european union Essays

european union Essays european union Essay european union Essay Germany Must Take The Wheel In The European Union TIMOTHY GARTON ASH Special to The Globe and Mail published Friday, Jun. 17 2011, 5:00 AM EDT Last updated Friday, Aug. 24 2012, 3:54 PM EDT Like an overladen lorry labouring up a steep hill, the European project is close to stalling. If it stalls, even the emergency brake may not stop it running back down the hill, out of control, until it Jackknifes. Two of the lads are wrestling over the steering wheel; others lie comatose in the sleeping area at the back of the cabin. We need a woman to come and sort them out. Her name is Angela. The most urgent part of this crisis is Greece and the Eurozone. Between the fury on the streets of Athens and the continued disunity of decision-makers in Brussels, Berlin, Frankfurt and Luxembourg (where the Euro Group huddles again Sunday and Monday), the lorry could stall any day. But its not Just Greece. In Ireland, Portugal and Spain, too, anger is boiling over, as people feel that the young, the poor and the unemployed are being forced to pay for the selfish improvidence of their politicians and of French and German bankers, ho lent profusely where they should not have lent at all. And its not Just the Eurozone. Every single major project of the European Union is faltering. France and Italy are suggesting that the achievement of the Schengen Zone, with no border controls, should be chipped away Just because a few thousand people from convulsed North Africa have taken refuge on the Italian island of Lampedusa. Many European countries are already in a panic about the integration of immigrants and people of migrant origin, especially Muslims. Solidarity and social Justice, central alues of the post 1945 European project, are in retreat almost everywhere, as a result of growing inequality and spending cuts to tackle public debt. In the Arab spring, Europe faces the most hopeful set of events in the 21st century so far, comparable in scale and potential to 1989, but its collective and institutional response to this historic opening has been feeble beyond belief. Yet, this was meant to be the year the EIJ got its act together in foreign policy. Even in the most hopeful cases, Tunisia and Egypt, we may have only a few months in which to prevent the Arab spring becoming an Arab fall. The disappointed hopes of that half of the population which is under 30 would then produce further, larger immigrant surges to Europe. The European-led military intervention in Libya was always likely to be a slow grind, but it has painfully exposed Europes chronic failure to concentrate its military capabilities. Already, some of the powers involved are running short of munitions. Even enlargement, Europes most successful project, is close to stalling. The magnetic attraction of EIJ membership continues to have a significant positive effect in a ountry like Serbia, but ever less so in Turkey. In his victory speech after the recent Turkish elections, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan did not even mention the ELI. Retired prime ministers and foreign ministers never tire of attributing this faltering of the European project to the lack of leadership. (Subtext: It was all so much better wnen we were In cnarge. ) I nls Is true, out less tnan nalT tne story. For wnlle tne quality of European leadership is somewhat poorer than it was a quarter-century ago, the need for it is greater. Why? Because all the great underlying motivators of the European project back in the days of Helmut Kohl, Franpis Mitterrand and Jacques Delors have faded or disappeared. Those powerful driving forces included searing personal experiences of war, occupation, Holocaust, fascist and Communist dictatorships; the Soviet threat, catalyzing west European solidarity; generous, energetic U. S. support for European unification; and a West Germany that was the mighty engine of European integration, with France on top as the driver. The West Germans wanted to rehabilitate themselves as good Europeans, but also needed the support of their European neighbours to achieve their goal of unification. All these are now gone, or very much diminished. While there are intellectually convincing new rationales for the project, including the rise of non-western giants such as China, rationales are no match for emotional motivators. Heart trumps head, every day. The key to so much of this, especially on the economic side, is Germany. For much of its history, what has become the EIJ pursued political ends by economic means. For Mr. Kohl and Mr. Mitterrand, the euro was mainly a political project, not an economic one. Now the boot is on the other foot. To save a poorly designed and overextended monetary union, the political must ride to the rescue of the economic. This is where Angela Merkel comes in. There is no particular reason to expect Germany to take the lead in creating a European foreign and security policy. For a response to the Arab spring, we should look first to Spain, France and Italy. If the issue is the integration of migrants, every country must do its homework. But if we are talking about the European economy and currency, Germany is the indispensable power. Only the combination of Germany and the European Central Bank, working in unison, has a chance of calming the mighty markets. For more than a year now, Ms. Merkel has attempted to find the narrow perhaps non-existent line where the minimum that can be done to save the embattled Eurozone periphery meets the maximum she thinks German public opinion will bear. She has then tried to win her Eurozone partners to that course. So far, it has not worked. Now she needs to start from the other end: Work out, with the ECB and other Eurozone governments, what is the most credible deal available, then put all her authority on the line to persuade a reluctant German public that this will be in their long-term, enlightened, national self-interest. Which it will be. For no one has more to lose from the disintegration of the Eurozone than the continents central economic power. It may soon be too late. Http:// www. theglobeandmail. com/commentary/germany-must-take-the-wheel-in-the- european-union/article583479/

