Taking the Politics of Fear to a New Low

The political class seems to have given up on formulating any positive reasons for voting in today’s elections to the European Parliament. Instead, it has reconciled itself to the fact that the institutions of the European Union (EU) lack popular legitimacy, and now acknowledges, more or less, that its ‘European project’ lacks content and meaning.

Surveys throughout Europe confirm that the public looks upon the EU with suspicion. Significant numbers of people also perceive it as a threat to their way of life. That is why the EU oligarchs, the Brussels bureaucrats who oversee this ‘European project’, have embraced the politics of fear. Unable to come up with positive arguments for voting, they have kickstarted a campaign of fear designed to scare people into casting their ballots.

‘If people don’t vote, the danger is that there will be more extremist parties or parties from outside the mainstream [in the European Parliament]’, warned Hans-Gert Poettering, president of the parliament. That is the main message of the EU oligarchy in this week’s elections: they are seeking, not a positive endorsement of mainstream EU parties, but votes cast to keep out the extremists.

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