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Someone Pull The Plug Or This Will End In War
Submitted by Raul Ilargi Meijer via The Automatic Earth blog,
I was going to write up on the uselessness of Angela Merkel, given that she said on this week that “giving in to Greece could ‘blow apart’ the euro”, and it’s the 180º other way around; it’s the consistent refusal to allow any leniency towards the Greeks that is blowing the currency union to smithereens.
Merkel’s been such an abject failure, the fullblown lack of leadership, the addiction to her right wing backbenchers, no opinion that seems to be remotely her own. But I don’t think the topic by itself makes much sense anymore for an article. It’s high time to take a step back and oversee the entire failing euro and EU system.
Greece is stuck in Germany’s own internal squabbles, and that more than anything illustrates how broken the system is. It was never supposed to be like that. No European leader in their right mind would ever have signed up for that.
Reading up on daily events, and perhaps on the verge of an actual Greece deal, increasingly I’m thinking this has got to stop, guys, there is no basis for this. It makes no sense and it is no use. The mold is broken. The EU as a concept, as a model, has failed and is already a thing of the past.
It’s over. And anything that’s done from here on in will only serve to make things worse. We should learn to recognize such transitions, and act on them. Instead of clinging on to what we think might have been long after it no longer is.
Whatever anyone does now, it’ll all come back again. That’s guaranteed. So just don’t do it. Or rather, do the one thing that still makes any sense: Call a halt to the whole charade.
As for Greece: Just stop playing the game. It’s the only way for you not to lose it.
There’s no reason why European countries couldn’t live together, work together, but the EU structure makes it impossible for them to do just that, to do the very thing it was supposed to be designed for.
Germany runs insane surpluses with the rest of the EU, and it sees that as a sign of how great a country it is. But in the present structure, if one country runs such surpluses, others will need to run equally insane deficits.
Cue Greece. And Italy, Spain et al. William Hague for once was right about something when he said this week that the euro could only possibly have ended up as a burning building with no exits. This is going to lead to war.
Simple as that. It may take a while, and the present ‘leadership’ may be gone by then, but it will. Unless more people wake up than just the OXI voters here in Greece.
And the only reason for it to happen is if the present flock of petty little minds in Berlin, Paris, London and Brussels try to make it last as long as they can, and call for even more integration and centralization and all that stuff. The leaders are useless, the structure is painfully faulty, and the outcome is fully predictable.
Europe has no leadership, it has a varied but eerily similar bunch of people who crave the power they’ve been given, but lack the moral sturctures to deal with that power. Sociopaths. That’s what Brussels selects for.
And Brussels is by no means the only place in Europe that does that. What about people like Schäuble and Dijsselbloem, who see the misery in Greece and loudly bang the drum for more misery? What does that say about a man? And what does it say about the structure that allows them to do it? At times I feel like the Grapes of Wrath is being replayed here.
It’s nice and all to claim you’re right about something, but if your being right produces utter misery for millions of others, you’re still wrong.
Greece is not an abstract exercise in some textbook, and it’s not a computer game either. Greece is about real people getting hurt. And if you refuse to act to alleviate that hurt, that defines you as a sociopath.
Germany now, and it took ‘only’ 5 months, says Greece needs debt relief but it also says, through Schäuble: “There cannot be a haircut because it would infringe the system of the European Union.” That’s exactly my point. That’s silly. And looking around me here in Athens for the past few weeks, it’s criminally silly. You acknowledge what needs to be done, and at the same time you acknowledge the system doesn’t allow for what needs to be done. Time to change that system then. Or blow it up.
I don’t care what people like Merkel and Schäuble think or say, once people in a union go hungry and have no healthcare, you have to change the system, not hammer it down their throats even more. If you refuse to stand together, you can be sure you’ll fall apart.
Get a life. Greece should just default on the whole thing, and let Merkel and Hollande figure out the alleged Greek debt with their own domestic banking sectors. They’re the ones who received all the money that Greece is now trying to figure out a payback schedule for.
Problem with that is of course that very banking sector. They call the shots. The vested interests have far too much power on all levels. That’s the crux. But that’s also the purpose for which a shoddy construct like the EU exists in the first place. The more centralized politics are, the easier the whole thing is to manipulate and control. The more loopholes and cracks in the system, the more power there is for vested interests.
Steve Keen just sent a link to an article at Australia’s MacroBusiness, that goes through the entire list of new proposals from the Syriza government, and ends like this:
Tsipras Has Just Destroyed Greece
This is basically the same proposal as that was just rejected by the Greek people in the referendum. There are some headlines floating around about proposed debt restructuring as well but I can’t find them. This makes absolutely no sense. The Tsipras Government has just:
• renegotiated itself into the same position it was in two months ago;
• set massively false expectations with the Greek public;
• destroyed the Greek banking system, and
• destroyed what was left of Greek political capital in EU.
If this deal gets through the Greek Parliament, and it could given everyone other than the ruling party and Golden Dawn are in favour of austerity, then Greece has just destroyed itself to no purpose. Markets are drawing comfort from the roll over but how Tsipras can return home without being lynched by a mob is beyond me. And that raises the prospect of any deal being held immediately hostage to violence.
Yes, it’s still entirely possible that Tsipras submitted this last set of proposals knowing full well they won’t be accepted. But he’s already gone way too far in his concessions. This is an exercise in futility.
It’s time to acknowledge this is a road to nowhere. From where I’m sitting, Yanis Varoufakis has been the sole sane voice in this whole 5 month long B-movie. I think Yanis also conceded that it was no use trying to negotiate anything with the troika, and that that’s to a large extent why he left.
Yanis will be badly, badly needed for Greece going forward. They need someone to figure out where to go from here.
Just like Europe needs someone to figure out how to deconstruct Brussels without the use of heavy explosives. Because there are just two options here: either the EU will -more or less- peacefully fall apart, or it will violently blow apart.
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Re ... this will end in war
Especially if USSA NeoConHag Nudelman-Kagan has her way
Wrong.
Scarlett O'Noodleman was just heard to say: "War, war, war. This war talk's spoiling all the fun at every party this summer."
You're probably thinking of Hillary.
