Friday 13 means in many countries bad luck. France, Austria and seven other countries in Europe are probably agreeing with that now as yesterday, January the 13, the US based ratings agency Standard & Poor’s cut France and Austria triple -A rating by one notch to AA+, and downgraded the other seven countries -Spain, Italy, Portugal, Malta, Cyprus, Slovakia and Slovenia two notches. Read the rest of this entry »

Elections in the US, specially presidential elections, have always been mystifying for Europeans, though little by little some European politicians are beginning to copy some aspects of it, like introducing families, and making their lives known to their constituents. Still there is a lot to catch up if in reality they want to transform their elections into the circus attractions and even the nastiness the American elections end up turning into. Read the rest of this entry »

This coming April the first round of the French presidential elections will take place, with the two biggest vote winners going through the last and decisive round in early May. While European elections don’t play as long as American ones nor are they so ubiquitous on television and all media, the French ones this time had been talked about more than usual due to the arrest in new York last May of Dominique Strauss-Kahn who until that moment had been considered as the one who could become the next French president. Read the rest of this entry »

In the middle of all the political disarray in the EU and the financial problems with the euro, we have seen President Sarkozy trying to solve these problems with his German counterpart Angela Merkel. Read the rest of this entry »

Summits, reunions, meetings… and yet no solutions for the economic problems the EU is suffering from. In reality, we should recognize that the situation is critical and we have to start now to cure it and even so, as the German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said there is no easy fix to the European financial crisis. Read the rest of this entry »

Located in the French Riviera, Keyboard Politics is in a “privileged” position to witness all the incredible happenings taking place in Cannes for the G-20 summit. From Menton, in the border with Italy, to Cannes, the area is controlled by a large display of police. Many people had the new experience of having their cars checked in the border what was something rarely taking place since the elimination of border posts among the EU countries. Read the rest of this entry »

In the second round of the Socialist primary elections wich took place yesterday the voters selected François Hollande. Read the rest of this entry »