


Angela’s new partner

The French president must learn to dance with a dominant German chancellor

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Readers' comments



maximus zeebra

"That leaves just the shortened Merde, which at least sums up the state of the euro."

Is this suppose to be a serious article? Because I stopped reading right there. How can economists not distinguish problems of nations, national debt and a currency? Or does this have something to do with the continued 'propaganda in any way possible' against the Euro.

The only thing that is merde is the state of capitalism, the capitalist model, keynesian logic and the state of total debt in countries like the UK, which until recently had less national public debt than the rest, but much more private debt and deficits. Now that it has cought up with everyone else with national public debt and is running deficits higher than Greece. I would rather call Greece and the UK merde. And call the Eurozone and the pound as currencies.

The Euro is falling in value against other currencies, which is a clear sign that it is getting to more reasonable levels, which makes our currency more competitive. 1.2 against the dollar is perfect as things stand. The Euro has been overvalued, that is the problem. It may get undervalued during this soverign debt and financial market crisis.

But none of this matter to the economist, who do not analyse, rather get propaganda instructions, and the print articles that people stop reading.

At least I did, when they proclaim the Euro as shit.


At root it seems that Europeans for too long grew plump and indolent on the back of German funds. Now they are facing the necessity of pulling their own weight and it's a terrifying prospect. So, of course, retreating into "we want more of what we had before" is the easiest option. Only problem is, the Germans are understandably sick of working hard to pay for everyone else's leisure. The game is up, but denial is a seductive mistress. Reality is going to be a very long and painful experience.


"Ex-communist economies of eastern Europe, such as Estonia and Latvia, offer many lessons on combining austerity and structural reforms to return to growth. "

A very good but rare point made.

Is that so? Then why is Italys export and industrial production suddenly and surprisingly booming?

The main problem of the Euro for a long time has been that it has been grossly overvalued against denial and print economies like the US and the UK.

My problem is the economist and their constant propaganda against the Euro, and their putting this propaganda into any place they can, obvious or hidden, to try to convince the UK people that nothing is wrong at home. This ofcourse goes well with the orders given from the "elected" UK prime minister and his party whom themselves points fingers at the Eurosone with gross neglect of facts and spiced up statements for propaganda value. The UK ofcourse is shooting from inside a fragile glass house with absolutely no view through the glass.

Capitalism IS the problem. The whole world economy is completely unbalanced, out of control and in a horrendous state. The financial crisis of 2008, and now the sovereign debt crisis and the dysfunction of the financial market for sovereign loans are just symptoms of the implosion of capitalism.
Capitalism creates a situation where its not profitable to do what we need, but instead profitable to produce what we do not need.

Thats my problem, aside from us pretending we have a democratic system in any western countries while bombing and robbing others to make them democratic.

dunnhaupt in reply to AtlantisKing

60% of German exports stay in Europe, and hence do not benefit from a cheaper Euro. On the other hand, almost 100% of German imports (raw materials, oil etc) come from non-Euro countries and now get more expensive with a lower Euro, i.e. a net loss for Germany.

Germanambassador in reply to fredigundis

Very well said:)
And fortunately this is the basic feeling of each British without any exception.
Very nice to see that the British never give up their tradition:)
But before you continue the war against Germany you better try to finish the little war in Afghanistan, solve your problem with the Malvinas Islands and some little problems in Palestine:)
And at home you can try to handle the next riots in your capital:)
And do not forget we are in 2012 and India is a super-power and since some time no longer a British colony:)
But keep you spitfires in good condition.

maximus zeebra

In general what even economists fail to grasp is that everything that is happening now is internal corrections within the Eurozone. Like lower wages in low producing countries like Greece.
Ofcourse, all braindead people rather call for devaluation than compeitiveness and reform.
A correction of production vs rewards, exprts, imporrts, debts, deficits etc.
This is a good thing. and the Eurozone leader should do as little as possible to try to prevent what needs to happen.

sanmartinian in reply to sanmartinian

In my list of "unimportant" details mentioned above I forgot one: the obviously non-neutral three rating agencies have downgraded almost everything in sight but Denmark wasn't touched.

Yet, a couple weeks ago, financial institutions in Denmark terminated contracts with Moody's, definitely the most biased of rating agencies.


Can anybody give an explanation?

Denmark is one of the fairest civilizations on Earth.

Yet does her sense of justice and altruism be strong enough for a measure of that nature?

I suspect the reason is Maersk one of the largest international Danish companies - and one of the most useful too - that seems to be not in good financial shape just now. I for one, hope it recovers very fast.

Pity Swedane no longer joins us here (which is very bad omen for Charlemagne's threads) to correct my eventual mistakes in this area.

By the way, if anybody is in doubt about ranking agencies lack of impartiality, check who their owners are. Takes a bit of time but it isn't difficult: just google their SEC proxy documents and declaration of shareholders. I did publish it here once. The post was deleted within minutes and the pen name I had used was immediately banned. So expect the same to happen in this case. Free speech is a marvel when it favours us.


"That leaves just the shortened Merde"


Chuck, the year is 2012. The war is over. You can relax now.

Josh_US Lux

Before the German-French aspect of the Merkel-Hollande relationship is blown out of proportion, could we maybe pause for a minute and realise he's a socialist, and she a christiandemocrat, so the probably most important fault line is not along the Rhine border, but between ideologies... .

Having said that, the good news is that Hollande is a pragmatist and Merkel as unideological as they come.

In other words: I'd be surprised if the differences wouldn't be overcome once the French parliamentary elections are over.

