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Greece Rejects EU Terms
New submitter Thammuz writes: With almost all ballots counted, Greeks voted overwhelmingly "No" on Sunday in a bailout referendum, defying warnings from the EU that rejecting new austerity terms would set their country on a path out of the euro. Figures published by the interior ministry showed nearly 62% of those whose ballots had been counted voting "No", against 38% voting "Yes". "Today we celebrate the victory of democracy, but tomorrow all together we continue and complete a national effort for exiting this crisis," Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said in a televised address.
One size doesn't fit all, so it should come as no surprise that a currency made for industrial nations doesn't work so well for a tourist economy.
Nationalism is the main threat for destroying the European Union. And that is not going to be good for the Greek people, not for people in other countries. Is a win-win vs lose-lose situation. Please, everyone, more brain and less nationalism.
I've already got the popcorn popped and the news on.
The Greeks can't seem to come to terms with reality. It is for the best of the EU they are booted. Clearly they don't understand austerity is necessary, they want their free shit to run on forever. Sadly, their free ride has broken down.
I am Belgian. Greece owes me, my wife and children over 3000 euro. We fronted it out of our taxes and if they don't pay us back, we'll pay it back out of our taxes. Now, I am all for social solidarity... anybody who has spent time here in Belgium knows how easy it is for an IT worker to do independent contracts under the table. I declare all of my side activities and pay my taxes specifically because I believe in helping those who are down on their luck.
But solidarity is a two-way street. Greece was bailed out once, in 2010, in exchange for reforms. They were slow in reforming and in 2012 we had to bail them out again... and they still haven't reformed and here we are in 2015 and they want more money. The reforms that our governments are asking are not onerous. It basically comes down to "don't spend more than you can pay". The Greeks for some reason seem to think that the rest of the Eurozone should pay for armies of useless bureaucrats and pensioners whose median pensions are higher than ours make more than my parents. Now, Greece is small and strategically important, so maybe every Belgian should just give them 600 euro and call it a day.
But then Podemos in Spain will be asking for the same thing. Then the Five star movement in Italy will want their free money. I'm sorry, but fuck you guys. I work my fucking ass off to support my family and my countrymen. Greece threw my good will in my face. They can go become lackeys to the Russians for all I care, fight a civil war, I don't care. I hope my government refuses to give them another cent.
Well goody for Greece where a majority thinks that that they can vote themselves out of responsibility for borrowing themselves into a hole. Now it's the turn of everyone else in Europe to decide whether to continue throwing good money after bad. The Greeks claim that the banks & everyone else are the problem. We'll soon see how well they do without either.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
People only in their dreams are US Republicans not actually the most servile, rule-bound people on Earth. You have to look very hard to find another country than Greece where the population does essentially what it likes and fuck the govt. Everything from taxes to road signs is a suggestion in Greece.
The only reason Greece would be Republican's dream is because it's a fine example of what happens when socialists finally run out of other people's money.
Citizen of Belgium here. That is totally cool with me. Please pay back the 660 euro per person that you owe us on your way out, though (in Euro, not Drachma)
Now they seem to be wanting a 30% discount on their debt. Funny that!
You give up now the 30%, and tomorrow they will put together another act like this to have another 30% cut.
Never negotiate with Debt Terrorists!
There are rules to be in the Euro zone. Nobody forced anybody to accept those rules.
If Greeks now they finally came to reality that retiring at 50yo might lead to shortage of pension funds, and they want "discounts", they should be booted out of EU.
The failure occurred within the banking structure itself. The irresponsible people were those selling junk portfolios. Iceland took the proper path in this matter, and everybody else should follow suit. I don't fall for that right wing schtick of blaming poor people who actually need help.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
In a world that throws away more than half of what is produced, a real democratic style socialism is easily affordable. If you wish to keep the property damage to a minimum, you might want to consider it.. If confrontation is more your cup o' tea, then by all means, carry on.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Whatever your opinion of her otherwise, The Iron Lady saw this coming
007: "Who are you?"
Pussy: "My name is Pussy Galore."
007: "I must be dreaming..."
I do not think the voters realize the consequences of the vote they just made. They voted to not accept the terms of a bailout which was asking for slightly reduced government spending and slightly more taxation of businesses in Greece, who have been simply not paying taxes due for decades.
This will result in Greece leaving the Euro and presumably the EU as well or at least reduce it to whatever status UK has. They have their own currency.
Greece will have to print its own currency again and distribute it via physical and electronic means to replace Euro holdings within Greece. Here's the rub. Based on current exchange rates with similarly situated economies fiscally, the exchange rate is likely to approximate 60% of the EU to $G or whatever they call it, probably the Drachma.
So people will have 40% less standard of living in exchange for a patriotic rant yesterday.
Once they realize this by experience they will seek a referendum as they have done several times recently, changing parties each time to try to change things. They didn't change. Greece has 50% unemployment, total public assistance, low tax collections, early retirement, and other factors that make zero financial sense, which is why they have debt several times their GDP and a credit rating of CCC, the lowest.
Greece will be monitizing debt, devaluing the currency and generally lowering the standard of living at a rapid pace much like the Fed does in the US at a steady pace by forcing 2% inflation. 10% less buying power every 5 years!!
Greece will lose 40% currency value overnight and an additional 3-6% for year into the forceable future, and owe the existing debt to EU until paid, payable with deflated currency exchanging to a powerful EU currency, a double cost repayment. Welcome to your future. You chose it.
JJ
If you're looking for details and depth, Paul Krugman's Op-Ed is a good place to start. His blog posts also have much of the same content if you're having trouble with the NYT paywall.
Single currencies never work. Just look at the disaster that is the 50 disparate states sharing the so called "US Dollar".
Greece is screwed either way. We can argue about blame all day (and there's plenty to go around) but Greece is not Iceland. They keep voting for more bread and circuses and then collectively refusing to pay taxes for it. If they go back to the Drachma, the government isn't going to suddenly get their shit together and fix the country's problems. They'll just end up printing more and more money and drive the inflation levels out of control.
Borrowing, who cares? Federal government spending is on auto-pilot to increase dramatically over the coming decades. When the feds run out of borrowing capacity, they will have no where else to turn but to raid people's investments. We are just as bad as the Greeks. We don't want to pay for our government, either.
http://www.usgovernmentdebt.us...
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
In Greece banksters rule because they borrow money for the socialists.
Yes, this is socialists/communists fault, including all the crazy retarded Greek social programs like benefits "for washing hands in work", benefits "for not being late to work" and other crazy inventions.
So various countries (including GREECE) agreed to forgive much of the debt and to offer them generous lower interest rates for the rest.
So just offer Greece the same deal we offered post-NAZI Germany.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
I don't quite understand what they are cheering about. They have put themselves into this situation and really there is no good outcome now for them. They take the EU conditions and further tighten expenses (drastically) or leave eurozone and stay between Turkey, Russia and the EU. Also in the second choice (leaving the EU) they go back to Drahma and face weeks lasting deep crisis and than 5-10 years of economic recession. Really no reason to cheer in my opinion.
