Don't Wait for an International Rescue

... like the Greeks did. It turns out that the cavalry coming over the hill are really just IMF observers.

German and Dutch leaders have concluded in the nick of time that they cannot defy the will of their sovereign parliaments by propping up a country that lied about its deficits, or risk court defeats by breaching the no-bail-out clause in Article 125 of the EU Treaties ...

Mrs Merkel’s speech to the Bundestag was epochal, a defiant warning that henceforth Germany would pursue the German national interest in EU affairs, capped by her call for treaty changes to allow the expulsion of fiscal sinners from Euroland. Nothing seems so permanent about the euro any more.

Days later, Thilo Sarrazin from the Bundesbank blurted out that if Greece cannot pay its bills “it should do what every debtor has to do and file for insolvency. This would be a suitably frightening example for every other potentially unsound state,” he said, pointedly excluding France from the list of sound countries.

Angela Merkel and her German compatriots did the opposite of what Barack Obama and the Democrats did. They listened to their constituents and decided on a course of fiscal sobriety rather than pouring untold billions of borrowed dollars (euros) down a rathole.

The lesson from all of this is that there is no Tooth Fairy, no Easter Bunny, no Santa Claus and no one to save you as you borrow and spend your way down the drain. The Germans, wisely, are more interested in saving Germany than saving Greece. When push comes to shove, the Japanese are going to be more interested in Japan than the US and their nearly one trillion dollar stockpile of US Treasuries will get sold to pay for their upcoming fiscal tsunami. When that happens, we're going to get whacked, big time.

The lesson needs to be learned at all levels. The best and surest way to prosperity, whether for the individual resident of San Diego, Compton or El Paso, the city of Long Beach, Spokane or Charleston, the state of California, Texas or Maine, the nation of Greece, Italy or the US is to take care of yourself.

There is no international bailout, no government handout, no education tax credit that you can count on in the long run. It's all up to you.

The hits just keep on coming!