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.

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by oritteropo.

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by oritteropo.

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by Boise_Lib.

>> ^bovan:

Mr Tyson... If our DNA is 1% different from chimps, why are they 10 times stronger than us?
2 mindteaseers:
1. The human brain is twice the size of a chimp, which should make the difference in intelligence 50%? (or 100% from the chimps' POV)
(hope I'm not doing too much Glenn Beck math here..)
2. According to the wikipage "Chimpanzee genome project":
"Figures published in Nature on September 1, 2005, in an article produced by the Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium, show that 24% of the chimpanzee genome does not align with the human genome. There are 3% further alignment gaps, 1.23% SNP differences, and 2.7% copy number variations totaling at least 30% differences between chimpanzee and Homo sapiens genomes"
And the project is still ongoing, and apparently they still don't know what all the genes do, if anything, in the human genomes (source: pseudorandom wikipedia pages)


The usage of that 1% statistic always seems a little funny to me.

It's like marveling at how altering only 1% of someone's nervous system between their skull and back means they can no longer move their body. "But his nervous system is 99% the same ... Amazing!"

I think the 1% figure is something of an irrelevant measurement... the measurement we care about (can he move his body or not) clearly is on a different order of magnitude (not a 1% difference).

Mr Tyson... If our DNA is 1% different from chimps, why are they 10 times stronger than us?

2 mindteaseers:
1. The human brain is twice the size of a chimp, which should make the difference in intelligence 50%? (or 100% from the chimps' POV)
(hope I'm not doing too much Glenn Beck math here..)

2. According to the wikipage "Chimpanzee genome project":
"Figures published in Nature on September 1, 2005, in an article produced by the Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium, show that 24% of the chimpanzee genome does not align with the human genome. There are 3% further alignment gaps, 1.23% SNP differences, and 2.7% copy number variations totaling at least 30% differences between chimpanzee and Homo sapiens genomes"

And the project is still ongoing, and apparently they still don't know what all the genes do, if anything, in the human genomes (source: pseudorandom wikipedia pages)

"If this is really legitimate then T'okay, but if this becomes a strained locked political thing between London and Scotland that only makes this more problematic and not less."

I agree. If the SNP simply try and make things as difficult as possible for Labour then this will only lead to problems. I also think that it would undermine the SNP's support in Scotland - and the SNP are well aware of this.

In order to have a governing majority in the Scottish parliament the SNP will have to form a coalition with another party - probably the Liberal Democrats. Any party that enters into such a coalition will insist that the SNP concentrate on improving things in Scotland - not making trouble to ensure independence.

However, what is certain is that if the SNP form a majority coalition, with Alex Salmond as the first minister, this could make life very difficult for prime minister Brown and the Labour Party - which I'm all in favour of! Brown represents a Scottish constituency which would become part of an independent Scotland. Furthermore, without the Scottish vote the Labour party cannot win in England.

Hopefully, this situation will be beneficial for Britain and Scotland. The Labour party will have to devolve more powers to the Scottish parliament and resolve the West Lothian question - the fact the Scottish MP's vote on domestic issues that only affect England, but English MP's cannot vote on issues that affect Scotland (It should not be forgotten that the Conservative party won a decisive victory in last nights elections and they will want this issue solved as well). It may also mean that the Labour party has to temper its domestic and foreign policies in order to win back votes from the SNP (and the Conservatives and Plaid Cymru).

"maintaining the strong federal subsidies"

The English always winge that Scotland is a huge drain on the welfare state. The Scots retort that for over thirty years the English economy has been supported by North Sea Oil which should belong to Scotland. Whatever side you take in this argument the fact is that an independent Scotland will have to introduce significant economic reforms if it is to flourish. A major part of this will be reducing the size of the welfare state and the culture of benefit dependency in certain areas of Scotland. Unfortunately there is a strong corrollation between benefit dependency and voting for Labour. The SNP will have a hard job convincing these voters that they may have to give up their benefits in the short term in order to ensure long term economic success. Any economic change will have major social and political repercussions - and Labour will exploit this while they are in opposition. The ironic thing is that the the same politicians who complain that Scotland is a drain on the welfare state will attempt to win votes and undermine the independence movement by promising to maintain benefits and subsidies.

