What's Good for Covid, is Good for the Gas Crisis: the Trojan Horse of EU-led centralisation shows enormous contempt, staggering incompetence, and the end of popular sovereignty in Europe

Bonus features include historical analogies and a rant to rouse the citizens of Europe to fight the looming power grab by the EU Commission, if only for their and childrens' future

So, while I wanted to work on my book manuscript today (which is why I get up well before the kids: to work on my own stuff), I saw the below piece, which is just too great not to share with you right away.

Today’s ‘insanity check’ (I suppose) consists of a piece that appeared on the website of Austro-Covidian state broadcaster ORF a little over an hour ago (6:16 a.m. European summer time), and it tells the age-old story of ‘reality’ (i.e., wishful thinking) meeting, well, factual reality, or, as one of my own pre-WW1 academic heroes, Georg Jellinek (1851-1911), one of Max Weber’s contemporaries and a leading mind in terms of public (or administrative) law coined it: this is an essay about, in Jellinek’s words,

The normative [or normalising] force of the factual [orig.: die normative Kraft des Faktischen]

Before we continue, please keep the following two issues (and one quintessential contradiction) in mind:

1. EU-led centralisation etc. is based on the premise of, for lack of a more succinct description, that ‘size does matter’ (at least as far as the power, prerogatives, and arrogance of the Euroklatura is concerned), but in all other aspects of live, of course, the same Euroklatura insists on the wickedness, if not outright evil nature of ‘public institutions’, hence their pushing of New Public Management, which is to say ‘public-private partnerships’, by which is meant, in Mussolini’s and FDR’s memorable words, the melding of corporate and state power, or, simply put, ‘fascism’.

2. Thus, we may deduce the main ‘argument’ (ahem) in favour of the current push for EU-led ‘integration’ of issues pertaining to energy supplies, which is to say the breaching of the final frontier of Globalism: energy supplies being the one and only issue that has so far eluded the grasp of the Euroklatura, this is the moment the US’ and WEF’s brown-nosing camp followers in Brussels and all member-states’ capitals have been preparing for: the final bullet that goes into the heart of national sovereignty, the ending of the European ‘national state’ (Charles Tilly), and the abrogation of any resemblance of democratic-representative accountability—by which is meant popular sovereignty—via the anticipated conferral of energy policy to the Euroklatura.

So, with these preliminaries out of the way, here is Austro-Covidian state broadcaster ORF with its journalistic coup de grace (source here; as always, translation and emphases mine):

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Less Gas for Private Households?

Reducing Gas Flows Would Fail Due to Technical Difficulties

In view of reduced gas supplies from Russia, there are calls for a change in the emergency rules. The idea is that one should think about whether households should really be favoured over industry. Beyond the political implications, however, such demands fail already at the conceptual state—due to the technical difficulties. In the end, this issue is one of voluntary reduction of consumption for households, as the first draft of the EU’s gas emergency plan also make clear.

Will Europe run out of gas this winter, and, if so, at what price? In view of reduced supplies of Russian gas, this question is increasingly dominating political debates—and resulting in even more questions, one of which is: who should have to do without gas, if push comes to shove?

The legal situation is clear: the relevant EU directives and regulations, as well as resultant national legislation stipulate the following: gas supply must be ensured for ‘protected customers’ and the ‘supply of heat to private households’, even in the event of a supply crunch. In other words: while (large) industrial enterprises could have their gas supply switched off in the event of a gas shortage, gas flows would continue to households for as long as possible.

Adding Fuel to Fire

But: is this still justifiable in view of a shortage that could last for months? This question has been heard increasingly in recent days. Former EU Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger asked it last week [see here for my take]. German Energy Minister Robert Habeck (Greens), during his visit to Vienna last Tuesday [on which see here], said that in the event of months of interrupted gas flows, European guidelines do not fit exactly and might have to be tightened up.

It was quickly reported—in many places—that Habeck was questioning the codified prioritisation. The fact that the German minister had actually been thinking out aloud about an EU-wide solidarity mechanism was often lost. Accordingly, Habeck’s office was busy the next day engaging in damage control and trying to set the record straight.