The only thing that makes any sense to me is that the vampire bankster squid threatened Tsipras and his family if he didn't serve the Greeks up on a platter.
It's true that Greece has lived well beyond its means on a diet of OPM; the majority of the country appears to be quite happily enlisted in the FSA. And on that account, they deserve no sympathy.
However, it was also pointed out here on ZH a couple days ago, that Greek bonds were bought KNOWING they were worthless. There was never any chance that they would be repaid.
The bottom line is that two things need to happen: Greece needs to learn to live without OPM, and a whole lot of banksters need to be rounded up and executed, because psychopathy is incurable by any means.
Merkel will resign before this situation is resolved.
Raul You haven't been paying attention, Varoufuckis is an ECONOMIC HITMAN.
So is Stournaras Bank of Greece and quite a few others.
Research the relationship Stournaras and Varoufakis you will be surprised. NOT
We're in war already, trying to work off debts by borrowing for more bullets and tax parasites.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QS0q3mGPGg
we lost on voter apathy and federal immigration corruption-all funded by loan fraud dumped in invasion.
The world is always at war in one way or another. Again, there is no eCONomic, fiscal, monetary, or political solution to resource scarcity.
A decent standard of living requires tremendous resources, now think about the average income and standard of lving for people on earth.
same as it ever was...
That depends on how you define 'a decent standard of living.' The progress of technology allows us to do more with less, but consumerism demands that we must always be less satisfied with the consumption of more and more resources.
The math is what it is, sure, if you consider living in a mud hut and going without regular meals, then we can probably accomodate everyone.
Innovation/technology requires tremendous investment of resources. Population growth remains exponential, now you tell me, have we been investing our capital and resources wisely?
Some will have access to the consumable calories require to maintain a decent standard of lving, most will not.
Same as it ever was....
There are a lot of options between mud hut and McMansion. There are also a lot of options between industrial farming as it is done now, and more land and water efficient approaches like aquaponics.
The trick is to use that technology that we've *already* developed (at very high costs in terms of resources and human misery) to build a sustainable economy outside of the current model which is heading for collapse.
There's nothing in the laws of physics that prevent humans from doing that. It's the 'laws' of economics and politics that are the stumbling block.
Sorry but there is in fact a very real carrying capacity to planet. You need to do some homework on the nitrogen cycle, sulfur cycle, phosphorus cycle etc.
For example, humanity has been artificially accellerating the reductive part of the nitrogen cycle (via the Habor Bosch process) in order to produce enough ammonia to feed the planet (and most people are still hungry) This requires a tremendous amout of energy (coal, oil, nuclear). It's all about flux (how fast can you make that ammonia). Take away this process and you will lose 1/3 of the population, period. ALL the natural processes for reducing N2 to NH4 will not be able to keep up. Again, no one gets around these laws, period.
Life will go on, it will just be very very different.
Habor Bosch is an open-cycle industrial process. Think instead about the aquaponics loop with sunlight and atmospheric carbon as external drivers. You don't need to add fertilizer to a balanced aquaponics system. Fish produce ammonia as waste and bacteria convert that into nitrates that go back to the plants.
Your aquaponics loop cannot produce the ammonia as quickly as a Dupont reactor burning all that energy. Sorry. Again, flux matters.
By the way, you will remove nitrogen from your system when you eat it (fish or plants). How's that coming back? Does the nitrogen just magically appear or are you peeing and pooping in your system too? FAIL.
Not to mention that much of our phosphorous is mined, shat out into a toilet then flushed out to sea. In the future, it is going to behoove us to start developing sanitary methods of producing and using humanure without large industrial inputs. I don't trust the sludge stuff from sewage treatment plants that is put on crops, but reusing our waste would act as an enormous buffer on a lot of those cycles.
And yes, I regularly piss on my compost piles.
You are peeing and pooping into your system now. Where do think things go when you flush?
Yes, you close the loop via composting - that's how it works.
And you don't have to compost the fish waste. You just run it through a bio-filter where bacteria convert the ammonia back into nitrates before returning it to the plants. There are safe ways of doing this for 'humanure' also.
For most, it goes to a sewage treatement plant, where it is either turned into sludge, which I don't trust, or it gets flushed out to sea. However, it would take an enormous amount of resources to swap over from the green revolution methods of food production to aquaponics. It would be an enormous energy and resource hungry project. With most aquaponics systems, it would also be energy hungry due to the need to circulate the water. I just don't see it feeding 7+ billion people without industrial society to support it, and industrial society is on a shaky foundation right now.
Right - which is still in the 'system' as far as our biosphere is concerned. I think people balk at the cost of the changeover, but changing over to a more efficient system is always profitable in the long run.
And I don't see the energy costs for water circulation as being much of an issue when you break it down to Watts vs. GPH for what's required to support the caloric needs of an individual.
Industrial society is required to support building out a system like this, but if the system takes pressure *off* the shaky foundation of that industrial society over time, then you should see an accelerating ROI.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26xpMCXP9bw
I see an enormous up front energy expenditure, along with a lot of energy being used in that video. The other problem is that the food for the fish is an outside input. It is not a closed system, unless you produce the fish food yourself. It is that outside input that provides the nitrogen, phosphorous, etc...
I agree, but I also see a lot of energy expenditure on any large-scale factory farm that's intended to produce a profit vs. what you'd see in a back yard garden that's intended to feed a family.
Duckweed is a viable choice for fish food that you can grow inside the system, and even if there are some elements that 'leak,'replacing just those elements is still vastly more efficient than the mostly open-cycle processes that we rely on today.
Still will not work for 7+ billion people. Not enough time to let the cycles turn on their own.
"bacteria convert the ammonia back into nitrates" -- You are confused again. Going from nitrogen gas (largely INERT) to ammonia is the energy-requiring step (NOT going from ammonia to nitrite and then nitrate). Only a relative few bacteria (called diazotrophs) can do this, and it still requires energy input. They do this very slowly. So you mght support a few people on an acre, not all land is arable and guess what the population density of most cities is again?
Going from Ammonia to Nitrate requires no energy and just about every bacteria/fungus can do it. In fact the "denitrifiers" live entirely off the energy they get out of oxidizing ammonia to nitrite.
Educate yourself.
