Thanks for your reply. I'll keep it short as I'm on mobile. I don't mean this in a patronizing way, but I think you really ought to have a good look at how accountability the EU works. I used to work there and the amount of scrutiny Commissioners were under from both elected MEPs and the elected Council gave me a lot of faith in the process. You need to compare the EU Commission to Ministeries, where you also don't elect the bureaucrats. Ministers are chosen by ruling coalitions, which is the same for European Commissioners. I find your description of a hypothetical North American undemocratic union to be an inaccurate reflection of the EU. Agree to disagree is not enough here, it would be useful if you did or course or read a book on this issue, e.g. https://www.coursera.org/learn/eu-making-europe-work -- Don't get me wrong, the EU needs to some significant changes, but it's better to do that from within than outside. Overall, it benefits us immensely and leaving will give us zero power to change and leave us outside the world's largest economic opportunity. Just look at the predictions for Brexit.
The weapons argument to abolish the largest economic market is also not appropriate. Weapons (or drugs, humans, etc) will be smuggled whether there are borders or not. You could be in favor of more policing and investigatory powers. Breaking up the world's largest trading block because of something that will have a marginal effect on weapon availability is unwise. Further, close European cooperation in investigations is likely to be uncovering more cross-border international crime than if we were all going at it alone. The EU enables that cooperation and information sharing in a way that grouos of states cannot.
Where do you get the €50k figure from? I may have not heard about it, but it seems so unreasonable that I doubt it's an actual policy proposal.
Finally, I highly doubt D66 is in favor of a federal European state. I just looked at their manifesto (hard in mobile) and searched for the word 'federaal' and variations. Doesn't exist. They do say "Dit kan niet zonder ingrijpende hervormingen om
Europa slagvaardiger en democratischer." Which is what you were calling for. Have a look for yourself: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VuAZxGA1ulVB10TtvS5WfQ0NMTcOSgcO/view?usp=drivesdk
Anyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts. Would be great to hear what you think of mine, but no pressure. Hope they don't come across as patronizing! I really do care about these issues and spent several years working on them professionally, but I'm also aware I'm not in NL right now and may be missing things.