I note that he who knows nothing, but whose words are faithfully repeated by those of like-minded capability, has been pontificating on Jean Claude Junker’s views about treaty change.

As has been noted elsewhere, any decision about treaty change, if required and when, is not in the remit of the Head of the European Commission or the Commission as a whole, but is within the remit of the President of the European Council; and only then if so requested by the Heads of State that comprise said Council.

On that point it is reported, here and here, that a senior Brussels official (probably the filing clerk on duty) has stated that: “more and more” EU leaders are opposed to Treaty Change in the next two years, whilst EU President Martin Schulz has said it is a “relief” that other member state heads, such as President Hollande, were turning against Treaty change due to fear of referendums to ratify such changes in their home countries.

Why Schulz should be worried about referendums when the EU has a ‘procedure’ should a referendum not deliver the right response, can but amaze one. Coupling that with the fact that a referendum can be avoided because a particular Head of State can decide against one purely because he/she fears they might lose such can but illustrate that representative democracy is indeed a form of democratised dictatorship.

It is all very well to rely on the will of the people to deliver the desired result, providing of course that that those voting understand that for which they are voting. Talking, for the first time today, to a ‘bright and educated’ young lady who has a Masters Degree, the conversation turned to politics; at which point she informed me that she had never taken any interest in the subject, or thought about it – to which my immediate, unspoken, question was: and you have a vote?

It is on such people that he who knows nothing; our political class; and the media; address their ‘knowledge’, nuanced as it is, with a view to manipulating public opinion. Where public education is concerned Goebbels can be considered to have been in the kindergarten class in view of the degree to which public education has progressed.