Comments Posted By vb
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Rick,
I live in Germany, so I'll give you my take: Yes, the Germans are angry because they have been complaining about the lack of transparency of our investment banking system. They have urged us to better regulate things and try to work toward some kind od international standard. German banks have lost money, and the government is expecting negative fallout for the economy as a whole. That is the factual picture.There is more though: Elections will be held next year, pitting Steinbrueck's Social Democrats (SPD) against Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU).To date, the CDU is way ahead, partly because of serious pressure on the SPD from the Left Party (made of of old communists from the East and populist left-wing former SPD members from the West). The Left has been attacking economic reforms put in place by Schroeder. The more realistic SPD leaders know that the reforms were necessary and are trying hard to defend themselves. They will keep advertising how much more responsible they are than those preditory capitalists, the AMIs. Since Merkel is also upset by our failure to deal with the situation, she will hardly defend us.
The reporting here blames the whole mess on the US government (Regierung); however in German that word really means administration. No one has mentioned that McCain sponsored legislation to address the mortgage problem or that Bush has been urging congressional action for years. Once again we are getting a blame Bush (and McCain because he a Republican) situation. The faults of the Democrats are invisible here. Obama will continue to be seen as the saviour, and if he doesn't win, our stupidity and perfidy will be proven beyond a doubt.
I can understand the anger, but I also know that we will once again be used to deflect attention from local problems. It is becoming more than tedious.
BTW, should the Left Party make it into a coaltion government, it will be a nightmare. Think Code Pink having a say in the foregn office
Comment Posted By vb On 26.09.2008 @ 15:55
