For an insight into the ways of the EU elite, this remarkable story, reported by the Daily Telegraph’s Christopher Booker, takes some beating:

Imagine that a Franco-German MEP, invited to meet the Queen at Buckingham Palace, plonked down in front of her an EU “ring of stars” flag, insisting that she hoist it over the palace alongside the Royal Standard, and then proceeded to address her in a deliberately insulting way. The British people, if news of the incident leaked out, might not be too pleased. Something not dissimilar took place at a remarkable recent meeting between the heads of the groups in the European Parliament and Vaclav Klaus, the Czech head of state, in his palace in Hradcany Castle, on a hill overlooking Prague. The aim was to discuss how the Czechs should handle the EU’s rotating six-monthly presidency when they take over from France on January 1.

Read the whole thing.