If You Think the US Has Problems…

Frankfurt, Germany – Most Europeans are quietly horrified watching Donald Trump torn to pieces by political piranhas while Wall Street’s candidate, Hillary Clinton, appears to be pushing for a war with Russia. She blames everything on that wicked Vlad Putin. How long before she will claim Monica Lewinsky was one of Putin’s famed KGB seductress agents (I’ve met a few) known as ‘swallows?’

Europeans, whose male political leaders all seem to have mistresses,  would laugh off Trump’s awkward gropes and the outrage they caused as adolescent. Better gropes than a possible war with Russia over Syria.  But Trump looks like a mastodon stuck in a primeval tar pit, ambushed by Democratic hunters.

Does anyone remember the Democrat’s young god, Jack Kennedy, who used to drag women into the White House linen closet,  smoke a joint, and give them a presidential quickie? Lyndon Johnson’s Texas rough-riding, or Nelson Rockefeller’s too young girlfriends that did him in? 

Deutsche Bank’s collapse could bring a Lehmann Brothers-type panic to Europe’s already deeply stressed financial system.

Italian banks are in terrible shape, up to their tortellini in bad debts. Their depositors are likely to be hard hit in any bail-out or bail-in. However, the rule remains: save the banks first, then women and children.

Meanwhile, across the Rhine, France’s political landscape is shaking. The wretched President Holland, who has the charisma of a wet croissant, is now the most unpopular leader since Robespierre – maybe even more so.

Like the US Republican rats abandoning their sinking electoral ship, France’s center-left wants to ditch albatross Holland but can’t find any candidate popular enough to replace him.

Presidential elections are due in April and May, 2017.  The opposition Republicans have a so-so candidate in Nicholas Sarkozy and a good one in Alain Juppé. Sarkozy is still under investigation for taking campaign cash from Libya’s late Muammar Khadaffi – who was bumped off in what looks like a French-engineered murder.

Behind them looms the specter of National Front Leader Marine le Pen.  Her effort to ditch the EU and NATO, kick out the Arabs, and adopt economic nationalism makes her a French version of Trump. But she is a far more adept politician and a gifted speaker.

Like America’s Republican oligarchy facing Trump, France’s political elite trembles before Le Pen. So does the rest of Europe as her radical thinking enflames rightwing parties across the continent. The Front National could replace France’s venerable Socialists as the nation’s second party and main opposition.

Spain is in political paralysis, unable to elect a government.  In Brussels, the EU is trying to reshape its role after Brexit and find a new ‘raison d’etre.’  At least it will no longer put up with British sabotage. It’s what Trump would call ‘a disaster.’

The post If You Think the US Has Problems… appeared first on LewRockwell.