The “European Monster State”

There is Greece, inexorably tottering towards its exit from the Eurozone. Once again, the despised Troika inspectors have arrived in Athens. Based on their findings, they’ll decide if Greece should get the next tranche of the bailout billions—default and/or conversion to the drachma being the alternatives.... Greeks have stopped paying their bills....
Which is logical. They’re hanging on to their euros under mattresses or in foreign accounts, assuming that they will soon be able to pay their bills with devalued drachmas....Hospitals stopped paying for medication, individuals stopped paying for electricity, the government stopped paying for construction work......
the number of bailout candidates continues to grow: in addition to the five that have already requested aid—Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Spain, and Cyprus—Slovenia is now discussing it. And Italy is at the brink. Seven. Out of seventeen.....
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Piling Up: The Detritus Of Failed Stimulus Policies

....“ugly” can't describe is their relationship to the worldwide explosion of government deficit spending and central bank money-printing operations, ballyhooed for years and with deafening intensity as a powerful stimulant to the economy....
Since the onset of the financial crisis, central banks have forced yields on high-quality debt, such as US Treasuries, to near zero—and often below the rate of inflation. And they have printed voluminously to buy assets that are now decomposing on their balance sheets: $18 trillion “and counting,” or “roughly 30% of global GDP,” is now weighing down these balance sheets, according the Bank for International Settlements. A huge monetary stimulus.....and fiscal stimulus—that is, deficit spending—around the globe took on mind-boggling proportions. At the very top is Japan...by March 2013, the end of the fiscal year, gross national debt will surpass $14 trillion, or 240% of GDP....In the US, budget deficits have been ballooning for a decade,...by December 2012, gross national debt will have nearly doubled to well over $16 trillion. It’s already over 100% of GDP.

     .................. By Wolf Richter
 
But now the party appears to be over. The economies have burned through these trillions and have misallocated or squandered them, and what’s left are mountains of public debt everywhere, a debt crisis in the Eurozone, and central banks with balance sheets that are stuffed with reeking assets they’d bought with the money they’d printed.