Will Greece exit the Euro? (Thread now a poll)

I mention it as the prime example of fascistic crony-capitalism in the world today. There are two big things that prevent a descent into fascism in Western Europe and N America, namely a more-or-less functional representative democracy and, possibly even more important in this context, an independent and more-or-less effective judiciary, able to uphold such things as property rights.

Russia seems to regard both of these as dangerous novelties and, having experimented with them, seems under the current regime to be intent on regaining control of both.

 

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Except, that is a bunch of crap.

 

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Ok, yet another anti-democracy tirade from you. And yes I can name a democratically elected politician whose speeches are intelligent, Barrack Obama for one. If you want to know where a politician stands, you probably should pay attention to what they say and do. That is how it works outside Russia where people are encouraged to actually think for themselves and people actually dissent.

And as you pointed out in your last post, none of this has anything to do with the subject of this thread. So why did you introduce it? I think you are trying to do what you have advocated in other threads, promulgate Russian propaganda.

 

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Tsipras, among his many promises, Tsipras promised his fellow Greeks their banks would open soon after the vote. Well among other things, at this point, there is no indication Greek banks will open for business anytime soon. If anything, the $67 per day allotment is certainly doomed if Greece does not get additional financial support from the Eurogroup.

Additionally, Greece has another multibillion dollar debt payment due in a few weeks to the ECB (European Central Bank) upon which it will likely default as well if it doesn't find financial aid soon. That will be a brick wall for Greece as the ECB will then, by law, be forbidden to provide the liquidity to Greek banks as it has done and continues to do. Greeks had better get use to living on a few pennies (cents) a day if they default on their ECB debt. If they thought 67 dollars per day was bad, they will love a few cents per day. Greece will not be able to purchase medicine, fuel, clothing, or food. So while Greeks now celebrate their nationalism, they won't be able to eat it nor will it keep them warm at night or fuel their machines or heal them when they become ill.

This referendum may embolden or force Tsipras to make more proposals which don't stand a snow ball's chance in Hell of every being accepted by the Eurogroup. If that happens, this will drag on to Greece's detriment and Greece may find itself outside looking in. I think it is pretty obvious Tsipras has burnt whatever goodwill he might once have enjoyed with his fellow Eurogroup members. I think the Eurogroup would love to wash its hands and walk away from Greece and leave Greece to its own vices. I think the Eurogroup has had a enough.

The Greek economy is a mess and no matter what happens it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. It's now just a matter of how much worse things will get for Greece. Even if the Eurogroup turns on the money spigot today or a few days from now, the Greek economy has suffered severe damage which will continue to plague it in the coming days, months, and years.

 

I read that what happened once before was that the ECB agreed to lend to Greece on condition the other Eurozone countries guaranteed the loans. This avoids the problem of an unelected central banker effectively deciding the fate of a sovereign state - and puts the political problem back where it belongs, with the politicians who constructed the Euro. It seems possible the same will happen again. But that means the Bundestag would have to vote on exposing Germany (for example) to the risk of making a bad loan. The chances, this time round, of that vote being passed are, ahem, slim, I would think.

In which case the Greek government will quite soon have to print its own currency in order to pay its employees - including the army. So they won't be expelled from the Eurozone as such, but will be forced by practicalities to create a new drachma. Those idiots who have been holding parties and railing against the evil Mrs Merkel will have the mother of all hangovers within a few weeks. The EU will then have to mount a humanitarian aid programme, to prevent starvation. Tsipras and that absurd motorcyclist, Varoukafuckis, have wrecked the country, just as it was turning the corner.

 

LOL

Bad Democracy! Bad Democracy!!!

The funny thing is, I'm fairly certain 60%+ of Americans would, and will, make the same vote if given a choice (See: Bernie "Hi I'm from the Government and I'm here to Help" Sanders*). Luckily for us, we have plenty more decades of stagnation to get used to our lower standards of living. Well, not all of us, bankers and ex-banking slum-lords will probably continue to do pretty well.

* Sanders Promises:
- free government run higher than 'high' school education
- raise the minimum wage to $25 / hour
- create jobs jobs and more jerbs
- reverse climate change (either make it warmer or colder - you pick)
- lower taxes on the middle class
- give more to the poor
- free healthcare for all
- help the poor
- help the middle class
- hope and change
- change we can believe in
- defeat the terrorists
- colonize mars
- end the self licking icecream cone / only export industry the USA still has / MIC

Or hey, there's Hillary "I Never Saw a War I didn't Like or Banker I didn't Love" Clinton....


