Kevin Robertson's Column

     My wife, daughter and I visited the Republic of Ireland this past summer.  It was a delightful trip with the scenery being postcard perfect and the people even more charming than their reputation promised.     

    Their country's financial problems had been much in the news but at the time of our visit, seemed to be on the verge of being worked out.  It became my practice to start the morning with a copy of the Irish Times daily newspaper.  I would read with interest of Ireland's efforts to put her financial house in order.

     After several years of surging economic growth and an attractive business climate with the lowest corporate tax rate in Europe, now their rapidly growing consumer and government deficit spending, like much of the rest of the world, has the financial chickens coming home to roost in Ireland.

     As we traveled through the western part of this wonderful country, I closely followed their efforts to put their country on a solid footing, and couldn't help but be impressed.  In the newspapers and on TV, plans were put forward to reduce their nation's debt by the sale of state owned assets:  airports, toll-roads, and shipping ports.  There was talk of dificult cuts in state spending and the liklihood of increased taxes across the board.  By all appearances, they would be able to avoid a bailout by the E.U. like the one then being proposed for Greece.  It seemed the government and the people thought the could get the job done and seemed willing to tackle the hard work necessary.

     Then came the sudden and rather startling announcement that the European Union, after huddling behind closed doors with the European Central Bank, would be extending loans to Ireland after all (at the appropriately high interest rate). I could almost imagine the phone call from German Chancellor Angela Merkel to the Irish Prime minister "encouraging" him to accept the loans:  "You vill...take..ZE MONEY!!!!!" 

     There was immediate outrage from both the government's opposition in Parliamnet and the Irish people as a whole . . . and rightfully so.  They would now be paying exhorbitant interest rates to foreign banks so their government could bail out their own over-zealous Irish banks and after having been reassured repeatedly that no bailouts would be necessary.

     The fallout from this decision resulted in this past Friday's Irish election in which the citizens clearly voiced their anger by virtually destroying the ruling Fianna Fail party and bringing a new government to bear on the problem.  The question remains if the Irish will continue under the terms of the EU sponsored bail-out, with it's high interest rates and almost complete surrender of Ireland's economic sovereignty.  A sovereignty, which hard won from the British, will be hard to give up.  Or, will the government try to negotiate the terms of the bail-out with the EU?  A third option, considered nuclear, is default.  The mere suggestion is enough to send shudders throughout the European and American financial systems.

     The Irish story, while still in financial news, has largely been ecliplsed by news of revolt and revolution in the Middle East.  Ireland is working out it's problems with debate and elections rather than with tanks in the streets.  Yet, in many ways, this story has implications for us in the United States every bit as important as those stories coming out of Egypt and Libya. 

     That is because looking at Ireland's financial woes is a bit like looking in a mirror.  We here in the U.S. didn't get in the mess we are in financially because we have had a corrupt military dictatorship, siphoning off our wealth while the country went down the drain.  No, we got where we are the same way the Irish did only on a much grander scale:  by spending money we didn't have and then borrowing more money to pay the interest on the earlier borrowed money . . . for decades.

     Like Ireland, we have at least begun to slowly realize the predicament we are in.  As we begin the discussion of how to try to fix it, the question becomes whether or not we possess the will to do the hard work that will be required.  As we watch Wisconsin begin to wrestle with it's budget problems, it appears we are getting a slight preview of just how hard the problems are going to be to solve and how difficult it will be to convince people the world has dramatically changed.

     As a banker, I know first hand how hard it can be to convince people to make real cuts in their spending when their circumstances change.  It is extremely difficult to go backward in your standard of living.  If it is that hard for a family to do, imagine how much harder it is to change the spending habits of an entire state like Wisconsin or California or Illinois.  Then extrapolate that level of change to the massive U.S. economy — it becomes mind boggling.  An opinion piece in the March 1st Wall Street Journal by Charles G. Koch gives some idea of what we as a nation are facing:

                       "Federal data indicate how urgently we need reform:  The unfunded liabilities of Social

                        Security, Medicare and Medicaid already exceed $106 trillion.  That's well over $300,000

                        for every man, woman and child in America (and exceeds the combined value of every

                        U.S. bank account, stock certificate, building and piece of personal or public property)."

     Pause for just a moment to let the magnitude of that statement sink in.

     Now read another quote:

                       "Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and

                         said to him' You are old and your sons do not follow in your ways; appoint a king to 

                        govern us, like other nations.'  But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, 'Give

                        us a king to govern us.'  Samuel prayed to the Lord, and the Lord said to Samuel, 

                        'Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected 

                        you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.  Just as they have done to

                        me, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt to this day, foresaking me and serving

                        other gods, so also they are doing to you.  Now then, listen to their voice; only--you shall

                        solenmly warn them, and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over the.'

                        So Samuel reported all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking him for a

                        king.  He said, 'These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you:  he will take

                        your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horseman, and to run before

                        his chariots; and he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders

                        of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his implements

                       of war and the equipment of his chariots.  He will take your daughters to be perfumers

                        and cooks and bakers.  He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive

                       orchards and give them to his courtiers.  He will take one-tenth of your grain and of your

                      vineyards and give it to his officers and his courtiers.  He will take your male and female

                      slaves, and the best of your cattle and donkeys, and put them to his work.  He will take

                      one-tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves.  And in that day you will cry out

                      because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves; but the Lord will not answer

                      you in that day.'

                      But the people refused to listen to the voice of Samuel;  they said, 'No!  but we are determined

                     to have a king over us, so that we may be like other nations,'"   I Samuel 8:4-20  NRSV

     The most disturbing part of that scripture is the people's demand "that we may be like the other nations".

     That sentiment led Israel in many difficult directions; most often away from the direction God had chosen for them.  I think it also partly explains Ireland's predicament; they just wanted to be "like other nations."  This quiet little country, that a few short decades ago still literally had pony-cart traffic, didn't want to be like any nation, they wanted to be like us; the U.S.A.  And who could blame them?  For close to a century, this country has set the standard by which other countries have judged themselves.  We defined entertainment, sports, business accomplishment, standard of living . . . you name it.  If it was from America, it was something to be aspired.  So much of it has been so very good.  Ideas of liberty and self-determination; freedoms undreamed of until we set them upon the world.

     Will it slowly crumble because we value a plasma TV more than a balanced checkbook?  Was another SUV or a bigger house worth more than teaching our children to be responsible stewards?  Is lifestyle ultimately of more value than a quality life?  And when change becomes inevitable, will we fill the streets in protest?

     I love my country and will defend her with all that I have.  So it will be sad beyond words for me, and all who love this great nation, if our final legacy to all the countries that have looked to us and followed our example is not one of freedom and equality and religious liberty but instead one of irresponsible, childish, selfish, self-annihilation.                                             

 "Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people."
Proverbs 14: 34