To hold votes when not just one but both factors are against you is just bad politics.When the leaders of the 25 members go to the summit in a fortnight's time, they should start by being honest The constitution is dead. There is no point in trying to revive bits, however worthy and however free of criticism they were during the debates. The constitution was voted down as an entity and that's that.Nor is there much point in pretending that the European train hasn't been stopped in its tracks. A great deal of what its leaders had blithely assumed was already timetabled is going to have to be cancelled for the time being, and that includes further enlargement, any major change in the presidency and the introduction of a foreign minister.

The mandate isn't there.But then the opponents of the constitution are equally dishonest in claiming the referendums as some major negation of the union as such. There was no indication in the French or Dutch debates that the idea of Europe as such was being negated, nor membership of the Union.The voters were asked to approve the new constitutional treaty. Eight have done so without a referendum, one (Spain) has done so by popular vote, and two have given it the thumbs down It requires unanimity, so it falls. The anti-Europeans can't make more of it than that, any more than the Europhiles can.All the near-hysterical talk of crisis in the Union is no more than the expression of a Euro-sceptic wish that it were so.

Europe can trundle on much as it has done so far, meeting its issues as they come up, whether they are to do with the environment, aid to Africa, trade with America or Turkish entry negotiations. They are all political decisions which will have to be taken politically.In that sense, the crisis is not a systemic but a political one. Whatever the differences between France and the Netherlands, or any of the other countries, the one thing they all have in common is a loss of confidence in their own political leadership. The only major country which at the moment could be said to be at ease with itself is Spain, which is coincidentally the most pro-European. The rest are all going through, or have recently gone through, falling ratings for their government.Over the next two years, much of the European leadership will have changed.