Will the Euro break up over the next two years.

This is not advice and only a loosely held opinion, BUT .....

Off the top of my head, I don't think there is much of a precedent despite what other economists say. It's likely that the rules for membership of the Euro will get tougher and fiscal policy will go the same way as monetary policy into coordinated realms like the US Fed. The Canadian dollar survived and I expect the Euro will survive and probably do very well thank you. The world needs the Euro. Europe needs the Euro. We all need the Euro. Who would want to see Europe's framework weaken other than a stinking thinking individual. This is not about opportunism born out of American corruption, but of decent hard working peoples trying to coordinate efforts over the longer time so as to reduce the chance of war.

Gresham's law would prevail. Experiments such as Alberta issuing it's own currency did not last very long and failed because good money drove out bad. Any country that tried to opt out of the Euro would find it's currency treated as bad and a black market of Euros or dollars would probably prevail. Germany has the staying power to keep the Euro strong and the energy policy to take Europe into a world economic leadership position. Britain may join the Euro within a decade, but the size of the Euro zone will not in my opinion diminish much if at all despite Greece and Ireland.

On the other hand the dollar as a source of world economic ills may get it's opportunity to move closer to parity with the Euro as fears of Euro break up increase.

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.

French publishers plan digital newsstand

From The International Herald Tribune:

French publishers plan digital newsstand

PARIS — With sales of newspapers and magazines flagging at the ornate kiosks that adorn the boulevards of Paris, French publishers hope that a planned ''digital kiosk'' can help revive their fortunes.

The publishers, representing eight of the leading dailies and weeklies in France, said last week that they had formed a consortium to manage the project, which aims to create a single online portal to sell the publications' contents via the Web, mobile phones and tablet computers like the iPad. Consumers could buy articles or subscriptions with a single click of a mouse once they had created an account.

''The idea is to put a value on online content,'' said Frédéric Filloux, a former newspaper editor who is heading the project. ''It's a matter of survival for us.''

The plan is being introduced as newspapers everywhere are rethinking their digital business models, which until now have mostly been built on advertising-supported Web sites that were free to users. With online ad revenue falling short of hopes, some publishers are putting up pay walls, and others are considering plans to charge users for access to their sites.

The need for new sources of income is particularly great in France, where newspaper readership is low and many publications survive only because of government support.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/business/media/06pay.html

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect?   Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world.   Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works.    Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement.   Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.     

Payback time darkens Ireland’s view of E.U.

From The International Herald Tribune:

Payback time darkens Ireland's view of E.U.

Just about the time Ireland joined what was then the European Economic Community in 1973, Fintan O'Toole ran with the other teenagers around his public housing complex in Dublin, joyously reciting, ''We are into Europe!'' Playing on the title of a popular television show, they were celebrating the riches in European agricultural support that would now begin flowing to Irish farmers.

It was the start of a European journey that over the next three and a half decades delivered a transformational boon to the mainly rural economy of Ireland, a small country long overshadowed by Britain. With it came a brasher new identity and a new sense of political independence, as Ireland took its place in the constellation of European countries.

How things have changed: Last weekend, Mr. O'Toole spoke at a rally that urged Ireland to reject an €85 billion bailout program, equivalent to $112 billion, backed by the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, calling instead for Ireland to repudiate much of its debt to international banks. The rally's setting, on O'Connell Street in Dublin outside the General Post Office, said it all: It was the center of Ireland's 1916 rebellion against British rule, now redolent of the backward-looking and helpless gloom that has descended on Ireland since it became the latest victim of the European debt crisis.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/weekinreview/05bowley.html

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect?   Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world.   Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works.    Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement.   Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.     

An angry Libya delayed atom deal

From The International Herald Tribune:

An angry Libya delayed atom deal

WASHINGTON — In the early morning of Nov. 25, 2009, a large Russian cargo plane left the Libyan capital, Tripoli, on a secret mission, but without its intended cargo.

A small stockpile of spent nuclear fuel destined for disposal in Russia remained behind in a lightly guarded research center, apparently because of a fit of pique by Libya's leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

In a frantic cable to Washington, U.S. officials in Tripoli warned of dire consequences unless the carefully brokered deal to remove the 5.2 kilograms, or 11.4 pounds, of highly enriched uranium stored in seven five-ton casks was quickly resurrected.

If the enriched uranium ''is not removed from the casks within three months, its rising temperature could cause the casks to crack and to release radioactive nuclear material,'' the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli reported, according to cables made public by WikiLeaks. ''Security concerns alone dictate that we must employ all of our resources to find a timely solution to this problem, and to keep any mention of it out of the press.''

The seeds of what appeared to be the demise of the secret deal were planted weeks earlier in New York, when Colonel Qaddafi expressed unhappiness that he was not permitted to set up his tent in Manhattan or to visit the site of the destroyed World Trade Center towers during a United Nations session.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/04/world/africa/04libya.html

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect?   Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world.   Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works.    Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement.   Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.     

Distrust in Europe for tracing transactions

From The International Herald Tribune:

Distrust in Europe for tracing transactions

WASHINGTON — When the European Parliament ordered a halt in February to a U.S. government program to monitor international banking transactions for terrorist activity, the Obama administration was blindsided by the rebuke.

