William J. Holstein

Hey, Guys, What Happened to The Big European Crisis?
JUNE 15--I've suspected from the beginning that there was something fishy about the big European crisis. Greece is such a small economic player and it has had its problems for decades. Its lack of financial discipline was no surprise. Yet financial speculators whipped that up into a major crisis. Then we heard that Hungary was the crisis. Then it was the PIGs--Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain. Then it was that China's economnic growth was going to be torpedoed by an economic slowdown in Europe. Or China was going to lose confidence in Europe and pull out its investments.

Today, it seems all over. But who whipped this up in the first place? What is the responsibility of media gate-keepers to inject a little sanity into the picture? Can't we learn to adopt longer-term views of what is happening in the world and not get caught up in a daily whiplash?