Posted on 02/13/2015 2:11:33 PM PST by Kaslin
At midnight, Greece turns into a pumpkin. The clock is clearly ticking but is this the 10th or 11th hour?
Given the eurozone propensity to extend deadline after deadline, it's hard to say precisely what time this is. But we can say Greek Bailout Talks with Europe Break Down.
Eurozone finance ministers’ first attempt to grapple with the bailout demands made by the new Greek government broke down in recriminations after the two sides failed even to agree a way to take negotiations forward after six hours of talks in Brussels.Does Anyone Really Know What Time It Is?
Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister who chairs the committee of his 18 colleagues, said that while he had hoped a blueprint for future talks could have been agreed at the session, no negotiations were scheduled ahead of a self-imposed deadline to reach agreement on a bailout extension by Monday.
Although no final deal on Greece’s proposals was in the offing at Wednesday’s meeting, senior eurozone officials had hoped that, following days of public sniping over what a new bailout programme might look like, Athens and its creditors could at least find a road map to resolving the standoff.
But officials said even those low expectations were not met and there are currently no talks expected before another meeting of finance ministers on Monday, where eurozone leaders had hoped a deal could be clinched.
According to eurozone officials involved in the talks, a joint statement had been agreed between the finance ministers and Yanis Varoufakis, their new Greek counterpart, that would have held out the chance of reaching a deal to extend Greece’s current €172bn programme beyond its February 28 expiration.
But after the meeting broke up, Mr Varoufakis consulted officials in Athens and then raised new objections to the statement’s wording, and despite efforts to find an 11th-hour compromise, the statement was scrapped. Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras has vowed not to extend the current bailout.
In honor of the 10th, 11th, or whatever hour, I offer this musical tribute:
Does Anybody Really Knows What Time It Is?
Maybe the talks fell apart because it was all Greek to them
Why on earth is that protest sign written in English ? Outside agitators ?
Is it time to use Greek fire?
“it was all Greek to them.”
In a related vein, everybody is going to have to bend over to make this negotiation a success in down-the-road-cankicking. The Greeks need to be able to further renege on their original commitments, but they are so far underwater, that anything short of repudiation will be painful. On the other side, the Germans (who are paying for this deal) need to feel the Greeks are suffering, at least a bit, but are going to extend and pretend, taking an additional loss financially.
They are in a bit of a Greece spot.
Gosh, what happens when you run out of other people’s money? You become Greece where your only ‘threat’ is to default on your debt and seek loans from Russia and China. Guess what, Greece, when you don’t repay, those aren’t loans, those are gifts, and you’ve got pretty much nothing that either Russia or China wants.
This isn’t really that hard. You slash your cradle to grave health budget by half. You slash your inane 13 month government salaries to a mere 12 months. You cut vacations to JUST 3 weeks rather than 6-8 weeks. You make the people’s employees contribute to their health care costs and pension costs. You LEAD by showing how the government can clean up their act, and then that will trickle through your society.
Or, well, you do what you’re doing, and still end up doing the same thing, as you’ve run out of other people’s money, and no one is lining up to give you more.
Time to let the Greeks shift for themselves. They have been leeches on the rest of the world for far too long. They act like a country full of children unwilling to make the hard choices to fix their own problems, preferring to live off of the productive countries of the world. Screw them!
I think the message was directed at the rest of the Euro zone.
Greece has no economy to speak of. Never did. In the first place, there never were a hell of lot of Greeks. In the second place, Greece has a pretty lousy infrastructure. No roads, No trains, no airports, or at least very rudimentary ideas of those amenities. Same as in ancient Greece. You want to visit cousin Cristoforos on Lesbos, you're taking a boat and probably walking to the boat, if the bus crapped out.
Sure, Athens is hot stuff, and there is an awful lot of tourist traffic, beyond that, the Greeks sell each other olives. The problem is that the Greeks are very sophisticated people and want to live the sophisticated euro-lifestyle ... sort as if they were Swiss, German, or Parisians. They want top-flight medical care, they want 60 days vacation, they want old-age pensions, they want unemployment insurance, they want a secure government job without too much work, they want a car, they want a summer cottage, they want wardrobes, they want to eat out in fancy restaurants, they want the kids in college ... on and on. Hey the Swedes live great. The Norwegians live great.... why the heck not us?
