Vaclav Klaus: The Man with the E.U.'s Fate in His Hands - TIME »
Posted By gamahuche 5 months, 3 weeks ago in NewsWill he sign it or will he spike it? That's the question lingering in Europe's capitals as Czech President Vaclav Klaus holds the key to the European Union's future...
The Czech government first submitted the treaty for ratification in parliament in January 2008, but its opponents, encouraged by euroskeptic Klaus, managed to put the painstakingly negotiated accord on the back burner for over a year. Finally, the Czech Senate was the last parliamentary chamber in the E.U. to approve the treaty on May 6, passing the hot potato onto the president, whose signature is required for ratification. Klaus, 67, opposes the treaty as a boon to the E.U.'s bigger members and a threat to his country's sovereignty, and he has since kept Europe on tenterhooks as it waits to see whether or not he will sign.
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gamahuche
"I would rather be a square peg than fit in a pigeon hole" -
an essay which won me the "Lamb Essay Prize" at the Religious ...
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gamahuche5 months, 3 weeks ago
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I've posted a parallel story today. The other, about Vaclav Havel meshes with this in the manner that the two together effectively contrast this president, who spent the Communist period comfortably ensconced as a bureaucratic economist with our previous president Vaclav Havel who suffered through the Communist period in prisons and very undesirable jobs and also enjoying himself with illegal Rock and Roll. Two more different Vaclav's would be difficult to imagine though their lives make a strange and interesting counterpoint.
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What's the main problem with Klaus - well there are two. One of them being that his private life is a great pretence, the other that he hasn't grasped the idea that a president should represent the wishes of his people rather than follow his individual ego-ridden prejudices.
The Havel story is here: http://www.propeller.com/story/2009/05/21/freed-fr... -
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