The Econonomist: "The euro may yet be doomed"

The Economist is spot on about the euro:

"If Germany, France and Italy cannot find a way to refloat Europe’s economy, the euro may yet be doomed." --

 "In recent weeks the countries of the euro zone have begun to take in water once again. Their collective GDP stagnated in the second quarter: Italy fell back into outright recession, French GDP was flat and even mighty Germany saw an unexpectedly large fall in output (see article). The third quarter looks pretty unhealthy, partly because the euro zone will suffer an extra drag from Western sanctions on Russia. Meanwhile, inflation has fallen perilously low, to around 0.4%, far below the near-2% target of the European Central Bank, raising fears that the zone as a whole could fall prey to entrenched deflation. German bond yields are hovering below 1%, another harbinger of falling prices. The euro zone stands (or wobbles) in stark contrast with America and Britain, whose economies are enjoying sustained growth."--

"(But) without a new push from the continent’s leaders, growth will not revive and deflation could take hold. Japan suffered a decade of lost growth in the 1990s, and is still struggling. But, unlike Japan, Europe is not a single cohesive country. If the currency union brings nothing but stagnation, joblessness and deflation, then some people will eventually vote to leave the euro. Thanks to Mr Draghi’s promise to put a floor under government debt, the market risk that financial pressures could trigger a break-up has receded. But the political risk that one or more countries decide to storm out of the single currency is rising all the time. The euro crisis has not gone away; it is just waiting over the horizon."

The euro in its present form is bound to fail. The sooner it happens, the better. Unfortunately the present European politicians will do their utmost in order to deny the failure, thus seriously delaying the much needed economic revival in Europe.

The truth about wind and solar power: "Their output is entirely unable to respond to electricity demand as and when needed"

It is good to be reminded of the fact that wind and solar power are not even close to solving the energy problems of highly industrialized countries:

there is a major problem with these renewable energy sources. Their electrical output is not dispatchable. Their output is entirely unable respond to electricity demand as and when needed. Energy is contributed to the grid in a haphazard manner dependent on the weather, and certainly not necessarily when it is required.
For example solar power inevitably varies according to the time of day, the state of the weather and also of course radically with the seasons. Essentially solar power might only work effectively in Southern latitudes and it certainly does not do well in Northern Europe. In Germany the massive commitment to solar energy might well provide up to ~20% of country wide demand for a few hours on some fine summer days either side of noon, but at the time of maximum power demand on winter evenings solar energy input is necessarily nil.
Electricity generation from wind turbines is equally fickle, as for example in a week in July this year shown above. Similarly an established high pressure zone with little wind over the whole of Northern Europe is a common occurrence in winter months, that is when electricity demand is likely to be at its highest.
Conversely on occasions renewable energy output may be in excess of demand and this has to dumped unproductively. There is still no solution to electrical energy storage on a sufficiently large industrial scale. That is the reason that the word “nominally” is used here in relation to the measured outputs from renewable energy sources.

Finnish PM Stubb: "Russia´s repeated incursions into Finnish airspace are deliberate and designed to create tension"

The behaviour of Putin´s Russia is beginning to seriously irritate also the Finns:

Russia’s repeated incursions into Finnish airspace are deliberate and designed to create tension, Prime Minister Stubb claimed on Saturday.
Speaking on Yle’s Ykkösaamu politics show, the prime minister said the three alleged violations by Russian aircraft within the space of one week were “not a question of an accident”, and said the behaviour gave a “bad message”.
Stubb said Russia's foreign policy is based on "power politics" and the philosophy that "if I'm winning, you're losing". He said it was not uncommon for the superpower to forment instability on its borders, such as in Ukraine and in Georgia in 2008.
He described the situation as “serious” but said there is no cause for alarm. “You can’t compare what’s happening in Ukraine to the situation in Finland,” he said.
On Friday Finland’s defence forces announced its Hornet fighter jets were on standby to see off any further attempted airspace breaches.

How does one deal with a mentally unstable dictator in charge of huge nuclear arsenal?

Western governments face a terrifying dilemma: How do you deal with a mentally unstable dictator in charge of a huge arsenal of nuclear weapons?

Vladimir Putin raised the spectre of nuclear war with the West on Friday as he defied international condemnation over his decision to send thousands of Russian troops and heavy armour into Ukraine.

