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To: Haim R. Branisteanu who wrote (72978)	3/21/2010 9:27:57 AM
From: critical_mass	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 74559

How do you think that the process will resolve? Do you think that the tribal bickering will create lasting animosity between all parties involved? I believe that the political leadership of all parties involved showed extremely poor judgement in allowing this issue to be debated on the pages of the tabloid press. The amount of debate over this issue is way out of proportion and if nothing else, it sends a clear signal that if/when Spain, Italy and Portugal confess to any accounting trickery, nobody will enthusiastically defend them. There is always the possibility that the ECB and the Bundesbank knew that Greece was using band-aids supplied by GS to make the numbers and receive approval to join the Eurozone, and they decided to look the other way due to political pressure. Ditto for Spain, Italy and Portugal. If the countries do not have the ability to adjust monetary policy, and the currencies cannot adjust against German currency because they are the same, then the countries of southern Europe will need to either become much more productive or offer a significant cost advantage without triggering a protectionist reaction from the northern Europeans. When the original conversions were done, i.e. how many DM, French Francs, Italian Lira, etc per Euro, I wonder how the ECB planned to correct the valuations in case they got them wrong. I don't see an easy way out and rather than looking at this as a one off event, I expect more countries to come forward with problems.