And for the record - I love Greece as a tourist. I've been there many times but I also recall that they have a culture of not paying taxes which in my opinion is stupid and unpatriotic. Mind you - I am Polish and here also people HATE to pay taxes - they know that their taxes are being spent in wrong ways usually, the taxes fuel a caste of mindless clerks etc. but nevertheless Polish people DO PAY taxes like VAT and icome.
For what I know the Greeks as a tourist I know that they had a culture of mass avoiding the taxes - f.e. in late 90's I were on holiday in Greece and common practice was to use credit card for payment - best bargaining method. You just go to shop, pick some wares and tell to pay with credit card - imediately they dropped the price to the minimum and begged you to pay in cash (since using credit card would produce paper trail and taxing). And it was extremely common. Also in restaurants - go, eat and then wave credit card - the payment would drop from f.e. 2200 drahmas to 1000 (!!!) with a promise of further discount the next day. Really. Not to mention thousands of not finished housed used as finished houses (another reason for not paying taxes).
I have nothing against the Greeks - I like them - they are kind, warm and similar to slavian people. But they need to learn that paying taxes is what makes you country function. They need to learn that if they are into some international community they can't lie about their finances to get a credit. And so on.
Idiots. The whole corrupt and incompetent lot of greek politicians. They frauded their way into the Eurozone and have been dragging their heels ever since. This whole Syriza stunt was the very last straw. They were the worst. They could've gotten real reforms on the way - they had the mandate by the people. Instead they kept fucking and bullshitting around, squandering the very last bit of good will with every gouvernment in the Eurozone. Even Italy is pissed - which actually is quite amazing in itself, because they're are almost right up there with Greece when it comes to mal-administration.
They could've gotten away easy - now they'll be left to their own devices.
At least it's a clear "No" by the people. Better a clear NO that a whishy-washy YES. Tsipras can use this to get some real internal reforms on the way. ... Although I doubt he will.
Well, at least we can finally make a clear cut. No more money for free for all. No more bizarely overpaid early pensioneers and nepotism. The Eurozone should finally cut their losses, have Greece move back to the Drachma and prepare for humanitarian help, like food supplies and such - at least that money won't be wasted.
Lets finally put the ECB goodies and candy to work for nations who are actually pulling their weight and can use a little help aswell, like some baltic nations.
My 2 eurocents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Now perhaps the EU could either reconnect Greece to TARGET2 or acknowledge they have excluded them in a way that was not considered in EU treaties.
And on that later point, I cannot wait to see Greece suing the European Central Bank in the EU justice court, since the ECB acted in contradiction with the treaties.
Very badly, without a doubt. A humanitarian crisis is now looking not just thinkable but downright likely. The EU will pay vastly greater sums before the Greek crisis is over, if only because a failed state within the Schengen zone would make the current EU migrant problems look like a Sunday picnic in comparison.
Waves of starving Greek refugees who cannot afford food fleeing a country beset by blackouts and riots is something that Europe cannot afford, and thus, there is really no option but to continue massive wealth transfers into Greece. The only question is how the EU will ensure the Greek government is replaced with a proxy government, without triggering even greater problems.
One thing is for sure. All the people who voted OXI in the referendum thinking they would be taking control of their own destiny are deluded. Greece is about to fall apart. They will end up grabbing any lifelines the EU gives them regardless of how they voted.
Pretty silly. They owe money to other European citizen, not to banks. The banks are just the convenient intermediate here. They owe a total of 300 billion euros to other european countries. I don't know how devaluation of the drachma will help here, there is a limit on the amount of olives and feta cheese I can eat. Getting paid in monopoly money won't help neither to reimburse any debt in euros. And you are wrong, they have no budget surplus now. They still need to borrow money to meet this month's end obligations.
Achille Talon
Hop!
Iceland took the proper path in this matter, and everybody else should follow suit.
Bullshit. I've worked for companies valued bigger than the GDP of Iceland. They're like a speck of dust in the EU windshield. Even Greece, its like 2% of the total GDP of EU (and almost two orders of magnitude above Iceland). Citing them as an example is the same as saying that smalltown city X is awesome because they connected to their people and solved bankrupcy problems. It doesn't scale to real situations.
It doesn't help that Greece was forced into an austerity plan in their last bailout. Essentially that kicked off a death spiral. Austerity has already been well discredited (see here, here, and here. Original paper here) yet it keeps being foisted off on citizens everywhere.
I'm not suggesting that Greece should spend money like a drunken sailor on leave, but following a faith based economic theory even after it has been disproven (even to the satisfaction of the writers of the original paper) is not the answer.
It doesn't scale to real situations.
It certainly would! Nothing would put a faster end to this kind of thievery than to see the perpetrators suffer real consequences and the money returned to the funds they were stolen from. They are running a confidence game to protect a criminally run industry, time to end it.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Yah. Lets everyone put aside their interests over 1000.000KM^2 and sing kumbaya. Your're a naive person (and I actually respect that, I have a kid).
You take on a risk when you lend money. If the creditor can't repay it, it's your bad for lending them the money in the first place, and you're a fool if you keep lending them money when they know they can't repay it. The EU's stupidity was that they bailed out the private banks and took on the debt on behalf of their citizens. http://www.businessinsider.my/...
Oh bla bla bla! Debts have been zeroed out hundreds of times. This one can be also, and everybody will be better off for it. Or maybe you prefer a military coup to enforce the banks' wage slavery system. You want to pamper the wrong people.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Oh bla bla bla! Debts have been zeroed out hundreds of times.
Yah, true. Have a look at Greece's debt for the past 200 years.
James Hacker: Europe is a community of nations, dedicated towards one goal.
Sir Humphrey Appleby: [laughs]
James Hacker: May we share the joke, Humphrey?
Sir Humphrey Appleby: Minister, may I?
[sits]
Sir Humphrey Appleby: Let's look at this objectively. It is a game played for national interests and always was. Why do you suppose we went into it?
James Hacker: To strengthen the brotherhood of free Western nations.
Sir Humphrey Appleby: Oh, really. We went in to screw the French by splitting them off from the Germans.
James Hacker: Well, why did the French go into it, then?
Sir Humphrey Appleby: Well, to protect their inefficient farmers from commercial competition.
James Hacker: That certainly doesn't apply to the Germans!
Sir Humphrey Appleby: No, no. They went in to cleanse themselves of genocide and apply for readmission to the human race.
I really don't care. I just won't accept the *work or starve* ethic. There is just too much prosperity and abundance to tolerate such crap.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I do the same rant/joke too, although in mine I also suggest selling a couple of islands, we've got like a bazillion of them. They're already running like crap, generally neglected, bad infrastructure, people with cardiac episodes being flown in super puma helicopters to nearby islands where there's a doctor.
Sell a couple to the EU, the Germans can build and run things, the French, Italians and locals can handle the touristy stuff, hell I'd move there permanently.
