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NikolayTzvetkov

Listed below are comments made by NikolayTzvetkov between Saturday, 24th January 2009 and Tuesday, 9th June 2009.

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Eurosceptics triumphant 6:52pm on 09 Jun 2009 If we have to be fair the referendum that should be held in UK first is not about the Lisbon Treaty, but about the country staying in EU. If this one succeeds than people should be asked about the Treaty.
Cameron tougher on Lisbon? 6:52pm on 31 May 2009 I find it ironic that the eurosceptic Tories are the ones that push UK towards more integrated Europe at the end of the day. I guess Cameron will be no different. I am looking forward explaining the British public why the country should join the Euro. In two or three years it will become very clear how dire is the economic situation, compared to US or most of the EU states. Succession of UK governments have been in a war with the manufacturing sector, throwing perks at the financial serves in order to keep them in City. The country now is too dependent on them. And I see no good reason why London should be the main financial centre in Europe, if the country is outside of the Eurozone. After the Great Depression Britain was still an Empire, after World War II the country relatively undamaged compared to the other major economies in Europe. In the last 20 years or so the main advantage of UK was light regulation (if you assume that FSA was good for anything). I cant see this lasting much longer. If Eurozone adopts common financial markets regulation, this will spell the end of London as equal to N.Y., and it may fall behind Frankfurt. So the next government will be hard pressed to bring UK into the euro. I guess we should stay connected.
Additionally British and particularly the English seem to have a semantic problem. When they hear the word Union they think for a way to dominate over the others. I guess it is a legacy of the Unions of 1707 and 1801. Most continental countries see the unions and federations as ways to devolve power to the regions. Think of Federal Republic of Germany or Swiss Confederation. I wonder if this explains why so many people in UK still call the EU the Common Market.
Cameron shuns thorny EU 6:05pm on 24 May 2009 Democracythreat (113)
I think my question is entirely honest. I read your whole post and got your point, but I think you got me wrong. Freeborn-John obviously has his own position, but if we have to argue if EU is democratically legitimate or not I need to know before hand where John stand. There are many options, and they require different arguments.
Here are some possibilities:
1. John is not against relatively undemocratic and non-representive political systems (UK being a very obvious example), where premium is paid for efficiency (stable government, even if it represents only 25% of the people that voted). He is against such system being implemented on EU level, because (for example):
A. He does not like EU
B. He likes EU, but he thinks that EU not being a state requires different set up than UK
C. Some other reason
2. John generally prefers direct democracy systems like the one in Switzerland.
As I can not read minds I cant argue with John why Lisbon treaty is a good idea, before I know where exactly he stands.
Cameron shuns thorny EU 8:23pm on 23 May 2009 Freeborn-John (110)
Entire nations live under UK law and can not change it. At least not much easier than changing the EU law. Does this bother you?
Cameron shuns thorny EU 1:39pm on 22 May 2009 Freeborn-John (106)
The system you suggest is absurd to put it mildly. The EU secondary legislation consists of thousands to tens of thousands of acts. If you assume 27 member states, and average period between the elections 4 years this means change a change every 54 days or so. Do you really think such secondary legislation will have any value at all?
Reading your comment I assume you believe that European Parliament and Courts should be abolished. And by the way what is the point of existence of European Union? In your system the interested governments can just get together sign treaties, conventions or what ever they want. Once a new government comes to power it can always leave the agreement. Usually in international law six months notice is required.
Such system might be democratically legitimate, but for sure it will be useless.
Cameron shuns thorny EU 7:00pm on 21 May 2009 Freeborn-John (82)
I think you fundamentally misunderstand the nature of international law. UK to the best of my knowledge is member of WTO, UN and the Council of Europe. Interestingly the legislation of these organizations is superior to the British legislation. Once rules of WTO for example are accepted, UK can not adopt national legislation contrary to them. Even if the Opposition, is against them once in power it has two options: to renegotiate them in the framework of WTO (good luck with this one) or leave WTO. Otherwise it will have to follow these rules (like them or not). Note: Yes I know who negotiates on behalf of UK in WTO, but the point is valid.
I find it ironic that if one substitutes EU with UK and UK with Scotland (or Wales) in your post it becomes quite an interesting reading. What about if Scotland decides to choose-and-pick from the UK legislation, or your local council? After all I see no good reason in your framework of thinking why British legislation should have supremacy over the local one.
In your previous posts you seem to believe that lack of IDs in UK is a great achievement for freedom. Well I have been stopped in Germany only twice in 9 years and asked for my ID. Admittedly on both occasions I was riding my bicycle drunk. On the other hand London is CCTV capital of the world, many of them operated by private entities. It is impossible to scratch your back in London without being recorded. It was already pointed to you that you have to inform the authorities if you plan to travel to Northern Ireland (sic). To be honest I would rather have an ID in my pocket, than being filmed without my knowledge all the time, requested to provide information about movements and arrested during a dawn anti-terror raid only to be released 48 hours later.
The euro: safety net or straitjacket? 10:04am on 31 Jan 2009 SuperJulianR (32)
And you haven’t even heard about Eastern Europe in the 90s. I remember both 1990-1991 in Bulgaria when we had coupons for bread, butter and so and I still had to go around 6 in the morning to substitute my mother who was in the queue from 3 a.m., and the winter 1996-1997 when we had such inflation that in February I was earning around 10 dollars a month (I was student then, so could not work full time). I think very few people are still alive that remember the Great Depression, which I guess offered similar miseries in the west. My grandmother that was teenage girl at the time used to tell me that it was really tough and essentially they subsisted on what they could produce themselves. So I assume the present crisis is nowhere nearly as bad. And I hope it won’t get anywhere near.
Economic storm hits Greek farmers 4:45pm on 29 Jan 2009 I believe we are going to see much more protests across Europe. Unfortunately we face a lot of challenges and next 2-3 years will not be easy. The main problem is to reform the whole economic system (too social for what we can afford) without going into the brainless free market orthodoxy of Thatcher type. It’s funny that I experienced first hand the collapse of socialism (between 1985 and 1995 in my case) and now I may have a chance to see the end of the completely free market (admittedly a much better system). I guess that the answer is that the state should do all it must do and not an inch more, but it has an important role to play, because after all we are social animals and the benefits from social cohesion are as big as the ones of free personal initiative. The tricky part is to combine them. Unfortunately it is the human nature that we postpone necessary changes (but painful) in the good times (when the price for their implementation is the lowest), only to face the fact that their inevitable in the bad times (when they really hurt, but there is no better alternative really). For me the whole concept of consumers’ society is a bit alien, because I remember times when we had no disposable income, so I really can’t understand the idea of plasma TV in the toilet or the convertible car for the weekend. I think the people in Europe should work and save more, consume less, and not expect to retire at 60 and spend their last three decades in some tropical paradise. On the other hand we should have a system that provides for the less fortunate (as long as they are not free riding), prevent large fluctuation of food prices and generally allows reasonable standards of living for everyone. I guess Scandinavia is a good model.
About the euro: I think it’s a great idea. After all it is necessary for a common market, saves a lot of money and makes live easier. I believe that ECB has the right attitude (probably because it’s explicitly oblige to have it) to concentrate on price stability. After all that is the only thing that it can do. Providing a stable currency that is priced according to the fundamentals of the economy is the best way to facilitate growth. It prevents large fluctuations, gives security to the investors and to the workers and builds trust in all parties involved in economic process. If I invest I would like to have some idea how much it will cost me to repay my loans and to buy equipment and as a worker, what will my salary buy.
If anybody should be worries about the euro those are the politicians that have no easy way out by devaluating the currency (a very bad idea in a longer term because it actually impoverishes the majority of the population and reduces the competiveness and efficiency of the economy in a longer term). Now they have to implement reforms and explain them to the people.
