Apartheid for the British Bantustan.
And the timing is perfect!! In just a few days time the citizens of the United Kingdom will cast their ballots about whether to STAY or LEAVE the European Union! Would any sane democrat vote in favour of a system that discriminates not only against all non-party citizens (98 percent of the population) but the land of the Magna Carta and laws of Hywel Dda?
The treaties say all citizens have equal rights to be considered for the Commission but the EPP-Socialist Politburo says their parties’ nepotism trumps the rule of law!

Originally the Commission was composed 100 percent of non-politicians. For a good reason. The aim of the Commission was to be as impartial, as non-partisan as possible. Politicians always come with an agenda. (Fat cat jobs come after leaving by the revolving door!) All the present Commission are active party members and government nominees — two things the treaties expressly forbid!
The original Commissioners had to be impartial as a judge in Court to create an atmosphere of trust. That way they could help solve Europe’s burning problems. They were very experienced people but they owed no allegiance to party, enterprise, workers’ unions or to a national governmental interest.
No more! Because Machiavelli rules at the Commission! Machiavelli rules at the European Council and Machiavelli rules in the European Parliament. They are all in cahoots against the European people. A secretive political elite acts against the European interest. Instead of becoming a fully independent moral and ethical Authority, as it was designed to be, it has now been captured by a few political parties.
You don’t have to believe me. Believe Mr Donald Tusk, the President of the European Council who represents the Heads of Governments of the Member States. After lauding Pope Francis for the Charlemagne Prize, he spoke on the Future of Europe at a meeting chaired by Europe University Institute President Joseph Weiler.

”I was not a fan of this idea of Spitzenkandidaten {at first}. For the simple reason I was not one of the {candidates}! But the result is really impressive. I mean the two gentlemen around our table. Machavelli said, I think, that the end justifies the means.’‘

That is his assessment of the nepotistic system that excludes all European citizens from participating in the democratic institutions. It combines this affront to democracy and human rights with a further exclusion: The decision on who should be the President of the European Commission is also made behind closed doors. Thus no European citizen can see or hear what sort of deal is being cut between these members of Europe’s Politburo.

And Mr Tusk made no bones about it. He loves this system. He made his pronouncement in public before the cameras of the European Council and the great European public. That is like robbing the public and then sticking them in the eye!
We can be sure all the others in the European Politburo agree. They were sitting there right beside him.


That is the official pronouncement of the three top European leaders. Mr Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission agrees. He was sitting there with the European Parliament President Martin Schulz. They all smiled and congratulated Tusk at his wit for recognizing their gross theft and high-level larceny.
The European Commission has continuously lost its impartiality, political neutrality and its credibility among Europe’s citizens.. Under the Community Method it was to be the conscience of Europe.

Mr Juncker loves the Politburo Nepotism system too. He said that ”Parties put forward their candidates and [the people] can vote either for a socialist or for a Christian Democrat and conservative.”
But people may not want to vote for either. Why? Because this division is old hat. New parties have in common one thing: opposition to the present Brussels system. Secondly and more importantly the treaties say that the people cannot vote for politicians, for other sorts of lobbyists, for government representatives or for anyone who is not independent and impartial. The Commission must be independent. Non-Partisan means no party political guys allowed.

Mr Schulz loves the Politburo nepotism too. He made clear in an interview with Politico that he believes that the text and spirit of the laws of the treaties is not important. Nepotism trumps the treaties. He said: We achieved a change of the treaty without a treaty change. — Martin Schulz at Politico at 10 minutes.
 http://www.politico.eu/video/video-interview-schulz-at-politico-launch-event/

Is this the ultimate goal of Politburo nepotism:
NO TREATY OR COMPACT WITH THE PEOPLE IS NECESSARY FOR OUR SEIZURE OF POWER?

ECI 1: EU's Citizens' Initiative is a Counterfeit for real consultative Democracy

Lisbon Treaty’s European Citizen’s Initiative is a fraud for legally required, real consultative democracy.
Responding to the European Ombudsman’s request for reactions to the Lisbon Treaty’s Citizens’ Initiative, the Schuman Project sent the following contribution on 1 April 2014. The Ombudsman recently published her report. This Schuman Project contribution was sent to the Commission by the Ombudsman.

