You are absolutely right, the results of elections in Greece do not create an obligation for fiscal transfers from other European countries.

But that plays right into what Varoufakis has been saying for years, doesn't it? The program over the last seven years has reduced Greek output by a quarter, and thereby its ability to service and reduce its debt. The troika is offering more loans, loans that cannot be payed back, in return for a further reduction in Greece's ability to pay back those loans in the first place. Extend and pretend, all the way. Nevermind the humanitarian cost or the threat to democracy itself.

It is either counter-productive or aimed at a different goal entirely. Greece wants an end to those loans, and all the loss of sovereignty that comes with it, while the Eurogroup in particular wants to stick to a program that only increased Greece's dependency to a point where they can throw the entire country into unbearable misery at a moment's notice (e.g. cut ELA access).

Take the privatisation demands as an example. The program demands that Greece agrees to sell specific property at a specific price. Both parties are keenly aware that this price cannot be realised during a fire sale, yet they still demand a promise by the Greeks to do so. Any promise would be a lie and everyone knows it.

Same for the demanded specificity of Greece's plans. After decades of nepotism, a fresh government made up entirely of outsiders is supposed to draw up plans of more detail than any previous government came up with. And they cannot even rely on the bureaucracy, given that a great number of people in it are part of the nepotic system they are trying to undo in the first place.

Taxes, same thing. The first king of Greece (1832'ish) was a prince of Bavaria who was accompanied by his own staff of finance experts, and they failed miserably. Greece went through occupation, military junta and decades of nepotism, and the new government is supposed to fix that within months.

Those demands cannot be met. The Greeks know it, the troika knows it, the Eurogroup knows it.

Zizek called it the superego in his recent piece on Syriza/Greece:

"The ongoing EU pressure on Greece to implement austerity measures fits perfectly what psychoanalysis calls the superego. The superego is not an ethical agency proper, but a sadistic agent, which bombards the subject with impossible demands, obscenely enjoying the subject’s failure to comply with them. The paradox of the superego is that, as Freud saw clearly, the more we obey its demands, the more we feel guilty. Imagine a vicious teacher who assigns his pupils impossible tasks, and then sadistically jeers when he sees their anxiety and panic. This is what is so terribly wrong with the EU demands/commands: they do not even give Greece a chance – Greek failure is part of the game."

Aside from all that, the entire continent is in a recession. Not enough demand, not enough investment, unsustainable levels of unemployment. Greece was hit hardest, Greece was hit first. It's not the cause of the problem, it is the canary in the coal mine. And Italy is already looking very shaky...

Well, Syriza is an acronym for Coalition of the Radical Left (roughly), and everything left of the Berlin Consensus is considered to be radical left. So they are going to call Syriza a radical leftist party until the political landscape itelf has been pulled back towards more leftist positions. But you're right, if they were judged by their positions, they'd be centre-left in theory, if centre-left hadn't turned into corporatism by taking up the Third Way of Schröder/Blair/Clinton.

They are, without a doubt, radically democratic though. As your Grauniad article points out, they haven't turned on their election promises yet, which is quite unheard of for a major European party. Francois Hollande in particular was a major letdown in this regard. Few people expected him to bow down to German demands so quickly. Aside from his 75% special tax for the rich, he dropped just about every single part of his program that could be considered socialism.

Grexit... that's a tough one.

Syriza cannot enforce any troika demands that relate to the programmes of the Chicago School of Economics. Friedman ain't welcome anymore. No cuts to wages or pensions, to privatisation of infrastructure, no cuts to the healthcare system, nor any other form of financial oppression of the lower class. That is non-negotiable. In fact, even increases in welfare programs and the healthcare system are pretty much non-negotiable. Even if Syriza wanted to put any of this on the table, and they sure as hell don't, they couldn't make it part of any deal without further damages to an already devasted democratic system in Greece.

So with that in mind, what's the point of all the negotiations?

Varoufakis' suggestions are very reasonable. The growth-linked bonds, for instance, are used very successfully all over the world in debt negotiations, as just about any bankrupty expert would testify. Like Krugman wrote today, Syriza is merely asking to "recognize the reality everyone supposedly already understands". His caveat about the German electorate is on point as well, we haven't had it explained to us yet – and we chose to ignore what little was explained to us.

