Saturday, April 16, 2005
The Vodka was flowing
”The Vodka was flowing on an EU-trip to Kaliningrad”, reads a headline in today’s paper. A number of delegates were drinking so hard that some of them had to be led to their hotel rooms by the City Council hosts and others were puking in their taxies. And who were these happy-go-lucky EU-delegates? They represented the Committee of the Regions (CoR) of the European Union.The delegates from Sweden are selected (not elected) by the Swedish Association of County Councils (and regions) and Swedish Association of Local Governments (SKL). Both associations situated in Stockholm. (They are now quietly joining forces, but that is another story.)
How about the Swedish delegates? Were they drinking as well? And who are they answering to? I cannot recall any of the Swedish “regional delegates” reporting anything of their activities via the press or mass media during the ten years Sweden has been a part of the union.
Wouldn’t it be better if these persons were elected in the regions by the people in open and fair elections? That way we could get rid of some of them. Now we can’t.
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Again, the Swedish mass media's focus on the politicians' drinking or other personal habits, is a typical expression for the heavy Anglo-American influence which Sweden with its Free Church and temperance movement traditions has been under since the 1800's - but not Scania! Of course I _strongly_ agree that the Scanian policitians should be elected by the people, but Swedish religious puritanism shouldn't be a determining factor for their elegibility.
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# posted by 
: 16 April 2005 19:42
: 16 April 2005 19:42 << Home
