German tanks never backfire. Their engineers are top notch.

You know who else wanted to "remodel Europe"?

will backfire. Will backfire. No other way. History repeats and no one austeres themselves into growth.

Kar98: This business will get out of control. It will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.

OK i spent a good minute trying to determine why you used a Hunt for Red October quote, and am coming up blank. Want to fill me in on the joke?

Bad_Seed: JohnAnnArbor: German official explains that the EU is partly due to German war guilt. (new window)

That's the whole point of the EU, to rehabilitate Germany and get them to pay reparations without getting the people all pissed off and Hiltery. It worked very well, but the current generation of Germans feels that they've paid their debts and now they want the power and influence that goes with their size and economy, as opposed to the old system where the French did the talking and the Germans signed the cheques.

Rightfully so. The people running Germany's economic and political engines now weren't even alive during WW2 for the most part, let alone involved in any way with the stupidity of Germany's aggressive acts back then. They're no more complicit than you or I are for the Japanese internments in WW2.

That being said, Germany seems to have one of the few Eurozone economies not run on hopes-and-unicorn-farts, since they actually like competing in business and not just giving everyone welfare and 80% income taxes (a system that eventually runs out of steam once real businesses start pulling out). Unlike Greece, where people biatch about having to finally start paying the income taxes they owe, since tax evasion is the number one sport there. To those belligerent assholes, I'd just say "fark you! Pay your dues, because I farking pay mine." (note, my dues paid are to Canada and not to the EU, of course).

Bad_Seed: MadSkillz: That being said, Germany seems to have one of the few Eurozone economies not run on hopes-and-unicorn-farts, since they actually like competing in business and not just giving everyone welfare and 80% income taxes (a system that eventually runs out of steam once real businesses start pulling out). Unlike Greece, where people biatch about having to finally start paying the income taxes they owe, since tax evasion is the number one sport there. To those belligerent assholes, I'd just say "fark you! Pay your dues, because I farking pay mine." (note, my dues paid are to Canada and not to the EU, of course).

None of what you said makes any sense. Nobody has 80% taxes which cause "real business" to pull out. The Greeks should default - they owe too much and can't pay it back. Instead they're, and now the rest of the continent are being forced into a pointless austerity to appease the Germans. Germany has benefited greatly from the Euro, without countries like the PIIGS in the Eurozone a German currency would have appreciated faster and made German exports uncompetitive. They also served as sponges to soak up excess German capital.

So, sure we should put the war behind us and the Germans should take a greater role, but the way they are going about it is wrong and they're just going to end up screwing themselves. What everyone seems to forget was that it wasn't hyperinflation that brought the Nazis to power, it was unemployment and austerity.

Do you think that the same economic conditions could prevail in today's global marketplace? The Germans are used to austerity by now.

I have a question about 'sponges to soak up excess German capital'. You say that like they want to spend their money on things that have a negative return.

krusader3z: Bad_Seed: MadSkillz: Do you think that the same economic conditions could prevail in today's global marketplace? The Germans are used to austerity by now.

I have a question about 'sponges to soak up excess German capital'. You say that like they want to spend their money on things that have a negative return.

The Germans might not face austerity. As long as the Chinese keep buying their stuff (the Germans build the machines that go into Chinese factories), their economy will be good. But overall, globally, the situation is a lot like the 30's, even the IMF says so.

Of course nobody wants a negative return. When a bubble forms you have a period of very good positive returns, drawing in more money, which drives up prices which draws in more money until it all explodes and wipes everyone out. That's what happened in Spain and Ireland, which both had very good public finances and in Greece (which did not).

So much shiat is made in Germany and Austria.

More often than not I have to go out of my way to purchase a product that wasn't made in one of these two countries.

Is it quality stuff? As someone in north america, I rarely see anything made in Germany. It's all chinese broken shiat.