I am grateful to folks on both sides of the issue (and I realize there is more than just 'both' to the sides and issues that I simply don't have the background to recognize). Iaians I don't think your longish summary is irrational at all, but I don't see what your ideal situation would be. Is it a return to the economic situation prior to the formation of the EU? I don't think that is where you are but where are you?

What I gather from looking at recent history is that the heavy duty Europeanization of the continental economy seems to have been stimulated by the unification of Germany in 1990 and the extensive economic centralization that led to the introduction of the Euro just over ten years later. Along with these heightened concentrations of bureaucratic power in Brussels and the increasing porosity of European borders. The 90s and early zips seem to be a vital period where Europe was changing from a group of nations to a nascent superstate.

I remember talk in the U.K. in the 60s expressed as a U.S.E. a "United States of Europe". Then the comparison was to the U.S.A. although the prospects of a united Europe have been considered far before there were even American colonies. Clearly WWII was the impetus to consider uniting countries in an attempt to overcome nationalism, as was the institution the United Nations. The current U.S. President has rejected internationalism, using what for him is a pejorative "Globalism". Is this, Iaians, also where you are coming from in philosophy? Or are there other ramifications I'm not seeing (highly likely)?