Europe

I question some of the assertions in a recent letter to the editor ("Ehrlich's talk of Obama's radicalism strains credulity," July 25). For example, the writer claims that "European social democracy" has provided "lower poverty" than found in the United States, but he fails to state what he means by "lower poverty. " Nor does he identify the source of his information. Is the "poverty" he mentions "absolute" or "relative" poverty? Did he take into account the fact that different countries measure poverty in different ways, or that standards of living vary from country to country?

As European leaders meet this week in an attempt to once again shoo reality away from the continent's respirator, countries outside the European Union are making it increasingly clear that they'll have no role in prolonging the charade. Cyprus has just asked for a bailout from the EU's ATM, joining Greece, Ireland, Portugal and, most recently, Spain. So what's the excuse this time? Apparently Cyprus' intimate exposure to the Greek economy was more than enough economic Ebola. So another beggar's cup starts rattling just in time for yet another summit of European leaders.

Thomas M. Neale, who writes that the rich pay more than their fair share of taxes ("The wealthy pay more than their fair share," May 14), needs to read his own letter. The data he presents explains why the rich, who make up a much smaller part of the U.S. population, pay more taxes then the rest of us. In a universe of two, where one person makes a million dollars and the other makes $10,000 a year, the higher income person would pay 100 percent of the individual income taxes due under our system.

Europe's single currency is a bust. With unemployment reaching depression levels in the Mediterranean states, time has long passed to negotiate an orderly return to national currencies. Euro advocates argue a single currency is essential for creating a unified continental economy, and the euro is falling short of expectations because monetary union was initiated without fiscal union - namely, sovereign taxing and spending authority for Brussels. Those arguments are little more than polemics from politicians, public servants and pundits who have staked their reputations and careers on a failed economic idea.

The economic and political tumult in Europe has continued this week with anti-incumbent votes in France and Greece as well as signs of disaffection in Italy, Great Britain and Germany. The electorate is angry, and the election results have raised renewed concerns about whether Europe's most debt-burdened countries will stick with their quest toward fiscal discipline. On this side of the Atlantic, it's tempting to view the uproar in purely parochial terms - out of concern that the U.S. economy will continue to be encumbered by the eurozone crisis.

Europe is in recession. Portugal, Italy and Greece are basket cases. The British and Spanish economies have contracted for the last two quarters. It seems highly likely that France and Germany are in a double dip as well. Why should we care? Because a recession in the world's third-largest economy (Europe) combined with the current slowdown in the world's second-largest (China), spells trouble for the world's largest (that's still us). Remember, it's a global economy. Money moves across borders at the speed of an electronic impulse.

As the global economic crisis grinds into its fourth year, we now have a clearer sense of which countries responded appropriately to the crisis and those that perpetuated or aggravated their situation. That discussion must begin with a comparison of the differing approaches taken by European governments and the United States. Let's start in Greece, where I recently gave some lectures about the American presidential elections. Once the center of one of the world's most influential empires, Athens now finds itself at the center of the European crisis.

Herman G. "Hank" Tillman Jr., a retired Air Force colonel and pilot who flew in World War II, Korea and Vietnam and was one of Maryland's most decorated veterans, died Sunday of liver failure at his Chester home. He was 89. He was born in his immigrant grandparents' Anne Arundel County farmhouse, and later moved with his family to a home at Pontiac Avenue and Sixth Street in Brooklyn. After graduating from Polytechnic Institute in 1940, he attended the Johns Hopkins University at night and worked at Baltimore Gas and Electric Co.'s engineering department during the day. "As a kid, he was fascinated with flying.

Returning from a two-week speaking tour to Finland, Norway and Sweden, I kept thinking about that scene early in Martin Scorsese's Oscar-winning film "The Departed" where Leonardo DiCaprio's character is grilled about his personal background by Martin Sheen and Mark Wahlberg, who want him to become an undercover agent for the Boston Police Department. "Families are always rising and falling in America," says Mr. DiCaprio's character, quoting 18th century writer Nathaniel Hawthorne.

The Fitch Ratings agency has downgraded the credit of another five European countries -- Belgium, Cyprus, Italy, Slovenia and Spain -- citing "the financing risks faced by eurozone sovereign governments in the absence of a credible financial firewall against contagion and self-fulfilling liquidity crises. " In other words, these self-styled fiscal medics plunged headfirst into deadly disease without making sure they had all their shots. Is every European country that tries to find a clean end by which to lift up this mess now doomed?