Posts filed under 'Posts in English'
The situation remains – where realized – a taboo in the political discussion. Any such pessimism is considered dangerous as it will hamper a surge in consumer confidence needed to avoid recession from developing into a depression. Please ignore the Siberian blizzard and wet your trousers to keep warm!
Realising that something is wrong one side of the political spectrum try to energize the national economy by spending some money to keep more occupied until the end of the ‘recession‘. By so doing it worsens the situation in two ways. Firstly by ignoring that the free capital market has established an open and uncontrolled drain from the public budget deficit to international finance and secondly and directly because all extra economic activity means extra import. The other side of the spectrum realises the need for reduced public spending, but with the aim of increasing private consumption to minimize the effects of the ‘recession‘, the result will be the same, and its unlimited faith in the market makes it incapable of seing its destructive effects.
Continue Reading November 26th, 2011
That bleak future is a result of Western naivity and ignorance of its own history, including recent history. In delirious hubris at the ‘End of History‘ we adopted raw capitalism as God and Molok, uncritically subordinating any political control and management to the assumed blessings of the ‘Market‘.
We are left without other options than to hope that Flemming Ytzen’s assumed authoritarian but civilized Chinese imperial power will allow us room for rebuilding our societies after the collapse and troubles of the coming decades
Continue Reading November 12th, 2011
Both the politicians and their economic advisors are like navigators on a liner cruising in iceberg infested waters. The ship has been damaged by several minor iceberg hits and the mixed group on the bridge is arguing how they are going to get past the next such obstacles without totally loosing control. Late October 2011 the German ship-owner forced the rest to take a course past the closest large iceberg and to accept plans for new rules for cooperation. All ignore that some time back they deliberately blew away all seacocks and bilge pumps of the western economies to let the sea flow freely in – and out (ignoring that gravity would make this rather unlikely).
It is a veteran historian’s attempt to read through the chaff of public discourse during the phased economic melt-down. He desperately hopes – especially for his daughters and grandsons – that he is wrong in the analysis.
Continue Reading October 15th, 2011
It seems clear that the West is close to giving up trying to do what is clearly necessary to concentrate on doing the totally inadequate that can be done in agreement – thereafter to sit in a circle with heads in the sand and fingers crossed in hopeful ‘interthinking’.
Continue Reading November 26th, 2009
… as the Baltic States, Russia is now hit very hard by the international depression, due to the country’s dependence on an increasingly rundown oil industry. In the short term this may be good for Baltic security. However, if the current depression worsens, and lasts several years, which is now most likely, it could destabilise Russia politically far further than in the early 1990’s. Russia is far too large and screwed to be helped by an IMF-loan. The final result of such a destabilisation is very hard to foresee.
Continue Reading February 21st, 2009
It might be a good idea for NATO to conduct all the combined training for Afghanistan in Eastern Europe, thus discretely marking the continued relevance of Article V of the Washington Treaty. It would be seen as comforting by the East Europeans, it might awaken some West Europeans to the continuation of history, and it will be registered by the closely observing Russians.
Continue Reading June 11th, 2007
In most of Continental Europe, the Second World War became a civil war, where small and large nations were drafted, enticed or forced by lack of other options to fight for both totalitarian systems. No matter how courageously they fought for their comrades, their effort must be remembered as deeply tragic, as the Estonian have wisely chosen to do at the bloody ‘Blue Hills’ 1944 battlefield West of Narva. Fighting for a totalitarian system must not be celebrated, but mourned. Unfortunately the Russian leadership is far from realising or accepting this.
Continue Reading April 29th, 2007