Lagarde (top ECB): "Je kan beter een baan hebben dan spaargeld"

Lagarde heeft afgelopen vrijdag de baan van topgraaier Draghi als president van de Europese Centrale Bank (ECB) overgenomen, ook al heeft zij bepaald geen financieel economische opleiding gevolgd. Alle hoop van een aantal centrale banken in de EU op een ander beleid dan dat van Draghi werd vrijwel onmiddellijk de grond ingeboord. Vreemd overigens die verwachting, immers Lagarde is ook verantwoordelijk voor de gore spelletjes die het IMF sinds 2011 heeft gespeeld, in dat jaar werd ze directeur van deze inhumane neoliberale organisatie..... 

Overigens,  Lagarde is in feite een veroordeelde misdadiger, die haar straf van een jaar gevangenisstraf ontliep daar er anders een crisis in het IMF zou zijn ontstaan, dit nadat haar voorganger en verkrachter Strrauss-Kahn het veld moest ruimen..... Ongelofelijk daarom ook dat de ondemocratische EU Lagarde koos als topgraaier van de ECB.......

Lagarde nam haar functie bij de ECB op o.a. door Nederland en Duitsland te manen hun overschot te investeren, voorts begon Lagarde te zeuren over onderlinge 'solidariteit', ofwel steek ook je kont diep in de schulden. Wat betreft het 'beleid' van Draghi: Lagarde gaat gewoon door op de doodlopende weg die Draghi eerder heeft bewandeld: obligaties van landen opkopen en het verlagen van de rente tot nog verder onder de – 0,5%, die nu al ingevoerd wordt (zo ongeveer de laatste actie van Draghi), ofwel een rente die nog verder onder het 'nulpunt' zal dalen, anders gezegd: negatieve rente (waarmee geld lenen zelfs geld zou moeten opleveren, al zal dat 'natuurlijk niet' voor het gewone volk opgaan...)....

Dat daardoor een flink aantal mensen in de problemen komt interesseert autocraat Lagarde net zo min als haar voorganger Draghi, schijt aan de pensioenen die mensen hun werkende leven lang hebben opgebouwd, dokken en niet zeuren....... Ook de kleine spaarders kunnen wat Lagarde betreft doodvallen, ze durfde keihard te zeggen dat je beter een baan kan hebben dan geld op de bank..... Moet je nagaan: de misdadige dweil Lagarde gaat een inkomen verdienen van rond de 4 ton op jaarbasis is en dat is exclusief een gigantische onkostenvergoeding......

Taaie stof mensen, het hieronder opgenomen artikel van Tyler Durden, maar zeer de moeite van het lezen waard (het artikel werd eerder gepubliceerd op Zero Hedge). Daaronder een verduidelijking over QE ofwel Quantitative Easing, een artikel van Investopedia, QE of het waanzinnige beleid van Draghi om zoveel mogelijk obligaties van EU landen op te kopen (ook werden schulden van banken in Zuid-Europa opgekocht, waardoor de Grieken de regie in eigen land zijn kwijtgeraakt en nog steeds diep in  de ellende zitten...).... 

De ECB heeft overigens al aangekondigd, na de stop van één jaar, opnieuw bonussen ter waarde van 20 miljard euro op te willen kopen, ook al is het allesbehalve duidelijk of dit ook maar iets heeft opgeleverd voor de EU, behalve dan dat de drukpersen voor papiergeld overuren maakten en ons geld in feite steeds minder waard werd ook al merken we daar nu nog weinig van..... (dat gebeurt als de volgende crisis zich aandient en zoals je weet die komt eraan, de vraag is wanneer precies)

Lagarde: "We Should Be Happier To Have A Job Than To Have Savings"

by Tyler Durden

Mon, 11/04/2019 - 06:12

Any hopes that the replacement of Mario Draghi, who on Halloween left the ECB more polarized than ever, as the core European nations revolted against the Italian's profligately loose monetary policy in an unprecedented public demonstration of discord within the European Central Bank...

... with the ECB's new head, former IMF Director and convicted criminal, Christine Lagarde would result in some easing of tensions, were promptly crushed when Lagarde picked up where Draghi left off, calling on Germany and the Netherlands to use their budget surpluses to fund investments that would help stimulate the economy, in a sharp rebuke that will not win the former French finance minister any friends in fiscally conservative Germany.

