Comment du Jour

Portugal--Bailout Blues?


Portugal's mood can often be characterized by the Fado music, the soulful and meloncholy songs about Love, Fate and Fortune. Over the past year as Euroland teeters on the brink of bankruptcy, Fado comes to mind as Portugal's good name unfortunately surfaces in the list of debtors.

But Portugal is not Greece nor Ireland. Lisbon's debt numbers are much better as the budget deficit is projected to fall from 9% of GDP in 2009 to 4.6% n 2011. And GDP growth is expected to rise by over 1% this year, anemic but again better than many. Greece saw a nearly 16% budget defict in 2009 and will better itself with about 9% this year if things go as planned (they rarely do).


But now that the bankers have bailed out Ireland to the tune of $90 billion, all attention turns to the next European countries whose finances are teetering. The list is depressingly solid--Spain, Italy, and Portugal.

Portugal's profligate spending under the Socialists is indeed part of the problem, as is a bloated public sector. Here's a country where civil servants get a 14 month salary--in other words a one month cash bonus at Christmas and another in Summer.

Given they are broke, the Lisbon government should show good faith and trim such benefits so that wider layoffs can be avoided.

Portugal should not be on the Naughty List along with Greece and Ireland, but at the same time should be extra nice to avoid the wrath of the Eurocrats.

In the meantime the Financial Fado can be written how little Portugal edged to the brink, lost the love of Europeans, but heroically saved itself!

Comment du Jour

Trans-Atlantic Prosperity

As would be expected, countries on both sides of the Atlantic lead the list in global prosperity, social indicators, and overall well-being. Norway placed first out of 169 comparators, while the USA was # 4, Ireland #5, Lichtenstein #6, Netherlands #7 , Canada #8, Sweden #9, and Germany #10.

In the UN Development Programme’s recently released “Human Development Report 2010—the Real Wealth of Nations,” a global barometer not only of economic but equally also educational achievements, health standards, and perceptions of well-being, cited socio/economic gains both across the Atlantic and Pacific, with the impressive standings of Australia and New Zealand as number 3 and 4.

Switzerland came in 13th , France 14th , Italy 23rd. But look carefully and see that the United Kingdom scores 26th globally, just two places ahead of the Czech Republic at 28th or Slovenia at 29th .

Other former East Bloc states such as Slovakia scored 31st, Hungary 36th and Poland 41st.

One point worth noting in spite of the domestic debate in the U.S. over health care, the fact remains that per capita spending in the USA stands at $7,285; that contrasts with $3,900 in Canada , $3,323 in Sweden and $3,700 in France. Even the closest rival Norway comes in at $4,763.

Comment du Jour

Reunited Berlin--Happy 21st Birthday!

It's the 21st anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the birth of a new a re-united Berlin. In 1989 the Wall crumbled before the freedom wave which was sweeping Middle Europe.

Just last year, in a stirring and heartfelt tribute to the United States and its people, German Chancellor Angela Merkel addressed a joint session of the U.S. Congress in Washington DC and outlined the post-war relationship between the United States and a politically free, and now united, Germany. Speaking to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989, Chancellor Merkel underscored the close political partnership between Germany and the USA..


Angela Merkel, who herself grew up in former communist East Germany, offered unequivocal praise for the role American administrations played in the long fight to bring democracy and freedom not only to divided Germany but to Eastern Europe as a whole.

Comment du Jour

America Roars Back...



The Democrat Party took a drubbing at the hands of a pretty upset and politically energized electorate.

Anxiety over the economy and the unemployment rate of nearly 10 percent was a primary cause of the Congressional defeat for the party in power. But the election was more than just economic angst--it was a Referendum on the Preisdency of Barack Obama and the structures of Big Government.

In the Mid-Term Report Card, the Administration was handed a historic defeat with loss of the House of Representatives and a reduced majority in the Senate.

When Alexis de Tocqueville visited the young American Republic in the 1830’s the visiting Frenchman was enchanted not only by the pursuit of freedoms but by the individuality and spirit of the American people. In his magnificent narrative “Democracy in America,” de Tocqueville’s message was that America was great for many reasons, but first and foremost its freedom and the individual pursuit of wealth and happiness.

De Tocqueville coming from a France which was and remains a very Statist country, no matter the government of left, right had discovered the American Republic as a refreshing alternative to chaotic barbarism of the French Revolution or the theatrical militarism of Napoleon. America presented an alternative offering individual opportunity.


Fast forward to 2010. What used to be called “American Exceptionalism” by scholar Seymour Martin Lipset, has evolved into what I deem, American Dependency. I do not mean our economic dependency on Middle East oil. Instead I refer to an entire dependency culture which has emerged across all classes, creeds and colors which looks to Washington “programs” as a panacea to every problem and donor to every need. The Middle-class has been especially seduced by the handouts.


Much as the French are wedded to their entitlements and can recite their benefits as secular scripture, so too an increasing number of Americans (especially the Yammercrats of the Left) who see the State as the solution, the benefactor, and the arbiter for all matters of commerce and culture.

And that bring us back to the Mid-term vote.

Naturally with government funding on every level comes the natural consequence of higher taxes, but well beyond this emerges the control. What properly defined America as a Federal Republic and land of checks and balances, has increasingly become a unitary state dispensing checks but also dispensing with the traditional balance and dialogue between Washington and the fifty states.

Now there's an increasingly vocal majority of Americans who do not accept this path.