Yet the troika insists on something Syriza cannot and will not provide, as just outlined above. Some of the officials still expect Syriza to acknowledge reality, to come to their senses and to accept a deal provided to them. Good luck with that, but don't hold your breath. Similarly, Varoufakis is aware that Berlin is almost guaranteed to play hardball all the way.

Of course, nothing is certain and they might strike a deal during their meeting in Wednesday that offers Greece a way out of misery. Or maybe the ECB decides that to stabilize to Euro, as is their sole purpose, they need to keep Greece within the EZ and away from default. That would allow them to back Greece, to provide them with financial support, at least until they present their program in June/July. Everything is possible. However, I see very little evidence in support of it.

Therefore Grexit might actually be just a question of who to blame it on. Syriza is not going to exit the EZ willy nilly, they need clear pressure from outside, so the record will unequivocally show that it wasn't them who made the call. No country can be thrown out, they have to leave of their own. Additionally, Merkel will not be the person to initiate the unravelling of the EU, as might be the consequence of a Grexit. That's leverage for Greece, the only leverage they have. But it has to be played right or else the blame will be put squarely on Greece, even more so than it already is.

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Edit #1: What cannot be overstated is the ability of the EZ to muddle through one crises after another, always on the brink of collapse, yet never actually collapsing. They are determined to hold this thing together, whatever the cost.
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Speaking of blame, Yves Smith linked a fantastic article the other day: Syriza and the French Indemnity of 1871-73.

The author makes a convincing case why the suppression of wages in Germany led to disaster in Spain, why it was not a choice on the part of Spain to engage in irresponsible borrowing and how it is a conflict between workers and the financial elite rather than nations. He also offers historical precedent, with Germany being the recipient of a massive cash influx, ending in a catastrophe similar to Spain's nowadays.

It strikes me as a very objective dissection of what happend, what's going on, and what needs to happen to get things back in shape. Then again, it agrees with many points I made on that BBC videos last week, so it's right within my bubble.

In the current situation, "structural reforms" is used to subsume two entirely different sets of measures.

The first is meant to remove what you previously mentioned: corruption in all the shapes and forms it takes in Greece, from a (intentionally) broken tax system formed over decades of nepotism to a bankrupt national media in the hands of oligarchs. The institutions of the Greek state are precisely what you expect when a country has been run by four families (Papandreou, Samaras, Mitsotakis, Karamanlis) for basically five decades.

This kind of structural reform is part of Syriza's program. Like you said, it'll be hard work and they might very well fail. They'll have only weeks, maybe a few months to undo significant parts of what has grown over half a century. It's not fair, but that's what it is.

The second kind of "structural reform" is meant to increase competitiveness, generally speaking, and a reduction of the public sector. In case of Greece, this included the slashing of wages, pensions, benefits, public employment. The economic and social results are part of just about every article these days, so I won't mention them again. A Great Depression, as predicted.

That's the sort of "structural reforms" Syriza wants to undo. And it's the sort that is expected of Spain, Italy and France as well, which, if done, would probably throw the entire continent into a Great Depression.

I'd go so far as to call any demand to increase competitiveness to German levels madness. Germany gained its competitiveness by 15 years of beggar-thy-neighbour economics, undercutting the agreed upon target of ~2% inflation (read: 2% growth of unit labour costs) the entire time. France played by the rules, was on target the entire time, and is now expected to suffer for it. Only Greece was significantly above target, and are now slightly below target. That's only halfway, yet already more than any democratic country can take.

They could have spread the adjustment out over 20 years, with Germany running above average ULC growth, but decided to throw Greece (and to a lesser degree Spain) off a cliff instead.


So where are we now? Debt rose, GDP crashed, debt as percentage of GDP skyrocketed. That's a fail. Social situation is miserable, health care system basically collapsed, reducing Greece to North African standards. That's a fail.

