Three remarkable events that may influence European elections

Before the campaign for the 2014 European elections begins for real, I'd like to share with you, dear readers, three remarkable events that occurred during the final weeks of the past year: 

First, according to an expertise prepared by Andreas Fischer-Lescano, Professor for European Law at the University of Bremen, the austerity measures imposed by the Troika (EU commission, ECB and IMF) constitute a breach of human rights, other constitutional rights and the EU social charta. The evidence collected will be used for legal action against the Troika initiated by Austrian and European workers organizations. 

Fischer-Lescano argues that the Troika of EU, ECB and IMF has been operating outside of European laws and without consulting the social partners or the European parliament. The EU commission has been active in policy areas for which it does not have a mandate, e.g. in wage setting. The Troika's wage-, pension-, and social-benefit compressing policies inflict particular harm on the human rights of the most vulnerable social groups - children, women, migrants - and have created abject poverty and desperation for an entire generation.

Together with the investigation of Troika activities by the European parliament, the legal action against constitutional and human rights abuses by the Troika is bound to slow down, if not stop, further austerity policies in the euro zone.  And that is excellent news for all the people who continue to suffer under the misanthropic austerity policies imposed on Southern Europeans. 

Second, two days before Christmas, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) which is the mouthpiece of the German bank(st)er elite published an article that seems genuinely critical of banks, entitled "How we learned to hate banks." The FAZ authors Hahn and von Petersdorff correctly assess that systemic banks still risk the well-being of economies around the world because politicians have only treated the symptoms of the Great Financial Crisis, not the root cause, namely the lack of equity capital. Five years after the crisis, banks still have too little equity to weather a new financial crisis so that the tax payers would have to bail them out again. Hahn and von Petersdorff even agree with the leftist critics of the banks who have long argued that the business model of banks is to privatize profits and socialize losses. This model works only as long as systemic banks can threaten their governments with the collapse of the financial system.

And so, Hahn und von Petersdorff correctly conclude that tax payers have a right not to be importuned by the risks of the banks' business models and that, therefore, banks need to ensure that they have sufficient equity capital to weather a crisis. A recent book by scientists Admati and Hellwig suggests equity quotas of between 25% and 40% which were not unusual in the 19th century when the economy boomed. And what if the banks refuse to raise their equity capital to that level ? Then, Hahn und von Petersdorff say, we have to force them ! Force may be a dirty word for a liberal newspaper, but the word bail-out is much, much dirtier.

I say: way to go, boys !

Third but most important is a bomb that exploded in the Vatican: the Evangelii Gaudium.

To be honest with you, before Pope Francis came along, my opinions of popes fluctuated between disregard, disrespect, ridicule (with respect to the old men's luxurious clothing), and anger about their 'love' of young altar boys and the old men's general audacity of telling young women what to do. 

Then comes Pope Francis: a highly extroverted man who loves to 'bathe' in crowds of 'normal' people, always ready to share a warm smile and some kind words. A man who does not need the luxury trappings and chaffeured limousines of a pope but who prefers to wear normal shoes and drives a small car chaffeured by himself. A man who took the name Francis upon his election as Pope in memory of his beloved Saint Francis of Assisi who abandoned a life of luxury for a life devoted to christianity.

These symbolic gestures were sufficient to earn my respect and admiration for Pope Francis, especially when compared to some of his ridiculous peers in the catholic church, e.g. the German bishop Tebartz-Van-Elst who spent millions of Euros on his Limburg bishop residence, including a $20,000 bathtub with golden faucets, while cutting the salaries of employees.

But the sincerety of Pope Francis' Evangelii Gaudium and the courage to have it published by the Vatican press completely won me over. I, a proud Lutheran, am now officially a fan of Pope Francesco ! He is a very special human being, perhaps an angel, who was sent to us just in the nick of time.... Finally someone who, by the power of his position, can reach hundreds of millions of people on this planet, ask the right questions and tell the unadorned truth in defense of those who don't have a lobby in our globalized economy (see his Evangelii Gaudium, paras 53-61):

"How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points ?"...."Can we continue to stand by when food is thrown away while people are starving ?".... "Today everything comes under the laws of competition and the survival of the fittest, where the powerful feed upon the powerless." (para 53)

...."In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system." (para 54, boldface by author)

...."The worship of the ancient golden calf (cf. Ex 32:1-35) has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose. The worldwide crisis affecting finance and the economy lays bare their imbalances and, above all, their lack of real concern for human beings...." (para 55)

...."This imbalance is the result of ideologies which defend the absolute autonomy of the marketplace and financial speculation. Consequently, they reject the right of states, charged with vigilance for the common good, to exercise any form of control. A new tyranny is thus born"....."The thirst for power and possessions knows no limits. in this system, which tends to devour everything which stands in the way of increased profits, whatever is fragile, like the environment, is defenseless before the interests of a deified market.... (para 56)

....."Behind this attitude lurks a rejection of ethics and a rejection of God."...."Ethics - a non-ideological ethics - would make it possible to bring about balance and a more humane social order." (para 57) ...."I exhort you [financial experts and political leaders] to generous solidarity and to the return of economics and finance to an ethical approach which favours human beings." (58)

...."Just as goodness tends to spread, the toleration of evil, which is injustice, tends to expand its baneful influence and quietly to undermine any political and social system, no matter how solid it may appear."...."It is evil crystallized in unjust social structures, which cannot be the basis of hope for a better future. We are far from the so-called "end of history", since the conditions for a sustainable and peaceful development have not yet been adequately articulated and realized." (59)