Where is that you think that I'm confused? Fish produce the ammonia when they convert food to waste. Bacteria convert that ammonia into nitrites and then nitrates which are then returned to the plants. The plants and animals in the system are balanced so that once the system is running (it does need ammonia to start), it keeps recycling those resources.
And if that system works for one person, then making it work for 7+ billion is a matter of repeating the process.
There's no magic involved here - it's just setting up a system of agriculture which recycles its inputs rather than throwing them away. By doing that, you get a much more efficient system. I'm surprised that you're not seeing how that works.
Now you are feeding the fish too? Where is that nitrogen coming from?
At some point N2 must be reduced back to Ammonia, period, or are you going to really try and argue that the nitrogen cycle is not working in your "closed loop". Oxidation of nitrogen does not stop at nitrate! Plants and backeria will take it all the way back to N2O and N2, forms that neither plants nor animals can use!!!!
That is where you are confused. You cannot have "part" of the nitrogen cycle!!!!
Again, educate yourself on exactly what the nitrogen cycle is.
And nitrogen fixing bacteria or algae aren't a solution to that because... ?
You do realize that the biosphere has this all worked out already, right? Life got along - somehow, before people figured out how to refine nitrogen with industrial processes, right?
"And nitrogen fixing bacteria or algae aren't a solution to that because..." Because they don't do it fast enough. If they did we wouldn't need the Habor Bosch process in the first place!!! EXACTLY!!!!
"Life got along - somehow, before people figured out how to refine nitrogen with industrial processes?" --- Yes, but before 1900, we had less than a billion people!!! Take away the industrial supplement and the population will return to a sustainable level! YES! Now you got it!
They don't do it fast enough for a mostly open-cycle, throw-away system. That's not the case for an aquaponic system that relies on recycling of inputs and composting.
You'd be right if agricultural knowledge hadn't improved since 1900. But it has. That's the part that you're missing.
Properly crafted mud huts can actually be very comfortable. There is nothing quite like an old adobe home with 2 foot thick walls that act as a moderator on the temperature.
And there are rammed earth structures which are still standing after 2000 years.
We do need to drastically reduce our burden on the resources of the Earth, for example by:
+100. Relatively less expensive, rural farmland just outside of the suburban ring, populated at a denisty of about 8,000 people per square mile - using smart housing, agriculture, and transportation options should do the trick, imo.
Create incentives for poor families stuck in the urban core to move out there, and fund it with some portion of the money you'd save on a reduced reliance on the prison-industrial complex and the massively expensive infrastructure projects we need to address urban transportation / gridlock issues.
"Innovation/technology requires tremendous investment of resources. Population growth remains exponential, now you tell me, have we been investing our capital and resources wisely?"
Technology growth is also exponential. In my youth TV's and radios used vacuum tubes. Those were replaced by transistors which were then replaced by integrated circuits. Now add lasers, microwaves and fiber optics to the mix.
To even have this discussion in 1970 we'd have to be in the same room or on an expensive conference call. Now we can be anywhere on the planet and anyone with the motivation to do so can join in the debate.
The problem with setting limits based on the Laws of Physics is that we lack a complete understanding of those laws. Certainly some of them are ironclad, at least in an empirical sense, but we still haven't unified gravity and even some of the more established "laws" break down at the extremes of their range.
As I see it, "same as it ever was" simply describes the race between Malthusian principles and scientific research. Thing is, if we don't proceed on the basis that this race can be won, then we might as well just give up and party like there's no tomorrow.
And consumerism of course is fueled by the debt-backed money system in which the economy must expand exponentially no matter what. Technology goes through periods of explosion followed by periods of only incremental improvement; we are nearing the end of the technological explosion caused by the Industrial Revolution and that's why we're seeing the systems designed for exponential growth beginning to fail. Consumerism can only keep them on life support so long.
Yep. The lion's share of technological progress goes to those who have access to capital. Once their infrastructure is in place, it provides barriers to entry and a competitive advantage against those who would displace them from their economic niche.
So things stagnate.
Until something even more disruptive comes along, or the niche-holders's systems collapses under its own weight. The record industry is a pretty easy to understand example of this process at work.
yes, and the fossil record is littered with examples of societies who mis-allocated their capital and were in fact wiped out, less a small lucky few.
same as it ever was...
I agree. It is the same as it ever was - with one key exception. It's now possible for large numbers of people to understand how this all works.
Will they pay attention and take action? Unless someone figures out a way to get a Kardashian to talk about it, I can't say I'm optimistic.
But the ability to spread information that can produce change is one thing that is different this time.
Look at the "average" human. There is your answer.
"The lion's share of technological progress goes to those who have access to capital."
In the short run, yes, but consider:
In the past, you had to lay thousands of miles of copper wire to support a telephone network. In ChinaLatin America and Africa where no such infrastructure could be economically built, the problem was solved with cell phones and repeaters at much lower cost. All the benefits of modern communication without the cost of developing and implementing the original technology on which it was founded, i.e. the initial cost was born by the nation/generation that developed the technology, but the benefits of their eventual refinement accrued to all.
The steel industry is another example. Japan, Korea and China adopted new methods of steel making and rose to become major global producers. The traditional steel making nations who had to bear the sunk costs of the old technology handed the advantage to nations who had no such costs and could rapidly adopt the new methods. Tariffs were then the only barrier left to competition, and when those came down, traditional steel makers folded.
Note: the new technologies were NOT developed in Japan Korea or China. They were a natural progression of existing methods and refinements in the older steel making nations. By failing to adopt their own innovations, they lost market share and eventual dominance to those who did.
Another example: Taiwan, a major producer of IC chips, none of which were invented or developed there. Plenty more examples, but I think I've made my point.
<<Greece is stuck in Germany’s own internal squabbles, and that more than anything illustrates how broken the system is. It was never supposed to be like that. No European leader in their right mind would ever have signed up for that. Reading up on daily events, and perhaps on the verge of an actual Greece deal, increasingly I’m thinking this has got to stop, guys, there is no basis for this. It makes no sense and it is no use. The mold is broken. The EU as a concept, as a model, has failed and is already a thing of the past. It’s over. And anything that’s done from here on in will only serve to make things worse. We should learn to recognize such transitions, and act on them. Instead of clinging on to what we think might have been long after it no longer is.>>
Precisely. It's over... but its death is long drawn out. Nobody in their right mind agrees to lunacy, and despite the politicians whose paycheques depend on promoting lunacy, most of the world's proletariat are in their right minds. That is what the referendum showed. That if there is no printing press to pay magic money, the serfs ain't gonna rescue the bankers from their appointed date with reality. Mostly because they simply cannot even if they wanted to -- it is impossible.
