Verwünschter Grieche!

I expect Angela Merkel is spitting blood and biting the carpet this morning after the Greek Government agreed to Papandreou's proposal to hold a referendum on whether or not to accept the Eurozone's rescue package. It is usually the case that the Greeks are the architects of their own misfortunes, but this is taking it a little too far, nicht wahr? Having fiddled their way to bankruptcy they now seem determined to drag everyone else down with them. There'll certainly be some fireworks at the G20 meeting tomorrow when Papandreou turns up!

Papandreou has given himself two chances to completely screw everything up. First, there's to be a 'No Confidence' vote in Parliament. If he loses that there'll be a general election, the outcome of which is anybody's guess. If Papandreou wins, there'll be referendum on the rescue package and again, the outcome of that is anybody's guess. And maybe if someone else wins, they'll have a referendum too. So we're left with a double dose of uncertainty and the only people who make any money out of it are the currency speculators. Gott in Himmel!

It is so typically Greek to fail to think ahead and, when faced with the resulting mess, to spend so much time arguing, contradicting and being downright bloody minded instead of just getting on with sorting it out. And then having agreed a solution, to do something else. We've been employing a builder and an architect with similar qualities.