What Are They Thinking?

Silly question -- we're talking about the banksters and the IMF in the eurozone. They're not thinking at all, or if they are, it's about how to save their own asses, and to hell with everyone else. Two posts on this from Hullabaloo, first from David Atkins:

Cypriots reacted with shock that turned to panic on Saturday after a 10% one-off levy on savings was forced on them as part of an extraordinary 10bn euro (£8.7bn) bailout agreed in Brussels.

People rushed to banks and queued at cash machines that refused to release cash as resentment quickly set in. The savers, half of whom are thought to be non-resident Russians, will raise almost €6bn thanks to a deal reached by European partners and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

He's quoting this, but I don't know who from -- no link provided. Atkins' own comment echoes my own feelings on this:

This policy of directly punishing the middle class and poor for the sins of the banking establishment by simply stealing their money is a new and striking development. How creating a run on banks is supposed to help the Cypriot economy out of recession is anybody's guess.

So the economic gurus figure that the way to solve the problem they created is to screw the victims. Again. And what did they think people were going to do once the news got out? Sit there and say, "Oh, take some more of my money."?

Digby has a follow-up in which she quotes Felix Salmon extensively. It's hard to excerpt, so read the whole thing, but the headline is a good summary:

"A last-resort desperation move, born of an unholy combination of procrastination, blackmail, and sleep-deprived gamesmanship"

These are the people who are supposed to be fixing things, and they just keep making it work.