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The Weak Suffer What They Must: Yanis And The End Of Europe
Submitted by Raul Ilargi Meijer via The Automatic Earth blog,
From southern Europe to the far north, matters are shifting, sometimes slowly, sometimes faster. There are moments when it seems all that goes on is the negotiations over the Greek dire financial situation and its bailout conditions, but even there nothing stands still. The Financial Times ran a story claiming Greece is about to default on its debt(s), and many a pundit jumped on that, but there was nothing new there. Of course they are considering such options, but they are looking at many others as well. That doesn’t prove anything, though.
Yanis Varoufakis’ publisher, Public Affairs Books, posted a promo for an upcoming book by the Greek Finance Minister, due out only in 2016, mind you, that reveals a few things that haven’t gotten much attention to date. It’s good to keep in mind that most of the book will have been written before Yanis joined the new Greek government on January 26, and not see it as a reaction to the negotiations that have played out after that date.
Varoufakis simply analyzes the structure of the EU and the eurozone, as well as the peculiar place the ECB has in both. Some may find what he writes provocative, but that’s beside the point. It’s not as if Europe is beyond analysis; indeed, such analysis is long overdue.
Indeed, it may well be the lack of it, and the idea in Brussels that it is exempt from scrutiny, even as institutions such as the ECB build billion dollar edifices as the Greek population goes hungry, that could be its downfall. It may be better to be critical and make necessary changes than to be hardheaded and precipitate your own downfall. Here’s the blurb for the book:
And The Weak Suffer What They Must
Europe’s Crisis and America’s Economic Future
“The strong do as they can and the weak suffer what they must.” —Thucydides
The fate of the global economy hangs in the balance, and Europe is doing its utmost to undermine it, to destabilize America, and to spawn new forms of authoritarianism. Europe has dragged the world into hideous morasses twice in the last one hundred years… it can do it again. Yanis Varoufakis, the newly elected Finance Minister of Greece, has a front-row seat, and shows the Eurozone to be a house of cards destined to fall without a radical change in direction. And, if the EU falls apart, he argues, the global economy will not be far behind.
Varoufakis shows how, once America abandoned Europe in 1971 from the dollar zone, Europe’s leaders decided to create a monetary union of 18 nations without control of their own money, without democratic accountability, and without a government to support the Central Bank.
This bizarre economic super-power was equipped with none of the shock absorbers necessary to contain a financial crisis, while its design ensured that, when it came, the crisis would be massive. When disaster hit in 2009, Europe turned against itself, humiliating millions of innocent citizens, driving populations to despair, and buttressing a form of bigotry unseen since WWII.
In the epic battle for Europe’s integrity and soul, the forces of reason and humanism will have to face down the new forms of authoritarianism. Europe’s crisis is pregnant with radically regressive forces that have the capacity to cause a humanitarian bloodbath while extinguishing the hope for shared prosperity for generations to come. The principle of the greatest austerity for the European economies suffering the greatest recessions would be quaint if it were not also the harbinger of misanthropy and racism.
Here, Varoufakis offers concrete policies that the rest of the world can take part in to intervene and help save Europe from impending catastrophe, and presents the ultimate case against austerity. With passionate, informative, and at times humorous prose, he warns that the implosion of an admittedly crisis-ridden and deeply irrational European capitalism should be avoided at all cost. Europe, he argues, is too important to be left to the Europeans.
How dire the situation is in Greece becomes obvious from the following article by documentary film maker Constantin Xekalos, posted on Beppe Grillo’s site. It makes you wonder how Europe dare let this happen. How it could possibly have insisted prior to the January elections that the Greeks should vote for the incumbent government, and how someone like Eurogroup head Dijsselbloem could ever have had the gall to point to “all the progress we’ve made”.
