The European Refugee Crisis

Here's an idea.  Thousands of Syrian refugees have been showing up on the Greek island of Kos.  Greece, pretty much broke, can't afford to absorb them.  (By the way, they've been showing up from Turkey, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if Erdogan is arranging the boats to move them to Greece.)  The Greeks are sending a cruise ship to Kos, where the refugees will be processed.

It occurs to me that, once they're aboard the cruise ship, there's nothing to stop the ship from leaving port.  It can transport the refugees to a wealthier country, one that can afford to give them the services they need.  I'm suggesting Germany.

What will the Germans do if a cruise ship full of refugees arrives off the coast of Bremerhaven?  Will they sink it?  Not likely.  They'll just refuse to let it make port.  That's when the Greeks get out the rubber boats, and land the refugees on shore.

Merkel, of course, would be very unhappy — but she and her countrymen, who have been shafting Greece for years, deserve it.  This scenario won't happen, of course, but it's fun to think about.

The Greek Debt "Agreement"

Pretty clearly, no "negotiation" took place in Vienna.  The Germans — who, at last, seem to have achieved their WWII goal of taking over Europe — dictated the terms.  Tsipras, faced with the crash of the Greek banking system, had no choice but to agree.

Personally, I believe that immediate "Grexit" is preferable to yet another round of destructive austerity.  Maybe there are enough members of the Greek parliament to say "no," as the Greek people said "no" last week.  Okay, I understand that a substantial majority of Greeks want to stay in the Eurozone, but it won't do them any good if they have no euros to spend.

The euro was a bad idea from the beginning, as the British recognized when they opted to stay with the pound.  Not only Greece, but Spain, Portugal, and Italy would enjoy a great deal more economic autonomy if they had their own currencies.  If Europe ever is politically unified, that will be the time for a unified currency.  All the euro has accomplished is to put the bankers in charge.

In the meanwhile, it's time for Greece to cut its losses and default.  The future is grim for Greece no matter what it does, but real recovery will come sooner if Greece has its own currency.

Μην αφήνετε τους Γερμανούς να κατακτήσουν και πάλι στην Ελλάδα. Πες ΟΧΙ!

The NO Vote

The Greeks have soundly defeated eurozone efforts to depose their allegedly "leftist" government by a margin of 61 to 39 percent.  Even though they had no way of knowing the impact of their decision on Greece's future, they clearly understood that banker-imposed austerity policies have been a complete failure, and rejected them.  The next move must come from the "troika," and what that move will be remains to be seen.

Nobody — not even Wolfgang Schäuble — really wants to see Grexit, but serious obstacles stand in the way of the debt relief Greece needs.  Yes, the IMF admits that Greece will be unable to pay its debts, but the ECB and other lenders will resist: after all, one doesn't want to set a bad example for other southern European nations.  If I had to guess which European leader is most upset by the "no" vote, my nominee would be Spain's Mariano Rajoy, whose government already is under pressure from Podemos, the Spanish political movement that bears a close resemblance to Syriza.  Rajoy just might be serving his last term, and a Podemos majority in the Spanish parliament certainly would be disruptive across Europe.

In Greece, things are likely to get worse before they get better, but glimmers of light are just barely perceptible at the end of the debt tunnel — which would not be the case if the shameless European propaganda campaign had succeeded in effecting a "yes" victory.  More austerity can only feed into an endless downward spiral.  Even Grexit offers more hope.

Catching up

Stuff has been happening, and I've been either too busy or too lazy to blog: hence, some quickies.

Domestic Terrorism
Speaking of catch-up, yesterday the New York Times caught up with my previous post about the greater terrorist threat in the USofA, albeit citing a new source.  Check it out.

Greece
Greece's creditors continue to demand more austerity in exchange for keeping Greece out of default.  Accepting such demands will exacerbate Greece's already drastic economic problems.  Do the creditors really continue to believe in austerity, or are they trying to monkey-wrench the Syriza government?  The latter seems increasingly likely.

