Imagine that the United States was instituting a brand—new Constitution, and suppose it had been drafted in secret by only two people, a former President of France, Giscard d'Estaing, and an American diplomat, someone like Madeleine Albright.  After they made all the most important decisions, an unelected Constitutional Convention would be allowed to add whatever bells and whistles it felt like, including protection for the rights of athletes, free expression for children, speech codes prohibiting criticism of gays and Muslims, and much more. It ends up forty times longer than the Constitution of the United States.

This is the new European Constitution, a Jeffersonian nightmare. Its goal is to centralize power in the hands of a small ruling class. Nobody really understands the EU Constitution —— it is much too long and complicated. No one knows whether one part contradicts another, but that's all right, because all those decisions will be made by the political hierarchy anyway. The Constitution is now being pushed on 25 countries as the new foundation for the European Union, to include almost half a billion people.

There is a stunning absence of public debate.  Critics have been scapegoated, so that even the British Conservative Party is afraid to oppose it. Dissenters are considered to be 'bad Europeans' ——— the EU equivalent of 'un—American activities' in the 1950s. News media have failed miserably to educate the public. European voters are not even interested. They place their new Constitution far down their list of priorities. 

The new Constitution does not provide for popular elections to its real centers of power. True, there are elections for the European Parliament ——— but the Parliament is an empty front. It is not permitted to make laws, only to rubber—stamp them. The imposed Constitution will take precedence over all existing laws in every member nation.  There is no balance of powers. There are no autonomous branches of government. No powers are reserved to member states. Individuals will have no rights. Only abstract categories of people are granted protections and claims.

The actual adoption of this sort of regime is impossible for Americans to imagine. You and I would be protesting in the streets. The voters would fire politicians for trying to pull a massive rip—off.  Even the New York Times would go into orbit. So what's going on over there?

In September of 2004 the EU held an art exhibit in Brussels that openly celebrated thirty years of deception. It proclaimed that

'After World War II, visionary politicians created a new structure ... for the entire continent ... Because the operation was so radical, it could only take place by stealth ... its ulterior motives could never be openly stated. ... This exhibition celebrates an end to its inhibited iconography, its coming out. From now on the EU will be bold, explicit, popular...'   (emphasis added)

The only inaccuracy is in the last sentence; for the European Union, born in deception, is simply pursuing more of the same. Suppose a miracle occurs and Europeans wake up before it is too late —— maybe in countries like Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Denmark, even Poland and the Czech Republic. Maybe they will vote against the EU Constitution. But in that case the EU will still keep all its power. Europe's new rulers have a fallback strategy: If the Constitution goes down to defeat, the political hierarchy will simply go on cranking out more decrees ——— because the EU already claims to exercise all the powers of the Constitution. The whole exercise is therefore a fig leaf to hide an historic grab for power. After all, if people are actually grateful for being lied to, what politician would bother to tell the truth now that the whole bizarre contraption is finally coming to its grand climax?

Behind its elaborate fa軋de, the European Union was built mainly by France and Germany. Both are deeply traumatized nations, obsessed with their own bloody histories. Significantly, they blame their national failures not on their politicians, but on the people. The EU therefore was structured around a maze of political committees, like the old Soviet Union.

Neither France nor Germany has enjoyed a stable, democratic government for very long. As Paul Johnson points out, France has had twelve constitutions since 1789.   The Western half of Germany had elections for half a century, but the East has no more experience of democracy than Russia. Just two years ago, Chancellor Schroeder won re—election by using the old Bismarck gambit of abusing foreigners —— in this case, America. Yet the Franco—German axis controls the EU. If Britain joins, it will be surrendering to an unaccountable power elite. And nobody seems to care. 

Anyone who knows Europe's bloody history must feel a shiver of apprehension. Calamities like Hitler and Stalin were not the creations of popular majorities; on the contrary, they were fanatically supported by political, intellectual and media elites. Europe is the home of all totalitarian movements of the last century, all invented and pushed by 'bloody—minded professors,' as Churchill called them. Fascism and Marxism are continental European creations. They could not have made it in the Anglo—American political tradition, just as the EU Constitution could not have come from a democratic culture. But if millions of Europeans are so easily duped, what does that mean for our common future?

We can already see the future taking shape. The EU is making an open pitch for world domination —— by using the United Nations, pushing scientifically dubious treaties like Kyoto, by wielding Europe's vast cultural influence, employing massive propaganda against the United States, and other soft coercion. Germany and Belgium already claim global jurisdiction over human rights violations, although they somehow overlooked Saddam Hussein and nearly indicted Donald Rumsfeld instead.  The European Union will become the new hope of world socialism, taking the place of the Soviet Union.  It will practice a kind of 'socialist nationalism' with a veneer of compassion and peace —— unless it needs military force, when it will arm—twist America into doing the dirty work. Any other political system will be treated with disdain and contempt.

Today Europe is selling advanced arms to China; tomorrow it will supply a nuclear Iran. Even now, France carries on large—scale industrial espionage against the United States ; the new EU will do more of the same. When the United States bows to European demands, as in Kosovo, we will be warmly applauded for our humanitarianism. When we act without Europe we will be damned as imperialist monsters.

All this is no accident. It is just the old imperial arrogance in fancy new clothes. All major nations of Europe were once great empires: Spain, France, Austro—Hungary, Germany, Sweden, Italy, Russia, Britain, even Belgium and the Netherlands. They have not forgotten. Europe is not warlike yet, but it is just as puffed—up and vainglorious as ever. The Soviet Union was in fact the latest European empire, governed by the elite ideology of Marxism. It, too, pretended to be peace—loving and internationalist. 

Only fifteen years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Old World is busy erecting a new monument to its ancient megalomania.