Don't Post That Meme

Restrictive Nonsense from the EU, Newsday, September 23, 2018. "In an act of unmitigated stupidity, the European Union Parliament has adopted a ban on Star Trek parodies. And posting photos at sporting events. Or photos with anything copyrighted in the background. The EU wants to tax your memes."

The Drifting U.S. Policy Toward Europe

"America’s Outdated Europe Policy: In 2017, the Next President Must Adapt to New Reality," The Conservative, a publication of the Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe, volume 1, issue 1, September 16, 2016, "Since the end of World War II, U.S. policy toward Europe has drifted, without deliberate thought, far from its initial premises—while Europe itself has changed beyond recognition. It is time that the U.S. recognized this fact. The incoming President should direct the National Security Council (NSC) to oversee a comprehensive study of U.S. policy toward Europe, a study to be based on the enduring American interests in Europe, the lessons of the post-1945 era, and on the new facts of Europe that have emerged since 1989."

Let Us Now Praise Useless Icons

Symbols Without Substance, CapX, March 3, 2016. "A few weeks ago, I met a group of Europeans who were touring the US on the State Department’s International Visitor Leadership Program. When the conversation turned to the proposed US-EU trade deal, most of the European delegation seemed to agree (sensibly) that its economic impact would be minor. But they supported it none the less, on the argument that it would be a valuable symbol. That meeting came back to me when I read Rob Halfon MP’s explanation of why he will be voting for Britain to remain in the EU. As he put it, repeatedly, “I am frightened”. For Halfon, the value of the EU is symbolic: it’s supposedly an “alliance of democracies.” The EU’s not doing anything to improve the West’s position. It’s not the kind of alliance that actually fights. It’s just a symbol."

What We Should Be Doing in Europe, 2016 edition

Top Five Priorities for U.S. Policy Toward Europe in 2016, with Dan Kochis, Heritage Foundation Issue Brief #4506, January 8, 2016. "U.S. policy toward Europe in 2015 failed to rise to the significant challenges that confront it. The U.S. is no closer to having a clear and comprehensive strategy to deal with Russia than it was a year ago; it continues to devalue key bilateral and multilateral relationships in Europe for the sake of supporting the European Union (EU); and it took no effective steps to support improved governance in increasingly autocratic Turkey or in the aspiring democracy of Georgia. The devastating Islamist attacks in Paris in December 2015 prove that terrorism is an increasingly serious threat in the heart of Europe, and, from Russia’s aggression in Ukraine to the refugee crisis stemming from Syria, the EU displayed its customary obsession with inward-looking bureaucratic processes and supranationalism. The U.S. should defend European security, sovereignty, and prosperity, not support supranational institutions that undermine all these values. Here are the top five policy priorities in the European region for the Administration and Congress in 2016."

The EU, A Self-Licking Ice Cream Cone

Refugee Crisis Exposes the EU’s Many Fatal Flaws, Yorkshire Post, September 25, 2015. "THE many thousands of refugees now reaching Europe have done more than anything, except the euro, to expose the myths behind the European Union. The tragedy is that it is those myths that will prevent an effective European response."

Like It Or Not, We're Involved

The Refugees, the Europeans, and Us, Newsday, September 19, 2015. "The Obama administration never wanted to take the lead on the war in Syria. It hoped that, if we stayed out of the war, it wouldn't come to us. The wave of refugees now moving into Europe, and lapping at the shores of the United States, shows that assumption was wrong."

The Faulty Geopolitical Case Behind TTIP

The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP): The Geopolitical Reality, with Nile Gardiner and Luke Coffey, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder #2953, September 17, 2014. "The United States and the European Union are negotiating a trade agreement—the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)—that is being hailed as the answer to the woes of the transatlantic relationship, as a solution to the EU’s economic difficulties, and as heralding the creation of a new institution that will reinvigorate the Western alliance. It is essential that both the geopolitical concerns that motivate support for a TTIP and the limits of a TTIP’s ability to improve U.S.–EU relations and address the rise of China be properly understood."

The Economic Case for and Against TTIP

The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP): Economic Benefits and Potential Risks, with Luke Coffey and Bryan Riley, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder #2952, September 17, 2014. "The United States and the European Union are negotiating a trade agreement—the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)—that politicians and commentators on both sides of the Atlantic hail as the answer to the woes of the transatlantic relationship, as a solution to the EU’s economic difficulties, and as heralding the creation of a new institution that will reinvigorate the Western alliance. But no U.S.–EU agreement can do all that has been claimed of the TTIP, and there are reasons to believe that its benefits have been oversold. The U.S. should support all measures that would promote growth and employment by increasing economic freedom, but it should not accept any agreement that could increase government regulation in the name of promoting free trade and create a transnational regulatory body that could infringe on U.S. sovereignty."

Iran Sues Europe, and Wins

Of Mullahs and Lawyers, with Andrew Southam, Weekly Standard, February 24, 2014. "For the past year, British and European Union sanctions against Iran have faced a string of legal challenges and lost nearly every round. The sanctions relief offered by the so-called interim nuclear deal between the P5+1 and Iran conceals the broader problem that the European legal basis for sanctions is eroding. Iran is expert in the waging of terror wars. It’s also, it turns out, good at lawfare."