The euro crisis and the FAZ

I'm starting to think that the euro crisis has been to the German press what the run-up to the Iraq War was for the American press. And that's really not a good thing. This is from the oh-so-Respectable Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, aka, the FAZ, Ralph Bollmann und Lisa Nienhaus, Denn sie wissen nicht, was sie tun 8.03.2015:

Außerhalb Griechenlands weiß keiner, wie es im griechischen Haushalt wirklich aussieht. Keine europäische Institution, keine Regierung hat Einblick in den griechischen Haushalt. Das verweigern die Griechen hartnäckig. Einzige Hoffnung für die Europäer ist, dass das Land wenigstens den IWF wieder hereinlässt – womöglich nach der Eurogruppen-Sitzung am morgigen Montag.

[Outside of Greece, no one know what the Greek budget really looks like. No European institution, no government has insight into the Greek budget. The Greeks stubbornly refuse to allow that. The only hope for the Europeans is that the country at least allows the IMF in again - perhaps after the EuroGroup meeting tomorrow on Monday.]

I'm trying to picture the stuffed shirts sitting around in Brussels saying, "Gol-lee, who knows what those Greeks spend their gubment money on? You think they pay soldiers and secretaries or something? Maybe they have a post office, or pay people to build highways and stuff? Who knows?! And who can speak Greek anyway?"

Now, I'm sure there is some cost center in the Greek national government that hasn't undergone an independent audit in the last, say, two days. But since 2010 until January's election, the Greeks haven't even *controlled* their own budget. Angela Merkel and her Finance Minister have been doing via the "Troika" of the EU Commission, the ECB and the IMF.

And yet here's the safely conservative FAZ publishing an obvious whopper like that. Presumably assuming that it will seem like plain good sense to their readers. Scary.