Fakegate breaks cover

It seems the Gleick story is breaking cover in the British press. However, he is getting rather gentle treatment - more gentle than he deserves.

COMMENT: "VERY SMALL TRAGEDY" THREAD

And for the anally retentive

… all those people who got so terrible sniffy about this blog, when we started warning of a revolution. But now the Failygraph is coming to the same conclusion, are we now permitted to discuss such things?

The interesting thing is that we are self-evidently in a pre-revolutionary situation but, despite the long-standing violence, there is no real evidence of an incipient revolution.

As we remarked recently, the equipment and tactics for dealing with street disorder are such that it is difficult for a crowd to prevail. Thus, we concluded, talk of an uprising may be premature, and even without substance. More to the point, possibly, there is no ideology which can motivate and unify the opposition.

However, since the great Failygraph has spoken, I suppose we must defer to their greater wisdom, although one does wonder (above). If this is what the EU is bringing us to, why is it that the paper wants us to stay in? What is this great "compromise" that it has in mind?

COMMENT: "WHAT HAVE WE MISSED" THREAD

Silence is not golden

When even the notoriously europhilic Independent newspaper comes up with such headlines, alongside the Guardian, which is similarly pessimistic, one has to conclude that the game has entered a new phase.

It certainly makes a contrast from the widely promulgated remarks of the preposterous Osborne, here in the Metro (below), which can only be for public consumption. Not even that arrogant fool can believe what he is saying, so one assumes that he is going through the motions of supporting the "colleagues".

Elsewhere, we get little relief either, not even from Ambrose. A day late, he has been overtaken by events and is offering very little that hasn't already been said, or could have worked out for ourselves.

But there is no point in pretending that this is capable of rational (i.e., predictive) analysis, or that we can get insight from secret documents or these high-level, magical anonymous "sauces". We are breaking into new territory here – uncharted waters.

Perhaps one should rehearse what is meant by "unprecedented". It actually means what it says … without precedent. Strange though it might sound, this then means that there is little to be gained from looking to earlier examples for guidance – there aren't any.

Ambrose makes a big deal about the electoral arithmetic of the coming Greek election, when it seems certain that the left wing/Communist alliance will sweep the board – possibly leading to repudiation of the bailout conditions.

That, though, is not until April and, before that, a number of eurozone member states must seek parliamentary ratification of the bailout deal, the biggest of them all being Germany. So far, the Bundestag seems to have been kept out of the loop and, in the ordinary course of events, one might expect it to roll over and do Merkel's bidding.

But these are not ordinary times and, while Merkel is currently riding high in the polls, things could change very quickly. Thus, 27 February, when the issue is pencilled in to go to the German parliament, could be another of those turning points.

As interesting is the role of the French, and in particular Sarkozy, who has been quiet of late. From the time when the "Merkozy" were dominating the news, and the odd couple seemed poised to move in with each other, they have been invisible as a pair over the last instalment of the crisis.

Unseen or not, the two will undoubtedly be talking, and the motor of integration has not yet stalled, and when it drops out of the limelight, then is the time to be alert. This dimension cannot be ignored – silence, in this case, is not golden.

COMMENT: "WHAT HAVE WE MISSED" THREAD

What have we missed?

I cannot think of any situation such as the Greek bailout, where the informed condemnation is so clear and unequivocal - and almost unanimous. You will be extremely hard put to find anyone outside the bubble who thinks the deal will work, and most think it will not hold more than a few months.

Perhaps the most entertaining, if not definitive piece comes from The Washington Post which has asked a group of experts and economists to pronounce on it.

We start with Kevin Featherstone, professor of contemporary Greek studies at the London School of Economics. "With this deal", he says, "Greece has only overcome the first of several hurdles". Barry Eichengreen, economist at the University of California Berkeley, says simply: "It won't work".

Henry Farrell, associate professor of political science at George Washington University offers a more subtle put-down: "The bailout will work", he says, "if by 'working' you mean putting off the really hard decisions for another month or two".

Vincent Reinhart, economist at the American Enterprise Institute, and Carmen Reinhart, economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, offer something similar, damning the deal with faint praise: "No doubt, the deal enhances the probability that Greece will be able to squeak past its major debt refunding on 20 March … ".

Dmitri Vayanos, professor of finance at the London School of Economics, is kinder, but still not very encouraging: "While the bailout plan takes care of Greece's funding needs in the short run and puts Greek banks on a sounder footing", he says, "it does not offer a full solution to Greece's problems".

Nicolas Veron, senior fellow at Bruegel, a Brussels-based think tank, is not too far away from that: "This agreement does not set Greece on a sustainable track, and more pain is sure to come down the road …". Yet Mohammed el-Erian, co-chief executive of Pimco is more blunt: " … this agreement is likely to follow its predecessors and fall apart in the weeks ahead".

Richard Portes, economist at London Business School says: "The bailout will fail even if debt restructuring attracts sufficient creditor support now and CDS are not triggered (both uncertain). Debt reduction seriously inadequate. Greece will need more official support, sooner rather than later. The politics are poisonous too, in Greece and in eurozone".

And so on, and on and on it goes. Anywhere you look, you will get the same sentiments. Even the great Gavin Hewitt, on the europhile BBC, can only offer the view that the "colleagues" are buying time (above) – a sentiment shared by many others.

Now, if this bailout is so awful that even the BBC can see it, and we know that the "colleagues" include amongst their number some extremely bright cookies, the fatal weaknesses of the deal must be obvious to them as well. So who are they trying to fool?

Therein lies the mystery. One should always beware of the obvious, and with so many commentators patting themselves on the back for their perspicacity – including me – there is the danger that we are missing something.

That "something" is the next step. The "colleagues" really are not that stupid, and if it is so transparent to us all that the deal cannot work, they surely must have something in reserve … a "plan B".

