The Norwegian Nobel Committee's decision to award the Peace Prize to the EU received the usual withering comments from the British press, almost none of them aware that they were all locked in copycat land. Since when do so-called 'controversial' columnists such as the Sunday Times' Rod Liddle think they are reinforcing their reputation by saying what everybody else says? Yawn.
Meaningless as it may be in some ways to give prizes like this to institutions, it was a well-timed gesture to draw attention to what has actually been achieved in Europe over the past 60 years. It is easy to draw attention to the financial problems and bickering, but at least there is a framework within which to resolve them. The EU was a magnet for the post-Cold War states of Eastern Europe; it has stopped the world becoming a place of polar antagonisms between the superpower USA and its Chinese and Russian rivals. It may not be an example of perfect harmony (what is?) but it is a model for another way of doing thins. I hate to say it but if the British cannot work with anyone else, they should leave. Although come 2014 a solitary England-Wales non-Schengen paranoid customs and frontier zone may not be an attractive place either to live or invest in.
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