EUROZONE - BLESS THEM

O.K.  Not a lot to say about the fun over dinner last night.  But well done Cameron.  Assuming, that is,  we have been given the whole truth.  

The eurozone, and the euro as it is currently known, is now finished not saved.  It will take a couple of days for the commentators to pluck up enough understanding and  courage to say so.  But let me be one of the first.  It doesn't matter therefore whether or not the UK had agreed to suck up to our French and German over-the-English-Channel neighbours. Either way the market consequences are the same.

What really matters to the U.K. is not what the Europeans think of the U.K..  What matters is what the rest of the World think of the U.K., and what the rest of the World think of the remaining Eurozone participants !  On those opinions depends the long-term success of the U.K.

Not to say that mainland Europeans ( the individuals I mean ) are anything but splendid.  They vary in character and attractiveness.  But they are nevertheless splendid and the UK is lucky to have such a mixed bag of sorts just across the water.  Shame the European mainland people have to put up with apparently stupid governments.  Well of course long-term they may not.

END OF THE OUZOZONE?

Look out. Here they come again !! Mr Papandreou has been "forced" to changed his mind and no longer seeks a referendum. Wicked !!  By all accounts he changed his mind because German and French "friends" from the current eurozone  threatened his country with bankruptcy. Nice eh?  


Now call me a kill-joy but I thought that was just the problem.  I thought they were already bankrupt. Let's not get all technical and revert to econotalk; its simple. Greece can't meet its liabilities.  The only way out - for a while -  is for some poor sots to write off half what it owes, and for eurozoptimists to bail it out somehow.  And, not unnaturally, these benefactors would require Greece to put in place very severe measures to turn around their economy. Dream on !! 


Do we really need to ask why, given the chance, most Greeks would have voted against the plan and its severe measures, and yet also would have voted to stay in the eurozone?! Possibly something to do with the quite understandable longing to preserve their roots, return to the beloved drachma, retirement for all at 50,  long sunny days sucking olives and quoffing ouzo, with the confidence to care not a monkey's about the world around them ?


For me this is the crux of the matter.  And if the eurozoptimists insist on trying to change a nation's character, then they might well get their fingers burned more than just the once. Some countries need to have their own currency; and there could be quite a few of them in Europe. They need a currency which reacts to the country's character, its roots, its work ethic, and so on.


It still seems to me inevitable that Greece will default; if not now,  then later. It would leave the Eurozone.  Now according to the intelligensia, the UK would then be doomed by some powerful knock on effect. Frankly I doubt it - but maybe.  Think of it all in family terms.  It's sometimes worth drawing the line, declaring bankruptcy, and starting again with as clean a sheet as possible.