Thursday morning, the German government headed by Angela Merkel voted in favor of a European bailout fund designed to aid Greece and by extension the entire euro financial system tentatively set at €440 billion ($600 billion).
That rivals in size the bailouts the United States passed at the urging of then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson in the fall of 2008 and again in February 2009, Obama's bill. Whatever the deficiencies of those bills spurring job creation, they prevented a complete implosion of the financial system whose consequences would have made the resulting recession and market plunge look inconsequential by comparison. Yet here are the Europeans led by the Germans taking significant action to stem their crisis"”admittedly after multiple missteps"”and those efforts are greeted with yawns and derision.
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