Perhaps you mean: where citizens no longer want to pay for the losses of investors who privatize gains, but socialize losses. Why is it that all you people who talk about "responsibility" don't seem to consider the responsibility of the investors that "sometimes win, sometimes loose." to accept their losses without trying to destroy a country? Being a fucking hypocrite is easier, i'd expect.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
Ok so the EU says to Greece that it has to do certain things (raise VAT, cut pensions, some other stuff) which will swing the Greek budget back towards surplus by x amount of Euros. Greece has then countered by saying that they can get the same x amount of Euros by increasing taxes on big companies and doing a few other things instead of doing the things the EU wants.
If Greece can get the money the EU says it needs to get in a way that provides less hurt to the Greek economy and to those worst off in Green society, why wont the EU let them do it instead of insisting on the economically destroying austerity?
It's not Germany's fault that Greece didn't live within their means.
Is it Greece's fault that their economy wasn't massively financed by "aid" from other countries like Germany? And no, I recognise both the factors behind the reasoning and basis of their possible economies are massively different - but try telling that to someone "you can't all have nice cars like the tourrerists"
Britain's brightest minds anticipated and analysed the whole Greece v.s Germany problem some years back. The core problems are not economical or resource based - it's all a matter of national philosophy.
And in that I do agree with you. But the greeks did put themselves where they are today.
I'm curious to know what their end-game is. Let's say that the E.U. let's them out of the Euro. What international investor is going to want to risk their money in the country particularly if the government is capable of confiscating other people's money? They've already defaulted on their debt to the IMF. Are they hoping that all of their creditors will decide to forget what they're owed? Even if they all did that, does the country have enough domestic wealth to run itself without outside help?
They were pushed.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
When famine people are pushed, no good comes from it. Giving money to their government, however, doesn't solve anything. Don't confuse my "macro economic opinions" and Greece's government and FUD campaign with lack of solidarity with their people (who elected them, btw). As a result of referendum, we will probably have a humanitarian crisis on our hands soon enough.
For the sake of democracy it would be quite interesting doing a referendum in Germany asking "Do you want to bail-out Greece at their terms"?
All EU citizens should demand a referendum asking if the taxpayers should pay this 'debt' created by derivatives and fraudulent market trading, or tell the bankers to write it off, suck it up, and never again be allowed to put depositor funds at risk on this commodities shell game ever again. And I have no trouble using some form of asset forfeiture against them to recover some of the stolen funds.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
that's what the greek people expected to happen. just printing more money.
NOW essentially what the goverment can do is to tax all money that is being held in greek accounts, almost the same as just printing new money.
they can't just print more money since they're in the euro, but the people still expect (and syriza promised to !) to pay money as usual. they expect that the government pays out more money than it has because that's "democratic".
also a confusing ballot is democratic according to syriza.. with an unlawlully short campaign time to boot. not that it matters, the cash is going to run out anyways. it's like the prime minister and finance minister either deliberately try to run the country into a crisis or they don't have even cursory knowledge of how things work.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Greece is getting thrown under the bus, "austerity". Aka lower living standards for the working class. It's already " live within your means " with you people. The Greeks weren't living the high life. A bunch of Rick asshats were passing bad debt around during the housing boom and Greece got caught holding the bag. If a big country like Germany had done it no harm no foul. It was too much for Greece though. And the powers that be are gonna use this to steal a bunch of old v folks pensions.
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Yes. National philosophy. Which I guess explains why Iceland, Ireland, and now Finland are having the same issues with recession and increased unemployment.
The resulting currency devaluation will make greek goods cheaper and exports will boom.
Greece can't export tourism.
As far as I am concerned the investors can FOAD. The end result of Sunday's vote will probably be that both sides (the investors, and the greek populace) will both take significant haircuts.
My bet is on the Red Cross and UN Humanitarian organizations. For those areas of Greece where people are particularly hotheaded, make sure to ship in pallets of lime.
Wipe out half the debt or something similar (like lowering the interest rate to be negative until half of the debt is reimbursed), but keep the other half. Personally i would be far more interested into inquiries in who loaned the money under what circumstance, who lied and and who told the truth, with associated disbarment, prison sentence and banning from having a bank or accounting job in EU zone, maybe a bit of all 3, for all actors involved in all countries before 2010 which led to the over borrowing and Greece acceptance in the EU with lower criteria. Those people should be taken to task for the immense problem they have generated.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
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visit randi.org
That's Moral Hazard: Encouraging bankers to make high-risk loans because they know the public will bail them out if it goes bad, and their customers get the cream if it goes good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The alternative is to let the banks go bust so in future customers think twice before loaning their money to reckless bankers, and jail the bankers as criminals: http://www.independent.co.uk/n... because bailed out bankers go on to do the same thing. And why wouldn't they? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...
I want referendum in my household too - no more mortgage payments, no auto loan payments, no credit card payments. It is too hard to pay for everything, austerity is terrible. Just keep the house and all the goods!
IMF and ECB are not investors. They handle taxpayer money. Even with private banks, investors are often just pension funds who distribute their gains and losses for retirement.
I don't know how "ruined" Greece is now, but it certainly not the purest country in the EU, even if they are acting like sky is falling. Countries in Central and Eastern Europe have much less money to spend.
A big one is just that the US controls both its currency and its monetary policy (meaning taxing and spending). That manes that it can take the steps it feels necessary to deal with loan repayments, such as increased inflation and/or a weaker currency. It doesn't have to convince other countries of it, it runs the currency.
An even bigger one at this point is that the dollar is the world's reserve currency. Things are settled in dollars on the international stage, meaning that the US can't have a current account crisis. It makes the dollars, things are paid for in dollars, so it can make more dollars to pay for things. It is unique in that situation. While it could change, that is how it stands.
In fact, that is part of the reason the US is able to borrow so much, and in some ways needs to. People and nations want to put their money in what they see as a safe reserve, and the dollar is one they seek. To make that possible, the US has to issue debt instruments. They have to be able to buy US dollars.
Yet another difference is that the US has high tax compliance. Most people in the US pay their taxes. There are those that cheat or outright evade, but they are the minority. That, combined with a generally quite low tax burden (compared to most first world nations the US has very low taxes), means that raising taxes in the US is a very valid strategy. People won't be happy, but they'll pay. Greece has real issues with tax avoidance which makes tax increases problematic.
Still another difference is in what the economy produces. Despite what you may have heard on whiny online sites, the US makes a lot of stuff. It is the #2 producer of durable goods after China, and only slightly. It builds lots of things that others in the world want. A good example would be microprocessors. Both Intel and AMD are US companies, and Intel fabs most of their newest CPUs in the US. The chips that run most computers in the world come from the US. Makes the economic situation rather different than a place that relies heavily on tourism.
Finally there's the issue of who owns the debt. Most of the US's debt, about 65%, is owned by the US itself. Of that a large part is intragovernmental holdings, and then debt held by the federal reserve. Of the nations that do hold US foreign debt the two largest, Japan and China, do so for strategic reasons to keep their currency cheap compared to the dollar and thus have a strategic interest in keeping that debt. Greece on the other hand, owes most of its debt to other countries.
