Oh sure. When the cold war ended and the Iron Curtain came down in 1989 and 1990, the countries that escaped the Soviet sphere of influence were greeted with open arms. "Oh yeah, come home to the EU.".... or...."Hey great to have you back!" or "Yeah, we're all one big family over here."
But a few weeks ago, a few of the econ types looked up from the staggering economic damage that was wreaking havoc on Western European economies and looked eastward. Suddenly everyone gulped. Well...they did more than gulp, but I am trying to maintain a sense of decorum here. It was one of those "uh oh" moments. They did a few quick calculations and figured out that if things were this bad in Western Europe, then things were really really bad further east.
How bad?
According to the Voice of America, "Hungary's Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany urged the European Union to show solidarity by establishing a support fund of about $240 billion to help failing economies in Eastern Europe." And when Angela Merkel heard that number, she passed milk through her nose. Because initially, they thought number might be somewhere around $30 billion.
Yes indeed, now everyone is pedaling backward so fast, they look like clowns on unicycles in the main ring at Ringling Brothers.
Mr. Ferenc warned that if the Western European countries didn't bail them out it would be like raising an "economic iron curtain." To which Sarkozy said, "Hey...you guys would do that? Really? Well OK. We'll give you the material to build it. Free. No kidding. I'll even send Carla Bruni in a bikini to cut the ribbon at the opening."
One big family indeed.
As Cyndi Lauper sang.... money changes everything.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment