Morning Notes for June 2nd, 2005

Crazy morning so this will be brief...

Another One Bites the Dust

Yet another EU member state rejected the proposed constitution yesterday. The Dutch "Nee", just three days after the French "Non", has plunged the EU headlong into crisis according to the FT. The markets are not at all amused:

Fears of an impending political crisis in Europe is causing concern in the markets: on Wednesday the euro fell 0.6 per cent to an eight-month low of $1.223 against the US dollar, taking its losses since Friday to 2.8 per cent. On Thursday morning however the euro seemed to have made a slight recovery.

This is essentially great news for Tony Blair who can now legitimatley postpone the British referendum (one he was loathe to carry out in the first place). Dan Drezner and The Duck's own Dan Nexon have some analysis. Suffice it to say, while the Dutch reasons for rejecting the treaty are certainly different from the French at some level they both reveal a fundamental problem that Brussels needs to deal with: the enormous gap between political elites in Europe and their citizens.

TPMCafe Launches

TPMCafe, a new group blog of sorts and an offshot of the popular Talking Points Memo, launched on Tuesday and has a boat-load of content. Particularly interesting to me is the America Abroad section which features a collection of rather famous IR scholars pontificating on all things international. Do check it out...

Filed as: EU Constitution, Netherlands, France, Dutch Vote