Dear Ombudsman,
I enclose a short commentary from the Schuman Project which studies the origin, purpose and future of the supranational Community method.
Yours etc,.


Schuman Project:
Comments and criticisms on the European Citizens' Initiative  

1. Overview of citizens' initiatives now and how they should work in a Community system
There is persistent criticism that the EU/ Community system is not very responsive, nor in fact democratic. This is not true. The Community system is Europe’s most developed democratic system ever. It is so successful that it was able to bring peace after more than 2000 years of continuous war. What is also true is that it is not working. Why? because it was blocked by de Gaulle and nationalist politicians in the late 1950s and 1960s. What de Gaulle did in distorting good administration can be found on the eurDemocracy commentary, quoting his minister Alain Peyrefitte. (http://democracy.blogactiv.eu/2012/12/16/nobel3-eu-councils-brazen-nobel-expo-fraud-general-de-gaulle-originated-europes-peace/)
What we have now – and the Citizen’s Initiative is a case in point – are ineffective bandages aiming to repair the appearance but not the substance of those problems. Under de Gaulle’s take-over of France in 1957, European politicians were given tools to make secret deals without public and democratic participation. The Consultative Committees were sidelined; the Parliament was ignored and scorned. Corruption and abuse typified by Wine Lakes and Meat Mountains were just some outcomes of these non-democratic ‘package deals’ made behind closed doors in the Council of Ministers. Schuman said all institutions should be open to the public so they could come under the control of public opinion. The Council shut its doors. Many still prefer this structure today.
The means to unblock those measures that ‘stifle’ and ‘chloroform’ European democracy (to use the terms of de Gaulle’s instructions to his staff) are not difficult to accomplish. However such measures as the Citizen’s Initiative are going about it in exactly the wrong direction.

Some Major defects in the Citizen’s Initiative Approach.
No matter how successful the collection of signatures is, there are major problems in (a) creating a worthwhile initiative; (b) applying the petition, and (c) evaluating it in European law.
The petition has first to be drafted. Who is authorized to do this? What if the drafting is inadequate and some people only sign with conditions and cautions? How are these to be evaluated if at all? What about highly prejudicial topics, lobbyist-propounded actions or one-sided, undemocratic and unfair propositions?

The major inadequacy of the ECI is that it ensures no real democratic process. This is apparent from the petition that was duly signed by a million Europeans end the travelling circus of the European Parliament {between Strasbourg and Brussels). The public will was clear but the institutions refused to listen.
 (Incidentally, in 1959, Robert Schuman as President of the European Parliament led a delegation to the Council of Ministers and received its assurance the seat of the Parliament would be fixed ‘as soon as possible.’ For the Gaullists, then in power, this meant never.)

Even if an ECI falls right inside the framework for the Commission to act, there is no guarantee for it to do so. Nor should it. The Commission is supposed to be independent in its own right of initiative to make proposals. It has to judge the measure, place and timing according to the proper soundings laid out in the Treaties and according to the Community method. (The core of the problem is that the Commission does not make the soundings with the body it is supposed to be in permanent dialogue with. That is the fully elected, democratic Consultative Committee.)
Thus the ECI may find itself in direct conflict with the Community method and therefore only adds to the frustration of citizens who deplore what they consider the lack of democratic sensitivity of the Commission. There are quite a number of other objections of this order, which I will omit here for sake of brevity.

Now consider what some might classify as the ideal ECI case. A petition is launched, it gathers sufficient signatures, and the Commission takes it on board as a proposal. It is passed by the institutions that have to give an opinion: Parliament, Consultative Committees (Economic and Social Committee, Committee of Regions, Scientific and Technical Committee) and the Council of Ministers. It then is passed into law by the publication of a Directive in the Official Journal

Then there is a dispute. Another Directive is passed to correct the problem. The case is taken to the European Court of Justice. How should the Court deal with the two Directives? Is the Directive that has the support of a million-signature petition more powerful, legally speaking, than the second Directive that has ‘only’ passed through the European institutions? If the Court overturns the first Directive, would there not be an uproar because it is seen by some as a super-democratic Directive compared to one that does not have ECI support? Any judgement is likely to raise controversy and lower public trust in the institutions by either one side or another.

