EU Commission vice president Viviane Reding: "We need to build a United States of Europe with the Commission as government"

Of course we have already known for long what the overpaid, useless top eurocrats in Brussels want. But with regard to the forthcoming European elections, it's good that one of them declared it openly - it makes it easier to vote against their megalomaniac plans.

So, thank you very much for your kind assistance, Mrs Reding! Hopefully you will continue spreading the message!

A campaign for the European Union to become a "United States of Europe" will be the "best weapon against the Eurosceptics", one of Brussels' most senior officials has said.

Viviane Reding, vice president of the European Commission and the longest serving Brussels commissioner, has called for "a true political union" to be put on the agenda for EU elections this spring.

"We need to build a United States of Europe with the Commission as government and two chambers – the European Parliament and a "Senate" of Member States," she said.

Mrs Reding's vision, which is shared by many in the European institutions, would transform the EU into superstate relegating national governments and parliaments to a minor political role equivalent to that played by local councils in Britain.

Under her plan, the commission would have supremacy over governments and MEPs in the European Parliament would supersede the sovereignty of MPs in the House of Commons.
 

Sleepwalking into the September 22 elections suits chancellor Merkel well

It is difficult to believe that there is just a few weeks left until the German elections (on September 22). Most political commentators are on holiday, and even if those who are on duty, make some tired attempts to remind people about the upcoming elections, nobody seems to be interested. Germans are enjoying the gorgeous summer weather, and the number one topic seems to be how Pep Guardiola will fare as the coach of Champions League winner Bayern Munich ...

But there are also political reasons as to why Germans are sleepwalking to the elections:

General elections are meant to pick a government and election campaigns to discuss the most important issues facing a country. If that’s your definition of an election, you may wonder whether Germany is really heading to the polls on September 22.

Seldom has the run-up to an election been as lacklustre as to this year’s vote in Germany. Just nine weeks ahead of polling day, most Germans have better things to do than to think about politics. They go on holidays, discuss the appointment of Pep Guardiola as manager of Bayern Munich football club, or just enjoy the sudden arrival of proper summer weather after an unusually cold spring.

Meanwhile, the political parties are not giving voters much reason to really engage with them and their manifestos. Their election pledges are all too easily recognised as gimmicks that will never be implemented, and on the biggest issues of the day, the future of Europe and the euro, there is no debate between established parties.

Foreign observers might naively assume that as economic data from Europe’s periphery deteriorate, Germany would discuss the implications. After all, its exposure to Southern Europe is huge. If only a part of German lending to the rest of Europe had to be written off – say after a sovereign default, a banking crisis, or both – this would inflict pain on German investors and taxpayers. German savers are already paying for the crisis because the European Central Bank's policies have made decent interest income a distant memory.

So there are enough reasons to pay attention to the euro crisis and consider ways out of it. But fight an election campaign on these crucial issues – you must be kidding.

It is as if Germany’s mainstream parties – Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Greens and Free Democrats – are forming a cartel to prevent real political discussions. None of them are willing to draw any attention to Europe as a topic. Little wonder as every single parliamentary decision on the euro crisis has been supported by all these parties. There is no way in which the opposition could now credibly blame the government for the very policies it has always supported.

There is a second reason for the cross-party armistice ahead of the election. A party challenging the consensus on Europe has emerged, the 'Alternative for Germany' party. The Alternative is currently polling at 2-3 per cent – where all the other parties would like them to remain. In order not to give Alternative any extra publicity, the political cartel refuses to engage on the issue of Europe, effectively pretending it does not exist.

To round off the boredom ahead of the election, polls have been stable for months, if not years – Chancellor Angela Merkel is virtually guaranteed to remain in office. The only uncertainty remains about her coalition partner (although it makes little difference in practice).

What is strange about this sleepwalk to the polls is not how it has paralysed proper political debates within Germany but how it has paralysed proper political debates within Europe.

Read the entire article here

PS

When the summer and the German elections are over, chancellor Merkel - and Europe - will again be faced with the same old problems - the perpetual euro crisis, unemployment (particalarly youth unemployment) and the rising costs of the failed renewable energy policies.  

Warmists desperate in Australia: Alarmist Julia Gillard's likely successor as Prime Minister will dismantle the vast climate change bureaucracy

Tony Abbott 

Reason to celebrate: "Australian elections on 14 September threaten a rollback of years of climate change progress" 
The (warmist) Guardian


No wonder global warming alarmists are getting desperate in Australia. It now appears more and more likely that warmist socialist Julia Gillard will be replaced by the conservative climate realist Tony Abbott, when the Aussies have a chance to vote in the general election on 14 September. 

If everything goes well, Abbott will be a great ally for U.S. Republicans and climate realists everywhere:

A COALITION government would dismantle the climate change bureaucracy and put commissioners including Tim Flannery out of a job, Tony Abbott predicted yesterday as a report painted a gloomy picture of the future.

The Opposition Leader, who vows to remove the carbon tax if elected in September, said there would be no further need for the bureaucracy that supports it.

"When the carbon tax goes all of those bureaucracies will go and I think you'll find that particular position you're referring to will go with them," Mr Abbott said.

Mr Abbott will consider dumping the Howard government's renewable energy target, which he says is "significantly increasing the cost of power".

Speaking to Sky News last night, he equivocated on his previous support for the scheme, which aims to ensure 20 per cent of electricity comes from renewable sources by 2020. "There is going to be a serious review of this, should there be a change of government," he said. "We'll wait for the review before deciding what we do, but I take your point that renewable energy is increasing the price of power."

PS

In the latest poll Abbot's coalition is supported by 50% of the voters compared with just 30% for Gillard's Labour Party. 43% of the voters think that Abbot will do a better job as Prime Minister. Only 35% are convinced that Gillard would be better. 

(image wikipedia)

Grillo's success a blessing in diguise: "Europe's Lost Generation Finds Its Voice"

As I tried to explain in an earlier post, the result of Italy's recent parliamentary election could actually be a blessing in disquise. Now German Der Spiegel seems to have come to a similar conclusion:

For years, Europe's young have grown increasingly furious as the euro crisis has robbed them of a future. The emergence of Beppe Grillo's party in Italy is one of the results -- and is just the latest indication that disgust towards European politics is widespread

Grillo is an Italian phenomenon, but his party's election results are an expression of the mounting rage and anxiety that is spreading throughout crisis-stricken Southern Europe. A new citizens' movement is taking shape, one that shares a mistrust of the established political system and a desire for more grassroots democracy. Only in Italy has it been democratically legitimized thus far.

These irate citizens are also united in anger against their own elite: politicians who have been tainted by party scandals and corruption, yet still remain in power or leaders who are seen as being the mere lackeys of Germany and Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Despite its name, Movimento 5 Stelle has long since ceased to be a movement. It has become a political party that is expected to take responsibility and make proposals for the formation of a government. During the campaign, it relied on a thin, 15-page platform.

The Grillini now have to prove that their country is not merely corrupt, indifferent and infiltrated by the Mafia. Ultimately, they could save Italy's image around the globe. They are the latest example of an uprising of the lost generation, that mass of people on Europe's periphery who are under the age of 40, desperate, unemployed and who have very little left to lose. The public outrage in Europe came to a boil in tent camps in Madrid's Puerta del Sol. It inspired the Occupy Wall Street activists. And it continued in Greece, where youth unemployment has reached 59.4 percent, and where there are no jobs and no economic recovery. =

Yet whereas the Greeks have not yet stirred up the old political system, the Grillini have found unexpected success. They were long underestimated in Italy, yet they long ago started having an effect. They have, for example, fundamentally shaken up the old party system, with its irreconcilable right-wing and left-wing factions. A new political class has emerged with them. Since the advent of the Grillini, Italians are debating Europe more than ever before, including their country's possible exit from the euro zone.

It must be terrifying for current bunch of European political leaders and Brussels eurocrats to watch the mounting anger, not only in southern Europe, but in other regions as well. In their hearts they must know that they have utterly failed, and that the day of reckoning cannot be far. 

