Identity : 10th December The National Interest

The EU vs the national interest. NoseMonkey, EUtopia (en)
"... The Telegraph’s Brussels correspondent Bruno Waterfield has made an interesting contribution to a pamphlet by the Manifesto Club, No Means No! Essays on the Eve of the European Council Meeting ... Ignore the populist eurosceptic rhetoric of the title, there’s actually a lot of interest here ...
... As such, Waterfield’s essay goes to the heart of this ongoing dispute about both the “democratic deficit” and future direction of the EU that’s a perennial favourite among those of us who like to blather on about the thing, and ends up effectively a short overview of the more secretive aspects of EU decision-making - and a very useful one at that. I do urge you to go have a look ..."

Cartoon : 10th December

Grigory Pasko: The Economic Extremists. Grigory Pasko, Robert Amsterdam (en)
" ... Poster from the times of the USSR. The text (in fine print) on the poster: «American number - minus 22 percent bears witness to the economic crisis that has already begun in the United States and together with this to the crisis that is growing in all capitalist countries. The Soviet number - plus 20 percent speaks of the further mighty rise of Soviet industry». The evil capitalist is holding a paper entitled "war plans" and has a lightning bold forming the word "Crisis" over his head. The main slogan (in large print) says "Same years, different «weather»" ..."

Quote : 10th December Rama Yade on the EP 2009

« Je suis très honorée de cette proposition, mais je suis davantage motivée par un mandat national (…). Je veux aller où je suis utile. Je ne veux pas être là juste pour occuper une fonction…».
" I am honored by this proposition, but I am more motivated by a national mandate (...) I want to go where I am useful. I do not want to be there just to hold a sit ..."
Rama Yade on Sarkozy's offer to head the European Election Campaign for the leading French right wing.

Answer from the Elysee after her decision :
«... s’étonne qu’au XXIe siècle, on ne soit pas intéressé par les affaires européennes ».
" ... (The Elysee Palace) is atonished that in the 21st century, one is not insterested by European Affairs."

Blogs : 10th December (en)

Ouf, ni Nadine Morano ni Rama Yade ne succéderont à Jouyet. eurojunkie, Blogactiv.eu (fr)

Nicolas Sarkozy exclut de nommer Rama Yade secrétaire d'Etat aux affaires européennes. Jean Quatremer, Les Coulisses de Bruxelles (fr)
" ... On estime, au château, que Yade sous-estime gravement l’importance du Parlement européen, où cette polyglotte aurait été « une star » et aurait pu se constituer un carnet d’adresse qui lui fait défaut. On fait aussi remarquer qu’elle n’aurait pas été obligée d’effectuer un mandat plein, mais qu’elle aurait ainsi prouvé sa capacité à affronter le suffrage universel. Mais, après tout, Rama Yade est peut-être tout simplement fidèle à elle-même: comme me le rappelle un internaute, elle a reconnu avoir voté non au traité constitutionnel européen en mai 2005... Pas très sérieux pour un secrétaire d'Etat aux affaires européennes ..."

Powerful Women: Follow-up on Rama Yade. Julien Frisch, Watching Europe (en)
" ... It is quite hard to judge from the outside which reasons have led to the decision of Rama Yade, but she does not seem to have serious backing in the French government, with France's foreign minister Kouchner saying that it was a mistake to create the post of secretary of state for human rights (the position Yade occupies today).In this sense, one could also interpret the proposal made to her to run for European Parliament as a smooth possibility to get her out of the way, to keep her somewhere where she could have become a star, but one with very limited influence, far away from the necessary political networks in Paris - something with great disadvantage for a woman who has made her way into influential circles so early in her life ..."

Join the (EU) Navy. Richard, EUReferendum (en)
" ... Since the Royal Navy has already been involved in NATO led counter-piracy operations off the coast of Somalia, using HMS Cumberland, NATO is obviously good enough for this operation. There is no need for an EU presence. But the EU has its vainglorious ambitions to become a military power in its own right. So it is using another of our ships with our men – and a few women – and boasting that it has its own Navy. And our government is mad enough, stupid enough, treacherous enough to let this happen ..."

The New Geopolitics of Oil. Jerome, European Tribune (en)
As a first point, I noted that we were oscillating between supply driven prices and demand-driven prices. In one case, when there is enough supply around, markets balance via supply variation, and the price of oil reflects the marginal cost of production, ie the price to add one more pump to a deep offshore platform off Angola. In the other, with supply constrained, it is demand that has to adjust (via demand destruction), and the price of oil has to go high enough, to imply, to force someone to take the bus instead of the car.
In the summer, we were clearly in a demand-constrained world and that explained the price peak more than any reference to speculation; we've now moved back to a supply-driven one, as the financial crisis has caused massive demand destruction of its own.

