The Bewilderness

A depressed, depopulated desert: the southern €zone?

I attended a lecture and book luanch this evening by Gavin Hewitt, BBC Editor for Europe, who has taken time oit to write a tome of contemporary history on the elite proceedings during the current crisis of the €. Hewitt set the stage with some thoughts on the emasculation of leaders, the gradual growth of fears over unemployment and the erosion of an adherence to austerity. 

Hewitt was honest in navigating between positions and showing how some criticisms are shared by both Europhiles and Eurosceptics. The problem is that their answers are different.

Yet, the talk omitted demographics. The depressed Mediterranean is suffering from a declining population with birthrates nowhere near replacement level. A crisis of economic growth was due to hit at some point. Yet, the crisis may have brought the effects of the demographic trap forward by encouraging emigration and creating a structural problem of youth unemployment. This would have crept up on the countries sometime within the next decade. Now that demographic death rattle can be heard within the Eurozone as a depressed depopulated desert becomes one outcome.  

The diversity of worms

Shale may now prefix oil and gas but long before this, it gave us the strongest evidence of the Precambrian explosion. This was the Burgess Shale in Canada with its evidence of soft-celled invertebrates giving us a fortunate of life in those early oceans. 

This gift is still giving: with a rather extraodianary hemichordate: a cousin of ours; a worm of some distinction. If Blackadder had been a palaeontologist, he would have been taken aback by the worm that looks like a thingy nestling in those warm waters. To view a modern equivalent, click on the link.

When I look down, is it a case of convergent evolution?

North Korea bays to the moon

North Korea has played a strong defence from a position of weakness depending upon threats, bluster and the covert deployment of weapons of mass destruction and their proliferation to obtain aid from the West. Without such assistance, it is not clear that the existing regime: a revolutionary regime ossifying into a hereditary kleptocracy would have survived without reform. (One looks to the red princelings of its big brother, China, to see how one party states follow this path, even without personality cults). 

North Korea has recently conducted another nuclear test and stated that it has a ballistic missile almost ready for intercontinental attacks. The new leader, Kim Jong Un, has proved even more aggressive than his father (who is rumoured to have died in a fit of angry apoplexy). The rhetoric, the grooves, the moves have become shriller as the regime ups the ante.

This becomes a concern since it mirrors an increasingly assertive China. Foreign policy is partially restructured by the People's Liberation Army, which appears to wag the Communist party, not vice versa. Is it too far-fetched to think that North Korea's own repudiation of the armistice and bellicose threats to attack the US mirror those of its patron? 

With treaty conditions, Chinese assertions, increased tensions on the Korean peninsula and the freedom of manoevre for radicals and hotheads to aggressively threaten the status quo, is it not a concern that war could break out in the Far East? Will the Glosters again defend Imjin?

Multishambles

The European Parliament is unhappy with the lack of consultation by the Council of Ministers and the Commission in regards to the proposals for economic and monetary union. Talk of a new treaty to achieve this goal is viewed as an attempt to sideline all Parliamentary assemblies (how does this tally with the dominant role of the Bundestag?). Some of the usual suspects like Elmar Brok and Daniel Cohn-Bendit have been agitating for a seat at the table. This development comes as the Commission's budget dries up under the twin pressures of overspending and austerity. The coffers have run dry.  

Meanwhile, Cameron appeared on the BBC to rile Eurosceptics further with his list of empty promises. He will try and keep increases in the Commission's budget to a minimum and look at reducing immigration from the European Union (shooting himself in the foot on defending the single market) On, and the next election could be a plebiscite on membership instead of acknowledging the People's Pledge. A good example of how to forsake friends and irritate people. He is a shambles! 

Elections on ice

The European institutions have adopted the very policy positions that spell out the doom that came to Madrid (and Rome, and so on). Incompetence is wedded to demands for greater austerity and banking capital at a time of economic collapse. The Commission twists the touniquet to ensure that more blood spurts out. 

Yet as more countries are taken down for the good of the whole, one does wonder at the strength of the European ideology. An outsider, aware of its flaws and irrationality, expects that the politicians will come to their senses, return to rationality and plot a course that could start to reduce these risks. Yet, they are enchanted by the irreversibility of the project: go forward, never back; except the road has almost run its course and they are out of time. 

The allegiance of all centre parties to Europe will invite extremes. The Greek election was an early example. Other elections will prove more radical in the years to come. If the Europeans prove as competent here as they have in currency union, then we must view democracy in danger, from extremist illiberals and technocrats. Will Europe engineer technocratic suspensions to foil Eurosceptic takeovers; elections on ice until people have again proved their fitness to vote?

Financial ferrets in a regulators' sack

Until now, the public has received little or no evidence of collusion between banker and regulator in relation to the manipulation of the markets. Nor have they understood the wider political framework within which such contacts took place. The FSA's investigation of Barclays bank has revealed ambiguous communications between the bank, Bank of England and unnamed parties within Treasury. 

