In almost a parody of himself José Manuel Barroso is telling us that "Europe" has still not found a solution to its sovereign debt crisis that would restore investor confidence. Then, from the school of "the solution is simple, something must be done", he advocates "greater integration as the way to move forward".

"The truth is", he says, "that so far there is no response to the sovereign (debt) crisis that restores confidence to investors … as long as that does not happen we will have very serious problems and debates in Europe".

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If Merkel and now Barroso tell us the ECB is independent, it must be true.

Although the European Union will be put out of our misery eventually, it has a nasty habit in the meantime of bouncing back stronger after reversals of fortune (Dr North's "beneficial crisis"). The Lisbon Treaty, for instance, was even more ambitious than the defeated Constitution. The euphoria after the Froggies and Cloggies told the EU what for in those two 2005 referendums seemed a very distant memory when Lisbon kicked in four years later. My champagne is staying in the fridge.

How to get treaty changes passed in a referendum in Ireland is somethng that should be excercising Frau Merkel, but somehow I doubt it.

Barroso seems to me to have a smirk on his face when he speaks about anything. It is almost a suggestion of 'if you believe this you will believe anything'.

For a long while now they have been whistling in the wind, pretending everything will be sorted out but knowing full well that the storm clouds go on gathering and catastrophe is coming towards the Union. There are things they could have done to prepare for the storm ahead, but they have done them not. What will be left after the storm has passed? Obliteration of livelihoods and pension funds, bitterness and division. But one good thing will be that the EU will be history.

I wonder if in the mind of Barroso there is a problem with the EU that CANNOT be solved by more integration?

What a joke! No wonder he smirks.

As you seem to suggest, Dr. N: that's more like it. Reinscription is the name of the game!

This egregious, pompous, pipsqueak apparat has been making bizarre statements for as long as he has been drawing breath.
Unafraid of compromising his Marxist principles, fast as his fat little legs will carry him, he ruthlessly fills his boots. Hoarding a nice little pile, capitalism he may despise but like all good little comrades - they're never backwards in coming forwards for the perks of dipping in his hand. How our Trades Union barons admire him and follow his lead, not for them, the paltry and pinched weekly earnings of their shopfloor colleagues in their shop steward days - how they luv the EU now!

Comrades in arms, thick as thieves, beloved of the Labour party too, and what a big party Manny is having, he [Barroso] is 'avin' a whale of a time.

One problem, as Manny surveys his fiefdom, as he counts his 'filthy lucre' his looks are clouded. His visage streaked with the greasy leakage, a perspiration of fear. Yes, Barroso knows, the game is up and his house of cards is about to fall, his main worry is - will they get to him before he can make his getaway and to his ill-gotten fortune?

And as the final denouement nears, his pronouncements become ever more shrill and sound ever more panicky, Manny's Empire is falling down............. .

The fact that the likes of Barrosso can get into the position that he has over us (or going further back, that the British people allowed the likes of Heath to sell out this country) is entirely down to *us*....we have been asleep on our watch for far too long...I have been speaking out against the EEC/EC/EU privately for many years in my own circle of friends and colleagues, and the response I invariably got was one of incredulity...."how can you say that?...the EEC/EC/EU is good for business"....(I wish I had a penny for every time I heard that bollocks). Well...it's *not* good for UK business...in fact it's not good for *any* business, due to the simple fact its conceived, built and run by communists.
This will end a bloody mess (literally).

It has been a long time since I have heard this expression applied outside my professional activities. I have spent years squaring circles, and have ordinarily measured success in the number of decimal places of accuracy. I'm not very used to the concept of squaring a circle missing by orders of magnitude. I usually expect my quadratures to be well within a first-order approximation. It must be an inordinately elastic compass that could conform to the convoluted and impermanent contours of the political topography. That said, I would not trust its measure. This is a device that can be worked to give any desired answer, the only real uncertainty is whether anyone will believe it.

That was the lie we were all sold, good for business?? - it is absolute b7ll7x, in every facet; economic, tax and rates, regulation, workforce etc, it was far better and easier to set up a business in Britain before we entered the 'common market', now business and real capitalism is strangled in favour of the corporate empires, who 'offshore'/downsize dictate and bully and block the workings of real market economics - thats business? - That's the EU, that's Western Statism.

If you repeat the lie often enough ... and make it a big one, the Beeb and the MSM will help.. .

What is this obsession with the ECB? It's already stuffed to the gunnels with rotten debt. The stench of debt decay is unbearable for all but the most staunch Europhilliac.

Theoretically, the ECB is simply managing credit advanced by member states. It is not a lender in its own right ... or, at least, that is my understanding.

"FAILURE IS THE ONLY OPTION" This is a good and accurate heading IMHO for in reality the EU project has only ever been about that. At long, long, last the reality is coming home to the deceived Barosso, and all his deluded friends in the UK, past and present, and the rest of the EU establishment.
It is the old scenario, often predicted, and oh so simple to see, that of the immoveable object (EU ideology) meeting the unstoppable force of the higher priorities of nation states and nationalist sense of identity and aspirations.
In such a a case national interest will always prevail and that is the very essence of the "ever closer union" problem which underlies the fundamental flaw in all EU thinking. As we know it is simply not possible without full blown political union FIRST.
So that itself is reason why the Eurozone itself and its self generated "crisis", and not least the absurd 'bail-out's doctrine, is impossible of any resolution.
Thus dissolution is inevitable - my guess is that not even Germany's economic might can have the slightest impact except in the very short term - it all has a momentum of its own now.