Andrew Sullivan being extremely sensible

Andrew Sullivan's commentary on the EU election results is by far the most sensible thing on the results I have read, since he gets both sides and realises the underlying conflict has to be managed, not "won". I particularly liked:

And, more to the point, Europeans increasingly feel they are not given a choice in any of this. So they vented.

Making folk feel ignored and powerless is not the path to social harmony. Also:

But when the money ran out, and the recession hit, and the EU only bailed out members on the basis of brutal austerity … the deal began to fray. Now that growth is returning, if only anemically, it appears, moreover, to be benefiting Blue Europe – the elites, the property-owners, the transnationals – while leaving ordinary, working- and middle-class Europeans in the dust. That fuels another layer of mistrust and despair.

The consequences of the ECB's "hard money" policy continue to resonate, badly.

ADDENDA: Sociologist Frank Furedi also has very sensible things to say about the Eurosceptic vote and how not to think about it (via).