''Paranoia runs deep especially about US intelligence agencies,'' a secret cable from the American Embassy in Berlin said. ''We were astonished to learn how quickly rumors about alleged U.S. economic espionage'' had taken root among German politicians who opposed the bank-monitoring program, it said.

The memo was among dozens of State Department cables that revealed the deep distrust of some traditional European allies toward what they considered American intrusion into their citizens' affairs without stringent oversight.

The program, created in secrecy by the Bush administration after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has allowed American counterterrorism officials to examine reams of banking transactions routed through a vast database run by a Brussels consortium known as Swift. When the program was disclosed in 2006 by The New York Times, just months after the newspaper reported the existence of the National Security Agency's warrantless wiretapping program, it set off protests in Europe and forced the United States to accept new restrictions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/world/middleeast/06wikileaks-swift.html

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect?   Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world.   Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works.    Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement.   Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.     

Humbled? Sure, but also proud

From The International Herald Tribune:

Humbled? Sure, but also proud

MANAMA, BAHRAIN — When U.S. diplomats get together these days, there is lots of dark talk about the fallout from the sensational disclosure of secret diplomatic cables. Will angry foreign governments kick out ambassadors? Will spooked locals stop talking to their embassy contacts?

Behind all the public hand-wringing, however, there is another, more muted reaction: pride.

The WikiLeaks affair has turned an unaccustomed spotlight on the diplomatic corps — pinstriped authors who pour their hearts and minds into cables, which are filed to the U.S. State Department and, until now, were often barely read by desk officers, let alone senior diplomats.

Whatever damage the leaks may do, and nobody doubts it could be substantial, they have showcased the many roles of the Foreign Service officer in the field: part intelligence analyst, part schmoozer, part spy — and to judge by these often artful cables, part foreign correspondent.

The pride of authorship is shared by their boss, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who found a silver lining in the disclosures, even after she spent last week trying to smooth the feathers of foreign leaders described in the cables as feckless, profligate, vain, corrupt or worse.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/world/05diplo.html

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect?   Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world.   Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works.    Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement.   Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.     

Signs of vast hacking by a Web-wary China

From The International Herald Tribune:

Signs of vast hacking by a Web-wary China

As China ratcheted up the pressure on Google to censor its Internet searches last year, the U.S. Embassy sent a secret cable to Washington detailing one reason top Chinese leaders had become so obsessed with the Internet search company: They were Googling themselves.

The May 18, 2009, cable, titled ''Google China Paying Price for Resisting Censorship,'' quoted a well-placed source as saying that Li Changchun, a member of China's top ruling body, the Politburo Standing Committee, and the country's senior propaganda official, was taken aback to discover that he could conduct Chinese-language searches on Google's main international Web site. When Mr. Li typed his name into the search engine at google.com, he found ''results critical of him.''

That cable from U.S. diplomats was one of many made public by WikiLeaks that portray China's leadership as nearly obsessed with the threat posed by the Internet to their grip on power — and, the reverse, by the opportunities it offered them, through hacking, to obtain secrets stored in computers of its rivals, especially the United States.

Extensive hacking operations suspected of originating in China, including one leveled at Google, are a central theme in the cables. The operations began earlier and were aimed at a wider array of U.S. government and military data than generally known, including on the computers of U.S. diplomats involved in climate change talks with China.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/world/asia/05wikileaks-china.html

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect?   Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world.   Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works.    Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement.   Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.     

WikiLeaks Archive - Arab States and Terror Funds - NYTimes.com

If you thought international cooperation was easy!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/world/middleeast/06wikileaks-financing.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=a2

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.

Discount Cruises, Last Minute Cruises, Cruise, Cruise Line, Cruise Vacation

Fancy a discounted cruise:

http://www.vacationstogo.com/

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.

Court to decide if one class-action suit is proper in massive Wal-Mart discrimination case

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/06/AR2010120602733.html?wpisrc=nl_natlalert

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.

Continental Airlines found guilty in Concorde crash · TheJournal.ie

http://www.thejournal.ie/continental-airlines-found-guilty-in-concorde-crash-2010-12/

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.

Ex-Merrill Lynch Employee Predicts What Will Emerge In The Wikileaks Bank Bombshell

http://www.businessinsider.com/what-does-wiki-leaks-have-on-bank-of-america-2010-12?utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Clusterstock+Select&utm_campaign=Clusterstock_Select_120610

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.

Bill Gates Now Promoting Apple Macs On His Blog

That a prominent information source Business Insider says such a thing suggests that editorial review there is somewhat lacking despite the sense of humour. We all know that the seesawing between Apple and Microsoft, between Gates and Jobs, has gone on now for forty or more years. That it's Apple's turn now at innovation comes as no real surprise and has to be admired. Microsoft dropped the tablet many times because as a language and software house your market orientation is very different from that of Apple. Using servers to process commands, as well as the tablet, is only a temporary phenomenon. As we enter the terabyte-memory-as-normal phase, who will care about the Internet... Seesaw!

http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-gives-up-on-pcs-starts-promoting-apple-macs-on-his-blog-2010-12?utm_source=alerts

Will not time reveal the lasting importance of friends and mutual respect? Be kind to those who think well of you and those you know and try to add positive elements to your world. Promote peace in your heart and sunshine in the minds of those around you by your own good works. Elevate the level of discussion by thinking less of the issues and more of how you can reduce the tension of stress that arises with honest disagreement. Relax by breathing more deeply and consciously.