EU WATCH
World Watch
Dueling Currencies* --
the real weapons of mass destruction?
Dollar vs. Euro -- Petrodollar War?!
Did the US Begin War on Iraq to Stop the Euro from Replacing the Dollar for Iraqi Oil Transactions?!
The following is from: OUTLOOK india.com ''OPINION - Defeat in Iraq? Au Contraire'' 4-Dec-2006 by C.M. Naim
''Beginning perhaps in 2000, but certainly by 2002, Saddam Hussein had started using the Euro for Iraqi oil transactions.
''His intention clearly was to incrementally enhance the role of the Euro in the oil market, thus obtaining a new kind of leverage in the oil market while also striking back at the United States.
''Hussein’s move was noticed in Venezuela, and by Spring 2003, Hugo Chavez had publicly expressed a desire to shift to the Euro.
''It is inconceivable that Washington did not know about Chavez’s intentions when the attack on Iraq began in March 2003.
''The pre-emption, in other words, was to protect the value of the dollar in the oil market, and not the access to the oil. And in that sense it was as much pre-emptive against Venezuela and other oil-producing countries as Iraq.
''Consider the consequences if first Iraq and then Venezuela had exclusively denominated their oil sales in Euros, followed predictably by Iran.''
Milton Friedman Speaking on the Euro:
The following is from: ''Milton Friedman, Nobel Prize-Winning Economist, Dies'' (Update 8) by Vivien Lou Chen
16-Nov-2006 (Bloomberg)
'''Freedom is a great objective,' Friedman said in a Dec. 27, 2005, interview with PBS's Charlie Rose. 'It enables people who hate one another, who don't speak the same language, who would fight one another if they had the chance, to cooperate together economically.'
''He opposed one form of economic integration: the monetary union of 11 European Union nations in 1999 that resulted in the replacement of national currencies with the euro. Greece joined in 2001, bringing the number to 12.
[Anti-Dollarization or the birth of Eurorization -- Wake up!!!
Watch out America! Are thy Glorious Dollar Days Numbered?!]
Freidman on Dollar vs. Euro! (continued)
''Euro Doomsayer
''As Europe was preparing for the euro's introduction, Friedman told German weekly Die Zeit in September 1997 that the euro would make conflict more, not less, likely.
''The continent's many borders and diverse cultures make a single currency unit unfeasible, as Europeans are more dependent on their own country rather than the 'common market or the idea of 'Europe.'' The introduction of the euro would turn economic shocks into political conflict, Friedman said.
''The euro went ahead as planned and the introduction of notes and coins two years later went off without a hitch.'''
*Concept from: http://www.thinkandask.com/news/thedollar.html
The Late Milton Freidman on
the Dollar vs. the Euro!
