And you are wrong. Read this: [urlhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21812853[/url

Specifically:

[iUPDATE 14:20: A well-placed official rings to tell me why investors should not be panicking that the punishment of Cypriot depositors is a precedent, or that lenders to Spanish and Italian banks will be spanked as well before too long.

He says the structure of the Cypriot bailout has been determined by German politics. (Aren't all eurozone bailouts fixed in that way?)

Here is the logic behind imposing a hefty levy on Cyprus deposits, according to this official:

1) Regulators and politicians are convinced that a vast amount of cash in Cypriot banks belongs to Russian money launderers.

2) Few German politicians of any persuasion would have voted for a Cyprus rescue that simultaneously rescued these launderers.

3) So the only way to get the bailout through the Bundestag is for the launderers to be taxed to the tune of almost 10% of their allegedly ill-gotten cash. And if innocent savers are hurt too, that is the way this particular "Keks" will crumble.

[/i

So now do you accept not only did the Cypriot government have to contribute 6bn Euors the Germans are behind the fact it had to be done via a raid on deposits?



It would seem they are wouldn't it?



It includes Germany and the German parliament would have to back the deal and the only way that was happening was with a raid on deposits. They are the ones who couldn't sell it to their electorate without a deposit raid. The CEO of the German stock exchange made the same point on Newsnight. Paxman actually asked him was he worried if Germany was seen as acting as a bully in all this. Paxman, the CEO and the Cypriot economist on the show were not under any illusions as to who was the driving force behind the need for a deposit raid and it's Germany because they want to give Russian depositors there a haircut.



I never said they were. The point I was making was a government was being told what to do by an undemocratic body.



I agree. Despite assurances that "this is different" the troika have shown they will do basically what they want so why are they to be trusted? When people go on about the perils undemocratic European integration this gives them plenty of ammunition.

That's an anonymous quote, there. Always dodgy.

And indeed, even on the basis of assuming that quote to be correct, it does not say what you want it to say.

It says: "He says the structure of the Cypriot bailout has been determined by German politics." This is not one and the same with 'the German government demanded this particular plan'.

It could entirely reasonably mean that what you have already acknowledged (that there's an election in Germany this year etc) has been influential in this particular plan being hatched.

Don't get me wrong – I'm no fan of the pastor's daughter and her political friends, but I do get a sense (perhaps wrongly) that you are quite happy to pursue a certain line on precisely the basis of the Germanophobia that was mentioned in the article I linked to this morning.

Because the idea that this is somehow the sole responsibility of Germany is basically nonsense and, as that article suggests, is massively influenced by that 'og God, the Krauts are involved again – it's the Nazis back' kind of attitude.

Your response to the issue of the man you quoted being Dutch and the Eurogroup not being just Germany is revealing, because exactly the same thing that you claim for Germany in that situation can be said of every other member of that group. Germany couldn't carry that group on its own, even it was the one screaming: 'let's hit the small savers of Cyprus!'

Where in that piece does it state that the German government was behind the levy on depositors with less than 100k Euro? because I can't see it. And the German finance minister has specifically stated that he and the IMF were against the idea because of the conflict with the principle of the depositor guarantee.


Only if you don't understand the situation.


It includes other countries as well as Germany. Are they blameless in your eyes. Oh, wait - you think the nasty Germans are bullying everyone again.


No it isn't. It's being offered a choice. It can do what it likes.


Except that this situation is being largely driven by politics, which in turn is being driven by democratically elected politicians worried about the voting public. This situation is a mess largely because of politics and the conflicting demands of the democratic process.

I should point out that being anti-German is one of the few 'anti-' attitudes that remains socially acceptable, and, oddly enough, unites people on both left and right of the political spectrum (not all, I hasten to add, for the sake of clarity, but some on both sides).

Of course I can understand foreigners' anti-British sentiments. Why would that concern me? It's natural for people to distrust other groups, tribes, nations.

I said millions of living people suffered as a result of German evil. That is a fact. If you have a point to make, make it.

The new party will challenge Mrs M in the election in September with the claim that the currency is dividing Europe, damaging, damaging its economy and undermining its democratic traditions. The new group nicknamed " The Professors Party" because of the large number of academics in its ranks has a platform which includes a demand for a gradual return to national currencies or the creation of a new currency for Europe's northern states. They would kill off the 17-member eurozone.

Bernd Lucke party president and professor of macroeconomics at Hamburg University said "The Euro has failed as a currency, making the southern countries less competitive and pushing the northern countries into guranteeing massive bailouts that cannot possibly help in the long run. We need to prepare a road map for dissolving the eurozone before the insurmountable internal differences cause a disorderly break-up that will wreck havoc on all our economies"

The Emnid Poll, timed to coincide with the new party launch found that more than a quarter of Germans would consider voting for an anto-euro party.

The party is at pains to stress that although it is anti-euro it is not anti-EU. Lucke also said his natural allies in Britain are the Conservatives and not UKIP. His party wants reform of Europs´s institutions along the lines advocated by David Cameron "We're fully supportive of Cameron's concept of repatriating powers from Brussels" he said.

