Greek elections

[Barking_Mad]

I'll ready my box of tissues

At least he's declared his self interest.

 

[Diamond]

I'll ready my box of tissues

Haha!

The last thing I need is your sympathy pal.

 

[butchersapron]

Haha!

The last thing I need is your sympathy pal.

Not sure he had sympathy in mind.

 

[DotCommunist]

Rather, I think you were trying to make a broader, crude point that some massed ranks of anonymous banks are "bullying" Greece, betraying your lack of understanding of the situation, in particular with regard to the "troika".

do you think I need to know the very specifics of capital, in its current mode, to see what is happening? You are way off if you do. Modes may differ but the beast has never changed

 

[Diamond]

do you think I need to know the very specifics of capital, in its current mode, to see what is happening? You are way off if you do. Modes may differ but the beast has never changed

The very specifics?

That is the one thing that your contributions have been extremely lacking in - the very specifics...

Pray, do tell, what are the very specifics of the current Greek eurozone crisis from an economic perspective?

 

[hipipol]

Fair enough, you've admitted you can neither read nor comprehend. Which makes your contributions to this thread (nay, the whole board) kinda worthless, really.

Oh dear, dear
Been on the sherry again vicar?
I can read, am just rather selective re the source
In what way have I failed to comprehend? I simply do not agree
Have I fallen below your 25% approval yet?
The term "worthless" would imply that
I would, however, prefer an explicit statement to that effect
Otherwise, how shall I ever be able to hold my head up in public again?

 

[DotCommunist]

The very specifics?

That is the one thing that your contributions have been extremely lacking in - the very specifics...

Pray, do tell, what are the very specifics of the current Greek eurozone crisis from an economic perspective?

the specifics are they are being asked to sign up to yet more austerity- and this mr eu lawyer shouldn't be a fucking joke to you, austerity is killing my class in this country and its far worse for them. But the government they voted in democraticaly are supposed to oppose that and introduce mildly soc/dec stuff.

And they are being asked to consent to borrow money to pay off the money they owe. So debt slavery.


Of course its all more complex in eu lawyer world where things play out in a technical way.

If they voted in a syzria who can't deliver, who do you think comes next? cos it aint fucking pasok

 

[belboid]

Oh dear, dear
Been on the sherry again vicar?
I can read, am just rather selective re the source
In what way have I failed to comprehend? I simply do not agree
Have I fallen below your 25% approval yet?
The term "worthless" would imply that
I would, however, prefer an explicit statement to that effect
Otherwise, how shall I ever be able to hold my head up in public again?

I apologise to the rest of the board for ever thinking this dishonest little shit could ever make, or see, sense.

(no need to put you 'on ignore,' your rambling incoherence is quite funny)

 

[Barking_Mad]

From here.

After seven years of a crisis that has left 26% of Greece’s workforce unemployed, 30% of its people below the poverty line, 17% unable to meet their daily food needs and 3.1 million without health insurance, it is hard to see how anything decided in Brussels or in Athens in the coming week will do much to change the lives of a large number of Greeks any time soon.

“Those that were already on the margins have been pushed right to the very, very edge, and those who were in the middle have been pushed to the margins,” said Ioanna Pertsinidou of Praksis, a charity that runs day centres for vulnerable people and offers legal and employment advice.

“So many people – ordinary, low-to-middle income people with jobs and homes and their lives on track – have seen their lives go drown the drain so fast,” Pertsinidou said. “People who never dreamed that one day they would not be able to pay their electricity bill, or feed their children properly.”

As it has scrabbled for every last cent to satisfy its creditors and ward off bankruptcy, Greece’s government has taken cash wherever it could – local authorities, healthcare, pensions, social services have all been tapped. In a country of 11 million people, public spending is now €65bn (£45.6bn) less than it was in 2010. “There is no safety net left,” said Pertsinidou.

 

[gosub]

One more reason to vote No, then

Not for a false prospectus. It would be outside EUro and their banks unprotected. But they would be able to devalue and eventually have a working economy. Either way though, in for a shit time short to mid term

 

[Barking_Mad]

Not for a false prospectus. It would be outside EUro and their banks unprotected. But they would be able to devalue and eventually have a working economy

Wouldn't their banks end up out of their own control? ie owned by foreign institutions.

