Must America be dragged kicking and screaming back to the concept of civilized behavior – by its wallet? For Switzerland’s Le Temp, lawyer and analyst Christophe Germann argues that in order to preserve ‘the European mission’ to spread peace and justice and preserve cultural and biological diversity, it must insist in trade talks with the United States that Washington begin living by the same rules as the rest of the world, i.e.: an end to do as I say, not what I do.
For Le Temps, attorney and analyst Christophe Germann writes in part:
Must we wear blinders and limit ourselves to liberalizing bilateral trade, leaving Europe and the world to further suffer the influence of Washington, Wall Street and Hollywood for the next 50 years – blindly worshiping the “WashWallWood” trinity, digitally merged in Silicon Valley by Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook & Co – and under the spying eyes of the NSA? It’s a sad vision that should be opposed in a truly coherent and effective manner by the “European mission” so celebrated by [European Commission President] Barroso. It is through its market power that Europe must uphold its values.
The lingua franca of the European Union today is American, and this single language dominates the thoughts and emotions of our children. Should we help reinforce this spiritual and material colonization, or finally resist it to create a better world? However the recipe, which seems to have escaped the European Commission president, is simple: Barroso should tell his colleague Barack Obama that negotiations and the conclusion of a free trade agreement between the European Unions and United States requires prior signing and ratification of the Rome Statute, the Convention on Biodiversity, the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change, as well as the Convention on Cultural Diversity. Without cultural and biological diversity, without peace and justice, there can be no commercial rapprochement. In other words, refuse unconditional free trade and reinvent the functionalism of European integration.
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