Not more than about a couple of months ago, the Greek government headed by the appointed technocrat prime minister Mr. Lucas Papdemos, a former Central Banker and Vice President of the ECB, signed the new loan agreement with the IMF/EU.

Now the terms of this loan agreement are tantamount to a total surrender of the Greek economy. Despite reassurances by the PM to the contrary himself in Parliament, the new bonds in the PSI swap are subject to British Law, instead of Greek Law, or even the Law of a Eurozone country such as Germany. This means that in the event of default the lender may seize assets of the Greek state uncontestedly.

Repayment of debt was given precedence over all and every other payment. Meaning that the needs of the Greek state such as schools, hospitals and everything else, can only be met after debt has been repaid (if there is anything left over). And as if all this were not bad enough, the targets set and means of attaining them are totally and completely unrealistic, meaning that although outright default had been postponed, it had been assured that it would happen a little further down the line.

Now the question is how and why did an experienced and intelligent man like our technocrat PM sign such a death warrant? Could he not see that default would come sooner or later? This is a particularly pertinent question in the light of the current Euro panic. It no longer seems like a question of whether Greece will default and leave the Euro but when. Traders are setting up shadow drachma trading desks, the atmosphere is rife with talk of how the return to the drachma will be effected and so on.

In the meantime, Euro apparatchicks and Politicians are all assuring that they do not want to see Greece leave the Euro. Others are saying that Greece should leave the EU altogether. Some are saying that the EU has buttressed itself in such a way that a Grexit (as it is so unaesthetically being called) can be easily withstood. Others, including the former President of the Commission Mario Prodi, say that a Grexit would be an unmitigated disaster and lead to the unraveling of the Eurozone altogether.

None of any of this came up before the Greek elections resulted in a resounding NO! to the German imposed barbaric and ruinous austerity. And the threats and terrorization are growing stronger the longer it is taking to agree to patch up some kind of government meaning that we may need to have a rerun of the election in about a month.

Now, the reason why it is proving impossible to form a government is that although almost 70% of the electorate voted for what are known as “anti memorandum” parties (that is against the terms of the savage austerity program), a flawed and undemocratic electoral law (legislated by the two major parties that have been running the show for the past 30 or so years), the first party gets a bonus of 50 seats out of the 300.

As a result, the two parties in favour of continuing the savage austerity package they signed up to have 149 seats, thus only two short of a majority. On the other hand, the remaining 151 seats include the Communist Party that refuses to join any coalition whatsoever, since it expects to instate a Soviet Republic in the resulting mayhem, and the Neo Nazi Party whom no one wants to work with in any coalition. Result: complete deadlock.

Hence the rising crescendo from Europe about Greece being headed straight for disaster, unless, it being implied, we change the way we vote! (The typical definition of Euro Democracy: Keep voting till you get it right. That is vote for the decision we have taken.)

Now here is the dilemma, if this is merely high stakes bluffing then it means that our PM signed up on all these disastrous terms because he was confident Greece would not be obliged to leave the Euro. But if all this is just bluster and bluff to intimidate the Greek electors on their way to the polls, then does that not mean we have an enormous bargaining chip in our hands, which means we can say no to the barbarous austerity after all?

On the other hand, given the impossibility of the actual terms of the loan agreement, default is inevitable unless they change. Germany and others are absolutely adamant that they cannot and will not be changed. Which means we are already half way out the door. If this is indeed the case then how could our PM have signed such a document amounting to a death warrant? Whose interests was he in fact serving? Those of Greece or those of the ECB whose Vice President he was until recently. And if so what does that mean? (And what might it mean for Italy whose PM is also an EU technocrat luminary?)

This has all gone way beyond a debt crisis. Greece has signed her sovereignty completely away not in return for a real bail out helping her to overcome her economic problems but in return for assured catastrophe. Disorderly default and expulsion from the Euro if not the EU altogether. Rumour has it that this is precisely what Germany wants and why it imposed such impossible terms, to get rid of that troublesome state completely, now that the EU has buttressed itself to withstand a Grexit.

