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Right Now In Greece
While the market is finally figuring out what was obvious about 12 hours ago, that even if, and that is a big IF because Pasok has made it clear it will not join ND outright, there is some coalition government formed it will most likely last all of a few weeks before the whole charade has to be repeated once more as the entire plan is to keep Greece without a government as its last assets are plundered via the Greek "rescue vehicle", events in Greece are once again going through their preset moves. Below, courtesy of Athens News is what is happening in the Greek capital today. Needless to say, if the headline comes that Samaras is unable to form a government, watch out below.
From Athens News:
12.55pm Antonis Samaras has received the exploratory mandate to form a government from the president. Speaking to the press at his meeting with the president, Samaras said:
I will try to form a government with the pro-European parties. We have to make the necessary amendments to the programme so that our people will get out of unemployment and out of the hardships that Greek households are going through. The new government has to be decisive on the issue of social cohesion. National understanding is imperative.
Responding, Papoulias said:
I want to congratulate you once more for your success and to underline that there is a great need for the formation of a government. The country cannot stay not even one hour without a government. I wish you every success in the effort that you are doing for the formation of a government.
12.50pm At noon, caretaker Prime Minister Panagiotis Pikrammenos tendered his government's resignation to President of the Republic Karolos Papoulias. The caretaker government will remain in office until the new government is sworn in.
12.35pm Antonis Samaras will meet with Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras at 2pm in parliament and with Pasok's Evangelos Venizelos at 6pm, New Democracy has announced
* * *
And perhaps most importantly, Germany will not renegotiate contrary to more stupid rumors:
1.40pm After two leading German politicians called for some easing of the deadlines for Greece to meet its memorandum targets (see 10.15am), a government spokesman has said that Germany does not believe the time is right for granting Greece any leeway or additional time on its reform commitments.
"It's decisive now for the troika to be convinced that Greece will stick to its agreements and fully implement the agreed reforms. Now is not the time for any kind of discounts to Greece," said deputy government spokesman Georg Streiter. Asked about whether there was any room for giving Greece extra time to meet its reform targets, as suggested by German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle earlier on Monday, Streiter said: "We stand by what has been agreed."
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Who(or what) counts the votes in Greece?
From what I've read elsewhere the results we've been given are "official projections."
from:
Greek Voters Decide to Accept Austerity
so the establishment parties snatch victory according to official projections...
there's a shocker.
The reason I ask "who counts the votes in Greece" is that I note that SCYTL("election management") has an office in Athens...
NICE TRY - but untrue. to quote a fellow ZeroHead who's nick is zuuuueri that wrote this here 2535683 :
"Paper ballots in greece and the counting is done in a very distributed and transparent way, each election district is responsible for its own counting, any parties who have candidates in that election send representatives, and overall vote counting is an affair in relatively local hands.
Corrupting an individual polling station's count might not be too difficult for a well organized local effort to compromise all the people involved there, but doing this on any meaningful scale is going to be very difficult and show up in the disparity between exit polls and vote counts immediately. You would be surprised how strong the general feeling in the public is about some things, given the condition of the country. The concept of legitimacy is still very strong in greece. By this i mean the idea that some things are public affairs and must be decided legitimately in a public way. If there was a publicly legitimate blessing (not just a widespread sentiment) about rounding up every politician and putting him in prison, the army would be out there doing it ten minutes later. But at the moment, there is still not a perception through the country that it would be a legitimate move. Perhaps i'm not doing a good job explaining this, but i get the impression that ingreece, compared to other countries i've gotten to know, the importance of the blessing of the public - not the possession of force and not even the letter of the law, since the law itself can fail to get the peoples' blessing - is a stronger factor in greek society than elsewhere in the west i have seen.
As a contrasting example, in the US, there is a great deal of attention paid to the letter of the law, both by those in power and those in protest. People there are indignant about laws being broken and seek to construct technically precise legal justifications for or against some action. In greece this is not sufficient in the society, for a mandate to rule. Nor is breaking some laws automatically going to revoke the mandate. The importance placed on a legitimate process for the giving or revocation of the mandate is very strong in greek society.the concept that it does really come from the people and nowhere else is also still a very strong one in the society.
And so, so far, while it might surprise people further west, where diebold voting for you is rammed down peoples throats wrapped in a sheet of 'technically not illegal' or some such thing, in greece vote counting is pretty free from tampering.
People in greece _are_ across the country very angry that the mechanisms they are familiar with dont seem to be working properly anymore (no shit), but they have a much higher threshold of tolerance before they will abandon the mechanism currently seen as legitimate, than in a lot of other places.
From another point of view, though, all of this is less important these days than who controls the media, let's not forget."
That's why I asked a question designated by this symbol ? because I didn't know. I did not state that SCYTL ran the election, just that they have an office in Athens.
Thanks for your input and I hope that's true. I only wish that we in the U.S. still had a transparent paper balloting (and tallying) system.
Having said that, even if one votes on a paper ballot, that doesn't mean it isnt optically scanned and electronically tallied. Which is not secure...I don't give a damn what they tell you.
