There is only question not being asked of the people of Europe…except stupid Ireland, who required two goes to get it right….lesson – never let the Catholic Church write your constitution.

The question is, Do you want to create a new country made up of the existing members of the EU?

Not difficult is it. After all this is the slowest coup d’etat in history.

Now I know you don’t like what-if’s but do you really think that all things being equal had the first vote been yes that the ill-advised electorate and change in the economic situation would have led to a second vote?

Violent ubernationists have generally been well represented.

Also there’s the small matter of the lies: such as IBEC promising jobs which they are in no position to deliver. Better informed? Give me a break.

52. That would be a matter for the Irish government to decide.

Gimpy,

The argument for the rerun of the referendum was that the public were ill advised first time round and the economic climate had changed, whether or not you agree with this is irrelevant.

If the economic climate changes again, would it be OK to hold another referendum?

The evidence for them being ill-advised was that the lack of information caused them to vote no, on the rerun, with more information available they voted yes. There is no campaign for another rerun from either side, unlike the first time round. This is why the Irish will proceed. The people have spoken, their representatives have accepted their decision. End of the matter.

And you wonder why people criticise the EU for their undemocratic tendencies? You’re not citing evidence at all – merely repeating that when the Irish voted no they were ill-informed, and when they voted yes they had been better informed. That’s not evidence, that’s a pathological inability to accept the will of the people, unless it accords with what you want.

The Irish people have indeed spoken, and their representatives refused to accept their decision. So they spoke again, and this time got the right answer.

The argument for the rerun of the referendum was that the public were ill advised first time round and the economic climate had changed, whether or not you agree with this is irrelevant. It is hardly undemocratic to deny a second vote when it was widely perceived there were problems with the first. There is ample precedent for the rerunning of elections and referendums.

Yes, but the evidence for them having been ill-advised was that they voted no. And it is notable how the re-running of elections and referendums only seems to work one way. If it’s a yes, we will say ‘on we go’; if it’s a no we will say ‘we proceed’.

You cannot argue ‘what might have beens’ when talking about the here and now. None of us have the capacity to predict then test alternate realities.

2. Leaving aside the politics of whether or not the Treaty is a good thing or a bad thing, the fact that yet again, the government held a second referendum because it didn’t like the answer of the first one is scandalous.

The argument for the rerun of the referendum was that the public were ill advised first time round and the economic climate had changed, whether or not you agree with this is irrelevant. It is hardly undemocratic to deny a second vote when it was widely perceived there were problems with the first. There is ample precedent for the rerunning of elections and referendums.

Tim’s right that it’s unreadable, and that the draft consitution is a pretty good alternative (and I note from his blog that he’s been there and done that, and may have the grey hair to show for it)

Another handy resource, for people trying to get to grips with the key bits, is this somewhat dry, occasionally slightly elliptic, but still decent analysis of the most crucial bits, across several posts around October 2008, by Ralf Grahn – see http://grahnlaw.blogspot.com/

There’s an easier way to work out what’s in it though. Read the draft Constitution. There’s no real significant difference between the two documents other than presentational style.

Well, there might be a touch more to it than that. Is Taiwan a state? There are shades of grey in international relations

True. But the general principle stands – you can’t just get up one morning, decide that you’re an independent state, and expect anybody to take you seriously. Statehood depends on mutual recognition, therefore no state can ever really be completely independent, and all this moaning about how ratification of this or that treaty means “the end of Britain as an independent European state” is (generally) overblown. I’m quite sure that there’s no shortage of better grounds to object to the Treaty of Lisbon, if anybody could (a) be arsed to read the damn thing, and (b) actually make some sense of it.

Sorry, it’s an issue that’s been pissing me off recently, mostly in relation to people claiming that Scottish political “independence” is completely meaningless as long as we’re “in Europe”. But that’s another argument for another day…

Being a state is entirely dependant on the recognition of others, as in the Treaty of Westphalia.

Well, there might be a touch more to it than that. Is Taiwan a state? There are shades of grey in international relations.

Or that should not be the subject of legislation at all.

Oh – I thought it merely required the nation could be violent enough to keep out those it didn’t want.

That’s autonomy, not state sovereignty, and it can operate at any level it can get away with – see, for example, the Lordship of the Isles up to 15th century, or perhaps the Zapatista Autonomous Municipalities today. Being a state is entirely dependant on the recognition of others, as in the Treaty of Westphalia.

Many people agree with an European Economic Community but the EU is becoming like the The Roman or Holy Roman/ Charlemagne’s Empire and the age of empires is over. Structures which are too rigid tend to be brittle are likely to shatter if they suffer a shock. The looser arrangement of the EEC probably means it would survive longer than the rigid EU which is in danger of following the mistakes of many large institutions, that of over reach. The EU is legislating on far too many issues , which are best left to individual countries or their regions.

I cannot see how as the EU becomes larger,centralisation of decision making and harmonisation of rules can only reduce the freedom of the individual. The EU will also favour large organisations which can afford to pay lobbyists to influence decisions over the individual and small local organisations. If we look at the USA, large organisations and their lobbyists have greatly reduced the power and freedom of the individual. Increasing the number and complexity of rules benefits politicians, civil servants and lawyers. If only large organisations can afford the lawyers to navigate a complex and expnsive legal system, then it will favour the rich over 95% o the population. As they say in the USA, it has the best legal system money can buy.

And with the arguments with Vlad, that could be of some significant importance.

It’s not at all good, really, that matters of employment and matters of foreign policy are all thrown together in one treaty that gets only one referendum… that’ll prevent people voting their conscience on some issues, sadly, for the sake of convenience.