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On February 09 2017 23:46 MyTHicaL wrote:
The bottom line is that by ourselves, unforunately, we can't stand up to the US or BRIC countries. However together we are stronger than them. Not to mention that both world wars along with the Crusades came from Europe. If economically we are leading then we have more say in regards to the progression of civil rights, etc. It's just a shame we need to continually clean up for the US.
Continually clean up for the US? You do know most of Africa and the middle east is the way it is because of nations in Europe. And then we had to deal with the cold war because of Europe getting the rest of us into two world wars. To say that France has done anything to clean anywhere in the last 70 or more years without the US holding its hand the whole way is a joke.
I mean for Christ sake after Vietnam you'd think the french of all people would feel a little about what they got the US into.
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... You blame Nam on the French? Roflmao. It was a French colony, they clearly wanted independence. The French pulled out. The US went in on yet another war on a noun (communism). Got completely destroyed and then proceeded to wreck the country economically.
Syria is the US's fault. Sadam was your fault, ISIS would not exist if you never went back into Iraq (again...) or Afghanistan. The country everyone says is pointless to invade.
Are you one of these deluded individuals who think that American foreign policy is a benefit to the world and that you are all loved overseas? ... Would be funny as the most hated country in the world.
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For new posters to this thread: welcome. Allow me to introduce you to our resident shit poster, whose sole purpose here is to rant about how the UK is irrelevant and doomed outside of the EU. No surprise he's into revisionist history about how the EU cleans up the US' mess and not vice versa, too.
Remind me, who won the cold war? WW2? WW1? Who intervened in Yugoslavia after the EU fucked it up? US/UK every time.
What mess of America's making did the EU clean up, again? The EU has no meaningful or coherent foreign policy, it just leeches the achievements of nation states.
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On February 10 2017 00:34 MyTHicaL wrote:
... You blame Nam on the French? Roflmao. It was a French colony, they clearly wanted independence. The French pulled out. The US went in on yet another war on a noun (communism). Got completely destroyed and then proceeded to wreck the country economically.
Syria is the US's fault. Sadam was your fault, ISIS would not exist if you never went back into Iraq (again...) or Afghanistan. The country everyone says is pointless to invade.
Are you one of these deluded individuals who think that American foreign policy is a benefit to the world and that you are all loved overseas? ... Would be funny as the most hated country in the world.
Nam was a french colony that the french screwed up its transition to not be a colony until it rose up against them and then still tried to violently suppress them. Then the Us had to make sure the entire region didn't turn communist. Communism was a revolutionary ideology that wanted to (and realistically could there for a while) conquer the entire world and enslave the people into a collectivist hell. The french pulled out after being embarrassed repeatedly and left the Us to clean up its mess (which we did and gave the effort we would put out for anyone who wanted to be free).
Syria is a product of the arab spring that everyone was celebrating until it came to a country that had Russian backed military and economic interests. It wasn't the Us who chooped the middle east up into oddly straight lines without concern for the locals you can blame the perusing fascist dictator on the british for that one. ISIS didn't exist until the Syrian civil war that no one wanted to deal with. Sorry if we wanted girls to be able to go to school in Afghanistan and not live under a theocracy. And If any nation has a point to invade its Afghanistan. The Russians would have been a hop skip and a jump from winning the great game finally and we found tons and tons of untapped mineral wealth in the country.
American foreign policy is the only relevant foreign policy in the world right now. You can't really judge it if there isn't anything to compare it to.
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On February 10 2017 01:13 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2017 00:34 MyTHicaL wrote:
... You blame Nam on the French? Roflmao. It was a French colony, they clearly wanted independence. The French pulled out. The US went in on yet another war on a noun (communism). Got completely destroyed and then proceeded to wreck the country economically.
Syria is the US's fault. Sadam was your fault, ISIS would not exist if you never went back into Iraq (again...) or Afghanistan. The country everyone says is pointless to invade.
Are you one of these deluded individuals who think that American foreign policy is a benefit to the world and that you are all loved overseas? ... Would be funny as the most hated country in the world. American foreign policy is the only relevant foreign policy in the world right now. You can't really judge it if there isn't anything to compare it to.
Let's not go too far, though. There are many, many countries with relevant foreign policy.
