StoneHappyMonday
Bluelighter
- Joined
- May 10, 2001
- Messages
- 18,084
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this a good easy to understand rundown of what exactly has happened to greece https://truthandsatire.wordpress.co...-biggest-lie-you-are-being-told-by-the-media/
And more understanding from Owen Jones
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/06/greece-democracy-europe-eu
From the cradle of democracy, a lion has roared. It is difficult to overstate the pressure the Greek people have both endured and defied. A country that has already experienced an austerity-induced economic disaster with few precedents among developed nations in peacetime has suffered a sustained campaign of economic and political warfare. The European Central Bank – which has only recently deigned to publish some of the minutes of its meetings – capped liquidity for Greek banks, driving them to the verge of collapse. There were stringent capital controls, and desperate queues outside banks followed. A country desperate to stay within the euro was told it would be ejected, and with calamitous results.
Martin Schulz, the European parliament’s president and a so-called social democrat, whose attitude towards democracy can be generously described as ambiguous, called for the removal of Greece’s elected government in favour of a technocratic government.
It wasn’t bluster. That’s what the EU and the markets previously pulled off in Greece and, yes, in Italy: however much justifiable distaste exists for Silvio Berlusconi, it should have been his own people who removed him. In Greece itself, the oligarch-owned “free media” acted as a political machine (sound familiar?), pumping out relentless propaganda in favour of capitulating to the creditors’ demands. An alliance between Greece’s economic elite and the EU great powers told the Greek people: however tough your lives have been in the last few years, your world will cave in unless you acquiesce. And still the Greek people voted no – not narrowly, but overwhelmingly.
It was Goldman Sachs who helped the then Greek government to cook the country’s books to win entry into the euro. It was German and French banks who profitably and recklessly lent to Greece, just as US banks disastrously showered subprime mortgages on low-paid Americans. It was Germany who benefited from being able to export its consumer goods to peripheral European countries such as Greece.
After the crash, Greece was forced to implement measures that sent debt hurtling to 180% of GDP, doubled poverty, left a quarter of Greeks and over half of young people without work, raised the suicide and infant mortality rate, left many without healthcare, and shrunk the economy by a quarter. Precious little of the bailouts went to Greece; instead they went to the European banks that had recklessly lent in the first place.
Syriza was a revolt against this Europe of austerity and corporate power, in favour of a democratic, socially progressive Europe. Podemos in Spain is part of this revolt, as is Sinn Féin in Ireland. If the referendum had produced a yes, then it would have represented a potentially terminal defeat for this gathering pan-European revolt. Instead, it has now been emboldened. Unfortunately the EU elites are not stupid, and realise this. They fear – justifiably – that if Syriza is seen to win concessions, the rebellion will spread. The resignation of Yanis Varoufakis is almost certainly part of an attempt to allow them to save face and do a deal.
The EU still wishes to make an example of the country: by forcing Syriza to implement policies that will destroy the government, by making “the economy scream” (to quote Henry Kissinger) until it is ejected from office, or even a disastrous default and removal from the eurozone. It may still succeed. And that is why Greece desperately needs support.
Educate yourselves. The fight is on.
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