Its just I thought the world had moved beyond that...especially in Europe. I mean, the leaders of this Golden Dawn party are Holocaust deniers, and the party's actions bear a striking resemblance to the SA and SS in Germany circa 1930. I just hope that things turn around for them soon.

Read the article Draug...

Is it safe for work, or will the language/ideas raise flags?

I don't think it'll raise flags....its an NBC article.

The Greek lied to the European Union about their country to get into the Euro. It lied to itself about not needing to pay taxes and still be able to retire at 60. One day your lies catch up with you.

That's all very true redhouse, but that doesn't mean their whole society should collapse. You have here the emergence of a paramilitary branch of a radical political party. I thought Europe had moved past the 1930s.

It's not something I think "should" happen, or they "deserve" it. It's just inevitable that it does.

When the center isn't effective, people turn to alternatives, both the radical left and the radical right. The thing with Greece is that there is this flourishing underground economy, and evading taxes is almost a patriotic duty. That's a deeply cultural tradition that probably goes back to resisting occupying armies and their demands, and it's going to take 100 years or more to change, if anyone can find the right combination of charisma and hard-line enforcement to bring it about.

Much of Greece's suffering could be eliminated or severely reduced if they would leave the euro and inflate away the unpayable debt they've accrued. That would still make for a rough time in the next few years, but it wouldn't be the full-blown depression they're in now. But such an idea is anathema to the idea of "ever-closer union," so the forces in Brussels will never allow it. The crisis could also be solved by a full-fledged fiscal union, but the people of Europe will never accept that surrender of sovereignty. So Europe is stuck in the horrible middle position which harms everyone.

^Good point, Invictus.
Also, the European Union is suffering from a terrible democratic deficit. The positions of chairman of the Council and chairman of the Commission should be merged into the position of President of the Union, and he should be elected continent-wide.

50% of cops in Athens voted for Golden Dawn.
Also, torture for everyone!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/09/greek-antifascist-protesters-torture-police

I'd be interested to get Hellalt's opinion on this all...or even Dejan's or some of our other Balkan-based players.

That article by largeham shocked me a bit more. I'd even say that's worse than the one I posted.

Sure this situation could be resolved by cutting Greece loose or strengthening the EU. I just think the situation is deteriorating too much. I'm not sure how it is in Ireland now, but Spain, Portugal, and Italy are all getting pretty restless, and wasn't France's credit rating downgraded to an A (or AA) a few months ago? It would just be awful if this type of ideology spread throughout southern Europe.

Typical of the Greek: they're never to blame. It's either the government, Germany, or the foreigners in their land that are to blame, but never themselves. I'd be happy to hear hellalt's opinion as well, but I fear the worst.

@Goldfinger, how is it strange that history would repeat itself? we've been repeating things for thousands of years.

our economies don't run that differently than they did 70 years ago. Neither do our democracies.

You seem to think the Nazis were irrevocably evil, when they actually took germany from a massive recession/depression and made it into a world power in a short 7/8 years. Anyone who could promise that would win an election...

Now it is just possible that GREECE, which has been run by a dictator for how many of those 70 years? is in a similar position, but people think that this party is actually not as evil as nazis (because the german nationalist socialist party are painted as bad guys - even if they were - worse than even the most terrible communist party, or corrupt african/south american dictator, or corrupt corporate western 'democracy'...)

@Redhouse, the democratic deficit of the EU may not be a bad thing. The EU is not a democracy, it is a collection of democratic nations. There is a distinction.

Every appointed position can be removed by the leaders of the governments, as such they have less teeth than an american president (who rules over a similar number of people and as large an economy, so i continue to see this as the closest comparison i can find) the difference in power is dramatic.

When was the last US president to be removed from power by individual states?

It's not even like congress, the european parliment is elected directly, and doesn't have the power to replace commissioners... but if it did then politcal groups (be they extreme left or right) from one side of the continent would have the power to reject decision made by commissioners supported by a majority of country leaders...

only the council of ministers has the power to reject decisions made by the commission, and they are all directly elected - not by the whole continent, but by their own country. Each country remains largely sovereign.

In other news of what-the-fuck-is-southern-europe-doing

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-20025626

@ora - We have been repeating things for thousands of years, but things change over time. There are no longer hordes of nomadic Asians invading Europe and the Middle East, its no longer ok to enslave people, and its not longer okay for France to fund a Scottish rebellion. I mean, slavery was eradicated in 70 years. That's a fundamental change in the economic system. I would think the economy today is fundamentally different than it was in 1930.

^^For that link just go to viewthread=935936 because its about the Italian scientist thing

@redhouse - the Greeks and others did lie to get into the Euro, but they saw the euro as being the only game in town, a game they had to be a part of. Could you imagine Greece outside of the Euro? Who would open a factory making washing machines there when the owners wouldn't know what the currency and therefore their sale price would be once the goods are made? Their creative accounting was well known at the time, and became acceptable as others were openly fudging figures to join, and everyone including germany has openly flouted fiscal rules since.

The Greeks relunctance to pay tax stems from a currupt an ineffecient system. Why pay taxes when the government mis-spends. I saw figures recently that suggested it would be cheaper for the gocernment to ferry every train traveller around in taxis rather than continue to subsidise the railways. Would you pay taxes to such a non-sensical system? Paying taxes just encourages them to be corrupt and ineffecient.

