The European Commission: An Aggregate of the States?

The European Union’s governmental institutions are not limited to the European Council and the Council of Ministers, both of which represent the state governments directly at the federal level. Nor, moreover, is the E.U. an aggregation of its states. In foreign affairs, for example, the E.U.’s foreign minister, Kaja Kallas, can speak and take decisions on the basis of consensus rather than the unanimous consent of state-level officials being required. Therefore, the Von der Leyen administration did not overreach in taking the “decision to send the Commissioner for the Mediterranean, Dubravka Suica, as an observer to the first former gathering of the United States President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace” on 19 February, 2026.[1] That Suica was merely an observer suggests that the objecting state officials were overreacting as well as misconstruing the E.U. as a confederation of sovereign states.

The Board of Peace originated at the very least in part to guide the real-estate redevelopment in Gaza. Accordingly, a spokesperson at the Commission explained the E.U.’s interest as follows: “Our participation is really to be seen in the context of our long-standing commitment to the implementation of the ceasefire in Gaza, as well as our commitment to take part in international efforts when it comes to the recovery and reconstruction of Gaza. We do believe that we need to be at the table, otherwise we will simply be a payer and not a player.”[2] E.U. was at the time “the biggest donor of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people, with a total contribution of €1.65 billion to the territories” since Israel’s genocide began.[3] Also, as many as 14 of the E.U.’s 27 states sent their own representatives to the meeting. Therefore, objections by a handful of states to the E.U.’s observer can be relegated as overblown and unjustified, and likely fueled in actuality by ideological objections to the U.S. federal president. That most of the state representatives at the meeting were diplomats or civil servants whereas the E.U. observer was a “political representative” is a petty objection, and thus likely a political subterfuge overlaying anti-American or anti-Trump resentment or jealousy. That the same people who objected to the “political representative” would likely insist that the E.U. was not a political union also points to a hidden agenda.

Regarding the E.U.’s executive branch itself, the European Commission, a state official of France, Jean-Noel Barrot, erroneously claimed that the approval of the E.U.’s state governments was required for the Commission to speak out or act in foreign policy. Slovenia’s Tanja Fajon even insisted that unanimous approval was necessary.[4] Such a view essentially places the Commission as subordinate to the Council of Ministers and ignores any lawful influence that the European Parliament might have with the Commission. The stances of the two state officials treat the E.U. as if it were a confederation—a mere aggregation of fully-sovereign states—rather than a modern federation wherein governmental sovereignty is “dual” rather than unitary.

To be sure, the European Council and the Council of the E.U. play a role in the setting of the E.U.’s foreign policy, and in those councils the principle of unanimity applies, but those two councils are not the exclusive setters of such policy; any executive branch has some leeway, and sending an observer to a meeting is hardly a substantive foreign policy, especially given the E.U.’s direct involvement in Gaza. Sending an observer can hardly be interpreted as an overreach in need of a unanimous decision by the Council of Ministers.

That some state officials were so interested in subordinating the E.U.’s executive branch to the Councils, while leaving the European Parliament out completely as if E.U. citizens had not voted for distinctly federal lawmakers suggests that the state governments have too much power (given their sense of entitlement) at the federal level. Switching foreign policy to qualified-majority voting in the Councils would be more in line with the fact that the E.U.’s foreign minister can indeed speak and act on the basis of consensus and with a nod to the distinctive foreign interests of the European Union, which the Councils cannot protect because they represent the state governments, which have their own interests. In short, neither the Commission nor the E.U. itself is a mere aggregate of the policies and interests of the state governments. Retaining the principle of unanimity in the Councils invites that mistaken view and thus qualified-majority voting is more consistent with the E.U. overall. For neither the Commission nor the Parliament is subordinate to either or both of the Councils as if the E.U. were a confederation of sovereign states.

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1. Mared G. Jones, “France Says Commission Lacks ‘Mandate’ to Join Board of Peace Meeting as Brussels Remains Defiant,” Euronews.com, 19 February 2026.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.

Trump Meets Putin on Ukraine: On the Exclusion of the E.U.

Like proud male birds dancing for a female for the chance to reproduce, U.S. President Trump and Ukraine’s Zelensky engaged in public posturing ahead of the negotiations set to take place between Trump and Vlad the Impaler Putin of Russia in Alaska on August 15, 2025. For the public, to take the postures as real positions, set in stone, would be nothing short of depraved naivete. Missing in action in all this posturing was E.U. President Van der Leyen and the E.U.’s foreign minister. Instead, the governors of two, albeit large, E.U. states were busy making demands as if their respective political bases were more powerful than the E.U. as a whole. In short, Van der Leyen missed an opportunity to join the dance of posturing.

The full essay is at "Trump Meets Putin on Ukraine." 

Strength in Numbers: The European Union in Foreign Policy

One of the chief benefits of having an empire-scale union of states is the sway, or influence, abroad that comes with strength of numbers. Dwarfing the foreign-policy of a state government, and even of an informal bloc of a few states plus others outside the union, an empire-scale united-policy enacted to influence other countries can make the delegation of the additional governmental sovereignty to the federal level worth losing some state power abroad. I contend that this lesson can be gained by examining the European-Russian relation during the month of May in 2025.

On May 14, 2025, the E.U. “agreed to impose a new round of sanctions against Russia, threatening to slap on another one if the country continues to refuse the 30-day unconditional ceasefire proposed by the White House and the ‘Coalition of the Willing’.”[1] The White House refers to the U.S., another empire-scale union of states, but the “coalition” is a more nebulous construction; it consisted of three E.U. states plus Britain, which had seceded from the E.U. and was thus separate. One of those states, Germany, threatened Russia with immediate sanctions only to see Putin continue his military invasion of Ukraine. When a person’s “line in the sand” is so easily and quickly crossed, that person should re-evaluate one’s own vantage-point for what it is. Even a small bloc of states plus a former state is not sufficient to stop a Russian bear in its tracks. It is no accident, therefore, that the E.U. lost little time in announcing its own sanctions against Russia. The lesson is that the state leaders should have put the E.U. commission in the driver’s seat in the first place, rather than demonstrate the need for collective action that the E.U. could provide.

Macron of the E.U. state of France said on May 12, 2025 that an “unconditional ceasefire is not preceded by negotiations” but he could do little to back up that statement, given that Putin had just dismissed an immediate unconditional ceasefire without paying any price.[2] That an informal coalition, or bloc, had “previously demanded a full ceasefire a precondition to starting negotiations” meant nothing to Putin.[3] Continuing to make military progress on the ground in Ukraine, he had no incentive to respond to the bloc, but to the extent that Russia could suffer from sanctions from the E.U., Putin would have more reason to take an ultimatum seriously.

