Politics

WE are living in truly historic times and witnessing historic events. Uncomfortably, the massive rally that followed the euro bailout appears to have petered out. The main leading indicator of sentiment is the euro/dollar exchange rate. Having rallied on Monday, the value of the euro has fallen back. One implication of this is that the…

The only thing that will stop Ireland – and a number of other EU countries – from defaulting on their debts is if the European Central Bank bites the bullet and starts printing money to buy up government debt in Europe in limitless quantities. This is what we have come to. Anything less and the…

How do these financial crises normally end? Many people are asking when this Greek episode will end and how it will affect us.

There’s good and bad news on this score. The good news is that, if the state does the right thing, a financial crisis can usually be managed.

Over 100 years ago, JM Synge described the gombeen man as follows, “groggy patriot/publican/ge-neral shopman who is married to the priest’s half-sister and is a second cousin once removed of the dispensary doctor … the type that is running the United Irish League anti-grazier campaign, while at the same time they are swindling the people themselves in a dozen ways and buying back their holdings and packing off whole families to America”.

The reason Anglo Irish Bank should be let go is simple: defaulting now will make no difference whatsoever to Ireland’s economic performance in the future. In contrast, keeping it on life support will cost us dearly. So shut it down and repudiate the debts.

Last year I remember watching the ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ programme on RTE featuring the eminently likeable Simon Delaney. The unfolding story of his grandfather in the First World War was extraordinary. Using records from the Guinness brewery, an odd mention of the British Legion in a newspaper and British military records, Delaney…

2+2=5
At the end of George Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the hero, Winston Smith, was prepared to believe this sum.

Having committed the ‘‘thoughtcrime’’ of questioning the system, Winston was rumbled. After a few days in the infamous room 101 he was so broken that he was prepared to believe anything. He was prepared to believe something was true, even though it was obviously false. This is what is called in the book ‘‘doublethink’’, where you can see no inconsistency in saying one thing and thinking another.

ON November 24, 1942, General Von Paulus of the German 6th Army, bunkered down in Stalingrad, received the order he was dreading. Instead of the retreat that he was planning, the orders from Berlin stated simply that “Fortress Stalingrad” was to be held “whatever the circumstances”. The general knew the game was up. The army was nearly encircled. There was one last chance of a breakout which could save hundreds of thousands of men and machinery that could be used to fight another day.

Have you heard of Neelie Kroes? Last November, this column said that the European Commission would save us from the crazy excesses of our politicians – and it delivered last Friday.

In a nutshell, the Greek bailout means that, in good times, countries like Greece, Ireland and Spain borrow German money to buy German-made BMWs, which is obviously excellent news for Germany. However, in times of crisis, we send Germany the bill, which is the payback (a) for us absorbing all the savings the Germans don’t want to spend and (b) for buying their cars and washing machines with their money recycled by our banks.