FRENCH PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION/GREEK ELECTION 2012

bb1 wrote:Thanks, Sabot, it's easier to follow these things in practical terms...there doesn't seem to be any sign of the euro stopping falling, so Heaven knows what is going to happen.

There was an interesting piece in one of the Resident articles Pedro posted. Apparently, fewer and fewer Germans are going to Portugal because of this, and because they can reach the former communist states easily.

But because of the euro sliding, Portugal is getting much cheaper for UK residents, so ill winds, and all that.

It is all relative, Bonny. The Euro was fine at 65 pence. That was the value decided on by The Euro Zone when The Euro was first adopted, so I don't understand what all of the fuss is about.
However, if it drops below 65 pence than they might need to worry, but that is 14 pence away.
There is so much crap being spouted by The Media, who are ignoring the obvious. The Euro is fine at the moment. And Europe is gaining in trade by the drop.

If Greece leaves The Euro then bloody good riddance. The solution is in their hands. Everyone has suffered, but none much more than me. My already ghastly Pension dropped by one third, and this was real hardship. But you didn't hear me endlessly bleating because I can't afford to buy something or other that I want. And nor do I run up Credit Card Bills that I can't afford to pay.
This all makes me so angry, when I can be bothered.

The Greeks wouldn't be in this mess if they hadn't subscribed to the spend, spend, spend syndrome. You run up a debt, you pay it off; you go without things until it is cleared. Simple, ain't it? LL

Lamplighter wrote:The Greeks wouldn't be in this mess if they hadn't subscribed to the spend, spend, spend syndrome. You run up a debt, you pay it off; you go without things until it is cleared. Simple, ain't it? LL

Yer, Well, Greece thought that Europe was an endless money tree that would go on bailing them out. Just like a certain type of person in UK thought they could go on running up credit. Sadly, the savers of the world often suffer, but who cares about them?
God knows what Francois Hollande thinks he is going to do. I don't want to contemplate that at the moment.

Oh dear....

Just in from Reuters: The French President's plane, on its way to Berlin, has had to be turned back to Paris after being struck by lightning. LL

More: A second plane has just taken off with him on board. LL

Good God! If ever there was a bad omen, that has to be it.

Looks like there was torrential rain in Paris, from these pics on the Sky site:



France's president Francois Hollande (C)
France's president Francois Hollande (C) shakes hands with veterans in front of the Unknown Soldier's tomb at the Arc of Triomphe in Paris, on May 15, 2012, following the formal handover of investiture ceremony with his predecessor.
Credit: MARTIN BUREAU/AFP/Getty Images
Date: May 15, 2012

Lamplighter wrote:

Just in from Reuters: The French President's plane, on its way to Berlin, has had to be turned back to Paris after being struck by lightning. LL

More: A second plane has just taken off with him on board. LL

Now that is not funny. BWAHAHAHAH.

It's okay, he got there safely. Just been watching the welcoming ceremony on Euronews - and it's tipping down in Berlin too!! LL

Not the most auspicious start to his Presidency, is it?

And I see Greece have decided to have a rerun of their election. That should help stabilize things - NOT.

This is interesting:

GM chooses UK plant over Germany for new Astra

LONDON (Reuters) - General Motors Co will build the next generation of its Astra compact in Britain after workers at its factory in Ellesmere Port, northwest England, overwhelmingly agreed to a new labour deal, leaving its plant in Bochum, Germany in danger of closure.
The U.S. carmaker said on Thursday it would invest 125 million pounds in the Ellesmere Port plant, where assembly of the new vehicle will start in 2015.
Britain's Unite union said 94 percent of those balloted voted in favour of changes to working conditions and that some 700 jobs would be created at the plant, securing its future until 2020.
"It's almost certain that one of GM's German plants will now be closed, probably the plant in Bochum," a source close to the negotiations said.
GM, which sells under the Vauxhall brand in Britain, is expected to halt production of the Astra, its most important model, at its main plant in Russelsheim, Germany, making the car only at Ellesmere Port and at Poland's Gliwice plant from 2015.
The source added that some production of GM's Chevrolet marque could be shifted from Asia to Europe, with Russelsheim the likely beneficiary. This would leave the Opel factory at Bochum as the most likely site to be closed.

More at:

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/government-says-gm-workers-agree-deal-astra-production-072305676--finance.html

I wonder if the ongoing instability in the eurozone played a part in that?

Every picture tells a story:



What are our leaders doing? Why, they are watching football, and Chelsea has just beaten a German team...

Just got my bank statement, and my Pension has increased by about 80 Euros per month in the last two months. Something in the region of £60. This is not bad, but far from what The Euro should be worth.
It has a least another 10 pence to fall before it is near what it was worth when it was first introduced.
There is so much rubbish and hysteria being talked about this. The Euro is still doing fine. Or The Pound is still not doing well. Depending on how you look at it.

The Euro was worth 65 pence at inception, which was a considered opinion on the Money Markets, and related to The Franc which was stable. It is now worth 80 pence.
But basically the value now is more to do with lack of faith in The Pound than confidence in The Euro.

Vive la France. And I do believe that France will control what is going on. Germany is far too keen on controlling Europe economically.

