I have just left a new comment to Margot Wallström’s blog explaining a proposal about how to upgrade the just launched Debating Europe forums (see Wallström’s post).

A proposal for developing a “forum++”

The problem

Web forums are very good to allow people discussing topics, and this means better information, more idea exchange and production, sometimes the development of a shared judgement about this or that policy. But will Commissioners be able to read 13,000 posts? Of course not… so European citizens will discuss things with other fellow European citizens, and this is anyway good, but they will not be heard by those people which seat where decisions are taken, and this is bad because democratic politics are made not only of discussions but also of decisions.

So what to do?

We need to add something to the conventional forum, I mean to add a kind of bottom-up tool which allows (i) people to propose policies to politicians and (ii) politicians to become aware of those proposals.

The following can be a draft description of the path of an idea inside this “forum++”.

Step 1.

An European citizen believes to have a good idea for an European policy;

Step 2.

She posts it publicly via some kind of web-form and in a particular format (i.e. not too long proposals and so on);

Step 3.

Some kind of editorial staff filters the proposals eliminating redundant ones and summarizing each proposal as much as they can (note that the not-filtered material must be anyway publicly accessible in order to allow citizens to check how the editorial staff is working, and note that this action of filtering has not to be confused with the common activity of moderation as it works for ordinary forums or blogs where they filter spam or offending material);

Step 4.

The edited material will be published on the net too.

Step 5.

People will be allowed to vote via internet about the various (edited) proposals.

Step 6.

Every month the ten most voted proposals will be checked by the Commission, this means that the Commission will be compelled to say if they intend or not to implement that proposals, why and in case how and when.

Today Margot Wallström wrote a post about Tibet, China and the Games. This is my reply (added some formal corrections) which I posted to her blog.

It’s time to start asking China to become a really democratic country, this is the first point: freedom of thought (and so religion), freedom of speech and press, freedom of association and peaceful manifestation, freedom of choosing the government__just for citing the basics.

This is what the so called Western Countries must start asking to China. Chinese government said that you cannot make economic and democratic reforms at the same time, I do not believe to much in this principle but even if we admit it to be true, anyway there are already 300′000′000 Chinese as much rich as west Europeans or Americans are and for these people its time to have the freedom we already enjoy. If Chinese government fears to fall into chaos as happened to Russia during the 90s they can just start with limited democratic areas as they started with limited free trade areas in the 80s on the base of the intuition of Deng Xiao Ping.

About Tibet (and Xinjian and Inner Mongolia and Taiwan), the actual solution is an actual federation as USA are (and as EU is going to be) and this will be a natural consequence of a really democratic reform.

So this is what to ask to China and this is what a real democratic government (at any level: region, State or Union, both European or American) must ask, without fear.

About Olympic Games, if Western governments are trapped into fear, I am not: I will not follow this Games on TV or every other mass media, it’s my freedom and freedom has no price.

Oggi avrei voluto non parlare di politica, tant’è…

Se c’è una cosa che avverso (oltre al culto della personalità) è la cultura del debito (dedicherò anche a questo tema una futura corrispondenza).

Oggi però leggo su La Repubblica un articolo di Eugenio Scalfari il quale verso la fine, in accordo con l’attuale programma del Partito Democratico, promuove l’emissione di obbligazioni da parte dell’Unione Europea, dette eurobonds (lui ovviamente parla di eurobond al singolare per la nota regola della lingua italiana, che io non rispetto e un giorno vi spiegherà perché, in virtù della quale le parole straniere si importano come indeclinabili).

Ma appunto che cos’è un bond, cioè un’obbligazione?

Da Wikipedia:

L’obbligazione (spesso chiamata con il termine inglese bond) è un titolo di credito emesso da società o enti pubblici che attribuisce al possessore il diritto al rimborso del capitale più un interesse.

L’obbligazione è quindi un debito. E perché si vuole che l’Unione Europea possa fare debiti? Si dice per finanziare investimenti in opere pubbliche. In questo senso parrebbe una forma di debito accettabile, è un investimento! Si ma detto brutalmente: un investimento è quel qualcosa che ritorna all’investitore più soldi di quanti ne abbia spesi. In questo caso specifico le opere pubbliche sarebbero un investimento se portassero ad un aumento delle entrate dell’Unione Europea.

E qui sta il nocciolo del problema. L’Unione Europea non può imporre tasse ai propri cittadini, essa infatti sopravvive in parte grazie ai dazi sulle dogane poste ai confini esterni ma soprattutto grazie ai finanziamenti che riceve dagli Stati Membri. Ora, ammettiamo anche che le opere pubbliche vengano realizzate davvero (cioè che i soldi non vadano a ingrassare criminali e affaristi come invece spesso accade con i fondi strutturali per esempio), e ammettiamo anche che le opere siano state selezionate con tale cura e competenza economica da generare davvero un ritorno maggiore della spesa iniziale (cui vanno aggiunte le spesso dimenticate spese di manutenzione), bene ammettiamo tutte queste belle cose da migliore dei mondi possibili, a chi andranno i soldi in più? Ai cittadini, sempre perché stiamo ipotizzando il migliore dei mondi possibili, che poi li ritorneranno parzialmente come tasse. Bene ma a chi li ritorneranno? All’Unione Europea? No! Li ritorneranno ai loro Stati. E gli Stati poi che faranno? Beh dovrebbero darli all’Unione Europea. Ma avranno interesse a farlo? Direi proprio di no e vediamo perché.

Abbiamo detto che in linea teorica questi denari presi a debito dovrebbero andare a sostenere degli investimenti. Ma perché dovrebbe essere proprio l’Unione Europea a prenderli a debito e non potrebbero essere direttamente gli Stati Membri? La ragione è che l’Unione Europea li investirebbe in opere di interesse continentale e non nazionale, opere che producono un aumento di ricchezza dell’insieme più che non delle sue parti. Bene, ma allora perché non farsi dare i soldi direttamente dagli Stati? beh, ma perché gli Stati essendo legati alle loro dinamiche politiche interne tendono a difendere il propri interessi particolari mentre l’Unione Europea può preoccuparsi di difendere l’interesse complessivo. Per poter fare ciò ha bisogno di sufficientemente autonoma economica da realizzare a pieno la propria politica. Dato però che la soluzione ottimale, cioè consentire all’Unione di imporre autonomamente tasse sotto il controllo del Parlamento Europeo a sua volta sotto il controllo dei cittadini europei non è praticabile, in quanto gli Stati Membri non vogliono mollare la presa, allora si passa agli eurobonds cioè si fanno debiti.

C’è un solo piccolo problema: per pagare quei debiti l’UE avrà bisogno delle plusvalenze generate dai suoi investimenti, ammesso che tali plusvalenze si generino davvero, e non potrà reperirle se non chiedendo a sua volta agli Stati Membri più denaro!!! E figuriamoci se chi governa uno Stato Membro può andare dai suoi cittadini che sono anche suoi elettori a dire che anche se loro sono più ricchi e quindi, pur mantenendo la pressione fiscale invariata, il loro Stato incamera più denaro, questo denaro non potrà essere reinvestito nel loro paese, ma dovrà andare a ripagare i debiti contratti dall’Unione Europea.

Non solo, ma se disgraziatamente quegli investimenti andassero male, un investimento è pur sempre una scommessa e anche manager onesti e capaci possono sbagliare in perfetta buona fede (figuriamoci se la buona fede non c’è…), non essendoci l’attesa plusvalenza per poter pagare i propri debiti l’Unione Europea dovrebbe chiedere agli Stati Membri di alzare le loro tasse interne!!!

E’ evidente quindi che il risultato dell’introduzione del debito pubblico europeo sotto forma di eurobonds al fine¹ di ridurre la dipendenza dell’Unione Europea dai suoi Membri, avrebbe come reale conseguenza quella di inasprire il risentimento dei cittadini verso l’Unione stessa rendendola contemporaneamente ancor più dipendente dai suoi Membri e dalle dinamiche politiche al loro interno. Un capolavoro non c’è che dire!