 

[Diamond]

the specifics are they are being asked to sign up to yet more austerity- and this mr eu lawyer shouldn't be a fucking joke to you, austerity is killing my class in this country and its far worse for them. But the government they voted in democraticaly are supposed to oppose that and introduce mildly soc/dec stuff.

And they are being asked to consent to borrow money to pay off the money they owe. So debt slavery.


Of course its all more complex in eu lawyer world where things play out in a technical way.

If they voted in a syzria who can't deliver, who do you think comes next? cos it aint fucking pasok

Ok, I agree with you on a few of those points, specifically the need for debt relief but all this needs to be framed in the wider context of the "European Project".

If you give Greece's debt a haircut and also accede to its political demands, where do you think that leaves Ireland, Portugal, Spain or any other member of the eurozone, be they peripheral or central?

Maybe you view the eurozone as basically flawed, which you would probably be correct about although I would guess for reasons that might not be economically sound.

But then where do you go from there?

The centrifugal forces that would be unleashed would probably lead to the eventual breakdown of the EU - is that a good thing?

And, finally, though the Greeks got a bad deal, it was their electorate that voted for this government. In life you have to make choices, take responsibility and deal with the consequences. The Greeks haven't been forced to follow through on that process in a very long while and now they are getting shafted as a result but that's simply what happens when you take that route.

 

[butchersapron]

Wouldn't their banks end up out of their own control?

Not if they're nationalised.

 

[Santino]

What an absolute cunt.

 

[DotCommunist]

Ok, I agree with you on a few of those points, specifically the need for debt relief but all this needs to be framed in the wider context of the "European Project".

If you give Greece's debt a haircut and also accede to its political demands, where do you think that leaves Ireland, Portugal, Spain or any other member of the eurozone, be they peripheral or central?

Maybe you view the eurozone as basically flawed, which you would probably be correct about although I would guess for reasons that might not be economically sound.

But then where do you go from there?

The centrifugal forces that would be unleashed would probably lead to the eventual breakdown of the EU - is that a good thing?

And, finally, though the Greeks got a bad deal, it was their electorate that voted for this government. In life you have to make choices, take responsibility and deal with the consequences. The Greeks haven't been forced to follow through on that process in a very long while and now they are getting shafted as a result but that's simply what happens when you take that route.

is your world just entirely devoid of any class analysis because you went the lawyer route or because you have been cosseted your entire life by money?

 

[Barking_Mad]

Joseph Stiglitz:

A few years ago, when Greece was still at the start of its slide into an economic depression, the Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz remembers discussing the crisis with Greek officials. What they wanted was a stimulus package to boost growth and create jobs, and Stiglitz, who had just produced an influential report for the United Nations on how to deal with the global financial crisis, agreed that this would be the best way forward. Instead, Greece’s foreign creditors imposed a strict program of austerity. The Greek economy has shrunk by about 25% since 2010. The cost-cutting was an enormous mistake, Stiglitz says, and it’s time for the creditors to admit it.

“They have criminal responsibility,” he says of the so-called troika of financial institutions that bailed out the Greek economy in 2010, namely the International Monetary Fund, the European Commission and the European Central Bank. “It’s a kind of criminal responsibility for causing a major recession,” Stiglitz tells TIME in a phone interview.

Failure to do so, Stiglitz argues, would not only worsen the recession in Greece – already deeper and more prolonged than the Great Depression in the U.S. – it would also wreck the credibility of Europe’s common currency, the euro, and put the global economy at risk of contagion.

So far Greece’s creditors have downplayed those risks. In recent years they have repeatedly insisted that European banks and global markets do not face any serious fallout from Greece abandoning the euro, as they have had plenty of time to insulate themselves from such an outcome. But Stiglitz, who served as the chief economist of the World Bank from 1997 to 2000, says no such firewall of protection can exist in a globalized economy, where the connections between events and institutions are often impossible to predict. “We don’t know all the linkings,” he says.

Many countries in Eastern Europe, for instance, are still heavily reliant on Greek banks, and if those banks collapse the European Union faces the risk of a chain reaction of financial turmoil that could easily spread to the rest of the global economy. “There is a lack of transparency in financial markets that makes it impossible to know exactly what the consequences are,” says Stiglitz. “Anybody who says they do obviously doesn’t know what they’re talking about.”