P.S. I also watched the program with Niall Ferguson on CNN and find it as far as solid science is concerned absolute intellectual rubbish. It was counterfactual, which makes a good base for fiction, but no basis what so ever for science. To be honest I quite like his books and enjoy reading them, but they are mainly of the “What if…” variety. So far no country is willing to leave the euro (on the contrary, probably because they have the Iceland example), China is not able to unhook itself from USA (this will happen to a large extend, but not during this crisis, I see it more likely in next 20-30 years) and willing or not will have to lend money to USA.
Five questions for Ken on Europe 10:49am on 26 Jan 2009 Freeborn-John (211):
I certainly agree that the present system is too rigid, and too much stuck in the past. I think the Lisbon Treaty is a step in the right direction, because it brings more democracy and allows so called enhanced co-operation. I think that Europe on multiple speeds and a la carte is a good idea. This way beyond a certain core policies that will be invariant, different states or group of states can try different models that if successful can be adopted by the others. Euro and Schengen are good examples. So far they prove popular.
Of course CAP is largely insane, but I also think food production is slightly different than most other businesses. After all you can’t eat oil or plasma TVs. That’s why it’s a good idea to ensure that Europe can produce enough food with good quality and produced according to high health and environmental standards. It is much more dangerous to be left at the pure mercy of the international market, when it goes down to food.
Five questions for Ken on Europe 6:29pm on 24 Jan 2009 Freeborn-John (145, 146):
Main entities as far as international law is concerned are usually the states. They can agree to transfer some of their powers to smaller (for example counties, Bundeslander or Scotland let us say) or bigger units (EU, UN, WTO and so on). This transfer is executed freely (at least as far as UK is concerned) and not under duress (occupation, war, etc.). In this sense the constitution of the state has supremacy over all other laws, international or local. Such constitution (written or informal) decided what are the procedures and the range for such transfers. I will try to give you a couple of examples (sorry my knowledge of Anglo-Saxon legal system is limited):
1. United Nations: the resolutions of Security Council (not all, but it depends of the type of resolution) are obligatory for all member states. They can not be made void by EU, individual states or city councils. In a way UN legislation has supremacy over EU legislation. But all member states have joined and accepted the UN Chapter will clear understanding that this is the case. On the other hand states that are not members of UN are not bound by the Security Council resolutions.
The reason why usually the legislation of bigger entities is supreme to the one of the smaller ones is that if it was the other way around the smaller entity would have adopted only those parts of bigger entity legislation that suits their own interests. This way the whole legal system will disintegrate because no option for enforcement will exist. Imagine that I decide to drive after having a few drinks (I don’t even have a driving license but anyway), the police stops me and decides to penalize me. Then I say that I personally do not accept the law that stipulates the alcohol limit so I can drive as drunk as I like. Same lets say with murder, theft and so. I guess my point is pretty clear.
2. UK decided to transfer a lot of powers to Scotland, but theoretically Westminster can always have them back so to say if it decides so. If Scots do not like this they can opt for independence, but then they have to be recognized (there is actually no standard procedure that decides when a state is legitimate or not, Kosovo and Taiwan are examples for this).
Ultimately State Constitution has primacy over any international or local law. But it allows the State to transfer some of its powers both up and down. What it does not allow is this transfer to be permanent. The State can always have them back if it decides so. So UK can always have its powers back from EU (for example it can negotiate on its own with WTO), although this can mean leaving EU. But in order for the international law to be applicable to all countries involved it has to be supreme to the local law. It’s always possible to arrange opt-outs on individual basis, but then the agreement of all other member states should be obtained. On the other hand the state should find a way to resolve conflicts that arise between smaller entities, in the areas where they have legislative power.
All in all, national constitution is superior and EU treaty because no EU treaty can force itself on any member state.
About the economic consequences of UK leaving EU we can argue for ages. I personally haven’t seen any serious study on the topic. This will require a lot more solid information than you and I have at the moment. I still believe that will be a loss-loss situation for both parties, but UK will be a much bigger loser.

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