Isn’t the solution then to make sure that the present institutions are acting to their full capacity as democratic support to citizens and are representative and responsive? How can the institutions be UNcholoroformed and UNgagged from the stifling anti-democratic mechanisms introduced at the time of the Gaullists. 

2. The Community Method

A full description of how the Community method should work and how it can provide the most sensitive form of democracy is given on the Schuman Project site at fed.htm .
The principle is that the full range of public opinion should be able to express their interests in any European legislation. This opinion can help to improve it, rescind it where necessary, and initiate whole new sectors that should be placed under democratic control broader than international agreements. For example a fully fledged Energy Community could be created to deal with the present energy and financial crisis arising from high gas and oil prices by cartels.
The Community method provides democracy at three levels: nation States; individuals and thirdly the democratic associations and ‘collectivities’. Another innovative institution is the European Commission which is defined in early treaties as supranational. That means it is (a) independent of all interests (b) it is impartial (c) it is composed of a small number of people selected on the basis of their wisdom, experience and their openness to the other institutions as sources of information, needs and interactions.


The Commission
At present the Commission does not fulfil these treaty obligations that
(a) its membership should be open to all citizens Lisbon Treaty (LT) TEU Article 10.3. It is now confined without treaty sanction to politicians or ex-politicians chosen in secret.
(b) Politicians have changed the Commission where originally no member was a member of political parties to full political nepotism. The LT says only that the Commission should be chosen at the time of the EP elections and taking the results into account. It nowhere says that parties may present candidates for Commission president. This is ruled out because any person aligning himself to a party political programme is by definition partial and not independent. Politicians refuse to resign from parties even though the treaties say in Article 245 TFEU: ‘Members of the Commission may not, during their office, engage in any other occupation, whether gainful or not.’
(c ) The present situation where Commissioners become political candidates for the EP, as it were on holiday from the Commission, then return to the Commission to judge on sensitive matters often dealing with governmental and political corruption is untenable to any thinking person. Article 17.1 ‘the Commission shall promote the general interest of the Union’, not a partial, political one. Only persons ‘whose independence is beyond doubt’ 17.3, may be Commissioners. ‘They shall not seek nor take instructions from any government, or any institution, body, office or entity.’ This must exclude all politicians who insist on retaining membership of a political entity. This clause was introduced into the Lisbon Treaty precisely to prevent political parachuting and other abuses.
(d) By allowing politicians to play politics in the Commission, impartiality is lost, and any Citizen’s Initiative becomes dubious or worthless. As a democratic exercise the ECI that does not conform to political programmes will find itself rejected or put into cold storage – possibly as long as the Parliament circus question.


The Council of Ministers.
The treaties are quite clear that all debates, drafting and discussions should be open to the public as well as decision-making. LT TFEU Article 15 .. the Union institutions, bodies and agencies shall conduct their work as openly as possible.’ 15.2 The European Parliament shall meet in public, as shall the COUNCIL, when CONSIDERING and voting on a DRAFT legislative act.’

The Consultative Committees
The Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of Regions have the right to select their membership from among all duly qualified associations. This has never been accomplished in more than 60 years because the Council introduced a measure that Schuman and Reuter classified as ‘illegal’. It gave to itself the prerogative to choose who should be members of these bodies.
Take for instance the Economic and Social Committee which is by treaty composed of three sections: entrepreneurs, consumers and workers’ associations. If a measure such as water accessibility for all was discussed, then a truly representative body with three sections would make sure that a petition such as a Citizen’s Initiative was balanced and fair.
If one of these groups, say the consumers managed to accumulate a million signatures for free water the tripartite Consultative Committee would not be able to pass an Opinion on the Commission’s proposal because it lacked the support of the other two groups. The water entrepreneurs would not be willing to supply water for free, nor would workers in the water industry as they would not get paid and their working conditions would deteriorate. That is the reason for the threefold division requiring that such matters are discussed at the technical, economic and social levels to make sure that Directives work. Fairness is what he called an independent supranational value.
Schuman said when he introduced the Community method to the Council of Europe that the Consultative Committee would have powers equivalent to the Council of Ministers. De Gaulle saw this as a problem to his nationalistic politics. He made sure that the four Consultative Committees were rendered a political cipher. That is contrary to the treaties and natural justice which is the foundation of the Community method.


