Todays been a bit hectic, first of all I've covered over 200 hundred miles to get a piece of paper signed by one of my uni tutors, my fault for procrastinating and not getting it done last week. It was my third to last day at uni, two more days and I leave with my teaching qualification - scary. Education is a huge responsibility, no more weekday nights getting smashed and turning up just going through the paces - the kids would murder me! Education is also a huge reward, the most rewarding thing I have ever done.
While on my early morning travels I was reading the daily telegraph, being the true blue conservative that I am, I saw an article on a pet peeve of mine the european union. It got me thinking about why I have an aversion to the EU. Is it just a knee-jerk nationalistic response? Is it just some form of racial/cultural memory from a bygone age when we were constantly at war with the EU that is so ingrained that I don't even recognise it?
Thinking this morning helped me clear my head somewhat and I think I can now honestly say no. I believe it was Reagan who said that "America is a country with a government". Which lead me to thinking are there are two types of country perhaps, a country with a government and conversely a government with a country? In the UK we are most certainly a country with a government, by and large are entire population supports and encourages the electoral process, it had become ingrained after hundreds of years that the government is the servant of the people. When you look at the EU on the other hand it is quite clearly a government with a country, this country "the EU" consists of twenty five smaller ones whose interests are being crushed in the seemingly unstoppable advance of european federalism, which is why it will not work the EU is a government imposed upon a country that has one purpose - its own survival. I thinkthat this is comparable to other "governments with countries" such as the old USSR, Yugoslavia, the eastern bloc, czechoslovakia, etc. they all ended up collapsing because the interest of the government was not improving its citizens lot but ensuring its own survival. After these thoughts the EU doesn't worry me quite so much, eventually it will collapse under its own weight.