Changes to the European Union you'd like.

[Snake-Pit]

We, the people, are bound by legislation concocted in another country, unless you're from Belgium!

I propose then, that we take Brussels out of Belgium, but have it remain in the EU.

Could it work?

Any changes you want for this EU thing to work?

[grouse]

I'd like the EU to fuck off, how about that? it's original purpose was way different

[sturginho]

I'd like for it to be more democratic but idiots would vote for ukip anyway

[Snake-Pit]

I'd like for it to be more democratic but idiots would vote for ukip anyway

, to what you said about UKIP voters.

[Facekicker]

It should go back to being the EEC - an economic trading community.

I don't want any laws affecting my country to be decided by unelected wonks in Brussels like that lunatic Herman Van Rompuy and that buffoon Jose Manuel Barroso

I don't want the euro, I don't want their flag and I don't want their central bank.

This is glorious -

"You have the charisma of a damp rag, and the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk. And the question that I want to ask, […] that we're all going to ask, is "Who are you?". I'd never heard of you. Nobody in Europe had ever heard of you. I would like to ask you, President, who voted for you, and what mechanism … oh, I know democracy isn't popular with you lot, and what mechanism the people of Europe have to remove you? Is this European democracy? Well, I sense, I sense though that you are competent and capable and dangerous, and I have no doubt in your intention, to be the quiet assassin of European democracy, and of the European nation states. You appear to have a loathing for the very concept of the existence of nation states - perhaps that's because you come from Belgium, which is pretty much a non-country. But since you took over, we've seen Greece reduced to nothing more than a protectorate. Sir, you have no legitimacy in this job at all, and I can say with confidence that I speak on behalf of the majority of British people in saying: We don't know you, we don't want you, and the sooner you're put out to grass, the better."

I'll buy the man a pint for that alone if I ever run into him

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqovTGjYjM4

Edited May 7, 2015 by Facekicker

[GUNNER PT]

Federalism or dissolution.

Edited May 8, 2015 by GUNNER PT

[magisme]

Dissolution.

[DieselDaisy]

The appropriation of Beethoven's 9th for a national anthem is particularly hard to stomach.

[classicrawker]

Used to be a lot cheaper to vacation in some of the EU countries when they had their own currency before they all adopted the Euro so from that stand point I wish it went back to the old days.

[Facekicker]

The unelected wonks in Brussels have invested so much capital in their pursuit of a Federal Europe that they will pursue their goal to the bitter end even if means destroying Europe in the process.

Lunatics.

[Gracii Guns]

I don't mind the EU, not one bit.

[DieselDaisy]

I actually like to handle different currencies. I liked the francs with the holes in and pesetas and lira. I do not see anything wrong with going from one country to another and having to deal with a different currency. It made it part of the exotic experience.

[Facekicker]

Best thing Britain ever did was keeping sterling. The Euro is a fucking disaster.

[Dazey]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

[DieselDaisy]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

Told you, all the British care about is money. Money is Britain's new religion. That is why a Tory victory was dead cert.

[Dazey]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

Told you, all the British care about is money. Money is Britain's new religion. That is why a Tory victory was dead cert.

It's your post that meant I didn't buy my Euros last week so cheers for that.

[Snake-Pit]

The ECC was about trade, the EU is about trade!

By Snake-Pit.

It was a common market with irregularities so they standardised, everything. From units of measurement for produce sold to regulations on health and safety.

On the most part, they even have a standardised currency.

Don't think there's an EU minimum wage.

Someone in Portugal can earn no less than €3.37 per hour, someone in Luxembourg can earn no less than €11.10 per hour.

They're this big group of traders who now suffer from delusions of grandeur in this day and age toting their own friggin anthem as well!

Freedom of movement, freedom of workers more like. It's JUST trade.

One trading body and countries invested into their Mickey Mouse money that you can only spend at their theme park 'The Eurozone'.They are a body designed to make trade easier, and that's it. The Eurozone doesn't want to pay for anything with these Euros, they just want to make it easier to count at the end of the day with these Euros; The EU can't work as it is, Eurozone-wide minimum wage, or stop messing with politics and just stick to what you know, commerce.

Exiting the EU doesn't pose any danger to our defense, but threatens the rate at which we trade with it's members should we exit, and that is enough to keep paying for it, for fear of trade, the traders have got us by the balls/are up our arse.

Edited May 9, 2015 by Snake-Pit

[Len Cnut]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

Told you, all the British care about is money. Money is Britain's new religion. That is why a Tory victory was dead cert.