Accused by Europe and Nato of launching a full-scale invasion of eastern Ukraine, the Russian leader boasted to a group of Russian youngsters that "It's best not to mess with us."

In language not seen since the height of the Cold War, he told his audience: "Thank God, I think no one is thinking of unleashing a large-scale conflict with Russia. I want to remind you that Russia is one of the leading nuclear powers."

Read the entire article here

Canadian delegation to NATO gives Putin and his troops a geography lesson

Canada offers some useful assistance to Putin and his troops:

Canada at NATO‏@CanadaNATO 22h

Geography can be tough. Here’s a guide for Russian soldiers who keep getting lost & ‘accidentally’ entering #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/RF3H4IXGSp

It is time to teach the liar Putin a lesson

Vladimir Putin - a criminal liar.

"Russia has nothing to do with the war in the Ukraine - it only sends the separatists tanks, missiles and paratroopers."
Berthold Kohler
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

"Russian soldiers fight in the Ukraine, Moscow leads a secret war against the neighboring country. It's time to call a spade a spade."
Die Tageszeitung


Time magazine:

Putin’s persistent denials of Russian involvement have started to crack, eroded by a growing body of proof that Russian soldiers are in fact fighting and dying in eastern Ukraine. The evidence suggests a new level of Russian involvement in the war, not merely funneling weapons and volunteers across the border to the pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine, but sending regular Russian ground forces on missions into Ukrainian territory. The inevitable result of that escalation has been a growing Russian casualty count, and the funerals and panicked relatives of Russian soldiers have been hard to sweep under the rug. Soon they are likely to force Putin either to come clean and admit his country’s intervention in Ukraine, or to face the growing public resentment over his denials.

It is time for the West to teach the liar Vladimir Putin a lesson!

David J. Kramer is right: "The last thing we need is a renewed search for accommodation with Putin"

David J. Kramer, president of Freedom House, has written an excellent article about the dangerous dictator Vladimir Putin. Here are the last paragraphs of Kramer´s article:

Russia’s military doctrine from 2010 cites as Russia’s top “external military danger” the enlargement of NATO and its military infrastructure “closer to the borders of the Russian Federation.” The reality, of course, is that Russia’s most secure and stable borders are with those countries—Estonia, Latvia,
Lithuania, Poland, Norway, and Finland—that are members of NATO and/or the European Union.
Citing this history is not to suggest that Putin is all rhetoric and no danger. On the contrary, a paranoid Putin is very dangerous for Russia’s neighbors and for internal critics. Just ask Georgia, which Russia invaded in 2008, or Estonia, the victim of a Russian cyberattack in 2007, or Moldova, which has endured trade cutoffs, or Ukraine today.
At the end of the day, Putin wants to destabilize Ukraine and other neighbors to make them unappealing to the West. Putin fabricates a threat to ethnic Russians in Ukraine to justify his invasion; the reality is there were no such threats, but more importantly he doesn’t give a damn about their welfare. After all, he doesn’t care about the rights of Russians living in his own country as evidenced by his nasty crackdown on human rights there and the import food ban. Whether Ukraine creates a federal model or some other form of governance is of no interest to Putin; fomenting chaos and separatism in Ukraine are his main objectives.
This is why calls by some commentators for Western leaders to “explore a quiet compromise” with Putin over the crisis in Ukraine and to “understand the Russian leader’s concerns, his demands, his ideas for possibly de-escalating the situation”are pointless, even counterproductive. Putin is not interested in de-escalating unless that would help him with his number one priority: staying in power.
Indeed, Putin is willing to do whatever it takes to stay in power, including, it appears, invading Ukraine under the phony pretext of a “humanitarian intervention.” Making matters worse, through his control over television programming, Putin’s propaganda has tapped into an increasingly ugly mood among Russians (see this “Bike Show” over the past weekend in Sevastopol) that will be hard to tamp down—and may even spin beyond Putin’s control. This makes Putin, and now even Russia, a serious threat. To deal with this challenge requires even tougher sanctions, including adding Putin himself to the sanctions list, and the provision of military assistance by which Ukraine and other neighbors—and not just NATO members—can defend themselves. The last thing we need is a renewed search for accommodation with Putin.