Racist Symbology
Symbols are important in the context of human psychology, so it is not surprising that racist Southerners cling to their Confederate banners, statues of John C. Calhoun, and similar bric-a-brac.  Also, it is not surprising that most black Americans want to see the last of such gewgaws.  Still, the First Amendment protects even the most hateful expression, so cowardly Republicans saying "the states should work it out on their own" unwittingly have a point.  (On the other hand, Confederate symbols represent not only racism, but treason against the government of the USofA.  Are the "Sons of the Confederacy" really endorsing treason?)

(Tweet: #ConfederateTakeDown - Replace #SouthCarolina #BattleFlag with WHITE flag! They DID surrender! Hooray for #heritage and #SouthernPride!)

Obamacare
Well, the Supremes said we still can have it, and it's better than nothing — but we still must do better.  I don't see any opportunity for a real national health insurance system at any time in the near future, but then I would have said the same, not that many years ago, about...

Same Sex Marriage
Congratulations to the LGBT community!  Granted, the "T"s still need a lot more public acceptance, but the right to marry won't be one of their problems now.

Legal Insanity
Let's face it — none of us can claim to be a paragon of "mental health."  James Holmes is nuts, and so is Dylann Roof, and the same is or was true of Dzokhar Tsarnaev, Nidal Malik Hasan, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, Adam Lanza, Josef Stalin, Idi Amin, and a bunch of other mass murderers.  Just the same, you can't convince me that any of them were unaware that what they were doing was wrong.  I don't approve of the death penalty, but just the same, a person has to be totally delusional before he meets the criteria for legal insanity, and that's as it should be.  Behavior must have consequences.

More etc., etc.

Love of Country
I was trying to figure out whether or not I love the USofA.  Well, probably not, unless you count as love the relationship of a long-married couple who shuffle along side by side primarily because splitting up would be more trouble than it's worth.  In other words, I'm not about to "lay down my life" to "protect" some alleged "ideals" that may or may not have ever been put into practice.  Anyway, the plutocracy is strong enough and rich enough to look after its own ass.

Four Months for Greece
Greeks will continue to suffer as long as Greece is stuck with austerity, and if Syriza is pushed aside by the Germans and their fellow travelers, "Europe" is likely to find itself dealing with Golden Dawn.  Europe will be pulled, one way or the other, by Greece, and Europe has to decide whether it will be pulled to the left or the right.

Three British Girls
The three girls who recently lit out for the Islamic State were middle class, good students, and not especially religious until very recently.  So why did they take off for the alleged caliphate?  My guess is that they were made to feel more and more isolated and alienated from British society, and the IS was the only outlet they could find.  The hatemongers, both in Europe and the USofA, are doing more to strengthen the enemy than to weaken it.

Net Neutrality
So far, so good.  Back in the eighties and nineties, monopolistic telephone companies were forced to lease bandwidth to competitors, which led to steep declines in the prices of long-distance phone calls.  If Comcast and the other internet giants are forced to lease bandwidth to smaller competitors, what might the impact be?  Let's hope we get to find out.

Homeland Security
Maybe we should try getting along with a lot less of it for a while, and see if it makes a difference.  To bad for the employees who will have to work without getting paid, but since those who work for the Department are not allowed to unionize, I guess they'll just have to eat it.

Recent developments

Syriza victory

Germany continues to insist that Greece will necessarily carry on with with its existing austerity regime in order to get the next installment of its bailout.  What Merkel and Co. fail to note is that the next bailout installment is earmarked to make payments on earlier loans, and the Greeks themselves will see not a cent.  After five years of depression (not recession), the last think Greece needs is higher taxes and more cuts in government services.  Alexis Tsipras knows this, and can feel quite confident that the troika will not go out of its way to screw itself, and thereby destabilize the euro.  There will be renegotiation.

Netanyahu address

I have a feeling that Boehner's invitation to Bibi to address Congress will backfire against both of them.  Boehner has given Obama a splendid opportunity to snub the Israeli hawk, and close a little more of the distance between the USofA and Iran.  Was the invitation AIPAC's idea?  Probably.  AIPAC doesn't lobby for Israel, it lobbies for Likud.

ANWR

Lisa Murkowski is livid, and Obama is grinning, even though he knows that permanently excluding oil and gas drilling from the Reserve won't be happening under this Congress.  Most of what we're likely get from Our President over the next two years is a succession of symbolic gestures, but while provoking Yosemite Sam impersonations from Republicans actually accomplishes nothing, it's still fun.

