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With the exception of Italy's refugee crisis, which I agree is down to a failure of EU country to work together and take a joint responsibility, the rest are individual EU countries failing to govern themselves in a proper manor, and in some of those cases the EU stepping in is literally to only thing saving them.

Regardless of what I think about the actual issue, this is not honest depiction of the reality. At least in Finland, the politians keep saying that they are forced by international treaties and EU to keep the borders open.

There is some leeway within the EU regulation. Denmark have had some form of border control for years now. You can't do a hard border like previously, but that doesn't prevent countries from patrolling, checking checking passports or even turn away certain people.

The effectiveness of that type of border control is debatable, but it is already being done by other EU members.

Border patrol and passport checks exist in many places in the EU, including in my country, but in the public debate, the expression "open borders" refers to the fact that the countries cannot for example choose whether to turn away non-national asylum seekers, even if they are arriving from other safe EU countries, are clearly originally from safe countries but have "lost" their passport, lie that they are 10 when they appear as 18 etc. Other countries turn such people away, but our politicians claim it is not possible. Of course it could also be that our politicians follow the regulations more carefully than politicians in other countries. However, as Italy has not been able to control their border either, and italian politicians are not famous for following the regulations meticulously, it is more likely that there comes some heavy pressure from the EU.

EU doesn’t set national tax rates.

The rest of your comment is similarly uninformed, just a random collection of irrelevant notions picked up from media; like arguing that the United States of America was a bad idea because traffic in Los Angeles is annoying and Florida has too many criminals.

> EU doesn’t set national tax rates.

Perhaps you're unfamiliar with the EU VAT Directive, which sets minimum tax rates?

And maybe you didn't know that the EU sets minimum Excise duties?

And be under no illusion, the EU is intervening in corporation tax rates. Read up on the 2020 Digital Services Tax and the Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base.

Which country would go below 15% VAT?

Most big ones are above 20% and use it to get tax money for the government.

Also if you tried to sell/export something to EU you geneally use their VAT rate anyway.

Switzerland has 8.1% VAT

Australia has 9%, in some US states there’s no VAT

Austalia is not in Europe.

My question was: realistiacally, which EU country would drop their rate to lower than the minimum 15%.

Most stay at above 20%. Switzerland somehow balances own budget with lower VAT. I doubt any EU country can lower the VAT below the EU mininum of 15% and balance their budget

They should spend way less then

I am not an europhile, but

"general anti-family and anti-natalist policies have stopped replacement level birthrates in all EU countries."

This problem is present everywhere outside Subsaharan Africa and Afghanistan, it cannot be pinned down on the EU. If Tehran, Beijing and San Francisco have the very same problem, it must go deeper than just "anti-natalist policies": all sorts of societies, religions and systems tend to react to modernity by an almost identical crash in births.

Your arguments are making it hard to not be snarky when responding.

But your arguments are blaming "the EU" for clouds shadowing the sun, as to say - "the EU" doesn't have a strategy of maliciously importing migrants. And even if it did, migrants are not somehow magically bad. Having migration in Europe is not a new thing, it was so for thousands of years now - migrations of war refugees, religious and cultural groups, invasions and other restructurisations of countries...

To keep trade going + keep using internet, but also somehow stop people moving + culture changing is impossible. If you have freedom, you have freedom.

(And why do your arguments have a smell of "let's forget about Frontex"?)

That's a lot of nonsense.

> Germany's failure to manage its national energy needs due to EU "green" policies made it subject to Russian energy dependency.

Germany did not import EU green policies. It was a driver of those.

The offer of cheap energy from Russia combined with the corruption following that, caused German politicians (CDU/SPD) to make a series of mistakes, like expanding energy dependence from Russia without making sure energy needs are covered in times of a crisis (AFD and BSW are making the same mistake, only worse, worshipping the authoritarian & corrupt government of Putin). When Russia was invading the Ukraine, suddenly the Gas storages were not filled anymore - Russia trying to blackmail Germany. Putin influencers like Sarah Wagenknecht denied any Russian plans, just days before the invasion, when already a huge Russian military, ordered by Putin, at the Ukraine border. At the same time the US already warned allies about the Russian plans.

> The US had to literally rescue Germany from itself by blowing up Nordstream

The US did not blow up Nordstream. Actually the US warned their allies of planned attacks. There is zero evidence for US involvement. The Nordstream pipelines were also useless, since they did not transport gas at that time.

> "the Ukraine"

Careful, that alone would get others flagged as a Russian asset. The name is just "Ukraine" now.

> Putin influencers like Sarah Wagenknecht denied any Russian plans, just days before the invasion when already a huge military was waiting at the Ukraine border.

Jordan Peterson has been interviewing Frederick Kagan (of the Iraq surge strategy fame) days after the invasion. Kagan said that no one in the U.S. foreign policy circles thought there would be an actual invasion.

>The US had to literally rescue Germany from itself by blowing up Nordstream

I wonder what rescued Germans think about that.

In the latest polls the two parties who want to reopen Nord Stream (AfD and BSW) have 25%. Many Germans (I'm one of them) still shy away from these parties and grudgingly vote mainstream, because obviously Nord Stream is just one of many issues:

https://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/

So I'd estimate that in an honest poll to reopen Nord Stream and protect it militarily you'd easily get 60% in favor. That aligns with the 61% of Germans who are against delivery of Taurus missiles:

https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2024/03/12/...

That 61% is in danger of being ignored yet again if Merz becomes chancellor in Feburary next year, though it will be Trump who is in the driver's seat by then.

> So I'd estimate that in an honest poll to reopen Nord Stream and protect it militarily you'd easily get 60% in favor.

That's nonsense. There are AFD and BSW bought and paid by Russia telling this nonsense.

Russia has used their energy policy as a weapon to try to dominate Europe and to conquer countries. It was a huge mistake to fall into that trap.

Nord Stream is dead. Russia is a paria in Europe.

Thanks, that's interesting, I didn't think numbers have changed so much.

What do Germans think about the fact that either Ukraine, which received tens of billions of euros in money and weapons from Germany, or the US, who is Germany's ally, blew up the Nord Stream?

Whenever there is a brief moment of free speech, they might find it odd. Similarly, they find it odd that Ukraine has kept its own transit pipelines open until just this week.