Greek elections

[belboid]

Is there a PDF of his Buying Time book? I can't read epub stuff.

one can turn epub's into PDF's you know...

 

[Maurice Picarda]

convenient story

Not denied by any of the participants, though.

 

[brogdale]

Not denied by any of the participants, though.

because to do so would be (politically) inconvenient

 

[Idris2002]

one can turn epub's into PDF's you know...

"New technology baffles pissed old hack".

 

[Idris2002]

Why can't you?

I am illiterate.

 

[brogdale]

"New technology baffles pissed old hack".

Shocker!

 

[Idris2002]

Shocker!

What did brogdale just say? I can't read that.

 

[butchersapron]

I am illiterate.

Well i was wondering if it's because you don't have an epubreader installed for some reason or if it was a work related thing.

 

[Patteran]

convenient story

There's a hint of that, isn't there? Same with Varoufakis' 'I was all for nationalising the Bank of Greece & that but was voted down'. He might have done, but without corroboration or complete trust in the narrator, there's a possibility that these stories are presented to create an impression of radical considerations that don't match the end result.

 

[Idris2002]

Well i was wondering if it's because you don't have an epubreader installed for some reason or if it was a work related thing.

Bit of both. I can't install stuff on this pc off my own bat. I might try some way around it. Laters.

 

[CNT36]

You could try opening it with google documents.

 

[brogdale]

It's certainly worth the effort!

 

[brogdale]

Meanwhile US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew is flying to Frankfurt for emergency talks with European Central Bank President Mario Draghi. Tomorrow he will meet Schäuble in Berlin. In a statement the Treasury has said the purpose of the trip is “to continue engagement with European counterparts on the ongoing situation in Greece.” Lew was quick to welcome Monday’s deal and is thought to be engaged in a last ditch attempt to save it.

They're worried about those NATO bases, aren't they?

 

[Idris2002]

You could try opening it with google documents.

Just done it, it seems to work.

 

[Pickman's model]

Just done it, it seems to work.

 

[Idris2002]

Ah yes, the famous "swooshstika".

 

[butchersapron]

This is the Treuhand process that Kouvelakis suggests the £50b worth of assets being taken into independent non-greek control is based on (this is from 2011 btw):

The Treuhand privatisation agency set up to sell off East German state assets is being touted by Eurogroup chairman Jean-Claude Juncker as a model of German efficiency that could help resolve Greek's debt crisis.

But the fire sale of communist East German industry -- 14,000 companies were sold in four years -- may not be such a shining example for Greece because the Treuhand ended up $170 billion in debt instead of an anticipated $900 billion profit.

...

The Treuhand conducted its four years blitz disposal of East German assets from the former aviation ministry headquarters built for Hermann Goering's Luftwaffe.

Launched with great promise in 1990, it left massive debts, a legacy of bitterness after 2.5 million jobs were eliminated and wide swathes of de-industrialisation.

 

[belboid]

demo's sound quite small at the moment, more expected later.

First couple of ministers have quit

 

[Belushi]

Funny, I was thinking the other day how Berlin's highhanded attitude to the Greeks reminded me of how East German friends describe the attitude of Wessies after reunification, it wasn't enough that the DDR had collapsed, they had to be humiliated as well.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

So you have answered one question badly and come up with two of your own to answer...

No I have answered the one question of yours which was relevant (re. the European Commission), accurately, albeit a bit curtly.

Your other questions didn't have any bearing on what is being done to the Greek people; and they won't have until you can explain otherwise.

Louis MacNeice

 

[DotCommunist]

Just done it, it seems to work.

if you are using firefox or chrome you should be able to grab an epub reader app as well.

 

[belboid]

They have 201 people on a Central Committee

 

[redsquirrel]

They have 201 people on a Central Committee

Apparently less than 15 of those 108 are MPs

Still it does show the opposition to this deal within the wider membership.

 

[killer b]

Apparently less than 15 of those 108 are MPs

difficult decisions.

 

[Fedayn]

From Stathis Kouvelakis (leading member of the Left Platform in Syriza):
"ATHENS NOW: AN EXPLOSIVE SITUATION!
MASS RALLY THIS EVENING IN FRONT OF THE PARLIAMENT!
THE MAJORITY OF SYRIZA'S CENTRAL COMMITTEE MEMBERS REJECT THE AGREEMENT!"

Getting interesting....

 

[Lurdan]

Interesting blog post by Mason

Decoding the IMF: Greek deal doomed, exit likely

His view is that Syriza will get enough votes in Parliament today but that the IMF report means that the bailout will inevitably fail.
(...)