What is the truth? Nobody tells us. We, the Greek electorate and all the peoples of Europe in one way or another, are constantly being fed lies and bombarded with threats to the extent that we have no real idea of where we stand and what is best for our country now that it has already been reduced to a pulp by the troika medicine which, as Yani Varouf;akis says, is not just a bitter medicine but a poison. That has worked its wonders, I would add.

So to all of our friends getting restless over the political gridlock in forming a government here in Greece and of what the hell will happen if we go back to the polls, the fundamental problem is: What are we supposed to believe and whom are we supposed to trust?

I told you. Even the best laid plans have a tendency of going terribly wrong. And a certainty of going wrong when based on the kind of Nonsense Economics The Frau believes.

After vetoing all of the tried remedies for getting out of a debt crisis, such as higher rate of inflation to devalue the debt and/or stimulus of the economy to increase revenues and hence grow out of debt, she and unfortunately We, are facing the possibility of an implosion of Europe. Not just the slimy little countries to the south, but the whole of the EU. And perhaps even beyond.

Elections in France and Greece have gone the wrong way for The Frau, an insolvent country Spain is required to bail out an insolvent bank, the North Rhine-Westphalia elections went sorely wrong for The Frau, slumping her party to the lowest its been, the spreads (interest rates) on Spanish and Italian bonds are going dangerously up, stock markets are falling, panic is taking root all over the continent, the Italians are getting restless, the Euro is falling in value against the dollar, Greece is in a political gridlock and cannot form a government, so Berlin/Brussels have begun threatening and blackmailing again… quite who? The Greek people as such? Total and utter confusion teetering on breakdown on a grand scale.

All of this should have been avoided. And could have been avoided had The Frau not decided unilaterally to impose the shock doctrine first on Greece and then the whole of Europe. It was a decision based on dogma, the Chicago School Milton Friedman dogma. It was not a decision based on economics, and certainly not on historical experience. J.K. Galbraith’s book The Crash of 1929 is only about 200 pages long. She could have read it in an afternoon.

But she didn’t want to know. No. She didn’t. Quite simply because she knew that it was she and only she who knew best. Perhaps the result of growing up in a dogmatic totalitarian environment. Or perhaps my Conspiracy Theory was right all along.

The Frau’s secret plan was to reinstate Communism throughout the whole of Europe this time, not just the East where she grew up and was educated. We do look so much closer to that now, don’t we?

Today I would like to share an excerpt from Jonathan Steinberg’s article in the 10th May issue of The London Review of Books, “Princely Pride” reviewing a book* on Crown Prince Frederick William of Germany, father of the notorious Kaiser William II.  

“On the 31’s December 1870, when the war council determined to break the siege of Paris by bombarding the city, a move the Crown Prince [Frederick] strenuously resisted, he wrote in his war diary:

We are deemed capable of every wickedness and the distrust of us grows more and more pronounced. Nor is this the consequence of this War only – so far the theory, initiated  by Bismarck and for years holding the stage, of “Blood and Iron” brought us! What good to us is all power, all martial glory and renown, if hatred and mistrust meet us at every turn, if every step we advance in our development is a subject for suspicion and grudging? Bismarck has made us great and powerful but he has robbed us of our friends, the sympathies of the world and – our conscience.”

Perhaps The Frau might benefit from reading this passage.

*Our Fritz: Emperor Frederick III and the Political Culture of Imperial Germany, by Frank Lorenz Muller.

Greece was selected as The Frau’s great experiment. First because it was in a terrible mess and second, but perhaps most important, it was too small to make any real difference if it failed. Or so she thought.

So the torture starts gently. Hike VAT and other consumer taxes, initially freeze all wages and pensions. In 2010. Get the puppet Minister of Finances there to assure everybody that by 2011 Greece would be back in the markets. Okay. The people accept it. The blame game filtering through. It was our fault, we were profligate, we were corrupt, we borrowed too much and all that.

Though poor little Greece and the Greeks were not exceptional in any way. In that there is major corruption throughout Europe, and don’t forget the major corruption scandals in Greece were bribery from German companies like Siemens, Ferrostahl and others. But be that as it may. As for over borrowing, the Greek private debt (as opposed to public debt) is probably the lowest in Europe. But be that as it ay again.

