Courtesy of Mish.
The G-20 summit is over. As expected, the two-day summit produced nothing but bickering.
On day one, European Commission president Jose Barroso kicked things off by sniping at a Canadian reporter and blaming the US for Europe’s problems.
UK Independent Party (UKIP) leader Nigel Farage responded by calling Barroso a “delusional idiot”.
For a highly entertaining video of Farage’s tongue lashing, check out Nigel Farage: “EC president Jose Barroso is a Delusional Idiot, The Whole Thing’s a Giant Ponzi Scheme!”
Merkel Ambushed
On day two, French president François Hollande and Italian technocrat prime minister Mario Monti combined to Ambush German Chancellor Angela Merkel
Angela Merkel, German chancellor, is well accustomed to turning up at international events to receive lectures on how to solve the eurozone’s crisis, but at the Group of 20 in Los Cabos the meeting turned into an ambush.
This time, the rebellion against Ms Merkel came from within the eurozone. Mario Monti, who last year received Ms Merkel’s imprimatur after succeeding Silvio Berlusconi as Italy’s prime minister, suggested the eurozone’s €440bn rescue fund should be used to drive down rocketing borrowing costs for both Spain and Italy.
Mr Monti denied Italy was about to seek help, but confirmed there were ongoing discussions about ways to reward “virtuous countries”, such as Italy and Spain, that are nevertheless being punished by financial markets.
“The idea is to stabilize borrowing costs, especially for countries who are complying with their reform goals, and this should be clearly separated from the idea of a bailout,” Mr Monti told a press conference.
The proposal was quickly seized upon by François Hollande, the new French president who has shown no compunction about publicly disagreeing with Ms Merkel about her crisis management plans since he assumed office last month.
Ms Merkel quickly left the summit on Tuesday evening with only brief comments to the media. But back in Berlin on Wednesday, she insisted such discussions were only theoretical and German officials attempted to pour cold water on the idea.
Official Denial…
