Hungary will block a planned 90-billion-euro (US$106-billion) European Union loan to Ukraine until the flow of Russian oil through the Druzhba pipeline resumes, Hungary’s foreign minister said.
I always hear Hungary fucking everything up, why not boot them from the union at this point? They clearly are an actor for a hostile nation, so there’s no need to deal with their bullshit.
Maybe we could suspend their membership removing privileges and voting rights, while Hungary is investigated for compliance of EU regulations on for instance their freedom of speech, courts and democracy.
removing privileges and voting rights, while Hungary is investigated for compliance of EU regulations
It’s not that easy. This can be abused. Countries joined because the EU had limited power.
The US has broken the power of its states by threatening to withhold federal funding. The EU is starting to copy that. How does the EU make sure that we don’t copy Trump, too?
False equivalence. EU is not controlled by a single president, for such actions there would have to be a near unanimous agreement among the other member states.
So the comparison would be if for instance 45 states agreed to take away privileges from one state in USA, instead of just 1 president, that may not even have won by a majority vote.
There’s a difference between a decision made in a democracy that respect minorities (EU), and a decision made by a president that is granted excessive powers in a dysfunctional democracy.
That’s how the US started. Still, legally, the president cannot change laws. It was normalized under Obama to get around this with executive orders.
It’s a development. If we step on that slippery slope, we should know in advance that we stop before it is too late. And above all, we should not assume that it can’t happen in the EU.
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837 – June 24, 1908) was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, serving from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897.
It can still be unanimous among the rest of the nations to be deemed legitimate.
Freedom of association encompasses both an individual’s right to join or leave groups voluntarily, the right of the group to take collective action to pursue the interests of its members, and the right of an association to accept or decline membership based on certain criteria. It can be described as the right of a person coming together with other individuals to collectively express, promote, pursue and/or defend common interests.[1]
Freedom of association is both an individual right and a collective right, guaranteed by all modern and democratic legal systems, including the United States Bill of Rights, article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, section 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and international law, including articles 20 and 23 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and article 22 of International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work by the International Labour Organization also ensures these rights.
Hungary is undermining the EU at every turn, if the rest of the membership wish to boot them out I think it would be quite easy for them to write up a compelling case for how and why.
There’s no such thing as ‘must be’. There’s only as much as the member states will put up with. If the cost exceeds the value, it will get changed, along with any rules that supposedly prevent it. The only thing the rules do is set a higher cost.
I always hear Hungary fucking everything up, why not boot them from the union at this point? They clearly are an actor for a hostile nation, so there’s no need to deal with their bullshit.
There is no mechanism for removing a member state from the EU other than a voluntary exit.
And as long as Hungary is getting any kind of monetary benefits from the EU, which Orban can steal, he won’t pull such a move.
Also his handlers in Moscow might find him more valuable in the EU than outside, so they likely would object to that.
Then clearly one must be made in order to handle this type of sabotage from a union members.
Maybe we could suspend their membership removing privileges and voting rights, while Hungary is investigated for compliance of EU regulations on for instance their freedom of speech, courts and democracy.
It’s not that easy. This can be abused. Countries joined because the EU had limited power.
The US has broken the power of its states by threatening to withhold federal funding. The EU is starting to copy that. How does the EU make sure that we don’t copy Trump, too?
False equivalence. EU is not controlled by a single president, for such actions there would have to be a near unanimous agreement among the other member states.
So the comparison would be if for instance 45 states agreed to take away privileges from one state in USA, instead of just 1 president, that may not even have won by a majority vote.
There’s a difference between a decision made in a democracy that respect minorities (EU), and a decision made by a president that is granted excessive powers in a dysfunctional democracy.
That’s how the US started. Still, legally, the president cannot change laws. It was normalized under Obama to get around this with executive orders.
It’s a development. If we step on that slippery slope, we should know in advance that we stop before it is too late. And above all, we should not assume that it can’t happen in the EU.
Obama made the least number of executive orders of any president for more than a century. So I seriously doubt he normalized them in any regard.
Also a slippery slope argument is a logical fallacy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope
The EU was created as an economic union with the intention to create a political union. It’s a slippery slope by design.
Interesting. I only remember democrats arguing that Obama had to use the orders because republicans were blocking congress.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2017/01/23/obama-executive-orders/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Cleveland
I’m betting a mechanism could be created. It hasn’t happened because Germany and France don’t want it to, yet. That could change.
Any EU decision must be unanimous, though.
It can still be unanimous among the rest of the nations to be deemed legitimate.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_association
Hungary is undermining the EU at every turn, if the rest of the membership wish to boot them out I think it would be quite easy for them to write up a compelling case for how and why.
There’s no such thing as ‘must be’. There’s only as much as the member states will put up with. If the cost exceeds the value, it will get changed, along with any rules that supposedly prevent it. The only thing the rules do is set a higher cost.
That’s just not true.