The taste of deferral, the taste of default

If you have a deadline today, any sort of deadline, don’t worry about meeting it. Meh, why worry about time constraints and this thing they call “urgency” when you can just relax, recline and have YOUR COUNTRY DEFAULT. Having said that, I know that none of you are sitting in the Greek government. Allegedly, there was a deadline for Greece to agree to EU measures this morning that wasn’t met (Greek officials deny it ever existed). There is also meant to be one anytime before the eurozone finance ministers meet. Things seem confusing. At least, the Greeks decided on a number of budgetary measures yesterday, including spending cuts of 1.5% of GDP and wage cuts. Immediate reaction from the Greek unions: full 24-hour strike on Tuesday. Point: protesting against the downward-spiral-inducing policies. Legitimacy: Kind of none, because it’s pretty late in the day. read article

But on the bright side, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy have just announced that the new shiny EU fiscal pact will be adopted in March. That doesn’t mean it will be implemented then, of course, because it will first have to go through 25 parliaments with 25 different governments, composed of about 250 different parties (rough estimate) and then be written into 25 constitutions…

Now this might hurt a little bit… somebody might already have broken it to you, Google is sponsoring the Conservative Political Action Conference, which is co-hosted by the Tea Party. Excuse me? Fine, so it’s a sales/lobbying call (e.g. for Google.com/elections/ed/us), but the fact that Google of all companies sponsors anything alongside the National Rifle Association (I hope you’ve seen Thank You for Smoking?) is just too weird. read article

In other news, you may remember that flying will get more expensive this year, as the EU is imposing a new emission tax on flights into and within Europe. Now the Chinese government has forbidden its airlines to participate in the scheme. According to Reuters, every ton of carbon dioxide emitted from a non-complying carrier will be fined with €100. But China isn’t the only country that is against the regulation, it’s joining the US and India in the opposition. read article

So long.

Filed under: news brief, Angela Merkel, aviation, blaming Brussels, budget, China, EU, eurozone, Google, Greece, Nicolas Sarkozy, regulation, US