Is it not obvious what happened here? This new proposal was hit AFTER various phone calls / visits from President Barky & Victoria Nudelman, et al. -- after the AMERICANS stepped in, realising that their beloved NATO is actually at stake. Barky's bosses looked at the referendum, and realised that Greece is a breath away from Russia, unless someone pays up fast.
After all this American intervention -- the talks of which nobody but the Greeks and eurocrats know the details -- suddenly Yanis graciously steps aside, suddenly the German rhetoric softens, and suddenly Tsipras puts forward a proposal that includes debt relief and austerity. Obviously (to me), someone has agreed to pay up. I suggest that someone is the one with the most to lose: NATO and the military-corporate US. The referendum did one thing: it showed NATO that the serfs were serious, so money had better be forthcoming from somewhere pretty soon if the eurozone is to remain intact. The key is that no politican -- not Merkel, not Tsipras, not Varoufakis -- wants to be blamed for breaking up the eurozone, not over what everyone agrees is a small amount (for a printing press), but that had now become the price.
It seems to me pretty obvious that the US has agreed to backstop Greek debt and save the doomed euro, in order to save the doomed NATO. This is the world's printing press running to the rescue again, with the only response they know: buying time. The people will win in the end, since it is their labour and resources that the parasites rely on (and are trying to steal). However, the printing press is failing precisely because it is the neocons' only answer to every reality check. The only thing the printing press can buy, is time, and even that is running out. The shelf life on this particular rescue is going to be short, since the rest of the PIIGS are next up and NATO is increasingly chaotic.
Syriza can accept euro-preserving deals, but it can't force the people to give up their resources. Neither can the eurocrats. Neither can NATO, and neither can Uncle Scam's printing press (which is the whole problem with the neocon adherence to the economic dogma of MMT). This is all about NATO.
It all clicked after Mish's clear-sighted column this morning, where he doesn't say this exactly, but I think he implies as much:
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.ca/2015/07/obamas-time-machine-ca...
After 6 years Renfield, You're still one of the best. Great post babe
Tsipras seems like he just isn't confident about how to go about re-establishing the drachma. He reminds me of a friend who managed to land himself a job that he was totally incapable of doing - so he just left his resignation on his desk and snuck out while no one was looking.
That's exactly what I've felt since he first spoke in public. But then, he is the prime minister, head of Greece's socialist party. Socialism is dependent upon other peoples' money. When the money stream is cut off, they're in deep doo. Tsipras didn't sign up for that. He signed up for gambling on Greece's future to attain better loan terms. Its what he campaigned on. Out of the EU, he might as well turn in his resignation.
+1 David . . .who the fuck is this Tsipras? Communist youth, collegiate idealogue and agitator, then politics far as I can tell.
Must be from Chicago.
So many Marxist writers at ZeroHedge.
All the Germans, Dutch, Finns are doing is making very good products that their customers find to be of very good value.
What would the ZeroHedge socialists have them do? Become less competitive so as to not make the Greeks look bad?
Many here cannot see past the Eurocrats and banksters.
The hard working northerners are invisible to them.
This is becoming like "The Ransom of Red Chief". Just give the Greeks 500 billion if they will go away and stay away. Probably would be far cheaper in the long run.
The only reason Northern Europe has avoided crisis is its tremendous trade surplus gained at the expense of the periphery: Spain, Greece, Portugal, Italy, Ireland, etc. Given the vagaries of the corrupt debt-as-money system, the moment the export revenues stop flowing into the north the interest payments to the bankers will have to be financed by more and more domestic debt. Eventually this will cause the Northern European economy to collapse in an ever-increasing spiral of deflation and contraction, just as we are seeing in Greece right now. Had the Greeks and other peripheral countries bowed out of this earlier Germany would have failed as well.
The periphery has financed the debts of the center for so long, that by rights Germany, France and UK should be forgiving the Greek debt at the very least. In the long term the need to end the debt-backed monetary system and move to sovereign money, issued either by the state or a democratic supranational entity (a reformed EU). Moreover, in the spirit of European cooperation, the central countries should have encouraged the growth of exporting industries in the periphery by way of foreign investment in manufacturing, tourism, etc. Instead they encouraged a FIRE-based economy in the peripheral countries (with all the money winding up in the City of London) to create bank money there and keep them, for a time, at the tip of the debt money pyramid scheme.
That scheme is now falling apart.
Bullshit. They have robust economies that export all over the world. They don't exclusively rely on PIIG patronage.
Europeon Union. You can check in but you can't check out. And no-the first word is not misspelled.
This is a comment a socialist/marxist would make.
This is a comment a socialist/marxist would make.
this is what amazes me people don't seem to get - all the coverage here in us keeps talking in terms of poker (guy on npr literally said: "greece is betting like they have four aces")?!? this is not two people at a table w/cards & chips - it's one person w/a glock pointed at another w/a suicide vest! yes, greece (whether they realize/intend it or not) is threatening to blow themselves up but germany, brussels (& rest of eu for that matter) is acting like they aren't all in the same small conference room if/when the greeks decide to go collect their virgins...
Why do you think Merkel talks about a haircut (not)? Why talk about a haircut if the possibility doesn't exist? The fact that she talks about it means she has already looking in the mirror to visualize it. Merkel is a greedy whore caught in the same room with the john who has 4 aces. Compromise is the only solution or kaboom, the EU becomes a cloud of dust.
Merkel could learn a thing or two from Tsipras. She should hold a referendum on her need for a haircut.
Clever! The old 'the people have spoken' routine.
What purpose would that serve, when the answer is already known? The Greek vote called by Tsipras was a dumbshit diplomatic move, basically poking all their creditors with a sharp stick. The results speak for themselves.
