Essay by Eric Worrall
Emboldened by the recent BoerBurgerBeweging electoral victory in Netherlands, Farmers in Slovenia, Germany and Flanders are staging large protests against the EU’s war on agriculture.
Tractor Protests Spread: 5,000 Slovenian Farmers Stand Against EU Green Agenda
By PETER CADDLE 27 Mar 2023
5,000 farmers are said to have taken part in a tractor rally in Slovenia in order to protest green agenda rules implemented by both national and EU officials in the country.
Thousands of farmers across Slovenia reportedly took to the country’s streets in their tractors on Friday in order to protest various green agenda rules in place in the country.
The demo is reminiscent of similar events that are now regularly taking place in other EU countries, with farmers in Germany, Flanders and the Netherlands all having taken part in similar rallies protesting EU green rules.
According to a report by Euractiv, around 5,000 farmers are said to have taken part in the protest, which has largely been in response to recent ruling restricting the use of pesticides in certain areas over water pollution fears.
…
Read more: https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2023/03/27/tractor-protests-spread-5000-slovenian-farmers-stand-against-eu-green-agenda/
The EU isn’t giving up on their anti-farmer insanity. As WUWT reported a few days ago, to date the EU bureaucratic response to widespread protests appears to be to ignore the complaints, and double down on dictating to elected representatives which fertiliser and pesticide policy goals they need to achieve.
The EU seems to be run by idiots. Anyone who could accept their Farm2Fork program apparently thinks organic agriculture is something other than Biodynamic Agriculture, a nasty remnant of the NSDAP and their ideology.
A quote about not suspecting deliberate evil when incompetence could explain political actions has been offered quite a few times on this blog but simple incompetence does not seem to be nearly enough of an explanation. Would anyone offer incompetence as an excuse for the Inquisition?
No it is not incompetence but a deliberate policy to replace small family farmers with agro-eco-companies who will obey the instructions from the WEFascists to make us eat bugs and plants. Horrifying to know that the most evil man in the world Bill Gates is the largest owner of agricultural land in the US. A point that people might not know about the Netherlands is that you need a licence to farm. I know, I was shocked at such a level of fascist control.
Hanlon’s razor doesn’t account for the malicious idiot.
The EU
seems to beis run by idiots.The EU was set up to be a very high trade wall. It was so successful at that; it went on to do experimentation on its captive subjects.
The Commission hands down the directives. Member states implement them – in their own way
No [democratic] way out
EXIT is the way out. Reestablish sovereignty and eject the EU dictatorship.
The attitude of EU bureaucrats in general, and the EU Commission in particular, to letting the peons actually getting to vote on “vital” things is exemplified by the switch that occurred between the EU Constitution and the Lisbon Treaty.
The “Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe” (TCE) was actually signed in Rome on the 29th of October 2004 “by 53 senior political figures from the [then] 25 member states of the European Union”.
Before that Jean-Luc Dehaene, former Belgian Prime Minister and Vice-President of the EU Convention, wrote in the 2/6/2004 edition of the Irish Times :
After ratification by 18 member states, including referenda endorsing it in Spain and Luxembourg, the rejection of the document by French and Dutch voters in May and June 2005 brought the ratification process for the TCE to an abrupt end.
When the polls indicated the French were changing their minds on the referendum in April 2005 Jean Claude Juncker famously said :
Note that the Wikipedia “2005 French European Constitution referendum” webpage (direct link) includes the following, which is probably also relevant to the “climate debate” since (at least ?) the 1990s :
– – – – –
For the follow-on Lisbon Treaty, only the Irish were “allowed” to put the new “It’s only a Treaty, not a Constitutional document !” to their citizens in a referendum (the Irish Constitution made it obligatory).
During the first campaign Bertie Ahern, the Irish Taoiseach, noted that between the TCE and the Lisbon Treaty :
The Irish initially voted “No” in June 2008 (53.4% to 46.6%, with a turnout of 53%).
They were given “a second chance” in October 2009, when they voted “Yes” (67.1% to 32.9%, with a turnout of 59%).
– – – – –
Since 2005 the EU bureaucrats and commissioners have learned their lesson, and strictly adhere to the following definition of “democracy”.
1) The peasants don’t get to vote on “treaties”. Those will only be ratified by “senior political figures” in Brussels (/ Strasbourg).
2) If a referendum can’t be avoided, and the idiots vote “against their own interests”, the question will be put to them again (and again, and again, …) until they vote “Yes”.
3) Once the peons have voted “Yes”, the question will never, ever, be put to them again.
4) As Jean Claude Juncker also said : “When it becomes serious, you have to lie.”
NB : The civil servants in the UK, aided and abetted by their journalist friends, have learned very similar lessons. See the debate about “reversing Brexit” that has been ongoing since June 2016 in certain sections of the British media.
EU Bureaucrat, “Oh no, global warming is going to slightly impact our agricultural output!” (Based on our flawed government model.)