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On February 10 2017 01:13 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2017 00:34 MyTHicaL wrote:
... You blame Nam on the French? Roflmao. It was a French colony, they clearly wanted independence. The French pulled out. The US went in on yet another war on a noun (communism). Got completely destroyed and then proceeded to wreck the country economically.
Syria is the US's fault. Sadam was your fault, ISIS would not exist if you never went back into Iraq (again...) or Afghanistan. The country everyone says is pointless to invade.
Are you one of these deluded individuals who think that American foreign policy is a benefit to the world and that you are all loved overseas? ... Would be funny as the most hated country in the world. Nam was a french colony that the french screwed up its transition to not be a colony until it rose up against them and then still tried to violently suppress them. Then the Us had to make sure the entire region didn't turn communist. Communism was a revolutionary ideology that wanted to (and realistically could there for a while) conquer the entire world and enslave the people into a collectivist hell. The french pulled out after being embarrassed repeatedly and left the Us to clean up its mess (which we did and gave the effort we would put out for anyone who wanted to be free).
That's funny, we lost the Vietnam War and that didn't seem to result in the whole world going Marxist. But I guess the millions dead was worth it, just in case.
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On February 10 2017 01:00 bardtown wrote:
For new posters to this thread: welcome. Allow me to introduce you to our resident shit poster, whose sole purpose here is to rant about how the UK is irrelevant and doomed outside of the EU. No surprise he's into revisionist history about how the EU cleans up the US' mess and not vice versa, too.
Remind me, who won the cold war? WW2? WW1? Who intervened in Yugoslavia after the EU fucked it up? US/UK every time.
What mess of America's making did the EU clean up, again? The EU has no meaningful or coherent foreign policy, it just leeches the achievements of nation states.
I second these welcomes.
This is the UK politics thread, where Bardtown single handedly and heroically holds back the pro EU communist socialist agenda.
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How many of these 'studies' are they going to do where they assume the government and central bank do nothing in their calculations? Apparently their growth predictions being out by ~2.5% of GDP has not led to any introspection. The UK very clearly recognises the importance of free trade - that's why we're leaving a protectionist bloc and seeking closer relations with economies that are actually growing.
On February 10 2017 02:21 Jockmcplop wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2017 01:00 bardtown wrote:
For new posters to this thread: welcome. Allow me to introduce you to our resident shit poster, whose sole purpose here is to rant about how the UK is irrelevant and doomed outside of the EU. No surprise he's into revisionist history about how the EU cleans up the US' mess and not vice versa, too.
Remind me, who won the cold war? WW2? WW1? Who intervened in Yugoslavia after the EU fucked it up? US/UK every time.
What mess of America's making did the EU clean up, again? The EU has no meaningful or coherent foreign policy, it just leeches the achievements of nation states. I second these welcomes. This is the UK politics thread, where Bardtown single handedly and heroically holds back the pro EU communist socialist agenda.
Somebody has to do it.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On February 09 2017 23:31 LightSpectra wrote:Show nested quote +On February 09 2017 23:24 LegalLord wrote:
That's certainly an important part of it, especially of the "soft imperialism" side. There's more to it than that though. Not really too useful to rehash all of the issues with the EU in general, as there are many and people don't generally agree on all of them. But nationalism as a force opposing the Europe project is indeed a reality that strikes from all sides.
My point, though, was simply that unity isn't always a good thing. Maybe we should argue that the subjects of the British Empire should have never sought independence because unity is important. Well I can't comment on any issues if you don't want to "rehash" them, but I will respond to the comparison with the British Empire: none of the colonial states had any real representation in Parliament, they were ruled as subjects. By comparison the European Parliament is a democratically-elected institution, so that analogy fails. I agree that "unity for the sake of unity" is not a good argument, but I think for the EU, if you do a pro/cons list, the "pros" far outweigh the "cons" (unless you're Greece).
I was going to say more, but the simple version of it is this: unity is only good if such a unity is actually helpful to the parties involved. The British Empire wasn't problematic to its subjects because of a lack of representation in Parliament per se; it was problematic because it created an arrangement in which the weaker parties were little more than client states to Britain. Even the annexed states (e.g. Algeria for France) weren't happy.
The member states of the EU have representation in a Euro Parliament... a joke of an organization that is great for giving populists a place to speak their mind and little more. The major power is in the European Commission, an unelected body. Beyond that, every individual state has its own balance of pros and cons, and some certainly feel that the EU is not in their best interests overall. The trajectory has been consistently, albeit with an oscillation, moving towards anti-EU sentiment.
