Congratulations to the physicists and scientists who worked long and hard and discovered the boson and above all to Professor Higgs who thought of it in the first place. A nonagenarian now, I hear he is ready to crack the bubbly and so he ought.
Now what is a boson? Well… I have no idea. But I dare say Frau Merkel knows all about it. She is said to be a physicist, or at any rate to have studied Physics. So presumably she does know something about it. No doubt far more than she knows about Economics.
I have just come across a really pertinent article by Joseph Stiglitz entitled: “Death-row Euro gets another last minute stay- of execution”. He describes vividly the lack of understanding and insistence on repeating failed policies again and again in this Euro crisis.
“The hope is that markets will reward virtue.” Stiglitz tells us describing the German obsession with a kind of warped morality in trying to deal with the crisis. Virtue here is austerity and atonement for sin no doubt. However, “…markets are more pragmatic.” he tells us, and therefore realise that austerity merely weakens economies rather than strengthens them and hence interest rates rise.
“Germany seems surprised by this. Like Medieval blood letters [Germany’s] leaders refuse to see that the medicine does not work and insist on more of it – until the patient finally dies.”
Hail Frau! We who are about to die salute you!