Thank you, Mr. Cohen. After your sometimes somewhat hysterical comments on Germany's role in trying to stem the current economic and fiscal crisis in the Euro zone, this piece offers a very well balanced assessment of the current situation in Greece:
"In fact, of course, Germany has also saved Greece from bankruptcy. It did so for the European Union, which helped usher Germany from its cataclysmic “zero hour” of 1945. Through Europe, Germany came back. Through Europe, Greece has been saved from the fate of Weimar. At a time when pettiness surrounds thinking about the E.U., and the assumption is widespread that the Union’s peacemaking role is over, it is critical to recall that the Union is Europe’s surest safeguard against the Continent’s darkest hours."
Germany's insistence on "reforms" and"restructuring" stems from its own hard-won experience to turn itself from "the sick man of Europe" during the '90's and '00's into the strong economic power of today. It is not some demonic effort to "achieve by economic means what it could not achieve by war".
We have friends and relatives in Greece, middle to upper-middle class, and with a wink, and with seemingly no sense of regret or guilt, they admit in private that they have hardly ever paid any income taxes. Even today there are still reports that most small businesses will do cash-only business, not giving any receipts, to avoid paying any taxes at all.
That is not sustainable. The "austerity" being experienced in Greece now is not due to explicit, malvolent "austerity" policies, but attempts to make Greece sustainable. Euro 250 Billion in aid is quite a bit to ease the pain of that austerity!
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