Alex Salmond just said: "Scotland has changed for good and forever. There may be Labour governments and first ministers in decades still to come, but never again will the Labour Party think it has a divine right to government."

A quick update on this story:

It's time! A few minutes ago Labour conceded defeat to the SNP!!!!!

From the BBC website:

"The SNP won 47, Labour came in second with 46; the Conservatives have 17; the Liberal Democrats secured 16; and others came in with three.

Earlier on Friday, SNP leader Alex Salmond said that the Labour Party had lost the "moral authority to govern Scotland".

"it borders on offensive at times"

I accept that some Scots harbour a rather nasty deep-seated resentment of all Englishmen - and I'm against this. But there are historical reasons for the existence of this widespread resentment, and furthermore you only have to listen to the moronic prejudiced ramblings of gorillaman - who won't even acknowledge that Scotland is a seperate country with its own culture, traditions and languages - to realise that plenty of Englishmen still hold equally prejudiced and distasteful views about the Scots.

"one-issue, isolationist"

Firstly, the SNP are not a one issue party. While in the past some of them could have been accused of being one issue politicians, the party has grown into a fully fledged party with a comprehensive set of policies. Secondly, the SNP advocate independence, not isolationism - An independent Scotland would be a member of the EU and would work closely with Britain.

I think there's quite a strong parallel, you want to set up a new country where it no longer belongs, based only on extinct historical claims and illusory cultural ties. Look around you, now go south of the so-called-border and look around there. Looks the same doesn't it? That's because it's the same bloody country. Modern Scottish and British culture are already practically identical, and are becoming more so every day; let them.

At least we agree on the reason for the SNP's recent gains - the present government are monsters, their main opposition are worthless and that's given the fringe nutjobs a chance to elbow in and grab some votes from people too stupid to know better. A lot of the policies in this video make sense, not the main one of course; if the SNP would drop the name, grow up and behave like a real political party instead of a one-issue, isolationist, nationalist farce they would probably get a few votes down here as well.

^ National pride is inherently offensive. And Scotland's 'own' language is English, given that the vast, overwhelming majority of its population speak it as a first language.

There are no parallels between the democratic polices of the SNP and the violence, terrorism and imperialism which led to the foundation of Israel!!!

"Scottish culture needs to be stamped out so we can all prosper from unity"

Again what I expect from you Gorillaman - wipe out Scottish culture, wipe out all Muslims and wipe out anyone who doesn't speak English or agree with your simplistic and ignorant ramblings. You're full of shit - and you know it!

"At this point Britain is indivisible"

Wrong - the Labour premiership has deeply divided this country. And this has very little to do with oppression. The main motivating factor behind the growing support for independence is moral revulsion at the domestic and international policies of the Labour party - and despair at the possibility of an English Conservative alternative. Independence would give Scotland an independent international voice. Furthermore, appropriate foreign investment and EU funds will improve the economic situation of some of Britain's poorest people.

You keep missing the point:

The Acts of Union did not create one super country called Britain. Scotland never lost its status as a seperate country and its people never lost their identity. Article 1(2) of the UN Charter set out the important aim: "To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples." Similarly Article 1 in both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) recognise the rights of all peoples to self-determination - including the Scots! The Scottish people have a right to choose independence and self-rule, either in this election or a future referendum. You would like to dismiss the SNP as a minority party - but they could soon hold a majority in Scotland - which is not your country!

"And everything you said about language is absurd. "

Right back at you!!!!

"I'm simply concerned that my country's influence and prosperity will be damaged"

I'm sure the Scots would appreciate your sentiment - that without the Scots Britain will crumble and decline!!!

Great post!

Unfortunately the SSP haven't been the same since Tommy Sheridan left. He has now formed his own socialist party appropriately called Solidarity. Neither party is likely to gain many seats in the Scottish Parliament, and it is likely that the Scottish National Party (SNP) will win with Labour or the Liberal Democrats a close second. The SNP's election broadcast is on the Sift here and you can read more about the forthcoming Scottish elections here.