An alternative, of course, is that there really is nothing left in the locker - that this is the last, despairing fling to stave off the inevitable. But, with their Houdini-like skills for escaping from impossible situations, it is hard to believe that. It is all very well, therefore, for these clever people pontificating about how bad the bailout deal is, and how certain it is to fail. Even the dimmest of us knows that by now. Thus, the question stands: what have we missed?

COMMENT THREAD

Not even a rounding error

The warmists making such a fuss about the few million dollars funding directed at the Heartland institute might do well to recall the pledge made in Copenhagen in 2009 and the Cancun Agreements of December 2010.

These formally committed developed countries collectively to providing resources "approaching USD 30 billion for the period 2010 - 2012" to support developing countries' climate efforts.

This so-called "fast-start" finance is supposed to help developing countries, particularly the poorest and most vulnerable, mitigate (reduce) their greenhouse gas emissions, and adapt and cope with the effects of climate change.

These pledges also present an opportunity to build trust between developed and developing countries in the international climate arena, in turn fostering progress towards a comprehensive post-2012 international climate agreement.

The money is being monitored by the World Resources Institute, which now lists $28.222 billion in pledges. By far the biggest single country donor is Japan, with $15 billion. The UK comes next with $2.471 billion and third is the United States with $1.704 billion. The EU member states as a whole, with the commission, have pledged $10.283 billion.

Against that sort of funding, the money going to the Heartland Institute is not even a rounding error. What on earth are the warmists worried about?

COMMENT THREAD

If we have to give aid

… would it not be better to spend it on issues which could make a real difference? Although not advocating that we should give any money at all to India, the money spent on climate change could perhaps be diverted to rail safety, dealing with a real rather than imagined problem.

Thus, recalling the piece last Sunday, where it was reported that £3.5 billion of public money has been paid out or allocated to projects addressing climate change abroad since 2007-08, we now stumble on the UK's International Climate Fund (ICF).

Worth £2.9 billion, provided via DFID (£1.8bn), DECC (£1bn) and Defra (£100m) (the latter with respect to forestry finance), the High Commission in India proudly boasts that a billion has already been spent (see below).

This would include – or so it appears - the UK's Advocacy Fund, launched on 6 September 2011, incorporating "a £10 million climate window" that will help strengthen the voice of the poorest countries in international climate negotiations.

The interesting thing here is that, had an Anonymous Donor given £10 million to the Heartland Institute for a "climate window", the warmists would be squealing blue murder. But when it is part of a £2.9 billion climate package, expropriated from hard-pressed British taxpayers, they are strangely silent.

Whatever the warmists might think, though, it would very much appear that the UK aid programme does not stand up to any serious scrutiny. There might be less opposition if the money was spent on serious, life-saving issues. But when it is being frittered away on nebulous issues such as climate advocacy, it is difficult to see how any of it can be justified.


COMMENT THREAD

A very small tragedy

In the ongoing mini-drama over the acquisition of electronic-format documents by deception from the obscure Heartland Institute think-tank, the fabrication of another and the subsequent publication of the batch on a number of warmist web-sites, we see a further development.

This is the online confession by an even more obscure person by the name of Peter H. Gleik, who purports to be a "water and climate analyst", published in the Huffington Post.

His choice of outlet tells you much of what you need to know about Gleik, and much that you don't. But one's disinterest is somewhat strengthened by one of his allies, Andrew Revkin, who writes of the confession in The New York Times. Such is the self-absorption of this man, and his lack of perspective, that he writes of Gleick's use of deception as "his personal tragedy and shame".

But, Revkin writes, the "broader tragedy" is that his decision to go to such extremes in his fight with Heartland has greatly set back any prospects of the country having the "rational public debate" that he wrote — correctly — is so desperately needed.

These are, it seems, characteristically emotive words, but it is hard to accept the idea of this being a tragedy – much less a "broader tragedy", given all that is happening in the world.

As to the debate, though, there have been millions or articles on the subject of global warming, hundreds of thousands of programmes on the broadcast media and hundreds of books written, with as many websites on the issue. Rarely, it seems, has there been a broader debate on any one subject – and the warmists lost.

Now, the public is largely indifferent to the global warming thesis, treating alarmists claims more often with derision than the concern that their authors would wish. Thus, if Peter Gleick is not getting the continued debate at the level he wanted, it is a rather small tragedy.

Nevertheless, it has given the Heartland Institute a boost, and a much-needed fund-raising opportunity, and has given the increasingly narrowly-focused, self-obsessed "deniers" a new "gate" with which to amuse themselves. And Dellers is having a field day, which is always good fun.

Overall, though, the greatest achievement of the "deniers" has been to turn the subject into the tedious backwater that it has become. Without the prominence and the heat (if one dare say that), the political traction goes and eventually the scare withers on the vine, which it is now doing.

What is of greater concern now is the regulatory aftermath, where the costs and burdens of regulation continue to multiply. And they lie within the greater realms of politics, where too many in the global warning game fear to tread.

As always, it will be politics rather than science which shapes events, with the likes of the euro crisis having a far greater effect on global warming expenditure than a thousand persuasive scientific papers. The reality of the money running out tends to focus the mind. And against such particular events, Gleick and his "fakegate" is a very small tragedy indeed.

COMMENT THREAD

'Twas thus ordained

"We have reached a far reaching agreement on Greece's new programme and private sector involvement that would lead to a significant debt reduction for Greece and pave the way towards an unprecedented amount of new official financing ... to secure Greece's future in the euro area", says Luxembourg's Jean-Claude Juncker, at the end-of-charade press conference.

The official Eurogroup statement is here. "We reiterate our commitment to provide adequate support to Greece during the life of the programme and beyond until it has regained market access, provided that Greece fully complies with the requirements and objectives of the adjustment programme", say the "colleagues".

Off-stage could be heard banging, shuffling and muffled screaming from the fat lady, as she was bound and gagged, and bundled out the back door into a waiting van.

Already, Felix Salmon of Reuters calls it "the improbable Greece plan". His view is that the plan assumes that Greece's politicians will stick to what they’ve agreed, and start selling off huge chunks of their country's patrimony while at the same time imposing enormous budget cuts. Needless to say, there is no indication that this will happen, nor that the Greek people will tolerate such a thing.

