EU Charter of Fundamental Rights

Great article from the BBC, looking at the Charter of Fundamental Rights (CFR). The UK, Poland and the Czech Republic all felt worried enough about it to negotiate opt-outs from it in the forth coming Lisbon Treaty (coming into effect next week). This article points out the charter is not nearly as powerful as people imagine and that much of what it contains is already EU law anyway. Which begs the question why have an opt-out to begin with then? I suspect that this a kind of straw puppet that government worried about anti-EU sentiment can put up to show they have kept some special power or such like. Then, in the future, when the next round of negotiations comes along, they can claim that in exchange for accepting certain new powers they managed to keep the opt-outs, taking the wind out of sails of their opponents. What's brilliant is how many EU sceptics are against the CFR despite the fact it's hardly, from their perspective, the main issue. Be sure that if one of the mentioned governments tried to remove the opt-outs the EU sceptics would go crazy, precisely playing into the hands of pro-EU political forces, and giving the straw puppet the appearance of flesh.