Blogs : 19th November

Italy’s Unicredit Has Definitely NOT Made Losses On The Russian Interbank Market. Edward Hugh, A Fistful of Euros (en)
" ... The real roots of this problem are to be found in the fact that Unicredit has very substantial exposure to losses in a number of key Central and East European countries, and the Italian government, which already has a debt to GDP ratio of over 100%, is in no position - especially with an economy which looks set to shrink all the way through from here to 2011 - to offer much in the way of cash to support the bank. As I point out in this post, Austria (which is a much smaller country than Italy, but which has similar East European exposure) has already lined up an initial 100 billion euros to support its banks, while the Italian government has remained hesitant to be specific about anything, but seems to be talking about support which only amounts to something like 20 billion euros. So we are left with the rather undignifying spectacle of the leaders of the eurozone’s third largest economy having to rely on Muammar Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi and Vladimir Putin for vital support to keep one of Italy’s leading banks alive ..."

A cyclist city is a civilised city. A Certain Idea of Europe (en)
" ... THE popularity of bicycle-rental schemes across Europe, inspired by the "Vélib" programme in Paris, continues to spread. Instead of sitting in gridlocked traffic, a growing number of Europeans are picking up a bicycle in one corner of town, dropping it off in another, and doing the reverse on their way home at night. Barcelona, Amsterdam, Lyon and Rome are some other cities that have embraced the idea. Now Boris Johnson, the London mayor who is an avid cyclist himself, has given the go-ahead to the placement of 6,000 rental bikes at 400 stations around central London by May 2010 ..."I have long held the view that a cyclised city is a civilised city'' ..."

Heading north. A Certain Idea of Europe (en)
" ... NOT all of those Polish plumbers leaving Britain and Ireland as the economies slow are necessarily going straight home. Sweden has seen immigration surge to record levels this year ..."

Economic stupidity strengthens. Ironies Too (en)
" ... I have just returned from a few days in England. Incredibly there still seems no general understanding of the treachery of the nation's parliamentarians or understanding of the depths of the social and economic crisis now prevailing.The media in particular seem to be goading the brainless Brown and his Treasury team towards the almost certain national suicide of large unfunded tax cuts ..."

The power of the pen. Richard, EUReferendum (en)

Tracking: European Parliament elections 2009 (XXVI). Julien Frisch, Watching Europe (en)
" ... So yes, EP elections are often used to sanction national governments, an act which on the national level sometimes leads to far-right votes, but right now I don't see a great danger of a Euro-radicalisation on the right wing of the political spectrum ..."

Charming MEPs. Open Europe Blog (en)

Cartoon : 19th November UK Monarchy

Corrigan, 2006

USA : 19th November

California Port Overrun by Unsold Foreign Cars. Matt Richtell, The NYT (en)
" ... For now, the port itself is the destination. Unwelcome by dealers and buyers, thousands of cars worth tens of millions of dollars are being warehoused on increasingly crowded port property ...
... But the inventory glut in Long Beach is not limited to imported cars. There has also been a sharp drop in demand for the port’s single largest export: recycled cardboard and paper products. This material typically goes to China, where it is used to make boxes for new electronics and other products that are sent back to the United States. But Chinese factories reacting to sharply falling demand are slowing production, so they need less cardboard. Tons of paper are piling up recycling businesses around the port, the detritus of economies on hold ...
... Roughly 20 percent of the nation’s container imports last year came through Long Beach, putting it close behind the largest container port, Los Angeles. This year, shipping volume at Long Beach is down 10 percent from 2007, and nearly all major ports around the country have seen similar declines ...

Newspapers : 19th November

Blair and Sarkozy to host summit. Henry Samuel and Robert Winnett, The Telegraph (en)
" ... The Jan 8-9 meeting, "New world: values, development and regulation", would include "international political leaders" as well as economists such as Nobel Prize winners Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen, according to the Elysée Palace.
French officials say it is too soon to list which heads of state will attend. "It's a kind of brainstorming on the future of our societies in the light of the financial crisis involving academics, economists and politicians," said an Elysée source. "Tony Blair wishes to be in the preparation of this event." ..."

Silvio Berlusconi plays impromptu game of hide and seek with Angela Merkel. Nick Squires, The Telegraph (en)
" ... Mr Berlusconi, 72, ducked behind a lamp post and then jumped out with a cheery "boo" when she approached during a summit between the two countries in Trieste, in Italy's north-east. The Chancellor evidently found the surprise amusing because she spread her arms and gave Mr Berlusconi a hug, addressing him as "Silvio" ..."

