How Merkel Failed Greece and Europe

[Harry_Dresden]

Britain used to be the balance point that sided as needed with France or with Germany to avoid most national egotisms. Britain lost that role since they are talking leaving the EU and the other possibility, Poland, is not yet strong enough. Italy has the boss of the ECB, therefore too mighty already to make a honest broker. So don't hold your breath.

Excellent point but I'd like to know what you thought of Merkel removing one Greek Premier and then having the audacity to hoist a technocrat of her choosing as PM to sign into law all German relevant demands and then drop kicked him into oblivion only to support Samaras who she manipulated and refused to support during the last election knowing full well that in doing so she would be paving the way for the current government and drams that just so have played into her hands.

In short, Merkel is engineering Greece's removal from the Eurozone under the pretext of Greece being unsavable after getting what she wanted... I.e. fire walling the euro at Greece's expense.

don't be shy questionmark tell me where I got it wrong?

[Harry_Dresden]

So, am I seeing this right? None of this is Greece's responsibility, corruption and mismanagement hasn't been rife in the Greek government? Bad Euro for giving a bankrupt country more money? What people are basically saying is that out of an 11 million population Greece was unable to find even one half decent economist to warn of the dangers of borrowing.

That's total BS, and everyone here who feels at ease to lay the blame solely on the shoulders of the EU and Germany is deluding themselves, because I'll tell you one thing, if Greece had not have received a bailout in 2008 the consequences of that would have been equally as contentious as the issue we face now .

I don't deny the responsibility of the creditors, but Greece is a big boy and needs to own the consequences of some very poor fiscal decisions.

You only had a point in 2010 when the EU finally took the blinkers off and saw Greece's cooked books. So what did Merkel do to Greece? Why she rewarded Greece's lying and theft by giving it MORE money...lol

Now 5 years latter Merkel has finally found her voice. What a joke!

Edited July 9, 2015 by Harry_Dresden

[questionmark]

What Premier did Merkel remove? I wonder if some people just sit around all day creating Conspiracy Theories. Go find a job guys!.

All decisions on whom was ruling Greece was taken by Greeks. The last one was not removed by Merkel but by Syriza by not compromising on a new Prezz. The Greek constitution requires new elections should that be the case.

There are guys in the background pulling strings, but their names are not Merkel, it is more like Ioanides or Niarchos. Or the oligarchs that helped the Greek governments of the past to get money to disappear and who now heavily invested in London realty. And they were those who engineered the fall of Papandreu or Venicelos. Not Merkel.

That Merkel wanted some transparency might have helped, but the reason for them to be gone is not Merkel, it is that the businesses of the oligarchs were in danger of loosing some revenue. And right now the best bet for revenue for them is that Greece defaults. Makes everything much cheaper and easily purchasable with their foreign assets.

[Grey Area]

You only had a point in 2010 when the EU finally took the blinkers off and saw Greece's cooked books. So what did Merkel do to Greece? Why she rewarded Greece's lying and theft by giving it MORE money...lol

Now 5 years latter Merkel has finally found her voice. What a joke!

So what? Should Greece have been stricken from the EU for having naughty people in power in 2010? Or perhaps it should never have been allowed to join the Euro in the first place? Given their track record of financial mismanagement, which goes way back to the days of the Drachma, I am surprised I haven't seen more of this. I'm hearing a lot of blame and nothing about the best course of recovery. Clearly, many nations have relied on bailouts as a form of recovery, and largely this has been a positive thing, though not popular or easy for the people on the ground.

Equally, each member of the EU is a separate nation and ultimately is looked upon by their electorate to be self serving first, so it should come as no surprise that the 'creditors' have an agenda, and we see exactly that self serving attitude in Greece's recent referendum where people feel that anti-austerity will serve them best, and who cares about the 100 odd billion we have just flushed down the toilet.

[Deleted]

So, am I seeing this right? None of this is Greece's responsibility, corruption and mismanagement hasn't been rife in the Greek government? Bad Euro for giving a bankrupt country more money? What people are basically saying is that out of an 11 million population Greece was unable to find even one half decent economist to warn of the dangers of borrowing.

