Are the Lib Dems pro-EU?

PayDirt

Can one be left-wing and not internationalist Mr Korki?

RKing

Isn't it par for the course that the Lib Dems don't know what they stand for?

fergus pickering

And about bloody time too.

Jupiter

Cleggy can't be anti-european, he's got his EU pension to think about.

Ben Andrews

Where's the evidence of a real shift though? Any quotes? Seems a bit thin this proposition.

RichieP

It's 'reining', though their views do seem to 'reign' too.

London Calling

If you support Arsenal, you don’t go around calling Arsenal supporters fanatics and wear a Chelsea scarf…unless your pensioned off by Chelsea and your partner works for Chelsea via the FA…:)

Good try DK…were all Antiseptic now…:)

London Calling

What did the EU ever do for us…?

170,000 Rules and Regulations…and still counting…

Banquosghost

Are the LibDems pro EU? Popes, balconies, bears, woods!!!!!!

Dennis Churchill

With the mask being dropped in Greece and Italy maybe the rank and file are seeing the wolf behind the granny disguise.
Continental Europe’s political default is not liberal democracy.

Doctor Wankenstein

Good grief, Korskikoff, your anus must get incredibly jealous of what comes out of your mouth.

Phil Chuds

Long live the West Country . We love Europe , but hate the EU . Luckily , multi-culti hasnt been enforced on us as much as many other areas of the UK . Anyone remember race riots down our way ? (Bristol doesnt count , its SW midlands to us). Back to the main point , the EU has buggered our fishing industry , and our agriculture , things that the metropolitan types dont give a monkeys about . Lib-dems will soon be history down here , unless they tow a eurosceptic line . Almost everyone i know down here are voting UKIP at the next GE . The political teutonic plates are shifting . Bring it on .

Hexhamgeezer

Are the woods full of trees? This might seem a very odd question, but if you look beyond all the Oak, Larch and Sycamore you find stuff like wild garlic and brambles. A very different situation than the usual simplistic little Englander position on woods. Stand still for, say, 3 or 4 years, and you may well see brambles growing a bit more.

Or wild garlic.

Austin Barry

The Lib-Dems attitude to Europe is best expressed in Jeremy Thorpe's besotted, plangent imperative:

"Bunnies can and will go to France."

And once there to get royally buggered.

disenfranchised

why do so many in the msm keep saying that the electorate don't particularly care about the EU?
go into any pub and ask those at the bar if they care or not.
daniel, prepare yourself for a shock, because they will say that they would sleep a lot happier in their beds if we were no longer members of the EU. further, they'll as likely say that voting UKIP is the only way the country is going to be able to achieve it.
go on, give it a try. pop down your local now, this solemn sunday evening.
cheers.....

Dimoto

Mr Korski: "A pro-EU position is part of the party's internationalist DNA".

Paydirt: "Can one be left-wing and not internationalist Mr Korki"?

I can assure both of you gents, that it is perfectly possible to be centre-right, Eurosceptic AND internationalist.
That is me actually.

The EU is a protectionist construct, which is quite picky about who can join and when.

It was created not through gradual development according to economic imperatives and democratic will, but by a cabal of controlling plotters.

It is the exact opposite of "internationalist".

Herbert Thornton

Mr Korski seems to specialise in asking silly questions, but the more people realise what the answer to this one is, the better.

Of course the Lib Dems are pro-EU. Pig-headedly, blindly and foolishly so.

exile on euro street

different than?
abhore?
forbears?
how much attention did you pay to writing this post and is the content any better than the the way it's written?

tankus

Simple political expediency..............
When the liberals crash and burn at the next elections over their incontinent lying at the last one ...He needs a euro bolt hole job to keep the gravy running , and the fawning cap doffing that makes him feel relevant and aggrandized....

.....theres going to be a whole bunch of them screaming for the gravy boat...a la mandy

Salopian

Go on the websites of the new entrant LibDem MPs and look for recent pro Euro speeches.........Korski's onto something !

Graphite

RichieP
November 20th, 2011 5:25pm

"It's 'reining', though their views do seem to 'reign' too."

****************

While we're at it, 'forbears' should be 'forebears' and 'different than' would read better as 'different from'.

But for someone who's probably had the disadvantage of a university education, not too bad.

tom jones

Clegg's speech about the EU was really good the other day. I liked what he said about reforming from within rather than just keeping the status quo.

