EUROPE: A longstanding grouping of countries is facing an acrimonious collapse after a series of policy blunders left it struggling with the worst Covid-19 outbreak in the world.
Experts say the worse than usual impact of the virus can be directly laid directly the door of a bungling administration and its photogenically blond leader, in power since 2019.
The Union now faces a breakup, as fractious members grow fed up with poor policy choices and centralised power grabs, Berlaymonster understands.
In addition to enduring death tolls many multiples higher than its neighbours, the ill-governed jurisdiction-cum-Petri-dish has even managed to foment deadly new mutant strains that left former allies cowering in fear.
In one astonishing policy error, the bloc’s Brussels-educated leader forced schools to open for exactly one day, ensuring all kids got a decent chance to have a good sneeze on each other before returning home to grandma.
That embarrassing U-turn came after outspokenly criticising political enemies who sought to cancel Christmas, and cancelling Christmas.
Attempts to limit the spread were further hampered with the failure of a high-profile system designed to monitor viral spread, a multi-billion public contract handed to the wife of a political ally. Bureaucrats also squandered nearly half a billion in budget funds to force lavish lunches in Covid hotspots, and you don’t need a degree from Bruges to tell you that’s probably a bad idea.
That follows an embarrassing series of hiding-in-plain-sight photographs in which one European leader proudly shook hands with vulnerable hospital patients weeks after the pandemic was declared.
In any ordinary political system, one might think that series of humiliating climbdowns would lead to hard consequences, but many EU experts have told Berlaymonster the Union’s system of accountability, or lack thereof, will allow the administration to continue unabated.
A 2019 vote showed a convincing majority of the parliament in favor of the current leadership, and there seems curiously little appetite to reconsider that choice.
Once appointed, the administration’s chief has also used powers unique to the so-called democracy to personally nominate dozens of politically sympathetic lawmakers whose loyalty is now all but guaranteed.
So far, the health crisis has not become a political one. The threat of northern regions claiming independence has been avoided, after central authorities ruled it would be unlawful to hold a referendum.
Journalists who might in the circumstances be expected to call for a change of government have been conveniently distracted by the shitshow on the other side of the Channel.
But multiple pundits contacted by Berlaymonster have confirmed that this time it is definitely the last straw, and this time the EU is definitely going to collapse, unlike all those other times before.