AN OFFICIAL CALLS

"Bit strident the other day weren't we, Charlie?"

"I don't know Jerry, I've said it before, just not in such great detail." Jerry is a very old friend employed by--let us say--not the private sector.

"I know but did you have to pile it on? Now that these publicity hounds have it and the newsspeak people are all over it, these things tend to become self-fulfilling. I wish you would stick to the Euros for a while. You're making a few folks nervous"

"Ah come on, we've all seen that movie before. They're going to muddle about until things begin to get too expensive and then hopefully by that time they will have gotten some honesty out of their banking systems, have a handle on what they need to fix them and get on with it by way of a restructuring circa 1980-ish."

"Very true so why not tell them how to do it rather than rolling hand grenades into closed rooms?"

"No fun in that. Besides my really smart friend Larry lives over there and he has less distance to go for the tutorial." The only thing left to decide is who goes first and where does Deutscheland come out."

"Uber Alles, mein good friend."

"Ja, In Die Welt if they had it their way! But as to our little Euroland west of the Hudson, you don't think I'm wrong do you? I know it's hard to see things from the swamp that is the Beltway but there has to be some worry."

"Charlie, I don't get paid to worry, I get paid to observe and advise."

"And...?"

I don't like what I see and they don't like what I am advising."

"Jerry, these clowns got it into their heads that whatever they did Uncle was going to bail them out. Maybe they were right a few years ago but from where I sit the good folks in the fly-over zone are in no mood to get into the Christmas Spirt with these deadbeats. In fact, the only "Christmas Spirit' I suspect people will hear is that which was uttered by Ol' Uncle Ebanezer; 'Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?'"

"I am afraid you are correct. So you are going to continue in your crusade?"

"Ah comeon, you weren't made for the silver stage...the silver vaults maybe, but not the stage. I, like you, Jerry, am merely an observer of the human condition about which I occasionally write.

"You, Charlie, are also full of crap but good at it. You also have this habit of being right from time to time."

"High praise."

"On the contrary, a worrisome commentary. Perhaps the Spirit of Christmas will enter and soften your heart and mind. Any chance?"

'For the next few days, Jerry, all the chance in the world. A Most Merry and Blessed Christmas old friend."

"And to you and yours Mr. James. It's always a pleasure."




...and a Most Merry Christmas to you all.