 

[Diamond]

Not if they're nationalised.

What do you think would happen to Greece's banking system if it were nationalised?

Or more to the point, what do you think would happen to the nominal euros in the accounts deposited with Greek banks?

 

[butchersapron]

is your world just entirely devoid of any class analysis because you went the lawyer route or because you have been cosseted your entire life by money?

Class appears plenty in his posts.

 

[gosub]

Wouldn't their banks end up out of their own control? ie owned by foreign institutions.

Yes vulture funds picking up mortgages at cents on the dollar then changing terms for the worse whilst people's savings evaporate

 

[DotCommunist]

If you give Greece's debt a haircut and also accede to its political demands, where do you think that leaves Ireland, Portugal, Spain or any other member of the eurozone, be they peripheral or central?

if podemos live up to the potential I hope the EU goes right down the shitter as its neoliberal austerity programs are rejected by every electorate within the crap version of the US them with money and power have been desperate to build for 20 years now

 

[butchersapron]

What do you think would happen to Greece's banking system if it were nationalised?

Or more to the point, what do you think would happen to the nominal euros in the accounts deposited with Greek banks?

Have you now understood what capital controls are and what capital flight is?

 

[Barking_Mad]

Yes vulture funds picking up mortgages at cents on the dollar while people's savings evaporate

Hmmm i thought I'd read this somewhere else, but dont have the time to look for the piece. Ill try later.

 

[Diamond]

is your world just entirely devoid of any class analysis because you went the lawyer route or because you have been cosseted your entire life by money?

So it's back to the ad hominems again, is it?

No substance, no argument, no evidence.

You have lazily tried to make some simplistically erroneous points and can't back them up so instead of getting involved in a more in depth debate you start casting about broad accusations and insinuations to hide your basic ignorance.

 

[belboid]

In life you have to make choices, take responsibility and deal with the consequences.

except the EU wouldn't allow any choices - it was simply 'do what we say or fuck off.' They are the ones who should be 'taking responsibility.'

If this does destroy the Euro everyone should send Greece a few quid just to say 'thank you'

 

[butchersapron]

Tonight: London rally, 6pm Trafalgar Square.

 

[Diamond]

Have you now understood what capital controls are and what capital flight is?

The original discussion was around capital controls, which are now being imposed in Greece, and capital strike; not capital flight.

Do keep up.

 

[butchersapron]

The original discussion was around capital controls, which are now being imposed in Greece, and capital strike; not capital flight.

Do keep up.

No, it wasn't. It was about a capital strike - which you couldn't believe someone would suggest, so you translated it to capital controls. When you really meant capital flight. It was great.

 

[DotCommunist]

So it's back to the ad hominems again, is it?

No substance, no argument, no evidence.

You have lazily tried to make some simplistically erroneous points and can't back them up so instead of getting involved in a more in depth debate you start casting about broad accusations and insinuations to hide your basic ignorance.

I never cast broadly. You take that back. My hook always lands where I send it.
But no the problem is we are arguing from radically different positions. You appear to be labouring under the misaprehension that I give a flying fuck about the (deliberately so) arcane workings of the eu. Thats simply not where I am coming from.

 

[Diamond]

No, it wasn't. It was about a capital strike - which you couldn't believe someone would suggest, so you translated it to capital controls. When you really meant capital flight. It was great.

This is all getting rather technical rather quickly and I think you are struggling very hard to keep pace.

The concept of a capital strike is not directly relevant to Greece at the moment, although it may be de facto indirectly.

The concept of capital controls is directly relevant because they were imposed, effectively, today to restrict capital flight.

None of that has anything directly to do with a capital strike. That might well, will probably in fact, come further down the line.

 

[butchersapron]

This is all getting rather technical rather quickly and I think you are struggling very hard to keep pace.

The concept of a capital strike is not directly relevant to Greece at the moment, although it may be de facto indirectly.

The concept of capital controls is directly relevant because they were imposed, effectively, today to restrict capital flight.

None of that has anything directly to do with a capital strike. That might well, will probably in fact, come further down the line.

It's not getting technical at all. Another poster said capital strike - you insisted he meant capital controls. He didn't. And when you said capital controls, you actually meant capital flight. Simple.