That the governors of three E.U. states chose to exercise their retained power in foreign policy rather than go through the Commission points to a vulnerability of the European Union from foreign policy being a shared competency while the state governments hold most of the governmental sovereignty in the union. It is very tempting to a state leader to grab media attention by taking the lead in a foreign policy that the E.U. could do with more power internationally.

There is also the conflict of interest in a bottom-heavy federal system wherein state leaders resist delegating enough authority to the federal level so it can function effectively, especially with regard to international relations. The E.U. had a foreign minister at the time, and a federal president, and yet three state leaders decided to spearhead a push for Russia to agree to an immediate ceasefire anyway. Their approach was doomed from the start because Russia could easily dismiss the threats from a few states even though the U.S. was on board on an immediate ceasefire.

So, it is problematic that once the E.U. effectively took over from the bloc of a few states, the need for the state level institutions to take a lesson and be willing to give the E.U. more authority to make and enforce foreign policy, as by applying qualified-majority voting to such policy, was not grasped in the public media and discourse. Lest there be any doubt concerning the power of a small bloc of (large) E.U. states, Dmitry Medvedev wrote on social media: “Macron, Metz, Starmer and Tusk were supposed to discuss peace in Kyiv. Instead, they are blurting out threats against Russia . . . You think that’s smart, eh? Shove these peace plans up your pangender arses.”[4] Ouch!  I submit that the E.U. announcing additional sanctions would not be taken as the blurting out of threats was taken, in part because of the much greater power of the E.U. vis á vis Russia. Macron, Metz, and Tusk looked like the three musketeers, with Starmer as a former fourth, relative to the E.U.’s institutions.

Unfortunately, the state level of governance had held back those institutions from being able to leverage the “power in numbers” in foreign policy that could otherwise be realized by the Commission with oversight by the Parliament and the European Court of Justice, and with a check by the involvement of the states at the federal level. Too much of a check by the latter, including taking the lead and ignoring the shared competency of the Commission, was detracting not only from a more perfect union, but one that could have enough sway internationally to operate as a real check on Russia as well as Israel.

Put another way, as the Trump administration was warming up to Russia and Israel, the world could ill-afford to have the Europeans resorting to informal blocs of a few E.U. states due to institutional clutching of power at the state level and a lack of leadership there for the good of the whole (E.U.) over state politicians’ self-interest for power and stardom. The breakdown of the international order, with the UN being politically impotent to stop Russia or Israel in their excessive aggression, means that Europeans could ill-afford continuing to allow their state officials to styme action at the E.U. level on the world stage.

Euroskeptics have feared the advent of a huge “federal state” without realizing that hamstringing E.U. institutions on competencies that are shared with the states only hurts the European Union itself. In other words, compromising a federal system because it is wrongly assumed that for such a system to exist (and thus that the E.U.’s system has not been federal from the start), there must be a massive state at the top, leaves Europe vulnerable to a real massive state—that of Russia.

This is not to say that Europe must also have a massive state; ironically, that the E.U. has a federal system enables there not to be a massive state covering the E.U.’s territory, for dual-sovereignty can and should be balanced such that neither the federal nor the state level dominates the whole federal system. In his book, Federal Government, Ken Wheare denies that such a balance is necessary to an ongoing and stable federal system of checks and balances. I disagree. Under his theory, the federal level of the E.U. could gain so much authority that the state governments are utterly dominated and still the federal system would work. I disagree. Whereas the U.S. federalism could be better balanced by having the states empowered to act as a check on the federal institutions, E.U. federalism could be better balanced by having the federal level gain additional competencies, with the states benefitting from the resulting collective action while still having enough sovereignty to check the federal institutions. Whereas the U.S. could benefit by increasing the formal involvement of the state governments in foreign policy in Washington, the E.U. could benefit by increasing the formal involvement of the E.U.’s president and foreign minister in crafting and enforcing foreign policy to defend Europe from aggressive powers abroad, whether they are empires in themselves or sovereign states.

It is telling that a year before Macron returned to his state capital of Paris empty-handed (just as Merz headed back to Berlin empty-handed) after Putin had dismissed the state-level demand for a ceasefire in Ukraine, Macron had given a major speech on the need for Europe to defend itself. “In the next decade,” he had said, “the risk is immense that [Europe] will be weakened, even relegated.”[5] The clear conclusion for us in contrasting those two events is that the state governments should formally allow the E.U. to take the lead in foreign policy rather than have state leaders attempt to “steal the thunder” by charging out in front as if by instinct with the federal officials tasked with foreign policy only able to look on. Yes, Virginia, the E.U. does indeed have a federal system, but this does not mean that transferring more governmental sovereignty on foreign policy (and defense) to the federal level would necessarily turn Europe into a federal state as Euroskeptics fear; the sort of federal consolidation that has occurred over centuries in the U.S. can be avoided even as Europeans lend greater balance to the E.U.’s federal system.

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1. Jorge Liboreiro, “EU Agrees New Sanctions on Russia and Threatens More If Putin Refuses Ceasefire,” Euronews.com, 14 May 2025.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Shaun Walker, “Vladimir Putin Rejects Ceasefire Ultimatum Proposed by European Leaders,” The Guardian, May 10, 2025.
5. Clea Caulcutt, “Macron Warns Europe ‘Can Die’ in Alarmist Speech on Protectionism, Geopolitical Threats,” Politico.com, April 25, 2024.

Tariffs as a Negotiating Tactic: Undercut by Wall Street Expediency

With all the economic and political turmoil from the anticipated American tariffs, it may be tempting, especially for financially-oriented CEOs and billionaires looking at quarterly reports, to call the whole thing off even though doing so would deflate the American attempt to renegotiate trade bilaterally with other countries. The concerns of the wealthy, whether corporations or individuals, have their place, but arguably should not be allowed to "lead the proverbial dog from behind, lest the dog run in circles and get nowhere." Moreover, the notion that any goal that is difficult and takes some time to materialize can or even should be vetoed by momentary passions at the outset is problematic and short-sighted. That U.S. President Trump's announcement of bilateral tariffs quickly brought fifty countries to the negotiating table is significant as a good sign for the United States, as long as that country's powerful business plutocracy (i.e., private concentrations of wealth that seek to govern) can be kept from vetoing the emergent trade policy, which at least in part is oriented to trade negotiation and ultimately to the notion that fair trade is conducive to increased free trade. 

The full essay is at "Tariffs as a Negotiating Tactic."