For Merkel to give the german people the chance to poke back . . .this is the difference between the risk of financial contagion and political contagion.
Assumptions are the mother of all screw ups. You, a nothing, speak for the German population. How so? The Germans have 2 options, loose money or loose money. A referendum will simple explain those options. Why did you not listen to Neil Farge?
Perhaps you need a lesson in reality and game play. Who cares about contagion of fiscal or political nature, both will run parallel and the germans et al all catch both diseases.
zh, waterboarding is treacherous and looks like even you are feeling the pain watching it... these are sensitive moments... so use discretion. Do not judge Tsipras or Merkel. They know how to judge themselves. The fact is I am yet to hear one coherent argument about what justice should be.
what do you want ... now this is very provocative and irresponsible - "how Tsipras can return home without being lynched by a mob is beyond"
Why we blame Germany for Greek problems. Greeks asked for money and money was loaned to them. That money has to be paid. Like everybody payes their credit cards or credit lines.
If Greeks wanted to live with someone else money, now they have to pay the price.
It's that simple. It's not Germany or creditors fault about situation where Greece is now.
Have you ever heard of responsible lending? Both lender and borrower need to be responsible. Lender should be even more responsible because they stand to loose the most when they are irresponsible. These loans to Greece irresponsible political driven loans. They went o\to the casino and they lost. To bad, one would have thought that a hard line greedy con would have understood the consequences. Sit down Mrs Merkel its time for that haircut, be a leader, now pay the price.
Perhaps you could explain this morally regal notion of "responsible lending" to my bookie.
Try starting with "bad debt".
After that, start a loan company and learn the hard way.
Bookies dont loan money, they borrower it from fools.
Many do not pay.
For any number of reasons they cannot.
When your income is too low because you are one of millions who were FUCKED by the system,
you file for bankruptcy, it's what is done.
Creditors get a haircut .
Its all about Germany because the German Elite put the German taxpayer on the hook so those elites could sip tepid plonk and rubber chicken as good Europeans with all the others in Brussells. Sure, Club Med would blow that money but how bad could it be?
Why we blame Germany for Greek problems. Greeks asked for money and money was loaned to them. That money has to be paid. Like everybody payes their credit cards or credit lines.
If Greeks wanted to live with someone else money, now they have to pay the price.
It's that simple. It's not Germany or creditors fault about situation where Greece is now.
Greece is stuck in Germany’s own internal squabbles, and that more than anything illustrates how broken the system is. It was never supposed to be like that. No European leader in their right mind would ever have signed up for that."
Wrong.
Germany is, perhaps rightfully so, struggling with throwing more at a decrepit ship of state. As far as the German people are concerned, I'm not sure I blame them.
Greece has been misled for a long time, and that Tsipras is clearly not up to the job, and is very confusing in his actions, so are the Greeks. They want their cake (social free-spending government, autonomy, and external aid, with very few concessions of import), and to eat it too. It's like asking a credit card company to extend more credit on an account in default, without new, growing income to repay old debt. Ain't likely gonna happen, especially if you need the credit more than the creditor needs you, as, argueably, in the case with the German people-part of the EU, seems to be the case.
No matter what happens to Greece, things are going to have to change...DRAMATICALLY.
Greece doesn't want to change...too much...cause...it'll hurt.
THAT'S the main problem here, and Greece (or anyone else, for that matter) cannot possibly break free of a corrupt economic system, like the EU, UNTIL THEY decide who THEY want to be, and WHAT THEY are willing to do/endure for it...THEMSELVES.
Tsipras is a snake oil salesman because Greece believes a snake oil existence is possible, at someone else's expense. Sooner or later, a very painful message will be delivered to them, whether they like it or not.
I've said all along that I support the Greek people, as long as they are willing to reform themselves. No one is asking for miracles overnight. But the way forward is not the way it has been, anymore than Tsipras is the guide forward.
Until I see REAL determination on GREECE'S part, no further waste of my time is needed in support of the "cause" they embrace.
What's it gonna be Greece?
At this point, it's about YOU, not the EU (as bad an idea as it is). Make a valiant decision, or YOU face the consequences ALONE.
m
+1 Well said.
Total joke. Everyone knows absent huge debt write off just a waste of time. Germany does not want to pY the benefits it gets from a currency too cheap based on her economy and Greece is fucked because euro way too strong for her to get out of economic hell. Can't have austerity without huge currency depreciation.
Read the piece carefully, and can't understand the conclusion that Varoufakis "will be badly, badly needed for Greece going forward"...
He can spread the word to all the Greeks that they have to go along with the plan or their families will be killed.
My understanding of that comment is this. Tsipras has just climbed down and basically given the Eu what it wants. He basically has given up or he intends to just take the bail out money and delay the inevitable consequences. This guy Varoufakis is a genius and is still pulling the strings. This is exactly his MO.
And so we can see the terminal result of a diplomacy in which substance trumps style.
The participants in modern diplomacy are either hand-wringers (a la most of the EU) or chest-thumpers (a la Tsipras, Obama).
There is no George Kennan, or Dulles, or Churchill in this century. Vlad rubs hands in glee.
There are a lot of complicit parties to this debacle but there are some clear points that should be made: 1. German citizens should not be required to foot the bill for a failed nation, and, 2. Greece needs to get real about its failed socialist policies. I don't give a shit about banks or governments, I care about people. Real leaders let their people know that nothing in life is free and that if you want a prosperous life you must work for it. Politicians who give away favors to get elected aren't leaders, they are parasites. Ultimately when there is nothing left to give then the cycle of growing debt is perpetuated until it can last no more or until there is a revolution. The world's current debt cycle can go on infinitely if the central banks coordinate, but then the wealth disparity will continue to grow unless they tax the producers more and more and redistribute that wealth in which case the risk takers will stop taking risks as there is no reward. One way or another this fails in a huge way: either it implodes or there's a revolution. But one thing is for sure, there will untold human suffering in the process.
Real leaders let their people know that nothing in life is free . . .
Somehow I don't see that as a campaign platform anytime soon.
Tsipras just want the $59.9 billions form the rest of Europe. Greece will never pay the $320 that already ows plus these ones. After they get the money they will dance the Zorba one and fuck Europe and Angela.
