NICE GOING, NEO-CONS

You were so intent on getting an American Empire that you supported a mediocrity for President and in turn for their backing, you supported the imbecilic Free Market fantasies of the GOP. That's gotten us 2 badly run wars and now we have a financial meltdown, a further erosion of our power. The rest of the world is beginning to notice. First, Germany -

U.S. Losing Finance Superpower Status, Germany Says (Update3)

By Leon Mangasarian

Sept. 25 (Bloomberg) -- German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck said the U.S. will lose its position as the world's undisputed financial ``superpower'' and called for a ban on speculative short-selling to help restore the global economy.

``The long-term effects of the crisis are impossible to gauge,'' Steinbrueck said. ``One thing seems probable to me: The U.S. will lose its status as the superpower of the global financial system. The global financial system will become multipolar.''

Steinbrueck said the root cause of the crisis lies far deeper than the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market.

``In my view, it's the irresponsible overemphasis on the `laissez-faire' principle, namely giving market forces the most possible freedom from state regulation in the Anglo-American financial system.''

Second, France -

Sarkozy Stresses Global Financial Overhaul
By STEVEN ERLANGER
Published: September 25, 2008
NY Times
PARIS — Mr. Sarkozy promised that the government would move ahead with its reforms, especially in shrinking the bloated state sector, and he called for an overhaul of the world’s financial system, arguing that an era of unregulated markets was over.

“A certain idea of globalization is dying with the end of a financial capitalism that had imposed its logic on the whole economy and contributed to perverting it,” he said.

“The idea of the all-powerful market that could not be contradicted by any rules, by any political intervention” was “a crazy idea,” he said. “The idea that the market is always right is a crazy idea.”