Excolar.net

Los analistas, banqueros y periodistas basados en Londres con los que he hablado recientemente están de acuerdo en resaltar la espectacular mejora en la política de comunicación del gobierno con los mercados. Esta política incluye páginas web informativas y de calidad, reuniones claras con analistas en Londres y en Madrid, incluyendo la famosa presentación del Banco de España a los analistas tras las pruebas de estrés del año pasado y que tan bien le sirvió al país, notas de prensa con calendario preanunciado sobre el cumplimiento de los objetivos presupuestarios, sobre la estrategia seguida, etc.

Este no es el caso desgraciadamente de los países en la crisis. Al contrario que la empresa del ejemplo anterior, el gobierno de un país, tiene la posibilidad de comunicar creíblemente con el público cuando todo el mundo sabe que al gobierno no le apetece reformar y recortar; por tanto si anuncia que “todo está fatal”, el público tiende a creer al gobierno.

Pero a la vez, al gobierno le interesa siempre conseguir financiación en el mercado, con lo cual al mercado nunca le puede decir que todo está fatal. El problema es que para el mercado, prestar cuando todo está fatal es costosísimo. Por ello, el juego con el mercado es uno en el que se exagera lo bueno y esto reduce (o elimina) la credibilidad.

I actually think the issue goes beyond the increasing unwillingness of Chinese authorities to even pretend to listen to Western complaints about human rights. Unless you buy the Nouriel Roubini argument, and I don't, China is going to be the world's largest economy within ten or 15 years, bigger than America or the euro-zone. And, in case anyone has failed to notice, it's a Communist country. Every year China continues to grow, the case that countries need to be democracies in order to become wealthy and developed becomes more tenuous. In fact, what's happening both in America and in the EU at this point is raising the possibility that democratic governance may in some modern situations be inimical to competent economic stewardship. The incentive structure created by democratic political competition in an internet-era media society may actually be driving countries towards fiscal self-destruction. We're increasingly getting a polarised, viciously divisive, intellectually bankrupt, wildly irresponsible populism that lives up to every negative caricature of multiparty democracy that a CCP ideological hack could dream up. That's certainly what the behaviour of the tea-party-driven GOP and the Party for Freedom suggests.

Last week Clive Crook had a piece, also in the FT, arguing for America to create more automatic fiscal stabilisers to take the issue of stimulus during recessions out of the hands of Congress; the less economic policymaking in the hands of that "broken institution", he wrote, the better. I agree with the point, but it says something pretty troubling about the place of democratic rule on the world stage at this point in history. It seems to me that if we're at a point where we are increasingly calling for important policymaking to be taken out of the hands of our elected representatives, we need to start addressing the problems that are rendering our representative institutions unworkable. The case for democracy is a moral one, not an economic one; but if democracies can't handle responsible governance, either on economic or more general policy issues, then governance will gradually become less democratic, and the moral case will make little difference. And this is where Europe and North America, the places where democratic rule is most deeply rooted, ought to see themselves as being on the same side.

Ya está bien de populismo, joder. Hay que reimplantar el voto censitario, qué es eso de que cualquier mindundi pueda votar lo que le de la gana. Además, ¿os habéis preguntado cuánto cuesta organizar unas elecciones? El voto tiene que ser de peaje.

Dictadura financiera: ¿hacemos oposición o dejamos que nos gobiernen los mercados?

Nadie los ha elegido. Invaden y contaminan los poderes del estado, son responsables del aumento de la pobreza y el hambre, de que miles de millones no tengan nada, forzados a vivir sin dignidad. Pero nadie les pide cuentas a quienes manejan los mercados a su antojo

Los ‘mercados’ hacen lo que les da la gana impunemente, hundiendo a quien sea mientras obtienen obscenos beneficios. Es la dictadura financiera. Dictadura camuflada, maquillada, disfrazada y travestida para aparentar ser natural, necesaria e inevitable. Pero dictadura.