Exactly, the Greeks sing and dance, thats their business and the Germans make machinery and torture nations. The Greeks win this time but many others have paid a big price.
One more piece of blatant Germany bashing and socialist paper-over approach. It is certainly correct that Germany (and other Eurozone states not to forget) finds itself in a conundrum, but the only way out, in my opinion is to let the Eurozone go and let Germany exit. Not anybody else.
The only reason Germany has kept ahead of its interest payments (public and private) is the massive inflow of export revenues from the peripheral countries, which take on debt as someone has to do in a debt-backed money system. Now that the peripheral countries are close to collapse Germany will have to play the self-eating debt-backed monetary system game and pay interest with more borrowed money magicked into existence by banks. This will lead to the collapse of the German economy just like it wrecked Italy, Spain and the rest.
Germany, France and the UK have only just managed to remain at the top of the pyramid scheme known as debt money. Their time will come soon and their people are unprepared.
Aren't they kept afloat by backdoor cash swaps with US fed bank magic printer money?
The banks certainly are, in every country.
Here's my best guess: the deal behind the scenes is with the US, which won't allow Greece to separate from NATO nor to cut back on military spending. The US will secretly help Greece financially but won't tell anybody because then the other PIIGS would rush to the US trough for their own bailouts. (I'm just trying to be entertaining -- I know the GIPSIs are victims of bankster-oligarch exploitation.)
The gravy train has reached its final stop. Food will no longer be served. Get off the train. Roll up your sleaves and get to work. Look around everything is broken! Start fixing/cleaning up this mess.
The European Socialist Union is based on socialism. Banks push socialism. Didn't know I was a socialist. I believe God and the Bible. Since when does socialism favor God the Bible?
Wasn't jesus a socialist? Not to mention an illegal immigrant.
He was more of a conservative liberal, and his theology was strangely Buddhist in nature. Certainly not Judaic in any sense.
Or is Buddhist theology Jesus-like in nature?
consistent refusal to allow any leniency towards the Greeks that is blowing the currency union to smithereens.
Maybe, but how can Greece get a debt write down when Spain, Italy, Ireland and others have not gotten any relief. They will be clammering for a write down the minute Greece is given debt relief. The the EU is toast, total toast. All the banks go down, and states will have to print their own money, or fake Euros.
Germany's Merkel is in office because she was placed there by Washington. She would never have office had Washington not insisted on her or a similar clone. The EU project may have been economic to start, a free trade zone, but the EU SUper State is now a plaything of Washington, and NATO political backbone. Washington wants this EU super state as it's plaything to turn against Russia and get two birds killed with one stone. An EU and Russia war destroys Russia and lays waste the EU, leaving America free to attack China, and the only real economic power in the world other than China. A repeat of 1945.
Europeans are too stupid to see they are puppets of a deep state neocon world empire, and that the EU super state is a means to crush Russia without the USA getting it's homeland dirty. Imagine Poland and Russia starting to fight, the Poles egged on by Obama, this would turn into a NATO Russia conflict in a heartbeat, Washington will egg the sides on to ever greater fighting, all the while sending just enough to keep it going.
The EU is now a bunch of chumps, too stupid to see their role in the hyper power's game plan.
Stupid Eurochumps. I keed, I keed!
West Europe was annexed to the USA empire after WW2. Germany, like Japan, will do what the master asks them to. What is the interest of the Empire to see problems in his empire. The empire is crumbling and as all empires in the past, it is crumbling at the perifery.
I think Moore's Law says that now the crumbling at the core will be 2x every 6 months. Something along those lines.
Placed there by Washington?
The average German has no knowledge of most of this. They are well kept behind a wall of censorship and sip the morning coffee listening to Deutsch Welle.
Angela Merkel was born in the D.D.R., the Communist portion of Germany in 1954. Her biography says she was born on July 17, 1954, and that she is the daughter of a Lutheran minister from an East German-controlled church. Recently however, Soviet KGB archive files reveal an entirely different story, Stasi GDR files indicate that she was born on April 20th, 1954, and details of her birth were included in the records of the German Dr. Karl Klauberg, who was one of the Nazi “death doctors” convicted by Soviet courts and imprisoned. when he later was recognized as a brilliant scientist, he was released after seven years and was recognized as the father of artificial insemination.
The Soviets were even more intrigued when they discovered Dr. Klauberg had preserved frozen samples of the sperm of Adolf Hitler. The forces of darkness in high places decided to try to produce a child from Hitler’s sperm, obviously for occult and illuministic purposes. Dr. Klauberg then brought the youngest sister of Eva Braun (Hitler’s wife) whose name was Gretl, to Eastern Germany, and the result of the experiment produced not a biological son of Hitler, but rather a daughter amazingly, Adolf Hitler was born on April 20th, 1889, and Angela Merkel was born on April 20th, 1954. (April 20th is 11 days before the witches high sabot of Beltaine) Angela becamed a custodian of the catholic church through its connections with East German Lutheran Church. Once a German Pope would take the Roman throne, Angela Merkel was to also take her biological father’s position as German Chancellor. On April 20th, 2005, the Nazi Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI, (16th), precisely on the 116th birthday of Adolf Hitler. Then on November 22nd, 2005, Hitler’s biological daughter, Angela Merkel was elected Chancellor of Germany. The day of that election, November 22nd, was the anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin’s Origin of the Species, which is an antichrist publication denying the Creator of the universe.
If the Soviet record is true, (it is trust me, editor’s note) the evidence is strong, it opens up some amazing possibilities. The undeniable daft is that Angela Merkel came from obscurity to triumviral power as German Chancellor, President of the European Union, and head of the powerful G-8 economic cartel. When I began to do research on this, I discovered that Hitler’s father, who took the name of Hitler, was the illegitimate son of a Rothschild mistress whose last name was Schicklgruber. The etymology of the name Hitler reveals that the name means a shepard who lives in a hut. The name Adolf from Old German means noble wolf. Thus, his combined name indicates that he was the Shepherd Wolf, or false shepherd. Strangely enough, Pope Ratzinger, or Benedict XVI, also has the title of Shepherd of the church, and since he took office, the roman catholic church has had a German shepherd. Incidentally, that breed of dog resembles a wolf. We also know that Adolf Hitler nicknamed himself Herr Wolf. His East Prussian headquarters was called Wolfsschanze; his head quarters in France was called Wolfsschlucht, and his headquarters in the Ukraine was called werewolf. Will the powerful European Union become the new world order and the Fourth Reich? Only God knows.
