Although if they weren't, what would it say about "the markets" if it turned out they were willing to make millions unemployed, homeless and impoverished in order to avoid tighter financial regulation and a possible end to the multi-decade party?

Elsewhere, we seem to have run into the problem that Europe means different things to different people. On ET we'd like to think it means civilised inquiry, intellectual curiosity, pragmatic as opposed to ideological empathy and enlightened democracy.

But what was the original vision? Does anyone know? I remember it being a "common market" - which doesn't bode well. Was it ever supposed to be more than that?

The question is only passingly relevant because - clearly - it could be more than that. But making it more than that means pushing against "the markets", the exploiters, the financial criminals, the petty populist nation-state tribalists, and the tragicomical media despots like Berlusconi and Murdoch.

Having the vision isn't bad. Not being able to achieve the vision - yet - isn't entirely bad.

It would be worse if the vision didn't exist at all.