Posted on 02/16/2010 1:04:10 PM PST by jpl
The EU was not ready to be a currency union because it does not have the mechanisms to handle asymmetric shocks as we see now. Major differences between EU and US:
1: Americans are very willing to move from one part of the country to another. Europeans are much more unwilling to move even within their own country.
2: Our national budget transfers money from richer to poorer regions; MI is going down the tubes so it pays less in income taxes and receives more in welfare, unemployment, and the like.
3: We like to talk about differences between Blue and Red State but that really pails in comparison to say a Greek vs. a German. As we all have read, tax evasion, and corruption are acceptable at levels that would horrify German sensibilities.
“Shades of California’s future?”
Yep, and Illinois, and Michigan, and New York and New Jersey and then the USA. Observe your future, learn, prepare.
>> seeing as so many Greeks were welcomed in the US and did so well here <<
Not only that:
The criminal who bears more responsibility than anybody else for Greece’s current condition is the late Andreas Papandreou.
This man had been an American citizen, a U.S. Navy vet in WW2, and eventually reached the pinnacle of success in his chosen profession by becoming a well-regarded, widely-published economist on the faculty of the University of California. Nobody could better exemplify the American dream of achievement for a first-generation emigrant.
Yet after Prof. Papandreou returned to Greece and became Prime Minister, he somehow evolved into an utterly insane enemy of the USA and a bosom buddy of Libya’s Col. Qaddafi — as well as a corrupt political thug nearly on the Ceaucescu scale. Greece has paid dearly for this cretin’s misdeeds and may continue paying for many years.
If the EU didn’t handle this Greece would end up in a Civil War over this situation. It would be ripe for the pickings in the days of the Cold War to the Russians like they were after WW II when their ass was bailed out.
At least now it’s Europe’s problem and European checkbooks footing the bill and not ours.
I fail to see where socialists bailing out socialists is a concern of ours or how we should tell the weak socialist nation to bail on the better off socialists. Wait until the same thing happens again to a much larger nation; it will happen again.
The EU may be all kinds of statism run amok but now it’s their problem, not ours.
Greece:EU
as
Texas:US
No difference.
But unlike Kahlee-FOUR-nee-ah, these states aren't under the dreaded rule of an Austrian autocrat.
So maybe they can somehow avoid the Curse of the Ahnold!
(Even today, some 90 years after their countries gained independence via the Treaty of Versailles, people in the Balkans will tell you in the most forceful terms that Austrian rule was almost as bad as Turkish rule!)
I know it would not happen.
But Greece was never under Hapsburg rule. hee, hee
You may know the history of OZ but not of Greece. What rubbish you post!
...Greeks fought Nazis and invading Commies and homegrown ones during WWII, with very little help - after the war Grece was part of the British sphere until 47 (unfortunately given that the Brits did much to cause the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Greeks during the war) and did little to help in the reunification of Cyprus to Greece...waging war against heroic Greek Cypriot patriots for years.
There are few Greeks that do not hold an affection for America - that idealized America as the land of the free—which is have NOT been for a while now.
The rest of your post is fantasy.
The Italians never made it into Greece. The Greeks spanked them in Albania and forced hitler to use real troops to take Greece. Thousands of the Greek soldiers and military commanders fled as a result of the nazi invasion. The only group to make a determined stand against the nazis, were the Cretians. The follow on Greek resistance movements ended up fighting themselves more so than the nazi occupiers.
I suppose if the Greeks want to claim some sort of military prowess, they could argue that they held out longer than France did.
Pay up Nazi. The reparations have still not been paid for the misery that miser Germans have caused.
The only true socialists I know of are the German and American ones that rule the show these days. Let’s not even talk about the ones Germany has spawned in the past.
What happened in 1973? It can’t be Munich.
You’re so full of hot air. Is that what the propaganda books teach you there in Nazi land?
One of the most heroic aspects of WWII was the brave Greeks who killed as many of the inhuman nazi krauts and Commies they could get...allowing the Red Army to bash them good.
>> Greece was never under Hapsburg rule <<
Yeah, but almost everybody in that world will tell you that as bad as Austrian rule was, Turkish suzerainty was much worse.
(And at least KahleeFOURneeah has been spared THAT problem!)
If Germany withdraws from the E.U., the whole thing will unravel rather quickly.
Welcome to EUtopia
I suppose you're getting the last laugh by being the welfare recepient of Germany today. Must make you proud like the rest of the Greeks must feel.
They hate America because they are full of Communism.
I know my history well enogh.
Some Greeks fought some other (Red) Greeks, 1945-1948 (and earlier)
WWII Greeks got a great deal of help from Britain - everything in the power of Britain at the time, which wasn’t enough. The Greek intervention cost Britain over 50,000 men and dozens of warships. And Greece was already at war with Italy before the British agreed to help.
Cyprus to Greece ? And the US had what to do with it ?
Americans helped Greece -
- Saving and feeding millions of refugees in the 1920’s
- Providing a second home for millions of Greeks, so much so that remittances were a major source of national income for decades.
- Saving Greece from the Reds.
My experience regarding “affection for America” is precisely the opposite, and I understand it is generally the same for any US serviceman who has been stationed in Greece, diplomats and other expats.
See above for comments on Papandreu. There were and are a heck of a lot of Papandreus.
after Prof. Papandreou returned to Greece and became Prime Minister, he somehow evolved into an utterly insane enemy of the USA
After he returned? Oh c’mon - he was a trotskyite in his youth—went to Harvard FGS...he was a third way socialist long before he went to the US. He was welcomed into the arms of the cacademics in this country as one of their own...socialistas.
He was, as most people believe, a CIA puppet.
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