---

¹In realtà l’intera proposta diviene perfettamente commisurata al fine se si assume che esso non sia dare maggiore autonomia finanziaria all’Unione Europea, quanto piuttosto scaricare su di essa le spese per le infrastrutture incamerandone poi le plusvalenze attraverso la tassazione a livello statale e annullando in tal modo gli effetti del patto di stabilità. Patto che guarda caso è stato uno dei pochi freni efficaci alla politica clientelare in quanto impone al politico che usa il denaro pubblico di compensare i premi offerti alle proprie clientele con corrispondenti aumenti di tasse agli altri cittadini alienandosi quindi inevitabilmente una parte dell’elettorato che quando diviene maggioranza lo espunge dalla scena politica, a meno che non trovi appunto artifici sempre più “furbi” per non dover pagare il conto…

From the blog of the European Commissioner Margot Wallström (check here for the full post):

Yesterday I announced, alongside the Presidents of Deutsche Welle and Radio France Internationale, the launch of a European radio network which I hope will provide a substantial contribution towards creating a European public sphere. Most people still get their information via TV and radio, but in the absence of international TV and radio stations it is difficult to generate debate across national and linguistic borders.

That is why I believe networks are the way forward. This one, under the working title, European Radio Project, brings together 16 radio stations from 13 countries, broadcasting in 10 languages. They will produce and share material on EU current affairs, debate, analysis etc. Their brief includes making the views of European citizens known outside their own countries and show how particular issues are addressed in different Member States.

Europe needs an European public opinion and you cannot have that without allowing Europeans to access to an everyday based common bulk of information. I have been saying this for years.

However this is not so easy to achieve: the problem was, and still is, the language. For this reason I thought that it could have been easier to start from Europe-wide spread newspapers with the same news in all EU official languages every day. This would have brought to an increase in costs but it would have been balanced by an increase in market scale.

Newspapers seemed to me better then radio or TV to start with. This was because newspapers do not transmit live so there is no need for simultaneous translation bringing costs to a little decrease. I also emailed this idea to some Italian politicians (I found their addresses on the web) maybe three years ago, when I got used to blogs I wrote of that here and there (if I remember well also in a comment on Wallström’s blog), but I never saw an European newspaper…

Of course I am not so naive of thinking that a couple of emails or blog comments can really make such a kind of project start up, but I think anyway that they can make people a little more sensitive to the issue.

Now it seems that something is moving by itself and this means that the problem is real and that presently known possible solutions are not so many (this kind of situation brings many people to have more or less the same view about the same topic). They will start with radio, not newspapers, but that’s good anyway (maybe better). I am curious to see how they will actually implement the project, nevertheless just because of being the first actual starting in this field it will be good.

The Lisbon Treaty, also known as the Reform Treaty has been signed today…

… and the UK has marked its position toward European Union and the Treaty in a quite clear way.

Anyway the job has been done,
Cherry Bye Mr. Brown!

These last few days I have got a flu so I stayed at home. Thanks to this contingency I had enough time to realise a project I had been thinking about for the last few months, creating a table through which putting together the newest consolidated version of the Treaty on European Union, the Reform treaty and the probable output you will obtain if you merge them.

The idea of such a kind of file was the result of the difficulties I found in my tentative analyses of the text (see this category in the ‘readings’ section or the mirror one on the ‘myeurope’ section).

At last I managed it and you can see the file in html format here.

If you are interested, this is the main directory with the same file in different formats.

Lastly I want to report a curious fact. As the source version for the consolidated Treaty on European Union I used a document edited by the Commission in 2002. The document was particularly interesting because the articles amended by the Nice Treaty (2001) were all tagged. However when I was near the end of my editorial effort I discovered that that consolidated version wasn’t the last one because there was also a version edited in 2006 after the Treaty of Athens had been signed few years before. So I had to check all the work already done… Fortunately the most recent version was just the same of older one, except for three sub-paragraphs of three articles. Anyway I am happy that this accident happened, because now who will see my table will be able to understand easily what articles have been amended both by the Nice Treaty and the Athens Treaty.

