Bummer,
they cut me, I’m off the team. It was a
blast while it lasted though. Imagine,
on the same 4x100 free relay with Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte and Nathan
Adrian! I thought it was a long shot, a
good joke really, but no, I got to be part of the team and practice with these
guys in Colorado Springs for almost a week before I got the word, you’re out.
I did
explain that I needed to use flippers for kicking sets because it helped build
up lactic acid faster and therefore was more challenging; I also avoided racing sets because of a
tender rotator cuff. I got some strange
looks, but in the end, they let me do my stuff.
The food was great, I really liked my Ralph Lauren USA sweatsuit, and being
with the guys was a blast.
I guess the
fun could have gone on for a while longer had we not been dragged to a charity
event to race a strong local team of Boys 10 and Under, and lost. Michael stormed out of the pool, Ryan had a
good laugh and Adrian’s eyes rolled back into their sockets. The coaches were not amused and got real
unpleasant:
-
“What the heck were you doing out there,
looking for clams! And what’s your name
again?”
-
“Euh, well …. I can explain but no need to blow
a fuse …”
So I did
explain; the CTS photo was real enough, except that I had photoshopped it a
bit; you see, the actual time was 1’08”46, and no, it wasn’t a long course
meter time but a short course yard one.
Anyway, there were pissed and I thought it was unfair because they were
all of a sudden nitpicking everything when they had welcome me as one of the
boys, as a real contender.
That’s
why I do feel great sympathy for the Greeks, I mean, they photoshopped some
stats and reports and the like, but it was all in good fun and the Europeans
should have realized it from the start, and now the poor Greeks are the butt of
unseemly sarcasm and threats of expulsion.
Christine Lagarde of the IMF is even demanding that they pay their
taxes!
But you
know, there is life after the Eurozone just like there is after Colorado
Springs. Greece is no more competitive within
the EU than I was in the pool. When you
“restructure” your privately held sovereign debt and your creditors take an 81%[1]
loss, and you still can’t carry your remaining debt, you don’t really belong in
the same club as the AA and AAA rated members.
More importantly, you need a break, a devaluation, to adjust your costs,
otherwise, you starve yourself to death and/or you have a revolution on your
hands. During the Asian crisis, the
Russian ruble devalued 333%, from 6 to 26 to the dollar, making exports of
goods very competitive, and while inflation shot up in the fourth quarter of
1998 and the first quarter of 1999, it then slowed down considerably.
While
Greece should exit the Eurozone, it doesn’t need to leave the European Union. Some may argue that Greece should stay within
the Eurozone and carry out the reforms needed to regain competitiveness. The problem is that these reforms, politically
and socially, would take years to be implemented (more time than financial markets
would allow), and success would not be assured.
Even then, given its demography, economic structure and size, Greece can’t
rely solely on cost cuts to be competitive with the likes of Germany, Holland
and France; so it still needs a one-time large devaluation to close the gap, and
perhaps a continuing one to stay within range.
Either way, it would be a hard slog, and it may be that Greece chooses
to follow a different path, of less stress and slower growth.
A good
relay must be made up of swimmers of comparable caliber who also get along well
together. The same goes for a political
and economic federation of countries.
People point out to the example of the USA at the end of the 18th
century as a possible model for the Eurozone.
I would say that the (voting) Americans of that time had more much more
in common than the EU today: they were
Anglo-Saxon, spoke English and had left Europe to found a new country common
values. The Europeans of today are far
more diverse, don’t speak the same language and don’t (yet) want to be governed
by bureaucrats from Brussels.
Perhaps a
smaller eurozone will survive, with the necessary fiscal and political
integration. This may not be the best outcome, as it may not respond to popular
aspirations and would codify a two or three-speed EU. A better solution may be a Europe of Nations,
as envisaged by de Gaulle back in the 1960s, but one accepting enough fiscal
and monetary coordination so as to facilitate a system of floating currencies
whose exchange rates will be confined to a wide band that will accommodate some
differences in policies and economic cycles; an improved “snake in the tunnel”
of the 1970s if you wish (it is interesting to note that, in the end, only
Germany, the Benelux and Denmark stayed in the tunnel).
Step up
…get set …
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