Here then is a man saying that the deal could easily all fall apart within months; the chances of it gliding to success and a 120 percent debt-to-GDP ratio in 2020 have got to be de minimis.

Earlier, in the forum, we wrote: "there will be the appearance of an agreement ... which will then take a few weeks to unravel ... the game this time is to get themselves past the 20 March crisis. Then there will be another day, another crisis". Merkel's only option, we wrote even earlier, was to buy time.

Now Salmon writes that Europe's politicians know the deal must fail. "But at the very least they're buying time: this deal might well delay catastrophic capital flight from Greece, and give the Europeans more time to work out how to shore up Portugal if and when that happens".

Wishful thinking that is, but for the moment it is the only game in town. "We continue to believe that Greece can be saved. Or at least we continue to say so", says one Eurocrat, according to The Economist.

COMMENT: "DANCE" THREAD

The dance must go on

It was all smiles when the happy colleagues met in Brussels, giving no hint of the tensions and acrimony that have marked the last week – and more. At the heart of the crisis though, there has always been that element of theatre, and no more so now, when the talks are running – especially as the outcome has probably already been decided.

One can imagine a scenario where all the "colleagues" are sitting in the lounge, doors closed and locked, the chaps with their ties undone and feet up, with the waiters passing round the booze. They watch television, roaring with laughter as their "spokesmen" feed in the pre-prepared statements, all designed to keep the drama going until the final press conference, when they straighten their ties, look serious again and tell the world what they have "decided".

Meanwhile, out in the cold, real people bleed, real people suffer, real people go hungry, and real people go bankrupt, their lives destroyed by the carelessness and indifference of their masters.

But the theatre is not quite that cynical, although it might just as well be. The outcome is pre-ordained … the "bailout" is going through, because it must. The small print will now emerge over the days and weeks, when we learn that Greece has taken another step towards Armageddon.

In the meantime, the very rich will get even richer, a lot of middle-income people will get poorer, and the very poor will either stay that way or die. The journalists will prattle and preen and some of them – a very few - will work out what is going on. None will say so clearly, because there are too many agendas to support.

Whatever is reported overnight, only some will be the truth. Much of it will be lies, or dissembling. None of it is worth staying up for. It will take weeks to get a feel for what really has happened, so the analysis can wait its time. In the meantime, the dance must go on.

COMMENT THREAD

The books, the books!

"I object to publishers. The one service they have done is to teach me to do without them. They combine artistic pettiness with commercial rascality being neither good judges of literature nor good business men".

George Bernard Shaw … as supplied by my publisher.

That said, the books are being released from the warehouse today. The formal publication date is 3 March. My apologies for the delay. When I said the books were "available" on 17 February, I didn't mean you could actually buy them - dear me no. What do you think we are?

COMMENT THREAD

A confused columnist

The Great Sage Wolfgang Münchau, doyen of European columnists and Custodian of All Knowledge, finally comes to the conclusion in the Financial Times that we reached over a week ago.

The German strategy, he writes, "seems to be to make life so unbearable that the Greeks themselves will want to leave the eurozone". He then adds: "Ms Merkel certainly does not want to be caught with a smoking gun in her hand".

But, in an article headed, "Greece must default if it wants democracy", he condemns the German strategy as one "of assisted suicide, and one that is extremely dangerous and irresponsible".

If Münchau is really serious about Greece having to default in order to restore democracy, what is the problem? After all, if Germany is trying to force a Greek default, does this not suggest that he and Germany are arguing for the same outcome?

So why is the strategy "extremely dangerous and irresponsible"?

COMMENT: "EAT AND DESTROY" THREAD

I just simply hope

The Sun and the Failygraph are covering this story, and even this obscure journal (above) points out that to give priority to a group on the basis of where they come from breaches employment law.

However, The Sun goes further, admitting that "EU laws ban discrimination against foreigners who apply for work here". But the Failygraph, recording the comments of the employment minister on Sky News, told us that when it was put to him that prioritising British candidates could fall foul of those rules, Grayling stood by his remarks.

He said: "I just simply hope that the choices that employers make in this country will be to give young unemployed British people a chance, so it would be bizarre if I didn't say that and we'll do everything we can to encourage them to do so".

So that is what it has come down to … in matters of acute national interest, our minister has nothing to offer, other than to incite employers to break the law and then "just simply hope" that they get away with it.

COMMENT THREAD

The thin green line

No one is pretending it [the bailout] will end Greece's problems says Reuters, which then makes it plain that the bulk of the bailout money will not go to Greece.

A debt sustainability report delivered to eurozone finance ministers last week showed that under the main scenario, Greek debt will only fall to 129 percent by 2020. And that, of course, is assuming that the Greek government can deliver the promised cuts, and maintain its tax income – neither of which conditions look capable of being fulfilled.

And just to rub it in, it seems as if the escrow account idea has wings, although it has not been decided who will manage the account. On the face of it though, the effect of this is that Greece takes on the €130 billion loan, but has no power over how the funds are dispersed.

All this comes with Papademos flying to Brussels, doubtless to get his instructions from his masters, with The Sun reporting that another condition of the deal will be a postponement of the general election.

The concern to stop the elections is understandable, with current polls showing support for the two main parties nose diving. From 42.5 percent in October 2010, the socialist PASOK is down to 8.2 percent, according to MRB and published in the newspaper Real News, with the conservative New Democracy party dropping from 28 to 19 percent.

This is being recorded as a "historic low" for the two main parties, matched by a lurch to the left, with a coalition of the Communists, the Radical Left and the Democratic Left taking a combined 43.5 percent of the vote in one poll.

Variously reported, anything up to 59 percent of the population want an immediate election after the bailout has been decided but, whether a rejection of that demand will translate into violence is anyone's guess. The media, talking up the prospects of a violent response, talk of 2,000 demonstrators clashing with police, but these are small numbers compared with the half-million that the unions can put on the streets.

