Brussels' Broad Brush.

• Author: Freund, Charles Paul
• Position: Brief Article

Seems the sun never rises over Europe anymore but that the new day isn't accompanied by new rules to live by. Parisians have awakened to learn that much of their beloved cheese failed to conform to new European Union microbe norms. Londoners have risen to find that British labor law as developed under Margaret Thatcher didn't conform to new EU work norms. And this spring, the men of Iesolo, Italy, woke to the fact that their barbers were violating EU shaving norms.

Yes, shaving norms. If a nation wants to enjoy the benefits of the Euro, its barbers must stop using shaving brushes to lather up their customers' beards. According to EU bureaucrats in Brussels, traditional brushes (which long ago disappeared from American barber shops) are unhygienic; by banning them, they plan to keep Europe's faces in uniformly good shape.

The barbers of lesolo, a little town near Venice, had failed to take notice of this change until April, when Daniele Bison, head of the town's council, asserted his leadership. "I have taken the...