http://environmentalrepublican.blogspot.com/2005/06/quiz-to-determine-if-karl-rove-meant.html

Sorry, too black and white.

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1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

From Europe to America: the populist moment has arrived. On both sides of the Atlantic, the political class has become convinced that the people do not know what is best for them.

by Frank Furedi

At first sight, opponents of the EU Constitution appear to have very little in common. In France, campaigners for 'Non' often sought to defend their system of welfare arrangements against an institution that they believe has come under Anglo-Saxon neo-liberal domination. British eurosceptics oppose the bureaucratic and regulatory ambitions of Brussels. In Holland, some 'Nee' campaigners feared the loss of their national identity and the entry of Turkey into the EU. Others used the referendum to simply have a pop at their political representatives.

The incoherence of the populist reaction against the EU has been seized upon by EU technocrats to call into question the validity of the referendums that rejected Brussels. From the perspective of the Brussels technocrat, the overwhelming rejection of the EU Constitution by the French and Dutch electorates is merely the confusing signal transmitted by a politically illiterate electorate. Along with sections of the media, pro-EU campaigners often represent this rebuff of the EU as both irrational and incoherent.

The movement against the EU has brought together old political foes from the left and right, far-left opponents of a 'capitalist' Europe and far-right nationalists who are suspicious of anything that is remotely foreign. Since the marriage of convenience between such disparate forces cannot last, some supporters of the EU feel entitled to minimise the significance of the rejection of the EU Constitution.

However, to interpret the outcome of the French and Dutch referendums as having little to do with popular attitudes towards the EU is an exercise in self-delusion. How human beings vote is never a simple, straightforward matter. People do not simply respond to a script handed down from above and vote in accordance with the instructions set out by the political classes; their voting behaviour is influenced by a variety motives and emotions. Sometimes people cast a ballot to vote positively for something they desire, and sometimes their vote represents a negative act of thwarting their political masters.

Teaching 'them' a lesson has an honourable tradition for a democratic electorate, as even the likes of Winston Churchill discovered. Voting is not simply about saying yes or no; it is also about making a statement. It can represent a call to arms, or it can be a cry for help. All these complex and contradictory influences should not detract from the fact that when people voted 'No' to the EU Constitution they actually meant 'No', and were expressing their opposition to the treaty.

Supporters of the EU treaty should not draw comfort from the fact that their opponents are driven by a variety of different and contradictory motives. The fact that French communists and the French far right have very different attitudes on many issues does not necessarily diminish the significance of the populist reaction against the EU. It may actually mean that as we move into the twenty-first century, the traditional division between left and right has lost some of its significance.

It is worth noting that while campaigners against the EU Constitution promoted diverse issues, they all expressed a sense of estrangement from their political institutions. Today, this response is often motivated by a sense of disengagement and a mood of anti-politics. It also frequently expresses a revolt against the values upheld by the political class and its institutions. The lower classes embrace values that are essentially focused on their nation and community, while the elites are oriented towards a cosmopolitan and globalist perspective. In France, those who voted 'No' came predominantly from the lower classes, and the most enthusiastic supporters of the 'Yes' campaign were members of the French cultural, economic and political elites.

The referendum was as much a clash of values - what in the USA is called a Culture War - as a conflict over what constitutes legitimate authority. People are bemused by the managerial and instrumental language of EU technocrats. And importantly, they believe that the EU is not of their making. By their very existence, movements such as the Dutch 'Nee' campaign draw attention to the lack of legitimacy of the focus of their opposition. It is not surprising that the emotional and political distance that separates the public from their representatives has acquired a particularly intense character around the EU.

Those who are genuinely interested in European unity need to engage with the sense of disenchantment expressed by the French and Dutch electorates. Ensuring that people feel at home in Europe is far more important than cajoling people to accept another top-down diktat from Brussels. And this means, first of all, rejecting the anti-democratic assumptions and prejudices behind the political elite's reaction to the 'No' vote.

Demonising the people
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the populist rejection of the EU treaty, the manner in which the 'No' campaign is disparaged by professional politicians betrays a powerful anti-democratic temper. It appears that professional politicians attempt to account for their isolation from the electorate by pointing their finger at the incompetence of the public. On both sides of the Atlantic, the political class has drawn the conclusion that the problem with the people is that they do not know what's in their best interest. This sentiment is particularly widespread among liberal and left-wing activists and thinkers.

'People getting their fundamental interests wrong is what American political life is all about', notes Thomas Frank in his US bestseller What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America. Otherwise, Frank argues, how could they possibly vote for the Republicans? The belief that people are too stupid to understand the complexities of public life was also widely expressed during the heated exchanges that surrounded the recent referendums on the EU in France and Germany. Margot Wallstrom, vice president of the EU, commented on her blog that the Constitution is a 'complex issue to vote on', which can lead many citizens to 'use a referendum to answer a question that was not put to them'.

According to this view, since the people cannot be trusted to understand the finer points of legal documents, important decisions need to be left to the professional politician. Andrew Duff, Liberal Democrat Member of the European Parliament (MEP), agrees that consulting the electorate is a distraction from getting on with the job. After the referendums in France and Holland, he stated that 'the experience begs the question of whether it was ever appropriate to submit the EU Constitution to a lottery of uncoordinated national plebiscites'.

The people are not only regarded as politically illiterate. They are also depicted as simpletons who are likely to be swayed by demagogues. In the context of the Brussels bubble, a demagogue is anyone who is critical of the EU project. As far as European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso was concerned, his eurosceptic opponents have crossed the 'border from democracy to demagoguery'. He claimed that a 'populist trend' is seeking to 'undermine the Europe we are trying to build' by 'simplifying important and complex subjects'.

In the USA, this sentiment has been systematically articulated by Democratic Party activists, who cannot understand why many blue-collar workers vote for Republicans. According to George Lakoff, one of the most influential thinkers in the liberal wing of the Democrats, 'people do not necessarily vote in their self interest'.

The belief that the public is too simplistic or too gullible has led some Democratic Party activists to blame the defeat of their presidential candidate in two successive elections on the stupidity of the people. One liberal activist, Michael Gronewalter, states that 'civility and intelligent dialogue are useful tools among intelligent people' but are inappropriate for engaging with the public. He argues:

'I really think the problem is that we liberals are in general far more intelligent, well-reasoned and educated and will go to astonishingly great lengths to convince people of the integrity and validity of our fair and well thought-out arguments. The audience, in case anyone has been paying attention, isn't always getting it! I suspect the problem is not the speaker - it is most of the audience.'


(Remainder of article at http://www.spiked-online.com/Articles/0000000CABCA.htm

This is just precious!

glenmore
1991 300CE
1990 LS400
2000 C280

Man this guy sounds like an MB shop member, can you guess his screen name?