Lisbon Day
What began with the solem ‘Declaration of Laeken’, issued by EU heads of state and government at their December 2001 European Council;
was followed by the Constitutional Convention of EU and national parliamentarians in 2002 and 2003;
was finalized in the ‘Treaty on a Constitution for Europe”, signed by EU leaders in October 2004;
was rejected during its ratification process first by the French and then the Dutch in late May 2005;
was subsequently suspended at the June 2005 European Council to be followed by a ‘reflective phase’;
was jumpstarted again with the Berlin Declaration on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome in March 2007,
was carefully compromised in dramatic late-night negotiations at the June 2007 European Council, when the Kaczynski brothers had their moment of fame on the European stage;
was finalized and signed in Lisbon in December 2007;
was rejected again by the Irish people in a June 2008 referendum;
was adjusted and compromised and put together like Humpy Dumpty hadn’t even dreamt of;
was approved by the German Constitutional Court in a landmark decision on June 30, 2009;
was approved by the Irish a second referendum on October 2, 2009;
was formally and finally ratified by the Czech Republic in November 2009 -
Is from this day on the Law of the EU: The Treaty of Lisbon becomes law as of today, December 1, 2009.
Van Rompuy and Ashton: WHO?
So here they are: Herman van Rompuy and Baroness Catherine Ashton. The Belgian Prime Minister has been selected by EU heads of state and government, by unanimous consent, to serve as the new president of the European Council of those same heads of state and government for a two and a half year term. The British Labour politician and current EU trade commissioner has been chosen as EU’s new High Representative on Foreign Affairs.
WHO? – Already, many TV pundits and commentators are wondering: WHO?
To begin with, it’s actually no surprise that those two ‘no names’ of global affairs ended up getting these two new jobs installed by the Lisbon Treaty. They perfectly reflect the fundamental nature of the EU’s ‘double identity’, being a hybrid of 27 sovereign states coming together and forming a new, transnational entity in-between the well-known categories of international relations and international law.
Van Rompuy, as a Belgian ‘federal’ politican from a country whose ‘national identity’ between ever-quarreling factions of French and Flemish speakers may only rest with its Royal family, epitomizes that double identity. His first press conference showed his fluency in French, Dutch (Flemish), and of course English, restating general (and obvious) principles of intra-EU cooperation.
British PM Gordon Brown may congratulate himself as well – he didn’t succeed in pushing trough Tony Blair as council president (an unlikely idea from start), but can tout his fellow Labour colleague Baroness Ashton in the newly revamped and more powerful office of EU Foreign Chief.
And Angela Merkel? What’s in her in all of this, so to speak? – My guess: She is doing just fine with this outcome. After all, she remains one of the major power brokers among the EU 27, no matter who serves in what EU position. Keeping the EU on track after the long and exhausting ratification process of the Lisbon Treaty, now tackling the real issues – the continuing fallout from the global financial crisis, climate change, energy, trade and development -, has been and will continue to be at the heart of her European approach, with herself in the driver’s seat, to be sure. All roger with Angie.
“We’re flooding now!”
November 9, 1989, around 10pm CET: After that famous mumbling by East German Politbureau member Guenther Schabowski concerning the new travel law at a press conference in East Berlin at 7pm, dozens of people are allowed to cross into West Berlin. Still, Eastern border guards still regard them as having ‘illegally’ left the GDR, thus unable to return without a special permit.
10:40 pm: ARD TV (Channel 1) anchor Hann-Joachim Friedrichs declares on the late night news: “The gate is open!” Well, it isn’t, but now, thousands and thousands of East Berliners are streaming towards those (not yet open) gates.
11pm: Faced with swelling crowds of people demanding to cross into West Berlin, Eastern border guards are frantically trying to get instructions from their superiors. In vain. Nobody seems to know what the new travel law as reported in the media and announced hours earlier by Comrade Schabowski really means.
11:3opm, Bornholmer Strasse crossing: “We’re flooding now!” The gates are opened. The wall’s no more.
Just another Day
/ Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it
And spills the upper boulder in the sun,
And make gaps even two can pass abreast. /
What else to say, or to quote? On a day like this?
Lest we forget – not “just” November 9, 1989,
but also November 9, 1938,
and November 9, 1918.
The Never-Ending Health Care Story
On the occasion of the U.S. House of Representatives’ vote yesterday, passing comprehensive Health Care Legislation by 220-215 votes and now referring the matter to the Senate, I’d just like to note that health care was, is and will always be the never-ending story of domestic policy in Western industrialized countries. Example: In Germany, with its quite different system of dual private and public plans according to level of income, ‘comprehensive reform’ has been enacted in 1996, 2003 and, most recently, in 2007.
And it ain’t over yet: The new, young, telenergetic, just 36-year-old FDP Health Minister Philipp Roesler has already indicated he’ll revamp financing of the public insurance plans yet again, laying the groundwork for another massive fight with the Bavarian CSU as well as Chancellor Merkel, who doesn’t seem to be too keen on taking up the controversial issue…yet again…and again…and again.
Clash of Civilizations?
