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May 31, 2005
The Complexities Of The Non Vote
Bill Rice over at The Fourth Rail has an excellent analysis of the French non vote on the EU constitution. The whole piece is well worth your time, but a couple of his points really stood out to me:
Many voted non as a direct rejection of any hint of free-market reforms to France's socialist workplace. Though of course in an altruistic sense one would wish for the best for all French workers, I'm certainly not going to cry in my beer over their insistence on flogging the dead horse of socialism. In fact, as Lexington Green points out over at Chicago Boyz, an independent nation whose citizens willingly choose socialism is still preferable to a stifling, lifeless multi-nation bureaucracy "sucking what life remains out of the old continent".
The rejection of the constitution will throw a wrench into efforts to coordinate and integrate military forces, which will subsequently make alliances with the US more attractive for uncommitted countries. Very interesting possibilities indeed exist for the countries of "new Europe". I hope GWB and Condi Rice are adroit enough to take advantage of the opportunity.
As problematic as the French and Germans and Spaniards have been vis-à-vis the war in Iraq along with their general animus towards America, I have never wanted their cultures to be subjugated to and diluted by some overarching European union. In spite of some of the more reactionary views to be found among the right, I think we are all better off with the states of old Europe retaining their cultural independence.
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