One more interesting point is that Chancellor Angela Merkel has an unusual obsession with the works of the occult composer Richard Wagner, who was a satanist. She made her obsession known in an interview with the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in July 2005. Wagner wrote the infamous composition called Parsifal, which is purely occult and demonic. Parsifal was a favorite of Adolf Hitler as well, and Hitler stated that the music of Wagner occupied his mind. Angela Merkel, like Adolf Hitler, is deeply fascinated with Wagner’s Ride of the Valkries. The valkries were minor female deities that would ride through every battle to gather the most valiant of the slain and carry them off to a place called Valhalla where they would wait to join the army of Odin in the last battle at the end of the world. Is this woman, Angela Merkel, being used of Satan to marshal the forces for the last battle called Armageddon? It is interesting to note that Chancellor Merkel has exactly the same eyes as Chancellor Hitler, and she bears a striking resemblance to him except for the little moustache, of course.
I'm sure that's it.
J Jason +1 for snark sark!
* Snark sark transltes in old German to roughly "Hitler died sipping a Mojito in Cuba circa 1958"
"she bears a striking resemblance to him except for the little moustache, of course." Her moustache is quite superior, IMHO. Great story, man! WOW
So at which part did Elvis come back again ??
"Chancellor Merkel has exactly the same eyes as Chancellor Hitler, and she bears a striking resemblance to him except for the little moustache, of course."
If you saw the nude photo of her posted a few days ago on ZH, you would realize that she has quite a large mustache.
"Europeans are too stupid to see they are puppets of a deep state neocon world empire, and that the EU super state is a means to crush Russia without the USA getting it's homeland dirty."
The US may not want to get its homeland dirty, but if a real war breaks out, there will be bright lights seen in the sky all over the US.
Would this be a reverse Maidan? Instead of boneheads wanting to be in the EU it's angry mobs wanting out of the EU.
Maybe Victoria Nuland, Geoffrey Pyatt and John McCain can work the crowds and hand out sandwiches and cookies.
Fuck the EU!
Don't forgeet the CIA funded snipers, but who would they be told to take out, its getting confusing
dupe of above. Sorry
Ha ha ha!!! I doubt that all the burocrats of the EU will give up their privileged positions so easily. The USA is the same, as well as everywhere else.
Condider the ECB... I think 2,300 people with huge salaries and powerful seats... where are they going to find a relocating job and the same set of privileges?
Not to mention the 10 of thousands working for the commission and the European Parliament directly or indirectly... why would they give up?
If government and oligarchs were not blinded by their own stupidity, greed and enslaving power, they could back down and fix things... but history teaches us they will not. So untill a crytical mass is reached and things go South... they will not be able to use any clear judgement, they will not be able to fix anything. Looking back at history they will be simply tossed out when the time is right, and at the expenses of millions of lives... unfortunately. The next couple of years will be interesting (IF we are going to have a couple of years, of course...)
I wished humans could be smarter, but evidently they are not. Too much of an Hegelian vision of history?
;-)
and from what I can see, even if the US backed the Euro system, it is pretty clear that lately they changed their mind on the monetary union. Or better... some financial gurus are waiting to get the spoils of a crumbling system. Like in all bankrupcies cases, the liquidators make tons of money...
;-)
eh...
At least when things go south in Greece they will already be there.
"It’s nice and all to claim you’re right about something, but if your being right produces utter misery for millions of others, you’re still wrong."
Never a truer word was spoken (that I know of).
Right fucking on! Grat no BS article. 10 out of 10
When the pain of failing to reform their free-spending government to live within their means is greater that the pain of no longer living on someone-elses' money, Germany will no longer be an issue for Greece, because they will have the will to solve their own problem.
Right now they want others to solve it for them.
France, Italy and Spain have the TBTF status bankers covet.
Unconditional bailouts all round with bonuses.
TBTF: To Bloated to Fuck.
Agree Perfectly, good piece.
Schauble told Lew he wants to exchange Greece with Puerto Rico, up his own ass or what?
By the way, You cannot possiby be Greek... Whats a guy like you doing in a place like that? :)
Up till now the Greek leadership treated us with suprises. Nobody could predict the next step.
Game theory... and a professor on a bike.... Vrooom and gone.
suprise suprise..... to the next step.
A parallel currency.. the Drachma.. Brussels is laughing its pants (usa trousers) down to the ankles.
But suprise suprise and behold.... the gold drachma... it might crush the EURO system.
Putins ultimate guerrilla weapon !
As we should with most government constructs on this planet, blow it the fk up.
Nuke it from orbit, just to be sure.
Gonna call BS here:
"But in the present structure, if one country runs such surpluses, others will need to run equally insane deficits."
That is not BS; look what happened to the German Bund; it went negative because Draghi was buying bonds (EU QE) and since the Germans had no need to issue new debt; the Draghi bond buying sent the German Bund into negative territory. German savers were once again punished for success; sound familiar...it should because it is what the "Central Plans" are all about. Now they have run out of saps to suck and are eating their own tails. This ends real bad and many people are going to be hurt as many have already, but the scale will get much larger as this spreads.
"Truly, were the countries of Germany and Greece to join forces against their common bankster enemies, everything would change on the Continent in a day and a night."
Good read here: European Union Morphs Into The ‘3rd Reich’ Using Germany As The Enforcer
http://themillenniumreport.com/2015/07/merkels-germany-dominates-entire-...
Excellent! One of the best articles I've read on the subject!
private central banking - private entities printing the public currency as a loan at interest - is *the* problem...
but Ron Paul and others have tried in vain to get Americans, particularly "liberals" to understand why this is a bad deal.
Apparently, since the arguments involved the Constitution, this turned the statist Left off. The Left is allergic to mention of the Constitution because it means limits on the power of .gov to force you to do something with your life, liberty, or property which the Left feels you ought to be forced to do...
