Cassandra the ancient Greek beauty of Troy, and prophetess who was cursed by Apollo for spurning his advances and doomed to having her forecasts ignored, would be surprised by the continued strength of the Euro. No doubt she would have long ago forecasted the demise or at least the soft implosion of the improbable and to many minds, quite illogical currency named the Euro. The 27 states of the dysfunctional statist entity called Europe have no common monetary or fiscal cycles. Ergo a common currency is both unneeded and harmful. However being a 'Cassandra' can be an unpleasant characteristic. So too at times is being realistic. The private capital and bank capital which has sustained European socialism is now being replaced by public EU and IMF money. The private sector in other words, is not lending its capital to bankrupted EU states. This means that in 2013 when the debt matures in places like Greece, there will have to be a massive EU led public-taxpayer bailout. If not the Euro sinks.

“As time passes, the debts of the Greek, Irish and soon the Portuguese governments are being transferred to the public from the private sector. Private investors aren't willing to fund these governments, so as bonds mature, they are taking their money and putting it elsewhere. The EU and IMF are replacing those funds, with the result that as the months go by, their share of the three governments' overall debt rises.

What this means is that if any of the bailout three were to restructure now, private-sector investors could be asked for a write-down of around 50%—by no means a comfortable conversation.

But should one of the three instead seek to restructure from 2013, it would face two far nastier alternatives: defaulting on all its debt to private creditors, thereby shutting itself out of the financial markets for years to come, or asking other members of the euro zone for a write-down. And the latter would be politically difficult—perhaps impossible—for whoever is then in charge of Germany, France, Finland or any of the other countries providing funds through the bloc's bailout mechanisms.

By 2013, for example, Greece's government debt could be at an unsustainable 170% of its gross domestic product. But half of that will be held by the EU and the IMF, and the IMF has preferred-creditor status, which means it must always be repaid first.

To return to sustainability, the Greek government would need to write down as much as half of its debt. To that end, Greece could renege on all its debt to the private sector, but governments that do that are excluded from the bond markets for a very long time.

The alternative would be to restructure some of its debt to other European Union nations. But how would that go down with German or French taxpayers?”

There is little chance that Paris and the Rhine area of Germany will finance the EU forever. But the likelihood that Germany will unilaterally leave the Euro zone, or deny a future bailout is also pretty slim I think. We should expect a continuation of the Euro facade, long after it begins to decline in value and fall below parity with the U$. When that happens the Euros might get serious about reforms, but it will take a decade perhaps, before a serious discussion takes place. Until then we should expect more manipulation, public money and fraud. The Euro was always a scam in which massive and unregulated deficits and debts could be hidden from public view. It was a mask. Now the mask is off. And the public debt debacle is not the most important part of the EU financial meltdown. It is the level of off- the-balance-liabilities totalling some $150 Trillion or more which is the more important concern. The public debt of $20 Trillion is dwarfed by the socialized guarantees, pensions, health care, welfare and sundry other vote-buying devices and candy-sugar coated programs of national 'values'. This unfunded debt is simply unpayable. Either the children [clients of the state] will not get their goodies [a political improbability]; or the state will raise taxes [Globaloneywarming is one example]; issue more currency [deflate the nominal debt and create inflation]; and nationalize the banking system to transfer private assets into the public domain to fund political preferences.

There will be no real reform for quite a long time, just more shell games, lots of rhetoric, and in the future a guaranteed general impoverishment of the masses, all for their benefit of course [and the children's future, not to mention for the old and defenceless]. When the Euro elite acts the facts will make their actions irrelevant. It will be far too late.