The E.U. and U.S. on Defense and Foreign Policy: Helping Ukraine

In March, 2025 after the U.S. had direct talks with Russia on ending Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the E.U. stepped up its game in helping Ukraine militarily. This was also in the context of a trade war between the E.U. and U.S., which did not make transatlantic relations any better. The E.U.’s increasing emphasis on military aid to Ukraine and the related publicity inadvertently showcased how federalism could be applied to defense and foreign policy differently that it has in the U.S., wherein the member states are excluded, since the Articles of Confederation, when the member states were sovereign within the U.S. confederation. Although both manifestations of early-modern federalism have their respective benefits and risks, I contend that the E.U.’s application of federalism to the two governmental domains of power is more in the spirit of (dual-sovereignty) federalism, even though serious vulnerabilities can be identified.

Kaja Kallas, the E.U.’s foreign minister, “pitched an ambitious plan to mobilize up to to €40 billion in fresh military support for Ukraine, which, if achieved, would represent a twofold increase from the defence assistance the European Union provided” in 2024.[1] Whether premised on the assumption that Russia would not agree to a truce or that Ukraine would need additional leverage in negotiations, “the Kallas initiative” put the E.U.’s defense and foreign policy in the spotlight globally. Lest it be assumed by assuming an exact likeness to the U.S. federal system that the E.U.’s defense and foreign policy areas were exclusive competencies (i.e., domains of enumerated power) at the federal level, the E.U.’s state governments, including their respective foreign ministers, played a significant role in the actual provision to Ukraine of artillery ammunition, missiles, drones, and even fighter jets. This arrangement, which includes overall federal coordination and significant funding, resembles the directive, which is a federal law that requires the state governments enact legislation to implement the content of the federal law. That Kallas, the federal foreign minister, took “into account” non-lethal provisions, including “training and equipment for Ukrainian brigades, . . . to ensure the participation of neutral” state governments shows just how much of a role the E.U. states had at the time in defense and foreign policy.[2]

Marco Rubio, Kallas’ counterpart in the U.S., would not have even consulted with state governments in coming up with an initiative regarding Ukraine. That approach, wherein foreign policy and defense are completely federalized, does not reflect modern (i.e., dual-sovereignty) federalism, whereas the shared competencies of the E.U. do. This is not to say that every enumerated power or federal competency should be shared. In fact, that the principle of unanimity applied to foreign policy and defense in the E.U. represents a serious vulnerability. Essentially, the requirement that every state government consent treats modern (dual-sovereignty) federalism as if it were confederalism, where the states hold all governmental sovereignty. Similarly, David Cameron, a prime minister of the ex-E.U. state of Britain, confused the two in stating that the E.U. is just another international network.” Given this category mistake, the E.U. was better off after Britain seceded from the union. Even the linguistic subterfuge of “Brexit,” as well as Kallas’ strange job title as “high representative” rather than foreign minister, attests to the vulnerability inherent in obfuscating (early) modern federalism with confederalism.

In short, involving the state governments in foreign policy and defense federal policy and legislation applies federalism more so than does consolidating those two domains at the federal level, and yet giving each state government a veto not only renders the federal system vulnerable to being exploited and paralyzed from within, but also treats a federal system in which two systems of government each have some amount of sovereignty like a confederation in which the states retain sovereignty.

The U.S. could improve how it manifests federalism by having the heads of the state governments represent them in the U.S. Senate, just as the heads of the state governments in the E.U. sit in the European Council. Additionally, the U.S. member states could play more of a role in the implementation of foreign policies and defense, such as in receiving money from the Pentagon to send machinery from the states’ respective militaries (called militias) to countries that are to be supported militarily. The federal level could then act as a check on corruption in the implementation. To be sure, giving the state governments veto-power would carry the check-and-balance feature of federalism too far. So both the E.U. and U.S. could stand to improve their respective federal systems towards ever perfect union—neither one being a trading “bloc” or confederation.

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1. Jorge Liboreiro, “Kallas Pitches Plan to ‘Potentially’ Mobilize €40 Billion in MilitaryAid for Ukraine,” Euronews, March 14, 2025.
2. Ibid.

On the U.S. President as Chief Executive

As the chief executive of the U.S. Government, the president is tasked with executing the law—the passage thereof involving both the Congress and the presidency. It follows that a president cannot legally stand in the way of appropriated federal funding of projects and programs once such allocations have become law. For otherwise, a president could simply ignore appropriations passed by the Congress and signed into law by a previous president. The powers of the unitary executive would reach dictatorial proportions. Within roughly one week of being sworn into office for his second term in 2025, U.S. President Trump decided to pause all foreign aid, and “grants, loans and other federal assistance . . . to ensure spending is consistent with Trump’s priorities.”[1] Those priorities, I submit, would properly have influence on bills in Congress that were not yet laws, as per the legislative veto-power of the presidency and the ability of a president to put pressure on members of Congress by speaking persuasively directly to the American people. The value of leadership available to a presiding role should not be ignored. In terms of symbolic leadership befitting a presider in chief, refusing to enforce laws sends the wrong signal. To be sure, delaying rather than cancelling funding that has already been appropriated as law may fall within reasonable discretion that goes with the executing, and thus executive, function. However, the size, or magnitude, of the federal spending being held up but not cancelled may test the test of reasonableness. This may also be so if the political dimension—that is, the salience of political judgment in the issues involved—is significant.

President Trump “issued an executive order for a 90-day pause in foreign development assistance pending a review of efficiencies and consistency with his foreign policy.”[2] At the time, the United States was the world’s largest international-aid donor; in 2023, $68 billion was spent for this purpose. That number includes “everything from development assistance to military aid.”[3] Interestingly, military funding for Israel was exempted from the delay even though the ICC had issued a warrant for Israel’s sitting prime minister for decimating the civilian population of Gaza, the International Court of Justice (the UN’s court) had ruled the occupation and military attacks by Israel to violate international law, and Amnesty International had found sufficient, credible evidence of genocide perpetuated by the Israeli government. If this exception to the U.S. president’s 90-day delay—and Trump unfroze Biden’s hold on the delivery of the 2000lb bombs to Israel because, Trump said, that country had bought them—reflects Trump’s foreign-policy priorities, then the matter of selectively delaying foreign aid cannot be reckoned as merely technical in nature; rather, the salience of the political dimension means that even a 90-day delay could be unreasonable without Congressional consent in the enacting of resolutions or even law.

With regard to pausing grants, loans and other federal assistance—excepting Medicare and Social Security benefits—again the sheer scale of the funding involved and the salience of politics in the decision to delay test the limits to what is and is not within the reasonable purview of executive discretion in executing federal law that includes federal spending. “Diane Yentel of the National Council of Nonprofits said the order could stop cancer research, food assistance and suicide hotlines.”[4] If so, even a significant delay could be unreasonable as well as contrary to the law concerning SNAP (federal food-assistance to 42.1 million individuals as of the fiscal year 2023) because—to put it bluntly—an awful lot of people need to eat on a daily rather than a monthly basis. Again, the president’s political-ideological judgment here is arguably debatable (hence suggestive of a Congressional legislative role even in the delay): delaying food assistance to Americans while exempting military aid to Israel from delay. Both, and especially juxtaposed, are contentious politically (i.e., ideologically). Furthermore, the memo delaying domestic financial assistance, “signed by acting OMB chief Matthew Vaeth, calls on government agencies to temporarily pause their financial assistance [programs], so they can review spending that could be impacted by the various orders Trump has signed” relating to diversity programs, “woke gender ideology, and the green new deal.”[5] It is difficult to square such overtly political reasons with a technocratic delay in the execution of laws. Of course, this is a judgment call, for the length of the delay is also a relevant factor. Aside from the financial assistance to Americans bearing on sustenance, a few month’s delay may be reasonable, but both the scale of the foreign and domestic funding and especially the political rationales for the delay arguably make the delay a significant political matter rather than merely an executive function in implementing law.

My assessment should not be assumed to be in line with my own political ideology, for I oppose affirmative action programs as being contrary to merit and woke “thought-police” as being repugnant to free-speech liberty; I am not obliged to “give my personal pronouns” (in fact, “one” is the neuter third-person singular pronoun in English). I assume, moreover, that we are all human, all too human in fact, and thus that none of us have a monopoly on truth to be imposed on others. My point here is that the use of reason to dissect even a controversial issue, such as presidential power in the U.S., should not cower to the bullying force of the mind’s own ideology. Incidentally, this point is vital in distinguishing between scholarship and opinion-pieces.

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1. James Fitzgerald and Ana Faguy, “White House Pauses Federal Grants and Loans,” BBC.com, January 28, 2025.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.

The E.U. on Hungary: Beyond Symbolic Measures

Any federal system of government must function fundamentally as a unit even though the states are semi-sovereign, as is the federal level. The Nullification Crisis in the U.S. during the nineteenth century highlighted the plight a federal union would face were state governments able to ignore federal law unilaterally. Fortunately, President Jackson was able to get South Carolina to stand down on this point. In 2024, the E.U.'s federal officials were having trouble getting the state of Hungary not only to apply a federal directive within the state, but also to stop contradicting the E.U.'s foreign policy against Putin's Russia in Ukraine by engaging in diplomatic trips of appeasement. A federal system that lacks the means procedurally or substantively to protect federal prerogatives against the contradictory actions of wayward states is not viable in the long term.

Every E.U. state government is bound by Article 24.3 of the E.U.’s basic law, which mandates that those governments must support the union’s foreign policy “actively and unreservedly in a spirit of loyalty and mutual solidarity.”[1] It is not often that a E.U. official mentions the obligation of loyalty in reference to the states toward the union, but the normative glue should not be ignored or even trivialized, especially given the preponderance of residual sovereignty that the state governments enjoy in the E.U.’s federal system. Josep Borell, the E.U.’s foreign minister, was referring to Viktor Orbán of the state of Hungary, whose “peace mission” to Moscow and Beijing coincided with the state of Hungary’s six-month presidency of the Council of the E.U. in early July, 2024. “Any so-called ‘peace mission’ that ignores” that Russia is the aggressor in Ukraine “is, at the end of the day, only benefitting Putin and will not bring peace.”[2] Borell was referring back to Orbán’s previous characterization of the union’s supplies of weapons and ammunition to Ukraine as a “pro-war policy.”[3] “The only one who’s pro-war is Putin,” Borell stated.[4] Referring to Orbán’s statement as belonging “to the realm of a lack of loyal cooperation,” Borell said, “We have to send a signal, even if it’s a symbolic signal, that being against the foreign policy of the European Union and disqualifying the policy of the European Union as the ‘party of war’ has to have consequences.”[5] The informal meeting of the foreign ministers of the states, known as Gymnich, would take place in Brussels rather than in Hungary’s state capital, Budapest. This move is indeed symbolic, for the official meetings are not subject to the 6-month rotating presidencies of the states.

The question is thus whether Borell’s use of the symbolic was sufficient to enforce Article 24.3 on the loyalty that the state governments owe to the union with respect to its foreign policy. I submit that a symbolic gesture, at best a “slap on the wrist,” is not sufficient to forestall undercutting moves by the governors of the state governments, for the political interests of the latter may differ from that of the union as a whole, and symbol is no match for real politic.

As Borell himself admitted, Orbán’s continued veto of military assistance for Ukraine was ongoing, and it was totally legal under E.U. basic law. Moving an informal meeting to Brussels would not change Orbán’s use of his state’s veto in the European Council. Nor would the states sending lower-level civil servants to an informal meeting of state interior/justice officials in Budapest. Arnoldas Abramavicius, Lithuania’s Deputy Minister of the Interior, refused to call sending lower level politicians a boycott; he would not even state that Orbán’s diplomatic trips to Moscow and Beijing violate the E.U. foreign policy against Russia. “I think this is a reaction towards Hungary’s external activity maybe sometimes not adjusted to the European framework,” he said at the meeting.[6] The diplomatic trips designed to negotiate with an aggressor with whom the E.U. would not negotiate is worse than merely not being coordinated or adjusted with the federal policy, which, by the way, is not a framework.

In fact, Borell undercut his argument and the E.U. itself by how he put the matter of the states’ foreign policy power. “Each member state is sovereign on its foreign policy—true. But as far as they’re members of this club, they have to obey the treaties.”[7] Given Article 24.3, however, each state’s foreign policy was not sovereign, for it could not contradict the union’s foreign policy. Moreover, the E.U. itself was not a club even as of 2024. The European Court of Justice had repeatedly ruled that federal laws, regulations, and directives are binding on the states, and the ECJ’s decisions are binding on the state courts as well as the state governments. Furthermore, clubs do not have a directly elected legislature such as the European Parliament, and, moreover, all three branches of government. Given the preponderance of governmental sovereignty residing with the states in 2024, the E.U. could ill afford being rhetorically diminished by one of its own officials, especially in the midst of a struggle between the union and a sitting governor.

