The European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund (I.M.F.) have committed €750bn (~$963bn) to bail out the Greek government and its vulture banksters. R.A. details at his Economist blog:

The plan consists of several parts. Euro zone nations agreed to the creation of a special entity that can raise up to €440b by issuing debt, which will be guaranteed by European governments. That money could then be lent out to countries struggling with debt (who would not be a part of the system of guarantees). The I.M.F. chipped in an additional €250b, and the European Union—including, interestingly, the E.U. governments not a part of the euro zone---has ponied up €60b, from the E.U. budget, which can be used immediately.

The U.S. government commits to supplying 20% of I.M.F. funding. Initially, it looked as if the U.S. bill would be $8bn---under the initial ~$150bn bailout plan---but the I.M.F.'s share demands $64,185,000 from the U.S. government to print out of thin air and hand over to the global poli-financial class.

The banksters are setting up Portugal and Spain's toxic governments for a similar downfall, R.A. continues:

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve re-opened currency swap lines it established during the crisis of 2008. And the Spanish and Portuguese governments are putting together plans to trim their deficits.

These lines were "wound down" in February, but re-opening them is set to swap up to $30bn with the Bank of Canada through January 2011, Jeannine Aversa reported at the Associated Press, adding:

Figures weren't provided for the other central banks....

The Fed's balance sheet ballooned to $2.3 trillion, more than double where it stood before the crisis struck. The program reopened on Sunday will expand the Fed's balance sheet, economists say.

She reports these economists add that the "program poses little credit risk to the Fed because the arrangements are with other central banks", but Neil Barofsky, inspector general of the Troubled Asset Relief Program [TARP], said the 2008 bailout with the swaps that followed added $23.7bn in taxpayer risk to the financial system. These weren't arrangements directly between central banks, but with Wall Street as intermediaries in many indirect deals between the Federal Reserve and other central banks. There is little argument against Mr. Barofsky's audit and it should be noted this was in July 2009, six-to-seven months before the swaps "wound down".

The value of the euro will be volatile for a while. No matter how Wall Street takes the swings, the short-term up's and downs shouldn't be taken too seriously and the strength of the U.S. dollar will be distorted as the euro continues a downfall.

Joe Weisenthal posted "what it looks like when a market gives up on a currency" at Business Insider last week:

 If there's one lifeboat for the U.S. dollar, it's a massive inflation of the euro. I'd call it a stay of execution. All in all, inflationary effects from participation in the Greece bailout won't be much of a factor as the dollar will look good for some years against the euro, according to the Deutsche Bank chief economist Thomas Mayer---and there's little reason to disagree. The direct effects will be more international Wall Street gambling that the Federal reserve will eventually bailout for more trillions.

This isn't a bailout of the Greek people's so-called 'welfare state', the government's unfunded liabilities to veterans and teachers and such. This is a bailout of the "shadow banking system", Ezra Klein points out at his Washington Post blog, and the propaganda machines throughout Europe are doing a very good job of concealing this:

Remember that this is no more a bailout of Greece and Spain and Portugal than TARP was a bailout of subprime borrowers....

Rather, this is a bailout of the European banking system (and possibly some international banks), much like TARP was a bailout of our banking systems (and some international banks). The way people understand the European crisis is that a few countries hold much too much debt. But you can flip that around, too: Many banks loaned a few countries much too much money. And if those banks don't get paid back, they're going to go insolvent, and the banking system is going to freeze.

Intra-European resentment is probably going to protect the banks from becoming the villains here (Germans would prefer to blame the Greeks than Deutsche Bank), but they're a big part of the story. Note The New York Times' report on the market's reaction the bailout: "European banks were the early winners. In France, BNP Paribas soared 14 percent and Credit Agricole rose 16 percent; Germany’s largest bank, Deutsche Bank, gained 10 percent."

As much hysteria's been made regarding Greece---and it is a catastrophe---the government's assets-liability ratio in better shape than the average household in the U.S., Canada and Japan, Robert Samuelson points out in a doomsday article at Newsweek. He lines up the Greece failure with events that preceded the Great Depression, but almost blames the gold standard to equate it with today's welfare state.

The common thread, if there is one to take from this article, isn't the gold standard, but the centralization of a global economy to a falling empire. Reading it in this context, there's a lot to take from his article. It's a more realist look at the geopolitical climate emerging in the East as the U.S. began to expand its sphere of influence after World War I.

The I.M.F. and World Bank have unsuccessfully colluded to prevent this, as I wrote during their October meetings:

At the Pittsburgh G-20 Summit less than two weeks ago, the Anglo-American call to the I.M.F. was for it to implement policies to force down the exchange rate of China’s currency (the renminbi) to save their own, [Krishna Guha] reported after the Summit. With Chris Giles, he followed up on his report that the G-20 was “unable to agree” on a currency agreement at the Summit, I.M.F. Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn “reiterated his criticism of China’s ‘undervalued’ currency… [T]he U.S. and Europe believe the renminbi needs to appreciate to help reduce China’s still large trade surplus.”

The World Bank and I.M.F. are being used by the Anglo-American factions to forcefully prevent the implosion of the intrinsically worthless greenback and euro. Nothing of relieving the odious debt inflicted upon Western workers and the Third World. Only the preservation of the “Euro-Atlantic” financial oligarchy over us.

If we see the Third World---and developing countries--- go to East Asia and the Middle East for solvency, away from the I.M.F. and World Bank, these currencies will actually strengthen in a de facto debt transfer. It isn't a coincidence that the U.S. is focusing on military partnerships in Colombia, Brazil, Afghanistan and Pakistan; protecting unlawful, covert nuclear proliferation in India and Israel (of course); and President Barack Obama recently nominated a top former government intelligence specialist on Iran to head intelligence at the Treasury Department.

Understanding the facts---which are, of course, contrary to any narrative suggesting this bailout is for the welfare of the Greek people, global economic stability in people's daily lives---that this is a de jure bankster bailout, here are the takes that seem valid to interpret the geopolitical theater:

1. The Anglo-American institutions colluded to create parity among the U.S. dollar and euro, unable to reach a deal with China to overprice the renminbi; or
2. The European Central Bank is playing on the false sense of security in the euro because of the U.S. bailing out Wall Street for up to $23.7bn in U.S. dollars.

Both seem to be the dominant driving forces behind the nation-state authorities in control of international banking institutions to further prop up the "shadow banking system", Mr. Klein quoted earlier, in short term as the E.U. and U.S. continue to make failing attempts at convincing China to undervalue its productive capacity.