Spanish soap opera: next chapter.

You knew it was too good to be true. The idea that the European states now in trouble would reduce their spending, get their bonds rolled over by the ECB and resume economic growth - it was just too good to be true.

Mario Draghi (head of the ECB) stated that it (the ECB) would do anything to preserve the European Union. In response Spanish and Italian bond rates fell. And the ECB did what? Had meetings and talked more.

There are structural impediments to doing anything. Using the Euro forces all its users to share the inadaquecies of Social Democracy. Good performers get dragged down by those who lag. And making decisions is hard, because of all the consultation that must be done. And the final decisions are usually too late to solve the problem, even if the decisions are thr right ones.

Most of all, Europe's problems are ade worse by the reverberations of the Socialists in Washington. When the US catches cold, Europe has pneumonia.