Repent, O Ye Bankers

Said the Bishop, in humbling homily:
"You bankers are quite the anomaly.
I'd like to convert you
To living in virtue,
Instead of behaving abom'nably."

The Wall Street Journal's Jason Zweig writes that the Church of England has called for "the financial industry [to] look within and search its soul." This call to soul-searching followed an invitation from the British parliamentary commission on the LIBOR-fixing scandal for public comment on how to reform finance. "The church calls for two striking steps," writes Zweig.

First, bankers should seek to build “a culture of the virtues” that would enable anyone working in finance to answer the question, “What would it mean to be a good banker?”... Second, the financial industry needs to apologize and repent.

The Rev. Dr. Malcolm Brown, director of the Church of England’s Mission and Public Affairs Council, elaborates:

It’s like shoplifting: Even if you put what you took back onto the shelf, you still did something wrong. Just restoring the status quo ante doesn’t give people the sense that trust has been restored. You can’t just put it back on the shelf; you have to admit that the way things were done was wrong.

France Defends Its Credit Rating

Said the Banque de France Gov'nor Noyer,
On the risk to the French "triple-A":
"But ze debts of ze Brits
Are so deep in ze sh£ts,
For comparison's sake, if I may."

French central bank head Christian Noyer may have sparked a war of words with Britain. Responding to S&P's putting his nation on negative credit watch, with the possible loss of its prestigious AAA rating, Mr. Noyer commented:

"A downgrade doesn't seem justified to me when you look at the economic fundamentals, or else a downgrade should come first for the U.K., which has a greater deficit, as much debt, more inflation, and less growth than us, and collapsing credit."

Trying to keep a stiff upper lip, a spokesman for Prime Minister David Cameron's Conservative government noted the credibility of the UK's deficit reduction plan. In truth, the British have nothing to gain by rising to Mr. Noyer's bait, since their public deficit, at 9.4% of GDP, is far above France's 5.8%.

A Prime Minister Who Can Say No

Said Cameron: "I could have been cannier
In dealing with France and Germania,
But when they're on a roll
About Euro-control,
In my mind I can hear Rule Brittania."

When the 17 euro-zone governments announced a deal to save their common currency on Friday, it was not - as some had hoped - accompanied by a major, supporting treaty change among the 27 EU members. Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron, constrained by his "euro-skeptic" Conservative Party, vetoed changes that would have centralized more fiscal controls with the European Commission, EU executive and European Court of Justice. This left Britain isolated within the EU but bolstered Mr. Cameron's standing at home, where a clear majority desire a "Prime Minister [who] can say 'No,'" in the words of one prominent Conservative.