What Xena the Dog and Nicolas Sarkozy Have In Common

[mallorys_camera]

Frankly I’m appalled that EU leaders have responded to Papandreou's call for a Greek referendum with such horror.

Amazing disconnect between the economic oligarchy and the populace. Proof of Weber’s maxim: In the end, every organization exists merely to perpetuate its own existence.

Essentially the EU is giving Greece money to float French and German commercial banks. The EU has always pursued monetary policies that favor richer countries like France and Germany over poorer countries like Greece. If Greece did not belong to the EU, it would have borrowed from Greek banks with the option of wiping out its debt the old-fashioned way – by nationalizing the banks!

Austerity measures are absolutely the wrong way to deal with the Greek debt. A debt that large cannot be serviced by cutting back on operational expenses. A debt that large can only be serviced by growing the economy. The conditions Merkel and Sarkozy are attempting to impose on Greece will not be met because they can not be met, and the EU leaders know this. What do they have, bags over their heads? As far as I can see there’s absolutely no upside for Greece in staying in the EU. They should vote to pull out.

Anyway the real problem isn’t Greece, it’s Italy. Italy owes French and German commercial banks something like three trillion dollars.

In other news, Xena the Dog ran away again this morning. I was prepared just to let her fly.

After spending the night on my bed, the first thing she did this morning – while staring at me defiantly – was to squat, pee and poop on the carpet. I screamed and threw her in the yard. Five minutes later, she wasn’t in the yard anymore.

Oh, well, I thought.

RTT left for school. Five minutes later he was back at the front door – with Xena. “She was running down Main Street with this stupid bag over her head, and all the cars were honking,” he told me. “It was embarrassing. I almost left her there.”

I don’t know whether I’m happy or I’m sad he didn’t. Do dogs get Alzheimer’s?

Comments

[robby.livejournal.com]

The upside for Greece for remaining in the EU is that eventually membership will provide more economic opportunity, and in the short run, some Greeks will be able work elsewhere in Europe.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Economic opportunity in what way? The Eurozone is essentially a market but I can't think of anything Greece is set up to export. Can you? Maybe fish. But Greece has no manufacturing, and they're only an agricultural economy by default -- the soil is incredibly rocky and barren for the most part. Tourism is their number one industry, I believe. I'm not sure how EU membership benefits that although I suppose it must.

Yeah, Greeks are able to work elsewhere in Europe. But that was true before the EU. Perhaps it wasn't quite as easy.

In exchange, what they're giving up -- at least the way I see it -- is self-rule. It's like they're becoming a colony of France and Germany.

[robby.livejournal.com]

Consider the Greek ports and shipping industry. I think it would suffer from being outside the EU. I agree that the Greek people should vote on this proposal, and you're right, it's sort of about what brand of poison to take.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Is there still a sizable Greek shipping industry? I know there was at one point. (I ask because I do not know.)

[robby.livejournal.com]

Yes, the Greek maritime and transportation sectors are still pretty significant.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Greece#Maritime_industry

[chezsci.livejournal.com]

Stoopid dog. That pic is hilarious. Yeah - I think dogs do get dementia. Had a Lab that did the pooping and peeing thing - asked the vet and he said she was old, probably had failing kidneys and was losing her walnut-sized mind. So we put her down. Found out almost immediately that she had been the seeing eye dog for the other Lab who was apparently blind, unbeknownst to my wife and I. Yeah - we kind of sucked at pet ownership as well as other more serious life skills.