Majority of Germans opposing Merkel's wasteful euro rescue policy finally get a voice

A clear majority of Germans has already since at least last summer been against throwing more taxpayers' money to Greece and other crisis ridden eurozone countries in order to "save" the common currency. 

Euro-critical Germans have so far not had a chance to voice their opinion through any of the country's established political parties, which all have been for more euro aid. 

However, this is now going to change. Germany will finally get a serious euro-critical party, "Alternative for Germany". The new party will be working for the abolition of the euro by replacing it with national currencies or smaller currency unions. The party is also against further bailout payments to problem eurozone countries, and it opposes the idea of the EU becoming a transfer union. In addition the "Alternative for Germany" demands a "debureaucratization" of the European Union by returning competences back to nation states. 

It will be difficult for the old parties and their supporters in the MSM to maintain that the people behind the new party are a bunch of populist extremists: The list of founding party members is full of present and former economics professors, leading editors and industrialists. The main initiator, University of Hamburg macroeconomics professor Berndt Lucke, was for over thirty years a member of CDU, until he in 2011 had enough of Merkel's failed euro rescue policy. 

Other well known economists supporting the new party are e.g. professor Stefan Homburg (Leibniz Universität Hannover), professor Charles Blankart (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin) , professor emeritus Joachim Starbatty (Universität Tübingen), professor emeritus Wilhelm Hankel and professor emeritus Karl Albrecht Schachtschneider. Also the former President of the Federation of German Industries (BDI), Hans-Olaf Henkel and the well known industrialist Dieter Spethmann are among the supporters. 

"Alternative for Germany" is planning to participate already in the German elections to be held in September, and latest in the euro elections next year. 

It will be interesting to see, whether the German mainstream media will give the new party a decent chance to present itself for the electorate. 

"Alternative for Germany" is a most welcome addition to the political scene in Germany. Hopefully it will inspire eurocritical movements in other EU countries. 

The encouraging result of the Italian election: The failed euro project is one step closer to its final demise

Here is a brief summary of the Italian election:

Italy faced political deadlock on Tuesday after a stunning election that saw the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement of comic Beppe Grillo become the strongest party in the country and left no political group with a clear majority in parliament. The protest vote is also a clear signal of the failure of the EU-German sponsored austerity measures which were implemented by the government of the non-elected technocrat government of Mario Monti.

Most commentators concentrate on the "ungovernability" created by the election result, but the real story is the massive anti-EU vote, showing that Italians are tired of Brussels dictates. The eurozone - and the entire European Union - is burning, but the Brussels bureaucrats continue like nothing would have happened:

"It is up to leading politicians to negotiate to form a government with a stable situation so that reforms and consolidation of the budget can continue. There is no way back, there is no alternative," Mr. Van Rompuy told reporters during a visit to Estonia, saying that holding elections in the midst of a transition was always "a risk."

The European Commission said Mr. Monti's reform and fiscal-consolidation agenda would "underpin everybody's confidence" in the Italian economy, whose growth prospects are at best tepid. The EU's economics affairs chief, Olli Rehn, said Italy should "continue to address the challenges it faces" despite the "complex" outcome.

These people do not understand - or do not want to admit - that all this would not have happened without the failed common currency. The end of the euro is now one step closer. That is the most encouraging result of the Italian election. 

People such as Van Rompuy and Rehn are the real clowns - not Beppe Grillo and his likes - in this sad (and tragic) European circus. 

Germany returns to reality: Merkel wants to cap subsidies to renewable energy producers

Merkel begins to see the light.

Upcoming elections sometimes have a beneficial effect on politics. Germany is a case in point: Chancellor Angela Merkel is now prepared to scale down the disastrous and huge subsidies to wind and solar energy producers. 

Merkel's environment minister Peter Altmeier this week announced a plan that he described as a "paradigm shift":

In a surprise announcement on Monday, he said he would draft legislation to cap subsidies to renewable energy producers in order to stop the recent sharp increase in electricity bills caused by those subsidies -- a potentially popular move in an election year.

"It is not acceptable that electricity consumers should keep bearing all the risk of the future costs on their own," Altmaier told a news conference.

