John Ward November 4, 2011 PAPANDREOU TO RESIGN

GREEK CRISIS: Everybody friends again as EU democracy takes its course.

Papandreou (l) and Opposition leader Antonis Samaras

Exit Papandreou

‘Stocks rally on Greek decision to dump Referendum’ trumpeted Reuter’s business home page this morning. ‘Greedy folks get rich as EU bullies more democrats’ would’ve been an equally accurate summation, but we each have our own perspective on life. What worries me is that I feel 99% certain that none of the Reuters subs will have grasped the black irony of the headline.

Anyway, the up-down, in-out, off-on, we-must-have-one-no-we-mustn’t thing continues in Athens. After an hour or two yesterday when it looked as though the severity of the crisis facing it might actually unite the Greek political class, things returned to their point-scoring, internecine, back-stabbing normality.

Basically, Papa and two of his mates went for a bold Up Yours strategy to stuff raving anti-democrat Merkozy Brussels, and the Greek finance minister Evangelo Venizelos (who was definitely running with hare and hounds on this one). After the Merkozy dressing down, Veryzealous saw his chance and split from Papandreou. Papa’s Cabinet caved in.

On paper, the Greek Dubcek is facing a confidence motion with a one vote margin in his favour. But events have moved on this morning. (Athens is two hours ahead). New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras and the Venizelos tendency appear to have persuaded George Papandreou to stand down. Papa has agreed to this, but only if they let him win the no-confidence motion later today. This is of course a completely pointless exercise as in theory George could say, “Well, I won…maybe I’ll stick around”.

Yup, it’s that close to being sorted out.

The rest is mystery. At least four alternative road maps are now on the table, but the obstacle to real road-action is that none of them seems to have any tarmac on them as yet. Fat Evangelo looks relatively isolated for the time being (the Rightist Opposition seems to find him as unpleasant as the PM does) and yesterday’s determination to get everyone – anyone – going on shouting “Where do we sign?” to the next bailout tranche seems to have evaporated overnight: the Opposition’s main priority this morning is to get Papa out. This could be because he was, until Bellyjealous defected, close to pulling off a coup that might have consigned them to a long period in Opposition; but more likely, it’s designed to leave Panok leaderless and divided going into December’s elections….which may or may not happen, depending on whether Greek sovereignty still exists by then.

You may not understand it, but you read it here first.

37Comments

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1

Yohay on November 5, 2011 at 1:56 pm

I think that Papandreou made a brilliant political move: he got the people with him on the referendum, the people against Samaras for suddenly supporting the bailout and the people against Venizelos for opposing the referendum and cancelling it.
I believe he’ll get to stick in power, as the opposition offers no alternative…

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2

dermot o'malley on November 5, 2011 at 12:27 am

Is he that bad or, as an Irishman in Ireland, is he portrayed that badly, deliberately by the MSM?

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3

dermot o'malley on November 5, 2011 at 12:16 am

They’re simply telling us the story that the elites want the plebs to hear.

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4

John Ward on November 4, 2011 at 8:13 pm

mjf
If Nigel Farage didn’t look, sound, walk, fly, waddle and quack like a wide-eyed looney, maybe the media would take a different view.
UKIP is a very good idea with a very bad leader.

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5

John Ward on November 4, 2011 at 8:10 pm

jrvf
Are these societies so secret, we are not allowed to know who they are?

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6

John Ward on November 4, 2011 at 8:09 pm

Jwoo
Agreed

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7

John Ward on November 4, 2011 at 8:01 pm

Gem
French villainy is hard to deny…if you live there.

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8

oldasiahand on November 4, 2011 at 4:50 pm

Autocracy is good for stockmarkets.

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9

Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 1:35 pm

That’s an excellent article. Redwood says:

“Why do they [the EU Euro planners] think the debt markerts will now behave differently from the currency markets? It is after all at base the same argument. Economies have to be in line with one another for the project to work.”

He’s right even though he didn’t mention that member state economies not only had to be in alignment at the time of convergence into a single currency, but over a very long period after. Without that, strains were always bound to arise as we now see. This very point was rightly made by the BoE Governor pre-Merv.

Redwood goes on to say this which Cameron should heed:

“The G20 is considering an IMF expansion. The IMF usually promotes a programme of budget deficit reduction linked to devaluation and appropriate monetary policy and interest rates, set by the sovereign government it is assisting. Euroland countries do not have the ability to devalue or to set their own money policy. This makes it difficult to see how IMF programmes can work.”

