Behold the European Union, a sprawling, ossified collection of nation-states that has managed to transform the very concept of a 'summit' into a recurring piece of performance art. Every few months, the grandees of Brussels gather in a building that looks like a transparent toaster to inform the unwashed masses that they are at a 'critical juncture.' On Thursday, they will do it again. The word 'critical' has been murdered by the European bureaucracy, its corpse dragged through the streets of the Belgian capital and beaten with a 400-page directive on the permissible curvature of cucumbers until the term is entirely devoid of meaning. If every meeting is critical, then none of them are. But this time, we are told, it is different. This time, the bogeyman is back.

Nadia Calviño, the high priestess of the European Investment Bank—a financial institution that functions primarily as a black hole where taxpayer money goes to be rebranded as 'innovation'—has emerged from the mahogany shadows to sound the alarm. She claims the EU must demonstrate its 'superpower' ability to push back against the looming threat of Donald Trump. It is a fascinating choice of words. To describe the EU as a 'superpower' in the current geopolitical climate is akin to describing a retirement home as a high-performance training facility because the residents have recently upgraded their walkers to include cup holders.

The catalyst for this latest bout of performative anxiety is, predictably, the return of the orange specter from Mar-a-Lago. To the Eurocrat, Trump is not merely a politician; he is a cosmic horror, a Cheeto-dusted Cthulhu whose mere existence threatens to expose the uncomfortable truth that Europe has spent the last three decades outsourcing its defense to the United States and its energy needs to whatever autocrat was offering the best bulk rate. Without Trump to serve as a convenient external threat, the EU leaders would be forced to look into the mirror and confront the reality of their own irrelevance. He is the necessary lubricant for the grinding gears of their stagnant machinery.

Calviño’s rhetoric about Europe’s 'superpower' status is a masterclass in bureaucratic delusion. The EU is indeed a superpower, but only in the realm of generating paperwork. It is a regulatory leviathan that has mistaken the ability to fine American tech companies for actual economic vitality. While the rest of the world is building the future, Europe is busy drafting 50-year plans on how to regulate the future out of existence before it even arrives. The 'push back' Calviño speaks of will likely consist of a series of sternly worded communiqués, translated into twenty-four languages, asserting that Europe is 'united' in its commitment to 'strategic autonomy'—a phrase that roughly translates to 'we have no idea what to do if the Americans stop paying for our security.'

The Left within the EU will use this summit to signal their moral superiority, clutching their pearls at the 'threat to democracy' while overseeing a centralized apparatus that is about as democratic as a Venetian doge’s court. They will talk about 'European values' as if they were a tangible currency, oblivious to the fact that you cannot buy 5th-generation fighter jets or semi-conductors with sanctimony. On the other side, the Right will stomp through the halls of Brussels, grunting about national sovereignty and the 'dictatorship' of the Commission, while secretly praying that the centralized funding doesn't stop, because their entire political identity is built on being a parasite within the system they claim to despise. Both sides are locked in a symbiotic embrace of failure, using the 'critical' summit as a stage to perform for their domestic audiences while the continent's share of global GDP continues its steady, terminal decline.

As Calviño and her colleagues prepare to dine on lobster and pretend they are the masters of the world’s destiny, the reality remains unchanged. The 'superpower' they imagine is a ghost. It is a collection of aging nations with stagnant economies, demographic collapses, and an energy policy that is essentially a collective suicide pact. They speak of standing up to Trump, but they can barely stand up to their own internal contradictions. By Friday morning, the 'critical' moment will have passed. A joint statement will be issued, full of lofty goals and empty promises, and the bureaucrats will return to their offices, satisfied that they have once again saved Europe from a reality they refuse to acknowledge. The only thing they will have truly pushed back is the inevitable realization that the party is over, and they are the only ones who haven't noticed the lights are being turned off.