"American Sniper"

I have a copy, but I haven't gotten around to watching it yet.  Eastwood actually is a talented director when he's not having conversations with empty chairs, so whether or not the film is "politically significant," it most likely will be watchable.

Some final thoughts for 2014

Guns don't kill people...
...two-year-olds who dip into their mothers' handbags while shopping at Wal-Mart kill people — well, one of them killed his duly licensed for concealed carry mother, at any rate.  I guess she thought putting the safety on was a violation of her Second Amendment rights.  Let's hope the kid never finds out what he did.

Syriza
Reading about the upcoming Greek elections, I was surprised to see the Times referring to Syriza as "radical."  Hey, NYT!  Being anti-austerity does not make a party radical.  It just makes it Keynesian and, hence, more likely to help the Greek people than "center-right" parties dedicated to kissing Angela Merkel's ass.

Scalise
Why is anybody surprised to learn that new House Republican Whip Steve Scalise of Louisiana delivered a speech to David Duke's white supremacist EURO organization?  He's a southern Republican, which means he has to pander to racists.  (It won't hurt him a bit.)

Palestinians and the ICC
Israel and the USofA have their knickers in a twist because the Palestinians want to join the International Criminal Court.  It's not just that the Palestinians may bring charges against the Israelis — the big problem is that they just might win.

Wrapping up March

It's been a pretty depressing month.  That mudslide out in Oso, Washington, is heartbreaking, and every developer who built a house in that known danger area should be financially wiped out.  It won't happen, of course.

Then, there was the Malaysian Airlines flight.  I can't pretend to have any clue as to what happened, albeit I suspect depressurization had some role — but, then, what do I know?  In both Washington and Peking, there are hundreds of people suffering, wondering what became of their loved ones.

As usual, though, there was more crap.

Crimea

It's part of Russia again, and won't be undone.  In the meanwhile, Ukraine is a mess, economically, and probably about to get worse, thanks to the IMF.  Look forward to shitloads of austerity, Ukrainians.  It's been six years of hell for Greece, and it will be worse for you.  Maybe you can overcharge the Crimeans for water, and make the Russians absorb some of the pain.

Israel and Palestine

Abbas will not agree that Israel is a "Jewish State," because that will accept the second-class status of Arab-Israeli citizens.  I no longer believe in the "two-state solution," if I ever did.  It's time for Israel, the settlements, and the rest of the West Bank to become a single state, with equal rights for all.  The Hassidim and the Arabs can compete to see who will reproduce more like the proverbial rabbits to see who stays in control.  Too bad for the secularists, but that's how the sperm splatters.

Barack and Francis

Okay, they've met, and sort of seem to agree that some degree of income redistribution is needed.  The big difference (apart from differences regarding abortion and birth control) is that Obama's perspective is political and the pope's interest is moral.  (My interest, by the way, is sociological.)

Greece

Supposedly, Greece now has a balanced budget.  Unfortunately, it still has a 25% unemployment rate.  If it experiences any GDP "growth," ordinary Greeks won't see any of it.

More depressing crap.

Meanwhile, in Greece...

By this time, I expect that just about everybody has concluded that Greece — and the rest of Europe — would have been better off had Greece never joined the Eurozone.  The big question now is whether Greece should leave the euro behind, and go back to the drachma.  Today's demonstrations (riots?) were pretty clear indications that many Greeks are very unhappy with the austerity demands by the various international lenders which might delay Greek default.

Granted, Greece (like Occupy) makes it clear that letting anarchists lead your opposition movement doesn't work very well.  Nevertheless, I have to sympathize with the Greek protesters, because Greece is not in recession.  Greece, with a 25% unemployment rate, is in depression, and the EU is doing nothing to correct that.  Austerity is the last thing needed to correct a depression.

If Greece defaults, German banks will take a big hit.  Nobody exactly knows how big a hit, but a little inflation in Germany probably would be worth it.  When the Spaniards and Italians follow, Germany will be dead in the water.

Election Day!

Egypt, Greece, and France held elections yesterday, with mixed results.