But this cannot happen in a country with a basically weak, or even no economy to speak of. That is, unless some generous foreigners care to subsidize it in some way. And that's what the EU did for a set period of years: It subsidized Portugal, Ireland, and Greece with massive cash infusions every year. Billions of Euros, after Billions of Euros. Newsflash! When these subsidies ended, there was no more spare cash for all those nice things that the citizens of the poorer euro-countries had begun to get used to ... and now depend upon. And they still had lousy economies.
Portugal? same problem as Greece... maybe not quite as bad. Ireland? Same problem, not as bad because they used the EU subsidy money a bit more wisely. Italy? onvcce an EU donor nation, now definitely same problem. But they have a lot more people, a lot lot bigger economy than Greece ... they might just scrape by .... barely. Spain? Loonie Left in charge ... economy potentially great ... but hurting badly because of Loonie Left. Pay attention American students. Call these countries the laboratory for Socialism 101.
As an old English woman once said:
BTW, all of the above mentioned countries suffering mightily with Third World immigrants ... legal and illegal ... they want in on the benefits which are drying up fast! Making a lot of the folks very angry.
Prediction: a bit of anarchy, followed by despotism. Both words from the Greek, you know?
Spot on analysis, and we are making the same mistakes on steroids.. But we’re ‘merica we can do it bigger and better.
P.S. Is there any Spanish derivative political system that is not Marxist and works?
and cowbell.
The alternative looks too much like family farming as peasant tenants grubbing for potatoes on Baron Luigi's place or cranking out artillery shells for the Kaiser. IOW, why so many euros ditched the Olde World for our version. (BTW, not too many people nowadays make more money than farmers in Italy or Ireland. But it ain't the olde model.)
......a Spanish derivative political system that is not Marxist and works?
Yesirree Bob! It did work. Not to say it worked all that well. It's called Catholic Monarchy, Colonialism, and a rigid caste system. Not an easy sell since Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Phillipines went in 1898, not to mention losing SA in the 1820s!
“Gosh, what happens when you run out of other people’s money?”
You force an Extortion-Care, where you are Exempt, and everyone else becomes your trafficked, bought and sold, body mortgage.
Brilliant summary. Without EU subsidies, I suspect Greece’s GDP per capita would sink far below Turkey’s.
The EU countries would be STUPID to give the Greeks a single additional Euro cent.
Enough is enough, and that same concept and a day of reckoning will soon be here.
Dude, it wouldn't matter if every dude in Greece worked His AO 24/7. There isn't FA to do! This is basically a subsistence economy. The Greeks are industrious, but there is no industry. There is no decent infrastructure. The population is small. Germany 80 Million/Greece 10 Million.
Your anger is justified, but the target is a bit off. It was the EU who basically conned the Greeks into believing they could live like Swedes when their country was basically very poor in resources. Sure the Greeks were dumb to believe it, but then who would rather live small when offered the opportunity to live large?
“Portugal? same problem as Greece... maybe not quite as bad.”
It would behove people to do even a bit of cursory research before posting generalized off the cuff, ignorant, asshat comments, like this fellow above.
This, from the first paragraph of wikipaedia:
“Portugal is home to a number of notable leading companies with worldwide reputations, such as Grupo Portucel Soporcel, a major world player in the international paper market; Sonae Indústria, the largest producer of wood-based panels in the world; Corticeira Amorim, the world leader in cork production; and Conservas Ramirez, the oldest operational canned fish producer ;[citation needed] Portugal Telecom which, after the fusion with the Brazilian Oi, with a forecasted 100 million subscribers will become the 2nd largest telecommunications company in Latin America and the 8th largest in Europe, under the corporate name of Corpco; Cimpor, one of the world’s 10th largest producers of cement; EDP Renováveis, the 3rd largest producer of wind energy in the world” and etc.
The problem with Portugal (and Spain, Italy, and to some extent Greece) is the Euro - period! A one size fits all currency never works out well. And by the way, UK would be in the same boat had they not had their own currency. Check out their total debt and budget deficit; but the difference is they can print money.
Kick Greece out of the Euro zone. They have gotten enough of a handout from the rest of Europe.
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