I agree completely about the "who controls the media" thing.
btw SCYTL will be tallying some of the American votes in the upcoming election...
that from:
FOREIGN COMPANY BUYS U.S. ELECTION RESULTS REPORTING FIRM+1 - last time I followed an election in Greece (quite a while ago) the system was electronic-free: only purely physical paper in cardboard ballots.
every election room was first searched by the committee (where every party sends volunteers and everyone can volunteer, even if not belonging to a party). then the ballot is searched (for emptiness). then the voting register (in book form) is checked. then voting starts. and then the count begins, and every piece of paper is scrutinized by every volunteer, who keeps count.
it is tamper-proof
go physical, bitchez
You mean Scytl, the Spanish company associated with George Soros, that will be counting votes in the US election this fall? Looks like Greece won't be the only election where tptb win this year...
http://www.dailypaul.com/228915/spanish-company-owned-by-geo-soros-will-count-americas-votes-overseas-in-november
I think its a crime that voting software isn't "open source"
+1 and I think that the old fashioned physical ballots are a mainstay of democracy. everything else can be explained as "tampered", which is defeating, in the long run
I completely agree with both of you. IF we must have voting software, it needs to scrutinized by everyone, and Open Source would allow that. However, I too still prefer paper ballots
Disentchanted (apt name), what exactly did you and everybody else actually expect from Greece? The (relative) majority is conservative, particularly outside of the big cities. The big political change was that part of the socialists found a new vehicle/party for their views.
This was the right decision. The older generations of Greek citizens have led the young by offsetting their misguided votes for anti-bailout parties like Syriza. These older people are wise - they understand what got Greece into this situation in the first place (Credit Default Swaps and short sellers of government debt), and now they are going t osupport the changes necesary to restore prosperity to Greece once again.
I needed a good laugh and you provided it with your sarcasm, thank you!
This MDB guy really is swift. CDS and short sellers of govt debt got them in this crisis?? Really? Why would people be short selling the debt if they were in anywhere near a solvent position or had an economy structurally prepared to deal with downturns?? Same as saying the life-long smoker with terminal emphysema died as a result of Zyban.
Right now in America... American living in cars and tents.
Maybe the ones going camping. You Idiot.
Americans are so poor they can't afford to go camping. Only the rich can afford that now. People live in their cars and in tents because Bernanke stopped the music and there wasn't enough chairs
Grasping at straws is the newest European trend.
Bullish.
Bullish.
"if the headline comes that Samaras is unable to form a government, watch out below"
I fully expect such bad news to be withheld until EU markets and naturally banks are closed.
Meanwhile the Greek economy continues to collapse whilst everyone does their best to look away..Even tourism has collapsed.
I run a tourism business in the UK. We thought our current acute downturn in business was caused by bad weather but now not so sure. Definite indications across all European tourism of reduced demand.
By the way, just heard that there are major problems in rural areas of Spain with people rustling animals and stealing standing crops.
Long life size fake plastic farm animals
I went to several travel agents last week thinking that I could get a really cheap Greek vacation considering that turism is down and there are loads of Greeks who would desperately want my money. But no, prices have not gone down, it was impossible to get a bargin och to negotiate prices. They are still charging as much for hotelrooms as Germans or Scandinavians even though they are much poorer. Every economicstextbook in the world would say that Greece should be super cheap right now.
The Greeks should be happy for whatever buisness they can get. Getting half of a German's pay is better than getting no pay.
Don't worry the entire Eurozone will be very cheap soon enough.
Thanks for the report and please keep doing so.
Who in their right mind would vote for more political union, when the clowns who were in charge refused to act when they saw -nearly a decade ago- how every country would just ignore the rules.
This catastrophe has been a long time coming; the problem has been that the burocrats in Brussels are incapable of leadership and decisive action.
Now that france has just let us see her socialist underskirts, there are at least three solutions to this, if not solutions at least end-games.
Greece leaves the euro
Germany and the Northern League leave
Greece & Ireland, Hungary starve, Spain, Italy and industrial France go into Japanese hibernation for a decade.
I Hope That I'm Wrong...
Posted 17 hours ago by Michael Chiotinis
http://thegreekperspective.blogspot.nl/2012/06/i-hope-that-i-wrong.html
It seems that New Democracy will be the first party by popular vote with a very small lead.
The best interpretation though of the popular vote is that more than 50% of Greek people want to see the end of IMF control over Greece.
Because of the electoral law, the difference in the number of seats in the parliament between the first two parties means that a coalition government will be formed with the first party (New Democracy) as the core.
The coalition partners will probably be PASOK and/or the Democratic Left.
This leaves what seems to be a minority but what actually is a majority of people that cannot be expressed and that given the circumstances and the dire economic conditions are and will become increasingly desperate.
A difference of 2 percentage points could mean more than the simple determination of the next government, rather it could fundamentally change the course of history.
Not only could it mean unprecedented phenomena of social unrest or worse social explosion,
but a weak pro-austerity government ready to sign whatever the Troika demands will deprive Europe of a chance to find real ways of dealing with the problems and thus save itself.