In Egypt, needless to say, the Supreme Military Council (aka military junta) stripped the soon to be elected president of all his powers even before the first vote was cast, so nobody really cared what happened.  What will Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi do with his empty title?  Beats me.  Is it time to to heat things up again in Tahrir Square?  Maybe — but Egypt could make Syria look like Luxembourg.

In Greece, fear triumphed, mildly, over hope (or anger) with the "victory" of the New Democrats — who really are not all that different from the Clinton-Gore New Democrats of the USofA.  Obama may be thinking about genuinely joining a religion so he might more effectively pray for a financial turnaround in Europe.  So far, New Democracy has not managed to form a government.  I suppose Pasak will join in by tomorrow or the next day, provided the alleged "socialists" are offered enough graft — but that coalition will be very fragile.

Greece could be facing new elections in a matter of months, unless the Germans get the steel rods out of their asses and let Greece ease up on its current austerity program, which has driven the country into depression.  In case you hadn't noticed, Germany is the country that has profited most from the euro — the euro is worth a lot less than a deutschmark would have been worth at this point, and that has been the primary factor driving Germany's export oriented economy for many years.  The losers were the net importing Eurozone countries of the south.  As I suggested last November, the best way to save the euro would be to kick out the Germans and generate some healthy inflation.

The good news is that Hollande and his Socialists have solidified their political control in France, creating a counterweight to Merkel and the Germans with regard to austerity.  If it's not too late, the Greeks, Spaniards, and Portuguese will appreciate Hollande's efforts.  It might even cheer the sad, suffering Irish a bit.  Countries cannot afford to watch their best and brightest young people emigrate because there is no work at home.

Election Season

Tomorrow there will be elections in France, Greece, Italy, and Germany.  In November, there will be elections in the United States.  Not everybody may see just how those elections are interconnected, but if they don't, at the very least, they ought to try. The European voting should be seen as a plebiscite on austerity, the modus operandus of the European Union since the financial debacle.

The Italian elections are local but, like last week's local elections in the UK, may be an indicator of how the electorate is swinging.  The elections in Germany are for the Schleswig-Holstein region, and have the potential to push Angela Merkel out of power if the Social Democrats and the Greens do well and are able to form a coalition.

There is a lot more attention, of course, to the national elections in France and Greece.  Polling shows Francois Hollande, the Socialist, leading Nicolas Sarkozy.  France, unlike a bunch of other European nations, isn't quite in official recession yet — but the handwriting is on the wall.  Hollande says he wants European action to stimulate growth, and it seems the French populace is responding to that message.  The question, at the moment, is what kind of winning margin he can achieve (assuming he wins.)  Nobody knows which way the National Front (the Tea Party of France) will turn, if they bother to vote at all.  It would be very amusing is they went for Hollande.

The Greeks have sufficient parties and political schisms so that it is possible that no coalition government might be formed.  Most of Europe is hoping that the socialist Pasok party and the conservative New Democrats (makes you think of Clinton) gather enough of the vote to form a coalition government (!) that can pander to the Germans enough to keep Greece in the Eurozone — but the situation is really crazy.

At the moment, the United States too is in austerity.  The (inadequate) Obama stimulus has run its course; the Fed is standing pat; the states continue to dump cops, teachers, motor vehicle clerks, etc.  According to the most recent figures, job growth appears to be slowing.

The Republican answer to this is more austerity — albeit, unlike the Europeans, Republicans refuse to raise taxes (especially on the very rich), and hope to "balance the budget" on the backs of the poor.  The example of Europe sliding down the economic drain means nothing to the corporate elite, the rentier class, and the rest of the plutocrats.  Hell, it won't hurt them.

The vast majority of America (including Democrats) consists of economic illiterates.  Pointing out that so-called "balancing the budget" by decimating government is exactly what failed in Europe will do little good.  I really hope Obama has a plan — however shifty and devious — to overcome the stupidity of the American people.  Needless to say, I also hope that, somewhere in his heart, there is a little "Old" Democrat who will do the decent thing when he no longer has to worry about re-election.

My big fat Greek... bailout?