That's total BS, and everyone here who feels at ease to lay the blame solely on the shoulders of the EU and Germany is deluding themselves, because I'll tell you one thing, if Greece had not have received a bailout in 2008 the consequences of that would have been equally as contentious as the issue we face now .

I don't deny the responsibility of the creditors, but Greece is a big boy and needs to own the consequences of some very poor fiscal decisions.

nope if she defaulted in 2008 she would be on the bright side, and probably spain Italy or another scapegoat would be in Greece`s position. Also corrupt government show me one government which isn't corrupt, also the EU installed the government after 2008 and dictated the policies which lead into a 25 % decline of GDP, well done, nice "support".

Edit: I said in 2008 that Greece shouldn't have bailed out its banks and should have defaulted the same goes for all other nations (except for Iceland which didn't bail out there banks). They should have restructured the financial system and jailed certain people. But nope they just made everything worse, so they added to the financial crises a debt crisis and now the crisis is dragging on for 8 years and it is getting worse. The financial markets are the same as every, the compound interest too, they chose the worst possible course of action, Greece is just the beginning. Soon others will be in the same situation, so I find it highly hypocritical to do as if only Greece is at a bad point, all above considering that the EU pressured her to introduce certain policies which had a bad effect on Greece`s economy and worsened the situation instead of improving it. Also the EU above all Germany doesnt take into consideration that teh Greece is in a bad position to compete with others since she doesnt have financial instruments for her economy because of the EURO and is a Net Importer because of the EURO, while Germany could improve her position because of the EURO.

Edited July 9, 2015 by hellwyr

[questionmark]

nope if she defaulted in 2008 she would be on the bright side, and probably spain Italy or another scapegoat would be in Greece`s position. Also corrupt government show me one government which isn't corrupt, also the EU installed the government after 2008 and dictated the policies which lead into a 25 % decline of GDP, well done, nice "support".

Most other governments could be corrupt, but to this point I have yet to see one that by abacadabra made 5% of the GDP be swallowed in a black hole, year for year, for 30 years. That made Greece's biggest decline.

[stevewinn]

So, am I seeing this right? None of this is Greece's responsibility, corruption and mismanagement hasn't been rife in the Greek government? Bad Euro for giving a bankrupt country more money? What people are basically saying is that out of an 11 million population Greece was unable to find even one half decent economist to warn of the dangers of borrowing.

That's total BS, and everyone here who feels at ease to lay the blame solely on the shoulders of the EU and Germany is deluding themselves, because I'll tell you one thing, if Greece had not have received a bailout in 2008 the consequences of that would have been equally as contentious as the issue we face now .

I don't deny the responsibility of the creditors, but Greece is a big boy and needs to own the consequences of some very poor fiscal decisions.

No, your seeing it wrong, I haven't seen one person on here say Greece isn't in part responsible for their economic crisis. obviously it is. But in percentage terms the majority of the blame lies with the European Union to think otherwise is completely bonkers, all this crisis has done is highlight the problems in a political and economic project that was and is always going to end in tears.

[questionmark]

No, your seeing it wrong, I haven't seen one person on here say Greece isn't in part responsible for their economic crisis. obviously it is. But in percentage terms the majority of the blame lies with the European Union to think otherwise is completely bonkers, all this crisis has done is highlight the problems in a political and economic project that was and is always going to end in tears.

The corruption problem is not new to Greece, take 1964 when Greece evidently was not yet in the EU. Certain Mr. Adenauer came by with 380 million dollars to compensate Greeks for sufferings under the German occupation during WWII due to religious or political reasons (at a time when the Greek GDP was around 6 billion) . Most victims learned that after they lost a lawsuit against Germany (2012) because their government never passed down a penny. It just disappeared into the famous black hole.

[Katzenking]

Hello to everybody!

One reason I write this comment is to get my posting-numbers up.

24 after more than 3 years is shameful.

It is also a big unsolved mystery to me how people are able to post 1,000+ or even 10,000+ comments.

Now back to the never ending €-crisis.

I still think that the best solution for all would be if Germany returns to the D-Mark and therefore I blame

Helmut Kohl and his foolish advisors for inventing the € and Gerhard Schröder and his even more foolish advisors

for implementing it.

The reason why they did it is a deadly sin: Greed!

