E.U. Political Parties

Following the E.U. 2024 election, political parties jostled for members in the Parliament. Whereas the political duopoly of parties in the U.S. House of Representatives severely limits such skipping around, the European analogue puts more of an emphasis on party management in terms of weighing ideological or policy “purity” against the power that comes from size. In contrast, the two major parties in the U.S. must be content to be “big tents,” each of which contains groups. From the standpoint of the parties in the E.U. Parliament, the groups are at the state level. The defection of Andrej Babis and the rest of his group from the Renew Europe party just weeks after the E.U. election in June, 2024 demonstrates the distinct balancing task of the E.U. parties. Such balancing is not something that the American political duopoly of parties need do. I contend that the Americans could benefit by looking at the European case in this regard.

The full essay is at "Political Parties in the E.U."

Nominating and Electing the President of the E.U.'s Commission

Before the office of president of the European Commission can be elected by the European Parliament by a simple majority, the European Council must nominate a candidate. The nomination is by qualified majority vote, in that at least 55% of the states must be in favor and the combined population of the states voting yes must be at least 65% of the total population of the European Union. Were any state represented in the Council to have a veto (i.e., unanimity being required), the infeasibility alone of getting a candidate nominated would be astounding and prohibitive for the Union and especially its executive branch, the Commission. Just imagine if every sitting state governor in the U.S. meeting as the Senate (which represents the states) had to sign off on a candidate for that union’s executive-branch president before the House of Representatives (which represents citizens) could elect the candidate by a simple majority! From this comparison, we might wonder whether the European Council should be tasked with nominating two candidates, whom the representatives in the Parliament would then vote on in electing the president of Union’s executive branch. After all, there is more than one candidate when the U.S. House of Representatives votes (by member state!) to elect the president if no candidate receives a majority of the votes of the states’ electoral colleges. Indeed, the E.U. is not the only federal union in which states have a significant role in electing the head of the (federal) executive branch. I contend that the members of parliament should have a choice of more than one candidate when voting for the president of the E.U.’s executive branch. This is as of June, 2024, when the European Council was busy coming up with a nominee; being able to present two nominees to the Parliament would have made the Council’s job easier and the Parliament’s voting more democratic.

The full essay is at "Nominating the President of the Commission."

Christianity and Hinduism: On Manifestations of Divinity

Hinduism is a polytheist religion whereas Christianity is monotheist. Many gods versus one seems like a clear distinction, and I submit that it basically holds. Yet nuances exist that make the distinction murky both in Hinduism and Christianity. The key to clearing up the ambiguity lies in deciding whether being a manifestation of something else is enough to count as existing as an entity. In simpler terms, is a manifestation real, or is it merely an appearance?

The full essay is at "Christianity and Hinduism."

The Pope on AI: On the Ethical (Rather than Religious) Dimension

In June, 2024 at the international political meeting of the G7, a group of seven industrial nations, the head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis, spoke on the ethical dimension of artificial intelligence, or machine-learning. Regarding what the Pope called the “techno-human condition,” machines capable of AI are yet another manifestation of human propensity, which our species has had since its inception, to use tools to mediate with the environment. Although tools can be thought of as an extension of our arms ad legs, it is important to distinguish the human from the machine, even as we posit human characteristics onto some advanced machines, such as computers. In the film, 2001, the computer Hal sounds human, and may even seem to have human motivations, but any such attributions come to an abrupt end when Hal is shut down. To say that Hal dies is to commit a basic category mistake. It would be absurd, for example, to claim that Hal has an after-life. So too, I submit, is there a category mistake in taking the Pope’s talk on the ethics of AI as being religious in nature. Just as it is easy to imprint the human mind on a machine-learning computer, it can be tempting to superimpose the religious domain onto another. The Pope overreached in arbitrarily bringing in religious garb on what is actually an ethical matter in the “techno-human” world.

The full essay is at "The Pope on AI."

The European Court of Justice Slaps Down Hungary: A Defense of Modern Federalism

The European Court of Justice (ECJ), the E.U.’s supreme court, which like the U.S. counterpart can overrule state courts, ordered the E.U. state of Hungary to pay a lump sum of €200 million and €1 million per day of delay from June 12, 2024 because the state government had disregarded “the principle of sincere cooperation” between states in taking in their fair share of foreign asylum-seekers and “deliberately” evaded implementing the federal law that directs the states how to treat those people who enter the E.U. through the state seeking political asylum.[1] The state government had made it “virtually impossible” for asylum seekers to file applications.[2] Similar to the Nullification Acts passed by the state government of South Carolina in the U.S. when that union was between 30 and 40 years old, the decision of Hungary to ignore the ECJ’s ruling on the matter in 2020 could not be tolerated by federal authorities, for a federal system of dual sovereignty (i.e., some held at the federal level and the rest at the state level) cannot survive if state governments can unilaterally decide to nullify, or ignore federal law. That federal directives in the E.U. reply on implementation into law at the state level just makes the E.U. more vulnerable should a state government so easily dismiss federal law. Why even be in a union if its law is deemed not worthy of respect?

