Steve. Motes, beams and maybe the eyes are yours. Had it occurred to you that you may be the one tied to an ideology? The initial idea of the EU was a good one. Unfortunately what it has become is a kind of modern day re-iteration of the Roman Empire and it's successor the Holy Roman Church.

It is not interested in democracy, it is not interested in the welfare of it's subjects. It is interested in it's own wealth, status and power. Like the Catholic church it has an ideology, with which you appear to agree, it has a closed system of appointing it's own leaders and it enforces a hierarchical structure. I wonder whether St Cuthbert realised what he was doing when he gave in to Romes rule. Maybe he foresaw war and destruction if he tried to resist. The Irish church model seems to have been closer to the Cathar heresy and look what happened to them. It took us a millennium to get free of the Roman church. We are now in a position to extract ourselves from it's political equivalent. It's got to be worth the price.