Here are some unedited thoughts I just shared with the BBC’s Radio 4 on Cyprus while we are all waiting for the new deal to shape up:
Cyprus’ banking sector must shrink. As did Ireland’s, the hard way. What is essential, as every Irishman and woman will tell you, is that the politicians do not load up the weaker citizen’s/taxpayers’ shoulders with enormous debts on behalf of bankers that refuse to wither.
Every bailout agreement, beginning with Greece’s in May 2010, seems less logical and more toxic than the previous one. The culmination was of course Cyprus this past week. Think about it: In one short week, Europe has managed:
To put in jeopardy the hitherto sacrosanct concept of state guaranteed deposit insurance
The monetary integrity of the Eurozone
The European Union’s single market principle according to which capital controls are a no-no.
Cyprus, more than all the others, holds a special place not so much with regard to the unique factors which brought about the financial crisis upon it but as a case study of how an EU micro- Mediterranean island member state is expected to be treated if ever its unfortunate turn would come to seek aid from its fellow member states.
Lest we forget: The neglected roots of Europe’s slide to authoritarianism
14 Mar~CLICK
Europe is being torn apart by a titanic clash between
(a) the unstoppable popular rage against misanthropic austerity policies and
(b) our elites’ immovable commitment to more austerity.
Precisely how this clash will play out no one knows, except of course that the odds do not seem to be on the side of the good. While at the mercies of this crushing uncertainty, it is perhaps useful to take a… short quiz. So, dear reader, will you please read the following ten quotations and, while so doing, try to imagine who uttered or wrote these words?
Answers:
[1] Arthus Seyss-Inquart, Minister of Security and the Interior in the post-Anschluss Nazi government, 1938, and later Prefect of Occuppied Holland – here he is addressing his Dutch subjects
[2] Walther Funk, Finince Minister in Hitler’s government, 1942.
[3] Memorandum of the Reich Chancellery), 9 July 1940, signed by Hermann Göring
[4] Alberto de Stefani, Finance Minister in Mussolini’s government, 1941
[5] Camillo Pellizi, editor of Civilita Fascista, in an article entiled ‘The Idea of Europe’
[6] Cicile von Renthe-Fink, Nazi official holding the diplomatic rank of minister of state, 1943.
[7] Vidkun Quisling, Norwegian Nazi Collaborator, ‘Prime Minister’ of Occupied Norway, 1942
[8] Adolph Hitler, addressing the Reichstag, 1936
[9] Joseph Goebbels, 1940
[10] Joseph Goebbels, 1942
http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/2013/03/14/lest-we-forget-the-neglected-roots-of-europes-slide-to-authoritarianism/
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