We haven't seen much police hardware in the pictures so far, and the "thin green lines" of police are just that … thin. So far – apart from the rash of burning Sunday week last - the police seem to be keeping control, even without pulling the heavy gear.

Thus, talk of an uprising may be premature, and even without substance. Away from the centre, the situation is reported calm. One wonders whether the more severe reactions will come not from the Greeks, but from the German people, when they realise what their rulers have committed them to.

COMMENT: "EAT AND DESTROY" THREAD

Facebook

It is a wonder that the human race actually survives.

COMMENT THREAD

Drawn to the same conclusion

Ambrose is in the Failygraph telling us that it's all over … for the moment. Bowing to intense pressure from France, Italy, and the US-led bloc of global leaders, he says, Schäuble has toned down threats to force Greece out of the euro.

The German finance minister has said (through gritted teeth, no doubt) that the country is "on the right path" and signalled that pension cuts agreed by the Greek cabinet over the weekend would be enough to secure the bailout. Nor is Ambrose alone. Others, such as the Irish Times have got there as well, with Reuters coming in behind.

We do not, of course, get from Ambrose any mention of the commission – which will have been orchestrating the pressure. That would spoil the Failygraph's "house narrative" of a German-dominated EU. But he still ends up exactly where we were yesterday.

So, with no moles, no magic sources, no secret documents, mad conspiracies or even smoke and mirrors to rely on, we get there using good, old-fashioned analysis, based on a sound political appreciation of the issues.

There will still be the " … further hurdles which Greece will be required to surmount". They will have to come since the fundamentals haven't changed. The pressure on Greece will continue, externally and internally. The dance goes on.

COMMENT: "EAT AND DESTROY" THREAD

Eat and destroy

After weeks of brinkmanship, bad blood and missed deadlines (to say nothing of wacky conspiracy theories with "secret" plans so secret that even their authors are not allowed to see them), a Greek debt deal may finally be within reach.

So says the Wall Street Journal (apart from the bits in the brackets), speculating on the possible outcome of today's Eurogroup meeting. The paper bases its thinking on the decision by the Greek Cabinet yesterday to find all the extra cuts needed to lower spending by €325 million, thus apparently surmounting the final hurdle standing between that benighted country and its bailout.

Maybe the WSJ is right, even if, as Ambrose suggests, it is too late to make any difference. However, what you see in the WSJ is a lingering belief that the Greeks (and the EU member states) are dealing with an economic problem, as the paper goes on to set out the measures which must be taken to resolve the deeper euro crisis.

Having set it all out in detail, the paper then argues that, unless this is what eurozone finance ministers have in mind as they sit down on Monday, they should have no business signing the deal. To go ahead, it says, with a flawed Greek bailout without a plan to accelerate eurozone integration and create a functional monetary union would be an act of calculated cynicism that would simply deepen Greek - and European - agony.

But, of course, what the WSJ demands as a minimum is not within the realms of political possibility, not with the German chancellor riding high on the belief that she is going to oust the spendthrift Greeks, and restore discipline to the euro-rump, once the rest of the PIIGS (less Ireland) have been excommunicated.

Thus, it is not an economic solution which will be bartered today, but a political compromise. It will be one which is set to achieve the impossible – keeping Greece within the euro yet keeping the increasingly fractious Germans on-side.

Thus, whatever comes out of the smoke-free room later today will be a fudge. It will not work, and there will be no real expectation that it will work. The name of the game is to deal with the crise du jour by buying enough time for preparations to be made for the next one.

Inevitably, therefore, embedded in the agreement that comes – to emerge later, after the hullabaloo has abated – may well be the poison pill which brings the whole thing down, or merely triggers the next crisis. Perhaps what will really happen is that we'll get another fabulously secret plan, this time so secret that its authors will be killed before they have even devised it, thus ensuring that nobody at all in the world knows the details.

On the other hand, when whatever happens actually happens, we will be in exactly the same position of wondering what on earth is going on, reflecting exactly the mindset of our rulers who, by all accounts, are making it up as they go along.

But, just to be on the safe side, you are advised to eat your computer after reading this post, and then press your personal self-destruct button. You just can't be too careful these days.

COMMENT THREAD

Tip of an iceberg?

A piece in The Sunday Telegraph by Richard Gray, Science Correspondent, purports to give us spending data from the Department for International Development (DFID), "on projects which they say will either reduce carbon emissions abroad or attempt to deal with the effects of predicted changes in the earth's climate".

According to Gray, in the past four years DFID has spent £900 million on climate change projects with nearly two thirds of that being spent in the past financial year. A further £533 million has already been committed up to 2013. The biggest recipients, he says, are India and Indonesia, two countries considered to be rapidly emerging economies.

These figures, apparently, come from a Freedom of Information request, and "reveal" that total spending on tackling climate change overseas has increased from £61 million in 2007-08 to more than £883 million in 2010-11. In total £3.5 billion of public money has been paid out or allocated to projects addressing climate change abroad since 2007-08.

This is all very good stuff and, coming from this source, is eminently quotable – as a number of blogs and other groups are already doing. It provides good propaganda, not least to counter the increasingly bizarre claims coming from the warmists, about expenditure by those whom they insist on calling "deniers".

However, I suspect that not even DFID knows exactly how much money is spent specifically on climate change. Much of the funding is grouped under portmanteau projects, covering a wide range of issues, of which climate change is sometimes only a small part.

Furthermore, there is some reason to suspect the accuracy of what the government has told Gray. For instance, based on his FOI answers, he tells us that amongst the aid provided by DFID was a £4.7 million project in Indonesia aimed at helping the government there provide "more effective leadership and management of climate change programming".

Indeed there is such a project, and details of this and all the others can be found on the DFID website. However, while Gray has been told of a £4.7 million project, the website details give us £6.2 million, in order to ensure that the GoI (Government of Indonesia) "can provide more effective leadership and management of climate change programming to deliver emissions reduction and poverty reduction outcomes".

