His beef is about the lack of democracy in the EU and also within the UK which he clearly sees as all of a piece – as I do! (This is not to say that I agree with all his remedies).

For the rest he has declined to join UKIP and is careful to suck up to Cameron (translation: he wants to be on the shortlist for a plum job at some future date) which makes me think that, the democracy aspect apart, he is probably not to far from the Tory mainstream.

And that the Tories are notoriously eurosceptic does not mean, as is commonly supposed, that they all want to ‘leave Europe’. Only the terminally stupid want that (and only UKIP and the Lib Dems want it to be a referendum option). No, what the Tories want is a EU made over in a typically Tory way – a safe playground for big business which is why they always bang on about having signed up only for a ‘common market’ and not a ‘federal’ (by which they mean ‘centralised’) superstate.

Well, as it happens I am also against a centralised superstate where powers are accumulated by a ratchet-like process – a one way street heading to Brussels. It is a thoroughly illiberal concept. Why do we not argue for a liberal vision of Europe to set against (a) the Tory one, and (b) the EU apparatchiks’ one (the one we have blundered into supporting)?

As a liberal, I would like to see a decentralised Europe where the only functions handled by Brussels would be those which, by common consent, would be better done centrally and where powers would be repatriated if/when we changed our mind. That would be consistent with our desire for greater local democracy.

The fight is not Britain vs Europe as it is usually framed. It should be liberals from across Europe vs Tories vs apparatchiks.

That is a battle we could win! Unfortunately the Cowley Street set has chosen the blind option fondly impagining that the issue will go away if they refuse to see it.

The EU is nu-Sovietism. Very similar.

It is also like do you wanna Queen or a Republic, and with Lisbon, there are enough opposed to warrant assigning some legitimacy to the entreprise.

Of course I am Irish, and if you ask me again, I may gave a different view

Gregory

The argument that a Lisbon referendum would attract lots of no votes from people who were anti-EU even though saying no to Lisbon would do nothing to change the EU for the better was very sound. What was less sound was going back on a promise to have a referendum on it anyway. Ideally the Lib Dem position should have been to have two referenda: and in-out one, and a Lisbon one. This would hopefully have led to a better public debate during the referendum campaigns.

Like the liberals with Home Rule (Ireland).

Churchill had a working formula, post-WWII. Unfortunately Britain wasn’t interested, France would have liked the UK as a cuddle-chum, rather than West Germany.

Odd really, when one thinks the Free French had to swim to France on the 6th of June

I exaggerate ever-so slightly

Gregory

Are you suggesting that there are precious few federasts in the LDs?

Rather than blaming your own party for not bothering to be electable enough? Okay, seems a bit hypocritical though.

Smaller parties are needed. Pro-Euro-Tories and Anti-EU-Tories should be separate parties. They can vote together on legalising fox-hunting or whatever else they have in common and they can robustly debate – and vote against – European issues without the worry that they’ll lose support from the Party bosses.

The same goes for most other political parties. No individual MP is ever going to agree with 100% of his party’s ideas – that shouldn’t be a crime. Splitting the party is a consequence you risk when you insist on a monoculture.

T