In Germany, the statements of the Economics Minister added fuel to an already smouldering debate. The prioritisation in favour of private households urgently needs to be changed, according to the employers’ association Gesamtmetall [i.e., a big business lobbying group representing heavy industry]. And in Austria, too, the statements by Oettinger and Habeck—sometimes taken out of context [gee, could that be because of mis-representing, and/or taking sentences out of context, dear journos?]—fell on fertile ground. ‘Industry must not be sanctioned in the event of a gas freeze from Russia. Politicians must quickly change the relevant laws’, an op-ed in Kurier argued on Wednesday.

Multi-Level Gas Network

However, what such demands deliberately overlook is this: from a technical point of view alone, a change in prioritisation would be difficult or even impossible, which has to do with the structure of the gas grid. The top level is made up of the large distribution pipelines, which transport the gas at high pressure from region to region [hence the issue with that gas turbine from the Nord Stream 1 pipeline]. From distribution hubs [such as the one in Baumgarten an der March in Lower Austria], the level two pipelines branch off. Some large consumers, such as industrial plants or gas-fired power plants, are connected directly to these level two distribution hubs. The vast majority of consumers—and this means: all private households—are connected to level three of the grid

In fact, gas-powered heating systems and gas-fired ovens [which are both widely used in Central Europe, even though governments are moving to outlaw them, because Climate Change] would therefore be the last to go out in the event of a quite disastrous gas shortage. If there is hardly any gas left in storage facilities and only little new gas is fed into the grid from abroad, pressure drops. For large consumers on grid level two, this can quickly become a problem. All these systems are designed for high gas pressure. At the lowest grid level, however, pressure is much lower anyway. Gas boilers could therefore continue to run even in the event of an acute gas shortage taking much of manufacturing offline. The emergency prioritisation is intended to prevent such a situation from occurring.

One May Only Switch ‘On’ or ‘Off’

Thus, anyone who wants to restrict gas supply to private households in the event of control measures would have to start at grid level three. But the Wiener Netze [the Vienna State-owned company in charge of gas distribution] told ORF that it is technically impossible to reduce gas supplies at level three. It is also next-to impossible to shut off individual local distribution networks at the low-pressure level due to the tight integration of the entire gas distribution network.

And even if doing so would be possible, this would entail serious consequences for flow of gas: one may only switch it completely on or completely off—for all consumers connected to the supply network, regardless of whether they are flats, commercial enterprises, or hospitals.

In the same way, gas consumption cannot simply be limited for each household individually. This starts with the fact that gas meters may only be read directly at each gas connection on the spot. And in the same way, if gas consumption exceeds any set limit, the gas tap would have to be turned off manually for each household, again on the spot—a rather absurd idea.

Appeals, Campaigns, and the Price of Gas

Any attempt to ration the gas supply of private households via regulations would fail on the practical level, explains Carola Millgram of E-Control [the Austrian Regulatory Agency]. The gas expert [sic] also considers it very unlikely that such approaches will be seriously considered [also, how?].

In fact, politics seems to rely primarily on appeals and raising awareness among households. This also applies to the gas emergency plan that the EU Commission intends to present next week. In a draft made public earlier this week [on which see here], the Commission proposes to that EU member-states institute a mandatory limit of room temperatures for public and commercial buildings. With regard to households, however, it is counting on extensive—and, ultimately, voluntary—savings campaigns.

Private households are to be called upon to ‘turn down the thermostat by one degree’. ‘The higher the reduction by voluntary measures, the lower the need for mandatory restrictions on industry’, the draft reads. Apart from PR campaigns and appeals, another very tangible reason is likely to make people save energy this winter: with the current development of energy prices, it will not be a matter of choice for many whether to save or not.

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A Rant about 1848, the Rule of Law, and Military Disaster

First and foremost: even though the consequences outlined are staggering and will, inevitably, result in much suffering, the ancient Greeks—yes, those we Europeans claim to be descended from, at least philosophically and intellectually—had a word for this: hubris, which brings about a visit of Nemesis, the goddess of righteous retribution.

Secondly, the above piece—and, really, everything else relating to the past 2.5 years of Covid mindfuckery—show the utter contempt for one of Western Civilisation’s crowning achievements, the Rule of Law, which is supplanted by a new spirit of the age (Zeitgeist), which is: ‘rules for thee, but not for me’, both internationally (cue the ‘rules-based order’, which stands in stark contrast to ‘international law’) as well as (trans)nationally and domestically. The EU Commission and its unaccountable actions are a key driver in the ongoing reduction of most European citizens to serfs.

