UNCHAINED MELODRAMA:

Europe is a dead political project: This is the beginning of the end for the EU unless it can find the capacity to start again on radically new bases (Étienne Balibar, 5/25/10, guardian.co.uk)

Within a single month, we have witnessed Prime Minister George Papandreou of Greece announcing his country's possible default, an expansive European rescue loan offered to him on the condition of devastating budget cuts, soon followed by the "downgraded rating" of the Portuguese and Spanish debts, a threat on the value and the very existence of the euro, the creation (under strong US pressure) of a European security fund worth €750bn, the Central European Bank's decision (against its rules) to redeem sovereign debts, and the announcement of budget austerity measures in several member states.

Clearly, this is only the beginning of the crisis. The euro is the weak link in the chain, and so is Europe itself.

It is because they were unable to forge the EU into a chain that Greece, Spain and Portugal could get away with their shenanigans in the first place. The euro was pretty muich the only link. Break that and there's nothing but a trade zone, which is all there should have been to begin with.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 26, 2010 5:55 AM