Hamish McRae: Recessions serve a useful purpose.
" ... So there will be tax cuts here and elsewhere, and there will be further cuts in interest rates around the world too. There is no dispute about any of that. There is however a serious debate about the scale of what should be done. You can always puff up economies for a few months with such policies, but the more you artificially boost them in the short term, the greater the problems a few years down the line. You can buy growth now but have to pay for it later ...
... It sounds harsh to say it and I don't mean it to be so, but recessions, slowdowns, squeezes, however you describe them, do serve a purpose.
They force efficiency. They force our whole society to figure out simpler and more effective ways of doing things. Increasing efficiency is the only way our whole society – not just a few talented or cunning individuals – gets richer. Why is Germany the world's largest goods exporter? Because its companies have lived through the fire, first of a high deutschemark and then joining the euro at too high a rate. Again and again the pressure on them has forced them to lift their game ..."

Poles offered break on carbon emissions. Joshua Chaffin, The FT (en)
" ... The French proposal, a copy of which has been obtained by the Financial Times, is intended to address Poland’s concerns about the expansion of Europe’s emissions trading system, a central pillar of the EU’s ambitious plan to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent from 1990 levels by 2020 ...
... The French proposal, a copy of which has been obtained by the Financial Times, is intended to address Poland’s concerns about the expansion of Europe’s emissions trading system, a central pillar of the EU’s ambitious plan to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent from 1990 levels by 2020 ...

Labour shortage dims Denmark’s vision. The FT (en)
" ... The apartment complexes that have sprouted round Copenhagen over the past few years say a lot about Denmark. The designers have, as usual, combined practicality and beauty to produce some of the world’s most stunning homes. Unfortunately, many of them are empty and those that are occupied are often let out by developers because they have been unable to sell them ...
... In theory Denmark’s “flexicurity”, a combination of flexible labour market rules and a generous welfare system, should allow companies to hire and fire more easily than some of their international. But Denmark faces a skills shortage because of the combination of full employment, an ageing population, tight restrictions on immigration and a tendency for the unemployed to prefer living on benefit rather than move or retrain to find work ..."

Bulgaria brushes aside warning signs. Kerin Hope and Theodor Troev, The FT (en)

Iceland braced for big bond sell-off. David Ibison, The FT (en)
" ...Iceland is braced for the second wave of a financial crisis that has already destroyed its banks, as foreign owners of billions of dollars of Icelandic bonds dump them as soon as the country refloats its currency ...
... The central bank is prepared to intervene in the currency market to offset the impact of the overseas selling by using its existing reserves of IKr409bn and $5bn in loans from the IMF and other governments ... “Using the foreign currency loans to stabilise the currency would mean subsidising the carry traders’ exit at the expense of future taxpayers who will have to pay back the loan,” said Jon Danielsson, reader in finance at the London School of Economics ..."

Cartoon : 12th November Britain's Battle on Tax Cuts to Support the Economy

The Times, 2008

Identity : 12th November

Sarkozy: emotion not commemoration. Henri Samuel, The Telegraph (en)
... In Douaumont, the French choir sung the European anthem - Beethoven's Ode to Joy – but there was no hand-holding: Germany was represented by the president of the German senate, not by chancellor Angela Merkel. Mr Sarkozy's "decentralisation" of the commemoration from neutral Paris to the killing fields of Verdun was apparently not to her liking. The Franco-German motor is in serious need of anti-freeze ...
... "The time has come to honour all the dead, without exception," Mr Sarkozy went on. This phrase did not go unnoticed in France, as it signalled Sarkozy's wish to rehabilitate the 675 Frenchmen shot for deserting or cowardice even though many were too exhausted, injured or traumatised to advance ...
... He has always been fervent about revisiting the past to boost a sense of national purpose. But as so often with this president, his way of doing things irks many French. "Choosing Douaumont over the Arc de triomphe is siding with the victims rather than the victors," historian Antoine Prost told Le Monde. Mr Prost and others accuse the president of inappropriately trying to extract "emotion" from war rather than plain commemoration ..."

Newspapers 12th November

EU to allow 'wonky' fruit. Bruno Waterfield , The Telegraph (en)
" ... The European Commission will on Wednesday tear up bureaucratic "marketing standards" that set precise measurements for the appearance, weight and size of 26 types of fruit and vegetables – including the Brussels sprout ...
... An estimated 20 per cent of the British harvest is thrown away to comply with the EU regulations, rules which have been calculated to add as much as 40 per cent to the price of some vegetables, such as carrots.
"Nature does not always comply with a perfectly rounded apple and poker straight carrot. People should be given the chance to buy odd shaped fruit and veg as they taste just as good," said NFU Horticulture board chairman Richard Hirst ...
... The rule changes will be implemented from July 1 next year ..."