A letter signed by over 63 state lawmakers addressed to the top three E.U. officials insists that Hungary’s Orbán had “caused significant damage” by his two diplomatic trips, so it was not merely a matter of not being adjusted to the E.U.’s foreign policy in which Putin is squarely the aggressor in the war.[8] Appropriately, the state officials called on the union “to suspend Hungary’s voting rights in the European Council” because “mere verbal condemnation” of the wayward state government has “no effect.”[9] Nor does merely moving the location of an informal meeting and sending lower-level officials.

That the European Council had not already suspended Hungary’s voting rights not only due to Orbán’s efforts to appease (Von der Leyen’s word) Putin but also the European Court of Justice’s ruling that Hungary had refused to implement a federal directive suggests that the union is vulnerable to defections by state governments with all but symbolic impunity. To apply anything close to unanimity for the voting rights of a state in the European Council to be stripped is itself not only foolhardy, but undercutting as well. An amendment applying qualified majority voting to sanctioning a violating state in the European Council would improve the coherence and functioning of the union at the federal level in line with the rule of law, while a state government deprived of its voting rights could still appeal to the European Court of Justice concerning the fairness of the mechanism and how it is being applied.

It bears noting that the Titanic could not avoid the iceberg in part because the ship’s rudder was too small, given the size of the ship. Or, if an analogy of several ships is preferred, a line spoken by a European in the film, The Godfather, Part III, applies: “Our ships must all sail in the same direction.” For one ship to sail not only apart from the others, but then into them must surely not be permitted. Appeasing or even just negotiating separately with Putin while referring to the E.U. foreign policy as pro-war even while vetoing military assistance to Ukraine should have been met with more than a symbolic response by E.U. federal officials, and the fact that it was not is an indication that the federal system contains a significant vulnerability, or weakness, that should be redressed especially before additional states are permitted to join the union.

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1. Jorge Liboreiro, “Borrell Accuses Orbán of Disloyalty and Joins Boycott Against Hungary’s E.U. Presidency,” Euronews, July 22, 2024.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. Caitlin Danaher, “E.U. Moves High-Level Meetings Out of Budapest to Protest Orbán’s Ukraine War Stance,” CNN, July 22, 2024.
7. Jorge Liboreiro, “Borrell Accuses Orbán of Disloyalty and Joins Boycott Against Hungary’s E.U. Presidency,” Euronews, July 22, 2024.
8. Caitlin Danaher, “E.U. Moves High-Level Meetings Out of Budapest to Protest Orbán’s Ukraine War Stance,” CNN, July 22, 2024.
9. Ibid.

On the European Commission Boycotting Hungary’s Presidency of the Council of the E.U.

Whereas just one presidency applies to the U.S. at the federal level, the E.U. has several. There is a president of the European Commission, a president of the European Parliament, a president of the European Council, and a president of the Council of the E.U., the latter being held by a state government on a six-month rotating basis. On July 1, 2024, the E.U. state of Hungary assumed that role. Because that state’s government had recently been found guilty by the E.U.’s top court, the E.C.J., of blocking federal law within the state, the matter of Hungary taking its turn in chairing the Council of the E.U. was controversial at the time. Because Viktor Orbán, governor of Hungary, used the insignia of the presidency of the Council in making unauthorized diplomatic trips to Russia and China on the war in Ukraine, the European Commission, the E.U. government’s executive branch, took the unusual decision to boycott Hungary’s presidency. Shortly thereafter, the E.U.'s parliament followed suit with a resolution condemning Orbán's diplomatic trip to Moscow. I contend that Orbán’s foray into diplomatic relations even as he was taking on a major role at the federal level presents good evidence for why foreign policy should be federalized in the E.U. as it has been in the U.S., and for the same reason.

At the Constitutional Convention in 1787 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, delegates felt the need to delegate foreign policy and diplomacy to the proposed federal executive branch out of concern that the states would be used, and torn apart from one another, by foreign states pursuing their interests at America’s expense. It went without saying that a state-level official could not represent the union abroad. Besides not being able to speak for the other states and the union itself, a governor conducting foreign policy both for the union and one’s own state would have to contend with a conflict of interest where the interests of the union diverge from that of the official’s state. All of these problems were obviated by having the states delegate foreign policy to the federal level with the states still retaining residual sovereignty. It bears stating that the thirteen states that exited the British Empire in 1776 were sovereign states until they delegated some of their respective sovereignty to the federal level of the union in 1789.

In 2024, in the midst of Russia’s continued invasion of Ukraine, the federal level of the E.U. was involved in foreign policy, and yet a governor of any state government could also take on a role in foreign policy as that was a shared competency (i.e., both federal and state levels). That the governor of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, used the official logo of the Hungarian presidency of the Council of the E.U. in his “peace mission” to Russia and China days after he had assumed the presidency for Hungary signaled or implied a federal foreign-policy role was troubling enough. That he publicly stated, “China is the only world power that has been clearly committed to peace since the beginning” of the war even though the E.U. had dismissed the “Chinese peace plan” for “making a selective interpretation of international law and blurring the line between the aggressor and the aggressed” was too much for the E.U.’s executive branch.[1] That Orbán met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, a person wanted by the ICC for war crimes against civilians in Ukraine, to “start a dialogue on the shortest road to peace” just days before Russia bombed a children’s hospital in Kyiv was also not missed by the Commission.[2]

As a result, the European Commission decided to boycott Hungary’s six-month presidency of the E.U. Council. In addition to going to Moscow and Beijing on peace missions, that Orbán had stated that he would use Hungary’s chairing of the Council to sideline the accession talks so to postpone statehood for Ukraine was likely another factor in the boycott. “In light of recent developments marking the start of the Hungarian Presidency, the President (Ursula von der Leyen) has decided that the European Commission will be represented at senior civil servant level only during informal meetings of the Council,” according to a spokesperson for the Commission.[3] The College visit to the Presidency also would not take place. 

Days after the Commission's boycott, the European Parliament passed a resolution condemning Orbán's diplomatic visit to Moscow. The resolution itself "stresses that during this visit, he did not represent the E.U., and considers the visit to be a blatant violation of the E.U.'s treaties and common foreign policy, including the principle of sincere cooperation; [and] underlines that the Hungarian Prime Minister cannot claim to represent the E.U. when violating common E.U. [foreign policy] positions."[4] That the governor of a state violated federal foreign policy in going abroad while president of a federal institution and two other federal institutions officially objected points to the serious need for E.U. reform concerning foreign policy in terms of the federal system. In other words, the federal system itself contained a fundamental problem in need of a solution.  

