h/t Instapundit
It is extraordinary to recall that, until June last year, HM Treasury still had a euro preparations unit, finally abolished in George Osbornes emergency Budget. This was the last, fossilised remains of the prepare and decide strategy adopted by New Labour, the premise of which at least in the Blair years was that Britain should and would join the single currency at some point in the future.
In past weeks, we have grown used to the eurozone as supplicant: the garlicky tramp on the pavement with a piece of cardboard on a string round his neck, bearing the words: Will work for bail-out. Even now, Osbornes team is working on a host of contingency plans, to be triggered by crises ranging from Greeces exit from the single currency, to the full-blown collapse of the eurozone.
Skai TV and radio reported at 4 p.m. that former Bank of Greece governor and ex-European Central Bank vice president Lucas Papademos will become the next Greek prime minister.
An emergency cabinet meeting finished shortly before 3 p.m. Current Prime Minister George Papandreou is said to have informed his ministers to have their resignations ready to speed up the process of forming a new government once its head has been agreed.
Former European Central Bank vice president Lucas Papademos was reported to be back in the frame after reports that he spoke with Papandreou on the telephone earlier in the day.
Papademos is thought to want to bring several of his choices into the cabinet, which could also include politicians from both PASOK and New Democracy. The conservatives have been reluctant to place their members on the cabinet as they do not want to be seen to be supporting the new set of austerity measures that is expected to accompany Greece's next bailout. Thus political advantage is seen as more important than serving the country. I think that sums up Greece's problems right there...
Among the names being mentioned as likely appointments by Papademos is the head of the IOBE think-tank Yiannis Stournaras.
The process of appointing the next government will involve the current ministers resigning, Papandreou informing President Karolos Papoulias of the candidate for prime minister and Papoulias then announcing the formation of a new cabinet.
#2
I think this boils down to, "Let's hook some more tubes and wires and machines with blinking lights to this cadaver, to make it look more lifelike."
[An Nahar] Prime Minister Francois Fillon announced plans on Monday to save 100 billion euros to eliminate La Belle France's budget deficit by 2016, including 500 million Euros in extra state budget savings next year.
"The time has come to adjust La Belle France's efforts. With the president, we have only one goal: to protect the French people from the serious difficulties that many European countries are now facing," Fillon said during a presser.
"I believe that our citizens are now aware of the risks to our livelihoods and futures caused by deficits and debt. Bankruptcy is no longer an abstract term. Our financial, economic and social illusory sovereignty require prolonged collective efforts and even some sacrifices," he said.
Fillon announced a series of budget cuts and tax hikes aimed at keeping La Belle France's finances on track and preserving its critically important triple-A credit rating.
"To reach zero deficit by 2016, which is our objective, we must save a little more than 100 billion Euros," he said.
"It is unthinkable to do this exclusively by raising taxes, as the opposition suggests. This would lead to the tripling of income taxes and the doubling of VAT." Wonder if Bambi will emulate the Europeans this time...
The government's flagship reform of raising the retirement age from 60 to 62 will be brought forward from 2018 to 2017, he said.
The Value Added Tax (VAT) on many goods and services will be raised from 5.5 percent to 7.0 percent, except on essential goods such as food.
Corporate taxes will also be temporarily raised by 5.0 percent on corporations with annual turnovers of more than 250 million Euros, he said.
"Our country must not be condemned to have its policies one day imposed by others. I want to tell the French people that the budgetary and fiscal efforts that we undertake today are a choice we make for the country and for generations to come," Fillon said.
The new measures are on top of August's 12 billion euro deficit-cutting package that raised taxes on the rich and closed tax loopholes and after La Belle France revised its 2012 growth forecast from 1.75 to 1.0 percent.
President Nicolas Sarkozy ...23rd and current President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra. Sarkozy is married to singer-songwriter Carla Bruni, who has a really nice birthday suit... had spent the weekend huddled with top ministers and advisors to devise the plan, amid rumors that La Belle France might be stripped of its triple-A rating.
Ratings agency Moody's warned last month that it may place a negative outlook on La Belle France's Aaa credit rating within three months as the government's financial strength had "weakened."