I love how you used McLeod as a sort of archetype of the unwashed there

[DieselDaisy]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

Told you, all the British care about is money. Money is Britain's new religion. That is why a Tory victory was dead cert.

I love how you used McLeod as a sort of archetype of the unwashed there

His attitude is fairly archetypical. Thing is, the British are not emotional ideologues like the French; the French still think of themselves as a 'grand nation' whose aim is to export Frenchness (i.e. republican values, liberte, egalite etc). Even the Americans possess an ideology of sorts, the tea party movement, guns, the christian right etc. All the British care about is getting (personally) richer and protecting those assets they already possess. Other stuff such as nationalism and the safeguarding of Westminster democracy, Common Law, monarchy etc, takes a back seat to money. Even things which seem at face value, non economic, such as the NHS all come down to money if you look at health care as an economic asset. Look at the Scottish referendum. How could something so, potentially emotive, consist entirely of tedious arguments about money and economic assets (e.g. North Sea Oil). Never has an independence movement been so, uninspiring and dull.

[Len Cnut]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

Told you, all the British care about is money. Money is Britain's new religion. That is why a Tory victory was dead cert.

I love how you used McLeod as a sort of archetype of the unwashed there

His attitude is fairly archetypical. Thing is, the British are not emotional ideologues like the French; the French still think of themselves as a 'grand nation' whose aim is to export Frenchness (i.e. republican values, liberte, egalite etc). Even the Americans possess an ideology of sorts, the tea party movement, guns, the christian right etc. All the British care about is getting (personally) richer and protecting those assets they already possess. Other stuff such as nationalism and the safeguarding of Westminster democracy, Common Law, monarchy etc, takes a back seat to money. Even things which seem at face value, non economic, such as the NHS all come down to money if you look at health care as an economic asset. Look at the Scottish referendum. How could something so, potentially emotive, consist entirely of tedious arguments about money and economic assets (e.g. North Sea Oil). Never has an independence movement been so, uninspiring and dull.

Do you think its because of just plain capitalism or theres some sort of deeper entrenched sense that things like that shouldnt be proliferated i.e. a national character, a sort of political correctness if you like.

[DieselDaisy]

The Euro's fucking great as far as I'm concerned. The Tory victory's just sent the exchange rate through the roof vs the pound so bollocks to the lefties cuz I'm getting a great deal on my holiday money for Paris in a couple of weeks.

Told you, all the British care about is money. Money is Britain's new religion. That is why a Tory victory was dead cert.

I love how you used McLeod as a sort of archetype of the unwashed there

His attitude is fairly archetypical. Thing is, the British are not emotional ideologues like the French; the French still think of themselves as a 'grand nation' whose aim is to export Frenchness (i.e. republican values, liberte, egalite etc). Even the Americans possess an ideology of sorts, the tea party movement, guns, the christian right etc. All the British care about is getting (personally) richer and protecting those assets they already possess. Other stuff such as nationalism and the safeguarding of Westminster democracy, Common Law, monarchy etc, takes a back seat to money. Even things which seem at face value, non economic, such as the NHS all come down to money if you look at health care as an economic asset. Look at the Scottish referendum. How could something so, potentially emotive, consist entirely of tedious arguments about money and economic assets (e.g. North Sea Oil). Never has an independence movement been so, uninspiring and dull.

Do you think its because of just plain capitalism or theres some sort of deeper entrenched sense that things like that shouldnt be proliferated i.e. a national character, a sort of political correctness if you like.

I see a more long term factor and a short term. Longer term, Britain invented modern day capitalism. Britain became the world's first modern consumer society, importing sugar, tea, coffee and calicoes from the Empire. At a governmental level, economic inventions such as a governmental sinking fund and public borrowing and debt, meant Britain could fund the wars she won during the 18th and 19th centuries - either directly, by funding the Royal Navy, or indirectly, by funding coalitions. You could argue that Britain beat Napoleon merely because she could marshal superior economic resources than France - unromantic, I know but there is an element of truth there (the Rothschild's are worth looking up here). The Industrial Revolution - Britain was the first industrial country - also eroded old agricultural tradition and hastened, monetization; the older customs of barter and exchange disappeared faster than elsewhere, e.g. rural France.

Shorter term, I think the Blair years were less, ''education education education'', more, ''spend spend spend''. It is curious because the working classes now demand Sky television and two weeks in Magaluf - it is hardly Cathy Come Home! Obviously with the 2008 recession, economic resources have been cut off and there is a desperate scramble for the remainder. Some of this is similar to the Americans and elsewhere. The world is definitely more, materialistic.