Heres an early report from the Washington Post on Frances rejection of the EU Constitution.
The vote was 56% to 43%. This is said to be a major defeat for Jacque Chirac.
I dont know much about this but it seems a good thing. The EU Constitution is about 300 pages which means the rule of bureaucrats not self-government. And, a major factor seems to be that many Frenchmen believe they are losing control of their country to immigrants and that approving the EU Constitution would further that loss.
The decisive factor was that Schramm has been out of town for a week.
You are correct, Mickey. This is a good thing. The EU constitution is a farrago that will further undermine self-government in the region.
In the past, countries have voted down EU agreements in referenda, but they were small nations like Denmark and Ireland, and the EU-crats found ways around these "nos."
But to have the voters of France, which is supposed to be the driving force behind the EU, reject this joke of a constitution--and by such an overwhelming margin--could be huge. I dont see how the French can be told, as many in Brussels would no doubt like to see, to in effect go sit in a corner for a year and then vote "oui."
BTW, while many traditional patriots and center-right or rightist Frenchmen no doubt voted non on sovereignty grounds, the things also lost b/c a lot of French leftists have convinced themselves (probably groundlessly) that the EU constitution will open the door to "economic neoliberalism" (thats left-speak for free markets and competition). So they voted the right way, but for objectively rather silly reasons. Still, Ill take it. A good day for self-government, and a bad day for supranational unaccountable bureaucracy.