Why did the West ignore the truth about the war in Georgia? Mary Dejevsky, The Independent (en)
" ... The journalists travelled to the region separately and by different routes. They spoke to different people. But their findings are consistent: Georgia launched an indiscriminate military assault on South Ossetia's main town, Tskhinvali. The hospital was among the buildings attacked; doctors were injured even as they operated.
The timing of the Georgian attack, as of the arrival of the first Russian reinforcements two days later, coincides for the most part with the original Russian version. It was only then that the Russians crossed into Georgia proper in the invasion of sovereign territory that has been universally decried. For the record, it should be added that Russia has now withdrawn from uncontested Georgian territory, in accordance with the agreement mediated by President Sarkozy ...
... What has now transpired, however, is that the US and Britain had no excuse for not knowing how the war began. They were briefed by the OSCE monitors at a very early stage, and those monitors included two highly experienced former British Army officers ..."

Moscow signals depreciation of rouble. Charles Clover, The FT (en)
" ... Russia’s central bank signalled on Tuesday it was prepared to allow a sharp depreciation of the rouble as it lowered the floor at which it would defend the struggling currency, while capital outflows from the country took their toll on foreign exchange reserves ...
... A large depreciation could expose the government to serious political consequences ... But holding the rouble stable may ultimately be futile as the price of oil, Russia’s main export, falls and international credit markets dry up, analysts said ..."

Danes ‘bearing the cost’ of being outside euro. Robert Anderson, The FT (en)
" ... Denmark is paying the price for not adopting the euro, Nils Bernstein, governor of the country’s central bank, said on Tuesday, even though last month’s rise in interest rates has been successful in stopping pressure on the krone. “It is first and foremost a political question whether to join [the euro],” the Nationalbank chief said in an interview, “but as we now see there is an economic cost to being outside the eurozone.”

French agency to make debut in bail-out funding. Anousha Sakoui , The FT (en)
" ... A new French agency will make its debut in the international bond markets this week to raise bail-out funding for the country’s banks, marking the latest entrant to a growing investment class.
Banks running the bond sale for the Société de Financement de l’Economie Française (SFEF) are hoping to sell between €3bn and €5bn in three-year bonds this week.
The bonds are of the kind with which investors in Europe and beyond are going to become increasingly familiar – government sponsored debt issued either directly by or on behalf of the battered banking industry ...
... SFEF will provide up to €265bn in new loans to France’s banks, to ease lending conditions. The SFEF will use an explicit state guarantee to raise debt of up to five years maturity on the markets and pass it on to banks at a commercial rate plus a 20-basis-point fee for the government backing ..."

After U.S. Breakthrough, Europe Looks in Mirror. Steven Eslanger, The NYT (en)
" ... Mr. Obama is the only black in the current Senate, and unless he is replaced by an African-American, the new Senate will have none. The new House has 39 black representatives, about 9 percent. Blacks make up about 13 percent of the country’s population.
But Rama Yade, the Senegal-born state secretary for human rights, called herself “a painful exception” in the French government, despite President Nicolas Sarkozy’s appointment of three prominent black or Muslim women to his government. As for the political elite’s embrace of Mr. Obama, she said, “The enthusiasm they express toward this far-away American, they don’t have it for the minorities in France.”
It is not only immigrants who are pondering what Mr. Obama’s victory says about Europe. France’s defense minister, Hervé Morin, called the Obama victory “a lesson” for a French democracy late to adopt integration ...
... But the conservative Le Figaro blamed French minorities themselves for part of their exclusion. The paper noted that Mr. Obama’s success was based on his upbringing, education and success at integrating into the larger society and articulating its values, including patriotism.
“From this point of view, Obama should be the model to follow for young immigrants who have come to doubt their feeling of belonging to the nation,” the paper said. “Minorities, who have chosen their exile, in contrast to black Americans, still have a lot to prove.” ..."

USA Special : Homer Simpsons 'Voted' for Obama

Homer Simpson Tries to Vote for Obama - Watch a funny movie here

Newpapers : Views From Europe on Obama's Victory 5th November

America speaks; now for the real test. The Telegraph (en)
" ... For several weeks now, opinion pollsters have predicted this outcome; but it is no less extraordinary for all that. The lengthy queues of voters - the biggest turnout in an American election in 100 years - were testament to the galvanising effect of an exceptional campaign. By any standards, Mr Obama's victory is a historic moment for America. Within his 47-year lifetime, people of his skin colour were not allowed in bars or on buses in some states. To elect him head of state marks a rite of passage for his country, though it will truly come of age when the colour of the candidate no longer matters, only what he believes ..."

