Today the Greek news media are on strike. And it is a salutary atmosphere. We are being spared all the complete and utter nonsense being spewed out about the cuts daily. All the base corner grocery book keeping, that treats state finances as no different from the corner grocery shop. (In fact even the corner grocery shop does realise that some cuts may be counter productive, which the troika and Greek government do not.)

We have to cut, we are told, another 12 bn or so (that is ANOTHER 5% of GDP no less) in order to balance the books. But by cutting demand out of the economy we shall  diminish revenue. Not to worry, say the brains of our government, we will just slap extra exorbitant taxes on property. No matter that properties lie vacant, or those still being rented, nominally, have no revenue either because the tenants simply cannot manage to pay the whole rent and never on time and on the other hand Mr Venizelos’ brain wave of the property tax through the electricity bill has sucked up any revenue left from renting and in effect has devastated the economy.

Never mind about any of that. Besides, we are told beamingly, “the atmosphere in Europe has changed”! A shining example is the French PM’s plea that “Greece be given more time”! More time to do what? Ruin its economy completely, turn Greece over to its “creditors” lock stock and barrel? Sell its people into slavery? What else will “more time” achieve? Yanis Varoufakis has already said that any extension would be tantamount to Greece being given more rope to hang itself with. Something that has been taken up and repeated consistently by Tsipras.

Another arrant lie we are being told by the government: That these will be the last such cuts! Now the operative word here is “such”, there will more more cuts, in other words but not quite “such” cuts. Meaning what? Nonsense. The government are already trying to project as a victory the troika’s demands that should targets not be met (and everyone knows that there is no way that they will be met) then pensions and public salaries will be slashed even more by the end of next year. Automatically.

Isn’t that great?

Perhaps in the welcome silence of all these cruel and ineffective inanities it is time we started pondering a simple fact. The EZ has no intention of helping Greece out of the hole it has only helped push it further into. The EZ has no interest in trying to put the economy back on track. Perhaps it is time that the Greeks realised they have no interest in fawning to the EZ and persisting in the destruction of their economy out of fear.

Fear of what? That what is happening to us slowly and irreversibly will happen suddenly, but in a way that can be eventually reversed?

The great man, and perhaps only now can we realise just how great he was, Franklin Delano Roosevelt once famously said, “You have nothing to fear but fear itself”.

It is time the Greek people realised as much.