Exactly the reverse of the mainstream argument,
I believe that the election result as it seems right now, will mean the breakup of the Euro, as a Syriza government could have been the only chance to save it.
Results looks like this if I take the numbers from the official website http://ekloges.ypes.gr/v2012b/public/index.html
votes% - equivalent to seats
29,66% - 129 New Democracy
12,28% - 033 Pasok
06,26% – 017 Democratic Left
48.2% – 179 seats together
26,89% - 071 Syriza
07,51% - 020 Independent Greeks
06,92% – 018 Golden Dawn
04,50% - 012 Greek Communist Party
45.82% – 121 seats together
94.02% take 300 seats total
Other much weaker and in fact undemocratic scenario because 42% rules over 52% while having 162 seats over 138 seats trough the crazy 50+ seats rule:
votes% - equivalent to seats
29,66% - 129 New Democracy
12,28% - 033 Pasok
41.94% – 162 seats together
26,89% - 071 Syriza
07,51% - 020 Independent Greeks
06,92% – 018 Golden Dawn
06,26% – 017 Democratic Left
04,50% - 012 Greek Communist Party
52.08% – 138 seats together
94.02% take 300 seats total
Youri, did I understand you correctly? are you arguing that the multi-party proportional electoral system for 250 seat + the 50 seat bonus for the "first" is undemocratic?
If yes, what is the "first around the post" system used in the UK and US? anti-democracy? there, the first takes it all (the seat)...
Democracy is no longer(if it ever has been) a majority rule, Democracy is a Biggest Minority rule, that is why it's especially dangerous to let in too many foreigneris into your country because if the ever reach a critical mass even like 20-30% they can effectively take over, this ofc also makes it much easier to control the whole country by controling(buying off) the biggest minority wether this minority is ethnical, political, religious does not matter
Azannoth, democracy is the worst way to govern a country, mhkay? The worst. With that little side fact that all the other systems are much worse, by far. (Paraphrased from Churchill, I'm afraid).
Cross that line and you are the enemy.
Interestingly, Athens is regarded as the birthplace of democracy.
Speaking of the U.S. system the Collier brothers wrote a book on this subject that came out in 1992.
Votescam: The Stealing of Americaor you can read some of it online, here:
http://www.constitution.org/vote/votescam__.htm
(the "official site" linked there is a dead link)
Who came up with that lame +50 seats to #1 even if they win by 1 vote?
Oh yeah ND and Pasok. Toally undemocratic.
;-) at that time they had more than 51% of the popular vote.
but again, and how much better or worse is the single-seat first-around-the-post system as used in the UK and US?
"it will most likely last all of a few weeks before the whole charade has to be repeated once more"
~~~
& to think just yesterday I got downvoted for my "Oracle of the Honey Badger" comment...
They are only playing for time till Germany has it's own elections and Merkel is Out and SPD+Green is In, same what happened in France than Germany will be more than happy to renegotiate everything and throw even more german Billions out the window, than all the socialists in Europe will be holding hands together and singing "Kum bay ya" until the Titanic finally sinks
Looks like the Greeks are still holding out for a Marshall Plan with this ND victory...
Will Uncle Sam get his shit together or what...
the stage play of the Bush-Gore election in FLA of counting chads had the main purpose of brain washing the US public that paper ballots were flawed and not workable..inter the diebold voting computers.. so the plan worked here in USA..vote and have NO way to prove what you voted for..simple for the fascist police state the best voting method ever..sick of it all.
This is great news. More Greece. GreeceGreeceGreece all the time. Tell me the same things about Greece over and over, I cannot get enough.
This says it all:
what's next for greece is political assasinations, and murder, and arson. Voting with Violence.
the election was rigged. no one in their right mind in greece is voting status quo. the polls are lies, and there's come's a period where the lies become more translucent. I think in greece, that period has arrived. voting is at once necessary to show one's opinion, and at once, a distraction from the truth that the manner in which one's opinion is tallied up is a control fraud.
there's only one way to fight control---by any means necessary. vote with violence.
To me, it is obvious the Greek media will first smear the violence, than try and cover it up and pretend it isn't happening, then eventually they will have their tianenmen square. athens will come to a grinding halt.
You could be right but I would need some data to confirm your opinion.
A more likely story would be that that hopey-changey stuff is all well and good if it will not materially effect your ability to buy food and pay for housing, but in such dire circumstances that exist in Greece at present, I can easily see how dancing with the devil you know may be more appealing than having the money spigot turned off abruptly.
Nothing changes the fact that Greece's finances are hopeless and postponing the enevitable default is preferable to the alternative.
Greeks are hoping that Germany will be willing to buy them time.
I'm not certain that German taxpayers consider that a bargain to jump on. I wouldn't.
The only difference between dope dealers and bankers is in intelligence.
Dope dealers don't give unlimited credit.
Greece is under Martial Law, and will become a prison labor death camp unless the people overpower the cops and remove their captors from office
I know what you mean, but I am not sure that we can change many things. We will see what will be in Greece
Anyone that actually believes that the elections are anthing other than a staged hollywood show...