The vaulting ambition of Anthony Blair

Six years ago today, on my blog Ironies, linked here, I considered the November 2002 Cardiff speech of then Prime Minister Tony Blair. The text was difficult to trace six years back and as I then predicted "I anticipate the speech might become practically invisible as the months go by" I now cannot find the full text to link, the original report on the web site of the UK Berlin Embassy not now being available. Yet the ambition of Tony Blair, or perhaps I should say "lust" for the post of EU President has clearly not lessened, indeed the obscene manoeuvres over the Lisbon Treaty, mainly designed to deliver an appointed multi-term EU President, bear witness to Blair's disgusting determination to get to the top, even though the ruins left behind in the shape of a decimated country and economy bear witness to his unsuitability! The fact that only six months after the speech was delivered I could only find a link at the Berlin Embassy lends credence to the thought that the entire speech, made outside of London, was an application to the highest authority for the Presidential post - but intended for early burial in the UK! Happily I quoted some sections in my original posting which I repeat herewith: The basic ideology should be described in this way. Europe is the voluntary coming together of sovereign nations. Their will is to combine together in the institutions of Europe in order to further their common interests. In so far as it is necessary to achieve these interests, they therefore pool their sovereignty in Europe. There is no arbitrary or fixed limit as to what they do collectively; but whether they do it depends on their decision as a group of nations. So whilst the origin of European power is the will of sovereign nations, European power nonetheless exists and has its own authority and capability to act. The negation of any democracy comes at the end, the sting in the tail as it were:- It should be democratic; greater integration, rooted in the freely given decisions of the nations that make up Europe; with greater openness and transparency of decision-making; greater participation and interaction of National Parliaments; greater connection between the European Parliament and the decisions of Europe; and with the independence of the Commission guaranteeing that the interests of smaller nations do not weigh any less than the large.