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EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

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Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#101

Post by InclinedPlane »

PotatoEngineer wrote: post #82
josteink wrote: post #76

Someone this determined to do something so wrong cannot be assumed to be neutral. This guy must be corrupt and on someone's pay-list. It would be in the EU's interest to start an investigation of Karel De Gucht to determine if this person is bribed and if these proceedings is a result of corruption. The EU would be wise to do so for its own business sake and before it's perception as a democratic body is tarnished in…

He doesn't have to be corrupt; he simply has to believe that ACTA is good for Europe. If he's trying to circumvent various obstacles in his way, it's because he thinks they're wrong.

That doesn't necessarily make it any better.

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#102

Post by inopinatus »

shard972 wrote: post #100
inopinatus wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because to eliminate the EU means, technically, throwing out the Treaty of Maastricht (1992), the Treaty of Rome (1958) and the Amsterdam Treaty (1997) which together define most of the framework, institutions, conventions and law enabling European freedom of movement and trade. There are several other treaties but these are the three most significant. In other words, they are simultaneously the EU's constitution and…

> cause to eliminate the EU means, technically, throwing out the Treaty of Maastricht (1992), the Treaty of Rome (1958) and the Amsterdam Treaty (1997) which together define most of the framework, institutions, conventions and law enabling European freedom of movement and trade. So your telling me that they cannot possibly abandon the EU without abandoning these treaties? That and what stops them from simply re-writi…

Yes, I am telling you that.

What stops them?

How about :-

  The multilateral complexity of negotiating the removal those pieces that aren't desirable anymore from those that are

  The massive number of directives that have been issued under the auspices of said treaties that have to be reconsidered

  The lack of political will

  The need to recreate the political sentiments active in Europe in the '50s

  The necessity for every European state to ratify said rewritten treaties in their parliaments
We're talking about disentangling tens of thousands of pieces of legislation and policy from the last fifty years, at both national and international level.

Honestly, it would be easier to progress to full federalism or just ditch the whole thing, than try to edit the EU and achieve any kind of systemic consistency at the end of it.

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#104

Post by davidhollander »

hipponax3 wrote: post #74
SagelyGuru wrote: post #65

Come back Nigel Farage http://www.nigelfaragemep.co.uk/ All is forgiven! Watch some of his videos laying into the commissioner(s) at the EU parliament. Quite amusing but it seems to be just what they need and deserve.

Do you realise that UKIP were about the only party that voted against the EU parliament's call to have the details of the ACTA negotiations made public?

I'm not European but my understanding was that they literally vote no against everything as some sort of protest?

Their statement if this is the correct vote you are referring to:

"Whilst we as a group voted against the ACTA Resolution on Wednesday 10th March 2010, we did so on the principle that the ACTA Treaty itself should not exist in any form. It is a catastrophic violation of individual private property. Had we voted to support the Resolution, we would be recognising the existence of such legislation and on that basis we decided not to recognise the Treaty."

http://www.ukipmeps.org/mypage_11_ExpVote.html

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#105

Post by jhdevos »

PotatoEngineer wrote: post #82
josteink wrote: post #76

Someone this determined to do something so wrong cannot be assumed to be neutral. This guy must be corrupt and on someone's pay-list. It would be in the EU's interest to start an investigation of Karel De Gucht to determine if this person is bribed and if these proceedings is a result of corruption. The EU would be wise to do so for its own business sake and before it's perception as a democratic body is tarnished in…

He doesn't have to be corrupt; he simply has to believe that ACTA is good for Europe. If he's trying to circumvent various obstacles in his way, it's because he thinks they're wrong.

European commissioners have two undesirable attributes: * Far too much power * Low public visibility

If they perceive their job as "governing this part of the world without paying much attention to what lesser people are saying", then that is partly because we have defined their job in that way. (And, of course, that will attract the wrong kind of people).

Reform is needed.

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#106

Post by seclorum »

franzus wrote: post #81
seclorum wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who voted for the EU President? (Nobody: He was installed by Heads of Industry from the member states..) >Besides, the EU is not a 'state'. Yup, and therein lies the problem.

Who voted for the German president? Nobody.

Does Germany's President veto stuff he doesn't like? (Nope. He can't.)

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#107

Post by DeepDuh »

Silhouette wrote: post #24
paol wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly the parliament is essentially a powerless organ by design. The problem is that the european commission accumulates both executive power and most of the legislative power, where the later should lie with parliament. The end result is that the parliament is basically a farcical attempt to give the appearance of democratic legitimacy to the EU legislative process, but the farce is transparent enough that it just e…

The Parliament is not so impotent since the new codecision rules under the Lisbon Treaty and has been happy to flex its new-found muscles. Moreover, if the responses to my letter to my MEPs on this subject are at all indicative, most or all of the major political groups in Brussels are outright hostile to ACTA at this point. I suspect De Gucht may have overestimated his influence here. He has also perhaps forgotten t…

Seriously, how flawed is the design of the EU's political institutions?

- No constitution right from the beginning.

- Executive can overrule legislative (and even judicative?)

- Legislative can hold up executive meetings (??)

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#108

Post by DeepDuh »

vidarh wrote: post #53
Nursie wrote: post #4

The commission needs to be neutered before the EU can be considered truly democratic. The fact that this guy can come straight out and say he's going to ignore court rulings and the democratic will of the elected MEPs with no fear of reprisals, because he's not elected, yet he can hold so much power ... it's sick.

The issue here is that the EU currently is a de facto confederation. The EU parliament can not be, and is not, the supreme legislative body for the simple reason that the member states are still sovereign, with the ability to withdraw (though there are some legal questions in some member countries about how that would be possible). It is the same issue facing the US under the Articles of Confederation, where Congress…

Don't you mean a ->federationSwitzerland is a confederation. Its 26 states have a lot of power, through the senate, state majority on national votes as well as sovereign areas like state taxes, education, state traffic. However, within boundaries, the Swiss national parliament can overrule state parliaments any day (and national people votes can overrule pretty much anything anyway).

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#109

Post by flyinRyan »

Angostura wrote: post #9
paol wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly the parliament is essentially a powerless organ by design. The problem is that the european commission accumulates both executive power and most of the legislative power, where the later should lie with parliament. The end result is that the parliament is basically a farcical attempt to give the appearance of democratic legitimacy to the EU legislative process, but the farce is transparent enough that it just e…

The EP can impeach the Commission - unfortunately only the whole Commission rather than an individual Commissioner.

That's unfortunate but, put them all on the street. Maybe the next group will make sure no single member does something this idiotic and gets them all fired for it.

Re: EU Commissioner Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By EU Parliament

#110

Post by vidarh »

DeepDuh wrote: post #108
vidarh wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue here is that the EU currently is a de facto confederation. The EU parliament can not be, and is not, the supreme legislative body for the simple reason that the member states are still sovereign, with the ability to withdraw (though there are some legal questions in some member countries about how that would be possible). It is the same issue facing the US under the Articles of Confederation, where Congress…

Don't you mean a ->federation Switzerland is a confederation. Its 26 states have a lot of power, through the senate, state majority on national votes as well as sovereign areas like state taxes, education, state traffic. However, within boundaries, the Swiss national parliament can overrule state parliaments any day (and national people votes can overrule pretty much anything anyway).

No, I mean confederation.

Switzerland is a confederation in name and by tradition only, but has had all the features of a federation since 1848.

After civil war in 1847, the new constitution was drawn up expressly to create a federal central government to replace the weak old con-federate governments, and to have the cantons cede some of their sovereignty to it, in the same was the US Constitution had the states cede sovereignty in certain areas - the Swiss constitution of 1848 was to a large extent influenced by the US Constitution.

The current constitutions official name even translates to the Federal Constitution of the Swiss Confederation.

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