Portugal

In all the bruhaha about Greece's approaching credit event, people have taken their eyes of Portugal. The country is going down the Greek path with high speed - austerity, a shrinking economy, more austerity, and political and social instability around the corner. Matt Lynn over at WSJ Marketplace has a lot of clever things to say why Portugal actually has LESS of a chance to pull out of the death spiral than Greece... higher private debts, for example. The one difference I see is that Portugal is not a complete banana republic -- the government actually tries to implement reforms, and get some things done. Meanwhile, the Greek clown show continues; yesterday, the Greek parliament even failed to liberalize the opening hours of pharmacies...