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10

marcjf on November 4, 2011 at 12:49 pm

Interesting listening to Jeremy Vine on the radio just now – covered whether the UK should increase funds to the IMF to bail out the EZ. Now whilst this is not a simple topic, it is pretty clear that Joe public has a very hazy grasp of economics. “The money will be used to feed starving Greek children” – “it won’t get spent, it will be used to scare off the the bond market” ????. But it drives home the point that most commentators and the voting public (sorry non-voting – we are not allowed to do that any more) have little real idea about the substance of this crisis. So it is very easy for politicians to lie and use scare tactics – assuming of course that they understand which I increasingly doubt. Nigel Farage presented and whilst he is commonly portrayed in the MSM as a wide eyed looney – in fact he spoke some sense and has been consistently correct in predicting this crisis.

However 99% of people don’t understand this situation – its causes, solutions and risks. What they do seem to grasp is the concept of good money after bad. Unlike our illustrious leaders who are putting our money where their mouths are – to use the venacular.

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11

Jwoo on November 4, 2011 at 12:02 pm

“It is the manner in which it is undertaken. The EU could have been good for Greece, the Euro could have been good for Greece. ”

But I am not condemning what the EU might have been, rather I am slating it for what it is. I would argue that it could never have become anything less corrupt but that is a different argument.

As to what Greece was or wasn’t doing, like Merkozy actions, we don’t condemn Germans or French for what their leaders do and I don’t condemn the Greeks for the same reason. If they had voted in a referendum then clearly they take the consequences, but they didn’t and now apparently wont. Neither will we. It is the power exercised by the EU as it is that has brought that about not some fanciful notion of what might have been.

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12

Jwoo on November 4, 2011 at 11:56 am

“Unfortunately for the rest of us, they crop up too frequently in positions of power.”

I agree with this in my view irrefutable observation, thus anyone wishing to make a move towards politics or any other position of power should be assumed to be psychologically unfit for the role until and unless proved otherwise. Rather than as it is at present, where the reverse is the norm and can never be undone until too late.

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13

AJC on November 4, 2011 at 11:44 am

Back to basics: the stability (or loack) of the EU and the Euro. John Redwood (as always) reminds us why we shouldn’t be surprised by turmoil.

The Euro looks like the ERM
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2011/11/04/the-euro-looks-like-the-erm/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+JohnRedwoodsDiary+%28John+Redwood%27s+Diary%29

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14

Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 11:37 am

@Gem: I think much of Merky’s behaviour (and also Sarky’s) can be explained by their joint national commitments to the continuation of building the giant European Superstate: USE. That is a very long standing ambition embedded deep into the EU political mindset.

As someone reminded us in another thread, virtually every political party across Europe is signed up to this madness. It is pure group-think. Thus, when this debt crises arose, they all had to act in concert to deal with it. There is no room in this EU group-think for dissenters. When Greece’s Papa stepped out of line and wanted a referendum, he had to be dealt with.

We have seen exactly the same processes going on regarding global warming where dissenters are shunned and punished for stepping out of line.

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15

Matt on November 4, 2011 at 11:34 am

Yeap, if you follow this train of thought, then you have to ask, why?

I don’t want to repeat myself ad nauseam on this one, but I really do think there are those that are socio-/psychopathic – Hare & Burke say as many as 1 in 25 – and they are emotionally dead apart from the thrill they get from dominion over others.

Unfortunately for the rest of us, they crop up too frequently in positions of power.

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16

johnnyrvf on November 4, 2011 at 11:23 am

If you want to have some idea of who and why are behind the scenes, it might be worth considering the ultimate aims of the secret societies, of course writing this means I will be automatically and irrevocably branded as a conspiracy theorist and therefore incapable of comprehending anything to do with every day reality let alone have the subtlety to be able to observe carefully concealed threads in the tapestry of civilisation.

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17

Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 11:21 am

@Gem: I don’t think it’s as conspiratorial as some people might think.
Nor do I don’t think there are layers of deception going on per se.

I am quite sure who is pulling the levers of power. It’s the EU-cratocracy run by the unelected asswipe Barroso. But to always give the appearance of democracy in action, the script being played out is currently fronted by the likes of Merkel & Sarkozy. This is always how unelected despots operate to avoid scaring the horses.

Barroso’s comments reported this morning on Sky News about “what sort of govt he’d like to see elected in Greece” will probably be seen as an error on his part and he’ll be asked to STFU or risk giving the game away.

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Gem on November 4, 2011 at 11:09 am

@Jwoo
the problem is not the Euro. It is not a concept of the EU.

It is the manner in which it is undertaken. The EU could have been good for Greece, the Euro could have been good for Greece.

But Greece itself was acting in an underhand manner with the EU, it was playing the EU’s own game, and as usual with these things, when you play with the devil, the devil always wins.

If you read my comment above, you will see that I have time for Dutch politicians. They work hard, and on the whole, do a good job. The levels of corruption are – in British terms at least – woefully inadequate.

