freedom of press in europe

[Kevin]

It is very sad to see that beautiful country slip away slowly and destroying their valuables like the beautiful coastline and nice city centers, because of the incapability to govern. And since they are founding members of the EU, the EU should have stepped in long ago.

Isn't this part of some of the general issues with the EU. I keep reading about the Czechs not wanting to ratify the Lisbon treaty mostly because they are worried about loss of sovereignty? Would the EU really back stronger actions against a government? Is the general sense of citizens that they want a stronger more centralized EU government or do they want their national governments to stay the primary powers. It's a bit like watching state rights vs federal rights in the US but coming from a different angle.

To tie back to the initial issue you raised in the thread. They couldn't get a censure, mostly because of a large block voting on what you say are religious lines but also political lines (don't alienate your party, do this for me I'll that for you). I get very little about the pulse of the people in Europe, but it's the same question. How varied is citizen support for the EU and specifically the EU expanding power? I see stuff about friction over Great Britian not use the Euro as the primary currency and grumblings that if the Lisbon Treaty is ratified and the new positions are created that if Tony Blair did step forward for the EU presidency position that there would be protests because he would be coming from a non Euro country. Does the average citizen care about that?

See I know that plenty of Americans really have bought into some of this Obama as the devil that will suck this country into a hell hole crap. I get to work with some of them. I know there are some that think he might be able to walk on water too. So sadly I do think the media is actually displaying the pulse of the citizens, or in some cases generating that pulse. I laugh a lot about Fox News making the Nazi comparisons when they have "reporters" coaching rallies and stuff. Talk about abuse of media manipulation. But that isn't really the point, there really are a large number of folks who really do believe that. Some of them quite intelligent folks too, and there are a large number on the other side.

I have no real idea what the citizen perspective of the whole EU government really is. Or how varied it is in country to country. I see that the Brits tend to oppose the EU getting more power a lot. Not adopting the Euro is just one indicator of that too. The Czech seem to oppose it a lot too.

I'm an ignorant American, I admit it. I don't even follow my own countries politics that closely and end up learning lots of stuff when I skim threads here and do more research, I'm rarely up to date on it though. So give me some edu ma cation. :)