The apex of naivety...

More bloviating regarding the depth of the crisis and the proper "policy response". No-one in history has ever legislated away the NEED for countries to compete with one another, to obtain comparative advantage economically, politically, or militarily, to expand influence at home and abroad. These are the very incentives that drive the existence of sovereign nations.

I don't view national boundaries in a geographic sense. I view them as ecological barriers that restrain organic growth. Unfortunately, these are not stable.


full article here.

BERLIN (AP) -- The President of the European Central Bank was quoted Saturday as saying that he still sees Europe's economy in its deepest crisis since World War II, or even World War I.

German news weekly Der Spiegel reported that Jean-Claude Trichet said that since the beginning of the financial crisis in 2008 "we have experienced and we are experiencing really dramatic times."

Trichet was quoted as saying that there was no doubt the economy "is in its most difficult situation since World War II or perhaps even since World War I."

In an interview to be published Monday, Trichet said the recent exacerbation of the eurozone's debt crisis had provoked a market reaction similar to that at the height of the global financial crisis in 2008.

"The markets didn't function anymore, it was almost like in the wake of the Lehman (Brothers) bankruptcy in September 2008," he was quoted as saying.

Even though European leaders last weekend agreed on rescue measures including a euro750 billion ($935 billion) loan guarantee package for troubled eurozone nations, Trichet urged further action to address the crisis' underlying problems.

The ECB's president called for a "quantum leap" in control of financial and economic policy across the 16-nation currency zone, the magazine reported.

"We need improved structures, to avoid and sanction wrongdoing," Trichet was quoted as saying. "We need an effective implementation of the mutual control, we need effective sanctions for breaches of the stability and growth pact."