they're usually true. government is amazingly stupid and does these "this can't be possible" things all the time.

If he's going to make claims, I'd like him to back them up. It's a pretty standard practice in this forum. I've seen nothing to support that this decision wasn't made by unelected bureaucrats.

The European Commission is nominated by the member states and elected by the Parliament.

FYP. Slight difference.

But the decision wasn't really made by the European Commission, it was made by the EFSA (European Food Safety Authority) i.e bureaucrats and it was signed off by the President of the European Commission, someone who the people of Europe never vote for directly.

This decision wasn't made by "member states". It was made by the E.U for member states, for their own good (of course!).

No one voted directly for the US Secretary of State and her Under Secretaries. That doesn't make the actions of the department undemocratic tyranny.

Yeah but who appoints the U.S Secretary of State? The President of the U.S. And the President is elected by the people of the United States.

It seems everyone in the E.U but the MEPs in the E.U Parliament are appointed to the position. This makes it very undemocratic. And the Parliament does not have nearly as much power as most Parliaments in the countries making up the E.U have. It's a lower body that cannot introduce legislation. All the big decisions are made by bureaucrats.

music. life is worth experiencing for music alone.

Great article by David Frum on the insanity of the GOP:

The head of states or chief executives are all elected (directly or indirectly) and the MEPS are elected. These two groups are in charge of populating the Commission.

The parliament is elected, has the final say in what becomes law and it appoints the council and commission.

Its just completely incorrect to portray the European parliament as being run by the bureaucrats.

Your course of action is obvious.

Have a Happy Halal Thanksgiving!

Arch-Islamophobe Pam Geller and the war against "stealth halal turkeys" in the American "Thinker".... http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/...nksgiving.html

"Non-Muslims in America and Europe don't deserve to have halal turkey forced upon them in this way, without their knowledge or consent. So this Thanksgiving, fight for your freedom. Find a non-halal, non-Butterball turkey to celebrate Thanksgiving this Thursday."

(Of course, Halal and Kosher methods of slaughter are virtually identical. I worked at a Kosher chicken (& turkey) slaughterhouse for a couple of weeks for some union crap. The process makes the poultry taste better, imo. Cold-water defeathering=less fat removed from skin ...or some such ****.)

Actually in the USA we put in a vote for one presidential candidate or another but we are actually picking members of the electoral college. I don't think anyone in the executive branch of our government is directly voted into office by the people.

Unfortunately it is not that easy.

First of all, the European Council is not appointed by the European Parliament, but consists of the 27 national governments. In addition it's role in legislature is the same as that of the European Parliament. They jointly pass legislation in the ordinary legislative procedure.
Second of all there are still some areas of policy where decisions are made without the EP (read the rest of the article.
Finally there are the comitolgy committees , which mainly consist of bureacrats from the EU commissions and departments of the member states. These implement specifics on a lot of rules. The treaty of Lissabon has given the EP some power to Veto those implementations if they consider them to go against the spirit of a law, but an MEP (who is very pro EU) has told me, that he still considers them far too powerful.

Of course all these people are all appointed by the people of the EU, however inderectly. Still, saying everything is fine and dandy over here is just as wrong as saying the EU is a dictatorship.

Not saying the E.U is a dictatorship, but I think it's clear that it has way too many un-elected technocratic bureaucrats. Can't be good in the long run.

I think you are right there. Looking at the history of he EU there is a trend toward giving the EP more power though. Of course democratic control will always stay a little problematic as long as there are 20+ national media focussing mostly on their national governments and not informing people about Brussels and Strasbourg.
There are enough reasons to remain optimistic however.

entertaining nigel farage video - How dare you tell the italian and greek ppl what to do

srsly, have you heard Dark Side of The Moon? Life is worth experiencing for the first minute and a half of that album alone.


Greatest album of all time!

USA! USA!



More here

Here, Here!

TERRORIST ARRESTED IN NYC

...but he's the wrong kind of brown person so nobody gives a ****

What did the FBI provide? Let me guess, the motivation, planning and materials?

I'm surprised that many people said we aren't perfect!

must have polled obama multiple times

Well said.