Those are not reforms to allow Greece to function independently. Those are reforms to throw the Greek population into misery, with ever increasing likeliness of radical solutions (eg Golden Dawn, who are eagerly hoping for a failure of Syriza).

So yes, almost every nation in Europe needs reforms of one sort or another. But using austerity as a rod to beat discipline into supposedly sovereign nations is just about the shortest way imaginable to blow up the Eurozone. Inflicting this amount of pain on people against their will does not work in democratic countries, and the rise of Syriza, Podemos, Sinn Féin, the SNP and the Greens as well as the surge of popularity for Front National and Golden Dawn are clear indicators that the current form of politics cannot be sustained.

Force austerity on France and Le Pen wins the election.

Meaningful reforms that are to increase Europe's "prosperity" would have the support of the people. And reforms are definatly needed, given that the Eurozone is in its fifth year of stagnation, with many countries suffering from both a recession and deflation. A European Union without increasing prosperity for the masses will not last long, I'm sure of it. And a European Union that intentionally causes Great Depressions wouldn't be worth having anyway.

Yet after everything is said and done, I believe you are still absolutely correct in saying that the pro-austerity states won't blink.

Which is what makes it interesting, really. Greece might be able to take a default. They run a primary surplus and most (90%+) of the funds went to foreign banks, the ECB and the IMF anyway, or were used to stabilize the banking system. The people got bugger all. But the Greek banking system would collapse without access to the European system.

Which raises the question: would the pro-austerity states risk a collapse of the Greek banking system and everything it entails? Spanish banks would follow in a heartbeat.

As for the morality of it (they elected those governments, they deserved it): I don't believe in collective punishment, especially not the kind that cripples an entire generation, which is what years of 50+% youth unemployment and a failing educational system does.

My own country, Germany, in particular gets no sympathy from me in this case. Parts of our system were intentionally reformed to channel funds into the market, knowing full well that there was nowhere near enough demand for credit to soak up the surplus savings, nowhere near enough reliable debtors to generate a reasonable return of investment without generating bubbles, be it real estate or financial. They were looking for debtors, and if all it took was turning a blind eye to the painfully obvious longterm problems it would create in Southern Europe, they were more than eager to play along.

yes, as we see, it provides ,war, murder, rape, torture,,,misery,,pain,,and horror after horror,,thanks religion.

I'm back!!!

Slaves? Yep
Job discrimination? Hell yeah/
Depiction of victim as criminal? You bet your goddamn arse

We done yet?

Don't get me wrong, racism, particularly against blacks, is still an issue in the US (and other parts of the world). But maybe next time read a history book or two before spouting such utter drivel.

And if you really want to get into an oppression contest...
African slavery started a few hundred years ago.
The Irish have had EIGHT HUNDRED YEARS* of oppression by the English, and I haven't even touched on the godawful misery the Jews have endured for thousands of years.

But that's a meaningless pissing contest and it only leads to idiocy.

* I am culturally obliged to write that in all caps. Sorry, it's an Irish thing.

Well, my response was not meant to be taken entirely seriously.

That said, most of the people @blankfist is talking about (his "democratic friends") probably have reasons not a million miles away from that.

As to whether secession is an inherent right, I don't know; it's a complicated question.

Legally, not really. Obviously, anything in international law is kinda murky with different jurisdictions etc, but there doesn't seem to be much support for the concept as a blanket rule. In individual cases, where there is a significant cultural difference, it can happen and with the backing of the parent country and the international community.

What is certain is that there is no legal framework that would allow secession in any form from the USA.

Morally and ethically? Jesus, that's a minefield. In theory, I could get behind the idea that if you have a well defined geographical region with a majority population that wants independence, you should be allowed to do that.

In practice, it's kind of a nightmare and often leads to all kinds of suffering and misery (I don't really need to list examples, do I?).

So yeah, as in so many things in life, the answer is "it depends".

The wizard had mostly retired by the time of the quakes.

And yeah, it reminded me of New Orleans too.

The day after the quake hit I was talking with some friends, and we were discussing the future of Christchurch. Some people left, some people felt there was no future, but most of us thought some good could come out of it. We could have a future city, built around sustainability; somewhere that would attract people to live in it.