Greece, The Euro’s Greatest “Success”
Greece is a social disaster zone. 3 million people are without guaranteed healthcare, 600,000 children are living under the breadline and more than half of them are unable to meet their daily nutritional needs. 90% of families living in the poorer areas rely on food banks and feeding schemes for survival, and unemployment is approaching 30%, with youth unemployment approaching 60%. These are not just numbers, they are real people. In order to show their faces and tell their stories, writer and documentary film maker from Crete and now living in Florence, Constantin Xekalos, decided to make a documentary film entitled: “Greece, the Euro’s greatest success “. In today’s Passaparola he talks about this documentary film and about the suffering of the Greek people that he has encountered in his personal experience. Today it is all happening, but is Italy next?
The healthcare tragedy in Greece When we made this documentary it was said that 1/3 of the Greek population, (more than 3 million people,) were without any guaranteed healthcare. In the interim that number has grown. They have been abandoned. If you go to a hospital, obviously a public one, they will treat you and they will accept you if it is an emergency, but if you are admitted, you then have to pay. If you are unable to pay, they send the bill to the Receiver of Revenue’s office and they take it from there. If you have no money, they start with foreclosure, even your home , even if it is your only home!
This is crime against society that is totally unacceptable. In an advanced and so-called democratic Country that is part of the western world, things like this are totally inconceivable, absurd and unacceptable. I repeat, this is crime against society that we absolutely cannot accept! If you are ill, democracy guarantees the treatment you need, otherwise it should be called by some other name. When a child is not guaranteed the nutrition he/she needs, a mere helpless child, or elderly people that are no longer able to look after themselves, then that is no longer democracy. Some of the older Greeks were telling me that when the Germans were there during the occupation in the Second World War, the people lived exactly like they are living now.
The Greeks are dying of hunger 90% of Greek families living in the poorer areas are obliged to rely on food banks and feeding schemes in order to survive. Unfortunately there are many in this situation. We toured a number of Athens’ districts and in each and every district there is a square where good people, people who care about others and truly have a sense of community have rolled up their sleeves and, with the help of the Church, are providing meals for those who would otherwise have nothing to eat. Every district has its own square. I saw children passing out because of lack of food, but are too embarrassed to admit it. We simply cannot accept this kind of thing. It’s a crime when children go without food to eat. I will shout that from the rooftops until I burst and I hope that they lay charges against me: it is a crime when a child cannot get enough to eat!
The disappearance of the Greek middle-class Many good people found themselves unemployed from one day to the next, not through any fault of their own and not by choice, not lazy people as they would have us believe. They want to work but at this point there simply are no jobs any more. The social fabric is gone, there is no more middle-class, it is virtually nonexistent. All there is is an ever-shrinking oligarchy of very wealthy people and then the rest of the people who are becoming ever poorer. Very real poverty! Currently, and here I’m talking about the latest data from a month ago now, someone who does indeed find a job has to accept a salary of €300 a month . Take into account that Athens is a very expensive city to live in, even more so than Florence. I happen to live in Florence so this is just by way of example, but I was horrified at the thought. How on earth do these people manage to live? There is no way that they can live decently, there is no longer any dignity and therefore they cannot be free: they are destroying your soul as well as you body!
Over 50% of young people are unemployed Youth unemployment is now standing somewhere between 50% and 60% . The young people do whatever they can, they accept any kind of position, even things that not right and unfair, simply because necessity forces them to accept job offers that should not even be made. I saw jobs offered at €100 a month . This sort of thing is now happening here in Italy as well.
What all this will eventually lead to, inevitably so, becomes clear from the following. Anti-euro, anti-immigrant, anti-bailout and down the line anti anything to do with the failed European project. In Finland, of all places, the anti-euro party looks certain to get into the next government. Finland’s economy is in tatters, despite its AAA rating, and people increasingly choose to see the world through blinders.
Anti-Euro Finnish Party Gets Ready to Rule as Discontent Brews
The anti-euro The Finns party, which eight years ago got just 4% of the vote, is now dressing itself up for Cabinet seats as Finnish voters are set to oust the government after four years of economic failure. The Finns, whose support is based on equal parts of anti-euro, anti-immigrant and anti-establishment sentiment, have captured voters on the back of the euro-area’s economic crisis and a home-grown collapse of key industries. In the 2011 election, during the height of the euro crisis, it shocked the traditional parties by winning 19% of the vote. “We can’t be ignored, because a strong majority government won’t be possible without us,” Timo Soini, the party leader, said [..]