Anyhow as the first wave of shock and awe struck, we were badgered into believing that it was all our fault and we had to pay for our sins. Since Greeks are the first to admit that they are indeed sinful (don’t forget ‘know thyself is Greek too), we just somehow accepted that. But then, as George Papandreou has recently informed us, The Frau told him that look here laddy, for this to work it’s really got to hurt!!! He didn’t tell us, but obviously this is what happened, he just nodded and smiled and acquiesced.

Then in 2011, the economy was in even worse shape despite the ‘sacrifices that must not be lost’, whatever that nonsense sentence may be supposed to mean. So the screw began being tightened even more. Across the board deep slashes in pensions and wages. Extortion taxation on the electricity bill, prices going up and all income sliding dangerously down lower and lower.

Well, the Greeks began to react. Following the Spanish Indignados they began collecting peacefully in Constitution Square outside Parliament. The crowds grew and grew, the clamour became louder. This wasn’t good for the experiment. The victims are supposed to grin and bear it. So in comes the cavalry. The peaceful demonstrators are attacked by the riot police (while the real hooligans are allowed to burn down buildings in Athens totally unimpeded). So much teargas is sprayed on the people that the Square still reeks of it several days later.

This happens several times till the peaceful crowd is defeated by brute force and chemical weapons. Smiles all around. There, we’ve settled that one, now for the big beef! Slash all wages in the private sector! Abolish all laws pertaining to workers rights! Make them grovel, make them into slaves. With unemployment soaring to over 20%, what will they do?

And it works again! The Frau pops the Champagne bottles, or maybe just beer, Champagne is too Frenchy a thing. She is delighted! What she’s done to Greece she has begun to replicate throughout Europe. Though what exactly is it she wishes to achieve? The Greek economy has been destroyed. Five years of deep recession. Soaring unemployment. And as Yani Varoufakis tells us, Greece has, in essence, become a failed state.

Nevertheless, that is presumably what The Frau wants to achieve, a state and a work force so broken that it will not resist anything any more and just do as it is told! Triumph! Triumph of the Will (perhaps?)

But then, however, those stupid Greeks decide to call an election. Of all things! Well never mind. Last time around when that idiot of a fellow tried to have a referendum we showed him! We pulled his ear, publicly humiliated him and his country and made it quite clear in no uncertain terms that it was NOT for the people to decide anything! You hear?

So anyway, let them hold an election. What harm? They’ll get it out of their system and then the two parties that have officially signed their country’s rights completely away and to us will just form a coalition between them and carry on business as usual! And what’s more this will be totally legitimate after the people have actually voted on it! The appointed Quisling Prime Minister has already told them that in the summer 77 new crushing recession inducing measures must be enacted or else! Another 11 to 15 billion Euros must be extracted from an already disappearing economy, or else!

And we know what lily livered scarriedy cats the Greeks are! They’ll be terrified into submission again! No problem.

But something did go wrong. Those stupid Greeks did not vote the way they were supposed to. The Greek experiment has exploded in The Frau’s face. And the failure does not consist of having ground the Greek economy into a pulp and making Greece a failed state. No, in itself, that wouldn’t matter at all.

It’s the repercussions. Throughout Europe. It’s that she is reducing her lebensraum to pulp. It’s that the will of the people cannot be totally demolished by fiat. And the rest of Europe has SEEN that! They have seen that a people CAN shout NO! for all the brutal police repression and chemical warfare waged against them.

She has of course succeeded in destroying an economy completely and in hijacking Europe. But unfortunately, history comes back to haunt us. German supremacy has never lead to growth and prosperity for the continent, ever. But unfortunately, the contrary. Death and total destruction. But of course, the only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history, as the saying goes.

Unfortunately, and not only for us, the Greek experiment has turned out to be a miserable and utter disaster, a complete failure.

Moral of this fable: Do you think The Frau might draw some conclusions from this rout? Yes. But you can rest assured they will be the wrongs ones.

It has been reported that the IMF has decided to cut costs and implement austerity by closing down certain offices (among them Argentina’s) and freeze wages in a bid to manage its finances.