Cynic

"Many of the party's younger MPs – especially in the West Country – reflect the concerns of their electorates ..." Couldn't have anything to do with the annihilation of the LibDems staring them in the face, could it? UKIP is pretty much on a par with the LibDems in recent polls, I understand, and looks set, given the recent EU antics, to overtake them. Nothing like the thought of losing one's seat to concentrate the mind and make one's constituents look marginally more important.

Heartless P.

The Limpid Dims know full well which side of the English Channel their easy money and sinecures are on, - and it isn't ours.

And, as with every utterance of the H2B, it's only phoney hot air.

Dennis Churchill

UKIP 7% against LibDems 9% in latest poll.Gap between Labour and Conservatives less than support for UKIP---something for Cameron to think about.

Mark Cannon

Does Mr Korski get paid for writing this nonsense? I gave up buying the Spectator about 8 years ago, having bought it every week for the preceding 20 years. If Mr Korski is any indication of the quality of those whose prose one has to pay for, I am reassured that I am missing nothing of value.

David Lindsay

Poll parity doesn't matter, not even when translated into votes. First Past The Post doesn't work like that. Ask the people who were once the SDP-Liberal Alliance.

But the shift within the Lib Dems is not a surprise. The only party not going in that direction is the Tories.

TrevorsDen

The LDs are sleep-walking into oblivion over the EU.
They are doing nothing to encourage the tories into an election agreement and are giving tory leaning and anti labour voters a clear dog whistle why not to vote for them.
The EU is a great electoral stick for the tories to beat the LDs with.

EC

Frank P @1:13pm

After reading this latest lunacy I fear that Mr CarPark has locked himself in the pub, and who can blame him.

Mr. Korski's think tank, and subsequently Mr Korski himself, may have become infested with Homaridae. This painful and incurable condition is well documented in the anals of the GMC. The blockage caused by Mr Korski's crustaceans will need to be removed by a skilled practitioner on an ongoing daily basis. In Mr Car Park's absence are you up for this job, Frank? This would surely have to qualify as the worst job in the world:

*ttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SentQjMIioY

Ian Walker

On the internationally recognised scale of Europhilia, I believe your average Lib Dem MP registers 2 or 3 millikorskis, or, which falls into the bracket of "rabid and slavish."

It only really matters what the ones in the Cabinet think, and you can be sure that Clegg's paymasters will not let him promote anyone who doesn't toe the line.

exile on euro street

I see the overnight editing pixies have been busy making running repairs to the text. It's nice to know someone on the inside reads these comments even though they tend not to be very kind to DK.

Vulture

@Phil Phuds: 'The teutonic plates are shifting...' even if you met 'tectonic' you are kinda right with 'teutonic'. Germany has gone from the gentle giant of Euro politics to the blkustering bully in under a month.

@Austin Barry" 'Bunnies will got to France to get royally buggered'. LOL!

..my Lib Dem MP has chickened out of a public debate on the EU tomorrow on the grounds that 'Only 5% of the public care about Europe', They are not even pretending any more that Euro-philia is defensible.

The lamps are going out all over Europe - as a Liberal Foreign Secretary once said - and hopefully they are going out for his party forever.

michael

If a rule abiding small business man chose to familiarise himself with "170000" regulations,(at tribunal/court, ignorance is no defence) allowing 15 mins to understand each one, and assuming:
35 hr week (after breaks)
47 work weeks p/a (after 28 days stat hols)

= 26 YEARS spent ABIDING.

Paul Danon

Their liberal tradition should make them deeply hostile to pan-nationalism. They should be calling for fewer powers for Brussels and Westminster, and more power for counties, towns and parishes. They are, in fact, bourgeois international socialists.

Widmerpool

Just reported that Clegg is not supporting the Tobin Tax does it really matter if he does or does not much more important how the Chinese/HK react.
All in all this is a pretty trivial post who cares about what a few Lib Dems think!

There are really pressing issues for us in whether we stay in or out of the Euro/EU why Daniel to you indulge in such trivial issues -it smacks of Europhile avoidance behaviour IMHO

AliC

Micheal, this dude does not abide.

Time we started trading more with the BRICS not the PIIGs. The future is not in 170,000 regulations.