John Mauldin has a very good (albeit lengthy) guest commentary on the state of the Euro and the European economy as a whole in his latest newsletter. You'll find it here (link is to an Adobe Acrobat document in .PDF format). Highly recommended reading.
Reading the guest commentary reminded me of this post from Theo Spark:
Some years ago a small rural town in Spain twinned with a similar town in Greece. The Mayor of the Greek town visited the Spanish town. When he saw the palatial mansion belonging to the Spanish mayor he wondered how he could afford such a house.
The Spaniard said; "You see that bridge over there? The EU gave us a grant to build a two-lane bridge, but by building a single lane bridge with traffic lights at either end this house could be built".
The following year the Spaniard visited the Greek town. He was simply amazed at the Greek Mayor's house, gold taps, marble floors . . . it was marvellous.
When he asked how this could be afforded, the Greek said, "You see that bridge over there?"
The Spaniard replied; "No . . . "
Ah, yes. Corruption is endemic in Greece, and Spain's not far behind. I'm sure that's got a lot to do with both nations' economic woes. We may as well laugh at it: it beats crying . . . and no-one over there's about to do anything to fix the problem.
*Sigh*
Peter
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