The speculation is forthcoming but this could have profound implications for the Labour party, if the parliamentary investigations uncover evidence of co-operation between government and banks. Miliband's cynical distancing from the last government will be undermined by a reminder that Labour were in hock to banks, just as they are now in hock to Unite.

Nor does this let the government off the hook. Osborne's judgement may prove even more flawed when it becomes clear that his chosen vehicle for clean-up is besmirched by the antics of his predecessors. The Bank of England will suffer reputional damage and the FSA has one final triumph: kicking its rivals after they have succeeded in eviscerating its role.

We can look forward to a few weeks of kicking lumps. 

Poet, peace activist, seeks controversy

Would Israel have been better off if the country had decided to ignore the controversy surrounding Gunter Grass's new poem? Or does the report of a poem that feeds into the extreme critiques of what such amoralists call the 'Zionist entity' lead to a reaction, especially when the poet is a self-confessed member of the Waffen SS? I have not read the poem though its contents, if reported accurately, are unsurprising and fit the prejudices of the anti-Zionist left.

Perhaps, at 84, Grass is no longer able to assert a moral independence from Left or Right. If a strong voice could provide an independent counterweight to the alliance between extreme left and anti-semitism, now would have been the time. There is plenty of ammunition to criticise Israel without aligning yourself with eliminationists. That is the rhetoric of Iran. That is not the rhetoric of Israel.

"It is unacceptable," said Willi van Ooyen, a spokesman for a group that organises the traditional peace marches held each year on Easter weekend in Germany since 1960.

"Threats and preparations for war poison the political climate," said Ooyen, referring to concerns that Israel might launch a strike against Iran's nuclear facilities to stop a suspected weapons programme.

Israel will not be listening to this German peace activist soon. His paean of defenceless prostration before barbarism does not carry a voice in Israel (Talk often with a visibly big stick!)

But, as voices in Israel attest, the shrieks of disapproval have been fanned by a political class that wished to make an example of a left-wing Nobel prize winner, whose reputation was tarnished by a revelation of Nazi participation. Their actions were framed for domestic and US consumption: banning an author for equating Israel with a second holocaust. Grass's search for notoriety through poetic cliche may have strengthened the Israeli government, an outcome he would not have encouraged.

Yet, as war rolls closer, the Palestinians may have already lost their hold on the pedestal for victims. The height of international interest in this conflict has been reached, and fundamentalist intransigence leaves this local difficulty as an aside to the Iran/Israel tango.

 

Volatility and unpopularity in the polls

All three mainstream leaders are now suffering from low ratings. All that has changed is that Cameron now joins Clegg and Miliband. Perhaps it was only a matter of time and adverse publicity. As Mike Smithson points out it is unprecedented for all three leaders to suffer from such disillusionment on the part of the electorate.

Yet, this may prove most dangerous for Miliband. With a Labour lead in the polls and an unpopular leader, the temptation to look for a more popular candidate will increase. An unpopular budget and a week that undermined notions of competence have wounded the Coalition. None of these indicate that we have faced a change in polling or a swing to Labour, when Galloway's victory points to increased volatility.

Eyeballing the Euro

And after all the threats, deadlines, ultimatums and wolfcries, Germany and Greece stand eyeball to eyeball. Now, austerity is no longer a measure that Greek politicians will abide by:

At a press conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Monday, Ms Merkel: "There can be no new Greece programme if agreement is not reached with the troika... All those who bear responsibility in Greece must know - we will not deviate from this position."

She added: "I honestly can't understand how additional days will help. Time is of the essence. A lot is at stake for the entire eurozone."

Who will blink first?

 

The Great Northern (European Banking) Run

What can they think? After a sleepless night where detail was discarded for the merits of a result, Merkozy must be overwrought at the bodyblow dealt to them by George Papandreou. Presented with the cost of bailout versus default in strikes, riots and the destruction of the Greek middle class, the Prime Minister could not continue to support European solidarity. The blubbering was not long in coming:

The Dutch Labour party called the referendum a "deal breaker" and said it would not support the Brussels accord if it were put to the vote. Jose Blanco, the spokesman for the Spanish government, said Greece's referendum was "bad news for Spain and bad news for Europe"

Recycling debt through the special purpose vehicle of the EFSF and preventing credit writedowns was considered more important than the obligatory impoverishment of one or more Eurozone members. Which politician will take such punishment for his fellow elites? Are we surprised that Papandreou made a sudden break for freedom with a democratic invocation. The referendum device was totemic, since its primary purpose was a figleaf of decency if his government lost a vote of confidence.

Constitutional doubts apart, politicians in the debt zone can no longer be relied upon to shore up the Merkozy. Torn between elite and electorate, the latter wins hands down. That being so, the debt crisis now embarks upon its most dangerous phase: political co-operation is no longer believed, yet we all wait for the actions of politicians to deal with their own crisis: and we will know their mettle when Italy crosses the finish line of market denial followed by the toppling of the banks.