So, we are left with a system in the US, and ultimately, in Europe, where the usual suspects, large transnational banks and banking dynasties print pieces of paper demanding it back + interest from people who have to exchange labor for that paper...
This absurd Babylonian Pharisaical Money Magick...
it must be destroyed. It is not the only problem in the world, but it just may be the leading problem.
How to get the Left to understand why the Fed is "regressive"?
Then again, the Left has begun to lose its mind. First, the Tea Party was blamed for everything in the world, now they got on this flag shit as they continue to ignore Chicago and Detroit and St. Louis and other shitholes.
'Cuz the flag can't shoot back.
yoy stated; "private entities printing the public currency as a loan at interest - is *the* problem..." Fiat moeny is the problem. These institutions wether private or not have the concent of the government. Return to sound money and free markets that's the solution. Only one problem, no moeny to be made by the parasites and scam artists! Can't have that.
you can tax us to the heavens or sodomise us but money we dont have.
www.truthinaccounting.org
The truth will set you free.
To even form a logical picture of what is going on, one needs to divorce themselves of this idea that Washington is calling the shots. Washington is a pawn in what you see happening on the world scene. Does anyone really believe that Hilliary, Obama, Pelosi, Crazy McCain et al are making police? Please!
When it is stated these machinations are to benefit "Washington". How is that? How does losing soldiers in wars and being 18 trillion in debt benefit Washington? Like they say, follow the money and the United States happens to owe 18 trillion dollars and counting.
Europpean media loves to blame Washington but they know the man behind the curtain is in the City of London, the vatican and several Rothschild banking centers who just happen to be the banker for London and Rome.
"Someone Pull The Plug or This Will End In War."
Done!
NO DEAL; NO BAILOUT! Greece to Exit EURO on Sunday, banks & Businesses already told SWITCH TO DRACHMA; CDS Unwind imminent:
http://investmentwatchblog.com/no-deal-no-bailout-greece-to-exit-euro-on...
Cuba went through their "Special Period" when the Russians pulled out. Without having the entitlements "Daddy" Russia had been providing, the "kids" had to make due on their own. Apparently, life was Hell the first few years, but after time, when "EVERYONE" was force fed living within their means, Cuba became one of the most sustainable and healthiest countries in the world. They don't have the "toys" like Americans have, and, whereas one out of every three Americans is Obese, cubans are lean, living on Organic Foods grown in their back yards. Life is not exactly easy in Cuba but cubans are no longer co-dependent on outside help and have an inner contentment that fewer and fewer Americans seem to possess. Eventually, we are ALL headed towards our "Special Period" and Greece appears to be next in line. When that happens in America, and that day is coming, and access to gmo-junk (fast) food and Rx drugs is cut off, it's gonna' get downright medieval in the streets.
"Greece is not an abstract exercise in some textbook, and it’s not a computer game either. Greece is about real people getting hurt. And if you refuse to act to alleviate that hurt, that defines you as a sociopath."
Fuck you. Greece is responsible for their own problems, no one else. If you live in Greece and don't like the system move to Germany like many Greek professionals are.
and everywhere else that is indebted up to their necks? Fuck them too? Does that include the country you are in? Includes me in sunny old London.
Greece is the first major countries to exhibit Debt Disease as I call it. Most other places have got it and are going to have a shit load of problems.
It is not the average person's fault...I think that is the general feeling. Normal people are getting ass raped for the actions of a few politicians and bankers. Bend over.
Well, looky at all the "normal people getting ass raped." They are creditors all.
If you expect Medicare bennies in old age, you are a creditor. You feel you are "owed."
If you expect SS bennies in old age, you are a creditor. This too, you are "owed."
Government employee who expects a pension? You loaned your past to the government, in exchange for your future.
This is what I would call irresponsible lending. Big fuckin' mistake! Anybody up for a haircut?
I want mine "High and Tight".
I thought Greeks ran Greece. How wrong I was....
I think he's fully aware of it. Maybe behind the scenes there are people that promised to support Greece if they ditch the EU.
Greece was the first domino to fall. If a Grexit happen that's just the final nail in the coffin for the Euro.
Yanis will be badly, badly needed for Greece going forward. They need someone to figure out where to go from here.
Just like Europe needs someone to figure out how to deconstruct Brussels without the use of heavy explosives. Because there are just two options here: either the EU will -more or less- peacefully fall apart, or it will violently blow apart.
Another complete essay of criticism with no recognition of how the problem originated and what system could be instituted to resolve it, or at least carry on without making it worse.
The problem is government ... in this case Greek government ... but they're all the same. They are irresponsible traders. They make trading promises and don't deliver on them. They rollover these trading promises (DEFAULT) without collecting INTEREST equal to those DEFAULTS. They are now left with stiffing their trading partners or continuing the charade.
At the very least, the Euro should become a "properly managed Medium of Exchange (MOE)". Failing that (which they of course will), Greece will have to create their own internal MOE ... and it "must" be properly managed or it will blow up too.
What can't be saved is the Greek government's largess. It must be reduced in size radically.
Who makes war ?
Not the people... but their governments.
In war times the president, prime minster, should lead......
we will watch them from the trenches.
Who lends 5 bucks to a wino, twice?
The EU was a ponzi set up so bankers could control the currencies to their advantage. Most of what they loan is invented by them, because they now control the electronic printing press.Doesnt mean someone didnt have to perform real work to get the currency into circulation, but the currency no longer correlates to goods and services, but political needs expressed as goods and services
Greeks dont control the electronic printing press. They have to pay interest using tax collections, which somewhat correlates to real wealth. Greeks are repaying ponzi currency with sweat currency
The rats at the top will never stop the game as long as they can still cash in ponzi chips for real wealth. The suckers at the bottom will not quit until they are ruined and forced out
The EU promised socialist utopia. For the ponzi to end, the people would have to reject utopia. They wont do that until the free stuff runs out
EU-bians still pretend the invading swarms of boat people from Africa are 'immigrants' and not invaders. This is a symptom of cultural psychosis: the lack of the instinct for survival.
No sane person would open his pantry to an unlimited mouse population
No sane person would trust the cat with the mouse
No sane person would trade liberty for a promise of security