The right-wing UKIP party is likely to win the upcoming European election in the UK on a platform of reducing immigration and leaving the EU. Otherwise intelligent, educated people are caught up in the hysteria and seem to have suspended thinking for themselves. While one has to has sympathy with protesters about immigration (even I think it has been too much), this can be moderated without leaving the EU. There is every reason for the British to stay in the EU, and few reasons to leave. To do so would be a near death blow to the country. Some good ‘ole boys among the conservatives seem to think that a closer connection with the US would do the trick, the so-called “special relationship”. This relationship is a figment of the imagination, too silly to take seriously.
What has this to do with Epicurus. Well, if the object of life is a enjoyment then being a penniless, ignored, offshore island, without much industry, finance, influence or friends is scarcely the way to achieve it. Where are the “masters of words”, the persuaders, when you most want them? Gone absent without leave.
The pro-EU politicians are doing a dire job defending the EU. Most of them have never done a proper job in their lives . They move effortlessly from university to think-tank to political candidate without any intervening experience of real life and work. At the very least they might try to assemble some persuasive arguments .