The big factor that unites all of these concerns is nationalism. The last century has been one of the most thorough demonstrations of the simple fact that the nation-state is the most stable and resilient level at which decisions can be made for the populace, and that's the level at which people identify (e.g. "I'm an American/Frenchman/German etc." rather than "I'm a European"). The past two world wars have shown that nationalism can be dangerous but the union-states also show that the nation-state isn't going anywhere. The mission creep towards "an ever-closer union" is a project that is dead on arrival, even if the Europhiles don't see it yet.
Kind of sucks for Europe that they can't really compete with the nations that are individually massive and powerful. But trying to impose a union on a collection of not-particularly-compatible nations won't work.
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On February 10 2017 02:44 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On February 09 2017 23:31 LightSpectra wrote:On February 09 2017 23:24 LegalLord wrote:
That's certainly an important part of it, especially of the "soft imperialism" side. There's more to it than that though. Not really too useful to rehash all of the issues with the EU in general, as there are many and people don't generally agree on all of them. But nationalism as a force opposing the Europe project is indeed a reality that strikes from all sides.
My point, though, was simply that unity isn't always a good thing. Maybe we should argue that the subjects of the British Empire should have never sought independence because unity is important. Well I can't comment on any issues if you don't want to "rehash" them, but I will respond to the comparison with the British Empire: none of the colonial states had any real representation in Parliament, they were ruled as subjects. By comparison the European Parliament is a democratically-elected institution, so that analogy fails. I agree that "unity for the sake of unity" is not a good argument, but I think for the EU, if you do a pro/cons list, the "pros" far outweigh the "cons" (unless you're Greece). I was going to say more, but the simple version of it is this: unity is only good if such a unity is actually helpful to the parties involved. The British Empire wasn't problematic to its subjects because of a lack of representation in Parliament per se; it was problematic because it created an arrangement in which the weaker parties were little more than client states to Britain. Even the annexed states (e.g. Algeria for France) weren't happy. The member states of the EU have representation in a Euro Parliament... a joke of an organization that is great for giving populists a place to speak their mind and little more. The major power is in the European Commission, an unelected body. Beyond that, every individual state has its own balance of pros and cons, and some certainly feel that the EU is not in their best interests overall. The trajectory has been consistently, albeit with an oscillation, moving towards anti-EU sentiment. The big factor that unites all of these concerns is nationalism. The last century has been one of the most thorough demonstrations of the simple fact that the nation-state is the most stable and resilient level at which decisions can be made for the populace, and that's the level at which people identify (e.g. "I'm an American/Frenchman/German etc." rather than "I'm a European"). The past two world wars have shown that nationalism can be dangerous but the union-states also show that the nation-state isn't going anywhere. The mission creep towards "an ever-closer union" is a project that is dead on arrival, even if the Europhiles don't see it yet. Kind of sucks for Europe that they can't really compete with the nations that are individually massive and powerful. But trying to impose a union on a collection of not-particularly-compatible nations won't work.
Question: why are arbitrary lines on the map drawn >60 years ago more valid than arbitrary lines on a map drawn <60 years ago?
Just because you say the "nation-state" is the best level to make decisions doesn't make it so. In fact, plenty of nation-states collapsed just in the last 30 years.
USSR
Yugoslavia
Czechoslovakia
Sudan
Meanwhile in a slightly longer time period, other nation-states grew considerably (at the cost of neighbouring nation-states), most notably China, but there were some wars over territory in Africa and South America too.
Are these newly annexed lands stable parts of this "nation-state" you so revere? And what makes a nation-state special anyway? We have about a hundred different flavours. Is the USA a more stable type of nation-state than France, because it delegates a lot of power to its states, rather than hoarding it at the federal level? What about Spain?
