Monday, May 30, 2005

A spectre of a Polish Plumber is haunting Europe -- or at least France!

There's much I can say about Sunday's monumental rejection by the French of the proposed European Constitution. It has all of Europe in a tailspin. Moreover, the overwhelming "non!" vote exposed the distance between the elites and the populace both reactionary in their misplaced anger at American influence (the former) and globalization (the latter) . I suspect the snickering will be hard to repress on Pennsylvania avenue.

There are many great links with post-referendum commentary. A good start is at Dan Drezner's blog

I suspect this lets Tony Blair off the hook and it gives a great lift to the Euroskeptics on both sides of the pond. I am among them. The EU is a fantasy notwithstanding the economic arguments for integration. I am awaiting how the American mainstream media plays up this debacle particularly since the "social market" model is a great meme.

One irony about the French sentiment: I was particularly struck by the idea that the French thought the monstrous 400 page EU constititution was too favorable to the British. Generally that's a poor excuse. Chirac didn't make the case to a nation that obviously has rejected the 21s century.

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