Former president of the European Parliament, Pat Cox, was on Newstalk today discussing the financial crisis.
Like economist, Colm McCarthy, Cox thinks that Greek politicians are nasty liars while their Irish counterparts are saints heroically struggling to save their people from Armageddon.
Unlike the Greeks, our situation is pretty awful with numbers but we haven’t lied about the numbers. We’ve been very slow to discover some of them which I think is a huge part of our credibility problem but we haven’t deliberately mislead as the Greeks did.
Notice the claim ‘We’ve been very slow to discover some of them’. That’s Irish for – ‘We lied’.
By using these words Cox can tell the truth but at the same time remain outside the realm of reality.
Sadly, the reality is very, very close now and it will be interesting to observe how officials, commentators, experts, captured journalists and politicians mangle the English language in their efforts to remain outside of reality while EU bureaucrats are rubbing their faces in it.