The British have been shocked by the size of their recession. And so they should be. At least all over, they are saying and shouting that the Cameron carbon copy of The Frau’s Final Solution, has been a disaster. In Larry Elliot’s words, a “Catastrophe”. It remains to be seen whether David Cameron has the capacity to think at all and work it out for himself.

The Guardian gives us an interesting statistic, the U.K. economy is 4.5% lower than its 2008 peak, whereas the US economy is already 1.2% higher than its pre recessionary peak. The Americans have tried to stimulate the economy. They have not done nearly enough to regulate the financial sector, but at least they have not succumbed to the neo liberal free market dogma of screw the people save the banks.

At least Britain has reacted with shock at the realisation of where this policy has lead to. In Europe denial that there is anything wrong with the policy prevails. We have to watch and see what Cameron does now.

However, there is a very great difference between Britain and Europe. And that is Democracy. David Cameron is directly answerable to the British electorate and runs a high risk of getting booted out at the next election if he persists in this folly.  On the other hand in Europe, as it is, Democracy has been effectively abolished.

The decisions on the economic policy to be imposed are taken on the one hand by an unelected, unaccountable Eurocracy of nonentities who risk nothing at all if everything goes wrong because they are appointed. And on the other hand the decisions are taken by the powerful countries in the north with surpluses and imposed on the weak countries in the south (mainly) with the deficits.

Now here, Democracy works in reverse, because the politicians in the north are voted in by their own electorates, by the German electorate in Frau Merkel’s case, not the Greek, Spanish, Italian or any other. So she plays the populist card of blame the dirty lazy southerners who should be severely punished! This goes down well with her electorate and her approval rate soars.

No one ever bothers to explain to the indignant Germans say, that they would not have these surpluses without the deficits in the south. But in any case, owing to rampant populism, the German electorate probably wouldn’t give a damn anyway. Screw the lazy, undeserving southerners! Is the order of the day.

So, when those imposing this vicious, senseless and catastrophic policy are rewarded by their own electors, they have no reason not to persist in the catastrophe. And as for the nice people like Christine Lagarde, Herman Van Rompuy, Mannuel Barroso… well they are all so totally unaccountable to and in effect so absolutely disconnected from the people their decisions make suffer, that all they can say is

LET THEM EAT CAKE!