Free Republic

Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti on Sunday rejected talk of a euro crisis and said Rome was open to the idea of a tax on financial transactions championed by France—but only if the measure was part of an EU-wide effort. "The euro is not in crisis, the currency has solidly maintained its exchange rate with the dollar," Monti said on RAI 3 public television, adding that Italy's "banking system is not under threat". "The problem we are facing is that some EU countries have a public debt crisis," he said. "Our crisis is a systemic crisis." Monti, a former European...