Well, now Greece must be made an example of. I mean, we wouldn't want Spain, Italy or Portugal getting any ideas. Iceland was bad enough. No, the Greeks will have to be made to pay for their insolence. That much is clear.

 

I think the Eurogroup will be pained to do anything which could be construed as a victory for Tsipras. Tsipras on the other hand has told his fellow Greeks that a no vote would strengthen his hand at the bargaining table. Well he now has his no vote. There is a huge gap in expectations which will make any deal very difficult and perhaps impossible. So I am not optimistic a deal will be reached.

Greece appears to be laboring under the impression they have some kind of leverage when in fact they really don't. First, Greece really isn't that significant economically, accounting for about 1% of EU GDP. Two, the world has had a year to prepare for a Greek departure. About 75% of Greece's debt is held by governments. So there is virtually zero risk of economic contagion in the EU or anywhere else. The chief worry is that other EU countries might want to try to imitate Greece and exit the EU. And given the spectacle Greece has become and the pain it has endured and will endure, I don't think other countries will be very anxious to imitate Greece anytime soon and leave the EU or risk leaving the EU.

Three, even if Greece is forced into printing its own currency, it won't solve its problems. That new currency will be virtually worthless. Tsipras will be able to pay retirees in the new currency, but the new currency will be practically worthless. No one will want to buy it or use the new currency. Greece won't be able to use the new currency to buy the foreign goods it needs (e.g. oil, food, medicine, clothing, cars, etc.) because foreign producers will not accept the new currency as payment. Businesses will go out of business because they don't have the foreign currency they need to conduct operations and pay their bills. Unemployment will skyrocket. It's just bad for Greece no matter what happens.

If things continue down this course, which I expect they will, I agree, in a few weeks the Eurogroup and others will be sending humanitarian relief shipments to Greece to prevent starvation. There is one tiny shred of hope, Greece has a new finance minister.

 

First, the prime example of crony capitalism today is certainly not Russia. Russia of Jeltsin time - ok. But what Putin made was a return of the power from the oligarchs (Beresowski, Chodorkowski and Co) to the state. There was some sort of a proposal to the oligarchs - he is ready to forget about their criminal past and leave them their robbed fabrics and so on if they stay out of politics, most of them have accepted this, the others have started a fight and lost. So, by now the power is back to the state, which does not what the oligarchs want. (The conflict with Chodorkowski was, for example, about taxation for oil.)

An example of classical fascism, not only economical, but political, is the Ukraine. Here it is the oligarchy which has the power. And, essential, in the US it is also the oligarchy which has the power.

Democracy cannot prevent fascism, because classical fascism is inherently a mass movement which can win democratic elections easily. And has won them, in particular in Germany. Actually, the ukrainian fascism has also had enough support of the masses to win elections, they have choosen another way because Washington wanted more confrontation. And an independent judiciary cannot prevent fascism too - taking power fascism can even legally, if not it couldn't care less about what old judges say and simply replace them by their own puppets. In Germany, there have been independent judges, even influental, and the Nazis have, for example, lost the process against Dimitroff about the Reichtstag fire.

 

I answer what is proposed if I think it has to be answered. Then, learn to read. The question was about "speeches worth to be reread, say, after 10 years", not about the wish to know where this guy with power actually stands. If you put Obama into this category, this is sufficient to characterize your intellectual lever without further comments.

 

The Greek No is certainly also a No to the mass media. Which have been, except for a few Syriza-connected outsiders, for a clear Yes. Similarly, this was supported by various polls which claimed something close to 50:50. The political lies of such polls are also already well-known, in Germany it has been found that they systematically manipulate election polls to decrease the chances of political newcomers to reach the 5%. And after the Scotland independence referendum many people think that even the result itself has been faked. (In the new US-colony Ukraine there is no doubt at all about the election fakes.)

The German internet-based (non-mainstream) http://www.heise.de/tp/artikel/45/45364/1.html has nicely characterized the reaction of Martin Schulz, chief of the EU parlament, about the need for humanitarian help. If Greece would not already be in the NATO one would have to be afraid that this humanitarian help means, like in Libya, air strikes against the Tsipras regime. And even the German mainstream paper Zeit wrote an article about this No against the Greek media. And got a lot of comments of type "Ah, the same as here".

 

LOL, you know it is indeed sad. How about surprising me and posting something rational or relevant one day? There are a number of people whose speeches are cited, (e.g. "we have nothing to fear but fear itself").

"This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days." President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Or how about President Lincoln who wrote:

"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." President Abraham Lincoln

Now how you think that is relevant to this discussion about Greece is beyond me. Don't look now but you have been proven wrong once again.