Obama culmina el sueño de cambio. El Pais (es)
" ... Obama has done it. Amid global expectation, Americans have accepted the challenge of change proposed by the Democratic candidate for the White House to give a clear victory in elections held this historic Tuesday, November 4, making him the first black president in the history of the country. There was little his Republican rival, John McCain, could do faced with the enthusiasm generated by the message of hope launched by the Democratic candidate during his campaign, one of the brightest in living memory ..."

EU hopes for more Europe-friendly US under Obama. Bruno Waterfield, The Telegraph (en)
" ... José Manuel Barroso, the European Commission President, said he hoped the Democrat President-elect would herald a new world order of international cooperation between the EU and US.
"This is a time for a renewed commitment between Europe and the United States of America," he said. "We need to change the current crisis into a new opportunity. We need a new deal for a new world." ..."

The upstart with a dream. Leonard Dole, The Independent (en)
" ... A little more than a year ago, he recalled, he was far behind in the polls, unable even to secure the endorsement of many black politicians who figured he could never beat Hillary Clinton. Many in the US political and media establishment had also concluded that his campaign was a flash in the pan. He was all but written off as a talented but fundamentally inexperienced upstart ...
... But the story of Barack Obama is one of being constantly underestimated by his opponents. From his earliest days as a community organiser on the south side of Chicago he revealed a talent for motivating people who thought they were powerless. As a young politician, hungry with thwarted ambition, his intellect, self-confidence, astonishing networking skills and a capacity to charm people into supporting him, turned him from a lowly Illinois state senator into a political superstar ...
... His election remains nevertheless a story of extraordinary talent and self-discipline, along with some fortunate timing. With a first name that rhymes with Iraq, a middle name of the former dictator of that country and a surname that even American television anchors confuse with Osama Bin Laden, the 47-year-old Chicago politician was always going to be a hard sell with America's so-called "low information" voters ...
... While she was flying an expensive "Hillacopter" around the state, Senator Obama and his team logged tens of thousands of miles persuading rural white Iowans to back him. Through word of mouth and the efforts of his devoted followers, he won a state that is 95 per cent white ...
... Condescending remarks he made about working class white voters "clinging to guns and religion" were a gift to his opponents, and even though he secured the Democratic nomination, he was polling 20 and 30 percentage points behind John McCain in must-win states like Ohio ...
... he said, "It shows you what one voice can do. One voice can change a room, and if a voice can change a room it can change a city, and if it can change a city, it can change a state, and if it can change a state it can change a nation, and if it can change a nation, it can change the world." ..."

Veterans fall by wayside as Republicans suffer huge US election losses. Tim Reid and Jenny Booth, The Times (en)
" ... An unpopular war in Iraq, a stricken economy — and various sexual and corruption scandals within Republican ranks — have dealt them the harshest of verdicts from voters across the country. Republicans in once reliably Republican suburban districts suffered particularly badly.
One of the Republican winners of the night — away from Capitol Hill — is perhaps Sarah Palin, the running-mate of John McCain. Despite her controversial role in the campaign and fears that she was viewed as a drag on the Republican ticket among independents, she has emerged as a popular figure among the culturally conservative base of the party. Many believe that she harbours plans to run for president in 2012 ..."

Analysis: Barack Obama's victory is head-spinning stuff. Gerard Baker, The Times (en)
" ... The American people yesterday demonstrated once again their unique capacity for self-renewal by electing the first black man as head of state, not much more than a generation after the country’s African-Americans were accorded full civil rights ...
... The country regarded loftily by many Europeans as hopelessly racist and irredeemably right wing has voted to be ruled by a black man, at the head of a party committed to economic redistribution and a foreign policy rooted in peaceful diplomatic engagement ...
... The country faces challenges on a scale no incoming president has had to tackle since Ronald Reagan was elected in 1980. The economy is in a recession likely to be as deep as the deepest in the last 50 years ..."

USA Presidential Election Special : Map of Victories

Identity : 29th October Island next EU Member ?

L'Islande, 28ème Etat membre? Jean Quatremer, Les Coulisses de Bruxelles (fr)
" ... Un sondage publié hier par le quotidien Frettabladid montre que 68,8 % des personnes interrogées souhaitent que leur pays présente sa candidature contre 55,1 % en février 2008 et 48,9 % en septembre 2007... Mieux: 72,5 % des sondés sont en faveur de l'abandon de leur couronne dévaluée pour l'euro. Un autre sondage publié la semaine dernière indique que 70 % des Islandais souhaitent un référendum sur l'adhésion de leur pays ...
... En tous les cas, ce sondage démontre que la pédagogie de la crise fonctionne parfaitement. Le problème est que, dans le cas de l'Islande, il est un peu trop tard... Et on se demande pourquoi il faut en arriver là pour que les peuples comprennent l'intérêt de constituer une puissance globale face aux menaces extérieures. Comme si un petit pays isolé -Malte, France ou Allemagne- pouvait résister à quoi que ce soit ..."

