Newsdate: Friday, July 1st, 2006

Posted by Guessedworker on Wednesday, 26 January 2005 21:43.

EU CONSTITUTION LANDSLIDE FOR THE NO’S DUE TO “MALEVOLENCE AND DISTORTION”

Times London reporter, Omani Padmehum
Times Brussels reporter, Siswe Mbeki

Britain’s position in Europe was thrown into deep confusion this morning as the full extent of the government’s defeat in yesterday’s European Constitution Referendum became clear. Voters turned their backs on the Prime Minister’s “Yes to Success” campaign by a margin of almost four to one.

Mr Blair was said by aides to be “deeply disappointed but not surprised, and determined to fight on for Britain at the heart of Europe”.

Many observers question how long he will “fight on” as Prime Minister. His grand design of leading “Britain towards its new purpose in Europe and the world” was crushed as predicted. The ‘Yes’ campaign, conceived and spearheaded by Sir Peter Mandelson, was humiliated by a staggering 11,771,819 votes to 3,280,812 votes on a turnout of 52%.

Recriminations are already sweeping a straitened Labour Party, with open discussion of possible successors to Mr Blair, should he choose to resign now. The deputy Prime Minister, Sir Gordon Brown, has warned against putting the EU Constitution issue before the country again “in the forseeable future”.

Sources close to the Prime Minister were letting it be known that there were no plans to revive the issue at present. “There’s no such thing as never, though. Common sense will dawn as voters see the real significance of their decision, and that they were duped by a ‘No’ campaign of pure malevolence and distortion.”

Michael Gove, the Conservative spokesman, hailed the result as “a victory for Britain and a victory for the nation state.”

He said, “The Prime Minister’s prestige has been left in tatters. It was his vaulting ambition and the arrogance of Mr Mandelson that drove this government to believe it could take the country into a formal European superstate. It was clear in 2004 before the Constitution was even finalised and signed that no majority for ratification was ever likely to exist. Now, thanks to messers Blair and Mandelson, we are in no-man’s land and someone, but probably not Mr Blair, will have to work out what to do next.”

The Liberal Democrats had campaigned with the government in the ‘Yes’ campaign. Ed Davey, European Affairs spokesperson, said, “The matter can’t be allowed to rest there. We have to persuade the doubters because that is the patriotic thing to do.”

Asked why the ‘Yes’ camp had been unable to do so this time Mr Davey said, “I think we presented the issues well. But we couldn’t counter the blatent untruths from a very well funded and ruthless opposition. I don’t blame anybody on our side and I don’t think the AWOL’s made that much difference to the outcome.”

“AWOL’s” is a reference to those senior Labour Ministers such as Chancellor Alan Milburn and Home Secretary Charles Clark whose performance in the Referendum debate was noticeably low-key. Some Labour loyalists have accused them of “unbridled self-interest” in seeking to disassociate themselves from the looming Referendum disaster. Neither Mr Milburn nor Mr Clarke have been available for comment.

In Europe reaction to the result has been muted. A Commission spokesman expressed disappointment, “but we have learned to be patient with the British.”

But M.Giscard-d’Estaing, President of the Convention of the Future of Europe and chief author of the Constitution itself, said, “Naturally, there will be some consequence. Certainly, the British must decide whether they wish to be part of a future Europe that is just and prosperous and integral to the new bipolar and tripolar dynamic of the global political dispensation or whether they want to do something by themselves. But they cannot hold back the peoples of Europe from moving forward with their grand vision of justice, their new architecture for political expression and for the full representation of the glories of modernity in the European conception.”

Mr Daniel Hannan, leader of the Conservatives in the European Parliament, declared the result “extremely satisfying”. He said, “There was never any doubt about what the outcome would be. We knew it. Mr Blair knew it. Even Giscard knew it.”

Mr Hannan said he did not believe that Britain’s failure to ratify the Constitution would make any difference to the workings of Europe. “Those threats are just vapid Napoleonic pride. They need us more than we need them, and quite a lot of people think we don’t need them.”

Last story: Downing Street awaits new IRA statement on decommissioning.
Next story: Thirty-first council seat gives BNP control of Birmingham.

Tags: Humour

Comments:

Posted by Geoff Beck on Wed, 26 Jan 2005 23:33 | #

Give us some of your commentary on this, Guessedworker.

I love this… sounds a lot like Bush:

“But they [Britain] cannot hold back the peoples of Europe from moving forward with their grand vision of justice, their new architecture for political expression and for the full representation of the glories of modernity in the European conception.”

said M.Giscard d’Estaing.

Posted by wintermute on Thu, 27 Jan 2005 06:45 | #

I second Geoff’s request for more commentary from you, gw. It’s hard for us colonials to have all the on-the-ground context necessary for an adequate understanding of implications here.

Specifically, two questions come to mind: How long until they try again? and how much actual damage has actually been done to Blair’s reputation?

Posted by Guessedworker on Thu, 27 Jan 2005 08:13 | #

Ah, yes. It’s made up, I’m afraid. I made it all up. Look at the “real” headline.

The point is that this is exactly what the London Times will be reporting the day after the Referendum on ratifying Giscard’s Constitution. You need to read the link article to see where we are at today.

As for Giscard he is the most stuffed-up, intellectually pseudish, grandiloquently snobbish European public figure since the French cut short their monarchy. In his overly drawn-out period as French President (prior to the socialist sex bomb, Mitterand), he was a kind of latter-day Sun King of French political life. He tried to turn himself into Monsieur France, and should have been despised for it. But somehow the French are curiously respectful to their politicians and lack the cynicism and, to be honest, offensive humour of the perfidious Brits. So not only did they suffer the insufferable, the allowed him to remain a public figure and eventually get himself the plumb job of writing an EU Constitution.

