France , Italy and Spain do the EURO Shake !
Spain would be Spiderman naturally.......Italy ( Monti and Draghi would be firemen naturally ) , France PM Hollande wears the chicken costume........
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-02-25/next-domino-spain-main-suspect-rajoy-graft-scandal-has-passport-confiscated
Next Domino: Spain, As Main Suspect In Rajoy Graft Scandal Has Passport Confiscated
- Corruption
- European Central Bank
- Italy
- Newspaper
- Recession
- Reuters
- Swiss Banks
- Switzerland
- Unemployment
While today's attention was focused on the austerity-crushing defeat of Monti in Italy and the pre-supposition that the ECB being able to use its OMT promise against an ill-disciplined nation fades; there is another super-cell of destruction wending its way towards Berlin (and Brussels). At the perfect time for such things, Reuters reports that theman at the center of Spanish PM Rajoy's political scandal, Luis Barcenas, has been banned from leaving Spain, had his passport revoked, and ordered to report to court twice a month. The millions of dollars in Swiss bank accounts that investigators found that he had deposited and the linkages to Spain's royalty in the so-called 'graft' case are not playing well with the population as unemployment surges above 26%. Judged as a serious flight risk, the high court judge ordered the steps after finding out he was skiing in Canada two weeks ago (where they suspect funds were also transferred). One protester complained, "They are lying to us, and worse than that, scorning us... Enough is enough, we need some accountability."
A former treasurer of Spain's ruling party, at the heart of a corruption scandal that has hurt Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, was ordered to surrender his passport on Monday while judges investigate millions of euros he deposited in Swiss banks.Luis Barcenas is accused of using his position to take bribes, evade taxes by hiding the proceeds in Switzerland and launder money through shell companies, charges that carry prison sentences of up to six years and fines.The long-running High Court investigation of Barcenas and agraft case involving the son-in-law of Spain's king have enraged Spaniards at a time when deep recession has pushed unemployment to 26 percent and the government has slashed public spending.
After three hours of questioning Barcenas in a closed-door court hearing, High Court examining judge Pablo Ruz ordered steps be taken to restrict the suspect's movements as there was "a serious risk" he might attempt to flee.
...Ruz banned Barcenas from leaving Spain, seized his passport and ordered him to report to a court twice a month.Barcenas, 55, an avid mountaineer who once scaled Everest, went skiing in Canada two weeks ago, according to media reports. Some of these reports said the police suspected he also used the ski trip to move funds he holds there.
Then, El Pais newspaper published extracts from what it said were secret PP account books that Barcenas kept for almost 20 years, showing cash donations from construction magnates that were distributed to Rajoy and other party leaders.
...Barcenas says the money in the Swiss accounts is from legitimate business activities, but Ruz's investigation has cast doubt on that defence,...Rajoy has denied any wrongdoing, either personal or by the party....The Barcenas scandal has soured a public mood already bitter over joblessness, cuts to education, health spending and public sector wages, and the 40 billion euros in public funds spent on rescuing failed banks.
"They are lying to us, and worse than that, scorning us... Enough is enough, we need some accountability," said Ana, 59, a civil servant from Madrid who declined to give her last name.
From Italy ....
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2013/02/201322611124347157.html
( updated tally of results... )
Italy faces political deadlock after vote | |
Hopes of economic recovery and stability dashed as election results show no coalition strong enough to form government.
Last Modified: 26 Feb 2013 05:30
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| Italy faces political paralysis as near-complete results in crucial national elections have shown that no group won enough votes to form a government. The uncertainty bodes ill for the nation's efforts to pass the tough reforms it needs to tackle its economic crisis and prevent a new round of global financial turmoil. With more than 99.9 per cent of returns in from polling stations, Monday’s results showed the centre-left had scored a modest victory of around 130,000 votes in the lower house of parliament, enough to give it comfortable control thanks to a big winner's bonus.
But no party or likely coalition won enough seats to form a majority in the upper house, creating a deadlocked parliament - the opposite of the stable result that Italy desperately needs to tackle a deep recession, rising unemployment and a massive public debt.
The result was an extraordinary success for Genoese comic Beppe Grillo, leader of the populist 5-Star Movement, who toured the country in his first national election campaign hurling obscenity-laced insults against a discredited political class. Wave of anger Grillo was set to become the biggest single party in the lower house, riding a wave of anger against waste and corruption by ageing political leaders. He polled more around a quarter of the vote in a stunning rise from the 1.8 percent he received in his movement's first local political test in 2010. The result was a humiliating centre-left leader Pier Luigi Bersani, who squandered a 10-point opinion-poll lead less than two months ago against Silvio Berlusconi's centre right. Berlusconi, the billionaire media magnate who staged an extraordinary comeback from sex and corruption scandals since diving into the campaign in December, came in a close second in the Senate race, with an estimated 117 seats. With almost all results in, the centre-left was set to take 121 seats in the upper house, Grillo 54, and Monti languishing on only 22 after a campaign which never took off. The Senate majority is 158. Berlusconi, 76, wooed voters with a blitz of television appearances and promises to refund Monti's unpopular housing tax despite accusations from opponents that this was an impossible vote buying trick. Anti-euro sentiment Grillo had attacked all sides in the campaign and ruled out a formal alliance with any group although it was not immediately known how he would react to his stunning success or how his supporters would behave in parliament. The next move to solve the crisis will be when Giorgio Napolitano, the head of state, calls in political leaders to discuss how to form a government. But this is not expected until March 10 after the election result is formally confirmed and parliament convened. The results showed more than half of Italians had voted for the anti-euro platforms of Berlusconi and Grillo.
and...
