Thank you for making this place what it could be – a place for thoughtful people to talk. I have greatly enjoyed reading your exchange.

Perhaps we can club together and buy a TV channel and a newspaper. Otherwise we could spend a fortune on lobbying…

Seriously though, it's much easier to identify problems than propose solutions.

I'm not really worried about losing a little wealth, most of which was only on paper anyway. I am worried about a complete breakdown of society. I hope that this is a little unjustified, but it is pretty hard to fix an airplane in flight

I'm very happy that we have a space scientist on board – and a very eloquent one…

The hurt that your family and friends may feel at the melt-down, is the realization that they're not as rich as they once thought, in absolute terms of equity in value of homes and in relative terms of buying power in the 3rd world.

Most people can come to terms with this. Food will be produced and distributed, and God knows we have more than enough real estate to house everybody. Sharing will be the new greed!

I'm with you on the not so conspirational approach to politics. It's understandable how badly informed wishful thinking ends up as stupid political decisions. We need to get the honest ill-informed on board also – how can we communicate with them more efficiently in your opinion?

"The European Central Bank said yesterday that it had spent €16.5 billion buying government bonds of Greece and other financially weakened eurozone states.

(….)

The ECB moved to offset the emergency injection of cash into the bond markets, seeking deposits from commercial banks to calm the potential inflationary effect of the new money created to purchase sovereign bonds."

"Seeking deposits" may be the extent of the "sterilization" of the intervention. The amounts deposited are not quantified however….

The mischievous part of me would like the whole thing to fall apart as quickly as possible. Then I think of my family and friends and the pain that the collapse would cause. That is why I'm not so sure…

I'm angry too. This whole crisis is the biggest crime ever perpetrated. A group of people have actually managed to steal money from the future – the perfect crime. No one will ever go to prison over it either. That makes me angry.

Any elected politician, whether they are bought by the financial oligarchs or not, would prefer a slow melt down over a collapse – that is the problem. I don't think that they have any plan of how to deal with such a collapse. Civilisation (if we can call it that) is very fragile these days, much more so than we realise.

I work in the space industry (luckily it's not very financialised, nearly 100% of the development cost is labour, political reasons not to offshore, no economies of scale as most items are one offs, etc). I was discussing, just the other day, with some colleagues, what would happen if all the satellites in orbit stopped working. No Telecoms, No GPS (OK maybe a good thing), Weather forecasts. Everything would grind to a halt. Is it hard to imagine this happening, not really – one big solar flare could do it.

People in the developed world are more and more specialised, less able to look after themselves if it all falls apart. It is all very well to encourage collapse, but we need a plan for getting through the worst phase. I don't think our politicians are completely in the pockets of some financial overlords – they are just out manoeuvred, badly advised and slightly scared (mainly for their reputations perhaps).

As for a slow melt down – I think that is the best we can hope for. If you look at the total use of the worlds resources by the developed world, then it would take 3 Earth's (I think) to support the entire world population at the level of the developed world. I used to wonder how this would happen (in fact it will never happen). But what will happen is that the developed world's standard of living will fall to meet the developing world somewhere in the middle. Another trigger for the crisis are the large wage differences between the developed and developing worlds. The devaluation of the US and European currencies shows that we are headed down to meet the developing world.

You mention that the slow melt down will rot our nation. I think that that the last 20 years of comparative good times have not exactly seen a flourishing of anything to be proud of. But I take your point.

"for now" is indeed the key phrase. It will have to happen. Absolutely no question about it. It is a certainty. Just a question of when.

"Josef Ackermann, the chief executive officer of Germany’s largest bank, said in an interview on ZDF television last week that it’s imperative to avoid a restructuring of Greece’s debt for now, even as he expressed doubts about the country’s ability to pay back its borrowings in full. "

I guess the operative word here is "for now"…

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/markets/article-23835210-george-osborne-must-start-bigging-up-britain.do

And, as I understand it, the Euro
ministers of finance is still wrangling with the "details" of the 750 bill. prop-up fund. Seems they find themselves in difficulty trying to device austerity without austerity effects (savings in public spendings with no adverse effects on growth). Wildly differing comments have been made public today.

I much prefer that we help educate than help murder. Weapons research and manufacture is such a corrupt and corrupting business – at least what I have seen of it.

Rob,

I agree that at some point the debts will be written down. As you say those who would lose are trying to put off the day and lessen the amount by getting us to cover it for them.

I don't think the choice is between a sudden collapse versus a slow melt down. I would say it is traumatic surgery (think Napoleonic navy type – bite down on this son – kind of thing) but versus watching gangrene consume not just our economy but our democracy, our values and our culture.

The slow melt down will rot this nation and its people if we allow it.

I am NOT willing to let that happen. Not without a fight. I'd prefer a verbal, democratic fight. But if that option is not left open to us then I hope we will find the courage to stand together against those who shit on us.