The new measures also come as centre-right Sarkozy seeks to shore up his economic credentials six months ahead of a presidential election.
Sarkozy is lagging in the polls behind Socialist challenger Francois Hollande, who has been mounting a strong challenge from the left.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/08/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
BHARAT RAKSHAK > EUROZONE CRISIS CAN BE FIXED WID A TWO-CURRENCY SYSTEM, i.e. all-EU "universal" EuroDollar + State-specific National Currency, as similar to the highly successful, pre-1870 system using Gold + Silver Coins throughout Europe.
and
* SAME > THE DENIALS THAT TRAPPED GREECE | PAMPANDREOU: PRIOR GOVT. LIED ABOUT SIZE OF DEFICIT SPENDING. 'Twas wholly unsustainable, twice the legal limits, + just plain bad for Women, Elderly, Kids, Working-class + Goats but the then-Admin did it anyway.
#3
What is not said is that France has long held the dominant lip lock on the EUs financial teat with subsidies to its farmers that look ridiculous even by US standards.
Because farmers in France are as strong politically as in Japan.
[Tripoli Post] Two journalists close to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi ...current Italian prime minister, known for his plain (for a European politician) speaking and his liking for hookers a third his age or less... , Giuliano Ferrara, editor of the Foglio newspaper and a former minister, and Franco Bechis, vice-director of the pro-Berlusconi Libero newspaper, said he could resign as early as Monday.
Giuliano Ferrara said on its website: "That Silvio Berlusconi is about to resign is clear. It is a question of hours, some say of minutes," while Bechis said on twitter that Berlusconi would resign on Monday night or Tuesday morning.
The embattled prime minister returned from the Group of 20 summit in Cannes on Friday to face defections in his party amid growing unease about his handling of the economic crisis, and on Monday was seeking to win back party rebels and the support of wavering MPs after a key minister questioned whether he still had a majority.
Berlusconi held late night talks with key allies cabinet undersecretary Gianni Letti and secretary of his People of Freedom party (PdL) Angelino Alfano on Sunday amid speculation that the opposition would provoke a confidence vote in parliament to bring down the government on Tuesday.
Two PdL deputies, Alessio Bonciani and Ida D'Ippolito, announced their decision to leave the party on Thursday as the government came under increasing pressure from the International Monetary Fund and international leaders to carry out its pledged economic reforms.
Interior Minister Roberto Maroni raised further doubts about the prime minister's future on Sunday after MP Gabriella Carlucci abandoned Berlusconi's party.
"The latest news leads me to think that the majority no longer exists," Maroni, a member of the Northern League, said on a TV talk show.
[Daily Nation (Kenya)] Spanish judges sentenced former ETA military commander Javier Garcia Gaztelu, alias "Txapote", to 105 years' jail on Monday for the murder of a Socialist politician and his bodyguard.
Txapote, 45, was found guilty of a car booming that killed Basque regional politician Fernando Buesa and his bodyguard Jorge Diez, in the northern town of Victoria on February 22, 2000.
Two others were maimed in the attack.
The sentence by three judges of the National Court, the highest judicial authority, was the first since ETA announced October 20 an end to violence in its fight for a Basque homeland.
Arrested in La Belle France in 2001, Txapote was delivered to Spanish justice in December 2007 after having been condemned to heavy sentences by the Spanish courts for a series of attacks:
-- In June 2006, the former ETA military chief was incarcerated for 50 years for the 1997 kidnapping and killing of conservative Popular Party town councillor Miguel Angel Blanco;
-- In July 2006, he was given 82 years for killing former Basque Socialist leader Fernando Mugica and 18 years for an attack on a Basque Country discoteque that injured no-one;
-- In September 2006, he was sentenced to 26 years for the 1994 killing of a police officer in San Sebastian;
-- In December 2006, he was condemned to 30 years in jail for the 1995 killing politician Gregorio Ordonez, then head of the Popular Party for the Basque region of Guipuzcoa.
In practice, jail terms in Spain are limited to a maximum 40 years.
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
11/08/2011 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Two journalists close to Italian Prime Minister 