You point to these arbitrary lines and say "nation states", not "unions of nation states", as if it makes a real difference. The UK is a nation-state and had IRA bombing for independence for the longest time. Catalunya still clamors about its independence from nation-state Spain, and aren't you one of the people who claimed that Crimea should be legitimized because it wanted to switch from being part of nation-state Ukraine to nation-state Russia? Doesn't seem very stable to me.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On February 10 2017 03:09 Acrofales wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2017 02:44 LegalLord wrote:On February 09 2017 23:31 LightSpectra wrote:On February 09 2017 23:24 LegalLord wrote:
That's certainly an important part of it, especially of the "soft imperialism" side. There's more to it than that though. Not really too useful to rehash all of the issues with the EU in general, as there are many and people don't generally agree on all of them. But nationalism as a force opposing the Europe project is indeed a reality that strikes from all sides.
My point, though, was simply that unity isn't always a good thing. Maybe we should argue that the subjects of the British Empire should have never sought independence because unity is important. Well I can't comment on any issues if you don't want to "rehash" them, but I will respond to the comparison with the British Empire: none of the colonial states had any real representation in Parliament, they were ruled as subjects. By comparison the European Parliament is a democratically-elected institution, so that analogy fails. I agree that "unity for the sake of unity" is not a good argument, but I think for the EU, if you do a pro/cons list, the "pros" far outweigh the "cons" (unless you're Greece). I was going to say more, but the simple version of it is this: unity is only good if such a unity is actually helpful to the parties involved. The British Empire wasn't problematic to its subjects because of a lack of representation in Parliament per se; it was problematic because it created an arrangement in which the weaker parties were little more than client states to Britain. Even the annexed states (e.g. Algeria for France) weren't happy. The member states of the EU have representation in a Euro Parliament... a joke of an organization that is great for giving populists a place to speak their mind and little more. The major power is in the European Commission, an unelected body. Beyond that, every individual state has its own balance of pros and cons, and some certainly feel that the EU is not in their best interests overall. The trajectory has been consistently, albeit with an oscillation, moving towards anti-EU sentiment. The big factor that unites all of these concerns is nationalism. The last century has been one of the most thorough demonstrations of the simple fact that the nation-state is the most stable and resilient level at which decisions can be made for the populace, and that's the level at which people identify (e.g. "I'm an American/Frenchman/German etc." rather than "I'm a European"). The past two world wars have shown that nationalism can be dangerous but the union-states also show that the nation-state isn't going anywhere. The mission creep towards "an ever-closer union" is a project that is dead on arrival, even if the Europhiles don't see it yet. Kind of sucks for Europe that they can't really compete with the nations that are individually massive and powerful. But trying to impose a union on a collection of not-particularly-compatible nations won't work. Question: why are arbitrary lines on the map drawn >60 years ago more valid than arbitrary lines on a map drawn <60 years ago?
No particular reason. But if you want to establish a new, larger identity you can't just pull that out of your ass and pretend it works. Nationalism still exists and it's certainly not on a "we are citizens of Europe" level. At least, with the exception of those who migrate for more money and rationalize it as an ideological, rather than economic, decision.
"Nations" are formed and unformed plenty. But in some form or other, national identities are quite resilient compared to other forms of identity. The cultural core of European countries has existed for centuries.
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The funny thing about your list of 'nation states' there is that all of them consisted of distinct ethnicities amalgamated into unnatural unions which then broke down into actual nation states based roughly on historical/ethnic ties.
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On February 10 2017 03:20 bardtown wrote:
The funny thing about your list of 'nation states' there is that all of them consisted of distinct ethnicities amalgamated into unnatural unions which then broke down into actual nation states based roughly on historical/ethnic ties.
Yes, like the US of A. Oh no. Wait. Not that one. Like Brazil! Oh no. Wait. Not that one either. Well, then like South Africa! Nuh, shit. Wait. I got it. Like Belgium! Crap. Spain? Damn.
Oh hell. I give up.
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On February 10 2017 03:16 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2017 03:09 Acrofales wrote:On February 10 2017 02:44 LegalLord wrote:On February 09 2017 23:31 LightSpectra wrote:On February 09 2017 23:24 LegalLord wrote:
That's certainly an important part of it, especially of the "soft imperialism" side. There's more to it than that though. Not really too useful to rehash all of the issues with the EU in general, as there are many and people don't generally agree on all of them. But nationalism as a force opposing the Europe project is indeed a reality that strikes from all sides.