EU Official in Agriculture Cabinet (that couldn’t grow a lima bean in a dixie cup): “Yes, we should severely restrict our agricultural output to stop global warming!”
People that have a portrait of Trofim Lysenko behind their office desk should NOT be in charge of any agricultural policies.
The agricultural policies seem to attract this sort.
Single out these bureaucrats, plaster their names and faces all over Europe. Let every European know these are the people responsible for your fuel shortages, high energy prices, inflation, supply shortages, lost jobs, wasted taxes and companies fleeing Europe. Bureaucracies don’t cause these problems, people cause these problems. Bring them out into the open so they can be recognized and dealt with.
Bob – I understand what you mean when you say “Bureaucracies don’t cause these problems, people cause these problems.“, and I agree with your proposal to expose those people to public scrutiny, but … it was the bureaucracy that created those people in the first place. If those people fall, there are plenty more lined up behind them to take over and carry on. That’s how an unelected unsupervised bureaucracy operates – it’s an iron law.
Mike I am with you all the way however if the new people taking over see that the position is not a faceless empty desk their judgement will be tempered. I don’t care how many bureaucrats we go through we will keep running them out until they understand that yes THEY are responsible for the decisions THEY make, and WE fully intend to hold them responsible. That is not expecting too much.
Thus the fundamental reason for stripping rule-making authority from unelected bureaucrats and returning it to the elected representatives of the people to whom they are accountable; the only form of just government. Watch bureaucracies change for the better when aspiring tyrants are no longer attracted by the lack of power to compel others to their dictates.
In the U.S., start by repealing and replacing the 1946 Administrative Procedure Act. Yes, I will keep beating this drum until it happens.
All these global-warming “experts” at the EU Commission don’t have a good answer for a simple question:
“What’s for dinner?”
“What’s for dinner?”
In the U.S., the cattlemans’ ad campaign response was, “Beef. It’s What’s for Dinner.”
Now if you ask that same question in Europe, all you hear is crickets!
How about “Crickets. It’s What’s for Dinner.”
Great double entendre, PI.
The fuel and agriculture poverty created in Western Europe will be used to justify annexation of whatever is Ukraine as a exploited frontier client of the EU, where farming, manufacturing, nuclear power, fracking, oil drilling and coal mining will take place all outside of the EU proper.
Soviet researchers used to study how to disrupt and defeat the food supply of western countries. Someone had to keep up the work.
Then, when a shortage of food is created and people start to starve due to their insane, inane policies, they can blame ‘climate change’…. You can’t fix stupid.
“they can blame ‘climate change’”
They’ll blame Trump.
You underestimate the power of willful, stupid people to blame the problems they create on something else and apply another stupid (non-) “solution”.
Talk about biting the hand that feeds you… I knew that most politicians went into politics in the first place because they lacked the ability to do anything else, but I never imagined they were this stupid.
Politicians are not stupid. However, the people who think they can make themselves better off by electing politicians to expropriate resources from others to themselves are not only stupid, but evil.
Perhaps stupid is the wrong word. But these politicians are either lacking in common sense, or they let their sense of entitlement and greed override it. I’ve known some very educated people who were totally lacking in common sense because they have been sheltered from the real world and have no idea where even their food comes from.
I think stupid is quite often the right word. Here in Woke-achusetts, I’ve talked to quite a few state politicians and so far, they are ALL stupid- hardly having a clue about the issues- especially in my field, forestry. The local politicians are far worse.
I am with you on that. Never underestimate the stupidity of politicians. When you think they have reached peak stupid, rest assured there are many levels worse they still wish to explore and are determined to go there..
I offer you Mr Biden amongst others. Politicians are, in the main, stupid. That doesn’t mean that they don’t see opportunities for self enrichment.
Yes, Biden is mentally deficient and corrupt, but he IS in office. My only point was that the ‘stupidity arrow’, to coin a phrase, should be pointed at the idiots who put him there.
The EU shows the dangers to representative democracy posed by a beaurocracy
The rules and regulations are created without any approval by the people and slowly, step by step freedom disappears.
Until, you find yourself governed by an unelected trade commission and your parliament is powerless.
Sort of like the EPA in the US. Nixon’s revenge.
Definition of a Leftist Deep State.
So far as the EU is concerned, that’s been the plan from the start.
Time for Allexit.
The peoples of Europe exit the EU and regain their freedom.
That may be our future ICE cars, oecologic correct, wood based, no oil, no gasoline
The ancient version
Stylish, in a sort of Rube Goldberg fashion.
For a little more style and no FF try this
There is nothing new under the sun. The old version looks better; they had better backyard mechanics.
EU Brussels seems to have an unconscious death wish. Ban ICE cars—right, no cars. Ban fertilizer—right, no food. Force grid renewables—right, blackouts and excessive e costs.
As the farmers are now showing, will not end well for the unelected EU.
Rud, are you saying a lack of accountability leads to extreme accountability?