It is far to simplistic to look and say "Oh this is all the same!" Public debt is actually a pretty complex issue.
They are not paying these billions, it is simple. Drachma would help keep economy running.
Yet you want to saddle Greece with similar crushing debt when they have a fascist party, Golden Dawn. So your plan is to.....repeat that mistake a second time?
And external loan sharks - funny how that part gets left out. Oh, and being forbidden from cutting military spending, rather than pensions and health care.
And what about their post-WWII debt, which was largely forgiven? By countries like Greece? So, to recap: Germany destroys the continent and all is forgiven. Greece got taken in for loan sharks, so they deserve to be pushed into national poverty worse than the Great Depression, for decades.
This is classic conservativism: more interested in being punitive than being just or effective.
You'll need to do some googling, I can't teach a full econ class here.
Not least because you're hopelessly unqualified.
But the TL;DR version is that every country that tried austerity has recovered more slowly than every country that didn't.
Please list these countries that had a choice about austerity, and which countries you're comparing them to.
That and the entire justification for austerity was in that one spreadsheet that turned out to have a glaring error.
You seem to have missed the slightly more obvious justification of avoiding a debt spiral.
The steps that Greece will take from now on, for those who don't understand enough economics:
1) Greece will leave the Euro
2) Their currency will be devaluated to stop avoiding losses (and the price of Euro will match savings and demand)
3) They will most likely set trade restrictions
4) Eventually, their balance will go back to being positive
5) Once balace is positive, Greece will renegotiate with the majority of entities it owes money to, and will end up paying back less (their debt titles allow this, unlike Argentina)
6) They will never return to the Euro, unless their GDPPC makes it worth it, but this (how much a country likes to work and produce (or has natural resources) vs how much it likes to import) is a cultural/natural thing and can't be forced on people.
that's it.
No their problem is that half of what they collect in taxes is used to service debt.
Austerity itself is the problem. The problem Europe has now is not hyperinflation its DEFLATION. The deflation in greece is the worst in europe. You cant pay off debts and grow your economy with 25% unemployment and negative gdp growth, In greeces case they have to make their exports cheaper through currency devaluation but they cant do that with the euro.
When Greece joined, they claimed to have a 3% or below deficit. It turned out to be more than 15%. Goldman Sachs helped them to cook the books. So there's multiple parties to blame. Greece for weaseling themselves into the eurozone, Brussels for turning a blind eye, and Goldman Sachs for committing large scale fraud. In the end, none of the responsible people will be punished. In the end, taxpayers in Europe, both the Greek and the rest of the Europeans are holding the bag. It is by design.
To Terminate, or not to Terminate, that's the question - SCSIROB
The current Euro treaties do not allow a member to leave the Euro zone. Nor do they foresee a mechanism to kick out any member.
Of course, the member states could come together and sign a new treaty. Needless to say, it would take a while. And, oh, it would take previous agreement.
Not a bad idea there. Or sell them to rich people at a premium with the understanding that they get (limited) sovereignity over them.
Liberty - Security - Laziness - Pick any two.
Irish economy grew 4.8% in 2014 making them the fastest growing economy in Europe. Just saying. Probably helps that one of their major trading partners (the UK) isnt in the euro and is doing ok-ish.
Indeed. Other countries in Europe that are poorer than Greece did not vote in governments that kept raising pensions while refusing to reform their tax base. Why should a pensioner in Slovakia with a smaller pension who pays his taxes also pay for a Greek pensioner with a larger pension who doesn't? Why is it that Greeks can continue to avoid property taxes by planning a 3 story house, building 2 & never finishing the top? It seems to boil down to: we Greeks democratically voted in an extreme leftist government.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
If the Germans think that Greece's actions are unreasonable, perhaps they should look at their own history and see how they reacted to demands for huge repayments.
How poor is a pensioner in Greece where voters kept voting in governments that kept raising pensions compared to a Slovenian? Why should the latter be paying for the former's pension? Who's responsibility is it to pick up the tab of someone who continues to believe that he deserves a free lunch? Of course, now that the Greeks have taken their stand, we will soon see if the Greek pensioner is poorer in a country with insolvable banks & a bankrupt government.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Well, it would have been those citizens job to elect not the parties that promised them everything for nothing but the parties that were willing to to make the hard but necessary decisions.
When you borrow money you have to pay it back. Or at least honestly try to do your best to do so.
Borrowing money and then saying 'We can't pay you back. Sorry. Your problem now.' is not the way to go.
We're talking several hundred BILLION Euro here. If Greece defaults on that that money will be missing in the coffers of the other European countries. That's money that you take away from the other 500 Million EU citizen.
It would be nice if you are less carefree with other people's money.
Funny how Greece should be one of the first countries to show the failure of democracy.
So many people are dependent on the government for paying money out to them, or failing to tax them. So all those dependent on state money voted for keeping their income as it is, rather than going for a sensible solution.
Like I heard the young people in Greece say, nobody of the parent generation ever asked what they could do for Greece, they just bought more Porsche Cayenne cars for the money they received from the state, or cheated from the state.
Now they will be booted out of the Euro, to show an example (Italy and Spain had the downsize public sector, why not Greece ?). We will get Drachmer at an exchange rate of 1:1, and all bonds will be converted. Then devaluating the currency to 25% of original value to minimize debt. And at the same time, everybody in Greece will get the same number of money, but at a quarter puchasing power. So even worse than the EU / IMF suggestions. People get what they ask for.
Denmark was close to bankruptcy around 1980. Then we got a right wing government, who made lots of hard economic reforms (one called the potato diet, making loans more expensive, and resulted in cutting the trade deficit from 36 to 20 billions within one year), they stopped the insane 10% yearly salary increase, and cut it down to like 2-4% (which resulted in inflation getting lower than salary increase, thus increasing purchase power). Now all parties in parliament agrees (government and opposition), that the the yearly finance law must be in balance, or very close.
As a Greek, I am stunned, and disappointed, by the level of criticism (and hate!) in slashdot. What I clearly see is that fellow Europeans are being told huge LIES about the Greek crisis, and what this referendum means. I'll try to put things in perspective:
1. The money fellow European governments are giving us, are not free; They are loans, that we happily repay, even if the interest rate is a highway robbery compared to what they are paying.
2. Nobody said about "writing off the debt". What we ask is for the due date to go further in the future and the interest rate to be lower.
3. If the rest of the European governments cared at all to be repaid, then they wouldn't insist on "reforms" which have been 100% proven wrong, such as tax increases and pension/wage cuts. These are the stuff we object to. Many of the other important reforms (early pensions, unemployment benefits) are already imposed for quite some time now. I could write a book about how increasing taxes can't increase a country's GDP but guess what, there are even now so many books that prove this.
4. Especially to my Belgian friends: The 2 bailouts of Greece helped repay loans given by private sector banks. In effect, we traded private sector loans with state loans. In other words, you people lended us money so that your banks didn't lose their money. Now we owe you money (instead of your private banks) AND you think that this was a mistake. We do too, so we agree on this.