Interestingly Indonesia is very much in the frame and, if Gray has done nothing else, he has certainly alerted us to that. Looking wider, we thus learn that in December 2009 DFID exchanged letters with the Government of Indonesia agreeing to a five year programme focusing on climate change over 2010-15, with a budget of £50 million.

The intention is that from 2011 onwards DFID focuses exclusively on issues of climate change in Indonesia, and delivers this by forming a joint UK Climate Change Unit with other government departments located in the British Embassy and withdraws from development work in other areas.

That UK Climate Change Unit (UKCCU) was launched on 6 April 2011, with the press release informing us that this cross-government unit would deliver the UK's climate change goals in a vitally important context.

Thus we see multiple additional projects, such as Promoting Low Carbon Development in Indonesia with a budget of £5,000,000. There is the  Indonesia Low Carbon Growth Project for £1,500,000, the Multi-stakeholder Forestry Programme at £2,000,000, Support to Climate Change Programme in Indonesia at £1,199,735, and the Rapid Response Facility on Climate Change at £500,000.

With a few others, that brings the known total to just under £17 million already spent, leaving – presumably – another £33 million in the kitty for the next three years.

But all of this pales into insignificance against the bigger picture. Go to the DFID website, hit the "project search" tab and then key in "climate change". You will get 301 projects, the first being the Environmental Transformation Fund, with a budget of £554 million, of which only £39.6 million has been spent.

That, however, is only the start. We have the Global Environment Facility 4TH Replenishment at £219,646,000, the Global Environment Facility 5TH Replenishment at £210,000,000, and the actual Global Environment Facilt at £203,080,000.

Adding these four, we already have more than £1 billion, but the projects get cheaper as you go down the list. You will love this one though, for a mere £13,999,992, the object being to fund DFID secondments to the EU:

To enhance the capacity of the European Union in policy analysis and programme management in key areas. These include Maternal and Child Health, Climate Change, Wealth Creation, Water and Sanitation, and issues focussing on Fragile States, Conflict Prevention and Resolution. In addition it will provide support for stronger overall Evaluation and Monitoring of EU spend. The Programme will second approximately 25-30 high calibre DFID staff (Seconded National Experts - SNEs) to the European Commission and related organisations in Brussels and Luxembourg, EU delegations in developing countries, EU Presidencies, and to the new European External Action Service (EEAS) of the European Union. The National Experts on Professional Training scheme (NEPT) will also provide short term opportunities in the EU (Brussels) for staff to get experience and knowledge of how the EU manage their development programmes.

So, nearly £14 million of our foreign aid budget goes to sending British bureaucrats to commune with Eurocrats in Brussels and elsewhere. The starving children of Sudan, to name but one location, will be delighted.

Obviously, Gray's work is but the tip of the iceberg, adding to his earlier work in an area already visited by Booker and myself on several occasions. Given a chance (unlikely though that is, with current pressures), we'd like to hack further into this iceberg. Perhaps DFID could give us a grant?

COMMENT THREAD

Chasing the ball

The Failygraph is finally getting close to the message, courtesy of Bruno Waterfield - despite the Londonisation and the desperate self-importance of this failing rag, needing to find a "secret" report to justify printing that which has been evident from open source material for days - and even weeks.

Despite that, Bruno has managed to convey some of the essence of the situation – that the Germans want Greece out of the euro. For this Bruno relies on Wolfgang Schäuble, the German finance minister. He, as we all know, simply does not believe that any Greek government is able to implement the reforms necessary to restore the country to financial health.

With no more substantive evidence of a split between Merkel and Schäuble than had The Guardian, the paper feels the need to run this meme, and while it has Austria and Finland supporting the German view, the Netherlands doesn't get a look in.

That leaves us with the unsupported Failygraph narrative, where the European Central Bank and the "Eucopean Commission" (sic) are, for now, lining up with Merkel to push for the rescue attempt to continue, "fearful that the financial tsunami that would be unleashed if it failed would swamp the eurozone".

At least the piece is without the rampant Germanophobia that so obscures proper analysis, and which has brought Your Freedom and Ours into the fray, but there is still a great deal of bolt-on reporting here.

So far, the only evidence of a "split" between Merkel and her finance minister is a hare started by the Financial Times based on comments made by unnamed "officials". Clearly, there is tension in the ranks, which means that different factions are going to be briefing against each other, so we need a whole lot more than unattributed comments from the rival gangs.

Oddly enough, when it comes to fears of "a financial tsunami that would be unleashed if it failed would swamp the eurozone", this seems to be old hat. In the Financial Times "Trader's diary", David Schwartz notes there were no meaningful price drops two weeks ago when negotiations between Greece and its lenders were thought to be going down to the wire.

Uncertainty of this type, Schwartz says, might have triggered three-digit price swings just six months ago. And last Tuesday, when the Eurogroup meeting was suddenly cancelled, the FTSE 100 fell just six points. To him, "it is becoming increasingly clear that investors are no longer panicking about a possible default".

With Europe's leaders now publicly berating Greece and repeatedly signalling that there are finite limits to the amount of financial support they are willing to provide, it also appears that EU leaders and UK investors alike are growing more comfortable with the idea of Greece's default and its possible departure from the euro.

Thus, Schwartz concludes, "many observers now expect the country to go bust. It is a question of when, not if. I also suspect that this perception is now firmly factored into UK share prices".

Timing, now, is everything. Monday's meeting may reveal more clues, and we might even get to see a glimpse of that elusive fat lady, waiting in the wings for her final crescendo.

COMMENT: "DANCE" THREAD

The dance goes on

It has been an interesting week, which started with the vote in the Greek parliament in the expectation that the eurozone ministers (the so-called Eurogroup) would meet on the Wednesday to approve the terms of the bailout.

The next day, though, it started to come clear that Merkel was blocking settlement, with the Germans wanting Greece out of the euro. Not least was the relative triviality of the funding gap, which was to become the battlefield. By Tuesday, it was becoming more widely known that there wasn't going to be an immediate decision, and that Greece was being pushed towards the exit.

