What Was VW Thinking?

In my years on Wall Street it was always said that Fear and Greed were the driving forces which led to the massive excesses which occur with disturbing regularity.

That they would drive the management of VW to the same excesses was something that was not supposed to happen.  Manufacturing industries still make things and the quality, and the nature of the products were there for all to see. 

There were no structured products; no sub-prime mortgages; no power caps; no inverse floaters; in short no financial engineering to create opaque financings where the bank was always the house and the clients always the mugs.

And then VW decided that engineering is engineering and if a financial construct could be used to circumvent regulations then an engineering construct could do the same.

Create a bit of kit that initiates emission controls when required, and turns them off under normal driving conditions.  (Criminally) Brilliant!

This is an intelligent bit of software.  It bypassed regulatory emissions tests for years.  No one believed the figures as everyone knew that the test results were done under circumstances far and away from actual driving conditions.

But I don't think anyone in their wildest imagination ever considered that the test results were achieved by a piece of software that would  turn on the "cleaning" equipment thus complying with the emission standards, and then automatically turn them off  allowing the engines to run without any emission controls at all.

It's not fudging.  It's not exaggerating.  It is pure and simple actively and consciously contravening the regulations. 

It is criminal.

And the fallout could have global repercussions. 

I can only hope that this actually is the first nail in the coffin of the internal combustion engine. 

Electric cars will remove a significant amount of pollution.  Of course we still need to deal with how that electricity is generated, but that is a discussion for another blog.

 

Don't Leave it to the Right Wing

Without a shadow of a doubt the rich developed world has had a crisis in the making since the original creation of colonial empires.


No matter how one tries to shade it the colonial powers practiced political, racial and economic  exploitation which left deep scars regardless of how recent-or not- the granting of "independence" was.


Now the West is reaping the rewards of its geopolitical arrogance.  We drew lines across geographies which had no relevance to the peoples living there; not to their loyalties, their religion, their language, their culture or even their ethnicity .  Indeed, there were times that boundaries were drawn precisely intended to keep any one group from gaining hegemony over an area ensuring that the inherent tensions were an accident waiting to happen.


And the result?  War, Famine and Poverty plague the former colonies from North Africa into the sub-Sahara  through the Middle East to Afghanistan creating a migration of peoples not seen since Attila the Hun came charging out of Central Asia driving such a mass of refugees that the West Roman Empire eventually collapsed leading to the East and West Goths controlling Central Europe.


The point here is to highlight that Europe is facing a massive challenge to formulate a cohesive response to a massive influx of refugees- be they driven by political, economic or military fears.  And it is not looking very coherent.


Twenty years ago I saw a film about the ramifications of having rich and poor continents essentially bumping up against one another. The plot was straight forward.  The poor and miserable of Africa were marching across the continent to Gibraltar.  There, despite the currents, through their sheer mass, exercising non-violence a-la- The Battle for Algiers they bridged their way to the Spanish coast.  And their mantra was that they were poor, because we are rich...


Today that film is reality.  I would like to emphasize that the causes of the migration are myriad, but somewhere in the mix it is clear that economics are involved.  Economics drive politics.  Economics drive wars.  Economics drives everything.


Generically Europe is a wealthy area.


It is not to say that Europe shouldn't be taking refugees.  It should.  But it has to look at who is coming.  It has to look at how the intake of refugees effects the social structure of the country, the county, the city and the village to which they are coming. 


Currently the pro-narrative has been driven by Germany with its twisted history of the Second World War and concurrent desire to demonstrate that its fascist past was an aberration.


The contra-narrative has been left to the far right such as Alternative fuer Deutschland,  The National Party Deutschland, The National Front, The British National Party, The Party for Freedom, Jobbik
Golden Dawn, Finns, The Danish People's Party, Austrian Freedom and Liga Nord.


This is extremely dangerous.


They are populist parties not only preying on the fears of the lower strata of society, but also appealing to the Middle Classes who feel their position in society is perilous and are looking for a party that "protects" their interest.


The Refugees are "ad Portas.  We have to have a response which is both humanitarian and, frankly, takes into account the fact that it will be expensive to integrate them and part of that cost will be to ensure that those to whom their very presence is a threat-be it real or perceived-are not alienated.


For that door leads backwards to a past we would like to leave behind us.