“Angel. Betrayal. Embarrassment. Blackmail. Typical American Arrogance, yet again.” And so on.
- Just a few adjectives to describe current reactions from politicians accross the political spectrum in Germany, union leaders as well as a majority of press commentary on GM’s board decision to scrap the (supposed) deal with Magna on selling Opel. One columnist from Berlin’s center-left leaning ‘Tagesspiegel’ newspaper calls the sequence of events in D.C. last Tuesday, when Chancellor Merkel and her staff seemed to be caught completety off-guard by GM’s apparent U-turn, the ‘darkest day of her chancellership’. A minority view in the media – more center-right and pro-business-, on the other hand, sounds relieved that German politicians including Angela Merkel were told a healthy lesson in how not to meddle in business affairs. (Never mind that GM is now a majority-owned state enterprise; so why didn’t Obama warn the Chancellor on Tuesday morning, it’s being asked…)
More worrying to me, though, are voices which could, if they’d be getting traction in German public opinion, have a profound negative impact on transatlantic relations between Berlin and Washington. Isn’t all this, these commentators are asking and a few political figures are beginning to argue, another proof of how different the U.S. has become from us over here in Europe? Free-wheeling American capitalism v. Socially-conscious German social market economy, that’s the simple equation behind this line of argument. A clash of (economic) civilizations, the Rumsfeldian ghost of ‘Old Europe’ v. ‘New Europe’ being resurrected from its post-Bush era cemetery – this is what I think some influential voices in German public opinion, as expressed by newspaper commentary and initial statements from public officials, are implying here. (Never mind that politicians and unions in the U.K., Spain and Belgium, other Opel and Vauxhall production sites in Europe, don’t seem to worry too much about this sudden turn of events!)
I personally disagree profoundly with such an argument. The Opel saga rather reveals an unfortunate mix of domestic German electoral politics (ongoing because of the state election in the most populous German state of North Rhine-Westphalia next May, where a CDU-FDP center-right state gov is seeking a second term while trying to protect a major Opel assembly line in Bochum!), combined with real worker’s concerns for their job both in Germany and the U.S. on a massive scale, fears for the future of the German automobile industry in a times of crisis, coupled and squared and juxtaposed with the Obama administration’s colossal attempt to save the U.S. automobile industry from extinction by the global economy as well as its own domestic electoral calculations.
Still, it’s tempting to resurrect the ghosts from the Bush-era. Or from the Reagan (“nuclear SDI Armaggedon of the Evil Empire is coming”) years. That reflexive sound of anti-Americanism, it’s so easy to cite. So easy to remember and putting it down in a comment or statement. So wrong.
Ms Merkel went to Washington
Yet another Day to Remember:
Being only the second German Chancellor to address a Joint Session of Congress in post-war history, Angela Merkel delivered quite a memorable address; you can read it here:
merkel-congress-03-11-2009-eng.
Just hours later, by the way, GM’s board announced it was scrapping the deal with Magna – heavily supported both politically and financially by the German government as well as several state govs with Opel production lines – and would keep its embattled German subsidiary. Surprise, surprise or, as North Rhine-Westphalia’s PM Juergen Ruettgers is quoted today – ‘the ugly face of capitalism’?!
Don’t turn away. More after the break.
A Day to Remember
Today is…Reformation Day.
See more (German):
www.reformationstag.de
In English:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformation_Day
BREAKING: Merkel reelected
It’s official:
Angela Merkel, born 1954, has been reelected for a second consecutive term as Federal Chancellor of Germany. The vote tally in the Bundestag this morning:
323 YES
285 No
4 Abstentions
(The coalition’s majority stands at 332-290, i. e. a few MPs of her coalition did not vote for her – but the opposition was unable to muster all of their votes, too!)
Next step: Federal President Horst Koehler will appoint her officially at his residence, after that she’ll be sworn at parliament by Bundestag President Norbert Lammert, reelected himself just yesterday. After that, the cabinet list will be presented to be appointed by Koehler and then sworn in by Lammert later this afternoon.
The new cabinet will meet (at about 16:00 CET) for the first time, before the newly reelected Chancellor heads off for Paris to meet French President Nicolas Sarkozy ahead of tomorrow’s European Council meeting of the EU’s heads of states and governments in Brussels.
17th Bundestag: Inaugural Session
Results just in:
Norbert Lammert, 60-year-old outgoing President of the German Bundestag, has been reelected by his fellow MPs for a second consecutive term at the helm of the German Parliament. Out of 617 votes catst, he received 522; 66 against, 29 abstentions.
Vice Presidents:
Gerda Hasselfeldt (CSU), 496 Yes, 66 No, 52 Abst.;
Hermann-Otto Solms (FDP), 487 Yes, 84 No, 42 Abst.;
Katrin Göring-Eckardt (Greens), 473 Yes, 73 No, 61 Abst.;
Petra Pau (LEFT), 379 Yes, 155 No, 74 Abst;
Wolfgang Thierse (SPD), 371 Yes, 170 No, 65 Abst.
Tomorrow: Merkel’s Big Day when she is up for reelection by parliament (secret ballot).
