Sunday 13th November

Although one hesitates to comment for fear that one’s observations will be obsolete before daybreak, what with elected heads of government toppling almost daily and stock markets zig-zagging their charts across our screens hourly, and the wringing of hands and almost constant summit meetings of Merkel and Sarkozy,  (I quite like the term Merkozy actually, it has a ring about it) and the smugness of our own Cameron and Osborne that we aren’t in the Euro, thanks of course to the much reviled Gordon Brown, who of course will never be thanked for it – it is actually in an awful mess.

Co-incidentally, after yesterdays post, and of course nothing is co-incidence – it is all linked, the whole thing kicked off shortly after the war ended and was an attempt by France Germany and Italy to tie their economies together so that they could never go to War again.  Laudable and completely logical, especially after the dropping of those awful atom bombs on Japan, when the understanding was that all future Wars would end in this sort of annihilation, (well they were wrong about that) and given that European history of a millennium and more of almost constant war the prospect of any future War in Europe was viewed with such horror.  The thing grew and grew and became a roaring success, and at least some of the participants were aware of the logical inevitability that they were creating a United States of Europe, or trying to.  But unlike America, which grew exponentially, as more and more States were formed by wiping out the Native Americans and filling up the space with mostly poor and dispossessed Europeans, Europe was a different entity entirely.

And now that the Euro, the financial precursor to political Union, is so spectacularly falling apart, one has to begin questioning the logic of Europe entirely.  I am certainly not one of those Tory backwoods supporters who have never gotten over the fact that we no longer have an Empire, and no little Englander either, I quite like the multi-cultural society we live in, especially here in London.  In any case one cannot stop historical inevitability, and now that air travel has facilitated easy and cheap mobility, people will move and want to work in whatever country they fancy.  Maybe we should just forget about borders completely and let people travel where they will without let or hindrance, it will probably sort itself out in the end in any case.  The war on illegal immigration seems to be going the same way as the war on drugs; vast expenditure and very limited success, and fortunes being made by criminals fighting the system.  Am I advocating Anarchy?  No, but maybe just accepting that the world is becoming much smaller and facing up to the fact that companies and people will move to wherever it is most advantageous, so maybe we should be trying to equalize conditions and taxes and wages all over the world, so that Nations become more like regions and we stop worrying about all of this competitive growth that is ruining the planet, and concentrate on living together happily.

Oh Catherine!!!  Pipedreams surely, but actually – that is probably what most people really would like, so why not.  You know why not, stupid.