I have just read the article Lisbon Council results: Two for the price of one? by Daniel Gros and Stefano Micossi.

The abstract of the article

he new ‘Lisbon Treaty’ agreed this weekend preserves most of the substance of the failed Constitution; it will serve the EU well. As usual, Europe has taken a step forward by creating a new disequilibrium; new Treaty revisions are likely to be proposed even before all the provisions of this present one have been implemented.

Four points about this paper which I found interesting:

• The High Representative will be a de facto Foreign Affairs Minister
• The two fundamental treaties to be amended by the Reform Treaty are the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty establishing the European Community, the latter will become the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union paving the way for a twofold structure of the founding treaties with one treaty with the character of a fundamental law and the second closer to mere implementing legislation
• The President of the Commission will be “[…] squeezed between his Vice President (who will also be foreign affairs minister and coordinator of the external policy) and the new President of the European Council […]”
• The European Union proceed by taking “a step forward by creating a new disequilibrium” which will need a new step forward to be solved

About the first two points I can say that I had already noticed them too, even if I went a little further asserting that the Treaty on European Union is already a de facto Constitution since 1992 (see here, here and here). Nevertheless I had not yet become aware of the other two points before I read this article.

Weapons

• 13 August 2004, Russia starts planning an increase in military expenditures [1]
• 17 November 2004, not only money but also new nuclear technologies are planned [2]
• 29 November 2004, from words to facts: firstly the core anti-ballistic defences is modernized [3]
• 06 December 2004, after defence comes offence: bombers are equipped with long-range cruise missiles [4]
• 31 January 2006, and a missile capable of penetrating any defence shield is claimed to have been developed [5]
• 5 December 2006, so, after one year of preparation the new upgrade is official: the Topol-M nuclear missiles are ready to penetrate multi-layer anti-missile defence systems [6]
• 29 May 2007, nevertheless, the improvement was not finished yet: new intercontinental ballistic missiles are tested [7]
• 9 August 2007, well, if you have an arsenal, why not using it? The Tupolevs are back: first they fly toward the US Pacific island of Guam [8]
and then, 6 September 2007, they start enjoying the North Atlantic current while being intercepted by Norwegian F16 and British F3 forcing them to go back [9]
• 11 August 2007, in the meantime a new round of promises starts [10]
• 12 September 2007, and since in Russia words are always kept: the biggest non-nuclear device in the world is tested [11]

Diplomacy

When you have a gun you can do basically four things: putting it down, threatening to use it, actually using it, selling it.

