Greek elections

[brogdale]

Certainly a very strong consideration - and very germane to the divided nationalistic interests which you were pretending weren't relevant.

If you think that financial capital is bound by national borders you have a Streep learning curve ahead of you.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

Better that than a Meryl lynch mob, I suppose.

 

[gosub]

If you think that financial capital is bound by national borders you have a Streep learning curve ahead of you.

If you think the Finns are just going through the motions, you have an absolute majority vote ahead of you, if you are lucky

 

[phildwyer]

If you think that financial capital is bound by national borders you have a Streep learning curve ahead of you.

In fact the Greek crisis suggests that the state may now be the final bulwark against capital. There's a conundrum for yer anarchists.

 

[Lurdan]

The screw Europe is turning on its own supposed member state now begins to resemble a sanctions regime.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Pretty nakedly regime change on behalf of capital.

 

[butchersapron]

He's just noticed?

 

[Supine]

EU summit cancelled then...

 

[butchersapron]

http://pic.twitter.com/zYwTeyx4Q5

 

[CNT36]

In fact the Greek crisis suggests that the state may now be the final bulwark against capital. There's a conundrum for yer anarchists.

No, it's not. It's probably in the fucking FAQ.

 

[redsquirrel]

New Democracy leader just happening to turn up in Brussels.

If Tsipras can't see which way the wind is blowing he's a fool.

 

[MochaSoul]

 

[Bernie Gunther]

In fact the Greek crisis suggests that the state may now be the final bulwark against capital. There's a conundrum for yer anarchists.

Seems a bit of a strange conclusion on the face of it.

Looks to me like we're seeing a clear message being sent that regime change awaits any state that makes even a partial attempt to protect citizens from capital

Regime change implemented by means of brutal sanctions, against citizens who have the temerity to elect a government that might try to protect them.

 

[spartacus mills]

Reuters publish the Eurogroup draft demanding tougher measures including "undertake rigorous reviews of collective bargaining, industrial action and collective dismissals in line with the timetable and the approach suggested by the institutions"

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015...nditions-draft-idUSKCN0PM0EP20150712?irpc=932

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Seems a bit of a strange conclusion on the face of it.

Looks to me like we're seeing a clear message being sent that regime change awaits any state that makes even a partial attempt to protect citizens from capital

Regime change implemented by means of brutal sanctions, against citizens who have the temerity to elect a government that might try to protect them.

It's more than that, even. It's not just regime change but colonisation. They're talking of confiscating state assets now. Greece is to be a vassal state.

 

[happie chappie]

Seems a bit of a strange conclusion on the face of it.

Looks to me like we're seeing a clear message being sent that regime change awaits any state that makes even a partial attempt to protect citizens from capital

Regime change implemented by means of brutal sanctions, against citizens who have the temerity to elect a government that might try to protect them.

I’m absolutely certain that the EU would have far preferred a non-Syriza government.

But one of the lessons of recent history (albeit in the Middle East - Iraq, Syria, Libya) is that if you are going to change a regime, you have to have to be pretty certain what’s going to replace it in case it's something worse.

I’ve got absolutely no idea how the Greeks would vote if there was a general election today.

In fact the situation is now so fluid that no one knows what’s going to happen tomorrow, let alone next week or next month - either in terms of economics or politics.

Either way the outlook's grim.

 

[happie chappie]

Schäuble now talking about a "temporary" Grexit. Absolutely no idea how that's going to work.

 

[Coolfonz]

It's hard watching history unfold. The only good, rather like the Ukraine thread, I can cry and you can't see me.

But like Ukraine the catastrophic mismanagement - Syriza aside imo - of a difficult issue making the problem blow up into structure-breaking madness. Now SPD saying Schauble is `lying` over 5yr Grexit, Luxembourg and Austria attacking Germany, France says 5yr Grexit `just playing to the gallery`, the Italian govt seems split between PM and fin min, Finnish govt might collapse...and the day the word `trust` became a euphemism. Is it me or is Germany threatening the whole EU?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Capital is threatening the people of the EU, Germany is just delivering the threat via Greece.

 

[Coolfonz]

Sure, but this is capitalists threatening capitalists, not just a 6 month old Greek govt. Rope/hang etc. The FN must be loving this...