We will soon see open rebellion in many parts of Europe, our leaders talk of us all being in it together - but in the UK for example millionaires are getting tax rebates while welfare benefits and salaries are cut or frozen. Both may be economically correct, we made need to incentivise millionaries and reduce the welfare bill; but politically it can only lead to sweeping change - more poor people can vote than rich people and if parties don't start representing the poor better, then new parties such as Golden Dawn wil fill the void. I think racism is evil, but peple will turn on their neighbours unless their demands for social justice are met.

" the democratic deficit of the EU may not be a bad thing. The EU is not a democracy, it is a collection of democratic nations. There is a distinction."

If it were just something like the UN then it wouldn't matter. But in the EU today most laws are made not in national capitals, but in a certain neighborhood of Brussels. Sure, a country like France has a fully democratic government, but does it matter when most of the laws that its people have to follow are made by unelected and unaccountable people elsewhere?

This all just goes back to my previous point about how this middle position is what's harming Europe so much. The EU is wildly undemocratic, but it doesn't have to be. All you'd need to do was make the Commission actually accountable to the Parliament and that would go a hell of a long way to quiet a lot of the democratic deficit complaints. Or alternatively, and more in line with European popular opinion (rightly or wrongly), the member states could take back the powers they've given to Brussels. An EU that's more like NAFTA and less like a federation would quiet the nationalists and still bring the huge benefits that the EU has allowed Europe to enjoy.

But I think the Europeans will continue to go with half-measures for the foreseeable future. Southern Europe will continue to suffer, and the people of the continent will become more and more disenchanted with what should be a good system.

"Typical of the Greek: they're never to blame"

Ironic coming from a Dutchman.

Greece was not the only country to fudge the numbers on their debt, and that isn't even the real problem. The real problem is not debt, it's the fact that the biggest economies in Europe don't buy anything from southern Europe. The southern European economies all compete with one another which undermines export growth. Look at export growth in Greece since they joined the EU. It's non-existent. Look at export growth in Germany. It has skyrocketed. Meanwhile Germany refuses to buy anything from Europe. That's the problem.

Japan had a much much much higher debt to gdp ratio than Greece, and yet the speculators didn't engage in a speculative attack against Japan. Gee, maybe I wonder why.

Furthermore, Spain was running surplusses prior to the great recession, and they were also the victims of a speculative attack. Debt is just an excuse.

And here comes Putin33. End of civil discussion.

How was I not being civil?

"Ironic coming from a Dutchman."


But mostly I'm applying your previous forum history.

"Gee, maybe I wonder why."

Because the debt is owned by residents and not foreign investors. The Japanese government can always tax the bondholders to pay for what it borrowed from them. Public debt at 230% of GDP, external debt at 45% of GDP. Foreign creditors don't have the leverage to mount an attack against Japan bonds. Greek external debt is higher than the public debt itself (because external debt also entails private external debt, a metric that is nevertheless much lower in case of these 2 countries; on the other hand in pre-crisis Hungary, it was relatively important).

No, guys don't jump on Putin right away. Speculative attack is a major cause for what is happening. He has his facts right. It happened before in Argentina, Mexico, and SE Asia in the 1990s, and this is just this decade's version of a bunch of speculators trying to make their millions and watching the world burn.

Well, partially. Now its basically devolved into debt and lack of economic growth.

But Greece isn't even in the top ten in terms of external debt to GDP ratio. The UK has twice the level Greece has. It has everything to do with larger countries being able to borrow in the international market.

"But mostly I'm applying your previous forum history."

And yet you're the one trying to make this conversation uncivil. Fancy that.

Golden Dawn is neonazi party consisting of mainly stupid people.
Their leaders cannot even speak and write proper Greek yet they pretend to be admirers of ancient Greece and make ridiculous attempts to use ancient Greek when they even fail in modern Greek.
This party is an old story in Greece (0,1% in the past elections) but has raised it's influence due to people getting politically apolitical, than means frustrated and despaired from previous corrupt governments.
Golden Dawn is a party supported during the past and now by the police and by the current right minded government. Despite being a bunch of apes walking around Athens in groups and beating immigrants they had a few trendy ideas that helped them reach around 10% nowadays. Sharing food and helping old cows get their money from the bank or cross the street is what brought them here combined with the good old hatred for the weak aka immigrants. Make no mistake Greeks are far from hospital. It's so annoying and brings me to despair to have a conversation with someone I thought he was a friend of mine and to listen to him say that illegal immigrants supposedly are the cause for everything that's going bad.
Still that's just the way the authority manipulates Golden Dawn through the illegal immigrant issue to divide the people so that they are controllable.
Having those apes wreak havoc and create hatred and fights between themselves and the lefties it's a good way to divide so that noone pays attention to the corrupt government that from 1974 till now behaves like the bitch of Europe.
Don't try to have wannabe economical analysis about whos fault the economical crisis is. It's capitalism's fault. From 1974 till now there has never been a free greek government. Greece is just the protectorat of banks and EU. They loan as money so that we can never repay so that we remain under control. Fuck it. I don't care about that. But I do care even people became fascists and nazis. And I also blame the so called democratic governemt of manipulating Golden Dawn to control the situation.