Essentially, Orbán was leveraging his temporary presidency of a federal governmental institution of the E.U. to conduct foreign policy at odds with the federal foreign policy against Russia and China. Even if he had been only been conducting bilateral diplomatic relations between his state and Russia and China, that his state government’s position would have conflicted with the E.U.’s position is problematic, for the belligerent foreign powers could have used Orbán’s state of Hungary to drive a wedge into the E.U. and thus weaken not only the defense of Ukraine, but also the E.U. itself as a federal union. Even just in terms of the union’s executive branch boycotting the presidency of the legislative Council of the E.U., the E.U. itself was weakened rather than unified at the federal level.

Most fundamentally, the state governments still had too much power relative to that of the union itself. Also, trying to conduct foreign policy at both the state and federal levels is just asking for trouble because they can work at cross-purposes and even confuse government officials of other countries. Russian officials, for instance, may not have known how much credence to give to Orban versus the condemnations by the Commission and the Parliament. 

Even by 2024, European integration had been tangibly realized in a federal union of states to the extent that one voice was needed on foreign policy, lest the E.U. compromise itself from within. Even though the economic domain had been the backbone of the E.U. coming out of the EC, it bears remembering that the European Coal and Steel Cooperative came out of the post-WWII need to keep an eye on Germany lest it remilitarize. A foreign-policy rationale is thus also baked into the E.U. as per at least one of the international European organizations that pre-existed the European Union. Put another way, the E.U. cannot be traced back only to the European Economic Community. Besides providing for smooth interstate commerce in a single market, peace in Europe is also a salient mission for the European Union, and in this regard being able to speak with one voice rather than divergent state and federal voices would be of great value were it operationalized rather than compromised.

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1. Jorge Liboreiro, “European Commission Boycotts Hungarian Presidency over Orbán’s Trips to Moscow and Beijing,” Euronews, July 15, 2024.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.

4. P10_TA (2024)0003, “The Need for the E.U.’s Continuous Support for Ukraine,” 17 July 2024.

Euroskeptic Federalism: Obstructing the E.U.'s Recognition of Palestine

Just because U.S. federalism deposits foreign policy exclusively with governmental institutions at the federal level does not mean that that domain cannot be shared between state and federal governments in a federal system. This was precisely the case in the E.U. as it struggled to come up with a unified response to Israel having ignored the verdict of the World Court—the UN’s court—ordering Israel to cease and decease from invading Rafah from May 24, 2024 onward. Meanwhile, two of the E.U.’s states were poised to recognize Palestine. Such emphasis on the state governments playing the leading role is fraught with difficulties even though in theory there is on reason why foreign policy cannot be a competency, or domain, that is shared at the state and federal “levels.” In federalism, the federal and state governmental systems are on par, rather than one of the governmental systems being above the other, so “levels” is misleading. Even so, a lot can be said for delegating foreign policy to the federal level. This can be seen from the state and federal reactions in the E.U. as Israel continued its invasion of Rafah just after the World Court had ruled that Israel would be violating international law and the UN’s charter in continuing the offensive.

The full essay is at "The E.U. on Israel."

The E.U. as Peace-Maker: Bringing in Serbia and Kosovo

Serbia and Kosovo reached an agreement on April 19, 2013 bearing on how much autonomy Kosovo would allow Serb cities in return Serbia’s recognition of Kosovo’s remaining authority in the cities.[1] Kosovo had seceded from Serbia in 2008, and the ensuing conflict kept both states from joining the European Union. As it turned out, the prospect of accession gave both Serbia and Kosovo enough incentive to reach an agreement. Indeed, only a few days after the agreement had been reached, the governments of Serbia and Kosovo approved it. Such swiftness indicates how strong of an incentive accession can be for belligerent republics in Europe. The E.U.’s deployment of this “carrot” is fully in line with the main objective of the European Union: to prevent war in Europe. According to the New York Times, the accord is thus “an important victory” for the E.U.[2] An even further victory in line with the E.U.'s most important purposes would be to internalize both Serbia and Kosovo so any future interstate conflicts could be peacibly resolved. 

In the wake of World War II, the European Coal and Steel Cooperative was formed in order to keep an eye on Germany’s use of iron, should the Germans seek to re-militarize. The EEC was also formed to obviate war in Europe, and the E.U. inherited this central aim. Accordingly, it is fitting and proper that, as Kosovo’s deputy minister of foreign affairs, Petrit Selimi put it, “The incentive of joining the E.U. played a huge role in clinching an agreement.”[3] The E.U. thus played a role in forging greater peace in Europe. In fact, the negotiations took place in Brussels, according to Catherine Ashton, the E.U.’s secretary of state. “It is very important,” she told reporters, “that now what we are seeing is a step away from the past and, for both [Kosovo and Serbia], a step closer to Europe.”[4] Days after the agreement was signed, the European Commission recommended to the European Council  that talks start on Serbia’s accession. Belgrade had “taken very significant steps and sustainable improvement in relations with Kosovo,” the Commission announced. The Commission also noted that as Kosovo had met all its “short-term priorities,” talks toward a Stabilization and Association Agreement, a precursor to Kosovo gaining statehood, should commence.
Bringing both Serbia and Kosovo into the Union would represent a more permanent means of forestalling war in Europe. As this depends too on how much power the E.U. has in reconciling conflicts between the states, giving the federal government sufficient competencies in this regard would also represent a step toward sustained peace in Europe. While the prospect of accession has been shown to be enough of an incentive for a meaningful agreement to be reached, better still is the incorporation of trouble spots into the European Union, where more pressure can be brought to bear on any bellicose states such that any nascent conflicts between them can be peaceably resolved. Indeed, the E.U.’s competency, or enumerated power, to remove state obstacles to a common market is in part geared to forestalling potential conflict between discriminating states. This is also a reason behind the interstate commerce clause in the American system.
Lest a fixation on any of the contemporary crises hitting the E.U. inculcates a pessimism that is destructive to the Union and thus ruinous to its more basic purposes, it should be helpful to keep an eye raised to one of those fundamental aims of the project. Given the two major wars in Europe during the first half of the twentieth century, it is wise to keep perspective regarding the role of the E.U., both directly and indirectly, in obviating war.

1. Dan Bilefsky, “Serbia and Kosovo Reach Agreement on Power-Sharing,” The New York Times, April 20, 2013.
2. Ibid.
3. Vanessa Mock and Gordon Fairclough, “Serbia Ready for EU Accession Talks,” The Wall Street Journal, April 22, 2013.
4. Ibid.