The full essay is at "The ECJ Slaps Down Hungary."

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1. Jorge Liboreiro, “ECJ Finds Hungary with €200 Million over ‘Extremely Serious’ Breach of E.U. Asylum Law,” Euronews.com, June 12, 2024 (accessed June 13, 2024).
2. Ibid.

Lolita

In being able to engage an audience both visually and audibly, and to do so at close range—something we don’t get from watching a play on a distant stage—the medium of film is capable of resonating with, challenging, and rebounding from both heart and mind. That is to say, the medium can engage us at a comparatively deep level and even touch us profoundly. The medium can tug at our ethical strings and even provoke uncomfortable thoughts and feelings precisely because sound and image can conjoin at close range such that we are brought closer to an ethical harm than is likely in our own daily experiences. Some ethical harms, such as that in a young woman not being able to stop a rape by an older man abusing a stark power differential, may simply be too horrific up close to experience even vicariously. A filmmaker can use devices, whether photographic, audio, or narrative, to moderate our exposure without sacrificing the depth at which the harm and its sordid scenario can reach in us. Such exposure to ethical problems or even to situations in which the ethical verdict is debatable can give to an audience a better realization of the ethical dimension of the human condition and improve our ability to render ethical judgements on specific issues and generally. Writ large, the medium of film can do these things for a society, reflecting and even provoking it with just enough directness to be palatable and grasped. The genre of science fiction in particular has been used to serve this purpose. Even by contrasting an original film with its remake decades later, a society’s changing nature can be glimpsed by an audience, especially as censorship guidelines are loosened as per changing social mores and ethical sensibilities of a society. The fictional film, Lolita (1962), and its remake, Lolita (1997), provide us with an excellent case study not only of changes in twentieth-century American society, but also of how powerful the medium of film can be in its treatment of the ethical dimension of the human condition.

The full essay is at "Lolita."

When Hollywood Gets Political: Partisan Profits

Entertainment celebrities and businesses alike risk losing customers and thus revenue by taking positions publicly on political issues. Fearing a surge from political parties on the far-right, some large businesses in the E.U. took the unusual step of coming out against those parties, labeling them as “extremist,” prior to the E.U. election in June, 2024. Typically, businesses there limit their political stances to particular issues that bear on core functions. This is a prudent policy, for human beings, being of bounded rationality, can easily translate ideological disagreement into switching brands. Even universities can get bruised by becoming embroiled in a domestic or international matter that is controversial. Hence after the contentious spring semester of pro-Palestine protests at Harvard (and other many other universities), the university’s administration enacted a policy not to take positions on issues in which the core functions of the university are only indirectly touched or are not affected at all. In creating a “marketplace” for academic freedom, universities themselves are best positioned by staying neutral. Although it is tempting for anyone (for oneself or one’s institution) who has access to media to sway public opinion on a political issue, I contend that the immediate self-gratification is usually outweighed by lost revenue and the reputation of being partisan. Applying strict scrutiny to one’s foray into controversial issues is harder to do if some vocal customers are demanding that a position be publicly taken. The silence of other customers, who would “vote with their purse or wallet” were an opposing position to be taken, should not be overlooked.  The singer Taylor Swift and the actor Robert De Niro provide us with two illustrations. Stepping out of their respective domains comes at a cost in those domains, and thus should, I submit, be done prudently and seldom.

The full essay is at "When Hollywood Gets Political."

American Airlines: Caring for People

What is the purpose of a business? According to Aristotle, there are different kinds of purposes. The final cause of a tree seed, for example, is a tree; the material cause is whatever biochemistry went into the seed. The final cause of a human sperm entering a human egg is an adult human being—hence the question of the ethics of abortion. A human embryo is potentially an adult human being. The material cause of an embryo lies in the biochemistry of the seed and the egg. But I digress. As regards a company, we can distinguish different kinds of purposes. Somewhat crudely, the real purpose can be distinguished from the ostensible purpose. The former has to do with what can be thought of as the bottom-line purpose: maximizing revenue or profit. Any ostensible purpose, such as feeding people or transporting them, is functional in nature, and can be viewed as a means of achieving the real purpose. A third kind of purpose can be labeled as a marketing purpose, the promotion of which is merely to serve the real purpose. In terms of Shankara’s Hindu metaphysical framework, the real purpose is in the real, the ostensible purpose is in the realm of appearance, and a marketing purpose is in that of illusion. I contend that business managers, especially in marketing, are accustomed to conflating these three types of purposes in being oriented to the real purpose. Not being transparent about the differences between these three purposes is, I submit, unethical in nature. I have an incident involving American Airlines in mind.