The current system works like this: Germany wants to boost its power generation from wind, solar and biogas plants, but the electricity they produce remains more expensive than coal and nuclear power. To encourage investment in renewables, the government allows operators of such plants to sell their electricity at a guaranteed fixed price or feed-in tariff that is above the market price. Energy consumers pay the difference via a renewable power surcharge on their electricity bills. To date, there has been no upper limit on Germany's subsidies for renewables, which means that the more solar panels and wind turbines go into operation, the higher the surcharge that consumers have to pay.

The guaranteed high return has led to a boom in investment in renewable energy in recent years. This has boosted the surcharge to a record 5.28 cents per kilowatt hour of electricity this year, up almost 50 percent from 2012 and up from just 0.88 cents in 2006. An average German household currently pays €180 ($242) per year to subsidize renewable energy. -

Altmaier wants the legislation to be passed by Aug. 1. However, it has yet to be approved by Economics Minister Philipp Rösler, chairman of the pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP), junior partner to Merkel's conservatives in the center-right coalition. Rösler praised the plan on Monday but stopped short of giving it his blessing. And even if Altmaier gets the go-ahead from the FDP, the law could be blocked by the opposition Social Democrats and Greens who have a majority in the Bundesrat, Germany's upper legislative chamber.

The new plan could according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung "end up stopping the expansion of renewables." If that is true, Merkel and Altmaier should be congratulated for finally returning to reality with regard to energy policy. 

Merkel will certainly get the votes of those hundreds of thousands of Germans, who cannot afford to heat their houses and flats, because of the steeply growing energy prices. 

The revolution that made it possible for Obama to win a second term

The shale gas revolution helped to re-elect a weak president.

There are of course a great number of reasons for why Barack Obama was able to win a second term despite being an extremely weak and incompetent leader. However, the crucial underlying reason was without doubt the impact of the shale gas and oil on the U.S. economy and job creation. The shale gas revolution - which Obama has played no part in, even if he tried to take credit for it - made it difficult for Romney to bring home his message of an economy in steep decline.

New research from the American Clean Skies Foundation shows the impact of the shale gas revolution:

Shale gas and advances in oil and natural gas extraction technologies over the last five years have provided a large economic stimulus for the United States. That is the conclusion of new research from the American Clean Skies Foundation, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to advancing America's energy independence and a cleaner, low-carbon environment through the expanded use of natural gas, renewables and efficiency.

The research is based on data and analysis by ICF International and estimates that technology-driven changes in oil and gas production since 2007 will lead to 835,000 to 1.6 million new U.S. jobs by 2017 and increase the country's gross domestic product by $167 billion to $245 billion on a net basis.

For example, the report estimates that for every billion cubic feet of additional gas demand per day, there are 13,000 additional direct drilling and pipeline jobs, plus thousands more related to new chemical plants and other gas-using facilities. In turn, these jobs generate a further 10,000 to 30,000 induced indirect jobs in the manufacturing, retail and service sectors.

In January I made this "prediction", which I think turned out to be correct:

In the United States the shale gas/oil revolution has through its own force already changed the country´s economic outlook. This development is taking place, not because of some positive action of the present US administration, but despite of its policies. Ironically, it is quite possible that the energy centered economic turnaround, in which Obama has had no role, will in the end help to get him re-elected. 

Mark Steyn on Obama, Hurricane Sandy and Benghazi

Mark Steyn at his best:

In political terms, Hurricane Sandy and the Benghazi consulate debacle exemplify at home and abroad the fundamental unseriousness of the United States in the Obama era. In the days after Sandy hit, Barack Obama was generally agreed to have performed well. He had himself photographed in the White House Situation Room, nodding thoughtfully to bureaucrats ("John Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism; Tony Blinken, National Security Advisor to the Vice President; David Agnew, Director for Intergovernmental Affairs") and Tweeted it to his 3.2 million followers. He appeared in New Jersey wearing a bomber jacket rather than a suit to demonstrate that when the going gets tough the tough get out a monogrammed Air Force One bomber jacket. He announced that he'd instructed his officials to answer all calls within 15 minutes because in America "we leave nobody behind." By doing all this, the president "shows" he "cares" – which is true in the sense that in Benghazi he was willing to leave the entire consulate staff behind, and nobody had their calls answered within seven hours, because presumably he didn't care. So John Brennan, the Counterterrorism guy, and Tony Blinken, the National Security honcho, briefed the president on the stiff breeze, but on Sept. 11, 2012, when a little counterterrorism was called for, nobody bothered calling the Counterterrorism Security Group, the senior U.S. counterterrorism bureaucracy.
-