Today Kohl is busy in fighting lawsuits against the writer of his biography and Schröder is busy in his role of

Putin's poodle.

Now to Mr. Wolfgang Schäuble, the current German finance minister.

There are not many politicians I trust, but I trust him. I feel that he wants the best for all and under the

current circumstances he obviously has no other choice than to act like he does. If he leaves office one day,

things will go from worse to catastrophal. That's what I predict.

The EU is good enough as a free trade zone, and may be military alliance (inside NATO) and everything else was

wrong. That does not mean it is false for all times but after travelling all Europe in my youth (except Eastern-

Europe) I learned about different lifestyles in various countries and I like them all. There is also a common

ground without doubt. But forcing these different countries together in a short time cannot work and leads to new

mistrust, hate and all these bad things...

These things need time. They should spend the next 100 years to learn more about each other (student, worker and

politician-exchanges and most important: marriages! ). And each time when they go a step further in 'European

integration' they should make sure that ordinary people benefit from it and not suffer from it.

And then in about 200+ years we can talk about a common currency, political integration... and so on.

Having said this I am aware that it doesn't help to solve current problems, so this comment is useless after all

but how I said in the beginning, I need to get my posting-numbers up.

[Harry_Dresden]

What Premier did Merkel remove? I wonder if some people just sit around all day creating Conspiracy Theories. Go find a job guys!.

All decisions on whom was ruling Greece was taken by Greeks. The last one was not removed by Merkel but by Syriza by not compromising on a new Prezz. The Greek constitution requires new elections should that be the case.

There are guys in the background pulling strings, but their names are not Merkel, it is more like Ioanides or Niarchos. Or the oligarchs that helped the Greek governments of the past to get money to disappear and who now heavily invested in London realty. And they were those who engineered the fall of Papandreu or Venicelos. Not Merkel.

That Merkel wanted some transparency might have helped, but the reason for them to be gone is not Merkel, it is that the businesses of the oligarchs were in danger of loosing some revenue. And right now the best bet for revenue for them is that Greece defaults. Makes everything much cheaper and easily purchasable with their foreign assets.

Now you're just waffling on... Papandreou was removed and you know it for wanting to take the bailout plan to a referendum. He wanted to default and force a better deal than the one that Merkel hoisted on Greece's shoulders potenyially for the next 50 years and he was vindicated with Syriza's recent response.

Back then Greece had the ability to force a better deal but Greece was the threat to Germany's empire and she acted like Attilla the Hun at a vestal virgins tea party by literally putting policies in place to rape Greece to save the euro.

You wanna blame fictional bogeymen for Greece's destitution then be my guess... Merkel threw Greece under a bus to save the euro and now that it's saved she hasn't the time or feels any moral obligation to spend any more time on the matter. She's happy now that Greece's value to the EU is spent and wants to make an example outta Greece to scare the chit out the rest of Europe. An object lesson in Germany's financial might.

Well the latest is that Merkels visions of Germanic grandeur just might have to take a back seat to French and American lobbying for a new Greek haircut. I guess Merkel and questionmark find themselfs all alone dreaming of what could have been...

Edited July 9, 2015 by Harry_Dresden

[Harry_Dresden]

A

Edited July 9, 2015 by Harry_Dresden

[Harry_Dresden]

A

Edited July 9, 2015 by Harry_Dresden

[Harry_Dresden]

No, your seeing it wrong, I haven't seen one person on here say Greece isn't in part responsible for their economic crisis. obviously it is. But in percentage terms the majority of the blame lies with the European Union to think otherwise is completely bonkers, all this crisis has done is highlight the problems in a political and economic project that was and is always going to end in tears.

Correct. The EU could have saved Greece by being practical and fair instead of acting like a drama queen these past 5 years. She could and should have solved the problem within the first 6 months with a debt haircut and reform. But the EU can't be fair and resonabke when it's controlled by one nation.

So what? Should Greece have been stricken from the EU for having naughty people in power in 2010? Or perhaps it should never have been allowed to join the Euro in the first place? Given their track record of financial mismanagement, which goes way back to the days of the Drachma, I am surprised I haven't seen more of this. I'm hearing a lot of blame and nothing about the best course of recovery. Clearly, many nations have relied on bailouts as a form of recovery, and largely this has been a positive thing, though not popular or easy for the people on the ground.