The European Parliament
A number of criticisms can be made about how the EP has never had fully democratic elections according to treaty specifications. They will not be dealt with here for space reasons. (http://www.schuman.info/election1.htm and http://www.schuman.info/election2.htm ).


Conclusions
The major means to have an effective Citizen’s Initiative is to strengthen the Consultative Committees and make sure they have proper elections. They will thus have greater credibility when for the first time they take the Commission or Council to Court. In the history of European institutions, the Council of Ministers only began to take the Parliament seriously when it took the Council and Commission to Court for failing to make full consultation with it. After that, elections were organized in 1979.
As it stands the Citizen’s Initiative is no substitute for real democracy based on the Community method.

Debate21: How Europe's "Top Politicians" are creating a Manifest Crisis of Democracy

Europe today is in a Manifest Crisis of Democracy. That term — Manifest Crisis — relates to an article in the treaty founding Europe’s first supranational Community. Without the will and the consent of the people, nothing lasting can be achieved. Yet the public will is manifesting itself more and more powerfully against the arrogant attitude of the self-appointed ‘Top Politicians’. These Top Pols, a modern Politburo, think they know better than Robert Schuman who patiently and wisely created Europe’s democracy system. Their opinions and too often their corrupt practices ‘top’ the rightful voice of the public.

Do they know how Schuman brought Europe’s first real peace in 2000 years? If so can they bring peace to other regions like the Near East?

Do they have any memory of their history, Europe’s astounding recent history? On 18 April 1951 — 65 years ago — leaders of Western Europe signed the Great Charter of Democracy. This document, that Robert Schuman compared to the Magna Carta of 1215 in Britain, encapsulates the foundational principal of public assent to government, European democracy. Schuman called it the Charter of the Community (Pour l’Europe, p146).

General de Gaulle, who was not known for his humility, took power in France a few years later. He despised the party political system, ‘the regime of parties‘. He was also openly hostile to the Community idea. He sought by all means to destroy it and replace it by his personal autocracy. Pro-European and pro-democratic ministers resigned from his government. The Charter was buried in the archives of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs for six decades. At the request of the Schuman Project the Charter was sought out of its Gaullist burial place. It was again reproduced and published.




In 1951 Western Europe was under threat by the USSR. In occupied Central and Eastern Europe, it had created a Bloc of fraudulent ‘People’s Democracies’ where people regularly voted and even held referendums. But it was just a veneer. The system was controlled by the Communist Party’s Politburo — sometimes using the names of Christian Democrats, Liberals and Socialists as front organizations.

How could the West demonstrate it was committed to real democracy? That is what the Charter defined. It is a principle that will one day or other be tested in the European court of Justice. The West’s fraudulent democrats today had better beware.
The Charter says:

This Europe is open to all European countries that are able to choose freely for themselves. We sincerely hope that other countries will join us in our common endeavour.

The same day the Charter of the Community was proclaimed, the six leaders of France, West Germany, Italy and the Benelux countries also signed into force the Treaty of Paris. It created the democratic principles of the Community. It is defined with FIVE democratic institutions. They cover

• individual democracy and freedom,
• organizational freedom and democracy and
• freedom of the national State and its government within in a supranational Community
• the democratic rule of law and most important of all,
• unfettered Freedom of Conscience.

To indicate how these principles should work experimentally on a restricted scale in one sector, the leaders created a European Coal and Steel Community.

1. The individual was represented democratically in an Assembly, later a Parliament.
2. Freedom of association was represented in the Consultative Committee with its three representative sections, workers, enterprises and consumers.
3. Freedom of States was represented in the Council of Ministers.
4. The Rule of Law was institutionalized in the Court of Justice.
5. The concept and practice of Freedom of Conscience was institutionalized in the High Authority (later the European Commission). Its members were not allowed to represent their national States. They could not adhere to any political party or other interest group. They were experienced in the sectors but they could not have links or interests in the coal and steel industries. Nor could they, after leaving office, assume any position whether paid or not for three years. Their independence and conscience helped define the meaning of supranational in article 9 of the treaty.

