As good a source as I've yet found on the subject -
Vicente Navarro: "Crisis and Class Struggle in the Eurozone"
Another characteristic of this group of countries is the acceptance by the governing social democratic parties of most of the neoliberal policies pushed by the EU establishment. This acceptance has been generalized among the social democratic parties of the European Union. Actually, these parties were part of the consensus in developing neoliberal policies (usually referred to as the “Brussels consensus,” the European version of the “Washington consensus”). As part of this consensus, both conservative-liberal and social democratic governing parties have been reducing taxes, particularly for the top income brackets. It was none other than Spain’s socialist candidate in the 2004 election (and later prime minister), Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who promised to reduce taxes if elected, saying that lowering taxes was a cause to be promoted by the left. The major economic thinker of Spain’s socialist party at that time was Jordi Sevilla, an economist who wrote in his book The Future of Socialism that “the left had to stop raising taxes and increasing public expenditures” – this said in the EU-15 country with the lowest state revenues and poorest welfare state.
Read the whole thing and see how often you can imagine hearing Rob Ford, or Dalton McGuinty, or stephen harper saying the crapola, and pursuing the same misguided policies.
10 comments:
NeoLiberalism is indeed endemic among our two ruling parties.
Merely switching back and forth between Liberal and Conservative governments only serve to change the pace at which these ruinous policies are pursued.
The Liberals preferring the frog in a pot strategy and the Conservatives preferring the blitzkrieg approach.
And the NDP has shown itself more than capable of swallowing the same snake-oil.
The status-quo has so discredited itself that it's becoming unbelievable that it's still the dominant narrative.
LMAO
The uber-sophisticated Europeans got taken to the cleaners by a bunch of redneck cowboys, yee-hah!
http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2011/09/europe-201109
I've often wondered what it will taken for people realise that and as for the NDP sadly I fear you are right
Anonymous,
What was your point in sharing that?
Germans are socialists
Americans are good at math.
People who are good at math are smart.
People who work on Wall Street are good at math.
People who work on Wall Street are smart because they are good at math.
People who work on Wall Street cleaned the German bankers out.
Therefore:
Socialists are stupid, American free-marketeers are smart.
Anonymous,
What an idiot you are.
They fucked themselves over pretty good as well.
And, by your logic, the US taxpayers, who footed the bill for the bail-out, must also be stupid, since Wall Street is having its way with them as well.
Really? Can you price a bond smart guy, or leverage a Gaussian cupola to calculate the amount of risk on a securities product?
Anonymous,
Can you construct a coherent argument?
Can you read things for comprehension and then say something relevant about them?
The original link went to a very good article about the deleterious economic impact of fascism on several European economies and the counter-productive effects of austerity in response to the resultant financial crises.
You replied with a link about how German banks allowed themselves to be conned by Wall Street and accompanied it with some asinine crowing.
When asked to explain yourself you replied with the witless bit of drivel about how Germans can't do math because they're socialist, which I subsequently exploded as bankrupt by showing you a link about how the banksters conned themselves and were only saved from their criminality and stupidity by the US taxpayer.
A word of advice fuck-face: You're not as awesome as you think you are. I've chosen to publish your comments because they clearly make you look bad. You've just been too full of stupid hubris to realize it.
(Then again, maybe you have an inkling of how much your embarrassing yourself, hence the "Anonymous.")
ha ha, love the arguments ;) But seriously, we're all fucked in the financial ass now.
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