Equally, each member of the EU is a separate nation and ultimately is looked upon by their electorate to be self serving first, so it should come as no surprise that the 'creditors' have an agenda, and we see exactly that self serving attitude in Greece's recent referendum where people feel that anti-austerity will serve them best, and who cares about the 100 odd billion we have just flushed down the toilet.

Saying that "Anti Austerity" will serve them better does not represent the fact that austerity has been willinging swallowed by Greece for 5 years. Has anything changed? Can you blame the Greeks for wanting to try something else? Only a fool would continue doing the same destructive thing with the same results over and over again.

Edited July 9, 2015 by Harry_Dresden

[Leonardo]

So when Tsipras says that Grrece has been a experimental debt laboratory he's absolutely right... put yourself in Greece's position. What if you couldn't manage your mortgage and the bank convinced you that MORE debt would solve your problems...

Ah, so you're saying the (previous) Greek govts were idiots for not understanding that you can't borrow your way out of debt?

Saying that "Anti Austerity" will serve them better does not represent the fact that austerity has been willinging swallowed by Greece for 5 years. Has anything changed? Can you blame the Greeks for wanting to try something else? Only a fool would continue doing the same destructive thing with the same results over and over again.

5 years is not a long time, in fact it is way too short a time to expect to see any actual recovery taking place but rather it would be a situation where the downward slide into bankruptcy is slowly halted. Trouble is, Greece didn't stop spending on non-revenue generating items - such as early retirement for a bloated public sector.

Edited July 9, 2015 by Leonardo

[Harry_Dresden]

Ah, so you're saying the (previous) Greek govts were idiots for not understanding that you can't borrow your way out of debt?

You're being simplistic now. If you're going to caste blame on who's fault it is/was then let's be thoroughly honest and mentioned that Greece was a weak economy that was allowed to enter the euro under Chancellor Schroder and President Chirac for political reasons. Then let's mention the impossibility that Greece supposedly deceived Wall Street and European banks. Let's also mention that Greece's debt and economy were weakened by the GFC...

You seriously give the Greeks FAR too much credit for trying to outsmart the system. Just face it the euro was poorly thought out and implimented and is an impossibility to manage. You can't have mules, donkey, draft horses and zebras all racing against a race horse and expect the others to keep up.

[Harry_Dresden]

Leonardo,

Yes those damn Greeks just don't wanna die in an efficient German manner... the actual nerve of those wily Greeks to want to live with some dignity and not die in the streets from hunger and cold. But that's what you get from a corrupted Greek government that puts people ahead of financial responsibility.

[Leonardo]

You're being simplistic now. If you're going to caste blame on who's fault it is/was then let's be thoroughly honest and mentioned that Greece was a weak economy that was allowed to enter the euro under Chancellor Schroder and President Chirac for political reasons.

The EU is a political organisation/alliance. All reasons for joining it are political.

Then let's mention the impossibility that Greece supposedly deceived Wall Street and European banks.

How is that so impossible? Greece did write it's own balance sheet, after all.

Let's also mention that Greece's debt and economy were weakened by the GFC...

According to stats from 2009, Greece reported negative GDP growth rates - but these were still better figures than those reported by Italy or Germany for the same period. A clue, perhaps, that Greece was misreporting the extent of the underlying weakness in the economy?

You seriously give the Greeks FAR too much credit for trying to outsmart the system. Just face it the euro was poorly thought out and implimented and is an impossibility to manage. You can't have mules, donkey, draft horses and zebras all racing against a race horse and expect the others to keep up.

And you will offer whatever apologies can be thrown out if it means you can demonise the Euro project.

Edited July 9, 2015 by Leonardo

[Space Commander Travis]

The EU is a political organisation/alliance. All reasons for joining it are political.

How is that so impossible? Greece did write it's own balance sheet, after all.

According to stats from 2009, Greece reported negative GDP growth rates - but these were still better figures than those reported by Italy or Germany for the same period. A clue, perhaps, that Greece was misreporting the extent of the underlying weakness in the economy?

And you will offer whatever apologies can be thrown out if it means you can demonise the Euro project.