Source Sunday Times

No I don't mean what you choose to think I mean. I stated IMO that the single currency is doomed and have consistently felt so from the start. The EU politicians have been "busily" trying to correct the mistakes for several years now, in Kanute like fashion, and they will not do it because it is has already failed with hugely damaging results. It has dragged the whole EU down and it has brought real austerity to half of the Eurozone which the public are now rejecting. Eg Italy.





The new party is at pains to stress that although it is anti-euro it is not anti-EU. Lucke also said his natural allies in Britain are the Conservatives and not UKIP. His party wants reform of Europs´s institutions along the lines advocated by David Cameron "We're fully supportive of Cameron's concept of repatriating powers from Brussels" he said.

Your Eurofile tendencies have blinded you to the reality the the EU needs major reform. It is not working, it has become bloated with burocrats and regulations that have made the EU uncompetitive.




There you go again. Please do not put words in my mouth. Germany was very keen for the membership to increase because of its exports could be financed. At the same time the leading EU countries took a very relaxed view of whether countries like Greece fullfilled the membership criteria. You can form your own conclusions.

Quote ="Dally"If an EU member state is so overtly laundering money, does that not mean their has been a catastrophic failure in regulation by the EU? Shouldn't senior heads roll?'" You might enjoy this: www.vanityfair.com/society/2013/ ... ark-london

Quote ="Dally"If an EU member state is so overtly laundering money, does that not mean their has been a catastrophic failure in regulation by the EU? Shouldn't senior heads roll?'" You might enjoy this: www.vanityfair.com/society/2013/ ... ark-london

We use the same solution but we call it quantitive easing rather than overtly admitting to stealing money directly from people. The Cypriot mistake was to be honest and upfront about it. The markets don't like that.

Yes ... and that's history, most Germans today weren't even born then, most people in other countries weren't even born then.
If you don't understand that point, I can't help you further.

You also said "[iThey are individually and collectively a nation of bullies who only respect one thing - being stood up to[/i." ... which is the bit that was the most stupid as it panders to the silly idea that everyone in a nation, in whatever generation, is the same.

Sensible people in 2013 will not blame a Cypriot banking failure on Germans of 2013 just because of the role of Germany in the second world war.

Your ideas of national characteristics are as wild as your ideas about genetics.

That's your problem – right there.

Done it again.

There were two big mistakes that led to this particular problem.
The first was introducing the Euro before fiscal union (belatedly being addressed).
The second was allowing Greece to join the Euro.
The Euro is not inevitably doomed.
If this dreadful hiatus can be overcome, the Euro will be one of the strongest and most trusted currencies.
Considering its difficulties, it’s not doing bad in the markets, is it?


I stand by what I said before on this bit…i.e. they don’t know which powers he wants to repatriate because he has (probably deliberately) stopped short of a definitive list.
Personally, I think that he will be pushing at an open door because there won’t be much to his demands … e.g ending the travel involved in holding Plenary sessions in Strasbourg … wasteful but, frankly, just peanuts, useful as a bargaining counter that’s all.
Also, for the repatriations of powers, check out “subsidiarity”, agreed in (I think) the Maastricht treaty, where any powers that can be better executed at a country level, should and will be executed at country level.
The mechanism already exists, root and branch reform is not needed, such repatriations can be handled, if agreement is reached.
The new party is a single-issue party and, in that sense, has more in common with UKIP.


I am indeed a Europhile (and, for that matter, a Federalist) but, in my opinion, there are definitely parts that need reform and I have said so on this very forum before.
Number one in that category is the CAP.
But your bit about being bloated with bureaucrats and regulations leading to uncompetitiveness is plain wrong. The EU actually got rid of tens of thousands of complex, arcane and often-conflicting import rules and tariffs that individual countries had before, making it much easier for member states to import and export both intra-EU and extra-EU. Not only that but it did it pre-deadline and under-budget.
If you compare EU bureaucracy against, say, our own in Whitehall etc, the EU bureaucracy is tiny, whether you compare in %age terms or empirical.


I have.
And it doesn’t conclude that Greece were allowed to join so that they’d buy German submarines.

Agreed. It's only you that has implicity suggested that.

No, it's you who seems to think that it's because Germans do "evil" and are "bullies" that Cyprus is being hard-done-to.

I said no such thing. Why do you constantly make things up to suit your agenda?

Have a word with the mods as someone seems to have hacked your account ....

If you read what I said then it is nothing like you "interpretation" of it. However, many times you repeat it it never will be, will it?

Dally getting owned again, what a shock.

Was interesting to hear someone suggest on the radio today that Cyprus should sell some of it's gas field rights, apparently they have about half a trillion $ worth in the ground around them.

Also the Orthodox Church has offered to mortgage assets to help out.

Trying to turn into a slippery eel again Dally?
It would be easier for you if you didn't type silly things that get you slaughtered TBH.

Oh, I read it fine.



Which bit have I got wrong?

Dally can't even manage to do the one last 'acceptable' bigotry without making a mess of it, can he?

Your ability to interpret the written word.

Technically, he can't get an ability" wrong. You either have it, or you don't. If you get it wrong, that would be an "inability".

Like your inability to explain away your racist comment about Germans, or answer a simple question.