Blogs' News : 29th October

The Bank Bailouts Are Very Well Intended, But Where Is All The Money Going To Come From? Edward Hugh, A Fistful of Euros (en)
" ... So the big question now is, do these various institutions have the resources to back up their guarantees, should the need arise? ...
... According to the FT article the difficulties Austria, which has a triple A credit rating, is facing only serves to highlights the extent of the deterioration in the sovereign bond market, where benchmark indicators of credit risk such as the iTraxx index hit fresh record spreads yesterday ...
... Spain, which alos currently has a triple A rating, and Belgium have both cancelled bond offerings in the past month because of the market turbulence, with investors again demanding much higher interest rates than debt managers had bargained for ...
... Also, another story in Bloomberg gives us a further glimpse of how the EU governments are planning to do all that financing. The German government, it seems, is going to print IOUs (sorry, bonds) and give them directly to the banks. That is, they are not going to auction bonds and give the proceeds, they are simply giving the paper, and presumeably paying a coupon (or interest) ..."

As One CEE Country After Another Visits The IMF Sick Room, Will Poland Be Next? Edward Hugh, A Fistful of Euros (en)
" ... Central European stocks declined for a fourth consecutive day on Monday, with indexes in Vienna and Budapest heading for record monthly drops, as concern mounts that the global financial crisis is going to have a severe impact on economic growth across the entire region ..."

Romania In “Close Dialogue” With IMF, Bulgaria To “Seek Advice”. Edward Hugh, A Fistful of Euros (en)
" ... Romania is in “close dialogue” with the International Monetary Fund, though it is not asking for a loan from the lender that has offered support for Ukraine and Hungary ... This news today is not entirely unexpected, since only yesterday S&P’s downgraded Romanian foreign currency debt to what is effectively “junk bond” status ..."

News That Scares Me. Edward Hugh, A Fistful of Euros (en)
First off, we have Iceland, where the central bank has just raised interest rates by a whopping six percentage points ... Now, I know they have to do something like this, but just think about it for a moment. Eighteen precent is a very attractive rate for you if you put your money there (and assume that the banks don’t default) - but how the hell are the Icelanders themselves going to pay all the interest that people will be clocking up? ....

If We Survive The Credit Crunch And Global Recession (Or Depression), Then What? financialguy, BlogActiv (en)

L'euro, objet de désir à l'Est et au Nord de l'Europe. Jean Quatremer, Les Coulisses de Bruxelles (fr)
" ... Jusqu'il y a peu, les autres monnaies européennes ont bénéficié du bouclier de la monnaie unique. C’est terminé : en dehors de la couronne slovaque, qui va intégrer la zone euro en janvier prochain, toutes les monnaies de l'Union sont attaquées. Les couronnes suédoise et danoise, le forint hongrois, les monnaies baltes (couronne estonienne, lat lettone et litas lituanienne), le lev bulgare, le leu roumain, le zloty polonais et la couronne tchèque perdent du terrain face à l'euro et au dollar ...

Serves them right. Richard, EUReferendum (en)
" ... Based on the assumption that this German company would share the fate of the rest of the automotive industry, speculative "short sellers" have been holding short positions in anticipation of the share price plummeting as the demand for vehicles drops in the recession.Instead, as news came though that Porsche - which has been attempting to take over the VW for some years – had secured a larger stake in the company than anyone had thought, shares rocketed, prompting "a huge scramble to cover short positions in Volkswagen, which had been the most shorted stock in Germany's benchmark DAX index." ...
... One hedge fund said: "There have been some dark moments over the past few months but none blacker than this. We couldn't have dreamt a worse scenario." ...
... We do not claim any great prescience – but then we are not highly-paid analysts who do this sort of thing for a living. But anyone with at least moderately-tuned political antennae would have cautioned that you treat VW issues with the very greatest of care, tainted as they were by a complex political overlay. The "normal" assumptions simply do not apply ..."

