With the Lisbon Treaty finally ratified a new chapter begins for the EU. Who will become the first EU president? Tony Blair? Herman van Rompuy?
It seems that Tony Blair doesn't have enough support. My preferred choice is Jean-Claude Juncker as EU president and David Miliband as the High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy.
Didn't this guy always want it? http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0a/Valéry_Giscard_d’Estaing_1978.jpg
That's a myth! http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article5430362.ece http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article6869578.ece
It would have been funny if Bliar had got it, but I suppose it is more fitting for some little chap from a little place to have the post.
Well, you lost. http://www.euronews.net/2009/11/19/eu-appoints-new-leadership-team/ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8367589.stm Don't know what to think about this. Van Rompuy is unknown to many people, and Ashton has no foreign policy experience (as former EU Trade Commissioner). I'd have clearly preferred Juncker & Miliband (or even D'Alema).
The winner! Repped! Viva El Presidente! http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/Herman_Van_Rompuy_portrait.jpg Separated at birth? http://www.acephotos.org/c13389804/john-mcenroe-photo.html "Date of Birth:16 February 1959, Wiesbaden, Hessen, Germany" http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0568501/ Are you serious?
It seems so. Really weird to appoint 2 persons (who surely have some quality) with so few experience and no charisma (in my eyes) as ambassadors of the EU... Here's a comment concerning this topic: CLICK Have a nice weekend.
How typical. An inoffensive nobody for a President (I've lived in Belgium for six months and I'd never heard of the bloke) and a person with zero experience of diplomacy or foreign relations for a Foreign Representative. Still - why spend a couple of million Euros a year on something useful when you can spunk it away on two empty suits? Anyone still in the mood for a bit of "the EU has a grand vision and doesn't just do things that suit it's existence as an institution, irrespective of relevance to the wider world" propaganda? No? Yeah, well, it would be hard I suppose.
That's because he was a grey mouse backbencher for the longest time, until circumstances forced him to take over from Leterme. And that was just because at the time, everyone else refused to nip at the poisoned chalice that the prime minister post had become.
Well then we should be pleased for him, if no one else. Being President of the EU or whatever it is he's now called will be a lot less work and bother than being Prime Minister of Belgium. We should index his golf handicap.
No, I didn't know that. That's hard to do - I had a whole semester on them in my linguistics degree back in uni and it's as precise an art as filleting sushi.
The shock of this election jolted one Belgian man out of his alert-coma! http://www.nydailynews.com/news/wor...in_coma_for_23_years_was_fully_conscious.html
I can't believe how much of a story that's turned out to be internationally. Surely this case is not unique? The doctor who treated him estimates that 40% of the "coma" patients in his situation are likely to exhibit some spells of consciousness...
EU to okay Estonia for Euro in H1 2010 (Reuters) Next in line are Latvia and Lithuania who are also part of the ERM II system.