Now the joke: the IMF employees do not like this. They do not like it one bit. Why? Surely it is what they always prescribe as a panacea for everybody else!

Good for you Christine Lagarde. Now how about getting to grips with reality in the whole of the real world?

In the elections held on Sunday, the Greeks shrieked out in anguish, “Enough is enough! We simply cannot take this carnage any more!” The result was a sea change in the political party system that, combined with a sneakily unfair electoral law that gives an extra 50 out of the 300 seats in Parliament to the first party, made it impossible to form a government.

Nevertheless, the vote was clearly a demand that the economic straight jacket strangling the Greek economy to death should be removed. Since Monday there have been negotiations and posturing in an attempt to patch a government together, something that looks rather unlikely to happen. So the EU have got cross with us again.

How dare these sub human lazy slobs question our wisdom! How dare they! And on with the threats and terrorization. If you don’t comply with the programme completely (the one leading to a 5th year of recession, unemployment over 20% and growing, in short economic annihilation) then we shall cut off funds! You will starve, you will freeze and be turned into a sub Saharan failed state! If you don’t do as you are told!

Now, who exactly are they threatening this way? Since we don’t have a government, the aim is obviously to terrorize the people into voting as the EU wants them to in the rerun elections that seem likely. OR ELSE! Remember the EU idea of Democracy? We decide and you endorse! If you don’t we’ll keep you voting again and again till we grind down your resistance and you vote as you are told to. (Sort of Ceausescu Romanian elections.)

But just what is this terrifying OR ELSE we are being threatened with again? Quite simply, if you don’t do as you are told, you’ll be thrown out of the Euro! Now, it is well known that over 75% of the people of Greece, are in favour of the Euro. But as one wise man said on the radio this morning: I am in favour of my house and will do anything to keep it. However, when an earthquake strikes (and they do here in Greece) and everything is crashing down over my head, do I stay in my house or run for my life?

Like the gold standard, the Euro “at any cost” may no longer be an option. Particularly the way the EU functions now it has been hijacked by the German right.

So elections can still make a difference in The Frau’s Europe. We shall have to wait and see the outcome and whether the European Union and the Euro will survive after all. But at least the elections have shaken things up. Leaders are getting their collective knickers in a twist. All of a sudden Mr “Who are you?” (As EMP Nigel Farrange has called him) Herman Van Rompuy was galvanized into calling a Euro meeting to discuss growth! Of all things.

We are told in the Guardian article that Olli Rehn (The economics commissioner) has said  that the weekend’s elections in France and Greece have changed the face of European politics. And that this should be taken into account. The Chairman of the Bankers’ IIF Charles Dallara has said that there should be a shift in economic policy in Europe away from stringent austerity. Even Christine Lagarde of the IMF has mumbled cryptic remarks to this effect.

However, there are of course the loud and harsh voices of repression as well. The German official of the ECB threatening (or stating) that if Greece reneges on its commitments (to ruin its economy in exchange for money it then pays to the banks) it will be kicked out of the Euro. Or even our own friend Olli Rehn again. He is reported to have said that in the light of popular feeling we should ease up on austerity measures in countries struggling to meet their budget targets. But NOT in Greece. NO! Greece has to remain on the path of total destruction ruled by the troika.

Well, considering it was the vote in Greece that started shaking them up, this is a little disingenuous I would say. And considering that if Greece does go belly up in an utterly disorderly way, precisely because of the straight jacket forced on her by the troika, this will indeed cause shock wakes to hit the rest of the south and perhaps even further north in the EU, I can hardly call it very intelligent either.

Still, to cut a long and sorry story short, the democratic elections held in Europe over the weekend have managed to cause an earthquake. Of course The Frau and her ilk will be playing hardball to maintain the status quo of an EU hijacked and run by the German right. The Euro Commission will play along with whoever manages to be in the ascendant as it always does. Well, they have very cushy and totally unaccountable jobs. While the people start flexing their muscles and perhaps realising that they do have the power after all.

