Tag Archives: Politics and Economics

ATHENS – Despite their unequivocal Europeanism, the Irish have been serially mistreated by the European Union. When Irish voters rejected the Treaty of Lisbon in 2008, the EU forced them to vote again until they delivered the “right” outcome. A year later, when private Irish banks imploded, threatening their (mainly) German private creditors with severe losses, Jean-Claude Trichet, the European Central Bank’s then-president, immediately “informed” the Irish government that the ECB would...

[embedded content] Interview begins at 1’45”

[embedded content] Paul Krugman, Ross LaJeunesse (Google), Yanis Varoufakis (DiEM25) and Yasheng Huang, economist, M.I.T.

You left office about a year ago – any regrets?  None whatsoever. Once it was no longer possible to do good for Greece as minister, there was no reason to stay in office. Your proudest moment as #Greece’s Minister of Finance? When a poorly dressed boy pointed me out to another boy & said: “This is the guy that gave our mum a card to buy groceries!” Since you left, #Greek #euro crisis no longer dominating Europe’s headlines ? My departure ended a rebellion against debt bondage slavery....

In reply to Tariq Ali, Stathis Kouvelakis, Vicente Navarro and Stefano Fassina on DiEM25’s plan for resisting within the European Union Preface: This article (published in edited form in Jacobin, Neues Deutschland, Il Manifesto,  Mediapart and elsewhere) addresses left-wing critics of DiEM25 claiming that DiEM25 is pursuing the wrong objective (to democratise the EU) by means of a faulty strategy (focusing at the European rather than at the national level). This response, while addressed...

Sir, One often hears that people on the left of the political spectrum tend to be more intelligent, more articulate, better read and generally more fun to be with. Every so often, one sees a study in some psychology journal, trying to prove this hypothesis in a scientific manner. Virtually all these studies are deeply flawed as they invariably fail to account for immeasurable and innumerable variables. And then one comes across the article “Out of office” on the front page...

Der griechische Ex-Finanzminister sagt, der Geist Bruno Kreiskys sei verloren gegangen. 31.08.2016, 14:01 Der frühere griechische Finanzminister Gianis Varoufakis hat in Alpbach bei einem Pressegespräch auch zur österreichischen Innenpolitik Stellung genommen. Er kritisierte dabei die von den Sozialdemokraten übernommenen Inhalte rechter Politiker, wie die Errichtung neuer Grenzen. Damit sei das Ende der Sozialdemokratie, wie sie von Bruno Kreisky inspiriert worden sei, erreicht...

ATHENS – Objects of desire come at a cost. Only bad things, like toxic waste, have a negative price, the equivalent of a fee payable to anyone willing to make them disappear. Does this mean that negative interest rates embody a new perspective on money – that it has gone “bad”? [To read on, click here]

A few weeks ago, Stefan Aust, Die Welt’s editor and formerly the heart and soul of Der Spiegel, paid me a visit at our Aegina house. We spoke for a good two hours on Europe, Germany, Greece and, of course, DiEM25. It was a serious, pleasant and at times passionate discussion. On 14th August the article-interview was published. For Die Welt’s site click here. (For the interview, as published, in pdf form click: Part 1 & Part 2) Alternatively… “Merkel hat keinen Plan” Von Stefan Aust...

Interviewed by David de Jong, Bloomberg News [embedded content]