Difficult but crucial. Will the European Council be able to define the EU's financial framework for 2014-2020 at the end of the week? The heads of state and government and their president, Mr Van Rompuy, are trying hard to give the impression that they believe so. Yet the obstacles are really very daunting - as is the subject of the overall contribution, and the distribution of the credits between the different spending sectors. After the failure at the end of last November (see this column...