Back in Benghazi, the president who looks so cool in a bomber jacket declined to answer his beleaguered diplomats' calls for help – even though he had aircraft and Special Forces in the region. Too bad. He's all jacket and no bombers. This, too, is an example of America's uniquely profligate impotence. When something goes screwy at a ramshackle consulate halfway round the globe, very few governments have the technological capacity to watch it unfold in real time. Even fewer have deployable military assets only a couple of hours away. What is the point of unmanned drones, of military bases around the planet, of elite Special Forces trained to the peak of perfection if the president and the vast bloated federal bureaucracy cannot rouse themselves to action? What is the point of outspending Russia, Britain, France, China, Germany and every middle-rank military power combined if, when it matters, America cannot urge into the air one plane with a couple of dozen commandoes? In Iraq, al-Qaida is running training camps in the western desert. In Afghanistan, the Taliban are all but certain to return most of the country to its pre-9/11 glories. But in Washington the head of the world's biggest "counterterrorism" bureaucracy briefs the president on flood damage and downed trees.

I don't know whether Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan can fix things, but I do know that Barack Obama and Joe Biden won't even try – and that therefore a vote for Obama is a vote for the certainty of national collapse. Look at Lower Manhattan in the dark, and try to imagine what America might look like after the rest of the planet decides it no longer needs the dollar as global reserve currency. For four years, we have had a president who can spend everything but build nothing. Nothing but debt, dependency, and decay. As I said at the beginning, in different ways the response to Hurricane Sandy and Benghazi exemplify the fundamental unseriousness of the superpower at twilight. Whether or not to get serious is the choice facing the electorate Tuesday.

Read the entire article here

One can only hope that Americans make the right choice when they vote on Tuesday!

How the Obama team got some help from moderator Crowley

Barack Obama clearly got some help from moderator Candy Crowley during last night's debate:

In response to a question about the assault, Obama said he had called it an "act of terror" during remarks the next day in the Rose Garden, and Crowley vouched for him.

Romney was visibly surprised by the president's answer and appeared to believe he'd caught the president in a lie.

“You said in the Rose Garden, the day after the attack it was an act of terror? It was not a spontaneous demonstration? Is that what you're saying?” Romney said. “I want to make sure we get that for the record, because it took the president 14 days before he called the attack in Benghazi an act of terror.”

"Get the transcript," Obama replied.

Crowley then broke in, saying: “He did in fact, sir. So let me — let me call it an act of terror …”

“Can you say that a little louder, Candy?” Obama shouted.

“He — he did call it an act of terror," Crowley said as some in the audience applauded. "It did as well take — it did as well take two weeks or so for the whole idea there being a riot out there about this tape to come out. You are correct about that,” Crowley said.

The transcript of the president's speech from the day after the attack in Libya shows that Obama used the phrase "act of terror" during his remarks, albeit indirectly. 

At least to this viewer, Crowley's instant confirmation of what Obama said was somewhat surprising. 

Here is probably why she responded so quickly, without any hesitation and why the president also immediately spoke about the transcript and urged Crowley to "say it a little louder":

The Obama team knew that Romney would raise the Libya question during the debate, which is why they most likely sent a copy of the Rose Garden transcript to Crowley before the debate.  

Voting in the US 2012 presidential election

Ari Berman, writing in Rolling Stone:

As the nation gears up for the 2012 presidential election, Republican officials have launched an unprecedented, centrally coordinated campaign to suppress the elements of the Democratic vote that elected Barack Obama in 2008.
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Florida and Iowa barred all ex-felons from the polls, disenfranchising thousands of previously eligible voters.

Read the entire article here