Greece...

Generali

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Does anyone not find these sort of thing worrying?


You can get anything through if you keep expelling those who don't agree with you!

It depends what the article means by expelled. Does it mean like the NAZI Party in the early 1930s or like, as I believe, the Tory party in the 1990s? There's a big difference.

worldtraveller

Ah, good! Well, that's Greece done & dusted for a bit, until it all blows up again, when it will become patently bloody obvious that they were never going to pay their way, not in a million years!

I also liked the comment by the technocrat Greek Prime Minister, "Vandalism, violence and destruction have no place in a democratic country and won't be tolerated" - and yet it isn't a democratic country any more, is it? :think:

Anyway, meanwhile, let's now turn to Portugal.........:whistle:

BlondeHeadOn

Thinking outside the box a bit: There was an idea touted around a few months ago that Greece should raise some cash itself by selling off the odd Greek island or two.

Has that idea died a death? It would seem to be one way of cirumventing this whole mess for at least a short time... And there must be at least some pretty little uninhabited islands around their coast that they could flog.

The only other solution I can think of to the crisis is for the Greeks to suddenly find a large oil reserve under their coastline....

CLAPTON

BlondeHeadOn wrote: »

Thinking outside the box a bit: There was an idea touted around a few months ago that Greece should raise some cash itself by selling off the odd Greek island or two.

Has that idea died a death? It would seem to be one way of cirumventing this whole mess for at least a short time... And there must be at least some pretty little uninhabited islands around their coast that they could flog.

The only other solution I can think of to the crisis is for the Greeks to suddenly find a large oil reserve under their coastline....

thinking outside the box... they could look for a suitable country with large gold reserves to invade
they have a very large army and airforce; Germany may be a popular choice.

Generali

CLAPTON wrote: »

thinking outside the box... they could look for a suitable country with large gold reserves to invade
they have a very large army and airforce; Germany may be a popular choice.

Decent Navy too I would imagine. It's a traditional strength.

vivatifosi

Generali wrote: »

Decent Navy too I would imagine. It's a traditional strength.

I remember being told years ago while travelling on one - no idea whether it is an urban myth - that the reason that the hydrofoil service was so good in Greece was that if there was any hassle with Turkey they could use the commercial hydrofoil service as a very quick troop carrier. So not just a decent navy but a decent commercial fleet that can be used for purpose too.

lionelator

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Does anyone not find these sort of thing worrying?


You can get anything through if you keep expelling those who don't agree with you!

Not really, its Greece. They're probably refraining from voting in favour or making threats etc to save public face.
The bottom line is they need the money, the public in general wants the money but doesn't want any cuts to go with the massive loan.
Their minimum wage is already higher than numerous other Euro zone countries and they don't want it brought in line.
The fudged numbers, lied, delayed, embarrassed themselves repeatedly, and now effectively everyone else has to bail them out. Who can blame Germany and all the lenders for wanting better assurances than they've had to date?
If the UK was doing the principal lending we'd be demanding the same assurances. The anti German sentiment is getting old.

IronWolf

I don't think an invasion would help, wars cost money. Unless they operated a loot and pillage policy to pay the soldiers, cant see that being popular with the EU though.

mcfisco

Of course the Germans 'borrowed' 476 million reichsmarks from the Greek National Bank in 1941 that it's yet to pay back
So that's 60 years interest to pay

Graham_Devon

It's all off again (as far as I can make out).

The EU ministers now believe the austerity targets cannot be met and Greece is not making progress on the cuts. Therefore, they have held off the next meeting.

So were back (yet again) to EU ministers trying to play hard line, while we all know full well the money will be given (unless something actually changes!!)

Round and round and round we go!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17034677