Comments on: An Imperfect Union: Europe's debt crisis
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- And the liberals hold socialist Europe up as a model for us to follow. And following it we are, to the same end.
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- WWII, the Greeks were the only nation to fight Hitler and Mussolini and they held the Nazi at bay for six weeks after destroying Mussolini's army which forced the Nazis to send reinforcements from another front to take on the Greeks. When the SS forces entered France, Holland and other Western European countries, they faced no resistance, the French and Dutch and other Western Europeans laid down their arms and fled, their governments turned over the Jewish population willingly. The Greeks were slaughtered and pillaged but turned over not a single Greek Jew to the thieving murdering German soldiers who looted the Greek coffers taking tons of gold and other treasures back to Germany which were never returned. The current Greek economy is a wreck because the Greek government entered the Euro Zone and accepted the Euro currency in the false belief that dealings with the Germans would be fair and equitable. Currently the biggest and almost only beneficiary of the Euro Currency and Euro Zone is Germany.
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- Perhaps all the gloom and doom stories are accurate, but please, can we hunt around the world for GOOD NEWS????
You know, it is sunniest in Australia, or New Zealand limits petrol prices to $1.60 to protect citizens from exploitation??
Or even, the people of Japan are working hard to repair the damage caused by the 2011 tsunami!
Come on CBS!! I am sure that you can dig up some good stories from (say) Iowa State Fair? Or How to Rock in the Rockies? or how about "Texas for Tomorrow".
We have had drivel about terror, the state of the Economy, the incompetence of Congress (agreed), and the socialism of Obama. How about some HAPPY stories??
The US citizen, on average, cares more about happy stories than about Goldman Sachs.
Remember, since the USA was founded, the Rich have been Rich and the Poor, Poor!!
It is a fact!!!
PLease, please,please, media try airing some happy stories of how Neighbourly Iowa and Kansas really are, and how Jesse and Ike came to the rescue of stranded tourists on Route 66, taking care of them and seeing them on their way with happy smiles and "have a good day".
There is much good in the world, and the USA has more of its share.
Reflect that good CBS, the USA will thank you for it, as there has been too much navel gazing and gloom for years!
The US needs change, but the November elections are not the only change USA needs! Look how happy people were in the `50s, and they got by with LESS!!
How about lessons in modesty and neighborliness and forget International affairs for a while??? - Reply to this comment
- I am disappointed that 60 minutes has fallen under the govenment's oversight along with all other mainstream media. We are recognizing the great journalist Mike Wallace who served, and was a champion of the American people. We watch now and see 60 minutes interviewing the IMF head about European crisis woth never mentioning the fraud that is the real problem. There is no financial crisis; there are bad, fraudulent loans that need to be written off by the banks that made them.....another comment showed the Goldman Sachs connection in bringing the debt burden to the heights it is now....fraudulently, just like the subbprime mortgage fraud. These are the reasons for the debt crisis and the solution for it, but 60 minutes allowed the bankers to continue to frame it away from themselves.
Citizens are busy recreating a people's journalism and mainstream media will become irrelevant. - Reply to this comment
- The statement she makes that the US is doing terribly well is so uninformed so as to be laughable. The US is simply a slow motion train wreck of colossal debt, which inevitably causes economic contraction and destruction of value, as debt payments (i.e., debt service) eat into future cash flow. I won't pretend to understand how deflating the dollar and paying the debt back in less valuable dollars (big inflation) helps the situation, as many argue, is fine, doable, and sustainable. I take the opposite view--when gas is $15 per gallon and bread $12 per loaf, how can that be good??
When will the EU sue Goldman Sachs for getting these unstable countries into the EU by vouching for their financial status?? Is there no thought of pinning responsibility on Goldman for this?? - Reply to this comment
- As a cautionary tale, the UK was in a recession since 2008 and then came out of it during's David Cameron first year. Instead of promoting job security and creation, instead of encouraging bank to lend to small businesses, instead of keeping VAT at 17% he decided to cut social services, raise VAT to 20%, didn't discipline the banks and ask them to lend money to business, cut tax benefits, trying to change the NHS which really is freaking people out...these measures have actually sent the UK BACK INTO RECESSION. Kid you not. The UK was never like Greece, not even a bit of a resemblance. It had no reason to copy Greece's austerity program.
