The Washington Post once again parades its profound ignorance of the European Union in an editorial reacting to the appointment of new EU leaders in Brussels. Starting with the ultra-hackneyed, apocryphal cliché about Henry Kissinger supposedly wanted a single telephone number for Europe (he didn’t), the Post announces that after eight years of labor, European “federalists” delivered a mouse in choosing Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy as full-time president of the European Council and Britain’s European Trade Commissioner, Lady Catherine Ashton, as foreign and security policy supremo.
Anyone who thinks today’s EU leaders are “federalists” clearly knows next to nothing about Europe’s postwar history or current politics. There was also a mysterious reference to “bullying skeptical small countries,” without any explanation of how the “federalists” had done this or which countries had been bullied. The broader point, however, is that federalism has been struggling to survive in the EU for some years now, and it is not embraced by most EU leaders – just think, for example of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who would face a political firing squad if he even mentioned the word.
The editorial proceeds to muddle up the list of candidates for the two jobs, and then says that French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel “resolved that the new president would be a low-profile figure from a small country.” Yes, but that was what all the small countries wanted too, believing that a powerful leader would be bound to come from a dominant big country. The Post misses the irony that the least “federalist” country, Britain, was the one that proposed the best-known, supposedly heavy-hitting candidate, former Prime Minister Tony Blair.
Next, the Post says that “most Europeans aren’t ready to have their national governments supplanted in key matters of domestic and foreign policy – which is why the treaty’s more ambitious predecessor (the European Constitution) was voted down in three referendums.” Actually, it was voted down in only two referendums, in France and the Netherlands, in May and June 2005. The first part of Post’s sentence betrays a more general failure to understand the EU.
It has been estimated that up to 60 percent of EU countries’ domestic policy decisions are already made in Brussels, but this does not really mean “supplanting” national governments, because national governments comprise the EU’s most powerful decision-making body, the Council of Ministers. Appointing more powerful players for the new leadership positions would not have “supplanted” national governments either, as the Post seems to suggest. National governments will maintain control over foreign and security policies, regardless of who enjoys the fancy new titles.
If these weren’t enough mistakes and misconceptions for a four-paragraph editorial, the Post insists on referring to Lady Ashton as Ms. Ashton, which is incorrect. Americans may not like British titles, but that’s no reason for stripping them from their holders. “Lady Ashton” is the name by which she is known, which she chooses to use, and which has been legally conferred on her by the proper British authorities. If the Post were to be consistent in this practice it would refer to Prince Charles as Mr. Windsor – or does it give special treatment to royalty and those with hereditary titles?
Time magazine rescues the reputation of the U.S. media by coming up with one of the year’s best headlines, describing the two new leaders as the Bland Leading the Bland. The magazine’s coverage is pretty standard fare, but at least it doesn’t make the same kind of mistakes as The Washington Post. Among the points made by Time:
The New York Times also does a workmanlike, though not perfect, job in analyzing the appointments, although the emphasis of its lead paragraph is wrong. This says, “with the European Union’s top new jobs going to two low-key bridge-builders, the bloc appears to have set its sights on smoothing over internal divisions before trying to construct a bigger global role.”
It would have been more accurate to point out that EU leaders like Sarkozy and Merkel don’t want to be outshone on the world stage by powerful new EU players speaking on their behalf.
The appointment of the two less than stellar politicians “leaves the Union without the high-profile leadership for which many had yearned,” The New York Times report says. But it gives no explanation of who the “many” yearners were. They were certainly not the majority of Europeans or of European leaders – perhaps they were the hordes of “federalists” identified by The Washington Post.
An expert quoted by the NYT also speaks of this mysterious yearning or craving, largely confined to a group of elite policy makers and experts:
“In some ways, the EU craving for star-quality leaders was like trying to cover the lack of substance with appearances,” said Adam Jasser in an analysis for demosEUROPA, a research institution based in Warsaw. “Whether Europe will be treated seriously or not by the outside world depends on its ability to speak with one voice and get its priorities sorted out.”
Apart from the strange cravings, however, the quote gets to the heart of the matter. The fundamental issue is not who represents the EU, but whether EU governments can agree on common foreign policies.
Oh yes, and the NYT also calls her Ms. Ashton. Do today’s Americans still have chips on their shoulders dating back to the mid-1770s?
The Post and the NYT should review the titles sections of their stylebooks – and the Post should employ at least one person with a vague idea of how the EU functions.