French Protectionism for Europe? Dodo, European Tribune (en)
" ... You may also remember that rejection from other EU members came swiftly, and with particular harshness from Germany, where Sarko's protectionist push is seen as yet another attempt by France to force its model on the EU after previous failed attempts.
However, a new poll for German magazine Stern shows that the political elite is totally out of tune with public sentiment: the overwhelming majority of the population would support Sarko's plan ...
... The Franco-German difference over the state's role in the economy goes back to well before the emergence of (modern) neoliberalism -- for the German side, in fact it has its ideological roots in what was back then also called Neoliberalismus, West German social liberalism. In the Rhenan model of capitalism, for the state to be an arbiter between employers and employees, it shouldn't be the former itself. Consequently, German politicians fought statist-dirigist proposals at the EU level for 50 years ...

Hungary facing default. Ironies Too (en)
" ...The IMF had two reasonable conditions. One: plan a budget in which even in the most pessimistic case, you plan spending which you have funds for. Two: in a situation like this, don't commit to reducing revenue ...
... The IMF conditions will be of interest for the UK ... At present Brown is expecting the independent Bank of England to reduce UK interest rates while the government itself plans huge new borrowings which could only be achieved with massively raised interest rates to compensate for the daily more severe sterling currency devaluation risks.In the absence of any real political opposition party it is now increasingly difficult to see any way for the UK to escape from the equivalent of an economic Armageddon ... "

Thatcher, Bruges and future Tory EU policy. Nosemonkey, EUtopia (en)
" ... the Tories under David Cameron still have no EU policy. I’ve been hunting for one for a while now ... and they still seem no closer to working out what they even think of the thing ... The thing is, Thatcher’s near-infamous Bruges speech remains a great starting point for the Tories to set out their position on Britain’s involvement with the rest of Europe ...
... The speech is well worth reading in full ... it actually contains much that is positive towards a European Union, and fully supports continued British engagement at the heart of the process. It’s just that it doesn’t support the direction the current EU has been heading for the last 30-odd years towards greater centralisation and uniformity. Pretty much all of Thatcher’s suggestions back then are still being made to this day - and not just by eurosceptics ..."

A constructive Vision for Eurosceptics. RZ, Re:Europa (en)
" ... Exactly! It would be a really positive devolpment if Europhobes would present a vision how they think the EU should be structured in the future along the lines of this article. This would finally enable us to have constructive debate about the EU ..."

Debunking the case against NATO enlargement: a reply to the WPR op-ed. Vitaliy, The 8th Circle (en)
" ...Balance of power theory tells us that if Russia grows more threatening, the European Union — now richer than the U.S. — will respond by investing more on defense than its current average of 2 percent of GDP, and by further integrating its military capacity ..."

Newspapers : 29th October

Falling oil output 'is greater threat to UK than terrorism'. Jon Swaine, The Telegraph (en)

" ... The Peak Oil group warned in a report that the country could begin feeling the effects of a severe lack of oil within five years, as oil-producing countries will be forced to wind down production due to diminished reserves ...

... Mr Leggett, whose book Half Empty expands upon his vision of a looming international catastrophe due to an emptying of global oil reserves, said he was pessimistic that innovations in oil exploration, including the tapping of tar sands, could prevent disaster.
"When they fail to meet demand, many countries will experience this as an energy crisis. Some will experience it as an energy famine, as producers start to withhold exports," he said. ..."

Audacious Porsche in $20bn 'sting'. Mathieu Robbins, The Independent (en)
" ... The hedge fund industry has seen huge growth over the past few years, with many ambitious young entrepreneurs, including Nathan Rothschild, opting to enter the sector. It also poached many senior investment bankers and private equity executives, attracted by the high returns and pay, and relative freedom of working for what are normally small firms.
Hedge funds thought they could outperform traditional investors by using increasingly exotic ways of investing their money. They also presented themselves as slight rebels, different from the staid financial establishment, often opting to set themselves up in Mayfair, west London, rather than the City or Canary Wharf. There will be those in Germany who will relish the discomfort of the hedge funds. In 2004, a German politician, Franz Muenterfering, described private equity firms and hedge funds as "locusts".

Sarkozy, the natural leader of Europe. Charles Bremner, The Times (en)
" ...The financial mess of the past month has opened a boulevard for the French president to do what he believes he does best: rushing into the breach to take charge ...
... It has been a good autumn for Super Sarko. Before the banking drama, he had already ridden to the rescue to halt the Russian advance on Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, last August ...
... Sarko has in effect reverted to old French custom of strong intervention by the state. Its rulers, from King Louis XIV through to the post-war Republic of Charles de Gaulle, practised the tradition that l'état knows best. Some of the time, they have been right ...
... The Germans are amused by the presumption of the "Napoleon of Neuilly", as some of their commentators call Sarko, referring to his base in the posh western suburb ...
... In reality the crisis has exposed some of the weakness of the Union rather than its ability to pull together in crisis. The rescue has been run by national governments, not by the Union's supranational institutions -- the executive Commission, the court and parliament ...
... The United States has been forced to recognize that Europe's mix of state and market is not so out-of-date as it thought. Keynes is back and American leadership of the world is more in doubt than it has been at any time since the 1940s. Sarkozy believes that with les Anglo-Saxons discredited, it's time for the old continent to seize the moment and he wants to be the one in front. The next year will be interesting. "

