Of course I'm not suggesting that Cyprus is a threat to world peace. Heck they'd probably take a couple of weeks to defeat a military minnow like Argentina. And the next village to me, Weston-By-Welland would almost certainly beat Kirchner's mob more quickly. But what is a threat to world peace, to our civilised society, to the values and bedrock upon which we have built our prosperity and with which we have raised our children since the last unpleasantness, is what has been going on on that Mediterranean island.
Correct me if I'm wrong here, but didn't we go to war, twice, in the last century to protect ourselves from unelected tyranny, overpowering and self-interested dictatorship from Germany? To secure our freedom to elect our own representatives, to retain our own national identity and the ability to live in peace, work hard, earn money, pay for our material needs, daily comforts and, ideally, a comfortable and secure retirement?
At the heart of that, almost central to it as far as 'ordinary' people are concerned is the assurance that one can rely on one's bank to keep one's money safe. Indeed Governments used to advise people not to keep their cash under the mattress, but instead to put it in the bank 'where it will be safe'. Safe as the bank of England. Or Safe as houses they used to say. That might have a somewhat hollow ring to it if you're in Spain or Ireland or many parts of the US at this moment in time, but you get my drift.
So what we're now seeing in Cyprus where unelected Eurocrats in Brussels have decided simply to take people's money out of their bank accounts is, in my opinion, a grave and serious threat to the stability of the civilised world. If your money is not safe in a bank, where is it safe? If people who you didn't vote for, have never met, who don't understand your circumstances in any way, can simply take your money, what is the world coming to? Who can you trust?
And to say 'well there's lots of 'laundered' ill-gotten Russian Mafia money in Cypriot banks' is irrelevant. If it's illegal money then do something about that illegality. Use the law as it is designed to be used. Don't use it as an excuse to just steal that and other monies legitimately held by normal people. Money which, incidentally, has already been taxed by the local Government and some of which will already have found its way back to paying for these unelected fuckwits in Brussels/Strasbourg.
It's like Mr Hitler saying: 'there's some dodgy money in Poland and Czechoslovakia? Fuck it we'll take the Sudetenland and then move eastwards.'
The Eurocrats owe their entire cushy lifestyles to the EU and will do anything in their power to keep this failed project going, including the complete sell-out of the people they're supposed to be representing. The Cypriot deal, roundly rejected by that Island's Government and it's people last week, has now been forced through in such a way that the interested parties don't even get to vote on it. Is that democracy? Does that follow the EU ideals of accountability, fairness for all? Recognition of minorities and the overriding founding principle of cooperation in such a way as to make future wars impossible?
I've blogged before about what I called 'economic blitzkrieg' and also about the 'end of democracy in Europe' - the take-over of Europe by Germany, not with tanks, but banks. It seems to be coming to pass right now.
And remember that Germany is booming. Unemployment is less than 6% while it is over 25% in Southern Europe. Because Germany is enjoying a massively favourable exchange rate compared to what it would be if it still had the Deutschmark (because the exchange rate is measured in a way which includes the much weaker economies elsewhere in Europe) while at the same time having an almost captive audience for its goods and services. And the smaller, poorer, less industrially strong or efficient countries, which always used to be able to devalue their currencies and thereby become more competitive again, simply cannot do this now. Which means that they're (technical economic term) fucked.
It is becoming a German take-over of continental Europe and we're just now starting to see what that will mean for ordinary people who don't toe the German line. But this situation has been created by Germany (strictly speaking the EU but the terms are effectively interchangeable) allowing countries to join the EU and the Euro who had no hope of ever meeting the entry criteria economically (I won't bore you with those criteria, but you can take a look here and here). Then Germany got these countries 'hooked' on cheap money, gave them massive financial aid (which most of them promptly pissed up the wall as Germany knew they would) and now they are almost entirely beholden to Germany and the EU to have enough money to eat (pay their public sector workers including the police).
I think that the EU has become such a laughing stock over the years, on issues like straight bananas, health and safety, human rights etc., that no-one is really bothering to take any notice any more. And that's a shame, because if we don't take notice - really take notice - right now, it will be too late and the values and freedoms that our soldiers, in their millions during the last two unpleasantnesses, spilled blood to preserve, will have disappeared.
Cyprus has been a major blunder by the EU and the hard line has been more about upcoming elections in Germany (where the population are also increasingly anti-EU by the way) than anything else. But it has shown the potentially evil, undemocratic and all-consuming power that the EU can now wield. From unelected premiers imposed on Italy to stealing - yes it is stealing it's not a 'levy' FFS - the bread out of people's mouths in Cyprus.
And now they're (the EU) capping what people can withdraw, controlling capital transfers, not allowing people to leave the country with serious amounts of money and limiting card transactions to €500 per month. How is that a 'free movement of people, trade and money', as per the EU principles? see Here for details.
I also happen to think that if I wanted to find a group from which to steal money, the Russian Mafia would not be high on my list of targets, but that's another matter.
The Dutch and Swedes are also starting to lose faith in the EU but leadership is unlikely to come from those places. France is effectively bankrupt and will do whatever Germany tells it to do (as usual). Most of the other EU member states don't have a pot to piss in. The only hope for the independence of smaller (i.e. non-German) countries in Europe now probably lies with the UK. And we're not closely involved with the shambles that it is becoming (although we're paying massively into it).
I hope that the Euro will disappear up its own rectum because of the fundamental flaws in the system, but, as I say, these people will do almost anything - things, like this week in Cyprus which I think even Mr Hitler would have blanched at - to keep the thing going. If the wheels don't come off we're all in for a great deal of further pain and, in my humble opinion, I think that the EU could end up creating the very thing that it was set up in the 1950s to guard against; war and renewed conflict in Europe and beyond.
And now a joke to lighten the mood... not really. Thanks for reading, sleep well if you can/aren't already.
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