In an appeal to Germany's sense of solidarity, and in hopes that Germany's memory of hyperinflation has faded enough, Lagarde said that there "isn’t enough solidarity" in the single currency area, adding: “We share a currency, but we don’t share much budgetary policy for now."

"Those that have the room for manoeuvre, those that have a budget surplus, that’s to say Germany, the Netherlands, why not use that budget surplus and invest in infrastructure? Why not invest in education? Why not invest in innovation, to allow for a better rebalancing?" asked Lagarde, blaming Germany and the Netherlands for living within their means, and demanding they should no longer do so, just because most other Europeans decided to pull a page out of the American playbook, and live exorbitantly outside of their means.

Lagarde's direct attempt at shaming Europe's fiscal conservatives was nothing short of shocking: normally ECB officials avoid naming individual countries in public statements, because their mandate is to act in the interests of the eurozone as a whole. But when Lagarde made her speech she had not yet officially taken over at the Frankfurt-based institution — she succeeds Mario Draghi on Friday.

We somehow doubt this "explanation" will fly with the German population, which sees itself as funding peripheral Europe's profligate ways for the past decade, even as it benefited from the weak euro to supercharge the German export machine.

And just to guarantee she is as resented by Germany as was Mario Draghi, she said that the German and Dutch governments, which last year had budget surpluses of 2% and 1.5% respectively, "have not really made the necessary efforts," she added, referring to establishment's increasing desperation to force anyone with an even remotely normal balance sheet to sink to the same level as their insolvent peers.

As for the punchline, Lagarde defended the negative interest rates introduced by her predecessor Draghi, arguing that people should be happier to have a job than a higher savings rate. This, as a reminder, comes at a time when virtually everyone who is not named "Draghi" or "Lagarde" thinks that negative rates are catastrophic, and assure doom for the Eurozone.

When asked about the impact of negative rates on savers, Ms Lagarde said on Thursday that they should think about how much worse the situation would be if the ECB had not cut rates as much as it had.

“Would we not be in a situation today with much higher unemployment and a far lower growth rate, and isn’t it true that ultimately we have done the right thing to act in favor of jobs and of growth rather than the protection of savers?” she asked.

The unemployment rate in the 19-country eurozone has fallen from 12 per cent in 2013 to 8.2 per cent last year. GDP growth in the single currency zone was 1.8 per cent last year and the ECB expects it to slow to 1.1 per cent this year.

Finally, for those curious if the authorities will stop at anything to destroy the currency and send rates to even more negative levels if it means kicking the can on a global, populist uprising, by just a few months, weeks or days, here is the answer: "We should be happier to have a job than to have our savings protected," said Lagarde.

"I think that it is in this spirit that monetary policy has been decided by my predecessors and I think they made quite a beneficial choice."

Let's check back on that statement in a year, shall we?

Of course, there is no magic solution here: all the ECB has done is kick the can, and ensure that the next crisis will be even worse than if some semblance of a price-clearing reality had been allowed under Draghi's 8 years. Instead, the ECB's balance sheet exploded to €4.7 trillion euros, as the world's largest central bank-cum-hedge fund bought every bond in sight in hopes of keeping asset prices artificially elevated.

In October, the ECB, less than a year after it ended QE* in a failed attempt to "renormalize" monetary policy, announced it would cut rates to a record -0.5% and unveiled open-ended plans to start buying €20bn of bonds starting in November.

Needless to say, the comments by the former French finance minister confirm market expectations that she is likely to pursue similar monetary policy strategy to Draghi who flooded the financial system with cheap money to fight slowing growth and inflation while calling on governments to do more through fiscal policy to take the burden off the central bank.

In the end, the consequences of Draghi's monetary policy, as we explained before, will be catastrophic, but the former Goldman partner was wise enough to get off the European Titanic before it hit the iceberg. It will now be Lagarde's task to save as many people as possible once the ship starts sinking, and judging by her remarks, she is perfectly fine of not only going down with the ship, but also being blamed for the collision.

Tags: Business Finance
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* Hieronder de uitleg over QE of: Quantitative Easing, geschreven door Jim Chappelow en gepubliceerd op Investopedia (zie ook het eerste staatje in het artikel van Durden):

Quantitative Easing (QE)

REVIEWED BY JIM CHAPPELOW Updated Sep 6, 2019

What Is Quantitative Easing? (QE)

Quantitative easing is an unconventional monetary policy in which a central bank purchases government securities or other securities from the market in order to increase the money supply and encourage lending and investment. When short-term interest rates are at or approaching zero, normal open market operations, which target interest rates, are no longer effective, so instead a central bank can target specified amounts of assets to purchase. Quantitative easing increases the money supply by purchasing assets with newly created bank reserves in order to provide banks with more liquidity.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Quantitative easing (QE) is the name for a strategy that a central bank can use to increase the domestic money supply.
• QE is usually used when interest rates are already near 0 percent and can be focused on the purchase of government bonds from banks.
• QE programs were widely used following the 2008 financial crisis, although some central banks, like the Bank of Japan, had been using QE for several years prior to the financial crisis.

Understanding Quantitative Easing

To execute quantitative easing, central banks increase the supply of money by buying government bonds and other securities. Increasing the supply of money is similar to increasing supply of any other asset—it lowers the cost of money. A lower cost of money means interest rates are lower and banks can lend with easier terms. This strategy is used when interest rates approach zero, at which point central banks have fewer tools to influence economic growth.

If quantitative easing itself loses effectiveness, fiscal policy (government spending) may be used to further expand the money supply. In effect, quantitative easing can even blur the line between monetary and fiscal policy, if the assets purchased consist of long term government bonds that are being issued to finance counter-cyclical deficit spending.

The Drawbacks of Quantitative Easing

If central banks increase the money supply, it can cause inflation. In a worst-case scenario, the central bank may cause inflation through QE without economic growth, causing a period of so-called stagflation. Although most central banks are created by their countries' government and are involved in some regulatory oversight, central banks can't force the banks to increase lending or force borrowers to seek loans and invest. If the increased money supply does not work its way through the banks and into the economy, QE may not be effective except as a tool to facilitate deficit spending (i.e. fiscal policy).

Another potentially negative consequence is that quantitative easing can devalue the domestic currency. For manufacturers, this may help stimulate growth because exported goods would be cheaper in the global market. However, a falling currency value makes imports more expensive, which can increase the cost of production and consumer price levels.

Is Quantitative Easing Effective?

During the QE programs conducted by the U.S. Federal Reserve starting in 2008, the Fed increased the money supply by $4 trillion. This means that the asset side of the Fed's balance sheet grew significantly as it purchased bonds, mortgages, and other assets. The Fed's liabilities, primarily reserves at U.S. banks, grew by the same amount. The goal was that the banks would lend and invest those reserves to stimulate growth.

However, as you can see in the following chart, banks held onto much of that money as excess reserves. At its peak, U.S. banks held $2.7 trillion in excess reserves, which was an unexpected outcome for the Fed's QE program.

(voor de staat die hier hoort te staan, zie het origineel)

Most economists believe that the Fed's QE program helped rescue the U.S. (and world) economy following the 2008 financial crisis. However, the magnitude of its role in the subsequent recovery is more debated and impossible to quantify. Other central banks have attempted to deploy QE to fight recession and deflation with similarly cloudy results.

Following the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997, Japan fell into an economic recession. Beginning in 2000, the Bank of Japan (BoJ) began an aggressive QE program to curb deflation and to stimulate the economy. The Bank of Japan moved from buying Japanese government bonds to buying private debt and stocks. The QE campaign failed to meet its goals. Ironically, the BoJ governors had concluded that "QE was not effective" just months before launching their program in 2000. Between 1995 and 2007, Japanese GDP fell from $5.45 trillion to $4.52 trillion in nominal terms, despite the BoJ's efforts.

The Swiss National Bank (SNB) also employed a QE strategy following the 2008 financial crisis. Eventually, the SNB owned assets nearly equal to annual economic output for the entire country, which made the SNB's version of QE the largest in the world as a ratio to GDP. Although economic growth has been positive during the subsequent recovery, how much the SNB's QE program contributed to that recovery is uncertain. For example, although it was the largest QE program in the world as a ratio to GDP and interest rates were pushed below 0%, the SNB was still unable to achieve its inflation targets.