Those of us who are not Greek ought to be pretty happy today, relatively speaking. Two out of three leaders of the Greek coalition government seems to have approved the German diktat requiring concentration camp style austerity, and the Parliament will either accept it or reject it on Sunday. It could be close.

A lot of people out on the streets of Athens and other Greek cities seem to think Parliament should reject it. I'm emotionally inclined to agree with the angry mobs. Honestly, I don't know what will happen to the Greek people if there is a disorderly default, but I'm pretty sure about what will happen if they do accept Auswitch austerity.

Greece will be totally fucked for many years.

Most important, it is not Greece that will be bailed out by the current plan — the plan provides for a bailout of European banks. The IMF, ECB, and European Commission will pay into an escrow fund for the new Greek bonds, which will pay the banks first. Should there happen to be anything left after the banks are sated, that remainder goes to the Greeks.

In the meanwhile, Greece is in the fifth year of what is being called a recession but really is a depression, and that depression continues to be made worse by austerity imposed from outside. The new measures require Greece to reduce its minimum wage by 22%, and all wages are likely to fall as a result. 20% of the government jobs that have driven the Greek economy in the past will be eliminated, elevating the current 20% unemployment rate. Nobody expects a drop in the prices of things like food, fuel, and rent.

Personally, I'd be inclined to go with the drachma. Greeks who still have savings in Euros, I'm sure, will get them out of the country. Those who have Euro denominated debt can default along with their country.

Screw the banks.

Well, here's to democracy... I guess

Nominal socialist George Papandreou is referring the current Greek bailout deal to the Greek public in a referendum. The pundits seem to think he is "tossing the dice," hoping the Greek public will back his negotiated deal, and thereby shutting up the voices of opposition. That interpretation seems unlikely to me.

Could it be that Papandreou remembered that he is, at least nominally, a socialist? I sincerely hope so. I hope he returned from the negotiations asking himself, "What have I done?" From a political perspective, he might very well be asking himself how the Socialists let the Greek center-right seize the issue. Don't political labels mean anything?

(These days, probably not. Hell — Obama is accused of being a liberal.)

I would like to think that Papandreou's decision to put the bailout plan to the Greek people arises from pangs of socialist conscience. Most Greeks seem to understand that while austerity may be good for European banks, it is not necessarily good for Greece. Whatever chaos an "uncontrolled" default might cause around world financial markets, for the Greeks, following in the footsteps of Argentina seems like the best bet to me. I've already posted my unsolicited advice.

I just hope the rest of us survive it.

The Latest Eurodebt "Solution"

If there's anything the latest news out of Europe shows us, it's that markets bounce around like crazy on any news at all — even news that doesn't mean very much. Of course, the market professionals (and especially their computer algorithms) like volatility. Anyway, let's take a quick look at what's been announced.

First, even after their bondholders take their "voluntary" 50% haircut, the Greeks still can't afford to pay. All the extreme austerity measures the Greek government has been forced to accept have so crippled the Greek economy that the likelihood of Greece paying anything at all is very small.

Second, European banks have been required to increase their capital reserves. Granted, their capital reserves should be a lot larger — but rather than dilute their stock too far by selling shares to raise cash, they can be expected to cut back lending even more, stepping down even harder on Europe's economic brakes.

As for beefing up the European rescue fund enough to "ring-fence" Italy and Spain (and hopefully not France), the "plan" would inspire a lot more confidence if there were a real plan. Hoping the Chinese and Russians will come to the rescue is not a "plan."

I can't wait for next month's "solution."

Απονομή, η ελληνική κυβέρνηση!

(That is supposed to say, "Hey, Greek government!" but I must admit it's Greek to me.)

Anyway, I thought you guys were supposed to be Socialists — so what's with the sucking up to the ECB, the private banks, and the IMF? Those are your people in the streets. Don't fuck them over.

There's an odd chance your rocky, sunwashed little country could bring down multinational capitalism by tipping over banks like a row of dominos. That would present a big problem for the rest of the world, but in Greece you'd hardly notice the difference. Everybody knows you're going to default, so why keep torturing the Greek people when you could start helping them now.

