CONSERVATIVE EUROPE VS LIBERAL AMERICA?:

European Leaders Push Back on Obama's Calls for Aid (JONATHAN WEISMAN in Washington and MARC CHAMPION in Brussels, 3/13/09, WSJ)

Ahead of a high-stakes economic meeting of the Group of 20 nations, European countries are striking an uncompromising tone toward Washington, bolstering President Barack Obama's political opponents at home and pouring some cold water on Europe's love affair with the new U.S. president.

In Berlin Thursday, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at his side, French President Nicolas Sarkozy explicitly rejected Mr. Obama's push for more global fiscal stimulus, declaring, "the problem is not about spending more, but putting in place a system of regulation so that the economic and financial catastrophe that the world is seeing does not reproduce itself."

Regulate the derivatives.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 13, 2009 7:17 PM