For the issue at hand, i agree with other poster.. Things are not as bad as the article paints. That article as a lot of sensacionalism..

But i tell you this: We will see the real crisis (or not) after the holidays.. When people get back to work (mainly factories, we still produce goods.. we didnt embrace only business - maybe something to teach to the troll here.. europe is right at something...) and if their workplaces are no more.. then we are in real (snip).

If not.. then that means we are already recovering..

Duct tape is simply Amazing stuff...

Works in the event of An Anthrax attack or to seal your clothes from Fallout...

Holds the EU together

Seriously, Duct tape apparently is man kinds best invention... they need to re write hitch hikers guide to the Galaxy script out the towel and replace it with duct tape

Duct tape is like "The Force": it has a light side, a dark side and it holds the universe together.

If anything can hold the EU together, it's duct tape!

Originally posted by AReptileFeeder

Originally posted by wonderworld

The EU economy is crutial to the global financial stability. There was a time not long ago that many counties bagged the dollar in favor of the Euro.

Arab confederacies were tossing around the idea of a petro-Euro.

There have been some in the US that will only be paid in Euro's but they may have second thoughts.

nobody cares about the european union hate to break it to you

i don't think it serves any purpose other than to be cute and neat

the truth is, the european union is a joke homie...

europe is a joke, homie

they just want to eat, sleep, and repeat. they won't help us against the 2 wars we are fighting, they won't do anything but eat and sleep.

They didn't help you becuase you are a rogue state- you are in the wrong, why should another union assist a criminal action ?

Further more, Europe is considerably more important financially and globally than the US, along with historical, strategic, and long term significance - the US is just not that important - except of course to parochial flag waving Americans - but then again a self assessment of self worth if totally worthless -

The concept of EU was born because of strategical geopolitical alliance between Europe's stronger voices: mainly France and Germany.

Now, with 27 countries on board, it just can't be all about France and Germany. Other voices have to be heard. A lot of them. And that's what is failing in the EU. Greece is living such a hard time, that back-tracking on the Euro and signing off from the Union isn't such a remote possibility anymore. And such wild claims are already heard in Portugal in the smaller wing parties: right wing (Neonazis from PNR), and Communists.

The EU has been a very bad piece of business for the smaller countries.

Do you really mean the concept of EU or the ECSC of the beginnings ?
There's no geostrategic alliance, it's more of an economical alliance. EU can hardly speak as one voice. EU has no army of his own, in terms of strategy and geopolitics, what can they do ? How can they bear upon the international situation ? As it is, EU cannot do much but follow others lead.

It has never been only France and Germany. First, they have opposite views on what the EU should be. Second, UK is a very important member too. It's a common view the union goes further when France and Germany settle their disagreements and find a compromise. EU is always about an awful lot of negociations, compromises, promises, etc... It takes only a handful of members to block all processes, even small sized countries. You are right that now with a very high number of members, it's increasingly difficult to find compromises that satisfy everyone. Big members use their power to gain the support of small members, small members try to take advantage by asking for more.

As far as I know, Greece speaks about getting out of the euro zone not the EU.
I think in every EU member, you will find people advocating quitting the EU.
The questions aroud the EU now are around its future role, especially in the world stage and how to project influence independantly or not of the USA.
Objectively, EU was not bad for smaller countries. Greece and Portugal are the best exemples. They developped dramatically since they joined the EEC. They benefitted economically in a major scale by receiving ECC/EU aids that helped create the good infrastructures they were lacking and weren't able to finance. Right wing reject EU for nationalism, autonomist reasons, communists because of capitalism, it's not a new trend and you will those trends in each member country.

When I read the title to this post the first thing I thought was that the Canadian Comic Red Green (Steve Smith) was now in charge of the EU's money problems. Him being the resident expert on all things Duct Tape related!!

Zindo

[edit on 6/22/2009 by ZindoDoone]

Atually last summer the Canadian dollar was almost on par with the US dollar and came closer to the Euro. Now the US economy is sinking faster than the Canadian one and yet the Can$ is loosing ground on the US$ but closing the gap on the Euro.

Some people think this means the US$ is getting better but I think it means other currencies are just doing worse. Of course it's likely someone is trying to manipulate the values of these currencies. Depress the Euro and Can$, use US$ to buy them then wait for the US$ to crash which will briefly cause the others to skyrocket allowing you to make a furtune. Just get out quickly of those other $$ because the likely outcome is a massive crash of all currencies.

New Figure 5. Industrial output, four big Europeans, then and now
Months in to Crisis;





I'll find one from 2009. I think this is from 2008, which is also significant.