Germans Receive Bush Speech Coldly - NY Times

[Eurobabe]

Germans Receive Bush Speech Coldly

Transatlantic sniping over the global financial crisis intensified Thursday after President Bush cited an influx of foreign money into the United States as one of the root causes of the credit crunch.

Peer Steinbrück, the German finance minister, countered in a speech in Berlin that the conditions that gave rise to the current turmoil in the markets were allowed to develop because of a reckless pursuit of short-term profit and huge bonuses in “Anglo-Saxon” financial centers — along with a lack of political backbone to stand up to what he characterized as bankers’ greed.

“Investment bankers and politicians in New York, Washington and London were not willing to give these up,” he said. “The financial market crisis is above all an American problem”

The long-term consequences, Mr. Steinbrück added, could be serious for the United States. “The U.S. will lose its status as the superpower of the world financial system,” he told the Bundestag. “The world financial system will become multipolar.”

In its tone and emphasis, Mr. Steinbrück’s diagnosis differed markedly from that offered on Wednesday night by President Bush in a speech to the American people. Mr. Bush cited “serious negative consequences” from a credit bubble that was inflated for more than a decade when “a massive amount of money flowed into the United States from investors abroad.” He said the inflow of foreign money was driven by the attractiveness and security of U.S. financial markets to global investors.

Economists say U.S. consumers’ appetite for spending has made foreign investment necessary to finance the deficit in the U.S. current account.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/26/business/worldbusiness/26eureact.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[dipsydoodle]

1. Investors abroad.

Yes - its called the petrodollar recycling program. The whole point of that is they can only be reinvested back in the USA. America has always benifited from that fiat money scam and now it reaps the consequences.

[Eurobabe]

2. I totally agree with you.

I am personally glad that Germany is playing the adult with this one and saying that the "verwohntes Kind" can't have a bailout, at least not from its citizenry.

Who does this bailout benefit? Certainly not those living in other lands. :shrug:

[Bigmack]

3. Wow, imagine that....

the Germans weren't taken in by Bush's incredibly well-informed, detailed, thoughtful analysis of the current "crisis." I'm STUNNED....or something. Ms Bigmack