Comment by denton-scratch

> a clique of unelected beaurocrats (commisars - like in the USSR)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commissar

TL;DR A commissar is the USSR was a term with several meanings: a political officer in the armed forces, a government minister, and a bureaucrat responsible for supplies.

EU commissioners are really political appointments to head-up civil service departments; so they are more like ministers than anything else. I think that when most westerners think of "commissar", they think of a militarily-incompetent political officer in an army unit, who can overrule the military commander of that unit. There's no equivalent role in the EU bureaucracy.

FWIW, the USA has commissars; they head up armed-forces commissaries, i.e. they are responsible for supply and logistics.