OVER THERE

A remarkable thing happened today.  Little Paulie Krugman actually wrote a piece in the Times that more or less made sense.  All about Germany's self centered interests, crushing demands upon the southern tier, mad fiscal policy, blah, blah.  He was actually pretty much right if you take the view that Germany owes Europe.

Well, I'm not sure the Germans feel the same way for after all, it has been the the good Burgers'
money that has kept the EU afloat for the past few years, but today, Signore Prodi of Italy, almost as though on cue, suggested that what need happen is the formation of a coalition of the southern states to combat Germany, warning that "Germany will never sell another car in Italy" unless things change.

Now Prodi is not to be taken lightly.  He was probably the strongest moving force behind the establishment of the Euro and ran the EU for a goodly number of years.  Without him, all that has come about probably would not have happened but at the same time we cannot forget that it was his manipulation of the value of the Lira that made Italy eligible for European (manipulation is probably the wrong word..flat out lying about the value of the currency is more accurate) as he firmly believed that there could be no EU without Italy (probably correct).  Of course that has come back to bite Italia nel'la culo but it seemed like a good idea at the time.  Anyway, I thought this would be the week to talk about Europe and that's what we will do beginning tomorrow.  Meanwhile, Over Here, the train wreck that is Obama Care dominates all the conversation in DC with nary a sound emerging as to the discussions over the budget which in case you haven't been paying attention has about a month and a half left to solve all of our fiscal problems, and various factions of government continue to bring legal actions against anything that looks like a financial organization or financier.
Big win today, The Justice department nailed Steve Cohen and his SAC corporation with a $1.8 billion dollar settlement.  Of course that is exactly what Cohen was supposed to make this year.  Oh yeah, it's tax deductible.  Everybody wins.