'EU is suffering from a crisis of decision making, that means it will slide into irrelevance' Stratfor Founder.

'EU is suffering from a crisis of decision making, that means it will slide into irrelevance' Stratfor Founder. (SP).

The EU has a range of problems that it cannot solve because of fundamental weakness in its decision making that dooms it to irrelevance, George Friedman, US political scientist and founder of think tank Stratfor, told the EurActiv blog on Friday.

"The future of the EU is interesting, because it cannot make any significant decisions now, and it cannot decide to dissolve. What will happen is what is happening now: less and less does Europe make decisions, and when it does, European states pay less and less attention to them," Friedman said.

He drew attention to the disagreement between the EU's centers of power in Brussels and Germany, and the governments of Poland and Hungary. Although representatives of EU institutions have criticized the politics of those member countries, their governments have continued to pursue their own course, ignoring the EU's input and consequently consigning it to irrelevance.

​"The Polish decision to change the make-up of the board of their media and to change their judiciary, this is what Merkel and the EU have time for. So what does Poland do? The same thing Hungary did: it ignores it, because it doesn’t matter. The EU will exist, and will happily sink into irrelevance." Read the full story here. 

Related: 

Can the refugee crisis and subsequent rise of Extreme right make the EU fall apart?

Judge: Merkel Committed Historic Breach Of Law In Opening Borders, Constitution Allows ‘Right To Resist’ https://t.co/l0xvYU6lVo

— MFS - The Other News (@MFS001) January 17, 2016

Dutch 'no' to Kiev-EU accord could trip EU crisis: Juncker.

Dutch 'no' to Kiev-EU accord could trip EU crisis: Juncker. (DS).

THE HAGUE: European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker urged Dutch voters Saturday not to oppose an EU cooperation deal with Ukraine, saying such a move "could open the doors to a continental crisis."

A citizens' campaign in the Netherlands spearheaded by three strongly eurosceptic groups garnered more than 300,000 votes needed to trigger a non-binding referendum on the deal, three months from now.

Observers said the vote, set for April 6, pointed more towards broader euroscepticism among the Dutch than actual opposition to the trade deal with Kiev, which fosters deeper cooperation with Brussels.

A Dutch 'no' "could open the doors to a continental crisis," Juncker told the authoritative NRC daily newspaper in an interview published Saturday.

"Let's not change the referendum into a vote about Europe," Juncker urged Dutch voters, adding: "I sincerely hope that (the Dutch) won't vote no for reasons that have nothing to do with the treaty itself."

Should Dutch voters oppose the deal, Russia "stood to benefit most," he said. Read the full story here.


Related:    Can the refugee crisis and subsequent rise of Extreme right make the EU fall apart?

Can the refugee crisis and subsequent rise of Extreme right make the EU fall apart?

Can the refugee crisis and subsequent rise of Extreme right make the EU fall apart? (Taz).

An official with the EU has voiced a concern that the Union is facing a threat of falling apart.
Gunther Oettinger, European commissioner for digital economy and society, said in an interview with German newspaper Bild on Dec. 30 that there is a threat of disintegration of the EU, TASS news agency reports.

“The European Union has learned to overcome the crises. However, there are more and more countries with unstable or populist governments. I am concerned about it,” he said.

“For the first time I see a serious danger that the EU could fall apart,” Oettinger added.

The commissioner further called for continuing the talks for Western Balkan countries’ joining the EU, saying “however, the conditions for accession to the Union have to be strict.”

Oettinger also voiced scepticism regarding Turkey’s accession to the EU.

“There won’t be Turkey’s accession this decade and maybe during the next one,” he said.

European stocks stumble on gloomy Lagarde, oil retreat https://t.co/3E3AEKyO2m

— MFS - The Other News (@MFS001) December 30, 2015

EU Integration Policy Leaves No Room for Democracy – German Politician.

EU Integration Policy Leaves No Room for Democracy – German Politician. (SP).

German politician and member of the Left Party, Sahra Wagenknecht, has doubts concerning the sustainability of the euro currency and further European integration. The Greek crisis showed that the euro is not working, she said.

According to the politician, the monetary union has narrowed the space for national governments and lead to their inability to act. Wagenknecht called it a “Europe-wide abolition of democracy through the back door. "The politician suggested initiating a debate of whether European countries should reconsider their financial and monetary system.

Wagenknecht criticized the EU policy and called for a return to broader national sovereignty. An increasing number of integration steps undermines the sovereignty of national states and leaves no room for democratic decisions, especially if the whole policy of the EU member states is controlled by “EU technocrats,” she argued.

“It is time that we pursue the EU policy taking into account the actually existing social struggles in different member states, rather than abstractly talk about a ‘social EU’,” the politician said.

'Grexit' - Germany Open to Possible Greek Euro Zone Exit.

'Grexit' - Germany Open to Possible Greek Euro Zone Exit. (Spiegel).

There was a time when Germany feared the consequences were Greece to leave the euro zone. Now, though, with Greek elections approaching, Chancellor Angela Merkel is willing to accept a "Grexit" should a new leftist government in Athens demand concessions.

At midnight, Lithuania's days without the euro came to an end. As the calendar flipped to 2015, the countdown clock hanging over the entrance to the country's central bank hit zero and fireworks shot into the air above the city palace in Vilnius. People celebrated in the streets and in the bars of the Lithuanian capital as a euro symbol was projected onto the facade of the city's neoclassical cathedral. Not long later, Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius withdrew a 10-euro note from a cash machine decorated especially for the occasion.

Lithuania is now the 19th member of the euro zone. The country's currency, the litas, is history, making way for the "euras," as the European common currency is known in the country. 

In Greece, meanwhile, 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles) to the south, a different kind of countdown is proceeding apace. In contrast to Lithuania, however, the days being counted could be the final ones in the country's participation in the euro zone. On Jan. 25, Greek voters will be heading to the polls for parliamentary elections. Should the leftist alliance Syriza win, as polls show it might, the euro could soon be history in the country. Read the full story here.

"CHANGE" - Europe's future Face might look totally different.

"CHANGE" - Europe's future Face might look totally different.HT: Zerohedge.

Mario Draghi may have lied to Zero Hedge when saying there was no European "Plan B" (or Z), but he was right when he said that there has been a "vast amount of political capital that has been invested into the Euro." There is one problem: that political capital (like virtually every other form of capital in Europe) is evaporating at an unprecedented pace.

The following map from Votewatch may be in French, but what needs no translation is what Europe can expect following the 2014 elections for European Parliament which start today and continue until the 25.

In short - with the biggest projected "gainer" in the election, and a forecast winner in places like the UK, France, Denmark, Poland, Finland and others, being v, projected to gain 56 parliamentary seats to a record 177 (at the expense of popular European parties), the surge in the "revulsion and loathing" at the concept of a "united Europe" is unprecedented.

At this rate one more election and the Eurosceptics will be the single largest political block in a "United" Europe. We hope even hard line eurocrats can see the problem with that outcome.