after the Greeks ...

[anyroads]

I guess a country gets the government it deserves........

That is why the UK has a Conservative Government !!!


anyroads

[anyroads]

I see now where ..

"Greece set to sue over threat of euro exit "

Surely if you are a member of a "club" you should abide by its rules ?


anyroads

[Lavanda]

Do you expect that only the poor and little countries should abide by the rules while the rich, powerful banks and politicians break every rule they ever make up as they went along? Either you are not reading across the press, both left and right wing, or you are just cherry-picking. Greece, like so many other Mediterranean countries was jogging along — chaotically but nicely — before the Euro Experiment. Then they joined up to play with the Big Boys. Greece joined under false colours and everyone knew it but gave them lots of pretty money to play with anyway. Then they gave them more money to pay back the money they were first given. And so on. All this talk of money for 'the Greeks' misses the point that the money is not for the Greeks but for the banks. Just how cynical do you like your politics to be served up?

[katy]

Does anyone remember when individual people were getting into debt at alarming rates. Some were given high spending limits by banks. Who was blamed for these debts...the banks of course.

Looks as if plans are afoot in Brussels to replace the Greek Government. I seem to remember something similar a few years ago when Italy was not toeing the line. They got an unelected PM. Worrying

[Lavanda]

Exactly, Katy! Spot on! The risks to Democracy and the voice of the people getting fainter and fainter are the real worry here. 5od the money!

[anyroads]

That's all right then, because...

Bailout Number 3 is just around the corner.
4 anyone ? ( Oh, the Greeks will have that ! )

anyroads

[Lavanda]

No! The Greeks will not have that. The banks will!

[anyroads]

The problem is..

When you have a bunch of clowns in charge, you have a circus !

anyroads

[Lavanda]

We can agree on that. The EU circus is showing an act where the lion tamer thinks it is taming the lion. Let's hope it gets it's head bitten off this coming Sunday.

[olive]

I have a sneaky feeling that the vote will be marginally a YES.

I suspect by the end of next week Greece will have a puppet EU government and tax collectors. The banks will want their money bank.

All this talk of pensions makes me smile. Sure there will be examples where Greek people are retiring too early compared with other economies or are on a good thing but Britain can hardly criticise when its state pensions are the worst in Europe- so much so that they have to be topped up with means tested benefits. An outrage for a very wealthy country.

[markwilding]

I'm reading your posts with incredulity. The problem in Greece stems from their own mismanagement of their economy. What is happening there is the democracy of the Pied piper who cannot deliver.

I don't see Sunday's referendum as democracy but more Alexis Tsipras's total lack of balls. He's not taking responsibility and passing the buck.

Other countries in the EU/Euro zone are managing to turn their economies around while Greece refuses to accept that their need to be major changes and until they reign in their excesses, they will continue spiralling out of control.

Should they continue denying the real world and vote NO, then the rest of the world should then have the opportunity to have our own referendum to see if we would like to continue working until we are 67 funding the 58% of Greeks who can retire at 58.

[Lavanda]

I have the uneasy feeling you will be right, Olive.

I think a week with closed banks and restricted withdrawals of cash will spook most of the population into accepting whatever the EU dictates. If that should be the dreary — and quite terrifying outcome — then the unseen, undemocratic hand of the EU will close into an even tighter grip on the EU 'member states'. NO ONE will EVER be allowed to leave or escape. It will make the EU and its bullying tactics stronger and that is bad news for Cameron and his hopes for a renegotiation of the UK's membership. The UK won't be getting concessions but it won't be leaving the EU either. Any sane person must be looking at what is happening and be incredulous.

There was a documentary on the TV many years ago and a Russian historian/economist was being interviewed. He couldn't believe that just as the USSR was breaking up to grant democracy to its consistent states so European countries we're enslaving themselves to something similar. His final words were,"I have lived your future and it doesn't work!"

[markwilding]

You've got to be joking!!!!

What world do you live in where you are able to compare old The Soviet Union with the EU?

Let's have a little bit of perspective here.

The Greeks can do what they want. They can default if they want. Nobody is stopping them but they will need to live with the consequences. They can leave the EU as well if they want but they will still have to live with the consequences.

If they leave or default the EU, tanks won't be rumbling into Athens but the World banks won't be in a hurry to fund them. Any more than you would continue lending money to a neighbour who uses it to buy drugs and never pays you back.

[katy]

Oliv, I think they will vote yes too. The EU propaganda machine is in full swing. I think Tspiras's days are numbered. Doesn't seem to be much concern in the EU. We were warned of crashing markets, floods and pestilence if Greece defaulted.

There may be lots of generous pensions in Greece but according to TV yesterday there are also many low ones. Two men interviewed in Athens claimed to be getting €120 per month. As for UK pensions being low yes, but as you say they get top ups, to around £140 single, plus rent and council tax paid. Where is the outrage in that

[katy]

Argentinia seem to be doing ok. Since they defaulted.

Lavanda, agree. Joining the EU appears to be the same as making a pact with the Devil. All this should be a lesson for the Spanish voters. Iglesias from Podemos was interviewed in the Times yesterday. He praised Syriza, SNP and Sinn Fein then went on to criticise the politics of Blair.

[Lavanda]

What world do you live in where you are able to compare old The Soviet Union with the EU?

Mark, I wasn't making the comparison. The Russian historian/economist was. Read what I wrote.

[Lavanda]

Agree about the pensions, Katy. This news story, more than most, a person needs to read across the whole political spectrum of the press. There are wildly different figures and stories every day.

[Mowser]

We can agree on that. The EU circus is showing an act where the lion tamer thinks it is taming the lion. Let's hope it gets it's head bitten off this coming Sunday.

Shouldn't that be the EZ circus?

[anyroads]

I am surprised no one commented on this from a previous post.

I doubt any other country would be as generous.


"June 18 (Bloomberg) -- Sophia Constantinidou works as a teacher in a private school in Athens. She also has a more lucrative job: remaining unmarried.
The 52-year-old gets 400 euros ($496) a month from the Greek government, part of her late mother’s state pension. Under the current system, Constantinidou qualifies to receive the payment for life as the only surviving child of a deceased civil servant, provided she doesn’t tie the knot.
“It’s not that I didn’t want to get married,” Constantinidou, whose mother died 20 years ago, said in an interview. “But after I turned 40, I realized I wouldn’t be getting married and that thankfully I had this.”

anyroads

[ChrisM]

“The most puzzling development in politics during the last decade is the apparent determination of Western European leaders to re-create the Soviet Union in Western Europe.”


― Mikhail Gorbachev