Jose Manuel Barroso today called on Tony Blair to “stand up against public opinion” and have the “courage to ignore populism,” in relation to the forthcoming EU Council summit in Brussels. At the summit next week it is planned that the Heads of Government of the EU 27 to sign a ‘heads of agreement’ on the new Constitution.

This is one of their favourite terms. If it so happens that what they have to say has the support of the public, our elites will tell us that they have democratic legitimacy. However if public opinion is in opposition to their plans it is nothing more than ‘populism.’

This is of course an attempt to discredit public opinion, because of course ‘populism’ is very close to the way in which Hitler and Mussolini misappropriated plebicites. Thus those who are populist are evil near fascists, whereas those who have the support of the public are democratic.

In a rather amusing aspect of Barroso’s speech – the above comments were unscripted response to a question, Barroso went on with the classic meme, ‘If Europe doesn’t get an agreement on this then we will descend into chaos.’

To be fair he didn’t use that term, he said, “Losing this opportunity would be the greatest failure of our political generation.” though I have heard it innumerable times over the years. The French were told it, the Dutch were told it, the Danes when they were voting on Euro membership were given a similar spin, as were the Swedes, the Irish and so on. The problem with this scaremongering is of course that when the people decide to reject the elitist programme, the world still keeps turning, trade is done, people go on holidays, people fall in love, argue, die.

So each time the threat diminishes. We don’t believe you any more

Meanwhile, Roland Rudd has written in the Telegraph a contentious piece in support of the new Constitution. Mr Rudd is the Chairman of the pro EU pressure group Business for New Europe. In it he admits that the old Constitution had its problems,

“To be fair to them, the last time changes were being proposed to the way the EU is run, it was as part of a new constitution that contained some things which many agree were superfluous and unwarranted – the charter of fundamental rights (which carried a danger of jeopardising Britain’s labour market) – and other things that smacked of empire-building – such as a new European flag and anthem.”

 
Well he might be a bit upset if he reads Mr Barroso’s speech. The (unelected) Eurocrat says that he finds it “it difficult to accept that a democrat is against a Charter of Fundamental Rights.”
 
I also love the idea that the symbols will not be in the Treaty. Right, has he ever been to Brussels? The ubiquity of the symbols are such that they don’t need any grand words to constitutionalise them. They exist already, ‘de facto’ if not ‘de jure.’ As does for that matter the primacy of European law, another phrase that I predict will be dropped from the treaty.