SOUR KRAUT:

European Union Cannot Reach Deal on Constitution (JOHN TAGLIABUE, 12/13/03, NY Times)

The leaders of 25 current and imminent members of the European Union failed to reach agreement on Saturday on a draft constitution, stumbling on a problem familiar to Americans: how to apportion power among large and small states.

At issue was a proposal to discard a voting system agreed upon three years ago that gave Spain, a member of the union, and Poland, which joins next year, almost as much voting weight each as Germany, which has more than twice the population of either. Spain and Poland insisted on retaining the expanded rights.

Germany's chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, called the summit "largely a failure," and said, "We don't have a consensus on a constitution here because one or another country put the European ideal behind national interest."

The European ideal? Being dominated by France and Germany?

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 13, 2003 4:12 PM