Wednesday thus saw a conference call instead of the planned meeting, and an appreciation that there were serious tensions building up, with Germany, Finland and Holland pushing for the Greek to withdraw from the euro.

Then, by Thursday, it was out in the open, with Greece's finance minister Evangelos Venizelos making a public complaint that some eurozone countries no longer wanted Greece in the single currency. That, of course, left Merkel in a difficult position, having to deny the very thing that she and her colleagues were trying to achieve. Nevertheless, by the last working day of the week, the situation looks close to final, although there is an extraordinary variance in the tenor of press reports.

By now, there is a fightback going on, with the forces of darkness rallying to keep Greece in the Europe, ending up with the media hopelessly misreading the position, and still indulging in anti-German rhetoric, even though the Germans have made their position clear.

And all of this brings us back to Sunday, with Booker looking back over the week, in his column, to report on how "the European project is splitting apart at the very core".

Behind all the spin, smoke and fury of recent days, we see unfolding the greatest crisis in the history of the "European project", he writes. "What is emerging is a fundamental split which threatens to inflict on it by far the most serious reverse in its 62-year history".

The thesis is nothing new to readers of this blog, but – owing to the inadequacies of the media in general – it will come as news to many of Booker's readers. Thus, a wider audience will get a glimmering of what is really going on, ready for the message to be drowned out in the torrent of ignorance that will assail us in the coming week.

For what it is worth, my guess is that, under enormous pressure and very reluctantly, Germany will approve the bailout at the Eurogroup meeting tomorrow, only then to create further hurdles which Greece will be required to surmount. And thus the dance will go on.

COMMENT THREAD

Is it any wonder people are confused?

"What is so shockingly evident as you walk around Athens are the awful parallels between the war-time era and today. The soup kitchens, the beggars, the pensioners picking up discarded vegetables after street markets close, the homeless scavenging for food in bins … "

"There are so many similarities between these periods", says researcher Eleni Nikolaidou. "Of course, it was the Germans then, and once again the Germans are the dominant figures in our crisis now".

Greeks, we are then told by Mail writer Ian Birrell, "seem torn between outrage at their venal politicians, anxiety over the future and the fierce anger they direct at Germany for demanding tough measures as the price of a European Union bailout to allow their country to continue to function".

The imposition of the latest package of conditions by the German-dominated EU and International Monetary Fund, we are informed, provoked riots last weekend, while newspapers made ugly references to the Nazis, and politicians talked of living under a "German jackboot" as Europe's festering wounds burst open.

Shocked you are supposed to be, especially at the litany of hardships which the people of Greece are suffering. But, hang on a minute! Terrible though they might be, isn't this situation exactly what the Mail wanted (see above)?

"We earnestly hope EU leaders will find a solution that saves the euro from disorderly collapse", the paper said at the end of October last year. "Inevitably", it then noted, "we believe, this will mean re-writing the EU constitution yet again, to bring the countries of the Eurozone under a single economic government, with more uniform tax and spending policies — almost certainly to be dictated by Germany".

However, there is an alternative - for Greece to quit the euro. But that is precisely what The Mail doesn't want. It would sooner Greece remained in the euro, as indeed it is keen to see Britain remain in the EU. But then we are invited to decry the effects of the very policies that the paper endorses, while at the same time marking Germany down as the villain – the very country that wants Greece out of the euro.

Is it any wonder that people are confused?

COMMENT: "HAIL THE MSM" THREAD

Playing the German card

With Germanophobia never far from the surface in European politics, Greek politicians and their media have been shamelessly playing the "Nazi" card, to the applause of commentators throughout the world. Too many people – many of whom should know better - have been only too happy to believe the narrative of the German "steamroller" pitched against the hapless Greek people.

Bizarrely, even though it has emerged that the German solution to the current crisis is for Greece to leave the euro, and many of those self-same commentators argue for exactly the same outcome, Merkel gets a swastika armband and now finance minister Schäuble is dressed in an SS uniform.

It is, of course, not part of the media narrative to cast events in any other way, the net effect being to play to the propaganda of the EU commission and their Greek puppets, reinforcing the pressure on Germany to finance the bailout, and keep the euro intact.

At last though, it does seem as if the Germans have finally had enough, today's Bild running a story headlined: "Throw the Greeks finally out of the euro", complaining that, "We pay and they insult us" (pictured above).

But, indicating just how far adrift is the Nazi rhetoric – playing into the hands of the EU - the paper goes on to note that all Greek politicians want to stay in the euro, to which effect they are forcing the pace on harsh austerity measures. It is the German politicians who are saying that the "stubborn Greeks" have no future with the euro.

Thus in a cross-party alliance, we see Klaus-Peter Willsch of the CDU saying: "We must stop the tragedy. Greece in the Euro zone is no prospect of economic recovery", with Frank Schaeffler (FDP) warning that the protests might trigger a civil war.

It is then Veronika Bellmann (CDU) who says that everything the critics have predicted has occurred. She adds: "the ailing administration, the corrupt tax system and an unfit and unwilling political class are not a basis for structural reforms". And now, she warns, this is beginning even "to shake the democratic nature of the country".

What thus comes over is the very opposite of the legend we are being offered, with German politicians genuinely concerned at the fate of Greece, saying exactly the same things that British eurosceptics have been urging. Nor is this a question of throwing Greece to the wolves. CSU General Secretary Alexander Dobrindt, warns that: "We must prepare ourselves for the event that Greece does not implement the promised reforms".

But, far from being the heartless "Nazi invader" intent on dominating the country, he says that there must be a "contingency plan" for when Greece "escapes" from the euro, with the preparation of "an EU-Marshall Plan for the redevelopment of Greece".

All of this points to one inescapable conclusion: the Germans are the best friends the Greek people have right now. The people are being sold down the river by their own corrupt politicians, with the support (and instruction) of the EU commission and their "troika", whose only concern is the integrity of the euro, irrespective of the pain it causes.