5. Greece doesn't need more money to "keep spending above its limit". We've had a more or less balanced budget for the last couple of years, apart from the loan interest payments. So we need you to lend us money so we can repay the loans you already gave us. Is this more reasonable than what we're asking? (To postpone the pay off date and decrease interest rate)
6. You are angry because we tricked our selves into the eurozone. You are right. We are angry too that you tricked us into the eurozone. There was nothing good for us there, no reason at all to be part of it, yet our politicians agreed with your politicians that we need to be part of it, no matter what. And they, all together, agreed to put Greece into the Eurozone, what a huge mistake that was and oh how many lies were told so we believed them (you did too). They made a ton of money out of it. Then they made a ton of money from the debt crisis itself. Meanwhile, half the Europe suffers from austerity (with Greece being the most hardly hit country, but Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Cyprus got a great feeling of what austerity means) and the other half is being taught that "lazy Greeks are asking to be given for more money).
Friends, stop hating each other, we're passed beyond this. The people is suffering, not only in Greece, but in other nations too. A Polish fried says "you should see my country", and some other said "we're poorer than you". And why is this? Who is benefiting? Does this mean that Poland et.al. have to double their taxes and cut their wages in half and pensions by 60%, destroy their healthcare and educational system, sell out everything that can be sold, just to become "richer"? Would anyone really suggest that? Then why is it a must-have for Greece? How on earth will this help repay the loans? Up until now, it has created a 27% unemployment and 99% misery.
So, please people, don't believe what your media say. You're not giving away money, we're not asking for free money. Greece has paid the price, and was punished hard, for decades of poor planning, bad habits and outrageous corruption. But it's time for other countries to stop hiding behind the propaganda and be realistic, just like we are now.
Yes. National philosophy. Which I guess explains why Iceland, Ireland, and now Finland are having the same issues with recession and increased unemployment.
Interesting take on the video. Or did you ignore it so you could wank on about economics?
Just out of curiosity... how do you find life without a sense of humour?
Yeah, voting 'no' to the EU plan might seem great to the people who voted, but the problem is, most people who did vote 'no' don't even know what the consequences are of their vote, they have no clue that voting 'no' is even more dissastrous for them then having said 'yes'... If they thought their pensions etc were in danger with the EU plan, well, with exiting the 'euro' there will be no pension at all.. Greece still have to pay the loan they got in the end...
not to mention that greece has ~250 fighter jets to fight their big bad nato ally turkey.
the greeks are seemingly totally ignorant of happenings inside europe so it would be only just if they were to be kicked out.
they need a currency they can print, so they can keep raising pensions and social benefits(who cares if the inflation is actually higher than the raises).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
The resulting currency devaluation will make greek goods cheaper and exports will boom.
Greece can't export tourism.
Tourism *is* an export - foreign money comes in, services go out. Fair enough, the services occur locally, but they still go out while money comes in. Thus it's an export.
I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
It's the person who believes the lie, or knows that's it's a lie and uses it for profit that creates the problem.
Greece lied to get into the Euro because it thought it was going to be richer with a stronger currency. The EU turned a blind eye to it because they wanted the Eurozone to be as large as possible. Both are now going to suffer because of it. The Eurozone countries are not going to get their money back and Greece is almost certain to exit the Euro and very possibly the EU since there is currently no legal means to drop the Euro while an EU member. At this point the best thing to do is make this happen as quickly and painlessly as possible.
There are valid (selfish) reasons for keeping Greece in the EEC, even it appears that they do not want to be part of the common currency (or at least refuse to take the measures necessary to stay). Among them Immigration control. Greece is already the largest immigration point of entry into Europe for illegal immigrants.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Only if one doesn't know what socialists are or what constitutes "other people's money", so yea Republican's would probably see it like that. Strangely Republicans like socialism when it benefits themselves however it is usually called something else - adding "patriot" to the name is popular.
...we will probably have a humanitarian crisis on our hands soon enough.
Bank assets can be seized to avoid that. There is more than enough money sequestered in the financial markets to cover all 'debts'.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The rest of Europe (the world actually) needs to vote to zero the books and dissolve the financial markets that created this situation by tying it all up all our currencies in derivatives. Greece was pushed to take the money so the 'debt' could be sold off and bounced around the markets. The pensioners did not do this. That is propaganda from the banks and corrupt governments that serve them. It is they who are presently enjoying the free lunch. I hope the vote has a domino effect. Austerity is criminal in today's world.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
If greece prints its own currency. It will lose a lot more than 33% over the next year or three.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
The drachma would be in hyperinflation right now. And they way things are going, you will get the proof soon enough if they really do drop the euro.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
After 5 years of of austerity and negotiations, Greece has only been getting worse. I'd say this was bound to happen one way or another. Varoufakis has been clear that "the left is not ready" to leave the eurozone, but given the conditions of the alternative, I'm not so sure. The country's banks behaved the way most others did in pre-recession. The borrowing euphoria was due to very low interest rates at the time and growing economy - the big tab seemed to be a problem for the future that would be dealt with given growing gdp. Once the global economy sank the scope of the error became apparent. French and German banks are certainly equally at fault in lending those vast sums.
Do you really think other people should be responsible for someone elses debt? Why in the world should a Greek child born today be responsible to pay the debts of his Grandfather?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Good luck with that.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-...
Seems he's finally realised that everybody thinks he's a total twat.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
There may well be issues with graft, but there are also issues with taxpayers. Not paying taxes is a national sport in Greece. When Athens started looking at Google Earth and comparing addresses in rich areas with swimming pools (for which there is a separate tax) with the list of addresses paying the tax, they found that they were under-collecting by a factor of about 50: they had a list of 324 addresses and found at least 16,974 pools. In 2010, only a few thousand people in the entire country admitted having an income higher than 100,000 euros, and huge swaths of obviously well-off people (multiple houses and cars, successful businesses, etc.) claimed incomes less than 12,000 euros, exempting them from taxes.
Greece has to undertake a lot of reforms that will be painful for them (like raising the retirement age from 55). The creditors will almost certainly have to make some concessions of their own. It's not going to be pleasant for either side, but the potential cascade effects are potentially severe enough to knock Europe back into recession. Then again, being too lenient with Greece could trigger a cascade of its own with Spain, Portugal, and Italy coming back to demand more lenient terms for their loans, which would have its own problems.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
I would love to hear you define socialism, in your own words. I'm willing to bet that you have no idea what socialism actually is.
You first: Please explain why Slovenian pensioners who worked for more years before receiving a smaller pension should be paying more and more to support Greek pensioners who retire at age 50. Because that is indeed the issue: Whether European Solidarity is a bottomless fund that the Greeks can draw on without implementing any reforms or not.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Anything longer than a month or two and its a race to the bottom.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Border controls would be established if Greece would exit EU. My guess it would be easier to control border on the ground, rather than vessels coming to very long Greece shore.