Carlos Berzosa nos ha recordado recientemente un texto de “Contra la tercera vía” , de Alex Callinicos, en el que varios economistas asesores del presidente Clinton le informan de que lo urgente no es hacer las reformas económicas de su programa electoral, sino disminuir el déficit público para calmar a los mercados. Clinton, muy cabreado, pregunta: “¿El éxito del programa y de mi reelección depende de la Reserva Federal y de un puñado de mercaderes de bonos?” Y nadie se lo negó.

Gentes amorales, guiadas por una codicia obscena, gentes que nadie ha elegido jamás y nunca se han sometido al veredicto de las urnas, corrompen impunemente la economía. Inductores, ejecutores, cómplices necesarios y encubridores. Son los especuladores, evasores de impuestos, bancos y otras entidades financieras, grandes corporaciones, dirigentes de entidades económico-financieras internacionales… Con la inestimable colaboración de gobiernos serviles más los dueños y dirigentes de los medios llamados informativos… La minoría privilegiada.

Ike Eisenhower, en su último discurso a la nación como presidente, advirtió que “debemos guardarnos del complejo industrial militar. No debemos permitir jamás que el peso de su influencia ponga en peligro nuestras libertades ni nuestra democracia”.

Sustituyan ‘complejo militar industrial’ por tinglado económico-financiero y tendrán el diagnóstico de nuestros días. La dictadura financiera.

Da igual, por ejemplo, que índices económicos de España apunten a la recuperación (según sus neoliberales esquemas); las agencias de calificación rebajan la calidad de la deuda española. Porque sólo interesa especular y ganar ingentes cantidades de dinero al margen de la economía real. Lo demás, decorado.

Nadie los ha elegido ni ratificado, no tienen jamás en cuenta los derechos de la gente, invaden y contaminan los poderes del estado, son responsables del aumento de la pobreza, de más hambre en el mundo, de tantas miles de muertes que no tenían que ser, de que miles de millones no tengan nada, forzados a vivir sin dignidad. Y nadie les pide cuentas.

Interesantísimo, como siempre, Amicus.

Lo único que le falta en este blog es contar un chiste, y seguro que es cojonudo.

For months, the Republican leaders have emphatically pledged that there will be no increase in the federal debt ceiling absent huge cuts in government spending and fundamental changes in popular social programs, all without the whiff of a tax increase.

Now, with negotiations stalled and a potential default by the United States government just over the horizon, they are being held to those promises by their own rank-and-file, leaving them in a bind that is defying easy resolution and putting them at risk of being blamed if things end badly.

Behind closed doors and by phone, they groped for a solution and struggled to assert some kind of control over the situation as rank-and-file Republican members, especially in the House, grew more confrontational.

Panic had not yet set in, but the worry and tension were evident as seasoned lawmakers of both parties whose experience told them that Congress always finds a white-knuckle way to avert disaster wondered if this was going to be the time when it did not.

“Our problem is, we made a big deal about this for three months,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina.

“How many Republicans have been on TV saying, ‘I am not going to raise the debt limit,’ ” said Mr. Graham, including himself in the mix of those who did so. “We have no one to blame but ourselves.”

Potential last-minute options were being gamed out around Capitol Hill. Senate Republicans were pushing their counterparts in the House to deliver some legislation, which could take the form of a balanced budget plan due on the House floor next week. A bipartisan group that had been working on a major deficit-cutting plan in the Senate was trying again to produce a proposal.

And Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader and procedural maestro, was pushing his plan that would allow a debt limit increase to clear Congress without Republican fingerprints — and without the guaranteed cuts many in his party are demanding. He would establish an elaborate process where Congress would vote to disapprove instead of approve a debt limit request. That would allow the president to raise the debt ceiling via a successful veto of the disapproval if it came to that.

Despite resistance from conservatives and the initial unease many lawmakers expressed at such a slippery approach, the McConnell gambit was gaining credence as the best escape hatch. Senate Democrats went virtually silent on the idea for fear of jinxing it. While the White House said it was not the preferable option, it was viewed inside the West Wing as a real option nonetheless, even if it would transfer to Mr. Obama and his party all the political responsibility for a debt limit increase.