My point, though, was simply that unity isn't always a good thing. Maybe we should argue that the subjects of the British Empire should have never sought independence because unity is important. Well I can't comment on any issues if you don't want to "rehash" them, but I will respond to the comparison with the British Empire: none of the colonial states had any real representation in Parliament, they were ruled as subjects. By comparison the European Parliament is a democratically-elected institution, so that analogy fails. I agree that "unity for the sake of unity" is not a good argument, but I think for the EU, if you do a pro/cons list, the "pros" far outweigh the "cons" (unless you're Greece). I was going to say more, but the simple version of it is this: unity is only good if such a unity is actually helpful to the parties involved. The British Empire wasn't problematic to its subjects because of a lack of representation in Parliament per se; it was problematic because it created an arrangement in which the weaker parties were little more than client states to Britain. Even the annexed states (e.g. Algeria for France) weren't happy. The member states of the EU have representation in a Euro Parliament... a joke of an organization that is great for giving populists a place to speak their mind and little more. The major power is in the European Commission, an unelected body. Beyond that, every individual state has its own balance of pros and cons, and some certainly feel that the EU is not in their best interests overall. The trajectory has been consistently, albeit with an oscillation, moving towards anti-EU sentiment. The big factor that unites all of these concerns is nationalism. The last century has been one of the most thorough demonstrations of the simple fact that the nation-state is the most stable and resilient level at which decisions can be made for the populace, and that's the level at which people identify (e.g. "I'm an American/Frenchman/German etc." rather than "I'm a European"). The past two world wars have shown that nationalism can be dangerous but the union-states also show that the nation-state isn't going anywhere. The mission creep towards "an ever-closer union" is a project that is dead on arrival, even if the Europhiles don't see it yet. Kind of sucks for Europe that they can't really compete with the nations that are individually massive and powerful. But trying to impose a union on a collection of not-particularly-compatible nations won't work. Question: why are arbitrary lines on the map drawn >60 years ago more valid than arbitrary lines on a map drawn <60 years ago? No particular reason. But if you want to establish a new, larger identity you can't just pull that out of your ass and pretend it works. Nationalism still exists and it's certainly not on a "we are citizens of Europe" level. At least, with the exception of those who migrate for more money and rationalize it as an ideological, rather than economic, decision. "Nations" are formed and unformed plenty. But in some form or other, national identities are quite resilient compared to other forms of identity. The cultural core of European countries has existed for centuries.
National identity is bollocks and unless you selectively quote parts of history, you'll see it fast enough yourself. Newer larger identities have been pulled out of asses for as long as we can remember. There was an Austrian-Hungarian empire for the longest of time. Germany as an empire was cobbled together from a whole load of parts and seems to function quite well together despite Bavaria thinking it's better than the rest. Italy was cobbled together in a similar manner and has been disfunctional ever since. Meanwhile the UK is still a somewhat unhappy union despite CENTURIES of joint rule.
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You're only proving the point you're trying to argue against... Why was the Austro-Hungarian Empire called the Austro-Hungarian Empire? Because Austria and Hungary were distinct. Because it was an amalgamation of two empires. Why is the UK at risk of break up? Because there are national identities that want to be distinct. Why were countries like China, Greece, Germany, France and Italy united? Because there were great populations speaking the same language and sharing similar cultures. The words 'Italy' and 'China' and 'Germany' predate the existence of the official nation states. Belgium is hardly a nation state at all. It has barely any people and still has independence movements. Its national identity essentially consists of being the home of the EU and not wanting to be a part of the Netherlands/France. Spain on the other hand has extensive national history.
Tolerance levels of cultural/political differences depend on what can be gained from cooperation. The USA, for example, has an extremely strong national identity that is not drawn along ethnic lines, and a lot to gain from sticking together (e.g. hegemony). It is not comparable to the EU.
Nation states change, but they change into nation states.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
And to be fair, there definitely are borderline cases - do England and Scotland and Ireland belong together? The pieces of Germany? Germany and Austria? North and South US? Maybe, maybe not, it could almost go either way. But bizarre juxtapositions of multiple separate states like Yugoslavia is a failure waiting to happen.
"Europe" is a union of the latter kind, that much is clear cut.
