In keeping with the strong traditions of this blog, the only news worth printing is that which is at least two weeks old! Thus it is that I ruin your Saturday morning by re-introducing the topic guaranteed to bring about groans and headaches. Yes, people, the European non-Union!
Thought it had all gone away, did you? All settled and sorted by that nice little hausfrau in Berlin? All the naughty little Euro kinde sent to bed without any supper until they have learned how to behave? No way, José! A couple of weeks ago the new Spanish prime minister simply told the EU Commission to: meter la nariz en el culo de un oso muerto! I am assured by Google Translate that this is the correct translation of an old Australian saying: stick your nose up a dead bear's bum! You may wonder why I feel the need to insert an Australian saying into this European post but my regular - my only? - Australian reader, Andra, feels there is too much "kultur" and she needs something to make her feel at home. One does not lightly disregard the feelings of Andra! Where was I? Oh yes, España - long may she, er, viva, and all that sort of thing, because she has told the EU appatchiks that she has no intention of following their budgetry diktats and intends to set her own economic course and targets. The Spanish, I suspect, are probably the most nationalistic of all Eurpean nations. Stuck out into the Atlantic on their peninsular behind the massive Pyrenees, the Spanish have developed a strong sense of their own being, not unlike the English on their Island. (More of the geo-politcs we discussed earlier.)
Things are quiet on the European front for the moment, not, I suspect, because anything has been solved but simply because of the exhaustion of all concerned. However, Spring has sprung and shortly the temperature will rise. The Greeks have an election pending and by all the accounts I have read the result will be a Greek dog's dinner with the main parties brought to their knees and a host - a rabble? - of tiny extremist parties elected whose support will be required for anyone to form a government. A weakened Greek government, of course, plays into the hands of the EU Commissars but will do so only for a time. Eventually the anger and frustration of the Greek people will find other outlets and then the real trouble will begin.
The Spanish, of course, are in a different position. They have just completed their election and they have a new prime minister who knows that standing up to and even defying the Eurocrats makes him even more popular with his people. But still I wait, patiently, for the fat Italian lady to throw a wobbly! I have maintained for some time that the key as to whether or not the EU shatters lies in Rome. The Italian economy, even with their 'Grecian abilities' in creative accounting, is still very large and any threat to it will set off alarums in Berlin-Brussels.
So for the moment we have the equivalent of the Christmas truce in 1914 but it will not last and soon the economic guns will begin their rumble.
I'm disappointed that I've not seen one blogpost of newspaper article making a laboured comparison between Italy and the Costa Concordia.
Posted by: dearieme | Saturday, 17 March 2012 at 09:16
Don't tempt me, DM! Actually it did cross my mind but even I groaned inwardly at the thought.
Posted by: David Duff | Saturday, 17 March 2012 at 09:40