• Threatening to use the gun
• 4 June 2007, for example, why not targeting European cities as a response to the increasing tensions with the US because of their planned new anti-missile defence system in East Europe? [12]
• Using the gun
• 1 November 2006 - 27 July 2007, the Litvinenko affair [13]
• Selling the gun
• 6 September 2007, Russia repaid its debts so now can give loans to others, and they will use these loans for buying Russian weapons [14]
• Putting the gun down: Gas Diplomacy
• Ukraine
• 13 December 2005, Russian Gazprom threats Ukraine of cutting off gas supplies if they will not pay market rates for them [15] (let’s remember that one year before it happened what has been called the Orange Revolution led by Viktor Yushchenko)
• 1 January 2006, as I said before Russia always keeps its word: Gazprom cuts the supplies, some European countries are hit by this, Gazprom accuses Ukraine of stealing the gas paid by other European Countries [16]
• 4 January 2006, Ukraine and Gazprom reach a deal [17]
• 10 January 2006, the Ukrainian Parliament sacks the Government of Yuri Yekhanurov because of the deal, which they consider to much favourable to Gazprom, this will bring to new Parliamentary elections in few months [18]
(let’s remember that four months before The ‘Orange President’ Yushchenko had already sacked the ‘Orange Prime Minister’ Yulia Tymoshenko)
• 26 March 2006, Ukraine pro-Russian bloc wins the new Parliamentary elections, Viktor Yanukovych who lost the place of Ukraine President after the Orange Revolution is back as Prime Minister [19]
• 1 April 2007, Yushchenko tries to sack Yanukovych and his Government, Yanukovych does not move, both sides (Orange/pro-West and Blue/pro-Russia) organize street manifestations [20]
• 27 May 2007, a new election ballot is planned for September [21]
• 2 October 2007, both sides claim the victory of the new ballot [22]
• 3 October 2007, Gazprom again threatens of cutting Ukraine gas supplies [23]
• 8 October 2007, Ukraine and Gazprom reach a deal [24]
• 16 October 2007, the two leaders of the Orange side Viktor Yushchenko and Yulia Tymoshenko get an agreement for setting a Government coalition [25]
• Belarus
• 1 August 2007, Gazprom wants to cut gas supplies also to Belarus [26]
but they reach some kind of appeasement (
• 3 August 2007) [27]
• 11 October 2007, Belarus plans to build a nuclear plant in order not to rely to much on Russian gas [28]
• 14 October 2007 well, something is moving in Belarus, where a rare pro-EU manifestation is allowed for the first time in the history by the regime [29]
• France
• 17 September 2007, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner raises the spectrum of a war against Iran if they do not renounce to their nuclear program [30]
• 10 October 2007 -
• 11 October 2007, French President Sarkozy goes to Moscow for diplomatic talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Sarkozy says there are convergences between Russian and France policies about Iran and Kosovo, then he asks Putin to open Gazprom to foreign (French) investors [31], [32], [33]
• 16 October 2007, Russian President Putin backs Iranian nuclear program (is this the convergence Sarkozy was talking about?) [34]
• Germany
• 15 October 2007, German newspapers ask weather there actually is a possibility for a strategic partnership between Germany and Russia, while waiting for the meeting between the German Chancellor Angela Merkel with the Russian President Vladimir Putin on next Monday (i guess they will talk about gas too) [35]
• USA
• I have already talked about the missile mess in East Europe, let’s end this long survey with the last Russian hit towards US: the Russian President asked the US to set a date for their withdrawal from Iraq [36]
.

The bear has no more fear.

It seems they reached an agreement upon the Reform Treaty. Now if I understood well, we have to wait till December for it to be signed in Brussels and then it will start the ratification rush in order to have the Treaty into force in 2009, just in time for European Parliament election__this means a frequency of 2.25 countries ratifying the Treaty per month!

In her last post on her blog the European Commissioner Margott Wallstrom has summarized the contents of the recently approved Commission paper ‘Communicating Europe in Partnership’.

This is a quotation from her post:

The Commission is proposing actions aimed at informing people more about the EU and enabling them to voice their opinions. The EU takes many decisions which affect people’s daily lives but many people say they do not hear enough about how and why these decisions are taken. They also say that they feel they have no say in influencing EU policies.

People have the right to know what EU leaders – including their own governments - are proposing and to have the possibility to influence them. They have the right to debate European issues together – not only at local, regional and national levels but also Europe-wide. Informed discussions and debate are vital to a healthy European democracy.

As I wrote in a comment to her post, the proposals described are quite interesting but I think there is still on thing that has been missed in European public sphere: European newspapers.

What I mean by an European newspaper

• A bulk of journalists from each EU Member State, let’s say at least 27 journalists.
• A bulk of translators able to translate from a chosen lingua franca into each of the EU official languages, so at least 23 translators
• Everyday the journalists produce a stream of news in the lingua franca
• Everyday these news are translated into the 23 EU official languages

The main problem in starting a newspaper like this is the high costs due to the translation activity. At the beginning they can be reduced by publishing just an online version of the paper but in the medium term I think they can be repaid by the the fact that the EU single market is bigger then any single Member State’s one.

Of course, as I also explained in my comment, the Commission cannot start a newspaper like this otherwise the independence of the journalists will be hampered, so in my opinion a private initiative would be welcomed.