When we look at the media at large, therefore, we have to say that never in the field of euro-reporting have so many got it so plain wrong. But then we see how useless they have become, and cannot be at all surprised.

COMMENT: "HAIL THE MSM" THREAD

Hail the MSM!

All those resources, the gifted staff, the fact-checkers and the budget of millions, and this is the best they can do? I don't know whether to weep or laugh.

Yes dears, you who are so wedded to the soap opera. There is a schism … between Greece, the commission and France on the one side and, on the other, Germany, with Finland and Holland – plus other as yet undisclosed backers.

Angela Merkel, Mario Monti and Lucas Papademos are "confident" of a deal on Monday? Yeah, right! According to Mr Monti's office in Rome, as copied off the press release by the agencies and then rehashed by The Guardian "man-on-the-spot" … in Brussels. This, ladies and gentlemen, is how news is made.

And there are "concerns growing behind the scenes"? You don't say! I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you! What on earth would we do without our wonderful media to keep us informed?

It tells us that, in Berlin officials "rebutted" widespread reports of a growing rift between Merkel, who backs Greece staying a member of the euro, and Schäuble … unsurprising, because the only report of a "rift" is the Financial Times relying an unnamed "Eurozone official".

Then they then go to another part of the opposition, Francois Fillon, French premier. He "effectively confirmed divisions within Berlin". But he urged France's allies "not to play with" a Greek default and strongly backed Athens: "The Greeks have promised very important reforms. The Europeans now have to keep their commitments", he is cited as saying.

Seriously, this is actually how news reports are cobbled together. This is what thousands of people will be reading at their breakfast tables this morning and, worst still, believing it. Perhaps it is just as well we don't have to rely on the media for any serious news.

COMMENT THREAD

The Camekozy is born

We saw it coming in November 2010 when Liam Fox announced a new deal with the Kermits in the form of a Combined Joint Expeditionary Force (CJEF) of around 6,500 troops from the France and Britain under a 50-year deal for closer military "co-operation".

More recently, we've seen plans for an integrated carrier fleet (when we have a carrier to integrate) and now, in the next phase of defence integration, we now see Cameron and Sarkozy agreeing to accelerate plans to create a joint control and command centre for future military operations.

In a logical and continuous development of Blair's 1998 St Malo agreement (which was based on initiatives started by John Major), the two leaders also agreed to push ahead with the next phase of plans to build a new generation of UAVs.

This is the EuroMALE project which the French have been pushing since 2006, and represents a move away from US and Israeli technology in a field where neither the French nor the British have covered themselves in glory.

And if this is not bad enough, it gets worse. The "real and substantial" co-operation on defence discussed today will cover not only the new command centre and UAV production, but also nuclear weapons.

Speaking alongside Sarkozy at a press conference in the Élysée Palace, The Boy – without so much as a blush – told us all: "I don't think that there has been closer French-British co-operation at any time since the Second World War, not just in Libya but also on the vital issues of Syria, Iran, Somalia and defence co-operation".

We know The Boy is not very good at history, but this puts him into a different league. "The defence co-operation is real, it is substantial, it is going to make a big difference to the military capabilities of both Britain and France," he says. "We are similar-sized powers, with similar-sized armed forces, with similar ambitions.

"It is partly about new capacity - the investment that we are going to make in a drone programme. It is also about making the most of our existing capacity, as we will be combining and using it together. It is also about operational capacity and ability to take action together".

"If you look at the detail of what Britain and France are doing together on defence co-operation, not just building new drones together but co-operating on the most sensitive dossiers of all, including nuclear, I think that demonstrates an incredibly strong relationship based on our countries' shared interests".

Thus we have the next stage in the play. After running down our own armed forces, to the state that they are barely if at all capable of independent operation, our masters then enter into defence agreements with France, the Trojan Horse of European defence integration.

The Camekozy is born. The betrayal continues.

COMMENT THREAD

The full Monti?

Says ZeroHedge, "reactions such as the one yesterday confirm that the market is not only broken but also very stupid. Which is just as those in charge like it". Of course, the media loves quoting market reaction. It gets endless, easy headlines which save the jornos having to think. But more and more, we see day-to-day market movements as being irrelevant. The markets, like the politicians, inhabit their own little bubble.

At the risk of becoming ZeroHedge groupies (which we are not), we also take note of this piece, which observes that Papademos and Samaras are both out their creating dire images of a post apocalyptic Greek state if a default occurs.

Maybe, we are cautioned, it is a good time to remember what Papademos' job is:

He wasn't elected. He doesn't represent the Greek people in a fashion that we are used to – running for election and winning the election. He was foisted on the Greek people by the EU – the very people he is going through the motions of negotiating with. His JOB was to get the Greeks to accept what the EU wants. If he isn't the most conflicted politician of all time, he is right up there.

Samaras may believe it, or may have decided this is his best route to power when the vote is passed and the Greek people decide to kick Papademos out.

These are important truths. We are not dealing with a monolithic bloc, with a single message that TPTB are anxious to get over to us, the plebs. The players in this game are divided and highly factionalised, each trying to sell their own versions of reality, in an attempt to make them come real.

Thus, not only does one have to take care when exploring what is said, equally important is who says it, and when.

It is in this context that we look at the latest Reuters report. This has it that Merkel, the Italian prime minister Mario Monti and Papademos "are optimistic that an agreement can be reached on Greece at Monday's Eurogroup meeting". The source here is Monti's office, in a statement issued after the three leaders held a conference call earlier today.

But, we are told – in an unsourced interjection - negotiations with lenders in the European Union and International Monetary Fund are again going down to the wire, straining ties between Greece and northern members of the currency bloc.

This is then bolstered by citing Der Spiegel magazine, which quotes Austrian finance minister, Maria Fekter. She says: "The skepticism is especially strong among the AAA states over whether Greece will be able to make it". Thus, she says: "The risk of a Greek insolvency is not off the table".