It remains to be seen. All we do know at the moment is that a tiny little country pushed to the extreme and still under constant threats and violence (in the form of being flung into poverty and despair for no reason other than “saving” the banks) has helped shake things up in Europe.

The man of the day being Alexis Tsipras leader of the SYRIZA party who dared say the people had voted the troika package of destruction null and void through the ballot box. Which is true. It remains to be seen how the message will be implemented if at all. Nevertheless, like another lively young man many years ago, he has certainly managed to shake things up!

In 1959 Peter Sellers starred (in all the roles) in a brilliant piece of satire called The Mouse That Roared.

For those of you too young to remember this gem of a film, it was about a tiny Medieval state whose economy was going down the tubes and found itself in possession of a deadly weapon, a new technological invention, alias for a lethal atom bomb. The plan was to invade the US, lose the war and obtain Marshall Aid funds to put the economy right.

Apart from Sellers’ brilliant performances and Kissinger spoof, the joke was that this tiny insignificant country could hold the whole world to ransom because it held this lethal weapon that would have devastating consequences were it to be used by the pip squeak state.

I just couldn’t help remembering this delightful film after the result of our general elections here in Greece. We do have a lethal weapon in our hands as the tiny insignificant little state with economic woes. However, the trouble with this kind of bargaining chip is that if you are pushed into actually using it, you get blown up too with all the rest.

Nevertheless, when you are pushed so far you say “The hell with it! If I have to go I’ll take them with me!” In fact one of the new left wing SYRIZA MPs, Yanis Drakasakis, said on TV yesterday, that a large chunk of their voters were not left wing at all. Many told him, we used to be afraid of the Left, because they would confiscate our houses. But Mr. Venizelos has already done this with his extortion tax on property linked to the electricity bill.

So, the inference, if we’re being blown out of the water by a cruel and utterly failed policy, then we’ll take you with us! We have nothing much left to lose.

All we need now is a Peter Sellers, in the guise of the very wily and highly successful British like Prime Minister.

One would like to hope so. Then again one would rather hope that ‘battle lines’ will not be needed and that Europe will come to its senses, prompted, hopefully, by the meager signs of democracy at work that have managed to slip through the cracks.

In France Sarkozy, the pejorative second bit of Merkozy and all the horror that that entails, was not reelected President of the French Republic. No doubt his utter servility and love of playing bully’s side kick in the school yard did not help his reelection.

In Greece the electorate exploded. As it was obvious that it would. How else would you expect an electorate to react after it has voted for a socialist government only to be treated to the worse kind of Chicago School ‘shock doctrine’ economics ever? Fifth year of recession accounting for an overall depletion of the economy of over 20%, soaring unemployment officially at 21% but real unemployment well over that. Decimation of what is left of the welfare state, enforced ‘flexibility’ of the labour market which has led to shark like behavior and so on.

Did Herr Wolfgang Schauble really believe that his threat of “elect the guys ruining your economy at our behest or else?” would really have any effect on a desperate, impoverished electorate? Back to Monty Python’s Life of Brian, “just how much worse?” (see 14th March entry http://parina.gr/blog/?paged=5)

But the point is not Greece or France but the whole of the European Union and the European idea. When democracy was allowed to speak it spoke in a very different voice from that of The Frau and her brainwaves for solving the European crisis. And for all the success of extremists from France’s Front National polling around 20% and the Greek neo Nazi party entering Parliament for the very first time, the electorates tried to convey sound economic sense. Something that is sorely lacking in the German Christian Democrat camp.

In his article, “Ex President Bling-Bling” Paul Krugman tells us: “The basic fact about Europe right now is that the strategy of adjustment through austerity and internal devaluation isn’t working, won’t work and is rapidly turning into a social and political disaster.” (my emphasis). Joseph Stiglitz has told us that Europe (under the iron fist of The Frau) is headed straight for suicide. But when the electorates endorse these conclusions, the Eurodirectorate petulantly refuses to budge.

That is, up until now. Perhaps the two elections will force a change of policy on the intransigent German inspired dictates of the IMF/troika. Francois Hollande appears to be a moderate person who wants to negotiate change. The Frau shrieks No! I will NOT renegotiate. But she has been reminded that Germany cannot decide unilaterally what Europe’s fate will be. (At least not under EU terms).

