Nathan’s Registan continues to be one of the most reliable sources of news and analysis, to the extent that he is now being blocked from inside Uzebekistan itself. Among links you kind find there is one to the appropriately named Radio Silence. You can also access an on the ground report of the refugee situation in Kyrgyzstan.
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Category Archives: A Few Euros More
The Euro-vision and the Vote
The referendum battle continues its course. Le Monde notes the importance of the fact that whilst the ‘no’ vote seems to be consolidating its lead in France (see this FT graph), with only one week to go one fifth of the votes still declare themselves to be ‘undecided’.
Meantime the normally sobre EU Observer, lets it hair down for once to suggest that the Dutch No Looks Irrerversible, especially after a row surrounding the Eurovision song contest.
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The FT Sees It Differently
Actually the FT isn’t giving any apparent credence to the Times story, focusing on the embarrasing position the UK government might find itself in if there is a ‘no’. “Senior government officials are warning that if the French public votes No in its referendum on the European Union constitution, it could undermine Britain’s presidency of the EU in the second half of the year.”
Le Petit ‘Non’
Well, if you believe Times (and after last weeks episode with the Independent I believe no-one), le petit ‘non’, like its equivalent le petit mensonge, is not all that serious after all. According to the Times, Britain is working with other European states to draw up plans to keep the European Union constitution alive if there is a narrow ?non? vote in France next week. Just a soupcon of ‘no’ will, in the end ‘help the medicine go down’.
Make-up: The Ultimate WMD
I can’t believe it: “Belle de Jour” is still making waves in the conventional press. And in the Sunday Times Womens Section at that.
And Italy Heading For A 4% Deficit
That’s the current estimate of Morgan Stanley economist Vincenzo Guzzo. And even this he suggests can only be achieved at the price of a series of one-off measures which make the longer term outlook even worse. Just one of the problems:” Labor productivity growth averaged an appalling -0.4% over the past four years”.
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Portugal’s Deficit To Reach 6.8%: It’s Official
A special commission on the deficit set up by the government of Prime Minister Jose Socrates has just reported that the deficit this year will reach 6.83 % of GDP, that’s more than twice the European Union’s 3 percent limit. Over to you Almunia.
Portugal will have the highest budget deficit of any country using the euro since the common currency was introduced in 1999, the government said today. The announcement will prompt a package of spending control measures that may include freezes on wages of civil servants.
SPD Defeat in North Rhine-Westphalia
Gerhard Schr?der and the SPD have suffered a major election setback in these regional elections. Schr?der’s response it seems has been to suggest he will call an early general election late this year.
Schroeder made his proposal after exit polls showed the Social Democratic Party (SPD) suffered a heavy defeat in a state election in North Rhine-Westphalia where it had ruled for 39 years.
The conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) won 45 percent, comfortably ahead of the 37.2 percent for the SPD, public TV said.
Schroeder said the “bitter defeat” in North Rhine-Westphalia “throws into question the political basis for the continuation of our work” at a time when Germany was in need of wide-ranging reforms.
Xavi Sala i Martin in Beijing
According to the official version, Columbia University economist and well-known growth theorist Xavi Sala i Martin is in Beijing to give a paper at a meeting sponsored by the IMF. But my confidential sources (OK: I mean the newspaper ‘Sport’) here in Barcelona have another reading: the IMF meeting is a cover. Xavi – who is President of the Economic Commission of FC Barcelona (and a well known cul?) – is there to act as intermediary for Bar?a President Joan Laporta. His mission: sort out the details of the Beijing 2008 sponsorship for Bar?a shirts next season. If they get this the rumours say, then it’s next stop Thierry Henry.
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A New Kind of Science ;)
Crooked Timber’s Eszter Hargittai found a new paper by physicists about social networks and the Eurovision Song Contest and sulkingly remarks that a) CT was far ahead on the curve on this matter and that b)
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