In August 2016, the Bank of England (BoE) announced that it would launch an additional QE program to help alleviate concerns over "Brexit." The plan was for the BoE to buy 60 billion pounds of government bonds and 10 billion pounds in corporate debt. If successful, the plan should have kept interest rates from rising in the U.K. and stimulated business investment and employment.

From August 2016 through June 2018, the Office for National Statistics in the U.K. reported that gross fixed capital formation (a measure of business investment) was growing at an average quarterly rate of 0.4 percent, which was lower than the average from 2009 through 2018. The challenge for economists is to detect whether growth would have been worse without quantitative easing.

IMF tegen Grieken: sorry we gaan jullie land vernietigen..............

Op 11 april jl. berichtte ik al over de nieuwe maatregelen die Griekenland moet treffen, onder druk van de trojka, bestaande uit de Europese Centrale Bank (ECB), de Europese Commissie en het IMF.

Griekenland heeft de zeggenschap over haar staatseigendommen, die het nog in bezit had, af moeten staan aan het Europees Stabiliteitsmechanisme (ESM). Dit niet democratisch gekozen orgaan kan desgewenst deze eigendommen voor een appel en een ei verkopen, zoals Griekenland al eigendommen zwaar onder de prijs heeft moeten verkopen.....

De pensioenen worden verder gekort, terwijl het grootste deel van de ouderen in Griekenland daar amper of niet van rond kan komen...... Daarnaast worden de lonen verder verlaagd, ook hier geldt, dat veel Grieken al onder het minimumloon verdienen, althans als ze regelmatig betaald worden, ook daar wil het nog wel eens aan ontbreken...... Zelfs terminale patiënten kunnen in Griekenland veelal niet aan medicijnben komen, daar ze het geld ontbreekt........

Zoals Michael Hudson in het Information Clearing House artikel hieronder betoogt: de gewone Griek had part nog deel aan de leningen die Griekenland, totaal onverantwoord werden verstrekt, o.a. door banken en andere financiële instellingen in het NW van Europa (plus Frankrijk). Ook het IMF, onderdeel van de trojka schijnt Griekenland enorme bedragen op de pof te hebben geleend. Terwijl het IMF, maar ook de ECB hadden moeten toezien op verantwoorde kredietverlening. trekken ze nu het mis is gegaan, de gewone burger het vel over de oren....

PvdA hufter Dijsselbloem, de plaag van de Grieken, is mede verantwoordelijk voor de enorme ellende waarin Griekenland zich bevindt. Nog steeds betaalt Griekenland zich helemaal scheel aan rentebetalingen, terwijl de rente bijna op nul staat...... Voorts vindt Dijsselbloem het normaal dat grote Griekse bedrijven de belasting in eigen land ontduiken in....... Nederland!!!

De Griekse regering had volgens Hudson geen andere optie dan akkoord te gaan met de breidel van de vermaledijde trojka, dit daar men anders het Griekse bankensysteem zou hebben laten ploffen......

Overigens is het niet ondenkbaar, dat de regering van Griekenland de wacht is aangezegd, niet in zee te gaan met de Russen, waar even sprake van was, daar het Griekse leger dan met behulp van NAVO troepen een coup zou hebben gepleegd.......

Eén ding is zeker, zonder de EU had Griekenland niet zo in de stront gezeten.....

Mensen het kan nog veel erger en smeriger (wat betreft o.a. het IMF), lees het volgende artikel, een verslag van de video die u hieronder ziet (onder de geschreven versie, kan u klikken voor een 'Dutch vertaling'):

IMF to Greece: Sorry We’ll Destroy You

Bond holders, banks, and IMF bear responsibility for having made irresponsible loans to Greece, so it is not right for them to force yet more austerity on Greece, says Michael Hudson.


