When Spanish Eyes Aren’t Smiling
June 1st, 2011
Are we next?
As the European debt crisis reaches fever pitch in many of the continent’s failing countries, residents in Spain have gathered, as they have for weeks, in Madrid’s Puerta del Sol. They are protesting their government’s bailouts of Spanish banks that were hit the hardest by the credit-default swap meltdown back in 2008 (sound familiar?). Some estimates have placed the cost of the Spanish bank bailouts to be at around 11 billion euro, a large amount considering Spain’s fiscal troubles and political upheaval that resulted in the ruling Socialist Party being demolished in the municipal elections last month. The voters expressed their frustration for the government being more interested in saving the very banks that caused the meltdown in the first place, even as unemployment reached 21% in the troubled nation.
The actions of the Spanish government are not unlike the actions taken by Washington. Our government rammed through a $700 billion Wall Street bailout package, even as our deficits and debts grew to historic levels. As unemployment reached 10% last year, it became clear that federal stimulus money was not working the way our government though it would, and was only making the situation worse.
Unless we shrink the size and scope of government, we will turn into nations like Spain and Greece. It may be too late for them, but it’s not too late for us.
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