More integration is not going to save the European Union from its growing existential crisis.

I note this in light of the growing chorus of voices calling for greater, faster, and more unrestrained integration of EU member states under the EU governing umbrella. Take the former Obama administration deputy national security adviser, Julianne Smith, who on Friday called on German Chancellor Angela Merkel to join with French President Emmanuel Macron and embrace reforms to bolster the EU's power.

As Smith put it, "The European Union’s promise to form an 'ever closer union' seems more like an empty slogan than a strategy these days. But further integration is necessary." Smith's central argument is that "deeper European integration and a demonstration of faith in Europe’s common values and its common fate are necessary to keep the populist tide at bay." Here Smith is referencing the rise of the semi-authoritarian Viktor Orban in Hungary and the growing EU-exit (think Brexit) movements across Europe.

But there's a special arrogance to Smith's argument. After all, the most basic lesson of the recent political repudiations of EU power is not that Europeans want to see more integration more quickly, but rather that they want the EU to reassess whether it has taken too much power and avoided necessary reform.

That understanding certainly was the primary motivation behind the British decision to leave the EU, but it also helped elect a coalition populist-far-right government in Italy. Of course, Smith is far from the most senior voice to call for this double-down arrogance. In his state of the EU address last month, for example, EU Commission President Jean Claude Juncker echoed Smith's sentiments and even suggested that further political integration should occur without new treaties or votes to authorize that action! That absence of democratic authority speaks to the great structural weakness of the EU's power today: It is unbound from member-state populations.

Again, arrogance is the key factor here. Because in the alignment of views between Americans like Smith and Europeans like Juncker, we see the utter failure of the center-left to recognize that their world view has been obliterated. Instead, embracing denial instead of hard reality, they choose to push for further integration. And thus inevitable, eventual electoral blowback. The simple truth is that, while there are many Europeans who believe in free trade and multilateralism, there aren't that many who believe in giving up their democracies to a central bureaucracy.

Ultimately, however, the course is set. The EU remains far too arrogant and authoritarian in its action. And for that reason, more Brexit-type political calamities for the union are likely to come.