By Michael Hudson

May 10, 2017 "Information Clearing House" - Sharmini Peries: It’s the Real News Network. I am Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. The European Commission announced on May 2, that an agreement on Greek pension and income tax reforms would pave the way for further discussions on debt release for Greece. The European Commission described this as good news for Greece. The Greek government described the situation in similar terms. However, little attention has been given as to how the wider Greek population are experiencing the consequences of the policies of the Troika. On May Day thousands of Greeks marked International Workers Day with anti-austerity protests. One of the protester’s a 32-year-old lawyer perhaps summed the mood, the best when he said …

Speaker 2: “The current Greek government, like all the ones before it, have implemented measures that has only one goal, the crushing of the workers, the working class and everyone who works themselves to the bone. We are fighting for the survival of the poorest who need help the most.”
Sharmini Peries: To discuss the most recent negotiations underway between Greece and the TROIKA, which is a European Central Bank, the EU and the IMF, here’s Michael Hudson. Michael is a distinguished research professor of Economics at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. He is the author of many books including, “Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Bondage the Global Economy” and most recently “J is for Junk Economics: A Survivor’s Guide to Economic Vocabulary in the Age of Deception”. Michael it’s been a while, good to have you back.

Michael Hudson: Good to be here.

Sharmini Peries: Michael, let’s start with what’s being negotiated at the moment.

Michael Hudson: I wouldn’t call it a negotiation. Greece is simply being dictated to. There is no negotiation at all. It’s been told that its economy has shrunk so far by 20%, but has to shrink another 5% making it even worse than the depression. Its wages have fallen and must be cut by another 10%. Its pensions have to be cut back. Probably 5 to 10% of its population of working age will have to immigrate.

The intention is to cut the domestic tax revenues (not raise them), because labor won’t be paying taxes and businesses are going out of business. So we have to assume that the deliberate intention is to lower the government’s revenues by so much that Greece will have to sell off even more of its public domain to foreign creditors. Basically it’s a smash and grab exercise, and the role of Tsipras is not to represent the Greeks because the Troika have said, “The election doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what the people vote for. Either you do what we say or we will smash your banking system.” Tsipras’s job is to say, “Yes I will do 
whatever you want. I want to stay in power rather than falling in election.”

Sharmini Peries: Right. Michael you dedicated almost three chapters in your book “Killing the Host” to how the IMF economists actually knew that Greece will not be able to pay back its foreign debt, but yet it went ahead and made these huge loans to Greece. It’s starting to sound like the mortgage fraud scandal where banks were lending people money to buy houses when they knew they couldn’t pay it back. Is it similar?

Michael Hudson: The basic principle is indeed the same. If a creditor makes a loan to a country or a home buyer knowing that there’s no way in which the person can pay, who should bear the responsibility for this? Should the bad lender or irresponsible bondholder have to pay, or should the Greek people have to pay?

IMF economists said that Greece can’t pay, and under the IMF rules it is not allowed to make loans to countries that have no chance of repaying in the foreseeable future. The then-head of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, introduced a new rule – the “systemic problem” rule. It said that if Greece doesn’t repay, this will cause problems for the economic system – defined as the international bankers, bondholder’s and European Union budget – then the IMF can make the loan.

This poses a question on international law. If the problem is systemic, not Greek, and if it’s the system that’s being rescued, why should Greek workers have to dismantle their economy? Why should Greece, a sovereign nation, have to dismantle its economy in order to rescue a banking system that is guaranteed to continue to cause more and more austerity, guaranteed to turn the Eurozone into a dead zone? Why should Greece be blamed for the bad malstructured European rules? That’s the moral principle that’s at stake in all this.

Sharmini Peries: Michael, The New York Times has recently published an article titled, “IMF torn over whether to bail out Greece again.” It essentially describes the IMF as being sympathetic towards Greece in spite of the fact as you say, they knew that Greece could not pay back this money when it first lent it the money with the Troika. Right now, the IMF sounds rational and thoughtful about the Greek people. Is this the case?

Michael Hudson: Well, Yanis Varoufakis, the finance minister under Syriza, said that every time he talked to the IMF’s Christine Lagarde and others two years ago, they were sympathetic. They said, “I am terribly sorry we have to destroy your economy. I feel your pain, but we are indeed going to destroy your economy. There is nothing we can do about it. We are only following orders.” The orders were coming from Wall Street, from the Eurozone and from investors who bought or guaranteed Greek bonds.