The French and the Germans know that "Europe" doesn't work if they don't come together.

Ok. Here we go. IN the west we have an enormously corrupt system, where no one except the very few have a chance to make it to become a political leader.

The filtering system is called the party. One cannot become the leader of a country without rising the grades in a party. And to do that, you can not really hold independent views, you have to stick to the party line.

This is not why the party system is the problem, the reason the party system is a democratic problem is because it leaves the people no influence over policies. The political party system simply allows people to choose one of several party programs with several sets of policies. Most party programs are about 50% identical, so no matter what party you vote for you will get most of the same policies anyways. And the differences between the parties are in no way big enough to account for any real change. The problem is this. You will not agree much with the party program you vote for, statistically that is impossible. Not only because most people have absolutely no political education, but because opinions are so different.

It will be impossible for you to find a party that has the same opinions as you on immigration AND economics AND political reform AND labor policies AND taxes. The only thing that is possible is to find a party that represents yours views on one area OR another.

Elections have become a complete sham with modern media, people dont even vote for politics anymore, they vote for the best clowns and the people who promise them the most impossible lies. This ofcourse means that it is impossible to run on a platform to raise taxes to run a fiscally responsible and sensible government, because thats just not popular. So in the end we will have an ever bigger decline, because politicians have to give promises to be elected, promised that are not good for the country. Ofcourse, the elections nowadays are also much more about individuals than about politics, which ofcourse is just how it should be in dummyland.

If that is not enough, all parties with less than 4-5% of the votes in most European countries are completely banned from having a voice in the parliament and government, their opinion is ignored and or censored.
In the UK you are ofcourse very familiar with this issue, since your system is even worse. Two parties UKIP and BNP with a total of 5% of the votes in the UK, representing 1.5 million voters, got not representatives at all in the parliament. The liberal democrats got 23% of the votes, but only 8% of the seats, while Labour and Conservatives with 29% and 36% of the votes or 65% in total got 37% and 47% of seats or a total of 84%. This ofcourse ignores the opinions of pretty much everyone who is not dead center and/or brainwashed by the media.
But then again, we do not like to hear the voice of people who dont agree with us in the democracy we live in.

SOOOOO. Forgive me for not wanting to have a single leader in the EU. Single leaders dont belong in democracy.


As I see and read the difficulties and resentment of implementing German-inspired austerity measures across the eurozone and wonder about Paul Krugman's cautionary note about not every country being able to run a trade surplus at the same time to export the region back to growth I have a less myopic thought. By suppressing wage growth for 15 years to supplement its enduringly impressive industrial base is Germany more attuned to and foresighted with the harsh competitive realities of globalisation than the rest of Europe and the US which, broadly speaking, are either clinging to some recent golden years built on dubious economic growth or decades of government-spending indulgence?


All that's fit to print these days hovers around the Greek fiasco, European debt or the important analysis why didn't Chancellor Merkel and President Hollande kiss when they first met.

Yet, when Intelligence Services were staffed by people who could think, there was a curious saying: "if you want to get the big picture look at details nobody pays any attention to".

Why now, just now, there seems to be a gang war in southern China? Is the political strife in China linked to it or just a silly feeling?

Congress in the USA seems to be embarking again on a budget skirmish worthy of underdeveloped Syldavia? Just politics as usual, political calendar, or what?

Press scandals that have undone media barons seem to threaten a British Prime Minister. Bad luck, coincidence in time, or something more sinister?

Above all, Russian Central Bank reserves have fallen by over 4 billion dollars in the week that saw French and Greek elections (others too, but less talked about).

To keep things in perspective, J P Morgan Chase lost 2 billion in three months and caused a scandal.

All right, all right, J P Morgan is just a bank and Russia is a big country. But comparing equal with equal (GDP and total revenue, period of loss) Russia losing 4 billion in one week is just as bad as Morgan Chase loosing 2 billion in 12 weeks.

Yet nobody mentions Russia's travails.


If you wish to grasp what is before us, please watch details like this. Granted, it has not the same reader appeal that the political relationship between Mrs Merkel and Mr Hollande has.

But maybe it'll show better the holy mess the world is in at this very moment: possibility of military coups, military balances from Iran to SE Europe going upside down and others.

A holy mess that looks as if it is going to get much worse irrespective of whether Mrs Merkel and Mr Hollande will get on well or not.

Hope I'm very wrong.


Not only is the Merkozy era over but so is the era where Britain has any influence in Europe. At least France can still play a role in the EU whereas Britain cannot - unless of course we include The Economist.

Pedro Macedo

How to label this new "creature"? Frangelico (a). Like the liqueur.
Seriously, there must be a way out of this crisis. Europe has to change its narrative. We have to stop thinking that Germany (the germans) can do no wrong and Greece (the Greeks) can do no right (or vice-versa). Both parties have, of course, valid arguments. Greece has to control its budget deficit, and Germany has to be more sensible to the idea of debt mutualization( project bonds/Comunication from the European Comission to the Parliament, The Council, 19.10.2011)

Swedane in reply to jolyonwagg1

“Hollande is a French socialist with a classic state spend, spend mentality to solve all economic problems…..” Yes true, but where does the money come from?

By the way, how can you tell when a socialist is not at work?
(That’s when he has both his hands in his own pockets.)

bampbs in reply to emmafinney

Dither is always the worst response to a financial crisis, and the apparent ignorance of how financial systems work in the real world is astonishing. But it is probably not ignorance at all. What we see now, as we did at its start, is that the Euro is an economic matter condemned to be entirely at the mercy of political considerations, even to the exclusion of simple economic sense.


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