From Zero Hedge:

Citi's Willem Buiter, whose succinct analysis a few weeks ago sealed the coffin of the worthless EFSF, has just come out with another knockout punch this morning after telling Bloomberg TV what everyone else knows is true, but is terrified to say out loud: namely that, "time is running out fast."

He adds: "I think we have maybe a few months -- it could be weeks, it could be days -- before there is a material risk of a fundamentally unnecessary default by a country like Spain or Italy which would be a financial catastrophe dragging the European banking system and North America with it. So they have to act now."

In sum, a rehash of the Deutsche Bank pitchbook to the ECB we posted earlier, only in Mutually Assured Terms that would make even Hank Paulson blush. At this point Germany has an option: tell Europe to take a hike, or go balls to the wall in bailing out 250 million Europeans' early retirement packages.

The ball is in Merkel's court, who unlike Citi, JPM, DB, and everyone else, has to worry about this fickle, and potentially pitchfork bearing, thing called "voters."

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More on the euro crisis:

Italy is approaching "the point of no return"

The "worst case" scenario for Italy could now be here

Euro contagion: The crisis is spreading from Italy to Spain