Being sympathetic, feeling their pain doesn’t really mean anything if the IMF says, “Oh, we know it is a disaster. We are going to screw you anyway, because that’s our job. We are the IMF, after all. Our job is to impose austerity. Our job is to shrink economies, not help them grow. Our constituency is the bondholders and banks.”

Somebody’s going to suffer. Should it the wealthy billionaires and the bankers, or should it be the Greek workers? Well, the Greek workers are not the IMF’s constituency. It says: “We feel your pain, but we’d rather you suffer than our constituency.”

So what you read is simply the usual New York Times hypocrisy, pretending that the IMF really is feeling bad about what it’s doing. If its economists felt bad, they would have done what the IMF European staff did a few years ago after the first loan: They resigned in protest. They would write about it and go public and say, “This system is corrupt. The IMF is working for the bankers against the interest of its member countries.” If they don’t do that, they are not really sympathetic at all. They are just hypocritical.

Sharmini Peries: Right. I know that the European Commission is holding up Greece as an example in order to discourage other member nations in the periphery of Europe so that they won’t default on their loans. Explain to me why Greece is being held up as an example.

Michael Hudson: It’s being made an example for the same reason the United States went into Libya and bombed Syria: It’s to show that we can destroy you if you don’t do what we say. If Spain or Italy or Portugal seeks not to pay its debts, it will meet the same fate. Its banking system will be destroyed, and its currency system will be destroyed.

The basic principle at work is that finance is the new form of warfare. You can now destroy a country’s economy not merely by invading it. You don’t even have to bomb it, as you’ve done in the Near East. All you have to do is withdraw all credit to the banking system, isolate it economically from making payments to foreign countries so that you essentially put sanctions on it. You’ll treat Greece like they’ve treated Iran or other countries.

“We have life and death power over you.” The demonstration effect is not only to stop Greece, but to stop countries from doing what Marine Le Pen is trying to do in France: withdraw from the Eurozone.
The class war is back in business – the class war of finance against labor, imposing austerity and shrinking living standards, lowering wages and cutting back social spending. It’s demonstrating who’s the winner in this economic warfare that’s taking place.

Sharmini Peries: Then why is the Greek population still supportive of Syriza in spite of all of this? I mean, literally not only have they, as a population, been cut to no social safety net, no social security, yet the Syriza government keeps getting supported, elected in referendums, and they seem to be able to maintain power in spite of these austerity measures. Why is that happening?

Michael Hudson: Well, that’s the great tragedy. They initially supported Syriza because it promised not to surrender in this economic war. They said they would fight back. The plan was not pay the debts even if this led Europe to force Greece out of the European Union.

In order to do this however, what Yanis Varoufakis and his advisors such as James Galbraith wanted to do was say, “If we are going not to pay the debt, we are going to be expelled from the Euro Zone. We have to have our own currency. We have to have our own banking system.” But it takes almost a year to put in place your own physical currency, your own means of reprogramming the ATM machines so that people can use it, and reprogramming the banking system.

You also need a contingency plan for when the European Union wrecks the Greek banks, which basically have been the tool of the oligarchy in Greece. The government is going to have to take over these banks and socialize them, and use them for public purposes. Unfortunately, Tsipras never gave Varoufakis and his staff the go ahead. In effect, he ended up double crossing them after the referendum two years ago that said not to surrender. That lead to Varoufakis resigning from the government.

Tsipras decided that he wanted to be reelected, and turned out to be just a politician, realizing that in order to he had to represent the invader and act as a client politician. His clientele is now the European Union, the IMF and the bondholders, not the Greeks. What that means is that if there is an election in Greece, people are not going to vote for him again. He knows that. He is trying to prevent an election. But later this month the Greek parliament is going to have to vote on whether or not to shrink the economy further and cut pensions even more.

If there are defections from Tsipras’s Syriza party, there will be an election and he will be voted out of office. I won’t say out of power, because he has no power except to surrender to the Troika. But he’d be out of office. There will probably have to be a new party created if there’s going to be hope of withstanding the threats that the European Union is making to destroy Greece’s economy if it doesn’t succumb to the austerity program and step up its privatization and sell off even more assets to the bondholders.