I'll note that when challenged on how the Greek position is also impoverishing the poor throughout Europe that you avoid answering. How typical...
Not their fault, propaganda, etc? Irrelevant. The Greek pensioners have voted with the rest of their nation and any debt relief package from Europe will now have be authorized every nation in the EEC.In many cases that means parliaments & citizens that received the Greek FU loud & clear and are itching to show that their democratic votes matter just as much, if not more than the Greeks did (because we ARE more numerous for one).
A more likely outcome is a managed Grexit as European emergency funds are parceled out just enough to avoid the Greeks imploding completely. Germany, France & the rest of Europe will end up isolating the Greek debts for decades until they don't matter anymore (much like the Tsarist Russian loans that took over 80 years to be settled). The Greeks will soon be experiencing the joys of inflation and even with the free Drachma will never really recover economically -- they just don't export enough of anything to matter, STILL haven't put into place essential reforms like a global property registry like the rest of Europe has (so that they could begin performing that thing called property taxes properly) and have now pissed off the great majority people liable to vacation there.
Hard times ahead for the Greeks (harder than the 5 years of "austerity", IMO), we'll see if the young who were unable to vote yesterday appreciate the position today's Greeks put them in in a decade or so.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
I'll note that when challenged on how the Greek position is also impoverishing the poor throughout Europe that you avoid answering.
It's a silly pretense, a trick question. The 'Greek position' is not impoverishing the poor throughout Europe or anywhere else, the banks are doing that. They are loan sharks. This is their business. Hopefully the younger generation has enough brains to keep their future bank deposits out of the derivatives shell game. If they do, they'll be fine. You are just blaming the victims who are simply trying to reclaim some of the prosperity they helped create.
BTW has Germany repaid its debts incurred during the war? I mean, since they are the ones complaining the most...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Your attempts at Jedi mind tricks only work on the feeble minded.
Given that going back to my questions two posts back was too much of an effort for you I'll make it easier for you by recopying it here. Reply to the questions below & stop obfuscating by claiming that it's the banks, europe, Merkel, etc:
How poor is a pensioner in Greece where voters kept voting in governments that kept raising pensions compared to a Slovenian? Why should the latter be paying for the former's pension? Who's responsibility is it to pick up the tab of someone who continues to believe that he deserves a free lunch?
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Ironically enough, the reparations and austerity forced on Germans because of WWI is in part also what got them so fired up about Jewish people, in that stereotypical it would be Jewish moneylenders and banks collecting on German debt. Now you have Germany in the role of usury and the Greeks facing austerity, and rebelling because of it. Now the Greek government is talking about printing money and screwing the rest of Europe...
1) International Banks take stupid risks giving out inappropriate loans to people who can't possibly pay it back (Housing Crisis)
2) Greece's already shaky economy fails.
3) Banks get bailout out by Governments (Taxpayers)
4) International Banks take stupid risks giving out inappropriate loans to people who can't possibly pay it back (Greece Crisis)
5) Greece's already shaky economy fails.
6) International Banks take stupid risks giving out inappropriate loans to people who can't possibly pay it back (Greece Crisis)
7) Banks get bailout out by Governments (Taxpayers)
8) Repeat...
As I see it, a lot of hate towards Greece, when you look at it, the people who are getting all the money are Banks, and they people who are paying all the money are Taxpayers. This all just seems like another complex shell/ponzi game to shuffle as much taxpayer money into banking coffers. It seems to me that some people in Europe are getting played, while others are getting paid, at the same time as blaming the Greeks somehow for the whole mess.
I've been to Greece. They have no economy, it is about 95% based on tourists coming to visit. Greece doesn't even have proper sewage system. In order to compete with other destinations, they succeed by making their's much cheaper. You do this by deflating your currency. By joining the Euro, they lose the ability to control this. I can't see how no one saw this coming.
How poor is a pensioner in Greece where voters kept voting in governments that kept raising pensions compared to a Slovenian?
They are both human, or not?. One planet... There's too much prosperity to justify saying no. You have to remove it from the overhead financial markets and put it back into circulation. It doesn't require any higher taxes on regular citizens. That is just more propaganda.
Who's responsibility is it to pick up the tab of someone who continues to believe that he deserves a free lunch?
That banks that stole the money for their money markets! They are getting the free lunch, not the pensioners! They did not vote for that. Take the money back!
You are 180 degrees off target. You are blaming the victim of a grand heist.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
but try telling that to someone "you can't all have nice cars like the tourrerists"
Sorry, no sympathy here. I see hundreds of cards every day that are nicer than my 2010 Honda Fit with a dent in the door. Somehow I manage to go on.
Bravo for attempting to answer but BOO for again bringing out that tired old saw "Blame the RICH! Take all THEIR money!". I've got a newsflash for you: Every time that's been attempted in the blatant fashion you advise all that happens is that everyone gets poorer. Take all the money in the banks & the pensioners are destitute. Confiscate the evil pension funds and many more are destitute.
"There's to much prosperity to justify saying no". Where exactly? In the countries that implemented the reforms that the Greeks refuse which led to their current relative prosperity. Your "moral" justification for stealing from those who worked to succeed to reward those who refuse is in fact immoral and counterproductive.
The rest of your screed is from the same extreme leftist pipe-dreams. SOAK THE RICH! Take their money! Money should be FREE! Bla bla bla. You really have to be feeble minded to actually believe any of that bullshit.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Your defense of those people is the tired old saw that delays resolution of the problem. Your 'reforms' are not! It is more theft of peoples' time. Eh, whatever. Your position is clear, and is simply unacceptable, and over 60% of the Greeks agree... We just have to see what happens next. I personally hope it spreads globally. The 'debt' is a lie.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
but try telling that to someone "you can't all have nice cars like the tourrerists"
Sorry, no sympathy here. I see hundreds of cards every day that are nicer than my 2010 Honda Fit with a dent in the door. Somehow I manage to go on.
I don't doubt the truth of your first sentence. The second is an admirable composition fallacy. The third a red-herring. Well done! Congratulations on your admission to the bar. But if you ever hope to make Silk you'll need to combine the three into some sort of semblance of an argument (and do a little research into what constitutes austerity - a dented door in a five year old car will only work in Saudi Arabia).
Not sure what word you were aiming for there. Did you mean people who plant bombs, or ones who SHIT! randomly shout PISSARSEBUGGERBUM! expletives when they CUNT! speak?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Not sure what word you were aiming for there.
The word I wrote. What locals in tourist economies all over the world call tourists. They all have local slang for it that means the same thing - part tourist (they bring money), part terrorist (noxious and obnoxious).
Mexican call them senor and senorita.
i live in silicon valley, where BMWs and Mercedes (US luxury cars) are the norm, so yeah, #2 is quite true. for #3, i realize i'm well off compared to much of the world, which is exactly my point. the observation that someone has something nicer than you isn't license to revolt against the system.
maybe english is not the first language here. do you know the term "whoosh"? it's the sound of an important contextual point passing quickly between your ears.
the observation that someone has something nicer than you isn't license to revolt against the system.
