You can’t with one breath say that you’re independent and that you think the EU is evil, and then with the next moan that the EU didn’t save you from yourselves. Ditto with Brown; just because a system works in a country of 60m (if it ever did), that’s no guarantee that it’s the right system for a country of 300k.

And borrow the money elsewhere at whatever rate you can get. With the ratings agencies’ help, that might even be 7%. You already know that I think that rate should have been the same as the Nordics, which will likely average >5%.

The government and citizens of Iceland are allowed at present to pass laws only if they do not contradict the contract we signed as part of EFTA with the EU which did create what is known in English as the European Economic Area ( EEA ). Jan the 1st 1994.

We have always kept to our side of the contract.

But the EU has not by passing this stupid horrible regulations that have ended up burdneing every Icelandic tax payer and they childrens and maybe grandchilds with this huge IceSave debt

It was the flawed idea of EU Commission burecrats give wrong features to applying EU pillar freedom of establishment idea to banks through branches concept and Directive 94/19/EC that made IceSave as big as it was :

http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2009/06/22/haarde-in-dublin-ireland-worse-than-iceland/#comment-82596

Why did the EU memberstate with power to influence these regualations with they members of the EU parliament rubber stamping these regulations not stop them ?

Denmark, Netherlands, and UK have been in EU since before these regulations where made and during the many years they were accepted and implemented.

EFTA state like Iceland did not make these regulations.

But we did fulfil our end of the EEA agreement contract and implement them to letter, in many times more quickly than EU memberstates did.

And now we must pay for it — pay for IceSave debt at the 5.5% intersest rate that UK and Holland do force us to pay.

>BTW, did the EU require separation of regulators and central banks?

No, but as led by Mr Brown as UK chancellor this did become the accepted way to do it within EU and also EFTA.

Icelandic govnernments do follow what other country in the EEA did do in this regard. We did look to the UK unde New Labour ( as did many other in EFTA and EU ) as to how to regulate.

How wrong we were.

Come on, this mindless slogans are also not substitute for meaninful explanation and debating.

While Icelandic people do watch they politicians like a hawk from a position of underlying contempt for those politicains — in comparison for other people in representatative democracies — still they are not watching and approving of every decision that the poltiicans do make ” on they behalf “.

The only way what you are saying could be true Jim is if every decision that government make is put to a referendum. And that was clearly not how current system do work.

And certainly not the way Social Democrat do like it done.

If this is system that could work in future — more of the plebicite on decisions — is good question. It is technically feasible for this to be done now as all Icelander basically has access to free Internet inside country.

And from mobile phones too.

But thing is — just how important are our elected representatives in the mediation of decision making process. Are they more qualified to make decisions than the ” mob ” of voters are?

For example judges are better qualified to make decisions on justice than a jury is, because they know more about merchanics of ensuring justice.

But is that true of elected politicians? It used to be because local communities would elect best people from their communities to represent them.

But now I am not sure that is true. Because best people generally go into business, not government. And the ones that go into politics do because they are not able to make it in the ” real world “.

As good old P J O’Rourke do say:
“Politics is the business of getting power and privilege without possessing merit.

A politician is anyone who asks individuals to surrender part of their liberty — their power and privilege — to State, Masses, Mankind, Planet Earth, or whatever.

This state, those masses, that mankind, and the planet will then be run by … politicians.”

( What I said:
” You general posts do come clearly from stance as bond holder or other whole sale lender. You clearly are propgandist of some type. But please come clean and state it where you are coming from.

As bond holder or whole sale ledner I think you have reason to be upset because depositor have been put first, but your case is not strengthen by making these smearing splash of the brush . ”

There is nothing wrong with being bond holder or whole sale lender. They are people in this mess that are being hurt more than others.

That is simplest explanation for Mike’s increasingly shrill and smearing comments here. Of course he could have other reason for posting — but that is simplest explanation.

>If everyone here is representing an agency/agenda, what is yours? Because you certainly have some pretty stong beliefs, so you must therefore also be a “propgandist of some type”.

I am here reperesenting the Icelandic ideas ( which are individualist capitalistic, decentralized, rule of justic and laws not politicans ) against those who like to distort, smear and generally talk down those ideas and people here in unfair ways.

I think that pretty clearly drip from nearly every post I make.

Jim write :
>Fisy – You are so wrong on so many points that I think we’ll have to agree to differ. We apparently disagree on even the responsibilities of regulators, governments, etc!

What you mean is that you dont have refutation for what I bring up above.

If you did you would make it. You do so at length in many other thread.

Come on now, I am interested to have you refute them. And maybe some of the many that read IceNews are too.

Voting doesn’t delegate thinking. And ignorance doesn’t remove responsibility.

Not a reference to IceSavers I hope!

Not necessarily. Jim may or may not be some sort of elitist that thinks that people are stupid.

But all Jim has said in this thread is that Icelanders have allowed their current political system to arise and survive. Certainly, it cannot be the fault of Denmark, the UK/NL or the EU that this has occurred, as the citizens of the Republic of Iceland are and always have been in charge of their own destiny.

BTW, did the EU require separation of regulators and central banks?

Well Jim is selective with blame, but mostly blames the citizens with no blame to the financial wizards who provided the container loads of cash to Icelandic borrowers:)
That would be typical of a mindset that has a condescending opinion of the citizens. The ordinary people had the least knowledge and responsibility about the great economic matters yet carry the bulk of the burden, not only of their own debt but the reckless debts of speculative gamblers.
The citizens do not have the insurance policy of a limited company.

Fundamentally the EEA policy of the separation of the regulation agency from the central bank and allowing the banks to regulate themselves was the recipe for disaster especially in a fragile economic country like Iceland.
The banks did not regulate themselves but engaged in a competitive frenzy which included
outright blatant fraud, encouraging unlimited borrowing using inflated valued assets as collateral.

We are still getting calls to take up another credit card. I tell them that I can promise to use the card but there is no way I can promise to pay you back, is that still okay?
Let the lender beware.

You do understand that buying something for far more than you can sell it is no different from offering mortgages to people who can’t pay?

And that’s ignoring any deliberate asset inflation, which also occurred.

Also, it’s a bit rich that you accuse Jim of working for bondholders. What is your evidence, or do people only need evidence when they accuse an Icelander of something? :)

If everyone here is representing an agency/agenda, what is yours? Because you certainly have some pretty stong beliefs, so you must therefore also be a “propgandist of some type”.