The Greeks are not turning red or going fascist out of some kind of perversion. The are crying out in desperation that this policy, so callously and, I have to say, with amateur shoddiness, imposed on them simply is not working!

The initial answer has been threats. Sarkozy threatened the French that if Hollande were to be elected France would turn into the next Greece. (He refrained from telling the electorate, however, that Greece has been reduced to a pulp because of his blind kow towing to The Frau, which was rather deceitful of him.) Schauble has threatened Greece that if we did not elect the right government, there would be dire consequences. The implication? That all funding will be cut off. Greece will default in the most disorderly way imaginable, the people will go hungry and start dying in droves, and in fact end up in even worse shape than when Hitler left them.

Okay. But does that really sound like the best way of solving Europe’s crisis? And does Herr Schauble really think that when he decides to consign Greece to such a hell on earth, the vacuum won’t be filled by others? Such as  a new Islam/ Ottoman drive (that reached Vienna last time around) for instance, or perhaps the Great Bear of Russia pushing up against the exposed vulnerable underbelly of Europe? Or at the very best an American protectorate slam in the middle of Europe’s eastern doorway? Well? These things, and worse, do happen you know when matters swing violently out of hand.

So perhaps the intransigent, intolerant Germans should remember that they are part of a Democratic Union with certain timeless Values, and not the Fourth Reich on the rise. Perhaps they should be the first to shy away from a concept of battle lines and sterile aggressive confrontation within Europe. God knows they have as much to lose as anyone if they don’t.

Germany is not The Frau. Germany has a strong SPD, Greens, even Pirates on the rise. So let us indeed hope that some sense will finally prevail and that it will not be battle lines but collective responsibility and some modicum of solidarity. Particularly with the states your own misguided and mismanaged policies led to ruin.

Our good friend and saviour, Wolfgang Schauble, currently German Minister of Finances, and the next Head of the Euro Group, as The Frau has decided unilaterally, struck out again! On the eve of the general election here in Greece, he openly threatened the Greek electorate that if they didn’t vote in the parties who have unconditionally surrendered to the appalling (and destructive) terms of the German dictated policy, we would bear the consequences!

Now I have wondered before, why on earth are they so desperate for us to vote in the political parties that Germany blames for not having implemented their policy correctly and who are, therefore, responsible for the implosion of the Greek economy? So exonerating, they believe, Germany’s responsibility for this great achievement. But such open threats on the eve of a general election?

He also added, in something that sounded like petulant pique, words to the effect that Greece could pull out of the EU altogether for all he cared. But it isn’t quite like that Herr Schauble, is it? You do care, otherwise why are you getting your knickers in such a twist over a tiny, second rate, insignificant backwater of a country like Greece, eh?

But it all comes down to “practice what you preach”. That is Flexibility!!! We are constantly being told (Mario Draghi the latest culprit) that the labour market must be made flexible! Meaning of course, that all and any workers rights should be abolished forthwith.

But, gentlemen and ladies of the Eurodirectorate, the criminally stringent austerity policies you are imposing dictatorially all over Europe to save the banks just isn’t working! As I have said before, if you keep this up and reduce the EU economy to a heap of rubble, so that the banks wont have to pay for the mess they made, then how are the banks going to survive without an economy to feed off? The banking sector is parasitical. It cannot survive without a large healthy beast to feed off you know. Or don’t you?

So flexibility. How about applying some of your own medicine to yourselves? European policy makers must become far more flexible not only in their policies but also in their approach. At the moment Germany is displaying such rigidity in both, that all that can happen is that there will be a big resounding snap. And punching the little weakling in the school yard (that is Greece on the eve of elections) will not help one iota! (That’s Greek too).

Rigidity may be good for goose stepping formations and the like, but when it comes to politics and economics, it never works.

Meanwhile, tomorrow France and Greece will vote in new governments. Whether they, in Greece that is, succumb to the threats or decide that when you are so far down there’s nothing left to lose, remains to be seen.

This is above all a battle for Democracy and the final count down has begun.