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TIME magazine article about Ireland's "No"

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    #62
    CtrlSource
    Registered Users Posts: 825 ✭✭✭CtrlSource


    In your opinion ;)

    Look, if it comes to us being asked to vote again on this and if the entire rest of the EU puts a gun to our heads and says you guys are out the door if you vote No again, then i will of course allow the potential consequence of voting inform my decision


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    #63
    molloyjh
    Registered Users Posts: 24,762 ✭✭✭✭molloyjh


    CtrlSource wrote: »
    It would appear that the elected Governments of many of the others in the EU are in favour of the Treaty. What the people of say the UK, France and some others would say if it was put to a popular vote is an open question. My point being that i believe more countries would reject it if it was put to referendum.

    The French elected Sarkozy who had, as part of his election manifesto, that he would ratify the Lisbon Treaty without a referendum. If it mattered enough to the French then they wouldn't have elected him. Obviously it doesn't. The UK are a bit of an odd exception to the EU rule as they seem to favour their sovereignty far more than most member states from what I've been able to understand. Additionally there has been plenty of time for citizens of other member states to get out and get their voices heard re referenda and/or the Lisbon Treaty. Given the severe lack of reaction among the other member states its relatively fair to say that their isn't that much (strong) opposition to Lisbon.
    CtrlSource wrote: »
    You seem to be suggesting that we're really anti-EU and isolationist for voting No. Are you implying that just because we voted against this treaty, that we belong outside the EU? Very extreme view imho.

    I'm not suggesting anything of the sort. However these changes are fundamental to the way in which most of the EU want the union to proceed. If we can't agree the fundamentals there are some very serious issues that we need to look at. One of those is the possibility, regardless of how slim it may be, that if we disagree on a fundamental level then maybe we need to review whether the EU is what we want or not.

    Now what I did not say in that post (but have said o many other times in other threads) is that there seemed to be a very high level of ignorance surrounding this Treaty, which means that if that were resolved can we be sure of the same result, or could we end up with a different one? This would have huge bearing on the whole thing.
    CtrlSource wrote: »
    Obvious, but incredibly complex to actually achieve. It would be unprecedented for a country to leave the EU, or to be thrown out. i don't see either happening, but maybe it will.

    As Scofflaw pointed out this is not the case.
    CtrlSource wrote: »
    i flat out refuse to have my vote against this Treaty characterised as a catalyst for a potential split from the EU. i voted against the Treaty, it's up to the other to decide what they want to do.

    A No vote, just like a Yes vote, has consequences that as a No voter you must be prepared to accept. Also, as a country that has voted No, to move forward we must give feedback as to why we voted No. The only way we can do that is to get the people who did vote No to tell us why. If you don't then the whole thing stalls and there is no forward movement at all. Anyway I never said we would split from the EU. I presented possibilities and picked from them the 2 I thought most likely. If you think there are other scenarios then please contribute.

    CtrlSource wrote: »
    Taking this 75% at face value (although i have my doubts about its accuracy), what does it mean? We weren't asked to vote based on what we thought might be the outcome one way or the other. With respect molloyjh, there seems to be too much "oh no, now we've gone and pissed-off the Europeans, what have we done?!" in your posts. Just seems a little OTT and premature at this stage, to be planning the funeral of Ireland, as a result of our No vote

    I have no idea how accurate that 75% is, although I can't imagine its totally off the wall. Even with the No voters + the Yes voters that thought we could negotiate a better deal I would imagine that you're talking around the 30-40% of all voters, which is a lot of people to have been proven wrong. I also couldn't care less about whether we've pissed off the EU members or not, there are realities that have to be faced as a result of the referendum. If there are other possible scenarios then as I said feel free to contribute them, but to be honest all I'm trying to do is get down to brass tax as they say. What are the results and possible ways forward from here.......


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