How can you get at guys whose sincerest intent is to have a nice weekend with their friends and family in a quiet suburb of Deventer? It is a most serious problem for those who would use them. Thankfully, the banks came to the rescue and sprayed billions across Europe in an attempt to keep their balance sheets and their share price at the expected level for an internationally traded bank.

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Gem on November 4, 2011 at 11:02 am

@BT
we will never know. Which is the entire point of the operation. Some faceless person who will always be missed by the MSM.

They will live in perfect anonymity in broad daylight.

It is a sign of the times, and if you have any understanding of second level evil, you will be a step closer to understanding what is going on here. It can be characterized by the person doing some good to someone else, but in doing it, does the other person an injustice.

An old lady is looking up and down the street. A gentleman helps her across the road as a bus draws to a stop. The old lady, now on the other side of the road now looks at the departing bus. She now needs to get back across the road and find out where the correct bus stop was. She knows where it is now, because the bus she wanted to catch has just departed.

Question: did the man in doing what he thought was right, actually do good? He will have left with a feeling of pride. The lady will be left frustrated at missing a dental appointment.

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20

Gem on November 4, 2011 at 10:55 am

@BT
let us get this straight: the elected leaders of Europe are being used by forces whose idea of democracy is who pays for the next botttle of Chateau de Mouton Rothschild ’67.

You can say that Merkel is doing something un-democratic. Maybe she is, one must ask why she is doing these things. One must also look at what she does at home in Germany, how she handles things there. Is there a difference between the two? If so, then why is she doing one thing in the relative freedom of the Bundestag, and having to do something else at a Summit.

You can say that she wants to make the Bundestag do her will, or you can put the coin on its other face and say that forces more powerful than she is are forcing her to do one thing at a summit and another in Berlin.

I am not saying that she is right or wrong, only that individual politicians are easy to handle. In the case of the UK, through direct corruption. I know that in the Netherlands the MPs are pretty straight – only three were caught out by the copy-cat sting by de Telegraaf. Compare that to the three MPs from the UK parliament that are now serving prison terms, and the three that were *not* guilty of any major fraud.

My point is that Dutch and German MPs are pretty straight democrats. You have to use other tactics to undermine them and twist them to your ends. That is what you need to watch for in these instances.

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Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 10:50 am

@Gem: that’s a perfect description of how it works…

The question it raises in my mind is ‘who is the scriptwriter’?
.
.
.

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Jwoo on November 4, 2011 at 10:48 am

I am consistent in my belief that governments should act in thre interests of their nation. I am equally convinced that where this conflicts with another nation’s interests I expect something a little more broad visioned.

I haven’t yet read any comment which proves that the best answer for the Greek people is to remain in the Eurozone. I accept that there are pros and cons for them and therefore am of the opinion that they should decide for themselves.

The EU, fronted by Merkozy, appear to have bullied Greece out of that opportunity. However you dress it up it has been obscene to watch, never mind that they have been assisted by Greek Pols.

Not one normally given to supporting the act of revolt en masse and whatever it might deteriorate into, I have to say that were I Greek I would be tooling up to cause a little bullying of my own. A pox on the corruption, political and moral of the EU and all it stands for.

There, I’ve even surprised myself how angry this has made me. Not forgetting of course that in the UK we have suffered the same deceit by our pols. Put in a room alone with any of those morons and I promise you I would be able to get my point across, a pity it is the only way any of us would be able to.

Time for a walk around the field to calm down I think.

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Gem on November 4, 2011 at 10:33 am

@BT
the EU uses national politicians for its own ends. It will use underhand methods to position politician A to counter politician B to achieve their intended result C. The characters A and B are irrelevant save in the context of C. Character D showed some gumption by suggesting he do something out of the ordinary – a referendum.

Okay, so we know who A, B and D are in this case. But do look at other occasions and the characters are different, the goal the same.

If you concentrate on the characters in the play, you will miss out on what the scriptwriter is doing. This is why the MSM focusses on personalities, or national countries: it takes eyes away from the script.

After all, you never see the scriptwriter, do you. Even when Shakespeare himself trod the boards, he appeared as Hamlet or King Henry VIII, and not as himself.

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Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 10:22 am

Exactly so. And if the European political class get away with this scam, the EU-cratocracy will end up with far greater powers of despotism. The likes of Barroso will be laughing his way to the next politburo congress meeting of comrades.

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25

Rebraz on November 4, 2011 at 10:18 am

Another step on the way to dictatorship; as you say “avoid elections at all costs”. We have yet to see what the Greek people think about this.

