Nee and Non
Please note that though I delight in calling Europe a "rotting corpse of a continent," it would be overly simpllstic as well and incorrect to say I am opposed to the European Union. Three times it the twentieth century (the Great War, the Second World War, and the Cold War), American blood and treasure was necessary to halt European fratricide. We are only sixty years removed from the Second World War and I am not convinced that ancient enemies Germany and France will never again make war one upon the other; if the EU can forever end warfare in the heart of Europe, I am all for it. What worries me is the subtle fashion in which Brussels is acquiring power at the expense of the governments in Berlin, Paris, Oslo, and Prague.

Thus far, twelve of the twenty-five countries in the Union have made a decision about the EU Basic Law, the so-called European Union constitution. Ten countries have approved the constitution; two have rejected it, France and The Netherlands. France and The Netherlands were also the only countires to actually put the issue before the people. The ten ratifying countries did so by parliamentary fiat.

Government by referendum is no government at all (see: California, where the governor and legislature are now largely symbolic), but when deciding an issue as fundamental as the signing away of one's national sovereignty I do not think it inappropriate the seek the consent of the governed. Yes, the hallowed United States Constitution was not ratified by referendum and yet I consider it's ratification to have been above board and A-OK. But bear in mind that the Constitution was adopted nearly two hundred twenty years ago, when a national referendum was virtually impossible (thus the Electoral College); were we to consider such a drastic and irrevocable action today, you can bet your sweet Aunt Petunia we'd put it up to a national vote.

Plus, we had the famed Federalist Papers and a lively national debate. Only now, with the "nee" and "non" votes by the Dutch and the French is an equivalent discourse beginning in Europe. I fully support the economic liberalization and military unification provisions of the now-sinking EU constitution, but before the European Parliament truly succeeds Britain's Parliament, France's National Assembly, and Germany's Bundestag, I would like to see the Europeans have a serious and conprehensive conversation about whether that want the EU to remain a confederation of nations or become a federation of provinces.

I Don't Trust Clark Kent
Which received more coverage in the American media over the past week: the rejection of the EU constitution by the voters of France and The Netherlands or the revelation of former FBI executive Mark Felt as Woodward and Bernstein's famed anonymous source "Deep Throat"? As children, we are always told that two wrongs do not make a right, but in the case of the Watergate scandal that seems to be the case. The amateruisgh break-in at the Watergate Hotel was wrong; the Nixon Administration's attempted cover-up was even more wrong. But at the time Felt acted as Deep Throat, he was an FBI agent; it was improper and illegal for him to leak the details of an ongoing FBI investigation to the interpid young reporters from the Washington Post. Yet how many calls have their been for charges to be pressed against Felt? Sure, he broke the law, most would say, but he did so for the greater good, to uncover the true extent of Watergate. Thus, if it helps topple a reviled presidential administration, apparently two wrongs do indeed make a right, at least in the estimation of the HOLY GUARDIANS OF TRUTH, also known as the mainstream media (I'll shoot myself in the head before the use the abbreviation MSM). Just this once, I miss Attorney General Ashcroft; he would have already thrown the book at Felt, ninety years old or not.

Convenient, isn't it, that just weeks after Newsweek is roundly and rightly pilloried for repeating the lies of an anonymous source as if they were verified truths, the identity of the most celebrated anonymous source in modern journalism is revealed, once agains casting the use of anonymous sources in a positive light? I'm not saying it isn't a coincidence, but I do find it curious. In the words of plain, simple Garak, "Oh, I believe in coincidence. I just don't trust coincidence."