European Union Crisis Postponed, Money Travels Back Through Time

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William Briggs:

The World Series wasn’t the only event in the majors to be postponed because of inclement circumstance. The crisis in the EU, originally scheduled to culminate last night, was deferred when President Sarkozy, Chancellor Merkel, et al. discovered a large cache of cash in the pockets of a small group of private citizens who had arrived to witness the event.

Suspicious that any private citizen should have money and wary of anything untoward occurring, the assembled leaders of the EU persuaded this group of citizens to “voluntarily” surrender half of what they had. The crisis was then immediately called for the night and is rescheduled to begin again in two years’ time.Pluto saves the day

The money that was confiscated then traveled back through time (via a mechanism too complicated to explain) to Greece, where it was discovered by that country’s ruling Socialist party. The members of that party said to themselves, “My! Where did all this money come from? A gift from Pluto! Let’s use it to employ as many of our own people as possible. It’s better then forcing them to fend for themselves. If we don’t do this, we will anger the Gods.”

But the Greek leaders were unwise and employed far more than were possible. Eventually, nearly half the economy was dependent on government handouts. The leaders knew they had nothing more to give but promises, but were unconcerned and assumed that the Gods would deliver more gifts of cash from the future to replenish the empty treasury.

Then one day, one of the socialist leaders, after a night of lurid dreams guided by Eros, hit upon the idea of selling the Greek promises to non-Greeks. “Of course!” the rest of the leaders agreed, “We can generate promises endlessly, without limit. As long as we can persuade somebody to pay us for them, we can employ more and more of our people in government.”

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Interesting take on things from my favorite statistician.