It must be assumed here that Monti is a creature of the EU commission, and can safely be taken as a spokesman for it – the organisation that wants, above all else, to keep Greece in the single currency, and maintain the integrity of the eurozone. He thus will be bound to put a "pro-bailout" spin on the outcome of talks, whereas, one assumes (with no evidence to support it) that Maria Fekter is a Merkel proxy.

Monti – according to Bloomberg - is emerging as a game-changer in Europe's debt crisis, "as German Chancellor Angela Merkel tackles a domestic political crisis and French President Nicolas Sarkozy focuses on his re-election bid".

Monti was scheduled to meet alone in Rome today with Merkel. First set for 20 January, with Sarkozy, it was rescheduled without him and then cancelled today as German President Christian Wulff resigned amid the threat of a legal probe into corruption allegations. "Monti is extremely important because Italy is really the make-or-break country in the euro crisis", says Christian Schulz, an economist at Berenberg Bank in London. He has "re-established Italy as an important force in European politics".

So it has come to pass that we have had the three-way telephone conversation today with Merkel and Papademos. Monti and Merkel will also stay "in close touch" before the Eurozone meeting on Monday. Seasoned watchers may immediately notice something missing … Sarkozy. The Merkozy is no more … is it being replaced with the Merkonti?

Actually, that would be a misinterpretation of the relationship, as the two are ostensibly antagonists, as indeed Merkel and Sarkozy have become. With French exposure to Greek debt much greater than Germany's (see also pic), French banks are expected to take a battering. Germany, on the other hand, will be expected to pick up the bill.

Either way, though, time is running out. The FT blog has documents which "make clear the schedule is slipping dangerously". The Wednesday meeting of eurozone finance ministers, that was cancelled, was supposed to approve the launch of the restructuring so the process can begin today. Instead, we have the three-header with Monti in the chair.

All of this adds complexity upon complexity, unless of course you are the British MSM. Then all you have to do is plant the flag and talk in trite generalities, as does the Daily Mail today.

All its audience needs to know, the paper decides, is that Lord Howell, father-in-law to the Chancellor George Osborne, told peers (yesterday) that Britain was pressing for a "realistic and sustainable" solution to Greece's debt crisis, which he warned was having a "chilling effect" on the British economy.

He said "uncertainty in Greece must be brought to an end ... without utterly destroying that noble country". It seems that "infighting" is the problem, and if only these damn Johnny foreigners would stop it, and jolly well get down to sorting the problems, everything would be tickety boo.

So there you are then. These are your orders – over the top with you …

COMMENT: "FAT LADY" THREAD

A reality check?

Pulling together the disparate strains of events, there is appearing – as one of our forum members remarks – an extraordinary divergence in reports on the impending (or not) Greek collapse - some optimistic and some pessimistic.

Leader of this morning's stock of optimists (which include The Guardian and Reuters) is the Wall Street Journal - a paper with a recent history of optimism. It is telling us that a debt restructuring and second bailout for Greece "appeared likely to go ahead according to plan".

German officials, this paper advises, have scrapped an idea to pressure Greece by withholding part of the bailout and the European Central Bank developed a plan to protect its holdings of Greek bonds from the restructuring.

The source for news of this turnaround, it appears, is German deputy finance minister Thomas Steffen, but the intelligence is not direct from the horse's mouth. He is said to have told German "lawmakers" that splitting the bailout is off the table, by "a lawmaker who was present" – upon whom the paper relies.

Thus we learn that he said (Steffen or the "lawmaker"?) he was "cautiously optimistic" that finance ministers at a meeting on Monday would approve the second aid package.

So, all is well in the world, at least until 23 March when the sky is going to fall in, according to lots and lots of unnamed sources. This, presumably, is to coincide with the total eclipse, as German troops march across the Polish border, supported by US Armoured divisions.

We will try to make sense of this and much more, as the day unwinds.

COMMENT: "FAT LADY" THREAD

The fat lady clears her throat

The rhetoric has turned poisonous, says Ambrose as he catches up with events. He judges that Berlin, Helsinki and The Hague show every sign that they intend to eject Greece from the euro whatever it now does, calculating that the eurozone is at last strong enough to withstand contagion.

Theoretically, we should be seeing a resolution on Monday, when the Eurogroup finally meets. But Dutch minister of Finance Jan Kees de Jager is indicating that the Netherlands will block the bailout.

From that source, we learn that, even if everything goes well, Monday will only deliver a "preliminary agreement", creating a parliamentary reservation for the Netherlands, Germany and Finland. The German parliament debates the issue on 27 February and then, as we reported earlier, there is the European Council pencilled in for 1 March.

The Financial Times, however, sees in the German position a split, with Schäuble pushing to let Athens default while Merkel is firmly against.

For this, the paper relies on unnamed German and eurozone officials – and I don't buy it. But it does helpfully add that the Monday meeting is going to cover only the restructuring of Greece's sovereign debt - and the provision of a bridging loan until April is also under consideration.

Others, though – in addition to the Economist - are still totally in fairy land. This hilarious account from Reuters has Jim Paulsen, chief investment officer at Wells Capital Management in Minneapolis, preening himself on getting " … this incredible flow of good data".

The eurozone, we are told, is putting the finishing touches to a second bailout deal for Athens that could be approved on Monday, moving closer to averting a disorderly default by Greece. "People are increasingly of the opinion that although Europe will continue to have flare-ups, it's not likely to become a calamity for the world economy", Paulsen says.

On this, then, we have to turn to ZeroHedge. Its view is:

While next to impossible, now may be a good time to ignore the constant barrage of meaningless noise and flashing red headlines, which not only are contradictory but prove that Europe is literally making it all up as it goes along. Today is a great case in point of a tangential detour which does nothing to change the reality that Germany no longer wants Greece in the Eurozone …

Not yet do we hear the dulcet tones of the fabled fat lady, but somewhere in that lot, we can hear her clearing her throat for her warm-up routine. It can't be long now. Despite that, though, we need to be careful what we wish for. It might be worse than we think.

COMMENT THREAD