Welcome to European Tribune. It's gone a bit quiet around here these days, but it's still going.
Display:
See It? Say It? Do Something About It? | 40 comments (40 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)
Germany (4.00 / 4)
Hard-money as a policy would be tolerable (even with the results being seen), but Germany is not for hard-money. Germany is for whatever is better to Germany: During the re-unification (with its costs) it was OK to run deficits. Germany and Portugal were the two countries that broke the 3% deficit limit first more than 10 years ago and at that time it was fine because it was convenient to Germany.

This means that the correct narrative is not about hard-money, but about German interest. It is not very difficult to step from here and suggest that a certain pattern with regards to European domination seems to assert itself in Germany from time to time. In the previous century it was more atrocious, but the underlying pattern seems to be there still.

The EU has become a mechanism for that power grab  (nowadays probably unconscious). At the very least the Euro is that: For the sake of all of us, it must go.

by cagatacos on Tue Sep 23rd, 2014 at 12:02:58 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Germany (none / 0)
I think this is the wrong way of looking at it. Berlin really cares about hard money, and so does the average German. Neither Berlin nor the average German feel they have (yet again) embarked on a project to subjugate the rest of Europe. Rather, they see themselves as victims, the losers who have been tricked into bailing out the feckless southerners, who really should just behave as Germans and that would make everything alright.

No amount of arguments about mercantilism, current account surpluses or aggregate demand is going to change this - most ordinary people don't know what those things are, and even fewer politicians do.

Sure, Germany did break the Stability pact a decade ago, but who remembers that? Also, that was before the crisis, so hard money sentiment was not rampant. It might have existed under the surface, but no one really cared. Everything seemed to be working so well, after all.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Thu Sep 25th, 2014 at 02:36:52 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Germany (none / 0)
Hard money is not ok. If there would be a consistent hard money policy in europe we would all be screwed.

While there is a distinct and annoying  feeling of superiority in Germany, there is no power grab in the sense that Germany willfully destroys the southern economies to gain power.

by rz on Mon Oct 6th, 2014 at 03:11:34 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Germany (none / 0)
Instead German backed policies continue to grind to dust the economies of the periphery while German politicians assert not only that this is not the intent, but that their policies are not the cause - a sort of self serving blindness.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Mon Oct 6th, 2014 at 08:29:20 PM EST
[ Parent ]

See It? Say It? Do Something About It? | 40 comments (40 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
Display: