> For spying France has the emergency powers and Germany had scandals of spying on other states. And then the kinda-sorta-probably-maybe Brexiting of the UK which has been allowed for a while. The point is they aren't spotless in it.

Of course they aren't perfect. No government body is. Every major national government has spies and such like (including the US) and you can't really use that as an argument against protecting consumer rights nor the EU specifically. At least not if you want to make a credible counterargument rather than falling into the whataboutism cliche: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

> The airbus illegal subsidization and agriculture were to point to incidents of protectionist tendencies. Notably I avoided their actual sincerity - such a thing would in fact vary by the individuals just like there may be some people legitimately annoyed by long commute times complaining about "forced busing" in with the dog-whistling racists. I am pointing out how they can appear untrustworthy.

I'm sorry but I still don't know which case studies you're referring to.

> It also doesn't change that intention and results may differ. Public school funding was fueled by paranoid xenophobic fear that immigrant Catholics would take over as covert servants of the Pope but it was a great influence. Similarly the initial "Five Pests Elimination" program was well intentioned but killing sparrows lead to major locust problems such that paying the "bird tax" in letting the locust eaters also eat some seeds was preferable to swarms devouring farm fields wholesale. (Refusing to change after it was revealed to cause problems made it the vast disaster but that is another topic.)

Yes, none of those points are themselves wrong but that also doesn't mean they directly apply here either. I mean we could quote proverbs all day and night and still be no closer to talking directly about the EU.

> The best way to prove sincerity is an expensive signal in itself - acting against your own immediate interests repeatably in the favor of integrity consistently when it comes up. That may benefit you long term.

You mean like fining their own businesses? Like I had already commented that they do?

It may feel like US businesses get singled out if all you read about is US businesses but the reality is that's not the case.

> For example: a serial con artist may be sincerely reformed and telling the truth about his new plan to fight acquifer depletion but people would rightly be skeptical. If he gave away the scheme with absolutely no monetization potential or benefits to special interests it would show it isn't a scam. It still might not work but not a scam.

I don't think it's worthwhile arguing about what are token gestures, bluffs and double-bluffs because if you're going down that proverbial rabbit hole then you could twist any action or statement to mean whatever you wanted it to mean. While I'm not suggesting that everything can be taken at face value, I do think a debate where we second guess every motive is going to be a hugely unproductive one. And ultimately if that's how you feel towards the EU then perhaps it's safer for us just to agree to disagree?