A party invite for José Manuel Barroso
Dear José,
I know you are in Berlin today, because I saw you on the livestream of the “New Narrative for Europe” conference earlier. I see you also put out a statement, saying that Europe is a State of Mind. When you say state of mind where I am from this is what we think of.
But anyway, back to the point.
I’m sure you’re busy this evening. You might be flying back to Brussels, or having dinner with Angie if she has time. I’m sure it will be fine because she has just had to suffer with Dave and an elderly woman in London, and you’re charming in comparison. But you are coming to the end of your term in Brussels, and I reckon you ought to let your hair down a bit, and enjoy life a little. And, importantly, you might learn something too.
This evening, at my flat in Kreuzberg*, there will be a housewarming party at my new flat. It will go on until late, so do feel free to pass by after your other commitments. I would be very happy if you could come along.
I am not sure we are really what you would call ‘normal’ Europeans – I, after all, write this blog about the EU. But the people who will be here work in the tech companies you spoke about in reply to the questions earlier, they run startup companies, they work for all kinds of different sorts of organisations. They will come from the UK, Germany, France, Hungary, Romania, Italy, Sweden, Slovenia, Poland and the USA. They will speak all kinds of languages, and they all have their own reasons for feeling European, and for being in Berlin. These are the sorts of people you need for your new narratives for Europe (and I was happy you made it plural sometimes earlier).
So how about it José? We would be very happy to have you along. Bring a bottle – your call which European country it should come from!
Jon
P.S. I’ll happily give you a copy of Lakoff’s “Don’t Think of an Elephant” if you come along. I mentioned it to you on Twitter earlier, and I have a few copies here.
* – you have to contact me about the address of course. This invite is strictly non-transferable, even though it is public!
[UPDATE] A tweet from @BarrosoEU, signed /JMB no less, but confirming he will not make it 🙁
Ah, Jon, don’t take it so personally. I just wanted to make the point that there is a vast number of young people that do not tweet or move between countries, yet have substantive life problems. It is them that the new narrative has to find, not you or me.
Thank you for the snide comment, Marko. But I actually have to live EU things in practice, which the people at his event earlier do not not have to. Plus I also have been looking at the narrative of political communications for a while as well.
Jon, very funny, let’s see if Jose pops by. However, the people at your party are far from representative of the European youth and probably far from the youth groups that need to be addressed by the new “narrative”. You’re not the group that lacks “Europeanism”. Quite the opposite, Jose should forget about treating you kindly and rather focus on those to whom the future looks much bleaker. Those people are not living in Berlin, surrounded by friends of other nationalities, but are rather stuck in crushed suburbs somewhere in the South, with little hope of hosting a housewarming party anytime soon.