Posted on 02/16/2015 12:03:14 PM PST by Lorianne
Greece's pleas to stop the "fiscal waterboarding" of its devastated economy are substantively no different from President Obama's repeated warnings to Germany to stop bleeding the euro area economy with excessive fiscal austerity. Sadly, the president's reportedly more than a dozen phone calls to the German Chancellor Merkel in 2011 and 2012 urging supportive economic policies in the euro area fell on deaf ears.
These calls were not just brushed aside; they were plainly ridiculed as Chancellor Merkel kept telling the media that "it made no sense to be adding new debt to old debt."
But -- worrying about one-fifth of U.S. exports going to Europe – Washington kept trying. The former U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner went as far as visiting his German counterpart Wolfgang Schaeuble at his summer retreat on a North Sea island on July 30, 2012 to talk about relief to euro area economies. That's where Geithner was in for a big shock. He writes in his book "Stress Test: Reflections on Financial Crises" that he was "frightened" by the German talk of Greece leaving (i.e., being pushed out of) the monetary union. President Obama, he says, was "deeply worried" about Berlin's designs.
In the end, Geithner had to settle for his host's assurances that everything was going to plan, and that the heavily indebted euro area countries were making progress on their structural reforms.
Indeed they were: At the time of that meeting, the Greek economy was sinking at a rate of 6.9 percent, followed by economic downturns of 3.5 percent in Portugal, 2.4 percent in Italy, 1.6 percent in Spain and a continuing economic stagnation in France.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...
As I understand it, Greece is NOT helping to save the Euro. The Syzria party is totally against austerity. Against the German demands to take on more debt and cut back on spending. They seem to believe that going over the cliff will somehow save them.
Exactly wrong. You don’t bleed an economy with prudent fiscal management. You bleed it with profligate spending of money you don’t have (keep begging to borrow). Eventually, you can bleed it dry as there’s no more willing lenders Greece comes to mind right away here.
Why should Merkel bankrupt her citizens? She has her own country to run.
Greece's pleas to stop the "fiscal waterboarding" of its devastated economy are substantively no different from President Obama's repeated warnings to Germany to stop bleeding the euro area economy with excessive fiscal austerity.So, balanced budgets are a bad thing now, huh?
President Obama, he says, was “deeply worried” about Berlin’s designs.
yup- delinquents are always the victims to the child in the White House while those who pay the bills are vilified...
The fiscally prudent (i.e., you get whatever wealth you work for and create) countries in the European Union should tell the slacker, parasitic country Greece to suck eggs-—don’t give them another Euro cent!
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