Thursday June 2, 2005

The Dutch have spoken: 61.8% 'no'

Posted by Rob (#1) on June 2, 2005 08:18 CEST

The behemoth has been stopped. Dutch voters have rejected the European constitutional treaty en masse. In my home town of Rotterdam, there was actually an absolute majority of 67% to reject the treaty.

Next stop: Luxembourg, July 10.

The Houston Chronicle has a very good analysis of what's going wrong in Europe:

In France, anger with President Jacques Chirac and fears of an "Anglo-Saxon" Europe under the spell of free-market principles clearly influenced the outcome. Leading French supporters of the charter complained that many voters were more interested in sending a message to Chirac than making a reasoned judgment on the constitution.

But the Netherlands already follows Washington's free-market policies that alarm the French.

Instead, Dutch liberals feared the country would lose its independence over such socially liberal policies as euthanasia and marijuana. Conservatives fretted about immigration policies being decided at EU headquarters in Brussels, Belgium.

The common thread appears to be public rejection of the notion, at least for now, of a European superstate. That is a goal never explicitly articulated by national leaders who support the charter and even denied by some, yet it is implicit in the structures the constitution would establish.

Uh-huh.

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Random non-conservative note

Personal

Posted by Rob (#1) on June 2, 2005 16:58 CEST

I'm being a horrible person on MSN today:

Message to Stephanie at 4:57:11 pm: lol i want a gf with cum stains tatooed on her face

Message to Stephanie at 4:57:28 pm: then i can say she puts the ink in kinky

Guess it's time for me to leave work and go to Amsterdam for the Garbage gig, nothing useful coming out of me anymore!

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