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Monday, February 25, 2013 1:35 PM
Italy Senate "Ungovernable"; No Coalition Possible
La Republica confirms what we long thought highly likely: The Italian Senate is Ungovernable.
A Senate majority takes 158 seats and no party has more than 123 at the moment. The current results look like this:
Senate Seat Projections
A Senate majority takes 158 seats and no party has more than 123 at the moment. The current results look like this:
Senate Seat Projections
- Bersani 104
- Berlusconi 123
- Grillo 57
- Monti 17
There are 315 total seats and the total above is only 301. Although 14 seats remain, not even a Monti-Bersani coalition in addition to those 14 seats would bring Bersani's total to 158.
Curiously, it appears Bersani received a plurality of the Senate popular vote with 32% compared to Berlusconi's 30.2%. Grillo weighs in with 23.9%, and Monti at 9.1%.
If 123-104 in favor of Berlusconi over Bersani sounds strange, it is not unlike a presidential election in the US where one candidate wins the popular vote and another candidate wins the election based on state-by-state electoral votes.
Chamber Comparison to US
In Italy, both houses of parliament share duties equally. In the US, financial bills originate in the House, and only the Senate has a say in approval of judges and cabinet-level positions.
"AC" writes ..."Most likely Italy will go back to vote within a couple of months, probably after changing the electoral law."
Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://www.testosteronepit.com/home/2013/2/19/they-tell-the-french-illusions-and-lies.html
‘They Tell The French Illusions And Lies.’
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2013 AT 6:09PM
France is in upheaval. Arguments erupt live on TV, demonstrations block the streets, strikes shut down plants, and threats of mayhem are part of the show [French Workers Threaten To Blow Up Their Factory]. The problem: an economy where businesses are suffocating under an obese public sector. Ever larger budgets have been the only source of economic growth. But now that model has run aground.
During the campaign last year, candidate François Hollande forecast that the economy in 2013 would grow 1.7%. Shortly after taking office, he shaved it down to 1.2%. Late last year, for the new budget, he chopped it to 0.8%.
And now that too has gone up in smoke. Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius guesstimated on RTL that growth would instead be 0.2% to 0.3%. And the goal of a budget deficit of 3%? It hasn’t been “abandoned,” Fabius said. But there’d be “a delay.”
The final vestiges of economic optimism are evaporating. Taxes have already been raised to absurd levels, and new tools are being implemented to crack down on tax fraud [read...Draconian Cash Controls Are Coming To France].
But the deficit still isn’t coming in line. Now the chopping block has been moved to the center. On it are child benefits. Instant hullabaloo.
Child benefits are part of a gamut of social benefits and subsidies. Parents of one child receive no child benefits. Once they have two children, they receive €127 per month. With four kids, they receive €452 per month. For each additional one, they receive another €162. A household with eight kids receives €1,100 ($1,500) per month in salary-like payments. And it’s tax free, regardless of income.
But there are drawbacks: a single mom with one child and a minimum-wage job receivesnothing, while a wealthy household with two kids receives €127 per month; and it’s very, very expensive. Hence its sudden appearance on the chopping block.
Three options have been mentioned: include child benefits in taxable income; reserve the benefits for lower-income parents; or cap the benefits for high-income parents. The prior Socialist Prime Minister, Lionel Jospin, had already run his head into that wall. Tumults in the street forced him to retreat.
In this context, the evening news on France 2, France’s largest TV channel, had an amazing report, amazing because it showed a well-mannered, articulate, well-intentioned and rarely televised meeting of government functionaries and elected officials that,unintentionally, displayed in a microcosm what is wrong with the French economy.
France has a shortage of daycare centers—up to 12,000 places in Paris alone, according to the report. When three places opened up at the in-house daycare center of the Hôtel de Ville (City Hall) in Paris, 16 families applied. So 13 elected representatives and bureaucrats—some of them doctors and childhood specialists—sat around a conference table. The director of the daycare center, after meeting with the families, had put together a dossier on each case. Hours of work. Now she was presenting the dossiers. The 13 people weighed pertinent aspects and carefully arrived at a decision. It took nearly two hours—26 man hours (not counting the many hours put into it beforehand), paid for by taxpayers, to decide which three children should be able to enter the government-owned daycare center.
But where the heck was the private sector? Not a single word. Despite a shortage, and hence demand. No one even seemed to think about it. Certainly not the reporters ofgovernment-owned France 2. The private sector simply didn’t enter into the equation—though entrepreneurs creating daycare centers for 12,000 kids in Paris alone would have stimulated the economy in numerous ways.
“We have a major, massive, heavy problem that has never been dealt with until now,”lamented François Bayrou, presidential candidate of the centrist MoDem, “which is, our country has abandoned the force that it had, the force of creation, of enterprise, of production. If you don’t produce, you don’t have new products, new services, innovations, things to sell.” France has abandoned the private sector.
He estimated that growth in 2013 would be “zero, at best.” And the lofty growth forecast during the campaign? “As always during an election,” he said, “they tell the French things that are illusions and lies.”
But instead of falling for the latest fad of blaming German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister David Cameron, Europe, globalization, or other specters of the French economic nightmare, he said, “The problems of France are French.”
And so, the French economic model with its domineering public sector is being put through the wringer. That these discussions are taking place is a positive, though whether or not they will lead to anything constructive, or just more government intervention—and more stimulus, for “a moment of euphoria,” as Bayrou sneered—remains uncertain.
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