These once-proud nations have been transformed into hyper-dependent appendages of Brussels, who will probably not hesitate to send NATO forces to collect its monthly rent check.
For the millions of Europeans now protesting against brutal austerity measures, awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to the European Union must seem no less unthinkable had the Committee of Five handed their tarnished trophy to Anders Breivik, the nationalist who indiscriminately killed 77 people last year in a madman’s attempt to save Norway “from the menace of multiculturalism.”
The comparison is not as far-fetched as it may first seem. After the IMF is finished cleaning European clocks with its bloody mop, millions of Europeans will be feeling economic pain from Spain all the way to the Greek isles. Suicides are already an everyday occurrence on the continent.
The EU is just one bounced check away from becoming another American banker colony slavishly devoted to US-style laissez-faire- let-them- flip-burgers- at-McDonald’s form of public welfare.
Europe’s economy got decimated in 2008 thanks to the deregulated US financial sector, which since the days of Ronald Reagan had been enjoying an all-expense paid trip to Vegas where all of their bets were covered.
After all, according to the dictates of these corporate times, the only reason a government should go anywhere near a bank or corporation is when those institutions need a massive, taxpayer-paid cash infusion – Christmas bonuses included, thank you very much.
The Oslo-based Fraternity of Octogenarians could not have chosen a worse time to heap praise on the European Union for its “commitment to peace over the last sixty years.” The Nobel Committee even had the audacity to mention the three countries whose people are suffering the most from IMF-prescribed austerity measures.
“In the 1980s, Greece, Spain and Portugal joined the EU,” declared the Nobel Committee. “The introduction of democracy was a condition for their membership.” Hold on, did somebody actually utter that hijacked word “democracy?”
Personally, the only way to explain the Nobel Committee awarding the EU the Peace Prize at this sensitive juncture in history is to say that it is a smokescreen; a diversionary tactic to draw attention away from the crimes of the central bankers and their political henchmen. All of this is reminiscent of the uproar that followed last year’s Nobel announcement that Barack Obama was the Peace Prize winner despite the fact that the US military was hunkered down on two fronts and the Guantanamo Bay detention facility was still in the torture business. Considering the international wave of enthusiasm that greeted Obama’s presidency, however, most people were ready to forgive the Nobel Committee for its choice. It was as if the Nobel Committee was saying “Please, President Obama, we believe you will choose a different foreign policy course than your predecessor.” It was something like a down payment on a hefty bribe in the name of peace.
Nothing, however, can justify this year’s Nobel Prize announcement, which proves that this institution has become a cynical tool of the global elite to keep the money flowing in one direction: to the bankers and corporations. Although many European countries have suffered under dictatorships, none of them are prepared for the dictatorship of massive debt and indentured servitude that awaits them. These once-proud nations have been transformed into hyper-dependent appendages of Brussels, who will probably not hesitate to send NATO forces to collect its monthly rent check.
But the most laughable thing about this year’s Peace Prize recipient is that Norway, which apparently has so much respect for European democracy and institutions, soundly rejected membership in the European Union in referendums in 1972 and 1994. The overwhelming majority of Norwegians are opposed to joining the EU.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg congratulated the European Union on its Nobel Peace Prize win, but stressed his oil-rich nation had no plans to join the 27-nation bloc.
“It is possible to congratulate the EU for this year’s peace prize, to acknowledge the EU for its peace-creating role, and separate it from the question about Norway’s relationship to the EU,” Stoltenberg told reporters following the award announcement.
