Eurosphere roundup: Big freeze over Europe, Greek bailout, ACTA
Italy hit by shortage of Russian gas from FT.com – World, Europe Cold weather and reductions in supplies from Europe have put strain on the gas systems across the continent Europe’s big freeze tightens grip from BBC News | Europe ...
Are Credit Ratings Massively Overrated?
A striking new paper by two economists with Brandeis University and Oxford fundamentally questions the informational content of credit ratings. How “incomprehensible and irrational” are the assessments of Standard & Poor’s, Moody...
"Revitalising European Industry" by Frank-Walter Steinmeier
Europe is debilitated with the effects of two years of desperate crisis management. The prescribed treatment resembles the old practice of bloodletting on ailing patients. Growing debts are paid with...
Fransız Kaldım: Vapur vakti
Vapur vakti by Fransız kaldım Geçen gün dolmuş yolculuğu arkadaşlarımdan bahsetmiştim. Bugün sıra vapur yolcularında. Yalnız hemen uyarayim, romantik bir yazı olmayacak. Yani bu yazıda kitap okuyan ıssız adamlar, öpüşen çif...
"The Great Anti-Keynesian Flip-Out" by Paul Krugman
Keynesian economists made some pretty clear predictions around 3 years ago – predictions that were very much at odds with what anti-Keynesians were saying. We said that as long as the economy...
"Stronger Europe or Democratic Sovereignty? Yes Please!" by Paul Linden-Retek
European citizens today are confronted with increasingly histrionic specters of disaster: financial ruin, xenophobic regression, a catastrophic reversal of the pax Europaea achieved over the past...
George Monbiot's worst-ever Guardian column – and that's saying something!
George Monbiot has outdone himself in the Guardian today. Citing the recent Canadian study that purports to show a link between conservative views and low intelligence (reported in the Mail last week), he claims that the current government was electe...
Ten things about Irish politics that haven’t changed in twenty years.
The cynics amongst us often say that nothing ever changes in Irish politics. It isn’t true. Change does happen in Ireland, just very slowly. Having said that, here are ten things that haven’t changed from the day I first entered active po...
Seizing Sustainable Development
“The world is on an unsustainable path, and must urgently chart a new course forward, one that brings equity and environmental concerns into the economic mainstream.” At Project Syndicate, Jacob Zuma and Tarja Halonen explain the conc...
FSN tracks GOP nomination race across the US
FSN is continuing to cover the battle for the Republican presidential nomination as the race to challenge Barack Obama in November heads out West. Tuesday February 7th will see Minnesota and Colorado hold caucuses, just days after Mitt Romney's comma...
A Picture Is Worth a Lot of Bla-bla-bla
Sarkozy le FridolinFrankly, I find Sarkozy's frequent allusions to past Franco-German bloodletting in order to justify current acquiescence in the German view of the financial crisis in rather poor taste. If there is an economic case to be made, let...
ACTA, SOPA,PIPA...A threat or not?
As a blogger, I can not support the mentioned laws (ACTA,SOPA,PIPA). And while I understand the arguments that support this idea, the property rights and loss of revenue of the creators, I fear the way it could transform the internet and how we use...
THIS IS EUROPE #4
Freedom of information is luxury This is Europe (This is the world)...
THIS IS EUROPE #4
Freedom of information is luxury This is Europe (This is the world)...
Syria: Russia on the wrong side | Editorial
Moscow must now set out how to broker a credible alternative to the Arab League plan that it has done so much to destroyAlready grindingly destructive and violent, the 11-month long Syrian crisis has suddenly turned worse. The most searing evidence o...
Scrutinising Belarus
Belarus is often portrayed as the Bad Boy of Europe — the only European state that is not a member of the Council of Europe, thanks to its retention (and use) of the death penalty, the apparently fraudulent nature of its elections and its poo...
Further further reading
For the commute home, - How the business of international banking has changed over time.- Calculated Risk calls a housing price bottom: March of this year.- US economic conditions improving....
The unemployment exit race and structural impairment
We found a couple of items from a Credit Suisse note commenting on Friday’s jobs report to be interesting and worth discussing in some detail.First is a bit of commentary...
The anti-Putin promenade
Protests in Moscow before the presidential election...
Europe can't cut and grow | Sony Kapoor and Peter Bofinger
The EU needs a growth compact, not a fiscal one. Swift action on tax and jobs is the way out of the crisisOverspending by governments, we have been told, triggered this crisis. The cure thus lies in immediate austerity, hence last month's German...
Dossier défense européenne (2) : les alliances de Nicolas Sarkozy
Cliquez ici pour accéder au premier papier du dossier. Quels ont été les choix réalisés par Nicolas Sarkozy depuis 2007 en matière de défense européenne ? Quel est son bilan ? Le modèle français d’intégration européenne défendu par N...
Setting the right example in curbing climate change
As of 1 January 2012, the aviation sector is included in the Europe-wide emission trading scheme (ETS) for reduction of greenhouse gasses (GHGs), and not a moment too soon. Not only is the EU finally sanctioning a heavy-polluting industry, but is als...
A f(l)ight the EU will lose
This Air China plane - rightly - refuses to pay! (image by Wiki)The Chinese government has made a very rational and wise decision:China said on Monday it was forbidding its airlines from joining a European Union carbon emissi...
Heard of your EU Commissioner?
Have a look at the Financial Times Blog entry by Peter Spiegel. Turns out the Finns know their commissioner. I assume that is largely due to the lack of other current internationaly active politicians. (Same as with other small member states appearin...
Number 10 source: “Andrew Lansley should be taken out and shot”
Tomorrow’s Times adds to the metric tonnage (£) of commentary observing that it is “extraordinary that Andrew Lansley is still in position” having — from the perspective of both the government, health professionals and much...
Poland and Germany: How Close is too Close?
WARSAW / WASHINGTON – For hundreds of years, Poland suffered from an overbearing Germany that trampled on the rights of the Polish nation, occupied the country, and, at times, worked to extinguish the Polish nation-state entirely. No wonder tha...
Yvette Cooper has caught something off her husband Ed Balls
… By which I mean his habit of muttering darkly under his breath at Government front-benchers while they're at the dispatch box. At Home Office questions this afternoon – which I've sketched for tomorrow's paper – the Shadow Home Se...
January effects in credit
It’s been a rather optimistic sort of January. S&P financials are finally trading above book value (but with wide variations between individual banks), junk bond issuance...
Matt Zarb-Cousin is a beautiful snowflake
Snowflakes are unique. Each is completely beautiful in its own way. Then they fall to the ground and they all look the same. They conform. They sell out. Those unscrupulous, spineless, yellow-bellied Judas Iscariots. They are the Lib Dems of the weat...