 

Ok, not surprisingly, you don't like the Western media, you prefer Putin's propaganda and prefer to be told what is or is not true by Russian controlled state media.

 

Don't judge other countries by the low standards of Russia.

 

I have not claimed it is. I answer arguments if I find it worth or necessary to answer them, for example because they contain misinformation or so, even if the answer is, together with the answered argument, is more or less off-topic. If a moderation deletes this as off-topic, I hope it deletes the original off-topic argument too.

It is, of course, remarkable what you quote as being cited - two speeches, above with warmongering rhetorics, above of presidents who have led America into wars. Nicely corresponds with America being the greatest danger for peace today. As your hero Obama, who has forced the Ukraine into a civil war.

Why should I like mass media? I despise them, everywhere, because journalists are professional liars, and presstitute is the better name for their profession. I have seen examples of intentional lies in Russian media too, so they are certainly not a criterion of truth. And I see not much difference between state-controlled and oligarch-controlled media, if there is any at all, then it is a lower intellectual level of the oligarch-controlled media.

But this does not change the fact that there are some differences between different media. For example, ukrainian media are simply lies. Western media cite only ukrainian media, which is sufficient to reject them as lies, but they already remove the most stupid and unbelievable lies. The situation with Novorussian internet sources is different, some (Strelkow, Colonel Cassad) being too pessimistic, others (Basurin, yurasumy) too optimistic. At the time Strelkow was actually involved in Novorussia, he was almost the most accurate source, today this is IMHO no longer the case, he has, for example, predicted that Novorussia will be unable to close the Debalzewo cauldron, but they were. The novorussian military maps have been always many classes more reliable than the ukrainian ones, which were simply lies and wishful thinking, but copied by NYT and everywhere in the Western press.

Given that I prefer such internet sources, I cannot tell very much about the russian mass media - except what people writes in the comments about them. But this gives the impression that there is no large difference between novorussian internet sources and russian mass media. And what I read from time to time following a link does not suggest anything different.

In the German media, I prefer Zeit, for the simple reason that they almost don't censor user comments (all other German mass media use now pre-publication censorship and leave only overwhelming NATO support) so that one can often find interesting links in the comments. The content itself is not different from other German papers, all brought into NATO line.

BTW, again it was your off-topic remark about my on-topic comments about the Greek media, which have been caught in a clear attempt to manipulate in favour of the EU, which has motivated me to tell something about my choices of preferable media.

 

In the whole text you have quoted, Russia was not mentioned at all.

 

IMHO:
Greece would be better off without the euro.

 

I don't think so. Since independence in 1830 Greece has been in economic distress about half the time. Greece has spent a substantial portion of its existence in economic distress. Greece has some very deep structural problems that need to be fixed if t is every to become fiscally stable.

Greece needs to change and if left to its own devices I don't see how that happens. Greece is indeed a welfare state. It needs to change and change is painful. That said, I think Greece needs some debt forgiveness, and I think the EU is willing to do that if they see the changes Greece needs to make. Below is a link to an article which sheds some light on the historical nature of Greece's economic problems.

http://www.theglobalist.com/the-historical-roots-of-greeces-debt-crisis/

One more thing, you would think after years of discussion and most recently 5 months of discussion about this specific bailout and given the dire state of the Greek economy and all this fuss and complaining, Greek leaders would be able to instantly pull out a proposal for discussion with their EU colleagues. Well, they couldn't. Greece was to present a proposal to the Eurogroup today, it didn't. Greece didn't have one. Now the Eurogroup meeting has been postponed until Sunday. So it drags on. Greece is a hot mess, that is the bottom line. Sometimes I think Greece needs a good invasion and reconstruction in order to be a successful state. There is absolutely no excuse for the Greek bureaucracy or the Greek government.

 

A common currency without a common government is an ideal which has been, is, and will be prone to inequities.

 

Well with the exception of Greece, it has done fairly well. It has some kinks, but then I think that is to be expected. The US had some kinks too and still does.

 

LOL, what is quite remarkable is your ignorance. If you are concerned about misinformation then you should stop promulgating it. Two, you asked for examples, you were giving same. You were proven wrong yet again. Three, now how do you get war mongering out of those two speeches? What about those two speeches can in any way be construed as war mongering? And what does any speech made my an American president more than 10 years ago have to do with the Greek debt crisis?

Well then it should be easy for you to prove your beliefs. So prove them. The fact is you can’t, because your beliefs are sheer fiction. Your news preferences are clearly biased because you have so much misinformation. You prefer the misinformation of Mr. Putin. You don’t like information sources which doesn’t comport with your beliefs.