"I used to point out at art school, you can teach the craft, it’s the poetry you can’t teach. But now they try to teach the poetry and not the craft." David Hockney
Read more @ The Daily Mail: Mail Online
How The ECB Can Fix Europe Tomorrow
Wyplosz's scheme goes like this:
A much better arrangement is possible without a new treaty. Currently, in its routine refinancing operation, the ECB accepts as collateral a wide range of assets. Most central banks accept only – or mainly – treasury bonds. The unusual arrangement of the Eurozone is an artifact of history – because practices differed considerably among future Eurozone countries, the ECB decided to accept every asset that was previously accepted. The ECB has the authority to decide what collateral it accepts and it could decide to only accept treasury bonds issued by governments that exercise fiscal discipline. It would work as follows.
The ECB would ask an independent body to examine the fiscal policy framework of each member country. The body, call it the Fiscal Discipline Board, would look for arrangements that adequately constrain member governments, for example the German debt brake or the Dutch coalition agreements. The ECB would bind itself to follow the Board’s judgment. A country that has not adopted arrangements deemed adequate, or that does not abide by its own arrangements, would face the consequences: high borrowing costs, possibly loss of market access. The presumption is that the situation would be promptly corrected.
Journalists Sending Message to Wall Street
The media is talking to you, Wall Street.
Consider it a piece of New Year's advice from the editors watching the state of your union.
Their message is this: Like it or not, regulation is coming.
And the worst thing about it, is what Wall Street looks like trying to stop it.....
It's a new year, it's a new Wall Street. But that doesn't mean everything has to go down in flames: That is, unless Wall Street douses itself in gasoline and lights a match.
MOSCOW — A spokesman for the radical art collective Voina on Monday announced that its members had broken into a St. Petersburg police station on New Year’s Eve and used gasoline bombs to incinerate a police vehicle used to transport prisoners as “a gift to all political prisoners of Russia.”
This is a problem for the EU; how will it respond to dictatorships springing up within its borders? The article makes clear that Brussels has concerns. The new Hungarian government is so far unresponsive to them. Read "What a Constitutional Coup Looks Like" @ America Blog
'Bright future' ahead?
Cuba's economic changes create new entrepreneurs
The new entrepreneurs face towering challenges in getting their enterprises off the ground, including high taxes, a lack of raw materials, an uncertain customer base, labyrinthine bureaucratic rules and limited access to start-up capital. Yet, their success or failure will go a long way in determining the future of Cuba's revolution.
The Cuban state now employs 84 percent of the island's workers and controls 90 percent of the economy in one of the world's last bastions of Soviet-style communism. If the free-market experiment works, the cash-strapped government could shed millions of dollars from its payroll while boosting much-needed tax revenues and creating a new business and consumer class. It could also legalize part of a booming black market that provides everything from sausages to satellite television. Read original article @ worldnews.msnbc.com
Woman takes unique road to sue Honda over mileage
TORRANCE, Calif. (AP) – A woman who expected her 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid to be her dream car wants Honda to pay for not delivering the high mileage it promised. But rather than joining other owners in a class-action lawsuit, she is going solo in small claims court, an unusual move that could offer a bigger payout if it doesn't backfire.
Steve Jobs Action Figure
