Tag: Iceland

Iceland, Greece, & The Future

Iceland survived by taking over the domestic units of its banks and leaving the foreign creditors to bear losses. An 80 percent slump in the krona against the euro offshore in 2008 sent the trade deficit into surplus within months, while government spending cuts helped rein in the budget. Iceland will post a shortfall of 1.4 percent of gross domestic product next year after 2011’s 2.7 percent deficit, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said on May 25.

Instead of bailing out its banks using taxpayer funds like the United States did, Iceland let its bank default.

Some economists, such as Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman, now think that letting the banks default was the right thing to do for Iceland’s economy, and some see it as a model for other debt-stricken European nations.

http://www.businessinsider.com…

Here’s the 5 year view of it’s currency vs the USD:

http://www.xe.com/currencychar…

Pretty good, huh? It’s more or less doubled.

Of course, that’s the key difference, the 500,000 Icelanders have their own currency, the 11, 283,000 million Greeks no longer do. (nor do the 60 million Italians, 46 million in Spain, etc etc) So, with Germany and France controlling the currency, they can’t follow that route.

And, there’s no painless way for these countries to go back to their own currencies–really there may be no way at all to go back, painful or otherwise; they’re probably stuck in the zone, if they were ever to go back to their own currencies, it would only be after the Germans have carried off everything that wasn’t tied down, and most stuff that was too. How would the Parthenon look on the Rhine?

When all is said and done, what we’re watching play out is a bloodless war- perhaps planned a decade or decades ago.

Where the economic powers of France and Germany, etc. (and likely also the UK and maybe US to some extent)  will take the actual assets of the south, leaving those countries poor, with no assets, and in perpetual debt. I suspect that then we’ll see a two tier euro zone-where the borders are no longer so open, but ‘guest worker’ programs will return as the broke and out of work of the south, compete for subsistence wage jobs in the northern zone, or maybe no wages at home. More or less, then, a return to the 1980s.  

“WikiRebels”: The Documentary–Only 24 hours before it goes dark!

I hope many of you are around to view this vid documentary on Sunday, 12/13, because supposedly it’s only up for one day.  I am going out of town for the day and won’t be around to do anything on this, so I hope someone else can/will. And if anyone has time to burn and save it, please do, and let me know.  Thanks.

This is a Swedish made film with much behind the scenes stuff on Wiki and Julian and more:

“What we have here is a new breed of rebels, IT guerrillas without a national base.”

Finally, in response to globalized eco-destruction, globalized wars, and globalized banking that robs national and personal wealth, we now have globalized resistance so profound, so effective, that global elites are waging a massive censorship campaign to silence the group, WikiLeaks, and smear its figurehead, Julian Assange.

Read it and view it at global research  

Enjoy, learn, and act…

And remember I/We are all Julian Assange.

The Global Pension Grab

  Most people who have been following the news about Ireland are aware of the austerity measures, such as middle-class tax hikes, the lowering of the minimum wage, and massive layoffs. But the most outrageous action the government is taking concerns pensions.

 Fine Gael, Labour and Sinn Féin attacked the intention to use the National Pension Reserve Fund to help provide a further €10 billion in further capital for the banks. In total, the banks could end up getting another €35 billion if their losses are bigger than expected.

 It’s a case of blatant theft. The government is stealing from the working class to give to the wealthy bank creditors.

 Ireland is not alone.

The Week in Editorial Cartoons – Treating Mother Earth Badly

Crossposted at Daily Kos

THE WEEK IN EDITORIAL CARTOONS

This weekly diary takes a look at the past week’s important news stories from the perspective of our leading editorial cartoonists (including a few foreign ones) with analysis and commentary added in by me.

When evaluating a cartoon, ask yourself these questions:

1. Does a cartoon add to my existing knowledge base and help crystallize my thinking about the issue depicted?

2. Does the cartoonist have any obvious biases that distort reality?

3. Is the cartoonist reflecting prevailing public opinion or trying to shape it?

The answers will help determine the effectiveness of the cartoonist’s message.

:: ::

Bill Day

Bill Day, Comics.com (Memphis Commercial-Appeal)

AOBTD: Dutch Govt. Flops over Afghanistan

Another One Bites the Dust: The Dutch Government (Parliament Coalition) Collapses over the issue of staying in Afghanistan Saturday morning.  

The Dutch had been scheduled to end their participation in NATO’s mission in Afghanistan in August of 2010, with their troops to be out by December, but had been asked to stay longer.  Concerns over the Dutch budget deficit, which meant that either tax hikes or spending cuts were looming, doomed the coalition led by Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende’s government.


“I unfortunately note that there is no longer a fruitful path for the Christian Democrats, Labor Party and Christian Union to go forward,” Balkenende, who leads the center-right Christian Democrats, told reporters.

Balkenende wanted to extend the Dutch troop deployment in the NATO-led mission in Afghanistan past an August deadline, but Deputy Prime Minister Wouter Bos’s Labor Party opposed any extension.

http://www.reuters.com/article…

Parliamentary elections to form a new government could be held by the summer, but establishing a functional coalition between 4 or 5 parties to get a majority may take some finangling.

The Dutch have been participating in NATO’s Afghanistan occupation since 2006, and have lost 21 troops out of about 2000 deployed.

 

Iceland’s president vetoes IceSave law

Original article, by Jordan Shilton, via World Socialist Web Site:

Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, Iceland’s president, announced Tuesday that he would not sign into law the Icesave bill, which stipulates terms for the repayment of loans to Britain and the Netherlands. Instead, a referendum will be held on the matter, with polls indicating that a substantial majority of Icelanders will reject the latest version of the measure.

Iceland applies for EU membership

 

Wasting no time acting upon the Althingi vote, Reuters reports Iceland hands in application to join EU.

“The (Icelandic) ambassador to Sweden has met with the secretary of state and has handed in to him the application of accession to the EU,” said Urdur Gunnarsdottir.

Iceland’s formal application letter (pdf) states, “The Government of Iceland has the honour to present hereby, in conformity with Article 49 of the Treaty of European Union, the application of the Republic of Iceland for membership of the European Union.”

Yesterday, Iceland’s parliament, the Althingi, voted to start membership talks with the European Union. The vote was 33-28 with two members abstaining. ForexTV reported the vote was seen as a victory for Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir, “who has been pushing for joining the EU and the adoption of the euro as the recession-hit country’s currency.”

Iceland – what happened?

Original article, by Jack Smart, via Socialist Appeal (UK):

“The Icelandic economy is prosperous and flexible” (IMF 4 July 2008)

(There is) “a very real danger…that the Icelandic economy, in the worst case, could be sucked with the banks into the whirlpool and the result could be national bankruptcy.” (Iceland’s Prime Minister Geir Haarde – address to the nation 6 October 2008)