We are not Iceland (but maybe we should be)

What can I say? Seven weeks now, and the market is still up. I'm beginning to regret moving most of my investments to bonds.

But not just yet, because I remain convinced that we have not yet reached the bottom of our economic crisis. And why do I stick to that belief?

Because we're not Iceland.

Iceland went bankrupt a few months ago. Its conservative-led government let what the New York Times called "buccaneering free marketers" run amok through the country's economy, with the expected results.

Disaster.

But unlike here, Icelanders apparently think with the brains they have, and they knew that their conservative, anything-goes-in-the-free-market government was to blame.

So, naturally, they started protesting in the streets. And that led to the conservative government's resignation and a caretaker government's installation -- led by the Social Democrats, whose leader, Johanna Sigurdardottir, became caretaker prime minister.

This weekend, the Icelanders went to the polls, and they chose the Social Democrats and their liberal coalition partners the Left-Greens (does that mean Iceland has Right-Greens?) to stay where they are. And that includes Sigurdardottir, who is Iceland's first female leader.

And the world's first openly lesbian head of state.

I know the American right is terrified right now. But that's what happens when you fuck up your country as badly as the New Vikings, as the greedy sons of bitches in Iceland called themselves, did. The lesbians take over. The lesbians and a trucker dude from the Greens. His name is unpronounceable to us white folk in the United States too. Steingrimur Sigfusson. He's also a geologist. The prime minister used to be a flight attendant. Not a lawyer in sight. Or an MBA.

Sigfusson was Iceland's finance minister in the caretaker government, and he'll probably stay there. Despite being a geologist and former truck driver, he seems to know what he's talking about, finance-wise.

What are the people of the United States mad about now? It is the same poisonous philosophy that we had here, based on a lack of moral awareness and greed, and people who thought nothing of flying Elton John into Iceland for their 50th birthdays and paying him 70 million Icelandic kronur.

That's about $600,000, if you're keeping score. $600 grand, just for the entertainment at your 50th. I had Mexican food at one of my favorite restaurants for my 50th. The entertainment was the house band. If I had $600K to spend on entertainment for my birthday party, I'd fly all my friends to someplace really cool. Maybe Reykjavik. But we'd have to import the Mex.

Anyway, the conservative Independent Party -- independent of reason? -- managed 16 seats in the 63-seat Icelandic parliament -- called the Althingi, which they say is the oldest continuous legislative body in the world -- two more than the Left-Greens. But Sigurdardottir's party racked up 20 seats, giving their coalition 34, more than enough to form the government.

Interestingly, this is the first time in modern history Icelanders have elected a left-leaning government. But no wonder they did it this time. The conservative-New Viking alliance pretty much destroyed Iceland's economy. Unemployment -- virtually unheard of in the tiny country before -- is now at about 10 percent. Inflation is well into the double digits, and the financial experts are still trying to figure out what happened and how much it cost.

According to the Times,

Many of the debts that drove the banks to the brink of default were incurred as the New Vikings went on a splurge of acquisitions that made them owners of department store chains, soccer clubs and investment houses in Britain and other parts of Europe, as well as mansions, helicopters and Ferraris on their sojourns at home here in Iceland.

Sound familiar?

And as for the costs, the Times says that some estimates run to as much as $10 billion, which is about $30,000 for every man, woman and child in a country that has just over 300,000 people.

But unlike here, the Icelanders are following their leader -- a quiet, steady and pragmatic leader, who does not seek the spotlight, but instead puts her attention toward fixing the mess she was left with.

The people are calling for a change of ethics. That is why they have voted for us,

she said. Her chief opponent -- the leader of the Independence Party, Bjarni Benediktsson -- reacted much like his Republican counterparts in the United States. That is, he was clueless.

We lost this time but we will win again later,

he said.

Anyway, Sigurdardottir, who at 66 was getting ready to retire from politics, will have to stick around for a while longer to fix what conservatism wrought in her country.

But that's how I know we're not done here yet. Because in Iceland, when everything crashed, they didn't try to pretend we just needed a little stimulus here and there and some more tax cuts for the rich and everything would be fine. When everything crashed, it crashed, and everybody knew it. And they threw out the greedy bastards who did it.

But don't worry, some of the conservatives in Iceland are just as brain dead as ours are. If you read the comments on some of the Icelandic media Web sites, you'll find them claiming the Social Democrats, who were not in power until earlier this year, were responsible for the collapse of the economy last fall. My Scandinavian language skills are really poor, but I think I saw something about Sigurdardottir being born in Finland or something too. The socialist thing isn't working though, because, well, her party is the Social Democrats.

Oh, and by the way -- I love this -- 26 members of the Althingi elected this weekend were women. That's 46 percent. Compare that to our 16 percent. Now, I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say the Althingi probably isn't very ethnically diverse, but then, we are talking about Iceland, where 94 percent of the people are a mix of Norse and Celts and the rest come from somewhere else more recently.

Y'know, we could maybe learn a lot from a little island in the north Atlantic.



News Writer
AWOP Political Contributing Editor
Author of Stop the Press!

Cross-posted at News Writer's Guide to the Market

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Peace Y'all