EU Constitutional Disharmony: I just finished reading your Connie links. Was it Fukuyama that said modern liberal democracies do not go to war against one another? Hold that thought. I may be in the minority, but I think full constitutional union, particularly if taxation and foreign policy worm their way in, will be an unmitigated disaster. Countries like Poland and the Czech Republic, who are now stable enough to really rev up the capitalism a bit, will find such behavior frowned upon -- grasping and materialistic, in a very [sneer]American[/sneer] way. Germany, under the weight of punitive labor laws and byzantine regulation, will find the (relatively) free-market approach of the post-Thatcher bulldog an unfair hindrance to economic equality. (See, on this matter, the complaints of the South against the North in the U.S., circa 1859. Suddenly the idea of "union" look a whole lot less attractive to the South. Gunplay followed.)

I don't know what to make of it all. I'm glad it's them and not us in this mess. But it affects us anyway. Just looking at some of the draft "rights" that they enumerate, it seems a ridiculous enterprise, a lemming-like March of the Bureaucrats to the Sea. Imagine if every seat in our congress were suddenly filled by trial lawyers, Ralph Nader, rain-forest activists, "womyn's studies" professors, and nut-fudges who think that the UN is a trustworthy body of well-meaning Gandhis and Schweitzers. Imagine, then, that these clowns drew up a draft "Expanded Bill of Rights," including the right not to be called sh*theads; the right to double park in front of the India Palace when your samosas are piping hot; the right to do tai chi in Riverside Park without people snickering; the right to tell fat people and smokers things that make them angry and make you feel superior.

I assure you, gunplay would follow.