Euro-skeptics have plenty of reasons to celebrate. By strengthening national parliaments vis-a-vis the EU, Germany's highest court has ended the dream of a 'United States of Europe.' And that's good news for Eastern European countries, who often feel bullied by Germany, the alliance's heavyweight.

A few years ago, continental Europe was busy trying to present itself as a convincing alternative to American neoconservatives and their power-hungry worldview. And, in doing so, "Old Europe" actually experienced a completely unexpected resurgance. In the minds of its inhabitants, the European Union was the perfect alternative to an enormous United States that was drunk on power, savouring its "unipolar moment" and not giving a hoot about either its allies or enemies. To them, it was soft power against the hard US way of doing things --wanting to impose Western democracy on the entire world at any price. These were the issues that historians and political scientists were debating at American universities and at think tanks in the US capital.

Germany's highest court has literally barred Angela Merkel and any subsequent chancellor from giving up any additional powers to the European Union.

If we take a look, they said, can't we see that the EU is currently expanding democracy, freedom and prosperity -- and in a peaceful way? Of course, it's not trying to do things like they've been done in Iraq. No, in the EU, sovereign nations have relinquished part of their rights in order to attain something better for all of those concerned. A few years back, you could often hear the phrase "the European model." And Europe could have served as a model -- at least until the next regional or global crisis that proved once again that the EU's 27 member states had still not forfeited enough sovereignty or mustered the nerve to share a joint foreign policy. In other words, it was enough until everyone called on the US again to make everything all right.