Javier Solana, January 30, 2012

LONDON – Europe is now haunted by the spectre of debt. All European leaders quail before it. To exorcise the demon, they are putting their economies through the wringer.

Before S&P dropped the bomb on Friday that France and Austria were losing their Triple-A-rating, most of the crisis reporting last week had been concerned with the different drafts for the new “Fiscal Compact” Treaty to be signed at the euro summit at the end of January.