Every Monday morning the readers of the UK’s Daily Telegraph
are treated to a sermon on the benefits of Keynesian stimulus
economics, the dangers of belt-tightening and the unnecessary cruelty of
‘austerity’ imposed on Europe by the evil Hun. To this effect, the
newspaper gives a whole page in its ‘Business’ section to Roger Bootle and Ambrose Evans-Pritchard,
who explain that growth comes from government deficits and from the
central bank printing money, and why can’t those stupid Europeans get
it? The reader is left with the impression that, if only the European
states could each have their little currencies back and merrily devalue
and run some proper deficits again, Greece could be the economic
powerhouse it was before the Germans took over.
Ambrose
Evans-Pritchard (AEP) increasingly faces the risk of running out of
hyperbolic war-analogies sooner than the euro collapses. For months he
has been numbing his readership with references to the Second World War
or the First World War, or to ‘1930s-style policies’ so that not even
the most casual reader on his way to the sports pages can be left in any
doubt as to how bad this whole thing in Europe is, and how bad it will
get, and importantly, who is responsible. From declining car sales in
France to high youth-unemployment in Spain, everything is, according to
AEP, the fault of Germany, a ‘foolish’ Germany. Apparently these nations
had previously well-managed and dynamic economies but have now sadly
fallen under the spell of Angela Merkel’s Thatcherite belief in
balancing the books and her particularly Teutonic brand of fiscal
sadism.