Greece, Spain, Italy (interestingly and controversially Southern and Catholic - but Greece - still Southern) are extremely lax in their lifestyle. Until three years ago, the Greeks retired with pension nearly close to their full salaries at 50 year old. No one in Greece paid taxes or hardly. You were considered a fool, a chump if you did pay taxes. When Greece wanted to join the EU, many E ministers knew that Greece's finances were fake back then but people were bribed, looked away and now are scrambling to undo their idiotic choice to admit Greece into the EU.
But on the other side, look at Netherlands, Norway, Finland, and finally the number one, Denmark. These are countries the Tea Party supporters hate. These are the countries that defy everything that the Tea Party can't understand, stand against. They are financially strong, have higher wages, more freedoms, longer life spans and better education. They tend to be countries that constantly out rank the States in the Quality of Life Index and the Survey of the Happiest Countries. You can bury your heads in the sand but these countries are doing something right.
Unfortunately, the UK has slipped to 14th, I think, under the US. While the US is out of the recession, the UK is back for a double session of recession, a Cautionary Tale. - Reply to this comment
- by Popstroids April 9, 2012 1:31 AM EDT
The real citizens of the US have no desire to copy Europe, far too many mistakes. Mr Obama is only for posters and TV snippets, otherwise worthless. Mr Obama will sell the US to China in a second.------------------Of course there is no desire to change the world for a better place, but to continue the same selfishness of enrichment. Europeans immigrated to America in search of new horizons to escape policital and religious persecution, but conveniently kept some political entrapments for the betterment of higher solical echelons. It's too expense to be a compasionate human being. - Reply to this comment
- What a poor report.
Blaming countries and it's people but missing the big picture: Who lent the money, why was the money lent, why was the so called 'debt' allowed to get out of control? Could it be to 'on purpose'? To destroy economies as the IMF have done to other countries so these countries fall under their umbrella? Ever thought of that?
Bailouts that go back to the banks who give the money BUT the debt remains on the Greek balance sheet. And the Greek people not seeing a cent of the money?
Greece, Italy, Spain,Portugal were doing fine until it joined the EU? Why?
Where are these questions 60 Minutes?
And how the cocky Germans forget their own 1953 bailout when they requested 'help' from the world after destroying most of Europe(who were never helped financially and had to pick up the pieces)? Remember these bailouts:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,769703,00.html
Whilst most of your audience thinks this is a simple matter of spending, 60 minutes should have focused on the creative accounting methods used to create this false debt as well. And why. - Reply to this comment
- There are two major issues that this segment failed to address.
First, and most importantly, the issue of Germany repaying its debts to Greece after the horrific events of WWII. The German finance minister talks about the Greeks repaying their debts but he fails to mention that Germany forcibly extracted a massive "occupation loan" and basically plundered the Greek National Bank during its occupation of Greece. This "loan" was never repaid. In fact, Germany has failed to repay all of its debts to Greece. The finance minister has the audacity to discuss Greece's lack of financial prudence while the Nazis murdered, ransacked and devastated Greece and the Greek people - in comparison a minor offense on the part of Greece. In addition, there is the issue of war reparations for the mass atrocities and war crimes that have not been repaid to the Greek people. Greece was one of the most devastated countries of the Nazi was machine, but is the only country that has not received payment for those crimes. Repayment of these debts could wipe out most of Greece's debts, but Germany (and apparently 60 minutes) fails to acknowledge the elephant in the room.
A second issue is that of the bread lines in your footage. Most of those people you show looking for a handout of food are not, in fact, Greek people. They are an example of the hundreds of thousands of the immigrants coming from many of the poorer countries around Greece who have also played a significant role in devastating the Greece culture and economy. Greek women do not wear headscarves, as most of the women in the footage of the bread lines are wearing.
Sincerely,
ElladaMou - Reply to this comment
- Funny! I live in Germany for quite sometime. European countries are having problems, the same socio-economic problems any normal country has. Europeans have their health care working for them. You don't have to listen to selfish diatribes coming from annoying Republican religious minded idiots. Our Parlament do not waste time time talkinkg about contraception, or what women should do to procreate. Our Parlament mean business which more that you can say about your Congress. The Euro might have problems, but it's still on top of the Dollar. Ask the GI here trying to pay the rent. Germany's car industsry is in top of the world; if is not for Obama, you would no have car industry. Germany is number 1 in top quality exports. I mentioned "quality". If you talk about just exports, then China is number 1. Your fear of Socialism is so ridiculous is almost painful. You talk America, the most generous country in world, but when comes to take care of you own people you turn Facist. Hello! Get it together. Behave like what you claim to be. A Chistin country!
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