A LITTLE OFF TOPIC WITH THE E.U.

Down to earth now from the surrealistic event that many holidays are especially those with funny money and unbearably hot temperatures.  Flying over the same area on the very morning when  another plane was blown out of the sky was not at all comfortable.  This blog by its very purpose has touched on political points only when matters of the application of justice and associated considerations have been applicable. This morning after the holiday nights before, I had intended focussing on the school attendance appeal at the high court; a topic on which I assume every J.P. in the country has had experience.  But that was until I read of the E.U. by way of the President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker`s decision to invoke the rule of law mechanism to override the decision of a nation`s parliament.  There will be those who comment that extreme right wing parliamentary decisions have no place in any E.U. country.  But wasn`t the whole European concept to ensure that cataclysmic right wing nationalism of the 1930s could never be repeated?  

Nationalism is part of the bedrock of all nation states.  It could be argued that attempts to suppress such ideologies have been shown to be futile when the authoritarianism that imposed the suppression was weakened. The collapse of the USSR and the fragmentation of   the former Jugoslavia   are just two examples. The resulting conflicts were disastrous.  

Like the steam from a boiling kettle finding an outlet in the spout or the power derived from steam engines large and small being usefully directed the phrase "let off steam" has become a pithy way of describing  excess to be dissipated  as eg the parliamentary assemblies in Scotland and Wales have, so far, allowed their civil societies to function with those for or against full independence being able to join together co-operatively.  

It`s all very well for Mr Junckers to spit fire and brimstone at Poland and Austria but if Marine Le Pen becomes the next French president I doubt she would bend to his tirades. Nationalism is part of the living breathing nation state.  It functions beneath the surface everywhere and is kept under control by democratically elected governments. By attempting to throttle it the E.U. has presided over its biggest increase in popularity  all over Europe since 1945.  For that single reason I will be voting OUT on June 23rd.