Right now, I don't see that happening. In some ways, this needed a dictatorship, but instead everything has been buried in committees and insurance companies have tried to weasel out of everything and made peoples lives a misery.

I still hope we'll get something cool out of it, but I'm no longer as confident as I once was. Too much short term thinking and bitching about spending too much money.

Was a bit of a shaker and i was around 80 miles away. I do however really enjoy earthquakes. It does tend to bring damage and misery which sucks though. I'm guessing @shagen454 and @Trancecoach had a better ride as they were closer, although may have been sleeping. Any other Bay Area sifters feel the shake.

"Death and destruction, tornadoes, floods, fire, car wrecks, human misery and carnage, wait until you see what's in-store tonight on, Mintbbb-TV!!"

No real problem with having a woman as president as long as it's not the criminal and whore of Babylon Hillary Clinton. Her crimes whether documented, rumored, implied or perpetrated in her career in politics should they be listed in one place would take hours to include here...

...doesn't even qualify as human much less as a woman. If she runs, best you equality-touters do some extra-curricular investigative work on her background and history, and not the horseshit reported by the complicit media whores.

If anyone cares here, I'll provide a short list of her crimes against humanity. She and her boy Bill have left a 30+year swath of human misery and corruption in their wake. Nightmares the both of 'em.

I don't know what's worse, the fact that so many live in such a miserable shithole constantly, or that tools here would use that misery to push their TLDR political propaganda and attacks...

I'm no expert but everything I've ever heard/read from informed sources (i.e. people who study these things rather than random people on the internet) concurs with exactly you you just said there.

Traffic Jams supposed to act like longitudinal waves that snowball as they go due to people driving too close and needing to overcompensate. i.e. what starts as a few people braking a bit too much becomes 100's of people at a standstill a few miles down the line of traffic.

I think you are entirely correct to suggest that if everyone maintained a healthy distance and steady pace traffic would flow considerably more smoothly and many jams wouldn't even happen in the 1st place.

There are choke points but these need never take up more than a lane if people had some perspective and collective sympathy....

Unfortunately they don't and most (or at least enough) tend to drive like the impatient selfish twats they are. This makes biking gently past all of them in their self inflicted gridlock misery all the more satisfying (wouldn't be the 1st time I've sung the Trololol song while doing so either )

People are just too spoiled through our society. You grow up as a child, being dragged away and saved from even the slightest bad stuff. In TV you only see happy happy stuff that causes grown ups to feel the urge to barf (Teletubbies for example), and even as a grown up, you are not encouraged to deal with bad stuff and just ignore it with phrases like "its below your standard".

The fact of the matter is that there are many, many very unhappy people, who cant just swallow their misery and poop it out as a smile as many of us may have learned. I mean look at Facebook. Why is there no dislike button? Why do people always get so personal and defensive when you criticize them or their work even objectively? Especially women tend to see things much more personal than men because most of the time they have been cared and "saved" much more, and thats also part reason why there are less women channels, as she put so well.

There are simply people like this and the Internet allows them to openly say what they think. Not to mention that a huge part of those are just stupid jokes that are not meant to hurt anyone. Thats the fucking Internet and society and also shows us problems that need to be fixed PROPERLY. If you cant deal with it, you should go somewhere else where you can concentrate on your mental rainbows only.

We have forgotten how to deal with criticism and unhappy people. Instead we ignore them, generalize them, and make things even worse with that ignorance and then we are surprised when it comes back to us sooner or later at twice or more the power.
Seriously, especially from scientists I expect more thinking than this stupid generalization.
Criticism is an essential part of democracy, freedom and science.

Oh and that doesnt mean one should tolerate crap like that silently, but instead blame the culprit which is our society and that ultimately means we need to change ourselves. We cant change people, we can only change their surroundings, so they change on their own.

What a load of new age bollox.

Anthropomorphising that poor animal. Making it suffer for as long as possible because some bullshit 'communicator' said it was what it wanted.

They prolonged its suffering for nothing more than their own gain.

Disgusting. I really feel for the poor thing. It deserved to be put out of its misery, not made to suffer like that.