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Comment by belter | Hacker News Reader

EU is, and always was, a compensation job for failed national politicians at their respective national levels. It's the trade horse for allowing your party buddies to take over the government jobs.

EU politicians should keep their over inflated salaries, and stick to what they are good at. Meeting with Google and Microsoft lobbyists at the best Brussels luxury restaurants.

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EU was established to provide mutual economic and military security in Europe on a federal model following WW2, and it's done very well in that aim. Of course it's not perfect, but shallow takes like the one above provide nothing of value.

> military security

Wasn't that NATO (aka mostly the US)?

Treaty on European union 42.7

If a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power, in accordance with Article 51 of the United Nations Charter. This shall not prejudice the specific character of the security and defence policy of certain Member States.

Commitments and cooperation in this area shall be consistent with commitments under the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, which, for those States which are members of it, remains the foundation of their collective defence and the forum for its implementation.

There's also the point that countries with close economic ties have more to lose by going to war with each other.

It's a necessary component of this sort of idea, but clearly it's not sufficient. I mean, we have had Russia in war with Ukraine for about a decade now, beginning at the annexation of Crimea, even though they had fairly good trade relations, even if they were hurt once Maidan happened.

I think that one needs strong economic ties, but it seems to only truly work with democratic societies.

A point fully disproven by Putin by now.

I don't think that's right.

Economic interdependence is a deterrent against war, not an absolute barrier.

If you can easily swap trade partners for example, it's less of a deterrent. Which is one of the reasons why EU has gone beyond simple import/export agreements.

Kinda, but NATO is (imho) more about external threats. I think part of the EU's founding vision was to prevent further intra-European wars, in which it has been largely successful.

Following WW2? The European Union was established in 1993 with the Maastricht Treaty

The EU is an evolution of the EEC which is much older. The whole federation as a concept was made after and in response to WWII

A significant and huge evolution. That's why they have separate names

The European Coal and Steel Community wasn't meant to be a political federation, as the name shows. Nor was the European Economic Community to give it its full name.

The concept of the ECSC/EEC/EU as a political federation was always a goal of some small number of federalists (mostly in the beginning communists who were imprisoned on Ventotene during the war), but they didn't have any support for that from the people of Europe themselves, which is why the history of the EU is full of the people building it saying explicitly that they have to lie about their true intentions and can only expand its powers during a crisis.

Certainly there was absolutely no intent anywhere immediately after WW2 to create a political federation. Far from it.

Yes, Jean Monnet, pretty much the founding father of the EU, said this in 1943

“There will be no peace in Europe if the States are reconstituted on the basis of national sovereignty, with all that that entails in terms of prestige politics and economic protectionism. The countries of Europe are too small to guarantee their peoples the prosperity that modern conditions make possible and consequently necessary. Prosperity for the States of Europe and the social developments that must go with it will only be possible if they form a federation or a "European entity" that makes them into a common economic unit.”

Federation was always the goal and it was in direct response to WWII.

The European Coal and Steel Community, which in many ways is the precursor organization to EU was formed in 1951, with the explicit goal of linking the German and French economies to such a degree that they would be incapable of waging war against each other.

And a complete shadow of the current EU. Should we call a current intel CPU an 8086?

I only make the point because the current EU is so far removed in scope from the initial post-WW2 version

We do call current intel CPU x86.

As so many things, the organization we now call EU has changed over time. Pretending it formed ex nihilo in 1993 is at least as silly as ignoring what came before.

Reality is messy and drawing hard lines can easily discard a lot of nuance. But if I have to, I would place the foundation of the EU in the post-war era, not at the Maastricht Treaty

It's not pretending. It's literally a treaty. How more formal and matter of fact would you like to get? And I never said it formed ex nihilo - try reading my comments "ab initio"

Pretending is believing the EU is just a handful of countries getting together to form a farming union to feed their people, in 2024. The EU is a totally different beast. To imply or believe otherwise is delusional

And "x86" is not the same term as "8086"

> established to provide mutual economic and military security in Europe

Yes and it was/is very successful at that. The overpaid and incompetent bureaucracy in Brussels seems to be mostly tangential if not detrimental to that.

Also to be fair your take is also very shallow and provides little value.

For military and political security there is NATO.

The EU's mutual defense clause is an empty shell

The implicit line here is that if there is peace, then there is military security. And the EU has been pretty good at providing that within its borders (compared to the history of wars between countries of the EU).

> shallow takes like the one above provide nothing of value.

The previous Portuguese PM António Costa, who had to resign amid a corruption inquiry...Has just been announced today for an EU role that will triplicate his previous annual salary as Portuguese prime minister

"Portuguese PM António Costa resigns amid corruption probe" - https://www.politico.eu/article/portugal-prime-minister-anto....

"Portugal's Antonio Costa expected to be next head of European Council" - https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/portugals-antonio-costa...

"...Costa's appetite for a top European position has been an open secret for years. In March 2022, amid speculation Costa was angling for a Brussels job, Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa warned him that he would call an election if he were to leave his post early..."

It is a graft and of the worst kind, and naive takes like yours is what led to scenarios like Brexit. It's a jobs for the boys organization and you are not part of the club.

> Meeting with Google and Microsoft lobbyists at the best Brussels luxury restaurants.

Are you talking about the same EU that just passed the DMA? That must have been some really nasty food poisoning then!

At least far as it comes to privacy Apple and even FB, MS and Google to an extent share the same interests as their users, unlike the EU bureaucrats who just seem to be salty because they are unable to exert control over society and justify their existence (they might pass some decent policies while they are it that's just mostly a coincident..).

If Chat Control goes ahead long-term that will outweigh any benefits DMA might have.

DMA, like any other regulation that preceded it, was severely lobbied down. It happened in spite of EU. There is too great of a democratic consensus for it to be completely ignored. Do not get this wrong.

Are they even enforcing DMA? My WhatsApp still doesn’t have Third Party Chats.

I wouldn't expect it to any time soon either. They'll likely find a way to maliciously comply.

My bet is that they'll only allow "Trusted Partners" to interact with their network, and you'll need to sign a contract with one of these partners to connect to WhatsApp. This contract will have pretty much the same terms as signing up with Meta directly.

First: nothing against a polemic comment against politicians but in this case, the proposal is coming from the council, which is made of national politicians and this news was written by a EU politician (Patrick Breyer of the Pirate Party Germany), so maybe a bit misplaced.

> and stick to what they are good at.

No they should be kept accountable for their actions and the money they waste. Currently there is no mechanism for that, but i m sure hordes of them would quit if we made one

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