The recently developped option to buy debt at cheaper rates by piggybacking on the good ratings of strong Euro members like Germany eases the strain on nations like Greece, while it would be easier for Greece to inflate its debt away investors nowadays are much more savvy and will consider big inflation policies for what they are, a thinly veiled form of default.

I think on the whole Greece is pretty well off with the euro, given that they have a huge tourism industry and a pretty weak industry. Devaluation/inflation of their hypothetical national currency would mean less tourism and more expensive imports.

You have predicted many a thing in the history of the forum, and i don't think a single one ever came true.

Mildly stronger. Mind you, any real chances for improvement will be killed off for the sake of compromise.

Where i am from we got the euro in 2002. - all prices got recalculated to euro prices.

The euro has made everything alot more expensive. Food has dubbled/almost tripled in prices from our past currency.

if my country goes back to their old currency i dont see the prices go down.
i doubt people will buy alot of it when they see the prices.

Going back to the old currency might be really bad for a country to do so.

Explain, in simple terms, why a single currency can work in the USA and not the EU.

> Einstein wrote:
> Because if one State fails, no businesses will go there. <

Define state failure. How is this result any different than from country failure.

> If one nation fails, the businesses cannot as easily change location. <

MG Rover, now made all over Europe, not in UK.
Been watching Pontiac Coil slowly die since 2001, their European site is in Administration, all thanks to one Chinese company kicking their arse at seemingly every turn. Why is the european site still there? Cannot easily change location.

> Take Rolls Royce for example. If they quit manufacturing in England to goto Spain... it destroys them. <

See above, switch MG for RR.

> If Ford closes a plant in Tennessee but opens one in Texas... no harm is done. <

Oh I'm sure YOU could find a mistake.

> But if they move all production to Mexico then they are fried. <

So like when we're screwed if things leave the EU, you're screwed if things leave the US?

> National identification is a huge factor. <

Only the UK has an ID crisis, and that is mostly to do with our kids getting all of their behaviours, everything theyn know, from American TV shows (the effects of which even Americans worry about).
Not that the USA has an identity: Large groups of immigrants funnelled into ghettoes all silently agreeing to practice voluntary apartheid for 200 years, causing them to be more like the "olde country" than the olde country.

> Not for some, admittedly, but you are faced with national identity. <

Meh... I blame the movie industry...

> The Germans will speak German 200 years from now, the Italians will speak Italian, and the Spainards will speak Spanish. The Eiffel Tower will be a French national treasure, the Vatican will be known to be an Italian thing, and then Greece will have their columns. <

Ohh I know where this is going...

> It will not be a single nation, it will not be a single language, it will not be able to keep a single currency. <

  Just because you somehow managed to warp your Union into one bloated mass of a nation that resembles none of its origins it does not follow that we want to do the same. In fact your disaffected "Union" serves as a lesson to us in that respect.
  Just because you somehow managed to force your union to only use one language it does not follow that we will do the same. Actually we don't want to, none of us, not even me; I speak both French and English (badly) and because of this I can "communicate" anywhere west of Berlin.
"Defense de fumer? C'est un taverne! Encoul

Christ,

Especially a Belgian should understand that nationalism/regionalism is still alive and kicking.

I seem to recall you predicting the EU would be gone within 2 months....like half a year ago.

I also seem to recall you predicting civil war was imminent in the USA...months ago.

etc. etc. etc.

either way, even if people wanted to drop the euro, i think the sheer cost of this operation is reason enough not to do it.

Not really. The pro-flemish feeling is more of a discontent with several things going wrong within the Belgian state and fear of a globalising world (the EU for example).
That last part is essential to Regionalism: fear and discontent of the politically and economically globalising world. These new Nationalistic tendencies in the Netherlands are, because of that, regionalism as well.

Nationalism was a similar sense of union (but usually different and larger groups), but fueled by totally different ideas.

Wait, there is something wrong with our cloggs?

"As for the EU Prediction. I believe it was 6 months after formation of the EU that I said the EU would not last (I do not remember a time frame) where I quoted Englands decision to not use the currency (smart move) and the Turkey issues. I think the clogs issue was up then also."

That's nearly 20 years ago. The Maastricht treaty was in 1992. Are you considering a Nostradamus style of prediciting? If so, then obviously you'll be right.

Well it was the currency, sorry was bed time (I'm sick as any 10 dogs) and I goofed.