Freedom isn't Free

This morning I read an article in the Washington Post recommending that the solution to the Europeans fiscal plight would be a "tea party" movement to lobby for fiscal conservatism.

Now in my book anyone arguing that the solution to anything is to invite a right-wing fringe group like the tea party agitators essentially disqualifies themselves from being taken seriously.

I am not denying the need for fiscal restraint, nor the need for many voices in a functioning democracy, but the history of the United States has demonstrated time and time again that self-regulation is basically a chimera in pursuing the unlimited opportunities of the American Dream.

The tea party's "limited, responsible" government is often enough a byword for lawlessness and the tea party movement, harking back to their namesakes, demonstrated that in their original (dis)guise. Just a thought-why were they dressed as Indians?

The article continued on to praise Mervyn King's "Sudoku for Economists" which King claims illustrates "that it is essentially a political and not a technical problem" because the required balance between high-saving and low-saving countries requires political will, all on the part of the low savers!

The low-saving countries must "reduce their net borrowing" and stop playing the "role of consumer of last resort". Oh, so now it's all our fault. The fact that the high-saving nations on the whole are characterised by low wages, no social welfare nets and essentially non-existent environmental protection laws and as such are making workers in the low-savings nations redundant doesn't come in to the equation?

Perhaps it is because the Mervyn Kings of the world think that you can separate politics and economics. Personally I don't buy that.