Heartening to know that the EU is just as corrupt and piss-poor at financial management as our Fed is. I mean are there no competant experts in anything any more? Oh wait - the boys at the Jet Propulsion Lab do a good job of landing stuff on other planets and whatnot. But Jesus - the financial sector seems to be full of a bunch of Ivy League and West Coast Intelligentsia C-average, also-rans who can do nothing but run around with piss in their pants scrabbling up all the cash they can get while gibbering on about how bad things are gonna get and well, hell the best we can do is try to react because frankly there's no clear idea as to how we should be proactive without a lot of, you know, not stealing from and fucking over the very people we need to drive the bus on the sort of financial recovery that doesn't feature a worldwide Depression. I have near daily fantasies about filling a room full of economists, covering them with bacon then releasing some of those giant Russian bear-dogs on the lot of them whilst rifling through their accounts and transferring their funds to my local Rescue Mission and Food Pantry.
Somebody told me today that the congressional approval rating might hit single digits by next week. Shit - don't even get me going on that cesspool of privilege.
I gotta take a vacatin from the newspaper.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

It kind of reassures me to hear you put the incontinent dog down. You're an animal lover plus I have this notion of you (rightly or wrongly) as being pragmatic and sensible. It is the pragmatic and sensible thing to do, right? I mean to put my happiness before the happiness of a demented, incontinent Jack Russell's?

A few weeks ago I read an article about how if Americans really want the economy to improve they'll stop saving money and start using their credit cards again. Right.

[chezsci.livejournal.com]

yup - you have to get sort of ruthless about it - with my pets it helps that my vet is a large animal farm vet who views cats and non-working dogs with a certain dispassionate eye. You have to look at life quality, age and health with compassion, but yes, pragmatism.

Credit cards? Who the fuck has a credit card left after this debacle?

The retailers out here are already feverishly pushing the holiday shopping wagon. Sorta like whistling in the graveyard.

[flaxendandelion.livejournal.com]

Yow, you know your economics! I'm just glad I'm in Australia where things never really got that bad. I just hope this economic crisis is over in a couple years time when I move back to the US.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Australia escaped this most recent economic meltdown. Are you moving back to the U.S.? Didn't realize that.

[flaxendandelion.livejournal.com]

I will be in 2013. I'm excited to go back, but I'm also afraid I won't find decent work in NYC to pay the bills.

[flaxendandelion.livejournal.com]

Also, does Greece pulling out of the EU mean they'll also pull out of the euro? I just read this:

http://news.yahoo.com/analysis-leaving-euro-carries-massive-costs-181337877.html

[ccjohn.livejournal.com]

A debt that large cannot be serviced by cutting back on operational expenses. A debt that large can only be serviced by growing the economy

The problem is the speculative risk investors have to assume to fund Greek debt. There are absolute measures like the debt to equity ratio that can skeeve every currency trader without notice -- thinking of Corzone's firm. that's it. Leveraged 19 to 1. Tough borrowing climate.

Greece is bound by sovereign treaty to the EU. If they even tried to pull out the sanctions would be impossible. The fate of the EU would be in question. I'm not saying Greece can't leave, more that their conditions for staying, they'd better cut the crap and come to the EU for agreement on. The world currency markets are so integrated now, Greek bonds could plunge through the floor. In that case a separated government could not print enough money to serve the debt.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

The problem is the speculative risk investors have to assume to fund Greek debt.

Right. But that's reflected in the interest rate, isn't it?

What annoys me the most about the current brouhaha is that everybody knows that this bailout -- if it goes through -- won't solve the problem either. Yet they're all pushing for it to go through.

[ccjohn.livejournal.com]

Interest rate, yeah. The Greek kids are saying the EU precipitated this crisis by offering Greece artificially-low interest rates that encouraged profligate spending. I guess I'm saying they are right -- Greece is now in a fight that is not fair at all. The game is rigged such that if the EU forces too much austerity, social unrest will force the government into emergency measures. But if they don't, the problem of teaching irresponsible governments (Greece has overspent for its entire modern history, then devalued its currency to "fix the problem) Nordic-like behavior is put off and magnified. If they could get China to buy Greek debt as an investment, and the Chinese came to believe the EU meant business, it was a good deal for them, that's the one solution I've seen I have any hope in.

Patrizia we, here, need the EU to solve this fast! It's destabilizing our economy. Shoving down GDP. The West has to find some means of convincing investors of a predictable regulatory/investment climate, or we'll stay like this.