[quote]
In the US, action by the Treasury & the FRB restored banking solvency, thanks to control of the currency. In Europe, the most afflicted nations took on their banks' debt to restore solvency, borrowed to do it, and are now beating the cash out of their citizens to maintain that, ie, austerity. That's been the extent of European "stimulus", (other than temporary automatic stabilizers), the salvation of the financial elite at the expense of ordinary citizens. [/quote]

You hit the nail on the head. People like Krugman praise the stimulus bill or QE as somehow harming the interests of the financial elite while these programs actually amount to handing billions if not trillions of dollars in political favors directly to corporations and banks.

The IMF is no different. It seems people are critical of every word from the IMF, as they should be, except, curiously, its stated goals. Only a fool would take the "austerity" being forced upon Greece by the IMF at face value. Greece would have defaulted long ago if it wasn't for IMF and ECB "help". Rather both organizations continue to provide loans and bond purchases that have allowed Greece and the rest of Europe to continue deficit spending for far longer than they otherwise would have.

None of the stimulus efforts have had anything to do with the semblance of economic theory which was cobbled together in defense of it in this thread. The IMF doesn't particularly care what happens to the Greek economy. Its goal is to keep Europe in debt so that it will keep paying interest to the investment banks.

As Europe continues to take out loans from the IMF to finance its borrowing, Krugman is calling for "More borrowing! More debt!" And some people actually believe him when he says becoming debt slaves to the IMF and Goldman Sachs "doesn't affect the economy" or that borrowing loans from the banks somehow harms the interest of the financial elite.

To the liberals in this thread: if you want to make an argument based on Keynesian theory, fine. But don't pretend as if you're somehow taking a stand against corruption when you advocate countries should continue borrowing on the international financial markets, directly from the big banks you claim to oppose, and accepting IMF credit support to do so.