Monday, April 29, 2013

Some news items of interest

First off, Greece. These last couple of years have been quite dizzying for those who follow affairs in that country - never has it been so high up in the news so often before. Well, not since the Battle of Navarino and Lord Byron's demise.

The Greek Parliament has passed a Bill which is supposed to cut the civil service by 15,000 by the end of next year. It seems that this Bill has gone against the constitution, which had guaranteed public sector jobs for life. That, I have to say, is the most bizarre constitutional practice I have ever heard of. In fact, I am rather surprised that the infamous Constitution for Europe a. k. a. the Lisbon Treaty did not have an Article of that kind in it.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the Continent and the spectrum, Iceland has just taken another step away from EU membership.
Centre-right opposition parties in Iceland are set for a return to power with all the votes counted after Saturday's parliamentary election.

The Independence party polled 26.7% and the Progressive party 24.4%, putting them on track to win 38 of the 63 seats.

The ruling Social Democrats' share of the vote dropped to below 13%.
Not only are the two parties that will now negotiate likely to try to concentrate on economic growth, they are also, much more importantly, eurosceptic.
Two new parties performed particularly well: Bright Future, which won six seats, and the Pirate party, with three.

The Social Democrats saw their share of the vote fall dramatically to 12.9% (nine seats) while the Left-Greens' vote fell to 10.9% (seven seats).

Social Democrat leader Arni Pall Arnason, while disappointed, refused to acknowledge that the two centre-right parties had been given a major vote of confidence. "Their democratic mandate to change society is absolutely zero," he said.
Of course, one needs to talk one's own party up in politics but this is overdoing things somewhat.

3 comments:

  1. Just did a google-search for the Greek Constitution and came across this:

    http://www.hri.org/docs/syntagma/

    A very brief look would seem to indicate that these seem to be the relevant articles:

    Article 46
    1. The President of the Republic shall appoint and dismiss public servants, in accordance with the law, except in cases spe- cified by law.
    ...

    and

    Article 103
    ...
    4. Civil servants holding posts provided by law shall be permanent so long as these posts exist. Their salaries shall evolve in accordance with the provisions of the law; with the exception of those retiring upon attainment of the age limit or when dismissed by court judgement, civil servants may not be transferred without an opinion or lowered in rank or dismissed without a decision of a service council consisting of at least two-thirds of permanent civil servants.
    Recourse against the decisions of these councils may be sought before the Supreme Administrative Court, as specified by law.
    ...

    So there would seem to be a theoretical system whereby they can be dismissed, but the requirement for a decision to be made by a service council with 2/3 permanent civil servants would make it a little difficult in practice!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ahhh yes, Greece's crisis is all the fault of its public workers. Rather than a kleptocratic elite which controlled both PASOK and New Democracy in the run up to the crisis. The same kleptocrats which used your wonderful private banks (Goldman, JP Morgan etc) to hide half the sovereign debt in your wonderful tax haven system. The same kleptocrats whose Greek (though with large foreign stakes) banks collapsed necessitating the massive bailouts the German taxpayers have stumped up for - in effect bailing out their own Frankfurt financial elite.

    But hey! There's all that regulation you don't like. Would that they'd enforce it.

    And how's the austerity treating Greece. Been an economic and social catastrophe hasn't it? German banks who lent money hand over fist to politicians they KNEW were corrupt can now pick up Greek public assets for cents on the Euro.

    Still, I'm sure there's a good conservative explanation why this is all a great thing for Greek people's ''liberty''.

    Oh, and look who might be back in power in Iceland! The same party which turned the place into a (busted) casino.

    Anyway, while we're on about freedom, how do you feel about your heroine selling a billion pounds worth of arms to a butcher like Saddam Hussein? Or sending the SAS to train the Khmer Rouge? Or rushing to help Pinochet when under house arrest? Y'know, the man who had thousands of Chileans murdered, tortured and raped with dogs because they supported a democratically elected government.

    How's that for a freedom fighter?

    How exactly do you close your mind to these things, Ms Hobsbawm?

    The gulag was run by people like you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So it's all the fault of the private banks and the Kleptocratic elite, I suppose that's better than blaming everything on the International Financiers and the Jews...

      ...and what's wrong with nation states having their own tax systems? Tax havens aren't a "system" they're the opposite of that. They're the consequence of different nation states having their own separate tax systems, as opposed to a single international system of taxation, which is presumably your preference.

      "...There's all that regulation you don't like. Would that they'd enforce it."

      Exactly! Maybe there is hope for you! You can have all the regulation you like, but if they don't enforce it, or they are selective about who and when they enforce it, it's a complete waste of time. Conservatives/classic liberals are not against regulation, they're against too much regulation, bad regulation and poorly enforced regulation. You seem to think that all problems can be solved through Governments taking direct control, even when the initial problems were caused by previous attempts at central control.

      "And how's the austerity treating Greece... ...I'm sure there's a good conservative explanation why this is all a great thing for Greek people's ''liberty''."

      Why would you think that someone who is against the Euro would be in favor of austerity when it's intended to keep the Euro-zone together?

      "Oh, and look who might be back in power in Iceland! The same party which turned the place into a (busted) casino."

      Or maybe something to do with the Basel international system of bank regulations. I don't claim to be any sort of expert on banking. However when multiple banking systems around the world experience serious systemic flaws at the same time, it seems likely to have an international dimension to it. It seems to me that the Basel accords are the obvious prime candidate.

      "...your heroine selling a billion pounds worth of arms to a butcher like Saddam Hussein?"

      What arms would those be? Name some that were purposely allowed to be exported by the Thatcher government.

      "Or sending the SAS to train the Khmer Rouge?"

      Which was part of the Cold War struggle against the Communists.

      "Or rushing to help Pinochet when under house arrest? Y'know, the man who had thousands of Chileans murdered, tortured and raped with dogs because they supported a democratically elected government."

      Which was part of the Cold War struggle against the Communists (who were actively supporting Allende).

      Really, which side were you on during the Cold War? You sound as if you sympathize with the inhuman system that is Communism when you complain about efforts to combat it.

      How exactly do you close your mind to these things, Mr Hobsbawm?

      Delete