Thank You, Hans Saner!

Swiss Philosopher Hans Saner (1934), in an interview with the Basel newspaper "Basler Zeitung" (bazkulturmagazin, 28 october 2008) on the financial crisis,has made a fine statement on the misconception of democracy that has prevailed during the second half of the twentieth century and continues to prevail in the 21th century.
When the citizens of the German Democratic Republic took to the streets before the fall of the Berlin wall, they used to cry: "Wir sind das Volk!" (We are the People).

We all, Hans Saner says, use to cry: "We are the People!", but we should cry: "We are the Economy!, we are Politics, we are the Culture!" instead.
In fact, pseudo-religious neo-liberal prophets have tried to outdo the marxist hope for the inevitable death of the State by nurturing the hope that global wealth and well-being could be achieved by the forces of the market alone. In contrast to this concept, classical liberalism has always asked for a minimal coherence between regulatory interventions and the market forces.
In this context, it is refreshing to hear a philosopher say that democracy must not stop short of the concept of "The People" (or "The Nation"), but has to include, Economy, Politics, and, last but not least, Culture.

Peer Steinbrück and the weight of history: "Die Schweiz, das kleine Stachelschwein, die nehmen wir auf dem Rückweg ein.."

German minister of finance Peer Steinbrück must have slept back in 1968 and 1969 when during his training as a reserve officer of the Deutsche Bundeswehr the subject of the relations between the German Reich, the Wehrmacht and Switzerland was discussed. The above slogan was used by members of the Wehrmacht to explain why they did not invade Switzerland between 1939 and 1942.
Switzerland, when frontally attacked, is no easy adversary. The questions that are to be discusse these days are neither the inappropriate behaviour of Swiss banker Joe Ackermann at the helm of Deutsche Bank nor the behaviour of hundreds of milliardaire German citizens that have evaded German taxes by buying houses in the Swiss Alps, but the excellent cooperation of the Swiss Federal Reserve (Schweizerische Nationalbank) with the European Central Bank and the anger of hundreds of thousand of Swiss citizens and foreign inhabitants working in Switzerland who pay heavy taxes on the communal, cantonal an federal level over
unqualified remarks by a member of the German government.
The Swiss are themselves very well aware of the imperfections of their tax system, but they are absolutely adamant in asking for the right to fix this mess themselves.
Peer Steinbrück may be reminded that e.g. in the Canton of Basel-City, taxation is not negotiable, whereas such solutions are in use in certain Central Swiss Cantons.
An excuse not only to the Federal government, but to the ordinary Swiss citizens by Peer Steinbrück is overdue.