EU TOILET CISTERN AND SWINGS
MIROSŁAW PIOTROWSKI
‘We managed to regain people’s trust. People do not want us to define toilet cistern or the height of swings’ – these are the words of the chief of the European Commission Jean Claude Juncker said during a plenary session of the European Parliament in Brussels. Juncker defined withdrawing these and other regulations from the EU circulation as a success of the European Commission. In fact this is the only achievement about which he could boast. He did it during presentation of the White Book concerning the future of Europe. In the book he presents five scenarios. Even the biggest euro-enthusiasts, like the chief of the liberals Guy Verhofsatadt said that the first three ones are impossible and, apart from the fact, it is better to concentrate on the fourth and the fifth ones. This document did not raise any enthusiasm among MEPs, and the ideas presented by Juncker were defined, among the others, as ‘patching holes’. It was also noted that he did not make any conclusions from Brexit.
However, I think what was the most important, was the beginning of the speech by Junkcer which had an influence on the whole because, as Oscar Wilde was to say, ‘nobody gets the second chance to make the first impression’. It was so in the case of Juncker. For he began with reminding the founders but he mentioned only one of them (!) – Altiero Spinelli and Ernesto Rossi. He forgot about Robert Schuman, Alcide de Gasperi (at present in the Catholic Church there are their beatification processes) and KOnrad Adenauer, as well as other Christian democrats. He only deliberately reminded a communist Spinelli, an author of the Manifest from Ventotene and a co-author of this manifest, Rossi. It was made during the Second World War, and in the next decades it was launched by communist parties, the leftist and liberal ones on the European forum. In fact, Altiero Spinelli was elected an MP for the European Parliament in 1979 from the list of the communist party.
Apart from the meander of CV of Spinelli, it is worth, however, looking at the mentioned manifest. In the second chapter authors demand, among the others, ‘abolishing the division of Europe into national, sovereign countries’ – that is, their liquidation. And this is the message which Juncker presents towards Brexit and rising aversion of citizens to the European Union. Nothing comes to the mind than the words said by Stefan Kisielewski, who stated that socialism is fighting with problems unknown in any other political system heroically. If it is so, one can really be happy together with Juncker about successes of withdrawing one’s regulations concerning toilet cistern or regulations of the height of swings.
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„Niedziela” 11/2017