Liikanen isn't from a "major" country...

This is a feature, not a bug.

The new ECB chair will come into office in the middle of the worst constitutional crisis the European Union has had since... Hell, I can't remember the any worse crisis the European Union has gone through. And all the "major" €-zone countries (except maybe - maybe - France) have a major dog in this fight. That's what makes it a serious crisis. Nobody from Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy or Iberia could ever be seen as an honest broker, and another Frenchman wouldn't be acceptable for the reasons outlined in the diary. The UK has an opt-out, so they're obviously not in the picture.

That leaves Estonia, Slovenia, Finland, Slovakia, Austria, Belgium (who may be about to get a dog in the fight too), the Netherlands and Malta, Cypern and Luxembourg.

I think we want a Belgian of reasonable accessability of mind, because a Belgian is enough of a Good Old Boy that he should be acceptable to the Germans, but on the other hand, Belgium is about to become a graphic example of the fact that this is not a North/South conflict but a deficit/surplus conflict. The danger of backing a Belgian candidate is that Belgium might be attacked too soon, or not at all, leading him to become unacceptably partisan before his election, or to not draw the right conclusions after he is elected.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.