The Community had as its declared goals:

• Create a new entity called Europe
• bring lasting peace to Europe after 2000 years of continuous war,
• make war ‘materially impossible‘,
• unify true democracies of the Continent based on supranational principles, leading to World Peace,
• end the East-West division of Europe,
• create a Single Market in the Community,
• create monetary unity based on supranational principles.

The European Coal and Steel Community was highly successful in its democratic goals. Instead of the war that most commentators expected, Europe expanded on an unprecedented wave of prosperity and peace. Additional Communities were created in the fields of a customs union (Common Market) and a nuclear energy and non-proliferation Community (Euratom).

What did the Gaullist and neo-Gaullist politicians do? As soon as possible after the fifty year trial period of the European Coal and Steel Treaty they refused to renew it for a further period. They did not ask the public. They called for no referendum. The Community had protected the coal and steel industries through periods of boom and also crisis. Its budget amounting to a one percent tax on production was carefully monitored both by those who supplied it and those like the workers and consumers who benefited. There was no need for a Court of Auditors. Workers in these industries were guaranteed employment. When inevitably mines were closed as unproductive, the miners were re-trained for new industries. There was no cost to the national budgets.
Coal mines and steel-makers benefited also from a greatly expanded marketplace. Cartels were forbidden and dismantled. The industries were thus able to specialize and innovate. When there is over-supply in the steel industry the Community could declare a ‘Manifest Crisis‘ to deal with its causes on a Europe-wide basis.
After 2002 what happened? Prices of steels rose inexplicably, somewhat like a phantom cartel was acting. There was no longer supranational consumer control on the industries. Then businesses got into trouble. Foreign buyers took over many industries.

Today Europe is in a manifest crisis not only of its steel industries but also its democracy.
Steel is suffering because of Chinese overproduction. Speaking at a Politico event on 18 April, French Minister of the Economy, Emmanuel Macron, said that the USA rapidly imposed 300 percent tariffs to protect its industries while nowadays it takes nine months for the EU to react. The Chinese overproduction is equivalent to two years of steel production in Europe.

It is not only steel that is in surfeit. Politicians have created treaties galore, each abandoning the fundamental principles of targeted supranational communities and public consent of governments, individuals and organized civil society. The arrogant attitude of ‘We know best’ is ever more blatant and manifest.

When Denmark voted against the Maastricht treaty in 1992, the Top Pols, instead of binning the treaty as it broke both supranational principles and democratic assent, tried to ‘fix’ it. Sure, the Danes under pressure voted later in favour, but the other countries had no opportunity to say whether they too agreed with these later amendments. That is not a conscientious democracy. Having got away with this fiddle, the Top Pols tried other ploys. They amended treaties in parliaments. There they could force self-serving measures through using their party parliamentarians as voting fodder. The public was not able to participate or protest.
They then created a European currency based on flawed principles of economics. When the European Court of Justice reprimanded France and Germany for ignoring their own rules, the European Council thumbed their nose at the Court.

In other cases like the Fiscal Pact the Top Pols of the Council decided they would grant themselves complete immunity from legal action in Court. They decided repeatedly to defy the Ombudsman’s request to reveal documents about its mechanisms.

Then of course there was the ridiculous and illegal Constitutional Treaty. The turgid and undemocratic system granting politicians further unfettered powers was roundly rejected both by the French and more emphatically by the Dutch. Other countries such as the United Kingdom who were about to hold a referendum were told they would not be allowed to. (But they passed it by a TopPol ruse!)

So was the treaty as dead as door nail? Not on your life! The lookalike Lisbon Treaty is the same text. It shed only the articles on the twelve-star flag and the European anthem, (Hadn’t you noticed the EU has obeyed and banned the flag?).

Drapeaux européens devant le Berlaymont

To become the Lisbon Treaty the whole of the Constitutional Treaty was written into the existing treaties. How? As a long list of amendments to their articles! What a fraud! Don’t the politicians have any shame?

