Eric Posner has “two”:http://volokh.com/2009/10/27/reply-to-henry-farrell-part-ii/ “responses”:http://volokh.com/2009/10/26/bloggingheads-cont%E2%80%99d/ to my earlier post on international law. I’ll be writing two responses to the responses – the first (on Eric’s second rebutting post) beneath the fold [click to continue…]
Just after Mary Robinson announced that she was not interested in the EU Presidency, former Irish Taoiseach and outgoing EU ambassador to Washington “John Bruton has put his hat in the ring”:http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2009/1029/1224257604883.html. I know him and like him enormously (he’s a very decent right winger), so I won’t speak to the merits of his candidacy on grounds of manifest personal bias. But if I was a betting man (and there were a contract at Intrade), I’d think him well worth a considerable flutter. He fulfils the informal desiderata (Christian Democrat from a small state), but even more importantly seems like a very plausible compromise candidate. The Germans are likely to veto Blair, while the UK is almost certain to want to veto overly enthusiastic federalists like Jean-Claude “‘I am not a dwarf'”:http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&oi=news_result&ct=res&cd=2&ved=0CAwQqQIwAQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F55d05d12-c362-11de-8eca-00144feab49a.html&ei=ifnoSuC5L8HElAeg1YjBDQ&usg=AFQjCNHvNraUGoaaoyb7mPQ920MIXSVYmg Juncker and Guy Verhofstadt. Bruton is plausibly acceptable to both sides – he is pro-European enough to keep the mainlanders happy, but very well liked in the UK. At the moment, I’m not seeing any other declared candidate who could plausibly get a consensus behind him or her. I’ll try to write more on the candidates as the politicking continues …