.U.S. Constitutional Checks and Balances Under Threat: Congressional Oversight

Ambition checked by ambition. The assumption that political ambition can be counted on is the key to the “checks and balances” feature of the U.S. Constitution. Each of the three “arms,” or “branches,” of the federal government is checked by at least one other. This is not to say that the other arm takes over the function or even has greater competence; rather, the other arm is oriented here to providing accountability on abuses of power and investigating cases of gross negligence or incompetence. An offended branch should thus not be permitted to claim that oversight is not appropriate because it interferes with the function the branch. Treating oversight by another arm of the federal government as inherently partisan or illegitimate eviscerates the vital “check and balance” aspect of the U.S. Constitution. 

In disputes on oversight between two branches, the benefit of the doubt ought to go with the overseeing branch because it is only natural for human beings to resist being held accountable and so accountability itself needs a boost. I have in mind the case the director of national intelligence, Joe Maguire, blocking the inspector general from sharing an intelligence-whistle-blower’s complaint with Congress in September, 2019.

The contents of the complaint included a phone call between President Trump and another national leader in which Trump made a commitment. Ukraine was relevant. Rep. Adam Schiff, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, had been concerned that Trump’s delay in assistance to Ukraine had been politically motivated. The Democrats had planned to investigate whether Trump’s withholding of military assistance was not to get the Ukrainian government to reduce corruption, but, instead “to coerce the Ukrainian government into pursuing politically motivated investigations” into Joseph Biden, President Obama’s former VP and a contender to run against Trump in 2020 for president.[1]

Providing the U.S. House Intelligence committee with the contents of whistleblower complaint was “generally required by law.”[2] The executive branch insisted that the requirement must involve the funding, administration or operations of an intelligence agency, whereas Democrats maintained that the law did indeed apply. Regardless, Congressional oversight of the executive branch goes beyond particular statutes mandating the providing of whistle-blower complaint information to Congress. Nevertheless, the inspector general, Michael Atkinson, wrote to the committee that the complaint fell within the jurisdiction of the director of national intelligence and “relates to one of the most significant and important of the D.N.I.’s responsibilities to the American people.”[3] Atkinson was conflating a jurisdiction within the executive branch with oversight by another branch of the government. Put another way, oversight does not in itself rid the director of his jurisdiction; rather, oversight investigates the contents within that jurisdiction. Furthermore, that the director of national intelligence has an important job does not mean that it is immune Congressional oversight of the executive arm. I submit that the importance of the job is an argument for a greater need for oversight—not less.

It is as if Atkinson believed that the intelligence agencies were immune from such oversight, and thus from the vital checks-and-balance feature of the U.S. Constitution. For oversight to be viable, the branch of the government being overseen cannot decide whether oversight is allowable. Rather, the branch doing the overseeing can make that assessment and the other branch can contest it in the courts. The judiciary arm would serve as a check against the overseeing arm. In other words, the prerogative in the executive branch of somehow being beyond Congressional oversight stands in the way of the functioning of the checks-and-balances constitutional design. Ambition should not be allowed to bar contending ambition. What employee of a company would claim, “I can’t do my job if there is any supervision of my work!”? What department would claim that it is exempt from oversight from the company’s management because of the nature of the work being performed? Rather than cohere, such a company would eventually break apart.

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1. Julian E. Barnes et al, “Whistle-Blower Complaint Sets Off a Battle Involving Trump,” The New York Times, September 19, 2019.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.

Kant on the NSA Lying to Congress

James Clapper, Director of U.S. National Intelligence, told the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee in March 2013 that the National Security Agency was not gathering any type of data at all on millions, and even hundreds of millions, of Americans. After leaked documents showed that Clapper had misled the committee in stating, “There are cases where they could inadvertently perhaps collect, but not wittingly,” he issued an apology to the committee for having made the comment that was “clearly erroneous.”[1] U.S. Senator Diane Feinstein, chair of the committee, praised Clapper as an honest and direct man.[2] The discerning reader realizes the full implications of the difference between being in error and lying. To err is human, but to deliberately fabricate for the benefit of oneself or one’s group is a matter on which particular humans can and do differ morally.
Kant is especially well-known for having claimed that it is never ethical to lie. This makes Kant's ethics difficult to accept in terms of "white lies," which are told for another person's benefit rather than for selfish reasons. In terms of universalizing lying as a practice, were everyone to decide to lie on a regular basis, the truth would lose its value because no one would trust it. Lying would no longer have its intended value either, as it would be expected and therefore ignored. In other words, universalizing the maxim of lying would be self-contradictory concerning lying itself; lying universalized would involve a logical contradiction. Put another way, lying as a practice universalized would insult reason itself, and thus be unethical to any rational nature. As human beings, we have such a nature.
It is admittedly strange to think of "unethical" as being in terms of a logical contradiction being contrary to reason. It is easier to think that a logical contradiction is not possible for a being having a rational nature. Kant is saying that as we are rational beings, it is unethical for us to do something if universalizing the practice to it being done by everyone would involve a logical contradiction. Is this criterion simply an expedient method for determining whether a given practice is ethical or unethical, or was Kant really thinking of ethics differently than we think of ought? If the latter, even saying that a logical contradiction is unethical because it insults reason would introduce emotion where there is none; Kant's notion of what it means for some action to be unethical would be that reason is being used against its own rational nature.
Put in Kant's easier formulation that is much easier to understand, lying involves treating other people as one’s means only, rather than also as ends in themselves. You can still treat someone as your means, as long as you also treat him or her as an end in himself or herself too. This formulation has been likened to the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have done to you. However, I wouldn't like to be anyone's means and yet Kant permits this as long as I'm also treated as an end in myself (as a rational being). So I don't think Kant's ethic is as idealistic as is the Golden Rule.
Applying Kant to the case at hand, James Clapper either testified in ignorance or to deceive the senators. If the former, the NSA should not have sent him to testify. Either the agency was at fault for sending the wrong guy or Clapper should have known of the program but did not. If during a NSA meeting covering the program he had been daydreaming of spying on the woman living next door, he is culpable. He would have been using his boss as a means rather than also as an end in himself.
Alternatively and more likely, if Clapper knowingly deceived the committee, either on orders from the NSA or from his own will, he used the senators as means rather than also as ends in themselves. Put another way, I doubt that Clapper likes to be lied to; neither does Diane Feinstein or any of the other senators. Nor do the people of the states that those senators represent, or the general public for that matter. An agent knowingly misleading his or her principal is a particularly sordid instance of lying; not only is it selfish and inconsiderate, it is also insubordinate.
Clapper either testified in ignorance or to deceive the senators. If the former, the NSA should not have sent him to testify; the fault is not necessarily his own. However, if he knowingly deceived the committee, either on orders from the NSA or from his own will, he used the senators as means only, rather than also as ends in themselves. Therefore, whether out of ignorance or deceit, Clapper’s error or lie points to insufficient democratic accountability of the NSA to Congress. If NSA chief Gen. Keith Alexander lied to Congress in saying that the NSA could not determine how many U.S. communications were being gathered at the time when in fact the NSA was using its auditing tool Boundless Informant precisely to determine the number of such communications, a disturbing pattern rather than a single incident of faulty testimony would characterize the NSA.[3] In particular, the agency could have developed an organizational culture in which the elected representatives in Congress and even truth-telling itself are insufficiently respected and valued. Such anti-democratic values may be the underlying culprit behind what could be a cavernous hole in democratic accountability—the breach of which would of course maintain the illusion of ongoing accountability.

