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posted by martyb on Monday July 06 2015, @08:57AM   Printer-friendly
from the getting-what-you-asked-for-may-not-be-getting-what-you-want dept.

The Greeks voted no to the European Union's terms, despite warnings from the EU that rejecting new austerity terms would set their country on a path out of the Eurozone. 62% voted "No" while 38% voted "Yes".


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @09:15AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @09:15AM (#205527)

    The referendum was about the June 25 version of the terms, which was superseded by the June 26 version of the terms. And anyway, the deadline for the June 26 version of the terms was on Tuesday June 30. Since then, there are no EU terms, they have to be negotiated from the beginning.
    Go figure.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by theluggage on Monday July 06 2015, @09:51AM

    by theluggage (1797) on Monday July 06 2015, @09:51AM (#205538)

    The question is irrelevant. The practical upshot is that, even though shit has started to get real for the voters with the bank closures, they have handed the Greek government [something that can easily be spun as] a renewed mandate and tied the hands of the opposition parties. That makes it less likely that the government will get thrown out and replaced with a more compliant one (which the EU/ECB/IMF would love to bring about).

    • (Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:09PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:09PM (#205605)

      The question is irrelevant.

      The referendum was irrelevant. Look at Article 44.2 of the Greek Constitution [hri.org] which clearly states (emphasis mine):

      A referendum on Bills passed by Parliament regulating important social matters, with the exception of the fiscal ones shall be proclaimed by decree by the President of the Republic

      On its face the vote appears to be unconstitutional, though an article on Reuters notes:

      Greece's top administrative court, however, rejected an appeal against the referendum by two Greek citizens, who argued that the constitution bars plebiscites on fiscal issues and that the question is too complex.

      So PM Tsipras put himself in a position to get what he wanted no matter what. If the results had been "Yes" then he could have quietly nudged the court to overrule the the plebiscite. He's been playing both sides against the middle so he can keep posing as "Alexis Tsipras, Greek Political Rockstar".

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Monday July 06 2015, @08:40PM

        by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday July 06 2015, @08:40PM (#205828) Journal

        Here's the full text of 44.2:

        The President of the Republic shall by decree proclaim a referendum on crucial national matters following a resolution voted by an absolute majority of the total number of Members of Parliament, taken upon proposal of the Cabinet.
        A referendum on Bills passed by Parliament regulating important social matters, with the exception of the fiscal ones shall be proclaimed by decree by the President of the Republic, if this is decided by three-fifths of the total number of its members, following a proposal of two-fifths of the total number of its members, and as the Standing Orders and the law for the application of the present paragraph provide. No more than two proposals to hold a referendum on a Bill can be introduced in the same parliamen- tary term.
        Should a Bill be voted, the time-limit stated in article 42 paragraph 1 begins the day the referendum is held.

        So the first sentence allows the president to proclaim a referendum on crucial national matters. I think one can argue that this referendum was about crucial national matters.

        The second sentence (the one you partially quoted) gives specific regulations for a referendum on bills passed by parliament. This referendum clearly was not about a bill passed by parliament, and therefore that sentence does not apply.

        --
        The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @01:58PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @01:58PM (#206113)

        In a democracy the power comes from the voters, hence any rule that says "you can't ask the voters" is obviously overruled as soon as you do

  • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @10:21AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @10:21AM (#205541)

    They voted out the terrorists. That's right, the IMF, the European Central Bank and the European Commission are terrorists, because they forced Greece to close their banks by not giving them more free money, at least according to Greece's financial minister Varoufakis, who resigned today.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @05:38PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @05:38PM (#205749)

      Sorry, why was that modded troll? It's one hundred percent accurate: Varoufakis did actually call the Troika terrorists.

  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @12:14PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @12:14PM (#205583)

    Well as that one dude said on tv, for the honor of the country. That's now quite how i define honor. Honorable would be to pay back what you loaned and STFU.

    Raise your hand, if you've ever seen anything produced or a service from Greece, that's been sold outside of Greece. And please mention if it has been an actual usable product or something that just "looks pretty".

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Nerdfest on Monday July 06 2015, @02:10PM

      by Nerdfest (80) on Monday July 06 2015, @02:10PM (#205627)

      Wine. Some decent ones too.

      • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @02:29PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @02:29PM (#205634)

        The USA should offer to pay in full Greek debt on the condition that Greece becomes the 51st state of the United States.
        Imperial what?

        • (Score: 2) by SubiculumHammer on Monday July 06 2015, @02:48PM

          by SubiculumHammer (5191) on Monday July 06 2015, @02:48PM (#205645)

          I mean, no matter what Republicans talk, if a State defaults, the Federal government is going to bail her out.
          The EU should realize this. An offer as the AC suggests would make this point nicely. US of A takes care of their own.

        • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @03:32PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @03:32PM (#205666)

          The USA should offer to pay in full Greek debt on the condition that Greece becomes the 51st state of the United States.

          You mean take on another group of do-nothing moochers who expect a government pension for the rest of their lives? We already have enough of them ... they're called Congress.

        • (Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Monday July 06 2015, @04:09PM

          by nitehawk214 (1304) on Monday July 06 2015, @04:09PM (#205700)

          What do you think Russia is going to do when Greece goes to them for help?

          --
          "Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
          • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @04:21PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @04:21PM (#205711)

            Let it crash. Russia doesn't rescue squirrels, it collects road kill.

    • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Francis on Monday July 06 2015, @02:32PM

      by Francis (5544) on Monday July 06 2015, @02:32PM (#205636)

      And how are they going to do that? The austerity measures have killed the local economy and the Greek people themselves have less money with which to invest in growing the economy or paying back their bills. Europe in general has seen slower growth as they've tried to be responsible rather than admitting that money is going to have to just be forgiven in the short term to get through this patch more quickly. Here in the US where we didn't go the austerity route things are finally getting back to normal.

      Unfortunately, virtually all of the improvement is going to the rich because we don't have any measures in place to ensure that the people generating the wealth will be allowed to keep any of it.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @02:46PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @02:46PM (#205644)

        What, am i supposed to come up with a plan for Greece to become a industrial country? Like they haven't have any time to do that on their own? I don't care how they pay the depts, i'm just saying they can't claim honor or any other such excuses for continuing to not pay.

        I don't care about Greece, since they don't care about themselves or others either.

        It's not like everything is fine where i live, and if i had to come up with a 100 trillion euro plan to save something, it'd be my country, not Greece. I'm so fucking tired of Greece and the fucking excuses and paying for their shit.

        • (Score: 1) by Francis on Monday July 06 2015, @02:54PM

          by Francis (5544) on Monday July 06 2015, @02:54PM (#205647)

          They have to have money in order to pay money. That's what you and the idiots from the IMF seem to forget. They wrote the loans knowing full well that the Greeks were borrowing more than they could afford to payback. If they still want their money, they're going to have to accept that killing the economy is not likely to result in the money being there to be paid.

          The IMF does things like this all the time, they're just a bunch of greedy, ignorant, self-entitled jerks and it's high time they were told to STFU so the adults can work on solving the problem.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @03:44PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @03:44PM (#205676)

            Different AC here.

            They have to have money in order to pay money. That's what you and the idiots from the IMF seem to forget.

            They've already received 240€ billion in loans, and are now asking for debt relief & more loans to pay back part of the the reduced amount that is due. If I told my loan shark that I needed him to forgive part of my debt and also lend me more cash so I could pay back a little of what I still owed him, well, once he was done laughing I would be crying.

            Plus, Greece wants the IMF to increase the liquidity to their central bank because people are taking cash out of the Greek banks (limited to 60€ per day) and the central bank is broke too. Greece says it wants a "fair deal" but none of that "fairness" involves them paying back what they've already borrowed (or committing to pay back the new loans they keep demanding).

            Blaming Greece's current financial disaster solely on the IMF, ECB and other lenders completely ignores the fact that Greece has been borrowing from one place to pay another for decades, and thinks living within a national budget is unfair. They don't enforce their tax laws on the wealthy, and hand out lifelong pensions like teenagers hand out promise rings. If they need "money in order to pay money" they should start with their upperclass tax evaders and get them to actually pay their taxes (which the upperclass feels is as unfair as having to pay back their loans).

            • (Score: 1) by Francis on Monday July 06 2015, @07:03PM

              by Francis (5544) on Monday July 06 2015, @07:03PM (#205791)

              I'm not blaming them solely. I'm pointing out that the austerity measures aren't going to make it more likely that Greece will repay the loans, it makes it more likely that there won't be any money to pay the loans with. What happens if the people have a revolution over this?

              Yes, they should pay the loans, but realistically, I'm not convinced that's going to happen without the loans being restructured so as to have more time. As it stands there's not much money left over for rebuilding the economy or other activities that would lead to there being money to pay the loans back with. The situation sucks for everybody involved, but further punishing people who may not have actually had any say is just plain childish. The people who borrowed the money are mostly not the same ones that are being asked to actually pay the money as it stands.

      • (Score: 2) by gnuman on Monday July 06 2015, @05:48PM

        by gnuman (5013) on Monday July 06 2015, @05:48PM (#205758)

        The austerity measures have killed the local economy

        Not really.

        What killed the economy is trade imbalances. If all a nation does is import and it has no means of printing currency, what do you think will happen? Couple that with Greek unwillingness to actually "sell" things to foreign investors, so they run out of money.

        Greek problem is really a Euro problem. Inter-euro-zone trade imbalances need to be addressed with financial backflows, or every nation that has an inherent trade deficit in Euro area will also run out of money. Just like Greece. It may take longer, but eventually it will happen.

        Here in the US where we didn't go the austerity route things are finally getting back to normal.

        US prints their own money. And heck, the world loves US dollars so much that USD never devalue no matter how shitty US economy really is. And shitty it is - look at trade deficits for US. So please, don't lecture Greece on how things work. If US was using euros, US would be more broke than Greece.

        http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/balance-of-trade [tradingeconomics.com]

        • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday July 06 2015, @08:49PM

          by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday July 06 2015, @08:49PM (#205833) Journal

          And heck, the world loves US dollars so much that USD never devalue

          Really? You still get as much for a dollar today as you got 40 years ago?

          --
          The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    • (Score: 2) by tibman on Monday July 06 2015, @08:41PM

      by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 06 2015, @08:41PM (#205829)

      My ring was made in Greece by a Greek. Tritium vial set on a sterling silver ring. Probably falls into the handmade craft/art category and not a major exportable product.

      --
      SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
    • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday July 06 2015, @08:45PM

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday July 06 2015, @08:45PM (#205831) Journal

      Greek Asparagus.

      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    • (Score: 2) by penguinoid on Tuesday July 07 2015, @08:51AM

      by penguinoid (5331) on Tuesday July 07 2015, @08:51AM (#206040)

      Horses. Well, it was more a gift than a sale...

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      RIP Slashdot. Killed by greedy bastards.