Sharmini Peries: Finally, Michael, why did the Greek government remove the option of Grexit from the table in order to move forward?

Michael Hudson: In order to accept the Eurozone. You’re using its currency, but Greece needs to have its own currency. The reason it agreed to stay in was that it had made no preparation for withdrawing. Imagine if you are a state in the United States and you want to withdraw: you have to have your own currency. You have to have your own banking system. You have to have your own constitution. There was no attempt to put real thought behind what their political program was.

They were not prepared and still have not taken steps to prepare for what they are doing. They haven’t made any attempt to justify non-payment of the debt under International Law: the law of odious debt, or give a reason why they are not paying.

The Greek government has not said that no country should be obliged to disregard its democratic voting, dismantle its public sector and give up its sovereignty to bondholders. No country should be obliged to pay foreign creditors if the price of that is shrinking and self destruction of that economy.

They haven’t translated this political program of not paying into what this means in practice to cede sovereignty to the Brussels bureaucracy, meaning the European Central Bank on behalf of its bondholders.

Sharmini Peries: All right Michael, we will keep an eye on this. It looks like it’s going to get more heated in Greece. At least the people and the movements are planning to protest this new deal. I thank you so much for joining us and I hope you can join us again. I understand you are on your way to Greece in a few weeks and we’ll be expecting a report back from you about what you find there. Thank You.

Michael Hudson: Thanks for having me on.

Sharmini Peries: Thank you for joining us here on the Real News Network.
Note: Wikipedia defines Odious debt:

“In international law, odious debt, also known as illegitimate debt, is a legal doctrine that holds that the national debt incurred by a regime for purposes that do not serve the best interests of the nation, should not be enforceable.”

Michael Hudson is President of The Institute for the Study of Long-Term Economic Trends (ISLET), a Wall Street Financial Analyst, Distinguished Research Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri, Kansas City and author of J is Junk Economics (2017), Killing the Host (2015), The Bubble and Beyond (2012) http://michael-hudson.com
Greece Passes New Austerity for New Loans, The Real New Network, May 6, 2017.

Click for Spanish, German, Dutch, Danish, French, translation- Note- Translation may

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Weg met de dictatuur van de EU, NEXIT NU!!

Zie ook:

'Drie miljoen Grieken hebben geen ziektekostenverzekering daar ze die niet kunnen betalen....... Dank je wel Dijsselbloem (PvdA).......' (veel patiënten kunnen niet eens benodigde medicatie als pijnstillers en chemo kuren betalen.....)

'Radio1 met onvervalste anti-Griekse propaganda........'

'Paul Tang met kritiek op beleid PvdA partijcollega Dijsselbloem t.a.v. Griekenland............'

'EU vluchtelingenbeleid is een 'groot succes' zo merken de vluchtelingen in Griekenland........'

'Belastingontduiking/ontwijking kost de belastingbetalers wereldwijd honderden miljarden op jaarbasis......'

Terzijde om de macht van bedrijven over regeringen te laten zien:
'Wereldbank laat weer eens het ware, uiterst inhumane neoliberale gezicht zien: El Salvador wordt gedwongen miljarden te betalen aan groot vervuiler OceanaGold.....'

'Henk Nijboer (PvdA Tweede Kamer) is niet tegen 'rulings....''

'Jeroen Dijsselbloem (PvdA) wilde Griekse collega aanvallen bij nieuwe afspraken tot het verder in het pak naaien van Grieken.......'

Klik voor meer berichten n.a.v. het bovenstaande, op één van de labels, die u hieronder aantreft.

Donner en DSK

Vorige week vrijdag was Donner te gast bij Knekel en Flink, dit om zijn cadeautje aan welgesteld Nederland te presenteren, de verlaging van de overdrachtsbelasting. Invaliden, chronisch patiënten, laagbetaalden en ouderen moeten, van dit door fascisten geregisseerde kabinet, boeten voor de fouten die aan de top (politiek, banken, pensioenfondsen) zijn gemaakt, maar deze smerige gereformeerde CDA kakzever kan wel een cadeau uit de belastingpot geven aan burgers die zich een koophuis kunnen veroorloven. Zogenaamd om de huizenmarkt weer vlot te trekken. Wel zeuren over de huizenbubbel in China en de VS, maar de gestoorde gesubsidieerde huizenbubbel in Nederland, daar lullen we niet over. Zometeen meer hierover.

