EUROPEAN NIGHTMARE

WHAT a mess. Just a year ago Greece went bankrupt and now Ireland looks as if it it going the same way. Who next? Portugal? It is quite amazing that Ireland, which received billions of euros in aid from the European Union, is now in severe financial trouble. The European Union is going to have little option but to bail out Ireland, but surely it is a case of severe economic bad management by the Irish government and the major Irish banks?

Irish officials say that they are not in the same boat as Greece; it is the banks and the need to prop them up which is causing all the trouble.

But, does it really matter? At the end of the day the European Union is going to have to pay the bill. Spain and Portugal are also in bad financial shape and could need an aid package soon. But like everything where is all this money going to come from? The European Union doesn´t have a bottomless pit of money which it can use to bail-out failing European economies. There is something fundamentally wrong with the European Union and the European Central bank if countries can go bankrupt without anyone knowing until it too late. Both Greece and Ireland received billions from Brussels and where exactly has the money gone? Obviously, the roof wasn´t repaired when the sun was shining.