About that Peace Prize

As readers of this blog know, I tend to dissolve into hysterical laughter whenever the Nobel Peace Prize is mentioned. Until they give it to the US Marine Corps for bringing more peace and freedom to more places than there are countries in the UN, the whole thing will remain a joke. Nevertheless, it was a particularly joyous occasion when the EU, that corrupt and undemocratic organization got it for keeping the peace and promoting democratic values and freedom. (Oh dear, I am sorry, you will have to wait till I stop laughing.)

David Hughes, who is the Daily Telegraph's chief leader writer, is not happy with the whole concept of freedom in the EU. Specifically, he is worried about freedom in Greece. Well, press freedom. No journo ever worries about any other kind but, I suppose, even worrying about press freedom shows that his heart is in the right place.

The silence from Brussels is deafening. In Athens a Greek newspaper editor, Costas Vaxevanis, faces imprisonment for printing a list of prominent Greeks who have squirrelled away their fortunes in Swiss bank accounts to evade taxes. He could spend two years in prison if convicted. This assault on the freedom of the press exposes the deep fissures in Greek society – between a moneyed elite who ruthlessly game the system for their own ends, and the hoi-polloi who are bearing the brunt of austerity measures.

The Greek press is rallying round but the EU is doing nothing.

What exactly is the EU supposed to do? Send in the marines? That would be the Royal Marines and I cannot see such a move being particularly popular or effective, though I have the highest possible regard for that fine body of men and, I believe, nowadays women. Maybe they could share that Peace Prize.

Of course, it can make a stiff pronouncement but does the EU believe in democratic freedoms all that much? The EU, after all, thinks that  a referendum that is comes out with the wrong results should simply be run again (and, presumably, again) to get the right result.

Besides, we know what would happen if the EU or some part of it did intervene. We would get the usual "Nazi invasion" screams from all sides, especially from the Golden Dawn, whose spokesman, according to this account, read out, approvingly, from the Protocol of the Elders of Zion.