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On February 10 2017 03:45 bardtown wrote:
You're only proving the point you're trying to argue against... Why was the Austro-Hungarian Empire called the Austro-Hungarian Empire? Because Austria and Hungary were distinct. Because it was an amalgamation of two empires. Why is the UK at risk of break up? Because there are national identities that want to be distinct. Why were countries like China, Greece, Germany, France and Italy united? Because there were great populations speaking the same language and sharing similar cultures. The words 'Italy' and 'China' and 'Germany' predate the existence of the official nation states. Belgium is hardly a nation state at all. It has barely any people and still has independence movements. Its national identity essentially consists of being the home of the EU and not wanting to be a part of the Netherlands/France. Spain on the other hand has extensive national history.
Tolerance levels of cultural/political differences depend on what can be gained from cooperation. The USA, for example, has an extremely strong national identity that is not drawn along ethnic lines, and a lot to gain from sticking together (e.g. hegemony). It is not comparable to the EU.
Nation states change, but they change into nation states.
And nobody is claiming otherwise. What LL is saying is that the EU is not a level at which effective governance can take place. Despite larger unions of similarly disparate people having existed and persisted through centuries. The difference is that it was usually through conquest. The EU is unique in that it is a voluntary union. Yet just because it is a novel form of governance doesn't mean it's illegitimate, let alone impossible.
And there are examples of proto-EU unions throughout history. The first and most famous example is the Delian League. While of course, Athens had the upper hand, the Delian League was at its most powerful when the states were working together. Initially in the war against Persia, but also in trade. It only really fell apart with the Pelopponesian war, but by then was hardly more than an excuse for Athens to lord it over the rest. However, at its start it was most definitely a union of independent states.
The USA was a far looser union of states in its inception than it is now. And that union survived a bloody civil war, and in fact became a stronger union over time, despite (or more correctly: because of) hordes of migrants. Now I am not trying to say that the EU is much like the USA or that migration into the EU is anything like the migration into the USA. I'm just pointing to historic examples of unions among autonomous bodies that had a clear joint interest.
LL isn't even trying to argue that the nations in the EU don't have a joint interest. He's just saying "it's unnatural, and will fall apart". It's nonsense. It could fall apart if national differences do start to overshadow joint interests. But for now that is most definitely not the case, despite the problems. Even if Wilders wins the Dutch elections by a landslide, I have faith in my countrymen that a referendum won't result in a Nexit, because it just doesn't make any sense for NL to go it alone. Between the benefits to trade, and having incredibly close diplomatic relations with their big neighbours through this joint union, meaning national security is almost a non-issue, NL profits quite greatly from the EU.
And I'm sure Wilders will paint it as if we can drop out of the EU and have all the benefits and none of the downsides, but I hope the Dutch people aren't dumb enough to actually believe that. As the Dutch like to say: only the sun rises for free.
And insofar as I understand France and Italy, they seem uninterested in leaving the EU too.
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On February 10 2017 03:45 bardtown wrote:
You're only proving the point you're trying to argue against... Why was the Austro-Hungarian Empire called the Austro-Hungarian Empire? Because Austria and Hungary were distinct. Because it was an amalgamation of two empires. Why is the UK at risk of break up? Because there are national identities that want to be distinct.
Questionable at best example; it wasn't an "amalgamation of two empires", it was one singular Habsburg empire for hundreds of years that just changed its name as a concession to the wealthy aristocrats that didn't want to pay increased taxes after the country lost the Austro-Prussian War. Sure, there were Hungarian separatists before and after the name change, but they were wholly excluded from the 1867 negotiations.
Why were countries like China, Greece, Germany, France and Italy united? Because there were great populations speaking the same language and sharing similar cultures.
That's also questionable. Some people say that the only difference between a language and a dialect is the army that separates them. Viennese-Bavarian "German" is about as different to Berlinese (High German) as is Dutch, but it's considered "German" because Bavaria is part of Germany and the Netherlands are not. The Chinese vocal dialects are also mutually incomprehensible for the most part, but the Chinese Emperor forced them to share a dictionary and alphabet. It leads to a lot of confusion. The Italian dialects are also not 100% mutually comprehensible. Like German, Italians often learn both "standard Italian" and their dialect. Many English speakers find the Welsh and South Africans to be incomprehensible. etc.
On the opposite side of the spectrum, Ukrainian and Russian are arguably closer to each other than "Sicilian Italian" and "standard Italian" are, but Ukraine's a separate country.
There's lots of examples like that.
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India. India was a country of numerous regions and an extremely diverse population (still to this day). Not to mention extreme language barriers. Yet they have slowly managed to unify. I don't see why the Europe can't.
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