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Greek elections

Diamond said:
One thing is for certain - if Greece leaves, it will not be pretty for the Greeks.
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It will not be pretty either way. If they leave they are in for a brutal few years, if they stay IMF austerity measures will punish a generation.
 
Given that Greece is really only a member of EU for geopolitical reasons, as oppsoed to any kinda north european powers love for Retsina and cheese that doesnt melt on the barbeque, Do you really think that Greece can be allowed to drop out of the a) Euro , but more importantly, b) the EU?

I'm not convinced that this will be allowed to happen. short of a Greek vote to leave
 
agricola said:
TBH its probably better if they do leave; yes it would be brutal but devaluation and whats going on elsewhere in the Med will guarantee that at least the tourist industry will have a massive boom time.
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I think the best about them leaving would be that they'd be able to hold the people they elect to account rather than being at the mercy of a bunch of technocrats ruling them from afar. What good does it do to a people to organise against their parliament when decisions are taken from afar? That is the lesson the people all over Europe should learn from the whole Greek debacle and that is certainly a lesson the "institutions" need to learn.
 
agricola said:
TBH its probably better if they do leave; yes it would be brutal but devaluation and whats going on elsewhere in the Med will guarantee that at least the tourist industry will have a massive boom time.
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A week Two weeks ago I would have agreed, the way they've played it, the government they have is the biggest of their problems- overcooked it by a week.
 
not-bono-ever said:
Given that Greece is really only a member of EU for geopolitical reasons, as oppsoed to any kinda north european powers love for Retsina and cheese that doesnt melt on the barbeque, Do you really think that Greece can be allowed to drop out of the a) Euro , but more importantly, b) the EU?

I'm not convinced that this will be allowed to happen. short of a Greek vote to leave
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Just think how 'valuable' it would be to have an example of what happens when you don't play ball.
 
gosub said:
Just think how 'valuable' it would be to have an example of what happens when you don't play ball.
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Iceland did not play ball with the neo-liberal status quo when it decided not to bail out its banks and, instead, it expanded its social welfare nets during its crisis and then jailed the bankers. Few talk about Iceland now and yet... how "valuable" is that example?
 
MochaSoul said:
Iceland did not play ball with the neo-liberal status quo when it decided not to bail out its banks and, instead, it expanded its social welfare nets during its crisis and then jailed the bankers. Few talk about Iceland now and yet... how "valuable" is that example?
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A choice taken against the wishes of their politicians that involved devaluing their currency. If Greece votes No, Mr Tsipras is more likely to see it as an endorsement of him than a vote for devaluation
 
MochaSoul said:
Can't disagree there. Tried to, but can't :D
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According to this mornings Telegraph, he said as much last night. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...r-urges-country-to-vote-no-in-referendum.html but that means when the wave of shit hits Greece, he would still be battling to be side onto it rather than taking it bow on. Mr Tspiras' jeopardy free No vote, where neither savings nor EUro membership is at risk when refusing to reach terms with their creditors will unravel quite quickly.
 
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Times leader is saying Greece won't technically be in default til the end of next month, not sure that's right. Yes there is the dance of stern cables,, but the Greeks already consolidated all their non payments into one big non payment, and Leguarde made stern noises about grace periods at the time.
 
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wasn't aSoul said:
Iceland did not play ball with the neo-liberal status quo when it decided not to bail out its banks and, instead, it expanded its social welfare nets during its crisis and then jailed the bankers. Few talk about Iceland now and yet... how "valuable" is that example?
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Iceland wasn't part of a monetary union or the EU - it also fucked off the liabilities of its non Icelandic account holders pretty much - it was helped hugely by the immense wealth of its Scandi mates with short term funding. Not sure if Iceland is a good example, but not much else to compare with in europe
 
I can't read the Telegraph but the Guardian is saying it's interviewed Varoufakis who told them:

As if the stakes were not high enough, Greece is threatening a court injunction against the EU institutions to block any exit from the eurozone, according to the Daily Telegraph:

“The Greek government will make use of all our legal rights,” said the finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis.

“We are taking advice and will certainly consider an injunction at the European Court of Justice. The EU treaties make no provision for euro exit and we refuse to accept it. Our membership is not negotiable,“ he told the Telegraph.
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J Ed said:
It would be really great if just for once hope, or fuck it just hate against the real class enemy, would win over fear.
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if they vote yes, one thing will have been shown. Another example of the EU using economic sabotage against people who voted for an economic position to the left of ayn rand.
 
Beware the Runes:

Profitability, the euro crisis and Icelandic myths

But did Iceland ‘break all the rules’ and are ‘things now not too bad’? This is another Icelandic myth according one Icelandic blogger: “people continue to spread the factually dubious statement that Iceland told creditors & IMF to go jump, nationalised banks, arrested the fraudsters, gave debt relief and is now growing very strongly, thanks. No, Iceland did not tell the IMF to go away (https://www.imf.org/external/country/ISL/). Iceland didn’t bail out the collapsed banks, but that wasn’t for the want of trying. If you read through the Report of the Special Investigation Commission you’d find out that the Icelandic government tried everything it could to save the banks, including asking for insane loans to pay off the banks’ debts (http://sic.althingi.is/). The short version is that they tried to save the banks, save the creditors and screwed up completely. Iceland arrested a few bank fraudsters, but just the pawns, small fry, and the lackeys.

Yes, Iceland did nationalise its banks but then privatised them again in record time. Two out of the three collapsed major banks in Iceland are now owned by their creditors, not the state. The third bank, Landsbanki, is still nationalised but that’s solely because of ongoing court cases involving Icesave. Most of the creditors actually sold their stakes onto foreign hedge funds. Some of the bankrupt banks only remained in government control for a few weeks. SPRON, for example, was merged into Arion Bank which in turn was given to its creditors a few weeks later. essentially a free gift to Kaupthing’s foreign creditors
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That was 2013, since then the supreme court has upheld 4 jail sentences (one this week in fact) on big fish. But the convictions were for actual fraud, the same thing people here have been jailed for - not for just being in charge of the normal operation of financial or finance capital.
 
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butchersapron said:
Beware the Runes:

Profitability, the euro crisis and Icelandic myths



That was 2013, since then the supreme court has upheld 4 jail sentences (one this week in fact) on big fish. B the convictions were for actual fraud, the same thing people here have been jailed for - not for just being in charge of the normal operation of financial or finance capital.
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Thanks for that interesting how the Icelandic myth is swallowed without question.
 
butchersapron said:
Beware the Runes:

Profitability, the euro crisis and Icelandic myths



That was 2013, since then the supreme court has upheld 4 jail sentences (one this week in fact) on big fish. But the convictions were for actual fraud, the same thing people here have been jailed for - not for just being in charge of the normal operation of financial or finance capital.
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Another bit from that piece:

"My view is that either way, staying in or leaving the euro, will deliver more or less the same result for the majority. That’s because this crisis is not a crisis of the euro as such but a crisis of the capitalist mode of production."

That is the truth that fools like cubic_zirconium et al merrily ignore. Their solutions (to the extent that they have offered any at all) all pretend that accepting EU diktat will lead to anything but disaster, that there was some clever alternative Syriza could have carried out to make everything hunky dory. There wasn't, not today, not tomorrow, not two weeks ago.
 
Danuta Huebner, chair of the committee on constitutional affairs at the European Parliament




Interesting!
 
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