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[martinuzz]

Well, before Trump, who has spoken out against ISDS (or at least against TTIP as a whole), the US very much wanted that to be possible. The whole ISDS clause in the TTIP (which might or might not have been implemented, I think it hasn't but there has been a lot of effort to sneak it in at a quiet moment) was a US idea (obviously, because it's a neocon's wet dream). It works both ways, so yeah, foreign companies can sue the US for damages from new laws, and US companies can sue EU nations for damages from new laws.

[smjjames]

I wonder if it'd be constitutional in the US since the same sovereignity and autonomy issues which were brought up would also apply to the US.

I think I recall the TPP having something similar as well, not sure.

[martinuzz]

It must be constitutional, since you already have it for ages in the TTP, and in the trade agreement with Canada, what's it called, NAFTA?
That, or no one ever bothered to challenge it for constitutionality.

Resistance from the EU side to the US proposal to include an ISDS clause in the draft Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership treaty was such as to cause this element to be abandoned in September 2015. In its place, the European Commission proposed an investment court system (ICS).^[9][10][11] Not long afterwards, ICS was declared illegal by the German Association of Magistrates,^[12] though the Commission dismissed the magistrates' judgement as based on a misunderstanding.^[13] For its part, the United States wants ISDS reinstated

[Loud Whispers]

The main cause of the economic crisises in Europe is Germany putting their own economy over that of the other EU members'. You see, through some economical nonsense I only half remember, the shared Euro currency but separate economies mean that when Germany makes a surplus, it causes deficits in her fellow Euro-users. Because of this, the countries involved entered an agreement that, to make sure that the other economies did not crash, Germany had to restrict her surplus to a certain percentage. Germany then proceeded to completely ignore this agreement, ran the other economies into the ground, and then pretended to be all surprised when shit exploded.

Since then Germany have continued to fuck the crashed states over in every way they can while constantly repeating that "EU solidarity means that everybody else have to help pay for the mess we caused for our own profit". Unsurprisingly, the rest of the EU is not amused, and are worried that any kind of "emergency fund" is just a way to make the rest of the EU foot the bill while Germany continues to bolster her own economy through said economic practices which causes the deficits to begin with.

What do you think of the argument then, that this would all be solved by the further transfer of national sovereignty to a centralized EU?

[redwallzyl]

You can have German dominance if Germany is dissolved along with the rest of the constituent states of the EU into a regional based federal state. As a bonus that would solve the issues of rising regional separatism some parts of states by removing the overload and giving them equal representative power and preventing the oppression of regions by a nation state trying to keep a national identity based on a single dominate cultural group as the basis of state power and stability.

[smjjames]

You can have German dominance if Germany is dissolved along with the rest of the constituent states of the EU into a regional based federal state. As a bonus that would solve the issues of rising regional separatism some parts of states by removing the overload and giving them equal representative power and preventing the oppression of regions by a nation state trying to keep a national identity based on a single dominate cultural group as the basis of state power and stability.

And that's worked out so well for us, right? Even so, it's not a perfect system and there can still be an issue of how much representation smaller states (population wise) have vs the larger more populous states. And there are still going to be economic powerhouses or those dominating in specific industries having more influence than they might.

tl;dr: The US system can work as a scaffold to start from, but Europe is still going to have to find solutions that work for them as they're starting from an almost entirely different starting point than the US ever did, and we've had over 200 years of tweaking and modifying to get to the current system.

[martinuzz]

A disagreement between Kosovo and Serbia has made clocks all across the EU fall behind real time.
No, really.

Alternating current in the EU exits the wall plug at 50 Hertz. Or, it used to.
However, since the second half of january, the frequency has dropped 4/1000nds of a Hertz.
According to Entso-E, the European association of power net distributors, this is because Kosovo and Serbia are not contributing the agreed amount of power to the net.

Kosovo and Serbia have been fighting for 20 years now, and their newest thing is trying to thwart each other by witholding power from the net, for a total of 300MW capacity, about the output of a small gas power plant (and blaming each other for it).
In total, the Balkan region now owes Entso-E 113 GWh.
Entso-E claims the dip cannot be compensated by other power plants, because 'the net needs to be balanced'.
They want clarity about who is going to be held responsible for the shortage, and urge local and EU politicians to take action.

