Take Your Country Back From Brussels

A quote from Ian Buruma in The New Yorker, 10 January 2011:

Throughout Europe, a growing number of people, in some version of the Tea Party mantra, "want their country back" - from "Brussels," or from overeducated technocrats, or from immigrants.  The alienation of the Belgians is, in this respect, a typically European story.

Shute -> Freire

Atlanticist,

You cite what is entrenched and enshrined as revolutionary, cutting edge pedagogy on Kappert Isle. The little darlings have even figured out how to put wheels on the guillotine as they monitor the hallways and playgrounds.

Let's not forget what Comrade Paulo Freire wrote: "For cultural invasion to succeed, it is essential that those invaded become conviced of their intrinsic inferiority." This is just as applicable to the adult oppressors in the classroom as it is to those local populations who think they deserve an education in their home countries. 

In The Wet

I am implacably opposed to the EU and everything it purports to stand for. However, if we must be part of the damned thing, we could do worse than insist upon it adopting a voting system similar to the one described in Nevil Shute's excellent book 'In The Wet'. (A novel system in which everbody gets a basic vote with the opportunity to obtain up to seven votes in total). The family vote and the church vote sound  particularly appealing to me.