Boomerang

The interesting thing, said the German financier...is the glass room at the top (of the Commerzbank HQ building), from which one looks down over Frankfurt.It is a men's toilet. Commerzbank executives had taken him there to show him how, in full view of the world below, he could shit on Deutsche Bank.

Other countries used foreign money to fuel various forms of insanity. The Germans, through their bankers, used their own money to enable foreigners to behave insanely.

Indeed, one view of the European debt crisis--the Greek street view--is that it is an elaborate attempt by the German government on behalf its banks to get their money back without calling attention to what they are up to. The German government gives money to the European Union rescue fund so that it can give money to the Irish government so that the Irish government can give money to Irish banks, so the Irish banks can repay their loans to the German banks. "They are playing billiards, " says Enderlein. "The easier way to do it would be to give German money to the German banks and let the Irish banks fail." Why they don't simply do this is a question worth trying to answer.

Germans longed to be near the shit, but not in it. This, as it turns out, is an excellent description of their role in the current financial crisis.