UNIMPRESSED EUROPEANS: German press irked by US, pushes WH on debt.

In an apparent suggestion of United States hypocrisy on debt issues, a journalist in the German media challenged White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on the role of the United States in responding to the European debt crisis.

“The U.S., as far as I know, has a worse debt-to-GDP ratio than the whole eurozone, and we are talking about the eurozone, not about the United States and that Congress can’t get its act together,” said a member of the German press during the briefing. “So from the European perspective, it seems that this country is in a bigger mess than Europe. We are not proud where we are. We know that it’s slow and not bold, and so on, but at least they are doing something; they are deciding something, they’re trying to pull that through. And here, nothing is happening — third time this year,” he added, referring to the Supercommittee failure.

He’s got a point. Now if we could just cut like Britain. Or Canada.