In this duo, the hypocrisy prize goes without contest to French leaders, who spend their time placing all the blame on Germany, when the responsability is clearly shared. The new budgetary treaty, negotiated by the former (Sarkozy) majority, and ratified by the new (Hollande) one, could not have been adopted without France

OK, France maybe had the power to block things. Certainly I was very disappointed (though not all that surprised) that Hollande did not appear to use every trick in the book to derail that, considering he had been elected on such a mandate.

But Germany was applying immense pressure while France failed to resist as hard as it probably could have (knowing that if it had done so, it would have at least faced some significant punishment, and maybe not actually managed to stop the whole thing). It's a bit disingenuous to send them back to back as sharing the responsibility.

If someone were to drag me into a room and I failed to attempt a freeing technique that would dislocate my shoulder but give me an 80% chance to not go into the room, I would feel a bit rich that I be called hypocritical for pointing out that I have, indeed, been dragged into the room.

Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need, but not every man's greed. Gandhi