First, of course, you have to leave the Eurozone. Yes, we all know there never was an orderly way provided for a country to do that, so you'll have to improvise: start printing drachmas, and use them to pay your very numerous government employees. Pick any conversion rate to the Euro you like. Close your banks long enough to replace all their euros with drachmas. Pretty soon, what's left of your private sector will be paying its employees with drachmas too, because they'll be a lot cheaper than Euros; and those who sell goods and services will have to accept them because they'll be the only currency around. The idea, of course, is to end up with a devalued currency. The tourists will love it.

There will be, of course, a black market in currency — which will help to devalue the drachma even more. Inside Greece, though, prices will adjust to the new (old) money. Imports will be very expensive. Local producers will sell more of whatever they produce. Maybe you can find something other than tourism to sell abroad.

Gather together all the euros you can get your hands on — it doesn't matter how many. Set some aside so you'll have a little foreign reserve for when you really need imports, and explain to your creditors that all they'll be getting is what you have left to give them. Their haircut might take some scalp along, but you can just shrug in that charming Greek way you have, and go about your business.

Granted, nobody will give you credit for quite a few years but, at last, you'll learn to live within your means — and don't worry about the Germans invading again. They can't get blood from a stone.

Greeks v. Banks

We'll see tomorrow if the Greek parliament approves the austerity measures and the deep-discount privatizations the ECB and the richer European countries are demanding for another alleged "bailout." To me, the most likely scenario floating around is that the Greeks will go along with the demands for legislative actions tomorrow, and then just not implement most of them as they come due.

If the parliamentarians are paying attention to the riots in the streets, though, they just might say "no" to the package. If that happens, we'll have to see what ensues. A collapse of the Eurozone is a real possibility, and that certainly would be disruptive to the world economy.

Of course, there are some of us who think it just might be time to do it and have done with it. Having a single monetary policy and more than two dozen fiscal policies, from my perspective, is not a formula for success. It worked well enough when credit was cheap, borrowing standards were lax, and government leaders could buy support with all that borrowed money. Granted, the Greeks went a bit more overboard than most — and lied their way into the Eurozone to begin with — but the system was and is essentially flawed.

Whatever the original sins of Greek leaders, though, I could not condemn them if they tell the rest of Europe to screw itself. The interest Greece has to pay on the debt it incurs right now is in the junk bond category. How much higher could it go, and would it really make a difference? Greece can't afford to pay current rates, so higher rates mean nothing. The only sensible thing to do is default now, rather than enter into dubious refinancing schemes and then default for even more later.

The popular jargon for the current bailout proposal is "kicking the can down the road." It makes sense, though, to look at how the road might change a few kicks ahead.

Sarkozy has worked out a deal with private French banks that hold Greek debt to, essentially, roll it over — offer new loans to pay off the old ones (only at higher rates.) The immediate advantage of that for the banks is that it would mean they will not have to write down the bad debt for another three to five years, leaving their balance sheets looking healthier for a while. If the bailout deal goes through, we can expect other private holders of Greek debt to do the same.

Look back a little bit, though, and we see what French, German, Swiss, Belgian, and other private European banks have been doing since the last bailout — that is, selling off their Greek debt to the European Central Bank. If they can continue to do that, private losses can be minimized. Losses by the ECB would have to be offset by infusions of capital from European governments — in other words, by the European people as a whole. Fat cats, hedge funds, and corporate investors will transfer their gambling losses to ordinary people.

For the Greeks themselves, selling off public assets like their ports, utilities, railroads, etc. at this time seems like an especially foolish move. As the people in the streets and squares of Greek cities understand very well, not only would the sale of those assets sharply increase unemployment, but they would bring only a fraction of what they're worth. It makes a lot more sense to default first — tell their creditors they're not going to be paid — and save the assets for later sale, when Greece really needs the money. Cut off from credit, Greece finally would be forced to slice away the corruption and patronage from its economy. The nest egg provided by asset sales, if they turn out to be necessary, could be the country's key to survival.

US exposure to Greek debt is quite small, and the predicted domino effect on Portugal, Ireland, Spain, and Italy also would not have great impact on American holders of European debt. What we don't know, however, is the exposure of US banks and related corporations in the form of credit default swaps. How much of the impending European losses are insured in the US, or in European subsidies of US banks?

Well, we're still kind of in the process of writing the transparency rules on derivatives, so nobody actually knows.

Greece and the Eurozone

The street protests in Greece continue, as more and more Greeks figure out that they are being asked to transform themselves into citizens of a third-world country for a generation or so for the sake of minimizing losses by the banks of Europe. US exposure seems to exist mostly in the form of credit default swaps; how many, one wonders, were written by taxpayer owned AIG?

All in all, it looks like Greece, shortly followed by Portugal, Ireland, Spain, and Italy, soon will be forced to accept "bailouts" of the very rich by the middle classes and the poor.

Forced? Uh huh. If it turns out to be "politically impossible" to persuade ordinary outer-edge Europeans to vote for governments that will impose the requisite "austerity" measures needed to keep the super-rich fat and happy, the availability of governments (through coalitions and similar tricks) will be sharply reduced — leaving only those "democratically elected" governments willing to play along.

Can it be stopped? Can the megacorps be compelled to take "haircuts" for fear of far greater losses, perhaps to neck level? It may depend on the Greeks.

From my perspective, it would be better to take our chances on a Greek default — and see what shakes out — than to keep the bailouts going and spreading until the eventual default becomes devastating to the point of worldwide depression. The Greeks, of course, will not be letting me write their economic policy — but maybe somebody that somebody listens to will start the conversation, and quiet the whining of the Germans and the European Central Bank.

The Eurozone — like NATO, perhaps — just expanded too fast. Letting Greece in in the first place was a sure indication of poor oversight. Right now, Greece really needs the drachma, Portugal needs the escudo, and Ireland needs the Irish pound You can't have a unified monetary policy without a unified fiscal policy — and for the Eurozon, such a policy is far, far away.

Debt, more debt, and a bit of Afghanistan

I've been remiss. Sorry. Let's try to catch up a little.

So the US reached its current debt ceiling today, and Timmy Boy Geithner was only too happy to dip into the pension funds of federal employees to prolong the suspense. Nobody was surprised, and the yawns resonated across the Potomac. Wall Street, apparently, is not at all worried.

Why isn't Wall Street worried? My guess is that the Street is sure that nothing that happens will be in any way damaging to the Street. Oh, for Christ's sake, that's not a guess — that's just a totally non-creative reading of the way life is, these days. All I can hope for is that Democrats won't give in to "triggers" unless there are tax increase triggers as well as spending cut triggers. Hopefully, they won't have to look to Obama for leadership.
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Dominique Strauss-Kahn is in a New York City jail at the moment. Is it entirely likely that he, as a powerful world leader, has the testosterone, the hubris, and the disdain for lower class African immigrants to be guilty. Quite possibly, if he stopped to think at all, he presumed she was an illegal, and hence wouldn't report the assault.

On the other hand, it's not outside the realm of possibility that he was set up. Nicholas Sarkozy can't be terribly upset — in fact, quite a few champagne corks must have been popping at UMP headquarters when the news broke. A more likely scenario, though, is that certain bankers holding short positions on Greek debt find it in their interest to stop another bailout of Greece. With Strauss-Kahn out of the picture, the inevitable default is likely to come far sooner.

NYPD says it has forensic evidence supporting the alleged assault, which seems a little odd considering it took the form of what Bill Clinton famously called "not sex." The maid, who came from a Francophone country where France continues to exercise a good deal of economic power, must have shown extraordinary presence of mind — especially for a presumably traumatized woman pushing around a cart well stocked with those little bottles of mouthwash. Yes, testosterone, hubris, and disdain offer a more likely explanation, but I'm just saying that's not the only explanation.
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Meanwhile, John Kerry and a few others are suggesting that the recent Osamacide makes a somewhat accelerated exit from Afghanistan more acceptable. Sadly, somewhat accelerated is not likely to mean "next week," but at least Petraeus is keeping his mouth shut for the moment, which is appropriate for the future director of the CIA.

Now, if only Asif Ali Zardari and Ahmad Shuja Pasha can persuade Pakistani Islamists that they really didn't have anything to do with bin Laden's assassination, and also persuade Hamid Karzai he's better of accommodating Pakistan than India, some real progress in getting the US the hell out of Afghanistan might be achieved.