Eventually.
Well, if people see lamp posts not used for their primary purpose, they have to start wondering about other uses.
But there does not seem to be any practical way for this to go anywhere… short of a EU-wide civil war. Which does not look impossible right now, but far from imminent. In that a civil war requires either a split in the existing military forces as frictions rise, or massive external support. The latter is impossible due to lack of easy access for the possible supporters… unless something would push Turkey to jump off its comfortable fence to the side opposing NATO — but this would probably require an act of stupidity impressive even in these days.
An old Russian saying claims, «Anarchy is the mother of Order». Anarcho-tyranny evidently can keep itself from sliding into full anarchy for decades, but there’s no reason to believe it’s actually stable.
It looks like the modern record of 70 years was set by the old Soviet Union. China isn’t making many of the same mistakes, but we’ll see.
This only mildly inconveniences the ones in Brussel. So far.
When will this end so that we can get on with living our lives?
And today in the UK Telegraph, some news about the hydrogen boiler trials…
Households that faced being forced to switch to hydrogen or a heat pump in a seaside town will be able to keep their gas boilers in a U-turn following backlash from residents.
A community in Whitby, Ellesmere Port, had been told it would have to switch to hydrogen, or be forced to install a heat pump, if they were chosen as the location for trials starting next year.
But gas network Cadent, which is bidding to run the trial, is now planning to build a parallel grid under the area to allow households to opt out, The Telegraph understands.
The climbdown follows an outcry after it emerged gas networks would be given the power to enter the homes of people that refused to take part in the trial so they could switch off their gas supply for safety.
And it follows 10 months of fierce opposition from many of the 2,000 residents of Whitby in the trial area, who expressed concerns over the safety of hydrogen, as well as the disruption to their homes from ripping out boilers and gas appliances.
Concerns have also been raised by residents about the long-term cost of hydrogen, predicted to be 70 per cent higher than natural gas, and the implications for insurance and house prices in the area.
Cadent is one of two gas networks bidding to conduct the trial, which will inform the Government’s final decision on the use of hydrogen for home heating. It is in competition with NGN, which is proposing to run a similar trial in Redcar.
The problem is, what happens if the residents just say no? In that case, Cadent and NGN under the old plan could not leave their gas supply. They could not simply disconnect them and leave them without heating. So they would have to install a heat pump instead.
Given the choice, and given the opposition, most or all of the village would probably opt for the heat pumps!
So now a similar question will arise: what happens if they construct a parallel network and still meet with large scale refusals to participate?
This is an important indication of the lack of realism about the whole hydrogen program. The opposition is going to be the same everywhere. It is going to involve, as in this trial, replacing most of the gas pipeline grid to accommodate the refuseniks. In order to deliver hydrogen for which there is currently no source on the scale required except natural gas. But cracking the natural gas leads, of course, to great energy losses on the way through, and there is absolutely no point in it. Its a way of increasing, not reducing, CO2 emissions.
So, the hydrogen maniacs will say, we just keep the existing pipework and we add 20% hydrogen from some unspecified source to the existing supply.
Right. And when are we going to see pilot projects and proper trials to make sure this is safe, given the antique state of much of the last 100 yards plumbing in UK cities? As I said in a previous thread, look at the plumbing in a typical UK old build terraced houses city street. You’ll find iron pipes entering the houses, often well rusted on the surface, many decades old, coupled to copper to get to the boilers. Will this hold up to 20% hydrogen? In all cases? Are you sure?
And why do this anyway, since the aim is to move everyone to heat pumps, thus making the residential gas grid surplus to requirements?
The complete irrationality of these green measures makes one’s hair stand on end. People seem to have lost all ability to reason consequentlally, if something is labelled as green they want to do it and impose it, regardless of whether it makes any sense and even regardless of whether it actually lowers the emissions they are so worried about.
You are right of course but the politician’s cry is “we must be seen to be doing something”. They don’t care if it doesn’t make sense – they can always find someone to say Yes Minister.
By the way Whitby is part of Ellesmere Port at the bottom of the Mersey Estuary and near the entrance to the Manchester Ship Canal. I’d hardly call it a “seaside town”.
We used to call such idiocy the plan of the week and the policy of the month.
There are several ways to produce so called E fuel. The German car industry has just forced the EU Green energy loons to accept E fuel in ICE vehicles as an ongoing option past 2035.
The production of E-fuel from farming activities as has been promoted in the USA tells the Green anti energy zealots they have to close down that agricultural E-fuel down if they are to achieve zero reliable energy availability which is their ambition.
The fact half of Europe will starve to death under their anti farming policies does not concern these Climate Alarmist zealots one bit.
Sri Lanka’s attempt to ban modern fertilisers went well.
(No sarc tag needed, surely…)
To this day, I did hear a single word in French continuous news channels on as we call it “Pays Bas” (the low countries). We have more and more news channels and extremely few information on the world, even on Europe.