Digital clocks that do not depend on the internet or quartz crystal use the power net's frequency to keep track of their time.
By now, many clocks in thermostats, ovens, alarm clocks, and more are 6 minutes behind on real time.
Until the matter is resolved, Entso-E will be forced to keep transitting power at the lower frequency, and our clocks will keep running too slow, and fall behind further and further.

So if you're six minutes late for work, blame Serbia and Kosovo.

[redwallzyl]

You can have German dominance if Germany is dissolved along with the rest of the constituent states of the EU into a regional based federal state. As a bonus that would solve the issues of rising regional separatism some parts of states by removing the overload and giving them equal representative power and preventing the oppression of regions by a nation state trying to keep a national identity based on a single dominate cultural group as the basis of state power and stability.

And that's worked out so well for us, right? Even so, it's not a perfect system and there can still be an issue of how much representation smaller states (population wise) have vs the larger more populous states. And there are still going to be economic powerhouses or those dominating in specific industries having more influence than they might.

tl;dr: The US system can work as a scaffold to start from, but Europe is still going to have to find solutions that work for them as they're starting from an almost entirely different starting point than the US ever did, and we've had over 200 years of tweaking and modifying to get to the current system.

Well no it has not because no one is structured like that. You would break up the larger ones so the diffidence is not so large. and if you have enough with lots of divergent interests they can help balance each other by a equal representative power. You don't keep the old state borders. That way you can avoid stuff like having a California with out sized influence on the state and the domination of that internal state by its own centers by separating them out.

[smjjames]

Sounds like the European power network is very vulnerable to a severe blackout or chain reaction if it's so interconnected that sheneinighans between two states would disrupt things. I thought there would be buffers between individual country networks or at least have regional networks rather than one monolithic network.

I get that you guys want to have an integrated power system through all, but energy networks are one of the things where it makes sense to have regional blocks.

You can have German dominance if Germany is dissolved along with the rest of the constituent states of the EU into a regional based federal state. As a bonus that would solve the issues of rising regional separatism some parts of states by removing the overload and giving them equal representative power and preventing the oppression of regions by a nation state trying to keep a national identity based on a single dominate cultural group as the basis of state power and stability.

And that's worked out so well for us, right? Even so, it's not a perfect system and there can still be an issue of how much representation smaller states (population wise) have vs the larger more populous states. And there are still going to be economic powerhouses or those dominating in specific industries having more influence than they might.

tl;dr: The US system can work as a scaffold to start from, but Europe is still going to have to find solutions that work for them as they're starting from an almost entirely different starting point than the US ever did, and we've had over 200 years of tweaking and modifying to get to the current system.

Well no it has not because no one is structured like that. You would break up the larger ones so the diffidence is not so large. and if you have enough with lots of divergent interests they can help balance each other by a equal representative power. You don't keep the old state borders. That way you can avoid stuff like having a California with out sized influence on the state and the domination of that internal state by its own centers by separating them out.

Yeah, I was being rhetorical with that question since it definetly hasn't worked all that great, but it still works as a continent spanning analogue to Europe as it has the same analogous diversity of industries, etc, that a federalised Europe would have. So, it still works as something to point to and say that doing x in y way hasn't worked too well and that Europe could try doing it differently since some parts have worked well, others not so much.

[redwallzyl]

That's whats nice about building things later. If your smart you can avoid other peoples mistakes.

[smjjames]

So, an update on the Russian ex-spy, it seems that some kind of nerve agent was used.

fakeedit: Part of that links url is 'as cobra meeting takes place', what the heck is that about? The article doesn't mention cobra or anything. edit: This maybe? Seems like the most logical explaination.

[martinuzz]

Great, so UK has now been victim to nuclear and chemical attack. I guess Russia will use smallpox for their next victim?

[smjjames]

Biological agents don't seem like a great option for targeted assassination though, unless you don't care about collateral.

[martinuzz]

I suppose we're lucky Boris isn't running the show in the UK, or I think he might have cried ARTICLE 5 DECLARE WAR ON RUSSIA for those attacks on UK soil (he already threatened with severe measures against Russia yesterday, before it was even known it was a nerve toxin)

[Sheb]

Brexit trade negotiations still going nowhere, with the EU insisting that the UK's only options are to be part of the custom union, or a CETA-like trade deal which would only include limited scope for services, including financial ones.