Anti US paranoia flares in EU over Irish vote

Sunday Times:

FIRST it was the sheer ingratitude of the Irish, then it was the failure of the Dublin government to mount a successful yes campaign. Now Brussels has found a new explanation as to why Ireland voted down the European Union treaty in June - a CIA and Pentagon-backed plot, devised by American neoconservatives to weaken the EU.

The European parliament wants an inquiry into whether Declan Ganley, the multi-millionaire chairman of the Libertas group that campaigned against the treaty, could be in the pockets of US defence and intelligence services.

The calls have been led by Daniel Cohn-Bendit, the firebrand 1968 student leader turned Green MEP, who pointed to Irish press reports that “revealed there possibly exists a link between the financiers of the no campaign in Ireland and the Pentagon as well as the CIA.

“If proved true, this would clearly show there are forces in the US willing to pay people to destabilise a strong and autonomous Europe”, he said.

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They must have gotten this nonsense from the Hugo Chavez school of paranoia. I think most neocons could careless whether the Irish or anyone else joins the EU. My own interest in the vote was the amusement of seeing the EU bureaucrats bellyaching and being affronted by the exercise of democracy in the Irish decision. This anti American paranoia does suggest that perhaps the Irish decision was based on good judgment in not wanting to be associated with such nuttiness.