Dave says we need EU reform. He could secure these reforms if he really wanted to. So why won't he?

OK let's get the basics out of the way: The EU is on a publicly stated journey to establish a federal Europe: One in which national governments are subservient to the centralised EU machinery of governance. Exactly like the state legislature in America is subservient to the national government. Individual states can make local laws on minor local issues but the national government holds sway on major issues like taxation, defence, foreign policy, the fundamental laws of the land, welfare, education, healthcare, major investment in infrastructure etc etc.

Clearly the US had a major advantage when these policies were enacted - a single common language, currency and (largely) history after the unpleasantness of 1861. And they have a democratic system that most Americans believe in, with issues like free speech constitutionally enshrined. It's not perfect but it has worked for a couple of hundred years. And has delivered prosperity.

The EU is trying to get to this situation - essentially by making the whole of Europe Germany. You may laugh at that contention, but it is essentially true: Germanic in terms of taxation, employment and retirement laws, working practices, the standardisation of everything.

So we lose the quirkiness of southern Europe. The culture of Spain, Italy, Greece etc. How's that going by the way?

They signed up so that's their problem in some ways, but I'm not a 'little Englander' and I love Europe and its people. I'll come back to this anon.

The thing is that if we remain part of the EU we will be taken on this journey to federalism. We will not have our own army or foreign policy or ability to make trade agreements on our own behalf with the outside world. We will have to do everything within the machinery of the EU. We'll be forced to have an EU flag and anthem - small beer perhaps, but massively important symbolically. Because it will mean that we are no longer a nation state, able to defend itself or to set out its own policies for the future. Or to control who comes in to our country. Immigration is a big issue at the moment, but trust me, it's paltry compared to the other issues that being part of the EU will really mean to our lives.

And the raison d'étre of the EU was originally to make wars in Europe impossible. And to promote trade which brings prosperity. History tells us these things and history should be more widely studied and accepted in my view. If we studied history we would never have gone in to Afghanistan for example.

But, while we signed up to the founding principles of the EU in 1974 after the last unpleasantness (1938-45) we never signed up to a federal Europe. And certainly not to an unelected, undemocratic one, which is what we're looking at now. Where a failed (proven to be corrupt) MP from Luxembourg (Luxembourg for fuck sake) can make laws that effect us all in our daily lives.

And who wants to take more powers over our lives on an inexorable day-by-day basis. Without our democratic consent.

Here's the 'thing'. I always have some kind of 'thing' in my blogs. It tends to ensure that I don't write utter shit with no point or just state the fucking obvious all the time.

We are the 5th biggest economy on the planet. We are the second biggest net contributor to the EU. We are paying for this shit. And because, in spite of all this EU bollocks, we are making a success of our economy, we have to pay more in and we have become a magnet for economic migrants whose own governments are fucking up their own economies so they have nowhere else to go. We are also the Eurozone's biggest customer - there is a trade deficit (in favour of the EU) of £45 billion a year.

So we're important to the EU. That's like saying the heart pumping blood and oxygen to the brain is important to the person. Without it the person dies. And that is where we are. Without its second biggest contributor and single biggest customer the Eurozone dies. It doesn't 'soldier on' it dies, and quickly. And yet the Eurocrats sneer at us from their ivory towers?

So what if we were to leave? The Eurozone cannot afford not to trade with us. We're its biggest customer. They simply cannot afford to impose trade sanctions against us because we'd reciprocate and they'd be (technical term) fucked. So there would be no loss of UK jobs if we left the EU. None - except perhaps a few EU specific non-jobs. A handful of over-paid Eurocrats - forgive my indifference.

If we were to leave, the EU would be entirely fucked. Look at the crisis that the possibility of net recipient Greece's potential departure has caused in recent weeks. If we were to go the EU would be toast and very quickly.

Imagine if we were serious and threatened to leave. And the Eurocrats who have sold out their own countries, for years, in order to keep their ridiculously over-paid jobs were faced with the consequences.

I think they might stop sneering at us don't you? I think they might say: 'Actually Dave, if you really want to control your own borders we might be able to come up with some ideas. If you want to be able to do trade deals with the rest of the world we could look at that, if you want to deport people without having to go through the endless processes of the ECHR we might be sympathetic, if you want to make your own laws, have your own currency, have your own army, be like a proper country, we could do something.

Dave has all of this in his hands. He holds all of the aces in the pack. And if he did have the bollocks to do this - he wouldn't have to do anything just be credible in his threat - he could not only secure the reforms that he says the UK needs, he could also win the election at a canter. And most young people in Southern Europe would celebrate with us, because they would have a shot at a successful, prosperous future.

The question is, why won't he?

Thanks for reading.