So what about a people’s referendum on the Lisbon Treaty for the public to confirm they had changed their mind and now agreed to what they previously rejected wholeheartedly? No chance! The book-length list of meaningless amendments was voted by force through national and even the European parliaments. Some parliaments had not even read the amendments. Nowhere was an official text of the whole treaty produced before voting. That would make the fraud totally manifest!

Nothing could be more designed to destroy public confidence and trust. How did the French — those great revolutionary democrats — deal with this tricky fraud? Did their political leaders call for a second referendum? Of course not. They merely changed the Constitution so they would not have to have one! What sauce! It is not surprising that nearly every country now has ever-growing “anti-Europe” skeptic parties.They may soon grab the levers of power in Brussels.

So what does M. Macron think about this deceit? Was it a good idea not to take the first referendum NON into account and then purposefully prevent the French people from having a voice on it again?
“It was a mistake,” he told me.

Europe won’t get much further out of its manifest crisis until a majority of politicians also have the humility to say: “It was a mistake!” and mean it. It would be useful for the European institutions to start remembering to celebrate the anniversaries of the signing of Europe’s founding democratic treaty.

HOW CHURCHILL RESPECTED ISLAM AND OTHER RELIGIONS

HOW CHURCHILL RESPECTED ISLAM AND OTHER RELIGIONS

In February 1945, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was in Egypt and wanted  to discuss with the Saudi King ibn Saud a definitive and lasting settlement between Arabs and Jews.

Churchill was told that the King would not allow drinking or smoking in his presence. Churchill recorded:

"I was the host and I said that if it was his religion that made him say such things, my religion prescribed as an absolute sacred ritual smoking cigars and drinking alcohol before, after, and if need be, during, all meals and the intervals between. Complete surrender." Churchill by Himself, p353.

Britexit6 Why when Britons vote to LEAVE, must they REMAIN in European Community?

On 23 June 2016 whatever way Britons vote in the BREXIT referendum, the UK will remain a Member State of the European Community. The European Commission knows this. It is not clear if Westminster government realizes this. They should.
How do I know? That is what the treaties say! This burning issue was debated a decade and a half ago, when the Lisbon Treaty existed only as an illegitimate twinkle in the eyes of politicians.
First paradox: Democracy can be reduced but it cannot be destroyed. The fact that UK remains a member of the European Community is positive proof of this! The recent calls for referendums in Greece on the democracy-destroying effects of the ill-conceived euro, that of independence for Spanish Catalonia, the Dutch referendum on the Ukraine accord, the British referendum on BREXIT and the proposed Hungarian referendum against Brussels dictating the migratory flows to the country, show one thing. Brussels is sick. Not Europe or its democratic spirit. Expect more referendums, including one in France on FREXIT!
The core problem is that the Council of Ministers has retained neo-Gaullist powers as a closed-door big-daddy government of the political cartel. Europe needs to install the democratic rights written in the treaties for more than sixty years and its Great Charter of the Community 1951, guaranteeing the founding principle of authentic ‘freedom of choice‘!
Is Britain’s referendum anti-democratic? What about the sovereign will of the people as expressed in the BREXIT referendum? That deals specifically with the question on the voting slip.

“Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?” The options for voters will be ‘Remain a member of the European Union’ and ‘Leave the European Union’.”

The referendum question does not say European Community. Why?
Second paradox. Doesn’t the highly-rated British civil service and do not all the associated bands of experienced politicians (some of whom attend the Council and Parliament) know the difference between EC and EU? Why did they write such a question?
Third paradox. Is European history education so deficient that nobody has pointed out this glaring error? Has the fund of millions of propaganda euros that the EU has poured into the 875 Jean Monnet professorships around Europe and beyond been entirely wasted? They boast they have “educated” half a million students each year? Why then aren’t these passive students taking to the streets shouting ‘The emperor has no clothes!?’
Fourth paradox. The European Commission knows about the referendum question result. It knows the answer. It is no secret. It was widely broadcast while the so-called ‘Constitutional Treaty’ was being fabricated. But Commission is keeping stumm.
I have had a substantial correspondence with the Commission. They won’t raise the issue, divulge any information on it or debate it.
What is the reply of officials when confronted with the issue in the press room?