What this means is very simple: the third bailout agreed in principle on Sunday night is doomed to fail. First because the IMF cannot sign up to it without debt relief; second because, without debt relief it will collapse the Greek economy. This is even before you factor in issues like mass resistance to its details, or the total lack of enthusiasm for execution of the deal by the Syriza ministers who will have to do it.

(...)

But on both sides of the Greek political class there is cognitive dissonance, and it’s being generated by the same thing: a blindness to what the Euro has become.

(...)

One of the recurrent features of this crisis is the mismatch between the speed at which political parties learn things and how people do.

I’ve found, among ordinary people who were passionate supporters of the No vote in the referendum, the widespread acceptance that – to go forward with measures on social justice or alternatives to austerity – Greece will have to leave the Euro. Most people I talk to want it done in a controlled manner, consensually and with some kind of mandate from the people.

(...)

They’ve realised that Angela Merkel’s absolute refusal to countenance debt write-offs inside the Euro, alongside the IMF’s absolute insistence that they should happen, have created a cul-de-sac no Greek government can get out of without reversing out of Euro membership.

(...)

Syriza – which was always a coalition of left social democrats, New Left marxists and a harder left communist group – is finding it institutionally hard to accept this logic.

Opponents of exit argue that, with the Euro question “solved” they can get on with prosecuting a domestic crusade against corruption, poor police methods and the dysfunctional judiciary and the state.

(...)

Equally uncertain is: what kind of party does Syriza now become? Right now it is still, basically, an expression of the desire of large numbers of Greek people to stay in the Euro with less austerity.

The Greek electorate’s pattern over the past 5 years has been to put parties into power who say they will mitigate austerity but stay in the Euro.

(...)

We know from opinion polls that about 35% of Greeks want to leave the Euro but that a further 25% of those who voted No in the referendum probably fear what Alexis Tsipras spelled out last night: €250bn has left the country over the past 5 years and if Greece leaves the Euro this “drachma lobby” would be able to return to Greece and buy out everything and everybody.

(...)

The levels of economic pain and dysfunctional borrowing set to be inflicted on Greece mean that at some point in the next 12-18 months there is a chance that centrist 20-30% of public opinion will flip to a policy of controlled, or maybe temporary exit from the Eurozone. The only question then is: which party will offer a convincing narrative and lead it.

 

[hot air baboon]

Funny, I was thinking the other day how Berlin's highhanded attitude to the Greeks reminded me of how East German friends describe the attitude of Wessies after reunification, it wasn't enough that the DDR had collapsed, they had to be humiliated as well.

.....I get the impression that Germany ( or circles of opinion therein ) was at least countenancing the option of Grexit and default.....France then makes a grand gesture to keep them in the EZ basically "at all cost" in order to prevent this terrible "German" EU emerging & in so doing have contrived to bring about precisely that - or fuck-up a chance to throw a big oily spanner in the works at the very least........and at the same time ensuring that cost is going to fall ever heavier on the over-laden staggering donkey that is the Greek economy......nice one Francois....

....having said that they all believed Tsipras was never going to jump anyway....

 

[BandWagon]

I've just read this article from the Guardian:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/15/make-break-moment-greece-mps-vote-austerity-proposals

and this part leapt out:

"But George Osborne, the UK chancellor, has demanded that eurozone countries indemnify the Treasury against any losses if Britain is forced to contribute.

The Treasury is pushing for the €1.9bn of profits the European Central Bank has made on Greek bonds – a pot of money Greek’s embattled Syriza government had previously hoped to tap into – to be set aside in an account that could be used to compensate non-euro member countries for any losses."

Which casts a new light on the thing. How comes the ECB has made 1.9 billion out of Greece when the country is bankrupt? Can anyone explain the morality involved?

 

[DotCommunist]

Can anyone explain the morality involved?

Fuck you pay me

is what it boils down to

 

[Lurdan]

Been looking, without success, for a detailed account in English of the opinion poll conducted by Kapa on the 14th for the newspaper To Vima and released yesterday. (The Greek language story with a link to a PDF is here). Taking bits from a series of tweets, a Reuters report, the Guardian live blog and google translate :

Should Parliament approve the Brussels agreement? Yes 70.1% No 25.3%
Who is to blame for tough measures? European leaders 48.7% Greek gov't 44.4%
How do you view Brussels agreement? Positive/probably positive 51.5% Negative/probably negative 47.1%
Was this agreement necessary or was there an alternative? Necessary 72% Alternative 25.3%
If there is change to coalition, who should be PM? Tsipras 68.1% Another, widely accepted figure 22.6%

58.8 percent of respondents had a positive view of Tsipras.
64.5% believe a new government should be formed from within this parliament against 31.2% who think that new elections are necessary.