Thursday, August 16, 2012

Clearly the Hungarians are unhappy

Otherwise why would the Commission need to be spending 125,000 euros ($154,000) on very special propaganda in that country that is targeted at households, whatever that might mean. (Could there be propaganda targeted at gardens or gnomes therein?)

The Wall Street Journal article is not terribly coherent on the subject and, much more to the point, has abandoned all notion of fair-mindedness.
Hungary, a member of the European Union since 2004, has profited enormously from the bloc membership, having received 15.5 billion euros of subsidies for the EU’s less affluent members by 2010, latest EU data shows, while paying just 5.2 billion euros into the EU’s budget. Hungary, a small economy, is heavily dependent on exports to fellow EU members in the western part of the continent, mainly Germany.
It seems unlikely that the pros and cons of membership would be discussed in those terms about a country, like Britain or Germany, who are net contributors, for instance, as on this basis they would be better off out.

The question of exports, as we know, is irrelevant though it is true that back in those interim years after the collapse of the Soviet Union and before the East Europeans' membership of the EU, the latter, in the interests of freedom and democracy no doubt, put as many obstacles in the way of trade with the countries in question as it could and made it quite clear that it was membership with all the rules or nothing.
Certainly, the Hungarians are unhappy and have been so for a little while:
Despite receiving from the EU more than the nation paid in, the majority of Hungarians think the EU has been bad for them, a July poll by Szonda Ipsos shows. In the poll, 56% of Hungarians said the European Union membership brought more disadvantages, and some 34% said they considered the membership advantageous. This is somewhat worse than the 61%-26% ratio in April but is an improvement versus 60%-30% in January, the pollster said.
Will they change their minds as the result of the propaganda that is aimed at all the households? It's possible but only a very foolhardy person will make definite predictions.

No comments:

Post a Comment