I didn't say, or mean, they had a license. Most people just want - enlightened self interest is rare.
That's why preaching austerity is a fail - you might as well say "don't steal from those that have more", or don't migrate to somewhere the opportunities are better". It's just pissing into the wind and trying to stay dry.
That woosh you hear is the wind whistling through your head.
So many questions come to mind now.
How long before the new Greek drachmas (or whatever they call them) appear? Will it be folding money before it's available in bank accounts? Bank accounts before banknotes? Simultaneous?
How long before the price of the drachma, relative to the Euro, drops to half its initial price?
Will Greece do a banana republic-style pretend exchange rate, with control of cash crossing its borders? How about banning the use of other currencies, Soviet-style?
There are so many terrible monetary ideas to emulate. Which ones will Greece do? All of them?
Will Greece invent any new ones?
Stay tuned.
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
Greece is screwed either way. We can argue about blame all day (and there's plenty to go around) but Greece is not Iceland. They keep voting for more bread and circuses and then collectively refusing to pay taxes for it.
Erm, the real question is where is the money going? We are talking about 300 billion here. Where did it go? You say bread and circuses and yet there are Greeks who are starving. WTF over? The only circus I see is this whole dance going on with loans and a Eurozone membership.
From a naive outsiders point of view, it looks like Greece was easy prey and we are witnessing the kill/take-down live and in Technicolor.
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
Whereas your position is yet another rehash of "Soak the Rich" that worked so well for the fUSSR that they won the Cold War & the USA imploded.
The Greeks, all 11 million have voted. Now it's the turn of the 489 million in the rest of the EEC who, while not wanting to implement it, have been planning for a grexit if necessary. Greece has yet to hit bottom. Given how few ressources they have, their refusal to implement real reforms & their antagonism of everyone able to help it's going to be painful for them -- rich, middle class & poor. I already see stories of a nascent wave of expatriation for those who can.
& here you are hoping that "it spreads globally". How typically leftist of you to hope that everyone becomes poor.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
I see a lot of people telling that the Greeks are lazy and asked for money and now don't want to pay. I also see a lot of people telling that it's all the fault of EU.
Well, the thing is, this is not even the question. This that we are assisting is not about not wanting to pay, it's about a democratic elected government being able to take their own choices on how to pay it.
The EU, IMF want to dictate how the Greek government should run their country in order to get money to pay them back.
Now, look, there are two big reasons why this should be ridiculous to you: 1. If you believe in democracy, the sole prospect that an outside entity should dictate how a democratic elected government should act, it's abhorrent. 2. If you believe in logic, you will see that if the program was very definitely not working so far (and if you check the data you see it didn't work in Portugal and Spain either), then you should think a bit and see that an even worst program is also not going to work
Bottom line, what I see the new Greek government (and please notice that it's a really new government, not one of the Big Center parties that ruled Europe for the past decades) asking, is for time to implement their program and try to get out of the mess the country is in (which is fault of the previous Greek governments, the EU and the IMF).
I don't want to *soak the rich*. Again, that is pure propaganda. You really are a robot in the credence you give. Using the word 'leftist' is very revealing of where you get your info. Maybe it jibes well with your upbringing, or some traumatic event during your childhood, but it shows complete lack of critical thinking. You have this religious belief in what you are being told by your mass media that poor people are lazy and deserve to suffer, and any attempt to mitigate it is countered with the typical *you want to soak the rich!* spiel. I can't argue with faith, not gonna try. That wall you have to tear down yourself. And your definition of 'reform' is whack, just so you know, but I guess I have to repeat for the viewing audience that austerity is NOT reform! It is theft! And you, are pinning the wrong people. Everybody just needs to pay their share and stop claiming everything for themselves, and we will all be quite rich! We have already proven there is plenty for all and more. Resources are not scarce. We can start showing it by simply not throwing half of what we make into the landfill to keep prices up.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
You're out of it, man. Your little game doesn't impress...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Sorry, thought you were the other guy. For you, bleh...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Lead balloon
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
So you don't want to soak the rich, just implement policies that will in effect soak the rich. Nor do you want to impoverish everyone but you advocate economics that will have precisely that effect. You're truly another example of the the schizophrenia needed to believe in the communist dialectic you continue to post.
So which mass media is lying to me? L'Humanité? Rue 89? Le Canard Enchainé? Marianne? Do you perhaps wish to buy a hint before again incorrectly assuming you know where I get my info? That my English is better than yours does not mean that I watch Fox
Yeah, austerity is theft, refusing to let the Greeks blow through a few billion more of our money is terrorism & any information that detracts from your worldview MUST be propaganda. I hear you. Believe you? Nope. I refuse to be led quietly into the modern day Yezhovshchina your policies would lead to.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Like I said, your faith is strong. Reason? not so much.. Argument is futile..
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Coming from a parroter of the dialectic which rewards obedience & not critical thought, I'll take that as a complement.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Sorry for being so slow on the uptake!
L'Humanité? Rue 89? Le Canard Enchainé? Marianne?
OMG! The French media!! A more unbiased source of truth I will never find! Man, now I really have to laugh!
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
parroter of the dialectic
L'Humanité? Rue 89? Le Canard Enchainé? Marianne?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
That woosh you hear is the wind whistling through your head.
oh come on at least you can do is come up with your own troll. how lazy are you?
That the french press you belittle as biased parrots the same leftist stupidities you do confirms how biased you are.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Well, somehow you got your wires crossed if you're trying to use them to justify your abominable austerity because somebody wants to renegotiate their cable contract away from the package deal to something more à la carte!
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Given the liquidity problems the banks have had this last two weeks, I'd seriously doubt that. Even if so, who is going to buy such assets? At what price? A fraction of the real value?
They can be told to forgive all mortgages and loans. All medical debts can also be written off. This targets the right people who profiteered from the heist. All guaranteed deposits (don't know if they have that in Europe) must be removed from stock/commodities/derivatives markets and be made available on demand to account holders at any time. There's all sorts of things to help recover and prevent a repeat, but the thieves make up the rules, and the lies, and have the weaponry to back them up. Doesn't mean we can't overcome this. First, people have to stop believing the lies.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
but I'm not clever enough to explain why. Please read this. Also follow the link in the article to "This Time is Different" and read that too. We've been doing this little song and dance where banks screw up and blame the public for centuries...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
That woosh you hear is the wind whistling through your head.
[...] how lazy are you?
Very. I spend hours saving several minutes. Maybe you should watch the video I referenced and take yourself a little less seriously (everyone else does)?
it's interesting how i joked about you copying my troll, and you get out of that that i take myself too seriously. it's like you have this rolodex of cliche phrases and you are throwing them out at random regardless of the context. your first response was barely intelligible by the way.
"Abominable Austerity?" Apparently it looks really really good to Tsipiras now.