The full essay is at "American Airlines."

The E.U.: Pulled in Two Directions

European integration has proceeded in fits and starts since Robert Shuman proposed the European Coal and Steel Cooperative in 1950 so Europe could keep an eye on Germany’s military in the wake of World War II. Euroatom and the European Economic Community came in 1957, and the EC, which consisted of the three organizations, existed until 1993. Since then, the European Union too has progressed step-wise, with some steps backwards, such as when Britain seceded from the Union. Whereas the U.S. made the leap from a supranational alliance, the Articles of Confederation, to a federal government all at once in 1789, the way of the E.U. in terms of dual sovereignty and adding states has been incremental. Perhaps throughout its 31 year history, as of its federal election in 2024, the E.U. was being pulled in two directions. Some forces have led the E.U. to gain competencies over time, whereas other forces could be described as “states’ rights,” anti-federalist, or Euroskeptic tendencies. If dominant, those forces would ultimately lead to the dissolution of the federal union, whereas the former forces would lead to its consolidation. After thirty years, the U.S. too was more subject to the centripetal forces than those for ever closer union. From the subsequent history of the U.S., it is perfectly legitimate to ask whether the E.U. too will lean so close too to political (and economic) consolidation too by the time that union is over 200 years old. Like Europeans today, the Americans of the 1820s would never have dreamed that the federal level would be so dominate over the states, which were still regarded as countries.  

The full essay is at "The E.U.: Pulled in Two Directions."

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."

An E.U. Political Party Mischaracterizes the Union as an Alliance: Suicide by Mis-Identity

Two weeks before the E.U. election in 2024, far-right parties were projected to do well and thus have more seats in the E.U.’s lower legislative chamber, the European Parliament. Immigration was a key issue in the rising popularities of those parties. Although immigration in both the E.U. and U.S. was in dire need of governmental fixes, the rise of the right in the E.U. came at the expense of the union itself due to the underlying category mistake evinced at least in the European Conservatives and Reformists party.

The full essay is at "An E.U. Political Party."

Prospects for Civil War in an E.U. State: The Case of Slovakia

As the E.U. was heading toward legislative elections in 2024, the shooting of Slovakia’s prime minister could have served as a wake-up call concerning the silent benefits of having a union that is political, and thus governmental, rather than merely an economic “bloc.” Were civil war likely in Slovakia, given the aggressive political division there, being a semi-sovereign state rather than a fully independent country meant that explicit and implicit buffers existed that could stave off such war. Considering that an assassination had been the trigger for World War I, having a federal system that could quell aggression within a state is no small benefit.

The full essay is at "Civil War in Slovakia." 

Eurovision Song Contest 2024: On the role of Political Ideology in Inconsistencies

Political preferences can be salient in organizing bodies of entertainment events that are billed as non-political in nature. This broad inconsistency can in turn allow for others—some of which may not be obvious. My objective here is to render such inconsistencies transparent so that other “hidden” inconsistencies can be more easily detected in the future. As a prime case study, I have in mind the European Broadcast Union (EBU), and more particularly its approach to the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest.

The full essay is at "Eurovision Song Contest."

Chinese President Xi Exploits a Vulnerability of the E.U.

Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Europe in May, 2024 “amid concerns in Europe over Chinese support for Russia’s war in Ukraine and European markets being flooded with cheap Chinese electric vehicles.”[1] Although these matters were at the time properly matters for the E.U. rather than its states, Xi oriented his visit to the state level, and in particular to states including France and Hungary that had “special bilateral relationships” with China.[2] In other words, the Chinese leader sought to exploit the E.U.’s vulnerability wherein state governments have sufficient sovereignty to undermine the federal level. I contend that the state leaders should have refused to meet with Xi, redirecting him to meet with federal officials.

The full essay is at "China Exploits a Vulnerability of the E.U."

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1. Yuchen Li and Wesley Rahn, “Did China’s Xi Jinping Expose Disunity in Europe?” Deutsch Welle (DW.de), May 10, 2024.
2. Ibid.

The Lion in the Desert

In 1929, after nearly 20 years of facing resistance in Libya, Benito Mussolini, the Fascist ruler of Italy, appointed General Graziani as colonial governor to put down the military resistance of Libyan nationalists led by Omar Mukhtar. Graziani was ruthless, and fortunately he was arrested when Mussolini was toppled. His foremost atrocity was putting over a million Libyan civilians in a camp in a desert, with the intent to starve them in retaliation for the guerilla fighters objecting to the Italian occupation. The film, The Lion of the Desert (1980), faithfully depicts the historical events that took place in Libya from 1920 to 1931. The sheer arbitrariness other than from brute force in the occupation and the impotence of the League of Nations are salient themes in the film.

The full essay is at "The Lion in the Desert."