Germany told to act to save Europe

Financial Times ^ | Quentin Peel

[Mariner]

Germany is the only country in Europe that can act to save the eurozone and the wider European Union from “a crisis of apocalyptic proportions”, the Polish foreign minister warned on Monday in a passionate call for more drastic action to prevent the collapse of the European monetary union. (See more at link)

[Cronos]

Poland has it's own money, the złoty. They were supposed to join in 2012, but that's not going to happen. They don't have to bailout anyone in the euro-zone as they aren't in it. The ECB isn't biting yet

Joining the EU has been somewhat mixed for Poland -- for one it has given legitimacy as a higher developing country, given it access to trade and markets that it wouldn't have otherwise had, reduced or eliminated import taxes on its goods and opened it up to foreign investment which is primarily from Germany and France but also the UK

on the negative, it hasn't resulted in money for Polish infrastucture projects - that is being provided by Poland itself, and it ties in Poland too much to Europe -- which is opposed by the more conservative parties here (and note that the present party in power is centre-right and conservative by American, forget about European standards).

however, the Poles distrust Germany and Russia -- it's in their blood to not trust either. and they know that Germany shackled with the EU is better than a marauding Germany (1410: Battle of Grunwald, 1793 partitions of the Polish-Lithuania Republican commonwealth through to 1939-1945).

[Cronos]

It's probably closer to the emergence of a new Frankish Empire.

you are correct, this would be unlike the Prussian Empire which aimed at "Germanness" -- forcing German culture, language, religion on others (Kulturkampf) and which took its Prussian militaristic culture and first imposed it on the other Germanics (Swabians, Bavarians, etc) and then tried to do so on the Slavs etc.

This would become a renewed Frankish realm including what is now France, Germany, the lowland countries (Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg) and Austria and maybe Slovakia and Czechia.

The UK would be left out as would the Iberian peninsula, Italy, the Balkans and Greece and eastern Europe

I'm pushing the idea to my Polish friends of a revival of the Rzeczpospolita -- the Polish-Lithuanian republic that would include Latvia, Lithuan, Poland, Białorus, Slovakia and Western Ukraine and possibly also Romania and Hungary and maybe Bulgaria!

[Cronos]

Well, the problem is that it was soo easy to take the money. This was what hit Greece - they stopped developing and paid everything off EU money.

Spain used the money for development projects (the roads and highways in Spain are better than those in Germany imho).

[LZ_Bayonet]

Not being critical of Germany, but there is a long history here. I hope some old person who saw WWII will tell this guy to,
Be Careful What You Wish For!

[sphinx]

How do you "force" loans on borrowers? People, and countries, are perfectly free not to borrow. That, of course, would mean that they would have to immediately reduce expenditures to match income. Painful, yes, which is why the hopelessly indebted want to keep borrowing.

In such circumstances, the lender of last resort is perfectly entitled to insist that any new borrowing be coupled with a long-term fiscal plan that establishes, and maintains, a path toward solvency. So the lender becomes the fiscal cop ....

[xzins]

These are the results of a confederacy of nations.

[Old Teufel Hunden]

"The British and the Latin states are likely to be left on their own."

Britian is already on it's own. It is part of the EU but not on the Euro. It is still on the pound. However, Britian historically has been the banking house of Europe. I suspect that British financial institutions hold a lot of Euro Debt so in that way they do have a pretty big stake in what's going on. The Brits don't want to see Greece and Spain default on their loans, it could wreck havoc with British financial institutions.

[veracious]

To the German nation: do not go near any of it!

[apoliticalone]

This illustrates exactly the danger of the entangling alliances, the NWO, the move towards globalism, trade and currency treaties. They work for the benefit of the few, as in usually they are the banks and the political elite, and never for the sovereignty or the people of responsible countries.

The people end up losing control over their own government. These treaties take away the power of the people in their own democracy and instead give it to international bankers, corporations, consortiums and treaties.

The World Trade Organization and the UN as examples tell member countries what restrictions or laws they can make, how they make laws and various other aspects that were always the purview of the people and their elected representatives.

We need to demand an end to these entangling alliances just as George Washington once warned and said.

[Olog-hai]

Why is it that people always look at the social market as though it was the free market . . . ? It's not, it never was, and never will be.

Read the Treaty of Lisbon some time (I recommend the consolidated version, which is more understandable than the actual text that merely outlines amendments to prior treaties); and after that, read the Stability and Growth Pact, which imposes an impossible-to-achieve goal that even Germany has flouted (keep debt spending at or below 3 percent of GDP). Add in the lack of democracy, and all sorts of strange orders from the top have to be complied with.

Wolfgang Schäuble said that Ireland had to take a bailout in order to preserve the euro's future; in his own words, "We are not just defending a member state but our common currency. … Ireland has to meet strict conditions, and these will be negotiated in the coming days, so that it is not just providing financing but about ensuring that the problems are solved." Once you're locked into a currency that isn't yours, within the social market, you can indeed be forced to take a bailout loan, especially because control of your own economy has been given up. (There's no such thing as that happening in the USA, since we have a free market.)

[Olog-hai]

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Poland has it's own money, the złoty. They were supposed to join in 2012, but that's not going to happen. They don't have to bailout anyone in the euro-zone as they aren't in it

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Oh? Britain isn't in the eurozone either, but they are liable to backing the bailouts. You sure of that? Everyone in the EU participates in the eurozone, even if they aren't in the euro currency. Many other countries not even in the EU participate in the eurozone—you never heard of the "European Free Trade Association", through which Norway and Iceland participate in the "single market" (or "European Economic Area") but also agree to have EU law foisted upon them?

I feel bad for Poland. They're in the midst of the same old tug-of-war between Germany and Russia right now.

[Bielawa]

Does Norway and Iceland have their own currency or euro?

[Kozik]

Yes, they have their own currencies, as they are not members of EU.

[buzzer]

“They just want to keep kicking the can. How about Poland having its own money again? How about Poland NOT pledged to bailout irresponsible countries. How about countries not going into massive debt.”

Could you imagine California having it’s own currency ?

[buzzer]

“Just imagine the USA doing what Germany’s doing now. Can anyone imagine that?”

Could you imagine that someone asks Texas to bail out California ? Yes i can !

[buzzer]

“Germany can probably be guilted into trying to save Europe for awhile longer.”

The germans are in a classic “you loose whatever you do” situation.
- If they admit to bailout the whole EU they’re economy is doomed.
- If they deny the bailout, the Euro breaks apart and their export based economy is doomed.

We bailed out california by printing money :-) Something i can understand they really don’t want to do.

[buzzer]

“It’s going to be OK.... Obama will save the day..They don’t call him the Magic Man for nothing. He’ll lend them 7 trillion dollars of our money, Then tax our behinds till we bleed.” Taxing ? He doesn’t need taxes as long as he can tell helicopter ben to run the printing machines faster.

[Olog-hai]

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Could you imagine that someone asks Texas to bail out California ? Yes i can !

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That is not what I meant, and that is not what Germany is doing. Germany is demanding control over the economies of all these other countries. No US state would demand to exercise control over the budgets of any other state, nor does the federal government demand such control over the budgets of individual states.

[buzzer]

“Germany is demanding control over the economies of all these other countries.”
No, they want the EU to take control. Something compareable to a combination of the IRS and the GAO.

[Olog-hai]

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No, they want the EU to take control

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Unlikely they will give them direct and fully-independent control, especially over Germany, whose constitutional court already declare that the Grundgesetz is superior law to the EU law (funny enough, that is not what the Treaty of Lisbon claims). The EU is merely a proxy for Germany’s ambitions. Why do you think that the Irish budget was reviewed by the Bundestag before any other body (primarily the Irish parliament) got to see it?

The Karlsruhe constitutional court decision of 2009 meant that Germany invested itself with the power to review all European Union legislation before it gets passed. That meant that Germany invested itself with the power to pass laws for 26 other countries in the European Union. Now of course they have the Frankfurt Group, the self-appointed politburo (versus the formally-appointed politburo of the European Commission) taking a massive amount of power for itself and dictating even to EU institutions. Quite the old boys’ club.