This is just the news.
Europe does not know what it is doing.
Neither do I know what it is doing.
Here are the usual suspects:
Debt crisis: anti-austerity strikes hit Europe - as it happened
14 Nov 2012
| 950 Comments
Britain waits for boldness, Mr Osborne
14 Nov 2012
| 6 Comments
Europeans vent their anger as cuts bite
14 Nov 2012
| 13 Comments
Barclays swamped with demand for 'CoCo'
Barclays is set become only the second bank to sell contingent capital that would be used to rescue the firm if it gets into trouble in future.
14 Nov 2012
| Comment
Fitch threatens to quit Italy in protest
Fitch Ratings has threatened to stop its Italian coverage and quit its offices in Milan in retaliation to the accusations of market manipulation by the prosecutor in Trani.
14 Nov 2012
| 4 Comments
Fitch threatens to quit Italy over indictment
Fitch has warned it could pull out of Italy after a prosecutor in the southern city of Trani indicted two employees, claiming the credit rating agency's downgrade of the country was "market abuse”.
14 Nov 2012
| 8 Comments
Anger as anti-austerity protests hit Spain
Fiona Govan, the Telegraph's correspondent in Madrid reports on the escalating tension as Spanish workers join strikes to protest against spending cuts and tax hikes that trade unions say have brought misery and deepened the country's economic crisis.
14 Nov 2012
European Union workers stage anti-austerity protests and strikes
Trade unions are staging a series of demonstrations and "general strikes" across the European Union to protest at austerity measures that are blamed for driving up unemployment and pushing down growth.
14 Nov 2012
| 199 Comments
Anti-austerity strikes launched in Eurozone
Workers angry over austerity cuts and tax rises have launched a Europe-wide string of rallies and strikes on Wednesday, shutting transport, grounding flights and closing schools.
14 Nov 2012
| 45 Comments
German army 'wasting millions of taxpayer euros on sunscreen and lip balm'
Germany's army is wasting millions of euros of taxpayers' money producing its own sunscreen, cough drops and lip balm rather than buying them off the shelf, auditors have said.
14 Nov 2012
| 16 Comments
MEPs 'hold EU hostage' over extra £13.8bn
Crisis talks over the European Union budget collapsed in disarray after MEPs refused to turn up to discuss their demand for an extra £13.8 billion in Brussels spending over the next year.
13 Nov 2012
| 188 Comments
Finances go loco down in Acapulco
The mayor of Acapulco declares beach resort in 'technical bankruptcy'.
13 Nov 2012
| 3 Comments
Debt crisis: Greek debt auction averts imminent default
Greece managed to raise €4bn (£3.2bn) of short-term debt that is likely to avert imminent default, but fears over the country’s future persisted amid infighting among its creditors.
13 Nov 2012
| 84 Comments
Greece says bail-out will put 'drachmaphobia' to rest
Greece's finance minister has urged EU leaders to vote to give the struggling country its next tranche of aid when they meet next week and remove the fear of an exit from the eurozone.
13 Nov 2012
| 31 Comments
Guardian:
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14 Nov 2012: Martin Kettle: We think we know all about the rise of Asia and the decline of the west. But we've barely begun to grasp what it really means 193 comments -
14 Nov 2012: Institute of International Finance boss, who once lobbied for Greece's creditors, says focus must be on growth
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14 Nov 2012:
Millions take part in strikes, stoppages and marches on day of
co-ordinated action as eurozone teeters on return to recession
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14 Nov 2012: People in Italy, Spain, Germany, France and Greece have joined strikes and demonstrations against austerity measures
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Picture,
14 Nov 2012:
A photographic highlight selected by the picture desk.
