By Paolo von Schirach February 22, 2012 WASHINGTON – Whatever happens with the Republican nomination process, the winner is unlikely to truly inspire America. For different reasons, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are all very weak candidates. (I shall not even try to assess Ron Paul, who lives all by himself in a [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 15, 2012 WASHINGTON – The President of Greece, Karolos Papoulias, made headlines by criticizing the German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schauble, because he has said unkind things about Greece being a bottomless pit, or something to that effect. So, the old patriotic President got irritated and reacted against the arrogance of [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 12, 2012 WASHINGTON – True to form, the Greeks had to drag the signing of a most critical deal that will allow the release of essential EU funds (130 billion Euro) until the very end. The government headed by Lucas Papademos haggled and negotiated with the so called “troika”, (EU, European Central [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 9, 2012 WASHINGTON – The confused and fractious Republicans appear terminally incapable of getting their act together, as the latest contests in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri won by comfortable margins by conservative Rick Santorum show. By now it is pretty obvious: a large chunk of the rank and file GOP activists really do not [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 8, 2012 WASHINGTON – If you think that Asia is only about China and India, watch out for Indonesia. Indonesia is the quiet success story of South East Asia. Without fanfare, the country managed to grow more than 5% in seven out the past eight years. For 2011 the growth [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 6, 2012 WASHINGTON – Remember Yale historian Paul Kennedy and his 1987 tome “The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers“? At that time there was a lot of interest in, and indeed concern about his fairly comprehensive narrative focusing on how all major Western Powers, primarily because of the huge [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 5, 2012 WASHINGTON – What is most amazing about the Greek debt crisis is that more than two years into it, (it all started in the Fall of 2009), the European Union has not managed to take care of it. True enough, the Greeks bear full responsibility for getting themselves into this [...]
By Paolo von Schirach January 31, 2012 WASHINGTON – Wolfgang Ischinger, former German Deputy Foreign Minister, Igor Ivanov, former Russian Foreign Minister, and San Nunn, former US Senator, and once Chairman of the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee, in their current role as co-chairmen of the Euro-Atlantic Security Initiative voice their concern about the future [...]
By Paolo von Schirach January 27, 2012 WASHINGTON – As if it did not have enough problems with its never ending fiscal crisis, Europe is also afflicted by long term, possibly terminal, demographic decline. Across many countries there are fewer families, with fewer children or no children at all. This trend shows in the progressive decline of fertility rates, now below [...]
By Paolo von Schirach January 26, 2012 WASHINGTON – It is quite depressing to observe Washington total political paralysis, accompanied by cheap and openly divisive populism. Admittedly, it is difficult to govern when the two parties are so deeply divided. But the president has to try. This is what he was elected to do and what he gets paid [...]