Posted by wintermute on Thu, 27 Jan 2005 12:04 | #

Ah, yes. It’s made up, I’m afraid. I made it all up. Look at the “real” headline.

I read it. Other than the quotation marks around the words ‘malevolence and distortion’, it reads very much like a headline in a U.S. newspaper.

For example, my city’s daily ran a front page headline story about Sam Huntington’s new book. Within the first few paragraphs, the phrase ‘experts are calling the book sinister’ was deployed. Later, the opinions of local Latins and members of the ‘La Raza’, a Mexican hate group, were queried on their take on the book.

Remember, this is the front section above the fold top story, carrying the headline, “Spanish speakers stir melting pot”. Cognate with your “Padmehum and Mbecki”, the author of the this op-ed headline is one ‘Juan Castillo’:

http://www.statesman.com/search/content/metro/12/19assimilate.html

Harvard political scientist Samuel Huntington ignited a furor earlier this year by contending that many Spanish-speaking immigrants are slow or unwilling to assimilate into the U.S. mainstream.

Persistent high levels of Hispanic immigration, Huntington warned, threaten to divide America into a land of two languages, two cultures and two peoples, and the spread of Spanish could have significant consequences in politics and business.

Huntington’s views struck other researchers as unfounded, alarmist and even sinister in light of studies showing that newer Hispanic immigrants closely follow the language and assimilation patterns of earlier European migrants.

Castillo then turns to Alan Wolfe, today’s go-to guy on American religion, who spares the writer the bother of mouthing the neo-conservative platitudes which were the whole point of the article:

Alan Wolfe, director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston College, thinks it is unfair to demand that immigrants adopt a way of life defined by one ethnic group or race.

“You can’t change culture; you are what you are,” he said. “But you can adopt a new creed.”

Finally, Hispanic racialists are consulted for their opinion, rounding out the display of journalistic balance:

“It’s always the current wave we have a problem with,” said Raul Yzaguirre, retiring later this month as head of the National Council of La Raza, the civil rights and Hispanic advocacy group. ““The Irish were not so good when they came, but they became good afterwards. The Italians got to be OK.”

Gotta love that open dig at White ethnics which ends the story. We can say Italians and Irish were bad, but if you say one word about Mexicans, it’s off to jail with you. Ain’t diversity grand?

Finally, as Geoff points out, since our President just gave an inaugural address referrring to worldwide and perpetual war in the cause of Freedom, giving as his the source of his authority “a calling from beyond the stars”, we Yanks are in no state to question the reality of a public figures’ utterances, however removed from reality they may be. Compared to what has just been presented as our nation’s new charter, your quotes from d’Estaing regarding justice, prosperity, and the tripolar world seem quite tame by comparison.

The point is that this is exactly what the London Times will be reporting the day after the Referendum on ratifying Giscard’s Constitution.

Perhaps so. But, as you can see from the excerpt above, I as an American, have no means at all to distinguish it, from its laughably slanted headline to the ends-of-the-earth surnames of the authors, from “real” news.

Regretfully, must remain open to the possibility that we live in an age where satire is no longer possible.

Posted by Guessedworker on Thu, 27 Jan 2005 14:26 | #

Life not just imitating art, then, but beating it to the punch.

In fairness to you and Geoff, there’s no reason why you should be familiar enough with the EU-isation of the ancient states of Europe to spot the fake from a quick reading. Readers from this side of the pond should do so immediately, of course ... or I might as well give up and go live with my friend Padmehum on a Himalayan mountain top.

Posted by DissidentMan on Thu, 27 Jan 2005 18:05 | #

perpetual war in the cause of Freedom

I just read this on the web

From SFGate.com

For the women of Iraq, this weekend’s election will represent a landmark of sorts. At least a quarter of the 275 seats in the assembly that will write the new constitution are reserved for women, and 1 out of every 3 candidates on party lists must be female.

What kind of freedom is this?

About the “From beyond the stars” expression, I found this earlier usage:

Children will always be afraid of the dark, and men with minds sensitive to hereditary impulse will always tremble at the thought of the hidden and fathomless worlds of strange life which may pulsate in the gulfs beyond the stars, or press hideously upon our own globe in unholy dimensions which only the dead and the moonstruck can glimpse.

—H.P. Lovecraft
See H.P. Lovecraft quotes (pages 6-9)

Posted by DissidentMan on Fri, 28 Jan 2005 00:36 | #

What kind of freedom is this?

Since no one has yet answered I will suggest an answer of my own: The freedom of a slave to obey his master.

Posted by Effra on Fri, 28 Jan 2005 20:23 | #

Guessed: Late addition to your prescient report:

“A spokesperson for the EU Wider Objectives Programme said ‘Clearly the presentation and phrasing of the question in the Western Insular Region’s referendum was inappropriate and prejudicial. As customary, we will insist that the referendum be repeated at yearly intervals until a constructive answer is obtained.

‘Technically the Constitution should now be shelved, but the Projet d’Integrisme cannot be delayed by the obtusity of a small outlying “nation state”, so called. We will be examining the case for a press blackout for six weeks before the next poll, to allow the WIR electorate to reflect on their past follies without being confused. We must make allowances for their unfortunate past history of isolation from the international mainstream.’”

Posted by Guessedworker on Fri, 28 Jan 2005 20:48 | #

Thank you, Effra. When the Times news editor asked young Mbeki to check out WOP he became very nervous and, apparently, claimed asylum.