Following the failed vote on the EU Constitution last year, there has been a pronounced tendency toward trade protectionism among European countries. As an article in the Business correctly notes

the commitment of France and the other great continental economic powers to free trade and the single market has been revealed as skin deep.

This is bound to come as a shock to many, since the very people responsible for this were only recently among the most zealous proponents of the EU project whose primary justification was the removal of trade and commerce barriers. It would seem inexplicable that the same people now act in a manner exactly opposite.

How are we to explain this contradiction?

Although it is true that the EU was originally conceived as a vehicle for a common market and everything it implies, the project was eventually taken over by leftists bent on erecting a superstate that would centrally run the continent from its Brussels headquarters. The talk of free trade and commerce was merely a convenient cover to hide their socialist agenda.

In addition to revealing their hypocrisy, their present behavior also offers a good illustration of leftists' modus operandi. Rarely honest about their true intentions, they seek to implement their program under false pretenses.

The same, of course, also applies to American liberals. Evasive and prevaricating, they act like a guilty person trying to conceal something. Just in recent weeks, Democrat politicians held meetings behind closed doors allegedly to figure out what their beliefs are. It is obvious what the real purpose of such sessions is: To agree on what to say publicly so as not to betray their real goals and beliefs.

This fundamental dishonesty is displayed by leftists on both sides of the Atlantic. Surely this shared characteristic must be one of the reasons why they like each other so much.

Vasko Kohlmayer   3 22 06