All of these seem to make sense only if you take a good chunk of Russia in to weigh in countries. Russia is not really part of Europe. It's part of European history and culture, but it does not consider itself to be part of Europe, and it certainly won't be part of the EU for the foreseeable future.

Nah, the center of Europe is now somewhere in Western Germany.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes