Munich

The Munich Security Conference is so much more fun than Davos.  Saturday's sessions were particularly interesting - or at least they sound it;  but where are all the rolling blogs, the bated-breath, excited reporting, the WEForum style hype?

In the discussions of power, who's got it, and what they intend to do next  with it, Munich has not just the edge but the entire battleground.   US troops withdrawing  at last  from central Europe ( though unfortunately settling in Australia);  discussions of tactical nuclear weapons in the European theatre [surely not, there must be some mistake, we're not using Europe as a battlefield ever again, much too beautiful and valuable, Ed.];  war expressed as a euro crisis; transatlantic arrangements (not necessarily friendly after that assault on our currency, I imagine).

Best of all no re-hashing of dull economics 101 by has-been politicians with delusions of economic and financial genius.  All the attendees are very much in power right now.   And are discussing the need to get their act together on the European defence/war front just as much as on the welfare/social spending/ labour costs too high per unit of output and the left-over-institutional-defences-of-that -situation front,  which has resulted in such naughty levels of peripheral sovereign debt.

Europe has lines to assert, instal and defend both within its societies and around its borders, as well as the protection of its interests and resources elsewhere.   We can do global - in the European  interest -  and it really wasn't nice to try and bring down the currency and the Union.