Third, virtually everyone at the EU level—as well as their water-carriers in domestic politics—argues that ‘joint action’ is needed, and they do so by pointing to the ‘successes’ of such action in the fight vs. Covid. While I could go on an epic rant on that one, I’d instead like to invite you to ponder but one, albeit rather different question: how did that work out for you, your neighbours, and your fellow citizens? I suppose Ronald Reagan’s time-worn warning, slightly amended, might stand in to succinctly summarise our predicament:

I’m from the EU, and I’m here to help.

Be afraid, be very afraid for your livelihood, well-being, and safety, is the only logical deduction possible, it seems.

Fourth, albeit relatedly, this is what ‘technocracy’, or ‘rule by [self-declared] experts’, is: vacuous statements of intent that clearly show an absolute rejection of constitutional arrangements by leading politicians. While in another time and age, such actions would have been decried by the Fourth Estate using words such as ‘high crimes’ and ‘treason’, an apathetic citizenry-(re)turning-into-subjects is apparently the last group of individuals calling for bespoke trials.

Thus passes the glory of the (Western) world.

Thus ends the brief, if stupefyingly incomplete yet potentially marvellous, era of self-government: there are rules and regulations, even treaties and laws, but leading politicians and their brown-nosing camp followers in legacy media are taking one dump after another on our inalienable natural rights, shredding our constitutional protections, and, perhaps most insultingly, declare—at the same time—that even though they wish to change all of these things (and many more, such as Biology), they brazenly tell us that it’s actually technically impossible to do so.

The final—very angry, if appropriate, I’d argue—questions I’d invite you to ponder if you made it to the bottom of this piece are: since most Western energy systems may be described in quite similar terms such as the ones highlighted above:

Why is it that, with the fear-and war-mongering reaching fever pitch in this absurd ‘July Crisis’ of ours, big business and high finance are going along with clearly incompetent national and EU leadership? Do note the staggering silence of both and their lobbying groups in these discussions: silence means consent, as the saying goes.

Why, if Covid is the template, should anyone be complacent about the prospect of yet another wrecking ball of ‘emergency measures’ to be implemented? If past actions are a valid predictor of future behaviour, why would anyone in his or her right mind invoke the many Covid failures (clusterf***) as a sane and rational policy blueprint?

What, then, must be done? (The phrase is Lenin’s, one of the 20th century’s most reprehensible individuals, but it’s a valid question, nonetheless.)

I suppose mass protests—in favour of peace and self-government—followed by a restoration of the rule of law would be my favoured outcome.

Yet, as I wrote back in October 2021, I suppose the closest historical analogy is ‘1848’, the ‘springtime of peoples’.

For background, please see the below piece:

Forget About ‘Dark Winter’, it’s Actually Spring

And note that, as the saying goes, ‘it will get worse, before it might get better’, that the Revolutions of 1848 were, in a way, triggered by the ‘structural crisis of the bourgeois mode of production’, as Karl Marx would later call it (by which is meant the difficult 1830s and 1840s in industrialising Britain), in combination with famine (think: Ireland), resurgent nationalism (Poland, oh the irony), and financial catastrophe (collapse of the bond markets).

1848 saw a few major changes, such as the liberation of the peasantry from feudal domination east of the Rhine and west of Russia, but do keep in mind that the Revolutions were eventually suppressed by military force, with perhaps Hungary standing out: the quest for independence was crushed by a Russian military intervention asked for by the Habsburg régime in Vienna (oh, the irony), ushering in a period of ‘Neo-Absolutism’, i.e., centralised direct rule by Vienna (think: Brussels), which lasted for about a decade—until military defeats brought about the advent of constitutional governance (of sorts) from 1867 onwards.

Sure, historical analogies have their limits, but one issue stands out: while I think mass protests will be prevented (by, e.g., lockdowns) and/or crushed by whatever means possible, only military disaster has the potential to fundamentally alter our conditions.

Here’s hoping, especially for the sake of your children and mine, that military defeat will not come about in the shadow of a mushroom cloud.