“We don’t wish to discuss it!”

Why? Isn’t that a dereliction of duty of the ‘Guardian of the treaties’? The issue is obviously of supreme importance to know before voting! Britons might vote to leave the EU and find themselves still in the European Community!
This legal answer from a high-ranking official, an authoritative EU source, is positive affirmation in its way that the UK will definitely remain a Member. The UK will remain a participating member of the Council of Ministers. It will have to elect Members of Parliament to the European Parliament. It is obliged to participate in the Consultative Committees like the Economic and Social Committee (designed to deal with matters like the euro but ineffective) and the Committee of Regions (designed to deal with migration issues and equally ineffective). Both committees are supposed to be elected and radiate trust and legitimacy. Instead they are still nominated by the Council in its secret sessions.
Paradox five will be a shock! What will happen on 24 June, when Britons hear the results over breakfast?
They will find they have, for example, expressed a wish to leave the European Union, the EU. But that is not the European Community. The EU is a bloated, and often quite undemocratic, neo-Gaullist perversion of the European Economic Community. Some British like to call this the Common Market, but it was far more than that.
Today there are two active Communities. The EU is just the outgrowth of one. When the UK joined, it agreed to become active participants of THREE. Chronologically the first Community was the European Coal and Steel Community founded in 18 April 1951 and starting its activities on 10 August 1952. it created Europe’s first Single Market in February 1953.
Its treaty was in force for a limited but renewable period of 50 years. That date terminated in 2002. Lobbied hard by the steel and coal interests, the Council of Ministers decided without public debate (or a referendum!) not to renew the Community. The short-sighted cause was a 1 percent tax that provided houses and full employment for workers, new technologies for the industries and low prices for the customers and protection from unfair trade practices. Immediately after the end of the Community, prices of steel soared. Was this a coincidence? The Community had strong powers against cartel operations on price manipulation.
Since then Europe has experienced the consequences: firstly the great steel enterprises were sold off to foreign purchasers. Then more recently the steel furnaces have been shut down as China and other nations dump their cheaper products on world markets. The former industrial backbone of Europe has been broken by the greed and lack of vision of businessmen and the poor judgement of its cartel politicians.
The second Community was the European Atomic Energy Community, founded under the Treaty of Rome in 1957. It was envisaged by Robert Schuman in 1949 as Europe’s answer to the Soviet atomic bomb and a means to stop nuclear proliferation and war. This was the subject of de Gaulle’s ire. He paralyzed Euratom, as it was known. He then built a French atomic bomb, suborning others to contribute to the research. De Gaulle boasted that his bomb could kill 20 million people in two hours! Would you trust de Gaulle or any such autocrat with the Bomb?
The Euratom treaty would if applied have prevented any Iranian production of an atomic bomb. It would also have stopped the production of a Pakistani bomb and the Libyan and possibly North Korean operations.
http://www.amazon.com/Stopping-Nuclear-threat-Europe-South/dp/1291638954
The recent Iran nuclear deal shows the barrenness of EU foreign policy. Today flush with its 100 or 150 billion dollars bonanza, Iran, long considered the most dangerous terror State, is funding Palestinian terrorism. It is offering $7000 to each family for producing a ‘martyr’ and $30,000 for a destroyed house.
Euratom is not dead. Britain is still a part of its Community, the Commission, Council and Parliament. So if the referendum returns a vote to LEAVE, the authorities in Brussels and those in Whitehall will have to start explaining why leaving the European Community just is not possible. Before any BREXIT takes place that will have to be exposed, analyzed and resolved.
Reminder: the EU has an exit clause 50. The Euratom treaty has none. Why? Because those inside a club have rights as much as those who wish to leave!
The only way a Member State can leave Euratom is to persuade all other Members to revoke the treaty. That is simple democracy. We all have an interest in nuclear security and non-proliferation. We don’t need another de Gaulle-style autocrat, whether French, German or perhaps with an Islamic vision of grandeur, threatening to kill 20 million people based on shared European technology and fissile material.