Language Notes on the Use of Aint in English

Language Notes on the Use of Aint in English As far as I know, only one rule of English usage has ever made its way into a childrens jump-rope rhyme: Dont say aint or your mother will faint,Your father will fall in a bucket of paint,Your sister will cry, your brother will die,Your cat and dog will call the FBI. Though frequently heard in casual speech, aint has been described as the most stigmatized word in English. Dictionaries usually label it dialectal or nonstandard, while some purists even deny its right to exist, insisting that aint isnt a word. What is it about this simple negative contraction that agitates language mavens and spreads fear on the playground? As these notes demonstrate, the answer is surprisingly complex. Grammar and Usage[The] two meanings of grammarhow the language functions and how it ought to functionare easily confused. To clarify the distinction, consider the expression aint. Unless used intentionally to add colloquial flavor, aint is unacceptable because its use is considered nonstandard. Yet taken strictly as a part of speech, the term functions perfectly well as a verb. Whether it appears in a declarative sentence (I aint going) or an interrogative sentence (Aint I going?), it conforms to the normal pattern for all verbs in the English language. Although readers may not approve of its use, they cannot argue that it is ungrammatical in such sentences.(Gerald J. Alred, Charles T. Brusaw, and Walter E. Oliu, Handbook of Technical Writing, 10th ed. Bedford/St. Martins, 2012) A Brief History of AintAint has had an unusual history. Its a shortened form of several wordsam not, are not, is not, has not and have not. It appears in written English in the 18th century in various plays and novels, first as ant and then as aint. During the 19th century, it was widely used in representations of regional dialect, especially Cockney speech in the UK, and became a distinctive feature of colloquial American English. But when we look at who is using the form in 19th-century novels, such as those by Dickens and Trollope, we find that the characters are often professional and upper-class. Thats unusual: to find a form simultaneously used at both ends of the social spectrum. Even as recently as 1907, in a commentary on society called The Social Fetich, Lady Agnes Grove was defending aint I as respectable upper-class colloquial speechand condemning arent I!She was in a rapidly diminishing minority. Prescriptive grammarians had taken against aint, and it would soon become universally condemned as a leading marker of uneducated usage.(David Crystal, The Story of English in 100 Words. St. Martins Press, 2012) Collocational AintIn Present-Day English, aint is stigmatized even though linguistically it is formed by the same rule speakers use to form arent and other nonstigmatized contracted auxiliary verbs. . . . [T]here is nothing linguistically wrong with it; in fact, aint is used by many speakers in certain fixed expressions and to convey a certain rhetorical effect: It aint over yet! You aint seen nothing yet! If it aint broke, dont fix it.(Kristin Denham and Anne Lobeck, Linguistics for Everyone: An Introduction. Wadsworth, 2010 Prissy, Ridiculous, and Unpopular Alternatives to Aint I?As linguistic scholars have frequently pointed out, it is unfortunate that aint I? is unpopular in educated speech, for the phrase fills a long-felt need. Am I not? is too prissy for down-to-earth people; amnt I? is ridiculous; and arent I?, though popular in England, has never really caught on in America. With a sentence like the one under discussion [Im your best friend, aint I?] you are practically in a linguistic trapthere is no way out unless you are willing to choose between appearing illiterate, sounding prissy, or feeling ridiculous.(Norman Lewis, Word Power Made Easy. Simon Schuster, 1979) Class ActsA correlation exists between the use of aint and social class, i.e. it is more frequent in lower-class speech. In upper-class speech it is indicative of a personal relationship and an informal situation . . . and is employed when the other person knows that the speaker is using aint for stylistic effect, rather than from ignorance or lack of education (Feagin 1979: 217). Since the form is such a strong school-induced shibboleth, informants tend to suppress it in (more formal) interview situations.(Traute Ewers, The Origin of American Black English: Be-Forms in the Hoodoo Texts. Walter de Gruyter, 1995) Gender ActsThere is still in the American popular mind a notion that aint, for all its faults, is masculine, while arent is not simply feminine, but effeminate. In Thomas Bergers novel The Feud (1983), Tony, a high school student, finds that good grammar must take a back seat to his public sexual identity. Tony defends his use of the masculine aint against his girlfriend Eva s objection that it is a sign of ignorance: I dont like to talk like a girl. Somebody might think I was a pansy.(Dennis E. Baron, Grammar and Gender. Yale University Press, 1986) And that aint all. But for now well have to agree with the editors of The American Heritage Book of English Usage: Aint is a word that aint had it easy.