http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/blog/franceprofonde/turning-out-his-pockets/ Tim King on French politics Fri, 04 Jul 2008 00:54:37 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.5 http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/blog/franceprofonde/turning-out-his-pockets/#comment-31105 Sat, 08 Dec 2007 10:35:28 +0000 http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/blog/franceprofonde/turning-out-his-pockets/#comment-31105 This is potent stuff! Ghosts of history - the emperor unable to pay his legionnaires... The question is, is Sarko telling the whole truth, or is this just scare-mongering to help push through the privatisation agenda? He presents the financial picture to the public in very simplified terms (shades of Thatcher with her household budget analogies), yet his mates in big business and high finance increasingly deal in financial hocus-pocus, with complex 'financial instruments' turning debt into assets, seemingly producing money - or at least the ability to pay for things - where there was none. Hard to tell where the truth lies. But instructive perhaps to look at the UK, where Brown's supposed 'economic success', based on essentially US-style neoliberal policies, can be seen to be nothing but an economy afloat on a sea of personal debt as well as government debt. This is potent stuff! Ghosts of history - the emperor unable to pay his legionnaires… The question is, is Sarko telling the whole truth, or is this just scare-mongering to help push through the privatisation agenda? He presents the financial picture to the public in very simplified terms (shades of Thatcher with her household budget analogies), yet his mates in big business and high finance increasingly deal in financial hocus-pocus, with complex ‘financial instruments’ turning debt into assets, seemingly producing money - or at least the ability to pay for things - where there was none. Hard to tell where the truth lies. But instructive perhaps to look at the UK, where Brown’s supposed ‘economic success’, based on essentially US-style neoliberal policies, can be seen to be nothing but an economy afloat on a sea of personal debt as well as government debt.

]]>