The European Union Is At War

Yes, the European Union is at war.

It is a war with three main fronts: the eastern front, the southern front, and the western front.

Eastern front. In 2014, Putinism -- the cultural, political and social logic of a 21st century Russo-imperialism (a.k.a. a revanchist Eurasian petro-colonialism based on unsustainable energy-rents, comparable to theocratic Iran and monarchical Saudi Arabia) which had frittered away $2 trillion of oil and gas revenues on Olympic circuses and massive insider corruption -- launched a revanchist imperial war against the people of Ukraine. It quickly seized the Ukrainian district of Crimea, and hatched plans to occupy fully one half of Ukraine's territory (the lunatic notion of a "Novorossiya" or "New Russia", extending from Rostov to Transniestria). The Ukrainians fought back, eventually retaking two-thirds of the Donbas. Timothy Snyder has pointed out, correctly, Putinism's goal was never to destroy Ukraine, but to destroy the transnational organization the people of Ukraine, by a vast majority, wished to join: the democracies of the European Union. Why were the Putinists so angry? Because if Ukraine had joined the EU, it would have been a successful economy and role model for Belarus and Russia, much as Poland's success was a model for the rest of Eastern Europe.

Southern front. In 2015, Minotaurism -- Yanis Varoufakis' wonderful term for the ideology of permanent financial austerity incarnated by the euro, a common financial currency without a common fiscal union  -- occupied Greece. Since 2008, the people of Greece have suffered from a catastrophic 25% fall in their GDP due to the fundamental design flaws of the euro (read Varoufakis for the details). In any sane economy, a common currency means a common fiscal policy -- here in the US, if Nevada gets into trouble, the other states bail it out via Federal subsidies until a recovery takes hold. Not so in Europe, where the structure of the euro means no nation gets the help it needs. When the weakest nation sinks, it takes down the next weakest, i.e. Portugal and Spain. When they sink, they will take down Italy, and then France, etc. The eurozone since 2008 is exactly like a group of mountain climbers tied by a rope, each one going over a cliff. Instead of pulling together, each lets the last climber fall -- and eventually everyone goes over the cliff. Why were the Minotaurists were so angry? Because if Greece had succeeded in stopping austerity, Europe's wealthy elites would have had to pay a bit more in taxes and gamble less on Goldman Sachs derivatives.

Western front. In 2016, the Brexit campaign blamed Britain's homegrown problems -- four decades of Thatcherite austerity, which inflicted Dickensian squalor on the public while making a few plutocrats obscenely rich -- on immigrants, refugees, people of color and the European Union. The "Leave" campaign cooked up a stewpot of the most outrageous lies, claiming Eurocrats were fleecing the people of Britain and bankrupting the National Health Service. This, to employ British slang, is complete and utter bollocks. Britain pays a tiny amount to the EU, but gets most of its contribution back in the form of rebates and investment. All in all, Britain pays a net amount of 8.5 billion pounds ($12.5 billion in 2015 US dollars) into the EU every year -- a microscopic 0.4% of GDP. That's right, the UK literally spends more on paper clips than on the EU. It's still well worth the investment, because in return British citizens get the advantages of visa-free travel, the right to live and work in all EU countries, and advanced social and environmental protections, while British businesses get to enjoy the rule of law and unlimited access to the single largest market in the world. But the Brexit campaign was never about facts, but about revanchist rage at British and European elites. Satirical cartoonist Bruce MacKinnon had the best take on the psychology of the "Leave" vote:

Exactly so. There is a cruel irony in the fact that Brexit's greatest victim will be Great Britain itself. If the results of the referendum stand, a vast majority of Scottish voters (59% according to the latest polls) will vote for independence from Britain and subsequent re-membership in the European Union, this time as an independent state. Brexit will not solve even the smallest of Britain's problems, but it will succeed in destroying the 308-year-old union of the United Kingdom, while cutting off Britain's young generation from the opportunities of the single market. It will also crush Britain's economy, which runs vast current account deficits, i.e. imports money from nations who want to access EU markets. In short, Brexit is that extremely rare breed of economic, political and social disaster which happens once in a generation: the kind which has absolutely no redeeming features.

Common front. It is important for concerned citizens to understand that these three wars are part of a single struggle, the struggle for the destiny of the European Union.

It is a war between two forces.

On the one hand, there is the alliance of (1) the eurozone market fundamentalists who worship neoliberal austerity, (2) the Eurasian petro-colonial fundamentalists who worship energy-rents, and (3) Western European national fundamentalists who worship imperial nation-states. Their three respective programs are not just toxic, they are outright suicidal. Austerity is destroying Europe's economy from within and is driving the entire world economy into crisis. Petro-colonialism has no answer to the renewable energy/electric car boom and cannot stop the demise of the energy-rent economic model. For their part, the national fundamentalists fantasize about returning to the glory days of national empires, conveniently forgetting that these empires were grounded on murderous warfare, on Atlantic slavery, and on the famine-genocides of Congolese, Indian, Indonesian, Irish and Vietnamese peasants.

On the other hand, there are the approximately 507 million people of the European Union and the 277 million citizens of Eurasian nations located on the EU's borders (Belarus, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine) -- the staggering sum of three-quarters of a billion human beings, or 1 out of every 10 people on our planet.

The solution to neoliberal austerity, petro-colonial militarism and revanchist nationalism for the 784 million people of Europe and Eurasia is not retreating to delusions of national economies or national empires.

The only solution is to transform the anti-colonial premise of the European Union into a fulfilled promise. This means creating genuine transnational solidarity between all 28 European nations, as well as the four nations of Eurasia along the EU's borders.

We must dare to imagine a single free, neighborly, and economically fair Europe stretching from Reykjavik to Vladivostok. We must dare to dream of a Europe guided not by greedy plutocrats, psychopathic warlords or vengeful bigots, but by the infinite generosity, wisdom and creativity of its constituent peoples. We must fight to construct a Europe no longer at war with itself, but a Europe with peace, justice and prosperity for all.

We dare not fail.

We cannot fail.

We will not fail.

We resist!

(Closing pic courtesy of satirical feed Trumpton. As some famous person said, somewhere, humor is the very essence of a democratic society.)

Citizen Journalism Comes of Age

We said last year that the deepest significance of The Witcher 3 and Fallout 4 was that the greatest open world videogames of our era are the digital rehearsal of massive transnational class struggles to come.

The rehearsal is over.

The Panama Papers -- the biggest open source investigative journalism project, ever -- is now live. A massive cache of two terabytes of data, documenting some of the sleaziest offshore deals ever concocted by our transnational elites, is now in the hands of hundreds of reporters.

It's worth remembering that Wikileaks took down dozens of governments, despite being little more than diplomatic chatter. But the Panama Papers is going to ignite a much, much bigger firestorm: a raging debate on who owns what in the world-system.

You see, the transnational bourgeoisie has been waging a relentless class war against us workers for forty years now. The Wall Street plutocrats, the Euro-Minotaurists, the Eurasian petro-colonialists, and the bourgeoisies of Brazil, China, India, Indonesia and countless other nations have collectively  devastated the planet's real wages, plundered our pensions, ravaged our schools and hospitals, and now threaten to drive humanity to climate change-induced extinction.

Now comes the beginning of the payback. We live in epic times! 

Fallout 4 Ate My Book Project...

Fallout 4: The Bostopocalyspse

...and that's just fine. In fact, it's the highest honor a videogame critic could ever bestow on a game.

The original plan was to write a book on open world videogames, the preeminent genre of the preeminent art-form of the early 21st century. I had all the materials and source-texts lined up. And then Fallout 4 hit with megaton force.

Fortunately, all is not lost. Half the original project will go on as planned -- namely, there will be two chapters covering The Witcher 3, CD Projekt Red's stupendous achievement. But the other half of the book will be on Bethesda's open world masterpiece.

Will keep y'all updated.

Bears R Awesome

In other holiday news, Polish bears -- who have a long history of being awesome -- continue to be awesome (hat tip to SpecGhost).

Even The Stones Weep

In the final twilight of the Eurasian energy-rent neoliberalisms and petro-colonialisms, Syrian artist Nizar Ali Badr transforms the very stones into testimony.

Year of the Witcher: Yanis of Rivia Triumphs

We said before that 2015 is the Year of the Witcher -- the moment that three decades of pent-up anti-neoliberal resistance erupt, with tectonic force, into collective innovation.

In a referendum this Sunday, the people of Greece voted by a landslide 61% to 39% to reject neoliberal austerity.

Europe's neoliberal elites have preached the virtues of austerity for six long years. Their policies have failed. The  335 million citizens of the eurozone are now 3% poorer, on average, than they were in 2007. Rates of investment in the eurozone are crashing to all-time lows, while economic growth is nonexistent. Nowhere is the crisis worse than Greece, which has fallen into a catastrophic economic depression.

If this is success, one shudders to think of what failure is supposed to look like.

On Sunday, the ordinary people of Greece -- humble clerks and cashiers, drivers and cooks, students and teachers, farmers and civil servants -- proved wiser than Europe's elites. They voted against neoliberal austerity, but for European solidarity. To paraphrase the inimitable Yanis Varoufakis, their resounding NO to the financial despotism of the eurobanksters is a YES to the democratic union of all Europeans. Greece can and will pay back its loans, but first it needs debt restructuring and a return to growth.

After the vote, Varoufakis gracefully resigned his post as Finance Minister, a political gesture of goodwill towards the other finance ministers of the Eurogroup -- the folks who, after all is said and done, must sit down and work out an agreement with Greece. Varoufakis' stint very much a  real-life version of one of CD Projekt Red's witcher contracts -- the hunting and taking down of the Euro-Minotaur, that grievously wounded but still-dangerous beast which has devastated economy after economy. One must say, Yanis took down the beast with epic precision.

