Bulgarian “Ataka” party leader Volen Siderov (feature image) has proposed a national referendum on the secession of Bulgaria from the EU and NATO. We’re about to see a prime example of why “one size fits all” western ideas spell disaster in eastern Europe.
So America, NATO and the western oligarchs wanted a new Cold War, well they got it. Only this time we may not win out. Let me make this news as simple for the uninformed reader as possible. It Bulgaria abandons the west, and if Putin’s Russia assists Russia’s old ally, the EU is done, and the Euro with it. Given Brussels’ inattention to Bulgaria and other nations over the past months and years, who could blame the Bulgarian people for swapping allegiances? Hungarian, turned American, billionaire George Soros must be wringing his hands, over a world currency about to be flushed. But that’s another story, for now it’s Bulgaria’s future that’s at stake.
If I may, let me cement Bulgaria’s biggest problem for you. “When was the last time you heard “Bulgaria” mentioned in a positive sentence?” Okay, a positive sentence that did not involve cheap ski destination? Never, right?
While you think about this, let’s examine the Bulgarian people’s plight as EU experimental guinea pigs . First let’s look at how Bulgaria’s PM Boyko Borisov (belwo) has had to play shoe shine boy to the European Commission just to beg, borrow or steal enough money to keep the country afloat. At least this is the western assessment of how Bulgarian political favor works. In reality, Borisov and the other Bulgarian tough guys, they play the EU bean counters like their traditional gadulka. Underestimation, the chink in any leadership armor, it’s so prevalent in the west it smells. On many levels, this most recent money play by Bulgaria’s politicians, it’s the most dangerous and potentially disastrous the EU has faced. And it’s not all about South Stream, that’s just the “straw” breaking the union camel’s back.
Talk Is Cheap, Or Expensive in the East
Brussels is all about talk, talk, talk, it’s so cheapened the fabric of a united Europe, it’s sad almost. This (PDF) European Commission Bulgarian Reform Recommendation from four years ago, is indicative of the anemic EU system, as it applies to eastern Europe in particular. If you read the document, even the wording of the introduction says “weak” under the heading “having regard” for a maze of bureaucratic committees and previous regulations.
“Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, and in particular Articles 121(2) and 148(4) thereof…”
And to the Council Regulation (EC) No 1466/97, to Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011 , the recommendation of the European Commission, the resolutions of the European Parliament, the conclusions of the European Council, the opinion of the Employment Committee, and finally the the Economic and Financial Committee. Meanwhile a father who lost his job in Varna, his family begs for food on the sidewalk in a scene from War and Peace. Announcing a ten year plan, Europe 2020, the commission’s dogma here tells of Luxembourg and Frankfurt bankers leaning on lawyers and snake oil salespersons, and the good old USA and NATO, to calm the turbulent masses with bullshit. Any Romanian, Bulgarian, Moldovan, Albanian, or Serb with a brain, first laughed, and then scoffed at Brussels’ miscalculations as to running government. Were they really serious?
Let me quote once more from this majestic, and awe inspiring EU document, which actually foretells of a disillusioning disaster to come, if you read and think it right :
“On 29 June 2012, the Heads of State or Government decided on a Compact for Growth and Jobs, providing a coherent framework for action at national, EU and euro area levels using all possible levers, instruments and policies. They decided on action to be taken at the level of the Member States, in particular expressing full commitment to achieving the objectives of the Europe 2020 Strategy and to implementing the country specific recommendations.”
Just what the hell does that actually say? I can tell you what it says to a Bulgarian politician. “Get all you can while the getting is good, these people are idiots.” Flying to commission meetings and cocktail parties, eastern Europeans laughed their way to the hors d’oeuvres recalling former Kremlin dinner parties. Eastern Europeans are tough as nails owing mightily to austerity under Communism, and the Germans and Frenchmen they live in green, serine pastureland with echoes of Connecticut, Ohio, and Vegas scattered about. Excuse the cynicism, but no wonder Bulgaria is about to revolt. But let’s get down to the real insanity of EU bean counters here. Let’s look at how the EU demands Bulgarians screw their countrymen.
The mighty bankers of the EU forthwith recommend that Bulgaria should take action within the period 2013-2014 to (among other things):
“Phase out early retirement options, introduce the same statutory retirement age for men and women and implement active labour market policies that enable older workers to stay longer in the labour market.”
EU Decrees – Eastern European Toilet Paper
Reading on into this fairy tale legislative rag, I shudder at how America, my own country, so obtusely dealt with Europe in the last year. Obama’s power play for the energy titans, versus Russia, his demand for EU sanctions against Putin damned the EU to join every other failed political experiment in history. NATO’s march, Brussels’ dream of an economic empire in Europe, was shot down by a supposed ally. America back stabbed a continent, now Bulgaria, Moldova, Greece, Spain, Italy, and a dozen smaller states know it, deep down. The EU’s promise of democracy and equality, of prosperity in bushels, it’s in tatters, ruined by machinations from over the seas.
In the death throes of defeatism, November’s restart to Bulgaria for EU Operational Programme Environment, and other penny ante handouts to quell the public outcries, they’re now useless. If Bulgaria is not fully backing Russia and prosperity in a year, I’ll eat your hat and mine. The leadership in Brussels, or in all the western European capitals, haven’t the slightest idea how to govern in eastern Europe. When America was wheeling and dealing big dollars in east and south Europe financial circles, the EU could maintain their form of bribery. Now that the debt is unbearable, and Russian rubles are out of the picture, poverty is a coming reality. What most of Europe needs, is strong, undaunted leadership capable of telling Washington to go to hell. Instead, Brussels has become the new Georgetown legal circuit.