The country is struggling to emerge from a three-year recession after key industries such as its papermakers have buckled amid slumping demand and Nokia Oyj lost in the smartphone war, cutting thousands of jobs. The government has raised taxes and lowered spending, adding to unpopularity, and on top of that have been bailout costs for Greece and Portugal, among others, which have eroded finances for Finland, still top-rated at Fitch Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service. “Our stance will be very tight, no matter what,” Soini said. “Nothing is forcing Finland to participate in these bailout policies. If we don’t want to take part, we can refuse.”
Soini’s recipe for fixing the economy includes encouraging exports, backing entrepreneurship, investing in road infrastructure and cutting red tape. The party seeks to balance public finances through budget cuts of as much as €3 billion and higher taxes for the wealthy. The euro-skeptic group will probably join a three-party coalition. Polls predict more than 50 seats out of 200 for the opposition Center Party.
The Center Party backed bailouts and loans for Greece, Portugal and Ireland while in government in 2010 and 2011 and was then ousted. It has since opposed further help, alongside The Finns party. The Center Party and us will have a majority within the government, if it keeps the stance it has had,” Soini said. His group isn’t currently pushing for Finland to exit the euro. Still, “Finland should under no circumstances declare it will always and forever stay,” he said.
The party first negotiated joining government after the 2011 elections, after catapulting to third place with 39 lawmakers. Its opposition to euro-area bailouts in the height of the crisis meant the door to government was closed. In 2007, its five seats didn’t qualify for an invitation to join talks to form a ruling coalition. “We’ve grown, we’ve moved forward, we’ve stabilized,” Soini said. “It’s a key goal for us to consolidate our backing and be one of the big parties, so that we’re not just a one-vote wonder.”
Of course, there are worse options than the True Finns. You can get from anti-immigrant to downright extreme right wing, where Greece may be headed if Europe doesn’t adapt to Syriza’s view of what the eurozone might be.
The prevailing views amongst Europe’s richer nations, and its domestic banking sectors, don’t look promising. And when the European project crashes to a halt, things are not going be pretty. The wisest thing for Brussels to do may well be to try and dismantle itself as peacefully as it can. But Brussels is far too loaded with people seeking to hold on to the power they have gathered.
Still, there’s no denying they have held sway over rapidly deteriorating conditions on the ground (though they will prefer to lay the blame elsewhere), which will down the line lead to their own downfall. They better listen to Yanis now.
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Hopefully the Eu will disintegrate into seperate countries again.
What I really hope is that the US will break apart into four or five seperate nations. I don't think our country can survive anyway, and that would be the least painful solution.
Greece, default already! Enough foreplay, we want the climax.
Draghi has a new book coming out too...
The Weak Suffer What They Must: The ECB And The End Of YanisThe title of the book alone shows you what a braindead moron Yaroufakis and a lot of Greeks are. The weak don´t need to suffer in the EU, if states like Greece act responsible. But Yaroufakis is a role model for a politician acting irresponsible in every possible way and that´s why the weak in Greece have to suffer more and more. And of course the role model of a third or fourth class academic, who needs a classical quote for a book title to "show off" or better to pretend he has some education. Yaroufakis proves he´s an enemy of Europe and since most of the Greeks seem to agree with his views, Greece should be thrown out of Europe now and forever.
"...since most of the Greeks seem to agree with his (Varoufakis) views..."
as a reminder (more details in a lower part of this thread), Varoufakis was elected as Member of Parliament on an Independent ticket. He is not even in SYRIZA
claiming that most Greeks agree with him is imho a bit too far. the way I see it, Greeks threw out older parties out of their Parliament and gave new, fresh forces a chance. but Greek political sentiment about the EU and the EUR has not changed much, nevertheless. which, of course, is a problem for this current Greek government
Many forget Ghordius SYRIZA only received 37% of the vote and 70% of the Greeks want to continue to use the Euro as their fiat currency. This is indeed a problem for SYRIZA. Unlike the two party system in the USA many here forget European countries have more then two parties.
The problem is promises made by SYRIZA and the majority of the Greeks wanting to continue to use the Euro. Either the Greeks accept the measures outlined by their creditors and continue to use the Euro or abandon the Euro and either remain in the EU or go it alone. Of course Greece is going to be punished severely if they default and go it alone. Brussels must keep the other broke countries from leaving as well.
A referendum is the way to go and let the Greeks decide their own fate. The problem is the Greeks do not want to reform their corrupt system of politics and tax collection. 55% of employed Greeks are public employees with generous benefits and many retire at 50 if they have handled or worked around hazardous material. Even hairdressers were retiring at 55. This cannot continue and the EU knows this.
I am following the story of odious debt and the previous Greek administration. This could get interesting if proven true.
Varoufakis is a world-class economist who has published some of the most insightful economic commentary to emerge in the last decade or so. You on the other hand appear to be some gobshite nonentity of whom no one has heard and whose views are as irrelevant as they are ridiculous.
Maybe we should bust it down to thousands of jurisdictions (counties). Maybe we should only be able to vote in (for the leaders) the jurisdiction that we live.
Likewise, those duly elected at the county (ok parishes too, for the coonasses) vote only in statewide elections, and the state-level pols pick from among themselves a leader, and his cabinet, and his congress, and his judges.
Maybe we should abolish Federal funding to said jurisdictions, too- so that the fools get to experience first hand the consequences of their choices.
Maybe we should do this every coupla years.
Maybe we would recognize the Fed and the IRS as not only un-necessary, but un-desirable.
Maybe the Treasury would do its' job.
Oh shit! Was I snoring? Sorry, but it was a good dream, honey!
I'm making over $7k a month working part time. I kept hearing other people tell me how much money they can make online so I decided to look into it. Well, it was all true and has totally changed my life. This is what I do... www.globe-report.com
The last time that was tried, the banksters burned Dixie's major cities to the ground. They'd do it again in a heartbeat.
Just in case you thought all those nukes were intended for an enemy thatcould shoot back. No sir. They're for the first state crazy enough to try to secede. Think Hillary wouldn't H-bomb Little Rock in a New York minute just to show the rednecks who's boss? Think again.
And don't get me started on France's 60-odd nuclear power plants, rigged to catastrophically melt down if Russian troops are sighted within a thousand miles. The 10,000-odd rich men who rule the Fourth Reich are determined that only they will leave it alive.
Agreed, but you see, the banksters' great wealth is notional. He/she is worth nothing/zip/zilch/nada absent our support.
I defer to Boetie-
I do not ask that you place hands upon the tyrant to topple him over, but simply that you support him no longer; then you will behold him, like a great Colossus whose pedestal has been pulled away, fall of his own weight and break in pieces.I just can't wait for the anti Fed party to run in the US.
That's worth 1000+
Insanely Ignorant American Masses
http://www.hermes-press.com/insane_masses.htm
"But by far the worst feature of this 'double ignorance' is that, on the one hand, it stands in the way of its own cure, and on the other, if unchecked, it is constantly aggravating itself. For if we look at things with a distorted view, these things will present themselves to us in a distorted manner too; and thus, instead of reaping from our experiences new impressions which might help us in restoring a healthy spirit within ourselves, we shall only add nourishment to the ulcer within our mind. And on the other side, if we should try to cure our ignorance, we see that for so doing it is required that we look away from ourselves and from our habitual ways of thinking, which seems to us tantamount to a flat repudiation of our very selves and consequently impossible."
Hermann Gauss, Plato's Conception of Philosophy, 1974
Well I don't know what the hell "600,000 children living under the breadline" or guaranteed healthcare is supposed to mean but I have a pretty good idea of the propaganda involved. However I do know what 60% youth unemployment and a hundred more printers running 24/7/365 means for Keynesian socio-economics...lol.
They won't be printing up any food for starving chitlins and vorking for someone else won't make you free, yoots ;-)
"The weak suffer what they must." - The Melian Dialouge from Thucydides History of the Peloponesian War.....nice.
food insecurity...
who'dathunk
i thot that was only in NaziPelosi's USSA
The fiat euro jerk-off from goldsucksman
Banzai!
Completing the American Revolution
http://www.hermes-press.com/completing.htm
Plato understood that a society must have either of two basic forms of government:
• Oligarchy: a government in which a small elite group rules for its own benefit
• Plutocracy: rule of those with wealth
• Tyranny: rule of a criminal cabal
• Commonwealth: a government in which politcal and economic principles and practices accrue to the benefit of all members of society
• This form of government is ruled by some type of aristocracy, those with some kind of special knowledge and skill.
• Plato believed that a commonwealth should be ruled by those persons who were seekers of wisdom--philosophers.
" Plato believed that a commonwealth should be ruled by those persons who were seekers of wisdom--philosophers."
The problem is that Hillary and Jeb Bush think that they are the philosphers.
Greece suffers the same fate of every Latin based society. The rich plunder and have no sense of community obligation.
The latin way has its roots in Roman law and custom. They have kings and judges and graft is a form of governing.
The German/English way, has its roots in the Germanic tribes, and has the common man at the center. Trial by jury, the king only can maintain power by sharing the spoils, and can be voted out of power. The necessaty of building common purpose infrastructure.
Etc. etc.
Regardless of how anyone feels about the current leaders we are dealing with embedded cultures that are not easily swayed. The Euro is bound for failure. Germans are from Venus and Greece is from Mars, or vice versa.
"The German/English way, has its roots in the Germanic tribes, and has the common man at the center"
your theory does not explain the difference in how the police behaves let's say in the US versus how it behaves let's say in Germany, does it?
Incidentally, Germany, like France, Italy and the rest of the eurozone have no "Common Law" legal system, which you describe as "Germanic/English way", with the Trial by Jury as centerpiece, but the "Roman Law" system (aka Napoleonic, or "Civil Law" system)
nevertheless, even if you think it's an inferior legal system...
this very moment I vastly prefer to be a "common man" in the eurozone
I have reasons to think that as a citizen, here, I am way better served by it, and way less in danger of being shot or indicted or incarcerated by a state servant. How so?
Further, in the US 95% of the cases end with an admission of guilt before even a jury has to called in: how can your "superiour" system even work, if it's not used?
The US police is fine, its just that society is massively racially divided, in comparison most European countries are mostly homogenous so much easier to police.
And that was a splendid example of why the Germanic tribe mentality vs the Roman empire mentality is better, here in the UK we used to have a very fine legal system that developed from generations of Britons who appealed grievances and sorted out problems by debate in Parliament, and then we gave it away to be part of an unaccountable and unrepresentative EU state. Still, Europe has its racial problem growing, so we soon will catch up with the US, its just that our law will be even worse.
The filthy thief!
The structure of the EU and the people at the "top" who think that they know what they are doing makes it impossible for the EU to survive unless everybody within its borders pays homage.
Not going to happen, ever.
great stinking piles of bullshit
"and Europe is doing its utmost to undermine it, to destabilize America, ..." LOL (I have to admit this one was quite... unexpected. Where is the reasoning behind this interesting assertion?)
"and to spawn new forms of authoritarianism." DOUBLE LOL (Is that the same author that asks for a strong central government?)
"Europe has dragged the world into hideous morasses twice in the last one hundred years… it can do it again." And the argument is...?
