STAFF NEWS & ANALYSIS
EU Seizes on Snowden Revelations to Justify a Deeper Union
By Staff News & Analysis - November 19, 2013

Reding in Washington: EU Sends Tough Commissioner for NSA … EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding says data protection in Europe is 'non-negotiable.' … The EU is remaining firm with Washington over US spying, with officials in Brussels demanding better protection for Europeans. Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding is heading to Washington on Monday with a number of demands. When the European Union wants to signal that it's serious about an issue, it dispatches Viviane Reding. And that's exactly the plan for Monday, when the tough EU justice commissioner is set to meet with her counterpart, Attorney General Eric Holder, in Washington to discuss the consequences of the National Security Agency (NSA) spying scandal. – Der Spiegel

Dominant Social Theme: The EU will fight for its citizens' rights … For all of them. Altogether.

Free-Market Analysis: The often convenient leakings of Edward Snowden are bearing fruit yet again. The EU is using his revelations to posture as the sole voice of a region with dozens of nation-states.

We've been pointing this out for the longest time. Eurocrats have long been of the belief that a currency crisis – any crisis really – can be turned to their advantage as they seek to "deepen" a political union.

You could say we´ve simply stopped believing in fairy tales and that makes our lives much easier and our understanding more acute. Julian Assange, Edward Snowden – even "Anonymous" … these people and groups receive enormous publicity from the mainstream media.

And yet that cannot be right. The mainstream media ignores the alternative media completely except for selected instances. Now a movie has been made about Assange and surely there are movies in the works for Snowden and possibly for Anonymous as well.

Again, we're not accusing such people and groups of consciously advancing an agenda they claim to oppose. But various kinds of manipulations can evolve from particular programs. In this case, we´ve noted various advances in certain elite memes.

Brazilian officials are contemplating setting up a separate Internet, which may not be a positive evolution for those who believe the worldwide web has benefits that would be lessened by a Balkanized facility.

Then there is the issue of intimidation. Thanks to Snowden, the authorities have been able to float the idea that everyone's conversations going back a decade have been collected and filed by the NSA. This kind of psychic intimidation would not have been possible without Snowden.

The leaks are being used to legitimize what should never be legitimized. The US Congress is discussing ways to "strengthen" people's privacy. This is a bit like two wolves and a sheep deciding on dinner. And now the "EU" is sending over a representative who purports to speak for some 25 separate countries.

Here's more:

Reding, who is from Luxembourg, has a reputation in the US capital for being a formidable opponent. Her decisive attempts to ensure that Europeans enjoy the same rights to data protection as US citizens have not necessarily been welcome, though. "If Reding wants to continue keeping big US companies away from Europe, then she shouldn't be surprised if Europe is soon as isolated as North Korea," one high-level person working on trans-Atlantic issues said. But ahead of the meeting with Holder, Reding's resolve remained unbroken.

"Data protection is a fundamental right in Europe," she told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "Fundamental rights are non-negotiable. Period." Due to the misuse of personal data by the US intelligence agency, the trans-Atlantic relationship is mired in a true crisis of confidence, she added. "The Americans' approach has been shocking. I'm on a fact-finding mission in Washington. Are the Americans ready to restore lost trust? Are they prepared to see us as partners instead of opponents?"

We can see from this that EU officials have grabbed the opportunity to be portrayed as the sole representative and champion of the "little European." No more, apparently, are Italians, Germans, French or Spanish going to be represented at these sorts of conclaves. Without ever having had the chance to vote on it specifically, the citizens of Europe's great countries are now EU citizens first and foremost.

Of course, the exercise is far more cynical than that. The idea of Eurocrats posing as defenders of European democracy is ironic. A torrent of legislation spills from Brussels every year. And Brussels's imperial yearnings are well known by now and include a standing army, a flag, an anthem, civil and military police and, of course, an internal spying mechanism that will do to Europeans what Eurocrats indignantly reject from the US.

The EU is every bit as determined to build a Surveillance State like the US's and, in fact, they are surely partners in such a venture. The indignation that European leaders now evince is for show only. The reality is an elite that has the same goals and intends to use the same methods and violations of privacy to get there.

There is this hint, further down in the article:

[Secretary of State John] Kerry has already called for a "trans-Atlantic renaissance." … But is the White House even behind such reconciliatory efforts? … When Obama's national security adviser, Susan Rice, made a rare public appearance at the Aspen Ideas Forum last week, the NSA scandal wasn't even a topic of discussion.

When Kerry speaks of a "trans-Atlantic renaissance," he is not talking about a rapprochement with Greece. He has in mind much bigger quarry. Like Reding, Kerry wants it to be clear that Europe is at the table, not its individual nation-states.

As we have covered in a previous article, the "Atlantic" refers to a broad project of globalism that Reding and Kerry are engaged in for roughly the same bosses. This globalism is gradually dividing the world into three Orwellian spheres: Asia, Europe and the Americas.

In Europe the gambit has progressed energetically. The euro has destabilized a slew of countries and the Eurocrats have therefore taken every opportunity to "deepen" the political side of the equation as a result. They have installed technocrats in Italy, Spain and Greece, have virtually taken over insolvent government and introduced the IMF when Brussels itself is not intimately involved.

Talk of a "Grexit" has faded, even though the constant rosy predictions of a recovery in the spring have once again become faint. Instead, the ECB has stepped forward to become a far more aggressive entity. While it is not buying up bonds with the frenzy of a Fed, it is certainly pursuing a loose monetary policy, which has already strengthened Europe's biggest banks, if not the employment situation.

As in the US, the employment issue is often bemoaned and little heeded. The exercise of an economic recovery starts and ends seemingly with Europe's great banks. The average person is subject to austerity rather than a bailout. But have EU elites, panicked by the Internet, moved too far and too fast? Perhaps the question now is whether Europe has been destabilized but what are "Europeans" going to do about it?

There are break-away parties throughout Europe and in Britain, too. Some of these are at least partially libertarian, as we have long suggested they may be. And we shall take this opportunity to emphasize once again that unlike past spasms of European freedom, these engagements are quite serious and apt to be long-lasting.

Last time this sort of information revolution played out, the Renaissance, Reformation and Enlightenment all came to pass, one after the other. And then the New World was discovered and populated.

There is no New World today, per se, but there is certainly an old one to take back. As ministers gather together to deepen their Atlanticism, a counter-trend is sweeping Europe.

After Thoughts

It is clear where Eurocrats want to take the EU. It is not so clear that increasing numbers of citizens want to go there with them.

Posted in STAFF NEWS & ANALYSIS
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