Now comes the time of Ciri-style mass insurrection, as the people of Europe battle against the White Frost of Neoliberalism.

The Eurozone Crisis: Three Charts, One Solution

The European Union's common currency, the euro, has been in trouble for years. The problem, in a nutshell, is that the euro is a financial union between 19 countries, but not yet a fiscal union between those countries.

Why does this matter? Here in the US, we have 50 states which share a single currency, the dollar. It works because wealthier states like California pay more to the Federal government than less wealthy states like Mississippi. That means Mississippi can pay for its schools, infrastructure and healthcare, enabling its children to grow up and get good-paying jobs at Apple and Google, so it all works out. When an economic downturn comes, the Federal government steps in with deficit spending, enabling the 50 states to pay their bills. Everyone shares the burdens, everyone reaps the rewards.

Not so in Europe's eurozone. Its 19 participating countries share a currency, but there's no European equivalent of the Federal government to backstop the economy. When a downturn comes, the result is that the richest European countries (Germany, Netherlands, Finland) have the resources to recover, while the poorest countries (Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece) lack the cash -- and subsequently fall apart.

Here's an index of per capita real GDP growth in the Eurozone, Greece, and the US from 2003 to 2014 (i.e. adjusted for population growth and inflation):

Greece grew a bit faster than the rest of Europe from 2003-2007. But when the crisis of 2008 hit, the Greek economy collapsed into a Depression -- a 26.6% decline in its real GDP.

But what's scariest about this chart is not what happened to Greece, but the trendline for the Eurozone. Six years after the crisis, real per capita GDP in the eurozone is still 3% below its 2007 peak, precisely where real per capita GDP in the US is now 4% above its peak.

That's right, here in 2015, the 335 million people in the eurozone are, on average, still poorer than they were in 2007. You'd think six years of spectacular economic failure would cause the eurozone countries to rethink their policies, but no -- the Eurogroup is now demanding fresh austerity from Greece.

Why? Because when any national economy shrinks, governments have to run budget deficits (more money goes out than comes in). The problem is, when poorer countries in the eurozone have to pay the interest on their deficits, they have no fresh source of money to grow their economy. Austerity triggers more cuts, which trigger bigger government deficits, which trigger more austerity, in a never-ending spiral downward. This is what happened in the US during the Great Depression from 1929-1932 in the US, and the same thing has been happening in the eurozone. Here's the chart of national debt to GDP for Greece, the US, and the eurozone:

Blaming Greece for its debt is exactly like blaming a patient suffering from malaria for running a fever. The fever is the symptom, not the cause. The underlying problem is that the Depression has destroyed the viability of the Greek economy, preventing it from recovering. Here's the chart which explains why austerity has failed:

Investment (gross capital formation) is the motor of any modern economy. A country needs to invest at least 15% of its GDP just to maintain its basic capital stock, but needs to invest more if it wants to grow. US rates of investment took a hit during the recession, but recovered to respectable levels. But investment fell off a cliff in Greece. This is bad, because as long as its investment rate is this low, it will never, ever be able to pay its debts.

Regardless of what happens in Greece over the next week, this problem is not going away. In fact, it is going to get even worse (Joseph Stiglitz explains why). What's true for Greece is true for all the poorer eurozone countries, all of which are locked in a self-perpetuating cycle of austerity, stagnation, falling investment, and then more austerity. To borrow an apt metaphor from the field of nuclear fission, Greece's meltdown would trigger a chain reaction of defaults -- the meltdown of Portugal, then Spain, then Italy and Ireland, and ultimately the collapse of the entire eurozone economy.


Thankfully, there is a sensible alternative to catastrophe, an alternative has been proven to work in eighty years of US history.

Make the euro work for every eurozone citizen, just like the US dollar works for every US citizen.

The first step is investment. The EIB should immediately invest the equivalent of 3% of Greek GDP (just 7 billion EUR) in wind and solar energy, infrastructure, healthcare and education. Stabilize the Greek economy, enable it to recover, and then it will be able to pay its debts.

Next, extend this program to all the poorer nations of the eurozone. This will require an investment fund of about 150 billion EUR (that's about 3% of the roughly $5 trillion GDP of these countries).

This may sound like a lot of money. It isn't. The EIB has a rock-solid, triple A-rated balance sheet of 542 billion EUR, and 150 billion EUR is peanuts compared to the eurozone's $9.5 trillion economy. Remember, this isn't throwing good money after bad. This is putting idle savings to socially useful work, under the democratic supervision of the people of Europe. Get the eurozone growing again, and the euro will no be longer a deadly weapon of immiseration, but a benevolent engine of prosperity.

All in, nobody out.

It's as simple as that.