So do you believe anything, even doing effectively doing what Cameron and Sarkozy did to Libya, to one of the member countries of this great community, is a price worth paying if it'll keep the great European project limping along for another few years until it finally implodes then (hopefully through financial collapse, not war between member states, although that doesn't seem as impossible as it may have done once)? Edited July 9, 2015 by Norbert the Incredible

[Harry_Dresden]

Hang on Leonardo, we're talking about the euro and not the EU.

Greece entered the EU way before it did the euro. Greece was admitted into the euro under a different system to the one we have now, by that I mean the euro was more flexible and less of Germany's domain. It was a trade and unity feature that was to benefit all. Rightly or wrongly the Greeks were admitted and as such deserve full membership and security regardless of whether Germany wants to rewrite the rules and objectives of the currency... in short the euro belongs as much to Greece as it does Germany.

According to EU Stats Greece main exports were food stuffs and agriculture. I guess the bankers and Europe were banking (pun intended), on a significant rise in feta cheese and olive oil prices and demand on the world markets to pay back the chit load of cash they were throwing at Greece at cheap interest rates.

Never mind if we all do our part and eat feta cheese morning noon and night by the truck load then Greece will be able to make its debt repayments.

Edited July 9, 2015 by Harry_Dresden

[Leonardo]

So do you believe anything, even effectively doing what Cameron and Sarkozy did to Libya, to one of the member countries of this great community, is a price worth paying if it'll keep the great European project limping along for another few years until it finally implodes then (hopefully through financial collapse, not war between member states, although that doesn't seem as impossible as it may have done once)?

No, which is why I am not blaming the EU for Greece's current economic difficulties. Greece, although a member of the EU, is a fully independent entity and makes it's own decisions regarding how to run it's own economy. Those decisions have proven to be at fault for the financial woes Greece is experiencing.

That is not "believing anything", but paying attention to the facts. That is also not "paying homage to the great European project".

[Space Commander Travis]

No, which is why I am not blaming the EU for Greece's current economic difficulties. Greece, although a member of the EU, is a fully independent entity and makes it's own decisions regarding how to run it's own economy. Those decisions have proven to be at fault for the financial woes Greece is experiencing.

That is not "believing anything", but paying attention to the facts. That is also not "paying homage to the great European project".

Well, I'm afraid if you don't even at least partially blame the EU, then you really do seem to be so enamoured of the great European project that you'd excuse them anything.

[Leonardo]

Well, I'm afraid if you don't even at least partially blame the EU, then you really do seem to be so enamoured of the great European project that you'd excuse them anything.

If I am in serious debt and a bank offers me a loan, who is to blame for taking it?

And worse, who is to blame for spending the money on dvds and computer games?

Edited July 9, 2015 by Leonardo

[Space Commander Travis]

If I am in serious debt and a bank offers me a loan, who is to blame for taking it?

The bank, for being so incompetent and/or loan shark-ish as to offer it, without checking your creditworthiness. The one who could not realistically be blamed would be the one being offered it for accepting it if they were in such desperate straits. They would truly have to have the self restraint of a saint not to accept it in such circumstances.

[Leonardo]

The bank, for being so incompetent and/or loan shark-ish as to offer it, without checking your creditworthiness. The one who could not realistically be blamed would be the one being offered it for accepting it if they were in such desperate straits. They would truly have to have the self restraint of a saint not to accept it in such circumstances.

Thank you for at least giving me a laugh, Norbert.

[Space Commander Travis]

Thank you for at least giving me a laugh, Norbert.

At least giving you a laugh? So you believe that the one to blame and the only one to blame would be the one accepting the loan so foolishly offered? You really think that? I'm afraid that although I may have given you a laugh, you seem to have no notion whatsoever of how anyone would act in the situation you present. it's just utterly, ridiculously unrealistic to imagine that the one being offered the loan would be so saint-like as to refuse it, and to somehow try to pretend that the one offering it is either so naive as to offer it without doing any checking first, or so utterly callous as to offer it knowing full well that their victim wouldn't be able to pay it back, but either way is doing nothing wrong, can only be attributed to a love of the EU that's little short of fanatical. Edited July 9, 2015 by Norbert the Incredible