Germany seems to think its economy is capable of standing on its own

THE German business newspaper Handelsblatt has taken a swipe at our latest cover:





It's kind of an odd riposte. You've got export-dependent Germany there sitting apart from the world economy (dropping depth charges, maybe?). I'd say the "too big" part refers to debt, but Germany's public debt is bigger than Spain's. I'm not sure why America is there; it grew faster than Germany in the year to the first quarter of 2012 (luckily for the Germans, who are net exporters to the American economy).

The real takeaway would seem to be the insight this provides into the German mindset; whatever problems the world economy has, the Germans seem to believe, it isn't Germany's fault. That point, whatever its truth, is orthogonal to the one made in our cover leader: that Germany's government, more than any other, has the ability to navigate the euro-zone economy, and by extension the world economy, away from an economic catastrophe. The Handelsblatt image signals that the Germans still don't get it.