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26

Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 10:18 am

@marcjf: Thanks, excellent analysis.
All of us in Europe should be concerned that our elected leaders have mismanaged our countries to the point of economic collapse, which now require undemocratic govts of national unity to sort out, which the political class then describe as a good thing. If the crises had been caused by aliens from outer space I might agree, but…..

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Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 10:06 am

@Gem: People on the street might have another view, I wouldn’t expect anything else. People will not usually publicly admit that their elected leaders are self-centered, anti-democratic despots, especially if their actions are superficially in the national interest. People close ranks when the going gets tough.

However, the pressure from Merkey & Sarky was real and cannot be undone, despite Sarky’s attempt to dance on pinheads at his press conference in Cannes. They told Papa that his referendum must be about whether Greece wants to stay in the e-zone or not, not simply about the bailout terms as he intended.
I cannot see what happened as anything other than pressure and scare tactics intended to get Papa to drop his referendum plan. It worked because it frightened the pants off his domestic political class and they withdrew support for him.

But as we all know, the solutions are not solutions at all; just fixes which amount to kicking the can further down the road at growing expense to pan-European taxpayers. I see the IMF is now going to be the conduit for more bailout money, despite public denials by Cameron in the UK.

There is no negotiated solution possible to this crises, it’s too big. I have been convinced of that for weeks. Sooner or later events will have their day and the best that can be hoped for is that EU members have done their best to mitigate the fall out. We shall see.

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marcjf on November 4, 2011 at 10:03 am

I live in Europe too and whilst it is certainly the case that the German and French do not want to pay for Greek profligacy, this is a clear example of a failure of democracy. A Goverment of National Unity effectively gives the Greek people no say in their economic future. This may be regarded as responsible behaviour by markets, banks and desperate EZ politicias but it is in fact a loss of freedom. At least the Greeks can still vote with their feet and I expect they will – except for those without transferrable skills who will riot.

So in the cause of “saving Europe” (ie kicking the can up the road for a month) we should be delighted that democracy is being sacrficed on the alter of debt deflation economics. This is a wholly unsustainable situation. Italian bond yields have been over 6% for most of the week. Are we to see “National Governments” in Italy, Spain, Portugal and the rest too? This is not going to end well.

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29

Robert on November 4, 2011 at 9:43 am

It seems to me that a lot of the political moves have had only one aim. That is to avoid an election at all costs. Even now there is still talk of a government of national unity. They wish to avoid an election because they will lose control and could endanger the bailout and in the end the Euro.

Apart from a Eurosceptic minority in the Finnish paliament, all major political parties in the EU are pro EU and pro the Eurozone. They will do pretty much anything to save the Euro. Note how Dave is twisting all ways to support an IMF bailout.

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Gem on November 4, 2011 at 9:38 am

BT
I do not agre with your last paragraph. I live in Europe and the feeling here is quite different. It is the British MSM that has portrayed Germany and France as the villains in this play, but look to the people in those countries and you will see a different attitude. This tends to be “let the Greeks do things their way, but don’t expect us to pay for this”.

The private banks on the other hand have a different agenda. They lent out money cheaply, knowing that Greece would overborrow. The last thing they want is a default, because then they don’t get the goodies.

Germany is not interested either way just so long as Germany can pull themselves out of the mess, and in this respect expect Greece to do the same.

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Bankrupt Taxpayer on November 4, 2011 at 9:26 am

“You may not understand it, but you read it here first.”

John, it makes more sense than MSM utterings and their opinions-non-opinions on the subject.

For me, the big issue on this is that Greek democracy has been torpedoed by France/Germany and MSM has little to say about it. Instead, they’re telling us that stock markets rose strongly soon after.

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Right Paddock on November 4, 2011 at 9:01 am

Item 4 made me smile – http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/1/49964

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It'sAlreadyTooLate on November 4, 2011 at 8:55 am

I think he looks like Adrian Chiles, perhaps both of us should book an appointment with Specsavers

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Bill on November 4, 2011 at 8:54 am

When reading about these sorts of ploys and counter ploys that go in the political world I often wonder at what point does stupidity enter the mix.
I also try to figure out who gains the most, players, audience, backers, ‘off camera’ movers and shakers. I rarely succeed but I the stupid one for paying attention in the first place to something I cannot influence one way or the other?

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35

kfc1404 on November 4, 2011 at 8:50 am

Doesn’t Venizelos bear a striking resemblence to John Prescott? or maybe it’s me!

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Richard G on November 4, 2011 at 8:47 am

the Thursday edition of the Athens daily’s at a glance
even they seem to have mixed messages

http://web.amna.gr/anaenglish/articleview1.php?id=1266

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Gem on November 4, 2011 at 8:38 am

“You may not understand it, but you read it here first.”

Sums it up, dunnit?

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