Petros Giannakouris' photograph of a woman protesting in Athens is a
potent image of discontent
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14 Nov 2012:
Michael Spencer warns trading volumes may never recover to
pre-financial crisis levels as ICAP reports 26% pre-tax profits fall
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Gallery (18 pictures),
14 Nov 2012:
Protests in Spain, Italy, Portugal, Belgium, Greece and
France on international day of action in protest at response to economic
crisis
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Interactive,
14 Nov 2012:
Guardian readers have been sending in photos from the
anti-austerity strikes across Europe – and you can add your own to the
gallery
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14 Nov 2012:
The panel: European workers' representatives tell us their reasons for taking part in today's European day of action
455 comments -
13 Nov 2012: Letters: There will be general strikes in Portugal, Greece, Italy and Spain. In other countries, including Britain, there will be solidarity demonstrations
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13 Nov 2012: French leader asks weary voters to judge him at the end of his presidency, as his approval ratings plunge to record low
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12 Nov 2012:
Long-awaited Troika report into Greece is still not
finished, as IMF and Europe continue to argue over the country's debt
levels. Agreement tonight looks unlikely
506 comments -
12 Nov 2012: Christine Ockrent: Tomorrow President Hollande must convince the country he can be bold enough to become a French Tony Blair 145 comments
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Video
(2min 51sec),
12 Nov 2012:
The Greek government comfortably passes the 2013 budget in
parliament, seen as a crucial step if Athens is to receive its next
tranche of international aid
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12 Nov 2012:
Barry Eichengreen: The rise to power of a European government – that rejects the policy status quo would immediately bring the crisis to a head
9 comments
Der Spiegel:
Very possibly there will be revolution. The Russians think so.
Krugman:
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/13/life-expectancy-of-the-living-dead/
Life Expectancy of the Living Dead
Regular
readers know that a lot of this blog’s time is spent on intellectual
zombies — beliefs and concepts that have been killed by evidence but
that keep shambling forward nonetheless, trying to eat our brains. And
now that talk has turned once again to Grand Bargains and all that, I
see that we’re once again seeing the Social Security/life expectancy
zombie: we live longer, so shouldn’t retirement wait?
What you need to know:
1. The relevant life expectancy is life expectancy at or near retirement age. Falling infant mortality doesn’t make a case for delaying Social Security — and that’s important, because gains have been much less striking at age 65 than at birth.
2. Gains in life expectancy have been very strongly correlated with income and class; those with lower incomes and lower status — the very people who depend most on Social Security — have seen very small gains in life expectancy:
3.
The retirement age has already been increased: the Greenspan Commission
of the early 80s set it in motion, so that it’s now 66 and scheduled to
rise to 67, essentially consuming all of the life expectancy gains of
the bottom 50 percent.
4. The alleged wise men of DC don’t know any of this. When Ryan Grim tried to ask Alan Simpson about it, Simpson replied by denying the facts, attacking the interviewer, and insulting the AARP.
What you need to know:
1. The relevant life expectancy is life expectancy at or near retirement age. Falling infant mortality doesn’t make a case for delaying Social Security — and that’s important, because gains have been much less striking at age 65 than at birth.
2. Gains in life expectancy have been very strongly correlated with income and class; those with lower incomes and lower status — the very people who depend most on Social Security — have seen very small gains in life expectancy:
4. The alleged wise men of DC don’t know any of this. When Ryan Grim tried to ask Alan Simpson about it, Simpson replied by denying the facts, attacking the interviewer, and insulting the AARP.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/13/identity-voters/
Identity Voters
So Paul Ryan doesn’t believe that he and his party lost on the issues; it’s just that too many of those “urban voters” (hmm, I wonder who he means) for some reason showed up at the polls.
Actually, in a way Ryan does have a point: there are ethnic and racial groups that consistently favor one party over the other in ways that seem to reflect something more than economic self-interest. In the figure below — based on a bit of a catchall from the exit polls and the Pew pre-election poll – the blue line shows the average relationship between income and presidential preference, and the various markets show some groups that were far off that line. (I couldn’t find a good number on median income for Jewish households, but assume that it’s in the same general vicinity as Asian-Americans):
As
you can see, it’s not just those “urban” voters who seem to vote their
identity. Asians and Jewish households are much more Democratic than you
might expect given their relatively high incomes, presumably because
they see the GOP as believing fundamentally in a white Christian nation
from which they will forever be outsiders.
And then there’s the other identity-politics minority, which is every bit as anomalous in its voting behavior as those urbanites.
Some of the attempts to predict future trends argue that over time Hispanics will become politically “white”, the way Irish and Italians did. Maybe, although somehow that hasn’t happened yet to my tribe. But isn’t it equally likely that over time Southern whites will finally become culturally assimilated, and start voting like the rest of their fellow citizens?
Actually, in a way Ryan does have a point: there are ethnic and racial groups that consistently favor one party over the other in ways that seem to reflect something more than economic self-interest. In the figure below — based on a bit of a catchall from the exit polls and the Pew pre-election poll – the blue line shows the average relationship between income and presidential preference, and the various markets show some groups that were far off that line. (I couldn’t find a good number on median income for Jewish households, but assume that it’s in the same general vicinity as Asian-Americans):
And then there’s the other identity-politics minority, which is every bit as anomalous in its voting behavior as those urbanites.