Until the middle of last week the Tsipiras & their Economy Minister were claiming that everyone when called for the Greeks to respect their word & follow through on the reforms that they promised to implement _years_ ago were fascists. Supposedly, it is sufficient to vote for a populist that claims he can suspend economic realities like a bloated inefficient civil service & almost universal tax fraud for all problems to evaporate. Creditors who refuse to sign yet another blank check for a truant population and a government that does not respect it's word were saddled with #ThisIsACoup.
Tsipiras has now had a taste of the how Greece would fare without continued international support blinked and performed a 180, giving in to conditions that he had rejected previously. I give him credit for more wisdom & less stupid pride than he has displayed up to now, too bad he had to waste months and billions more. It remains to be seen if the rest of the Greek legislators are able to swallow their pride & implement the reforms that condition continued international support. Greece needs unanimous acceptance by the rest of Europe for this third bailout to be effective. Any more of the grandstanding and idiotic positions by the Greeks will cause the votes in the rest of Europe to fail.
So, who is it that has his wires crossed? Me, who has been saying accept the conditions or exit the Euro, Tsipiras who was elected on one agenda & is now following mine or yours which even Tsipiras has renounced?
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Everybody knew exactly what was going on when the whole thing started many years ago. The Greek 'debt' is merely a commodity on the financial markets that is not paying off too well at the moment. What is being done is an attempt to increase the market value of that debt, not pay it off. The resulting austerity is an abomination. It is grand larceny. It's purpose is to sequester all the currency it can into the speculative financial markets. This is the only reason banks are "short of cash". We know what has to be done, but won't even consider it. All our guaranteed funds are at risk without any force to back it up.
I don't know if it's submissiveness or resignation, but the property damage in Greece is remarkably low. Makes me wonder how serious the problem is. I would expect the customer to go get his gun if the damn bank told them they can't withdraw their money. It's just plain robbery.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The only grand larceny attempted was the Greek attempt at defrauding the rest of Europe. Funny how even Tsipiras has completely renounced your positions in his acts once he went through a week of no banks & realised that his bluff was going to be called. The Greeks don't burn the banks because deep down they know that they were at fault & now know that will be held to their promises or excluded from the Euro.
I can see how difficult it is for you to come to terms with reality. Coming to grips with personal & collective responsibility is always so hard for the orthodox leftists. It's always someone else's fault for you.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
I can see how difficult it is for you to come to terms with reality.
Nope, I just recognize submissiveness when I see it. That is the reality.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I suppose that you are referring to Tsipiras now that he has seen the error of your leftist "Resist at all costs" crap. The only way the extreme left reduces inequality is by insuring that all are poor as dirt.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
And the people who let the banks steal their money. All submissive little sheep. Tsipiras turns out to be a regular politician capitalizing on the situation. I'm sure his bank account is safe.
The only way the extreme left reduces inequality is by insuring that all are poor as dirt.
You really are a typical right wing zealot, spreading that propaganda and probably actually believing it. I don't know why I bother. You put up a good wall. Since it won't come down, I'll just leave some graffiti on it. You can always just paint it over. Heh, funny how the figurative and the literal can run together there, isn't it? The system works!
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I'm actually a centrist disgusted by both the far left & the far right (who often work together as they do within Syriza).
Yeah, yeah, we're all sheep because we see through the candy coating you are attempting to sell to the excrement inside. Not our fault, make someone else pay turns into everyone (except for the new rulers) is poor. As long as the new rulers give lip service to being anti-capitalist you dipshits don't care.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Centrists, middle of the roaders, are the worst of the worst! The epitome of sickening compromise and bad alliances. Always making the deal with the devil for a win. You present no argument, except right wing propaganda about people, appealing to the Official Narrative which is also quite 'centrist'. The banks are demanding the money, the people of Greece are (rather feebly) demanding their money, not yours, not anybody else's.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Ah the extremists, always willing to sacrifice someone else's life and happiness in order to further their short term objectives. All it takes is a holier than thou attitude to sacrifice everyone else on the alter of your own ambition -- you pretend that that it is all for the global good but deep down you know it it is merely to a long-term bid to seize riches & power for yourselves as history has proven time after time after time after time. It's either that or you are a fool incapable of looking more than one step ahead.
As a citizen of Europe, it is MY government that is handing over yet more billions to bail out Greece's refusal to tax its population & bloated bureaucracy again. It is real money that will have to be paid out of my pockets or more probably that of my children & grandchildren through a reduction in the capability of my state to finance things that would benefit us. Your arguments that it is fake money are intellectual puffery empty of meaning.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
You can't see the danger that surrounds from the middle of the herd. Only those on the 'fringe' can. The 'fringe' is the room with a view.
All your complaints are extremely one sided and biased. Kinda strange for a 'centrist'. You are merely putting the burden of austerity on the people who can least afford it. It is you and they who want to sacrifice their lives. I only wish to see the load more uniformly spread about. You, like a couple of others I know around here, see equal treatment as a threat to your upward mobility and special status in high society with your propaganda that we want to make the whole world poor. Lucky you! It still works! It seems beyond your comprehension that we can lift all people up! You prefer to believe lies.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
What I see is fringe idiots yet again screaming "DANGER! DANGER! RUN THAT WAY!" hoping that "the herd" runs blindly over a cliff so that they can profit from the death of current herd leaders. It has worked before & those who refuse to examine history may fall into your trap. I, however see through your attempts at perform the same mindless trick & denounce you for it.
When extremists call everyone else "one sided and biased" you know that they have drunk the kool-aid and no longer have any contact with reality whatsoever. The basis of being a centrist is not to close your eyes and mind to ideas as you do but to leave yourself open to ideas and evaluate which are worthwhile & which are self serving bullshit.
Yeah, yeah all info that doesn't fall into your narrow mindset is Propaganda, while you and the other fringies have somehow made the old leftist lies shiny & new. Seen it before, recognise it for the crap that destroyed nation after nation & will not be hoodwinked.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Eh, you go your way.. You're not listening.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Do I listen to someone who has admitted to not caring for the welfare of the vast majority of people? I believe this thread proves it. Do I believe anything you say when you recite from the leftist playbook? No.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
You don't even comprehend what I say! How can I possibly expect you to believe it?? You need to do things in their proper order, then your response might make sense. But I doubt that. You prefer to believe hateful propaganda. I can't overcome those kinds of psychological problems that cloud your judgement. That you must do on your own.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
You have surrendered your critical thought in order to pledge allegiance to your extremist screed & I still have mine, so no, I do not understand when you fall back on your self-referential leftist creed.
You espouse extremist political views that directly led to the deaths of hundreds of millions over the past century yet it is my beliefs (and those of everybody else who isn't an extremist like you) that is "hateful"?
Again, you're schizophrenic. You cannot overcome your mental problems until you recognize that you are sick & blaming others for your problems will only postpone it.
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Sure, okay... You win
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The only thing you have to watch out for is that you don't borrow so much that you find yourself unable to pay it back when interest rates climb. That's the situation Greece found themselves in
That's actually a pretty far cry from the situation Greece found themselves in... you see, interest rates are still low, and despite that fact, Greece can't service its debt.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.