Just a quick note, since time is in short supply at the moment.

We finally seem to have some coordinated effort from the PES to tackle the crisis. The socialist family has gathered in Greece to present an alternative path to the austerity-rules-all course imposed by the conservatives. They lure to have a thorough answer to the new economic governance rules proposed by Merkel and Sarkozy, now being refined to be voted by the Council later this month. Shy to some extent, it nevertheless points to the obvious building blocs needed to both deal with the crisis and reinforce the Union. The creation of an European Treasury, the creation of an European tax, even the reference to the needed structural paradigm change to build an Economy for the XXI century, all of it seems to be considered by the PES leaders.

The meeting is even more important for another reason, by displaying this unity the socialists are sending their citizens a clear message, the blind austerity is not being imposed by the Union, but by the conservatives that at the moment rule the Union. Merkel, Sarkozy, von Rampuy, Barroso, are all members of the EPP; the apathetic servitude to American rating agencies, the blind pursue of a stronger than steel €uro, it's their course, not of Europe itself.

Unfortunately, two socialist leaders missed the meeting: Zapatero and Sócrates. They don't seem to be interested in an alternative to the conservatives' policy. They are now themselves conservatives.

European Socialists propose alternative to Barroso-Van-Rompuy pact

EUOBSERVER / ATHENS - Europe's Socialist leaders have proposed a `growth pact' as an alternative to the `competitiveness pact' originally proposed by France and Germany as a solution to the bloc's economic woes.
Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann and most of the continent's social democratic leaders, many of whom currently sit on opposition benches in their parliaments, including French Socialist leader Martine Aubry and Germany's head of the SPD, Sigmar Gabriel, met at a summit in Athens to co-ordinate their strategy ahead of an EU summit where a `comprehensive response' to the eurozone crisis is to be finalised.

The centre-left leaders endorsed a plan that still backs austerity, but alongside it the introduction of a financial transactions tax that they say would deliver €250 billion a year to European coffers that could be invested in green technologies and infrastructure.

[...]

At the meeting the Socialist leaders also issued a call for the EU to lower the interest rates paid by Greece and Ireland on their multi-billion-euro bail-outs, a substantial increase in the lending capacity of the existing EU €440 billion rescue fund, and, in Mr Papandreou's words, the establishment of EU bonds, "so that Europe can manage collective debt properly."

It is thought that Messrs Zapatero and Socrates were nervous to appear at the meeting, with its combative stance, at the same time that they are battling within the European Council from a weak position.

I, and many citizens of Iberia, have been betrayed.