View Single Post
Old 12-10-2004, 00:16   #46
haku haku is offline
iMod
 
haku's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2003
Location: Normandie
Age: 54
Gender: Male
Posts: 7,839

Quote:
Originally Posted by thegurgi
I always thought the EU was an economic issue
The EU is a political and economic union, it's the only organization of this kind in the world, it's almost a confederation.

When a country joins the EU, a part of its sovereignty is transfered to the EU, legally an EU member is no longer fully sovereign.
France has had to modify its constitution a dozen times in 50 years to transfer parts of our sovereignty to the EU.

Like a federal state, the EU has an executive branch (the EU commission), a parliamentary branch (the EU parliament), a judiciary branch (The EU Court of Justice), and a central bank.

The EU has a lot of powers over its member states, the EU can force a national government to apply a law for example, the EU can also declare null a law voted by a national parliament which is in contradiction with EU laws.
In a lot of ways, the EU has more power over its member states than the Federal US government over the US states.

Within the EU, borders no longer exist, any EU citizen is free to settle and work wherever they want, any EU citizen can buy whatever they want in any member states, money and goods also travel freely as if the EU was one single state.

The EU is also about redistribution of money among member states, the richest member states pay a lot of taxes to the EU, this money is then redistributed to the less rich members.

If you don't understand why EU citizens are discussing the admittance of Turkey as a member, try to imagine what kind of debate there would be in the US if Mexico was bound to become the 51st state of the United States of America, it is of the same magnitude.

Quote:
Originally Posted by thegurgi
i'm sure you'd whine just as much if we were admitted to the Union as well.
Excuse me... I whine?

Are you denying me the right to debate about what people will become co-citizens of mine, about which country is going to participate in the writing of laws i'll have to abide by?
~~~~~~~~~~~
Patrick | TatySite.net t.E.A.m. [ shortdickman@free.fr ]

Last edited by haku; 12-10-2004 at 00:35.
  Reply With Quote