1trllion euros in QE from the ECB and the CDU are dropping a brick in a bucket over E79mn...

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I’m absolutely certain that the EU would have far preferred a non-Syriza government..

And there's the rub. In a functioning EU, the Syriza government is the EU. All elected governments would be supported and their mandates respected at all times. This is not a functioning EU - or at least not functioning in that way. This is a dictatorship of capital.

 

[MochaSoul]

Sure, but this is capitalists threatening capitalists, not just a 6 month old Greek govt. Rope/hang etc. The FN must be loving this...

I don't see things this linearly. Of course, there will be fights between capitalists. When capital is the god everyone will want a claim on it. That it translates in demilishing democracy is a side order of the menu.

ETA: demolish + diminish = dimilish (grand typo )

 

[Coolfonz]

I like `dimilish`. The EU is demilishing itself, no two ways about it

There is a R4 special `More or Less` on Greece about the stats/data here http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b063fdyk

Not listened to it yet.

 

[Idris2002]

But like Ukraine the catastrophic mismanagement - Syriza aside imo - of a difficult issue making the problem blow up into structure-breaking madness. Now SPD saying Schauble is `lying` over 5yr Grexit, Luxembourg and Austria attacking Germany, France says 5yr Grexit `just playing to the gallery`, the Italian govt seems split between PM and fin min, Finnish govt might collapse...and the day the word `trust` became a euphemism. Is it me or is Germany threatening the whole EU?

Laughable stuff. And this was meant to be a world power. They must be bursting their holes laughing in Washington and Moscow.

 

[agricola]

Laughable stuff. And this was meant to be a world power. They must be bursting their holes laughing in Washington and Moscow.

Perhaps, though of course a crisis like this was the only way that the many absurdities within the Euro / EU were ever going to be exposed and acknowledged.

That said with Trump roaming around the top of the GOP Primaries, I dont think the Yanks are in any position to chortle.

 

[MochaSoul]

Laughable stuff. And this was meant to be a world power. They must be bursting their holes laughing in Washington and Moscow.

This latest melodrama, playing out in Brussels as European finance ministers meet to discuss whether or not to approve a new Greek bailout, appears so nonsensical that it can be hard to believe these people are deciding the future of Europe.
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If Greece does leave the euro, though, it will only be temporary in the sense that all life is temporary. Bringing back the drachma would either be such a boon to Greece's economy that it'd never want to go back to the euro, or be such a disaster that Europe would never want to invite it back. But in either case, Greece and Europe's trial separation would turn into a divorce. That might actually be better for Greece now that it's already gone through a lot of the pain of ditching the euro—like a financial crisis—but it could be a catastrophe for Europe. It wouldn't just show that countries can leave the euro, but maybe that countries have to leave the euro to recover. So the next time an anti-austerity party wins power, it might decide to do the same, at which point the euro zone would be more like a northern euro zone, if that. Especially if France decides that this makes the euro not worth saving anymore.

What's the German word for kicking-someone-out-of-the-euro-and-regretting-it-later?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...-greece-it-seems-to-want-to-humiliate-greece/

 

[gosub]

Schäuble now talking about a "temporary" Grexit. Absolutely no idea how that's going to work.

That it would be at least five years before the EUrozone even considered writing off any the debt, should a deal not be reached, and Greece forcibly evicted from the EUro

 

[happie chappie]

That it would be at least five years before the EUrozone even considered writing off any the debt, should a deal not be reached, and Greece forcibly evicted from the EUro

it's just another bonkers idea - putting Greece through all the pain of an exit and a return to the Drachma (with the many problems outlined already in this thread) and, once the economy had adjusted to life outside the Euro, back they would come in again.

Probably under the same Troika-imposed fiscal straightjacket that the forced them out in the first place.

It's the currency equivalent of the Hokey Cokey - but with potentially disastrous consequences.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

It's a way of keeping Greece in the EU while accepting that they leave the Eurozone. Face-saving on various sides.

 

[frogwoman]

Wtf? I haven't been keeping up with this story (went out with my best mate last night) but the greek gov't proposed that deal, so why are they still being treated as if they hadn't?