Some of the attempts to predict future trends argue that over time Hispanics will become politically “white”, the way Irish and Italians did. Maybe, although somehow that hasn’t happened yet to my tribe. But isn’t it equally likely that over time Southern whites will finally become culturally assimilated, and start voting like the rest of their fellow citizens?
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/14/the-austerity-bomb/
The Austerity Bomb
Brian Beutler of Talking Points Memo seems to have been the first
to use the phrase “austerity bomb” for what’s scheduled to happen at
the end of the year. It’s a much better term than “fiscal cliff”. The
cliff stuff makes people imagine that it’s a problem of excessive
deficits when it’s actually about the risk that the deficit will be too
small; also and relatedly, the fiscal cliff stuff enables a bait and
switch in which people say “so, this means that we need to enact
Bowles-Simpson and raise the retirement age!” which have nothing at all
to do with it.
And it can’t be emphasized enough that everyone who shrieks about the dangers of the austerity bomb is in effect acknowledging that the Keynesians were right all along, that slashing spending and raising taxes on ordinary workers is destructive in a depressed economy, and that we should actually be doing the opposite.
Meanwhile, in Europe, which has had much more austerity in aggregate than we have, grim new industrial production numbers and a worsening unemployment crisis:
By
the way, some readers have asked me what is happening to Ireland, which
has seen an especially sharp fall in industrial production. The answer
appears, in part, to be Lipitor. That is, expiring patents on some
important drugs have created a cliff for Ireland’s pharma exports.
You don’t want to overstate the real impact on Irish citizens: pharma
looms large in Irish GDP but not so much in employment or GNP, because
it’s highly capital-intensive and much of the value-added accrues to
foreign multinationals. Still, not what Ireland needed.
And it can’t be emphasized enough that everyone who shrieks about the dangers of the austerity bomb is in effect acknowledging that the Keynesians were right all along, that slashing spending and raising taxes on ordinary workers is destructive in a depressed economy, and that we should actually be doing the opposite.
Meanwhile, in Europe, which has had much more austerity in aggregate than we have, grim new industrial production numbers and a worsening unemployment crisis:
They will consider no other policy.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/14/all-about-the-patriarchy/
All About the Patriarchy
There’s a strand of thought — I identify it especially with Corey Robin,
although he’s not alone — that says that conservatism isn’t really
about the things it claims to be about. It isn’t really about free
markets and moral values; it’s about authority — the authority of bosses
over workers, of men over women, of whites over Those People.
Score one on the morality front: Pat Robertson, stern moral lecturer, says that it wasn’t Petraeus’s fault because “he’s a man”.
Score one on the morality front: Pat Robertson, stern moral lecturer, says that it wasn’t Petraeus’s fault because “he’s a man”.
"The rest is silence."
Woman dies after abortion request ‘refused’
BBC, November 14
The death of a woman who was 17 weeks pregnant is the subject of two
investigations at University Hospital Galway in the Republic of Ireland.
Savita Halappanavar’s family said she asked several times for her pregnancy
to be terminated because she had severe back pain and was miscarrying.
Her family claimed it [...]
Even Low-Level Radioactivity Is Damaging, Scientists Conclude
Science Daily, November 13
Even the very lowest levels of radiation are harmful to life, scientists
have concluded in the Cambridge Philosophical Society’s journal Biological
Reviews. Reporting the results of a wide-ranging analysis of 46
peer-reviewed studies published over the past 40 years, researchers from
the University of South Carolina and the University of Paris-Sud [...]
If the additional radiation does not change the background there is no additional harm.
Anti-austerity strikes sweep Europe
Reuters, By Carlos Ruano and Andrei Khalip, November 14
Madrid/Lisbon – Police and protesters clashed in Spain on Wednesday as
millions of workers went on strike across Europe to protest spending cuts
they say have made the economic crisis worse.
Hundreds of flights were cancelled, car factories and ports were at a
standstill and trains [...]
Russia treason: Putin approves sweeping new law
BBC, November 14
President Vladimir Putin has signed a law redefining treason in Russia amid
fears it may be used to stifle dissent.
Now not only Russians working for foreign intelligence can be convicted but
also citizens who pass state secrets to any foreign organisation.
Even if no secrets have been divulged, the treason charge [...]
Pussy Riot should run.
President Obama is not speaking properly of the GOP fiscal blackmail.
"Once you have paid them the Danegeld,
One never gets rid of the Dane.".
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