East is East, West is West
Here’s the biggest problem the EU has always faced (a basic geography lesson). The widely varied cultural differences in between EU nations, particularly the eastern European ones, it’s problematic in ways Berlin, Brussels, and Paris never even worried about when the Iron Curtain fell. The western powers, NATO, they bumbled the whole concept of the European Union from the start. The power vacuum created when Moscow retracted, it was filled with leadership clueless as to how their new citizenry did things, how business was run, and how Communism had for generations mediated problems. Barack Obama’s recent “exceptional Americanism” reflects the arrogance and stupidity the EU has embraced the last dozen years. Bulgaria is not France, Bulgaria is not Ohio, and poverty stricken under the promise of Nirvana, simply will not do. Tell these people what they need to do, and they’ll do it. Don’t recommend their leaders steal more money. Here’s another example of how EU leadership misjudges their eastern brethren, and the document reads:
“The Commission has today taken 108 decisions, including 12 reasoned opinions and 5 referrals to the European Union’s Court of Justice (for instance: #Bulgariafor failing to protect endangered species, #Poland due to illegal reasons for excluding candidates from procurement procedures or #Germany – failure to respect rules on access to #justice-)
Now that should have put the fear of God in every Bulgarian crooked politician. There’s more of the lack of real commitment, they’ve left Bulgaria reeling under the weight of widespread corruption. From pharmaceuticals to parking tickets, and everything in between, Bulgaria is a victim of EU weakness, lack of a strong centralized command and direction, and the same old misunderstandings of the past. These people admire strong leadership, all east European’s do, especially the tough business people who’ve always controlled things. A sissy accountant from Luxembourg spouting useless rhetoric to a former oligarch or Bulgarian strongman, it’s like controlling sharks by pouring blood in the water. And on the other end of the spectrum, the money never trickles down to the hungry Bulgarian caught in the trap.
Let’s put Bulgarian austerity woes aside for a moment. Never being able to retire, that’s a spike in the heart of older Bulgarians. The new generations, if they’ve not moved to Germany or Sweden to find work, they’re in a hopeless situation. The EU’s overall youth unemployment rate hovers at 23.5% overall. By comparison, India has less unemployment than 80 percent of European countries. And the real EU killer is, Germany is the only large member state with youth unemployment less than 10%. And so on, and so on, and so on.
Then the USA of A comes to the rescue again. Obama’s string pullers in London, Houston, and Dubai need Russia out of the energy market, and fast. So we have NATO expansion into Ukraine, Russia’s traditional steppe is under siege by, you guessed it, the European Union. Eastern Ukraine and the Russians there, being shelled into extinction by a Kiev regime put in place by Washington. Putin, the Russian strongman who’s elevated the middle class there, he’s now the new Hitler on the horizon. His so-called South Stream pipeline, aimed squarely at propelling Bulgaria upward – it’s over.
Turkey Cooking – The Bulgarian Goose
That was, and is, the breaking point for eastern Europe. Brussels fell prey to the same arrogance all empires exude, in this case an American hegemony that could care less about Italy, Spain, Greece, or even Latvia. You see to Americans, unfortunately, Europe may as well be the third world. Give an American the keys to a new SUV, a tank of gas, and a credit card, and most would sanction invading China, until the gas runs out. This is the reality Angela Merkel, the Brussels Parliament, and Sophia’s leadership must wrestle with. America does not care. You are pawns to be used, our politicians and business people will suck the blood out of you. Get it? Vladimir Putin has sent a powerful message, but you need to look back to Ottoman rule of southeast Europe to understand it. Russian natural gas to Turkey, it’s the geo-strategic power play of this century, and Bulgarians will not be flushed down the toilet by Washington nor Brussels. Mark my words, Putin’s pipeline will stretch to Bulgaria, one way or another. It is essential for Bulgaria to avert disaster.
Will Bulgaria secede from the EU? You bet, sooner or later, the European Union is over anyway. For Sophia, the best course in my view is to be first. Russia, the only regional player with any future economic potential (unused stuff, you know?) will either prevail, or perish, just as Mr. Putin suggested a few days ago. This is east European practicality at its core, and Bulgarians who read English, you know it. Russia is not going down, the EU is. As for my American countrymen, if they do not wake up, our children will have nothing left to enjoy. We’re burning up resources faster than any sustainability model known.
For Volen Siderov’s secession movement, failed democracy in his homeland is potently obvious. I’d say a little bit of PR, some incentives from Russia, and this Attack party bid to dump NATO is a done deal. As for Siderov, the media mogul turned politician has been, like Putin, compared to Hitler himself. What with all the Nazi name calling flying in Europe these days, it’s wondrous all out war is not already upon us. The other side of the Bulgarian good cop versus bad cop policy game is Boyko Borisov playing Russia and the west against one another to maximum advantage. The other day the PM offered to turn Varna into the LNG storage bastion of the region, making China, the Saudis, America and of course Russia drool at the mouth. If Bulgarians can’t prosper one way, they’re damned determined to another. It’s Ukraine in reverse, for those with insight. Putin is surely, a genius.
If the people (and God) will it, Bulgaria will soon be an independent nation with potential again. The country that have lived in this region some 44,000 years, the legendary Thracians, the decedents of Khan Tervel, the great defender of the faithful (First Bulgarian Empire from 681–1018) they once again play a pivotal role in history. In Brussels, it’s high time high minded ideas of superiority evaporated, Bulgarians and other east peoples, should not really be trifled with. Watch for high drama from Sophia in the days and weeks to come.