Public Life is Public. The Times (en)
" ... The bureaucrats who recorded these items may actually have a sense of humour. Commissioners are powerful and necessarily well connected. It is well known that they are frequent guests on the yachts and jets of the very wealthy. Yet their rules for declaring interests are structured so that any meaningful act of hospitality goes undeclared.
Under the commissioners’ code of conduct, the public cannot know who entertains them or whether they mix business and pleasure in what they choose to call their private time, unless the commissioners themselves choose to say so. Usually, and unsurprisingly, they do not ...
... The code of conduct was drafted in haste by Neil Kinnock in 1999 after the resignation of Jacques Santer’s entire Cabinet, which had been condemned as shot through with fraud, corruption and bad management ... "

Warsaw to speed euro adoption. Jan Cienski, The FT (en)
" ... Poland’s government on Tuesday spelled out the country’s path to adopting the euro by 2012, part of a series of moves designed to help calm spooked investors who have been retreating from the Polish zloty as emerging market currencies are buffeted by the global financial crisis.
The plan calls for the government to begin talks on amending the constitution by early next year – the current document allows only Poland’s central bank to set monetary policy. Later in 2009, Poland would enter the ERM-2 European exchange rate mechanism, and the final exchange rate between the euro and the zloty would be set in the summer of 2011. Poland would be admitted to the common currency by January 1 2012 ... "

History and Media : 22nd October

Hitler 'planned propaganda TV'. Chris Irvine, The Telegraph (en)
" ... Plans for the system were first found when Soviet soldiers entered Berlin but have recently been reexamined by researchers for a new Russian documentary. The Orwellian screens would have been set up in public places and would show "people's television", depicting how the Aryan race should live, with the Nazis focusing on news, sport and education ...
... Hitler used live TV signals to broadcast his speech at the Berlin 1936 Olympic Games, and he continued to film his speeches and parades realising the power of television propaganda. "

US 2008 and Europe : 22nd October Gallup Polls

Barack Obama wins France in a landslide. Nile Gardiner, The Telegraph (en)
" ... A new Gallup poll conducted in 70 countries finds that just 4 percent of French voters support John McCain, compared to a whopping 64 percent who back Barack Obama ...
... It should though be cause for concern when an American presidential contender is idolized with an almost messianic zeal in countries with deep-rooted anti-Americanism, nations that have fought tooth and nail against U.S. interests on a wide array of issues over the past decade, from the war in Iraq and the war on terror, to trade and climate change ... "

French Newspapers : 22nd October

LE QATAR, JOKER DIPLOMATIQUE DE NICOLAS SARKOZY. Reuters, Le Monde (fr)

Nicolas Sarkozy veut diriger la zone euro jusqu'en 2010. Cécile Chambraud, Arnaud Leparmentier and Philippe Ricard, Le Monde (fr)

Sarkozy l'européen. Editorial, Le Monde (fr)
" ... Quand il était à l'intérieur ou aux finances, Nicolas Sarkozy rongeait son frein durant les interminables réunions auxquelles il devait assister à Bruxelles. Maintenant, il a visiblement pris goût à ces réunions, surtout depuis qu'il les dirige comme président du Conseil européen ...
... mardi 21 octobre, devant le Parlement de Strasbourg : il deviendrait président de l'Eurogroupe jusqu'à ce que la présidence tournante revienne à un pays de la zone euro, c'est-à-dire pendant encore un an au moins.
M. Sarkozy a ainsi inventé, à son profit, la présidence stable de l'Europe que le traité de Lisbonne aurait instituée s'il n'avait été rejeté par les Irlandais. Pour faire bonne mesure, le président français a aussi proposé de transformer cet Eurogroupe en un "gouvernement économique européen", de créer des fonds souverains en Europe pour investir dans les secteurs clés, de mettre en oeuvre une politique industrielle européenne. De vieilles idées françaises qui sont de véritables chiffons rouges agités devant nos amis allemands ...
... Il sait que toutes ses suggestions ne seront pas retenues, mais que nos partenaires ne peuvent pas toutes les refuser. Proposer, proposer, il en restera toujours quelque chose... La tactique a fonctionné dans la tempête ..."