"Yanis Varoufakis, the newly elected Finance Minister of Greece, has a front-row seat, and shows the Eurozone to be a house of cards destined to fall without a radical change in direction. And, if the EU falls apart, he argues, the global economy will not be far behind. Varoufakis shows how, once America abandoned Europe in 1971 from the dollar zone, Europe’s leaders decided to create a monetary union of 18 nations without control of their own money, without democratic accountability, and without a government to support the Central Bank. "
so at least some acknowledgement that the EUR is a response to 1971. When Nixon decided that the solemn promises of 1946 were... confetti
but America did not abandon Europe from the dollarzone. Washington would have preferred us to stay in the dollarzone. it's us who left the dollarzone... because it was not our money and nevertheless our problem (it's the Emerging Markets that have that problem, at the moment, and are quite mad about it, btw. but that's another story)
No democratic accountability ??? BOLLOCKS. take Google, and search "Draghi appointment"
And you will find out that the appointment of a ECB President is a highly political thing
Which, in Draghi's case, involved at that time a lot of political discussions among the conservative French President Sarkozy, the conservative Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi and the conservative German Chancellor Merkel, among others. With, of course, all the elected Parliaments having a say in it where they wanted (After all, if the German Chancellor does something the German Parliament does not like, well, they can exchange her with someone that does their bidding)
The countries in the eurozone are constitutionally set up as Parliamentary Democracies. THIS IS A FACT, A CONSTITUTIONAL FACT
if you don't understand the Parliamentary_system, if you don't understand the actually very simple principle of electing one body that appoints all the rest, then you won't understand that the author of this HUGE PILE OF BOLLOCKS is really talking absolute nonsense
of course you could come and say: Parliamentarism stinks, I ask for... >insert demand, here<. But then, this is a completely different affair. Then, you are asking for constitutional changes
Varoufakis himself was not elected as Greek Finance Minister. He candidated as an Independent and was elected as Member of the Greek Parliament in a multy-seat district of Greece
and then, he was appointed by the Greek Parliament to head the Greek Finance Ministry, and the same elected Greek Parliament can recall him anytime, and appoint someone else
which, in my humble opinion, they should. but there it is: it's their task to decide if he is fit to head that ministry (which, btw, makes Varoufakis an "Eurocrat", then he sits as FM in the all-powerful, at EU level body called EU Council), not mine. they were elected to do that, not me
oh, and note that the author moans that there is no (strong) (central) government to... support the central bank (the ECB). well, thanks, but no, thanks. after all that moaning against authoritarianism, you ask for a strong central government? for the purpose of (strongly) supporting the central bank? well...
Europe, or rather Brussels and Frankfurt is a fucking stinking heap of the most malignant and malign corruption, theft and pure fucking evil that has festered in Europe since that cunt Hitler and fucking Stalin were murdering at will.
The venality, the stupidity and the sanctimonious bull shit that spews from the mouths of every fucking parasitic cunt that draws so much as ten fucking euros a week is now beyond sufferance.
I want to see Europe or rather Brussels and Frankfurt, the EU the ECJ and the ECB carry on, I want them to try to become more dictatorial, I want them to start a pogrom and start jailing anti euro demonstrators.
I want it because I want that chance to go to to Brussels and bomb and kill and slaughter and burn the fucking EU bureaucrats, I want a chance to set fire to their children backs and bulldoze them into a lime pit 50 mtrs deep.
I want to see the Europeans that had the unfortunate experience of seeing these criminal fuck wits ignore what they were warned about, but became of their lies and hubris and corruption ploughed on anyway ignoring all warnings, so fucking arrogant are they,
I want to see the Greeks the Spaniards and the Portuguese make Serbia and Bosnia look like a paragon of restraint as they burn and cull and slaughter every fucking cunt who ever so much as fucking tweeted their love of the fucking monstrous criminal scam called the EU
LOL. Charming
"I want them (Europe, etc.) to try to become more dictatorial, I want them to start a pogrom and start jailing anti euro demonstrators."
you don't explain why you want us to have river of bloods flowing. I get it that you are mad, but you really don't explain why
you clearly talk about Europeans as "other people", so you are not one of us. then what have the EU, the ECB and Europeans in general done to you to deserve such "well wishes"?
I'd say you are a troll, but I have encountered too often genuine persons here that have similar views for that. but never a why, except some "I wish the world as I know it would end"
Because you stupid fuck, it is like saying the fucking Mexican drug lord running your town as his personal feifdom or the fucking Mafia running running your town is all fine and dandy for you.
These cunts are the biggest criminal cartels on the panet and you are too stupid to see it
Oh c'mon now, tell us how you really feel...
But I have to say, as harsh as your comment is, I totally understand what you're saying...