Don't they have children?...

...a continuing series. The FT reports the snippet below. This will not work, and is one of those "decaying ultimatums" that we have heard so often during the "negotiations" with Greece. It will be ignored in a month, forgotten in a quarter, and will never be heard from again in a year. All entirely rational. Next week we will hear of more Chinese "investments", designed to ensure there is at least one region in a plenum world that can act as vacuum.

to quote Machiavelli once again with regard to promises by sovereigns:

"The promise given was a necessity of the past, the word broken is a necessity of the present"

European creditor countries are demanding 38 specific changes in Greek tax, spending and wage policies by the end of this month and have laid out extra reforms that amount to micromanaging the country’s government for two years, according to documents obtained by the Financial Times.

The reforms, spelt out in three separate memoranda of a combined 90 pages, are the price that Greece has agreed to pay to obtain a €130bn second bail-out and avoid a sovereign default that the government feared would throw Greek society into turmoil.