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1. Kimberly Dozier, “James Clapper: Answer on NSA Surveillance to Congress Was ‘Clearly Erroneous’,” The Huffington Post, July 2, 2013.2. Jeremy Peters, “Feinstein’s Support for N.S.A. Defies Liberal Critics and Repute,” The New York Times, July 1, 2013.
3. Kimberly Dozier, “Edward Snowden: NSA Lying, Collecting All Communications Into and Out of U.S.,” The Huffington Post, July 8, 2013.

On Democratic Accountability in a Republic: The Pentagon Papers

The publication of portions of the Pentagon Papers despite President Nixon’s threats of treason highlighted the fact that four presidents successively lied to the American People on build-up of U.S. involvement in Indochina (most notably, Vietnam) and the Nixon administration lied on the prospects for victory in the Vietnam War—a war that had not even been declared by Congress. Clearly, democratic accountable extends to foreign policy at least in broad outline, such as in whether or not to continue an active engagement militarily in another region of the world. Even in U.S. presidents being able to get away with effectively declaring war even as one of their roles is that of commander-in-chief—a huge conflict of interest!—democratic accountability by the popular sovereign, the People—is important, even vital should the legislative and judicial branches fail as checks in the separation-of-powers feature of the U.S. Constitution.

The first article in the New York Times reported that the Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations “built up the American political, military and psychological stakes in Indochina, often more deeply than they realized at the time, with large‐scale military equipment to the French in 1950; with acts of sabotage and terror warfare against North Vietnam beginning in 1954; with moves that encouraged and abetted the overthrow of President Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam in 1963; with plans, pledges and threats of further action that sprang to life in the Tonkin Gulf clashes in August, 1964; with the careful preparation of public opinion for the years of open warfare that were to follow; and with the calculation in 1965, as the planes and troops were openly committed to sustained combat, that neither accommodation inside South Vietnam nor early negotiations with North Vietnam would achieve the desired result.”[1]

Meanwhile, the American electorate was being kept in the dark—lied to—in spite of the fact that the People in a republic are tasked with holding the elected representatives and their respective appointees accountable.

“The Pentagon study also ranges beyond such historical judgments. It suggests that the predominant American interest was at first containment of Communism and later the defense of the power, influence and prestige of the United States, in both stages irrespective of conditions in Vietnam.”[2] The U.S. Government’s defense of the escalation, however, was limited to the containment of Communism such that it would not take over the world as Marx had foretold and thus threaten even the U.S. itself. During the Johnson and Nixon administrations, American troops were being killed and taken prisoner increasingly for the prestige of the United States and irrespective of the intractable conditions on the ground in Vietnam. Crucially, these administrations kept the American people in the dark on these points, such that no electoral correction could be effected. Ironically, the administrations were claiming to protect democracy even as they were undermining it by using power to subvert democratic accountability by the popular sovereign (i.e., the electorate).

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1. Neil Sheehan, “Vietnam Archive: Pentagon Study Traces 3 Decades of Growing U.S. Involvement,” The New York Times, June 13, 1971.

2. Ibid.

John Kerry: An American Politician

Just after President Barak Obama announced that he would nominate Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts to be the U.S. Secretary of State, the occupant of the corresponding office in the E.U., Catherine Ashton, welcomed the prospect of working with Kerry.

U.S. President Obama nominates U.S. Sen. John Kerry to be U.S. Secretary of State.    Reuters

"I am delighted by the nomination of Senator John Kerry to succeed Hillary Clinton as US Secretary of State. I have had the privilege of meeting Senator Kerry on a number of occasions. His considerable experience, not least as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, makes him an ideal candidate for this crucial position. Pending Congressional confirmation, I look forward very much to working closely with him, and continuing the excellent relationship established with Secretary Clinton."
Whether Ashton knew it at the time or not, she would be working with an American politician. After all, Kerry had already run for the American presidency. To be sure, he was not taking up the foreign affairs post to build his resume. I believe he genuinely wanted the job. The problem is, is trying to please all the people all the time, a politician's patina (or deeper?), best in foreign affairs? In this essay, I focus not on this question, but, rather, on the patina itself in the case of John Kerry so the underlying problem behind the question of fit with foreign affairs can be more transparent to the wider public.
I, too, have had the privilege of meeting Senator Kerry. He struck me as a warm yet very ambitious man. At the time, I was on a deficit-reduction kick, so I asked him how his “big government” ideology was consistent with reducing the federal deficit. “I’m a fiscal conservative!” he insisted as he put his arm around my shoulder and smiled. “Oh, come on,” I countered in rather obvious disbelief. “I believe that government programs should be run efficiently,” he explained. “That’s good, but I don’t think that’s fiscal conservativism,” I said, “and it doesn’t necessarily make a dent in the deficit because you could simply add more programs that are efficiently run.” Perhaps Kerry as the U.S. Secretary of State might put his arm on Katherine Ashton’s shoulder and mollify her with something like, “Of course the E.U. is not a federal system,” or “the U.S. is firmly in support of the E.U. and ready to help.” Bill Clinton could even provide background music by playing his sax. Would the European succumb to the “I’m essentially whatever you want me to be”?
I would like to think that at least behind closed doors, politicians are capable of real talk rather than appearance and manipulation. What is the essential nature of a person who would make his or life that of politics? Do we ever really know them? Is there substance under the shells? Moreover, are the best people ruling? Does the democratic process proffer the best or merely the most pleasing appearance? As the E.U. struggles with the appearance of suffering from a democratic deficit, Europeans might want to reflect a bit on whether “technocrats” are really so bad. At least they don’t have quite the skill to conflate themselves into chameleons. Ashton might indeed have had Kerry’s number, yet no one would ever glimpse this from her glowing statement. Are she and Kerry two of a kind—both politicians managing appearances? How would the rest of us ever know? And yet we are the ones who are tasked with pulling the levers on election-day.

Source: E.U. Foreign Minister’s Press Release