Ook aanwezig advocaat Spong, aan de orde kwam het proces tegen Strauss-Kahn in New York.
Spong noemde een aantal details uit de zaak, zoals de verdenking van verkrachting enz. Donner voelde zich daar zichtbaar ongemakkelijk bij: hij wist niet in wat voor plooi z'n rotkop nu weer te manoeuvreren en gefriemel met de handjes. Waarschijnlijk wordt de griezel al opgewonden van al deze details. Nog gevraagd naar zijn mening, komt GodverDonner met een geweldig leuke grap: "ik weet maar één ding, het was buitenechtelijk", jezus wat een lol! Donner wordt zichtbaar nerveus van de uitlating die een andere gast doet: "als er iets met ons is (de vrouw wijst om zich heen), is daar geen aandacht voor" (doelend op de aandacht die Strauss-Kahn genereert). Ja, veronderstel dat Donner nog eens wordt geconfronteerd met zijn aandeel in de verantwoordelijkheid voor de dood van 11 illegalen in het Schiphol cellencomplex....

Als het over de overdrachtsbelasting gaat wordt Donner gevraagd wanneer hij zijn laatste huis kocht en wat de prijs was. Wanneer? 8 à 9 jaar geleden, en de prijs? 8 à 9 ton, dacht deze wanpresterende minkukel. Naast de doden is Donner verantwoordelijk voor een tsunami aan maatschappelijke ellende, daar verdient deze kwast zoveel mee, dat hij een huis van laten we zeggen 8,5 ton kan kopen, dat is godverdomme bijna 2 miljoen oude guldens. Snapt u nu waarom de politiek niets wil doen aan de hypotheekrenteaftrek, ook niet die van huizen boven de € 700.000,--?
Wat een land en wat een schoftentuig!

Huffnagel schiet zijn 89ste bok, dit keer het zwarte schaap

De sjoemelende Haagse VVD wethouder, de lachende luldoos Huffnagel, speelde afgelopen vrijdag weer eens radiopresentatortje bij BNR, voor het programma Peptalk. Een van de onderwerpen: mensen worden te snel zwartgemaakt ('in de media' slikte hij snel in, dat staat een beetje lullig als je radiopresentator speelt en regelmatig hele groepen zwart maakt). Dit alles n.a.v. het proces in New York tegen Strauss-Kahn.
Niet alleen het feit dat hij zich zelf regelmatig schuldig maakt aan zwart maken, was tenenkrommend, maar een oplettende luisteraar belde met de mededeling dat Huffnagel zich onlangs weer eens had bezondigd aan gesjoemel met subsidies voor zijn vriendjes van de Haagse Jazzclub, een malversatie die de landelijke pers alleen maar aantikte. Je hoorde de rechtse nitwit bijna zijn tong inslikken, jezus wat een lul!

Nieuwsuur, nu 2 kilo voor de prijs van 1

Kiloknaller Nieuwsuur deed afgelopen donderdag de uitzending van 17 mei jl. nog eens 'dunnetjes' over.
In het kader van de verdenkingen rond Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was men nog wat voorbeelden vergeten, zo kwam nu O.J. Simpson, Woody Allen en de hele rotzooi voorbij.
Ongelofelijk, wat een bagger!

Zie ook:
http://deazijnpisser.blogspot.com/2011/05/nieuwsuur-nu-per-kilo-nog-goedkoper.html

Nieuwsuur, nu per kilo nog goedkoper!

Om te laten zien hoe goedkoop Nieuwsuur nu eigenlijk 'wel niet' is, meende de redactie gisteren, dat het wel netjes was om de zaak van de psychopaat Dominique Strauss-Kahn te vergelijken met de 'seks perikelen' van de machtsmisbruiker Clinton, toen hij nog daadwerkelijk president van de VS was. Alles uit die tijd in de 90er jaren werd uit de kast gehaald, dus lekker veel sappige beelden.
En dat noemt zich een serieuze actualiteiten rubriek, gadverdamme!