I read somewhere or other, that this ongoing chaos is benefiting German industry - I forget why, and it probably isn't true.

The endless drift seems to be doing more damage, IMO, than anyone having a clear idea of what the future holds; no-one seems able to take decisions about it.

And this won't help:



That's all very well and good for someone in her privileged position, but ordinary Greeks are in desperate situations, and powerless to do anything to help themselves.

Oh Really. None of us have been having a good time. So poor old Greece can get stuffed. I have been surviving on two thirds of an already not very good pension. So sod them.
I can't be bothered to explain how I managed to adequately feed three children on peanuts, but I did.

One of the big Greek problems is that so many of them dodge tax. I saw someone this morning saying that if they were to pay taxes like everyone else the Government would not be bankrupt. It is apparently a national sport to see how much you can get away with not paying. You wouldn't get away with that in other countries, would you? LL

I personally think the situation in Greece is very dangerous, LL. Of course people should pay taxes, but when the haves start lecturing the have-nots, especially about things the have-nots have no control over, it's a recipe for disaster.

The man and woman in the Greek street can't do anything about this, but it is them who are being left without money for food, access to medical care, etc.

Look at the rest of it:

In a warning to Greeks ahead of the election, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) boss Christine Lagarde said it was time they paid for the mistakes of the past.

Asked by The Guardian if she was concerned about Greeks who are suffering from life-changing austerity measures, Ms Lagarde said: "No, I think more of the little kids from a school in a little village in Niger who get teaching two hours a day, sharing one chair for three of them, and who are very keen to get an education.

''I have them in my mind all the time. Because I think they need even more help than the people in Athens.
"I also think about all those people who are trying to escape tax all the time. All these people in Greece who are trying to escape tax."

Social structures continue to deteriorate in Greece with claims by chemists that they are running out of medicine after a government funding freeze.
Sky News has also found how some Greeks have resorted to rummaging in dustbins for food.


I wish people like her would SHUT UP; every time one of them makes a speech like that, they make matters worse.

Here's why Let them eat cake really is not helping....

http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16235055

Debt-Hit Greece 'Running Out Of Medication'

Pharmacies in Greece were on strike earlier this week in protest at the government not paying them for medicines that should be free to customers.

Many pharmacies now have huge debts to pharmaceutical companies for drugs they have handed out free of charge.
Sky News spoke to one pharmacist who has not been paid by the state for over a year.
Evaggelina Rousi, who runs a chemist in Athens, said: "The government owes us 30,000 euros but we have not been paid by them for a year and a half.

"How can we survive like this? We can't take it anymore."
The shop has stopped re-stocking its shelves and now only orders new drugs once a customer comes in with a prescription.
Dimitris Karageoregiou, secretary general of the Panhellenic Pharmaceutical Association, told Sky News: "This is an awful situation. Greece is running out of medication... Soon people will start dying because of a lack of medication.''

The Catsoula family, who live in the suburbs of Athens, are at breaking point. The two sisters and their elderly grandparents need various forms of medicine. Seventy-year-old Heleni Catsoula uses oxygen to help her with respiratory problems.
But she told Sky News: "The government reimburses me for the 100 euros I pay for the oxygen, but now they have stopped. They also used to pay the chemists for my drugs but they have stopped.
"Now I owe my local chemists 400 euros and I find it difficult to get my medication. If I have an attack, I don't even have petrol in the tank to get to the hospital. And nor can I afford the five euro entry fee."

The five euro hospital entry fee was a recent austerity measure introduced by the last government.
The family, who live in the industrial area of Aspropirgos, has sold all their jewellery including wedding rings and christening gifts to pay for food and medication.

Ms Catsoula's daughter Vicki, who is diabetic herself, now regularly makes a three-hour journey to a central Athens refuge centre to try to get hold of the drugs her family needs.
For the Catsoulas, austerity has meant the state no longer provides them with the support they need.
Their home sits in the shadow of the Aspropirgos power station and yet they cannot afford to service their electricity bills. One of the sisters lost her job at the factory three years ago.
A sign outside their home asks the energy company to be compassionate and not cut them off.


http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16232020

Quote:

Seventy-year-old Eletharias cannot afford to go the supermarket any more, so for the past few months he has started rummaging for food in dustbins.

He goes out in Athens at night so that no one sees. When Sky News met him, he was collecting onions from some wheelie bins.
"Since my pension was cut, I can't buy food so I look through the garbage," he said, "I can only pray that things get better."
He is among an increasing number of pensioners who have slipped into desperate poverty and rely on waste food to survive.

Irini Gkana, 77, and 80-year-old Argyro Hadri-Sotiraki get their sustenance from a downtown soup kitchen.
On her way out of the complex, Irini stooped to pick up an apple lying on the pavement and squirreled it into her trolley bag.
Life has not always been like this but the debt crisis has left them unable to provide for themselves for the first time since they were war children.

Oh dear....

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/may/29/christine-lagarde-pays-no-tax

Christine Lagarde, scourge of tax evaders, pays no tax
IMF boss who caused international outrage when she suggested that Greeks should pay their taxes earns a tax-free salary

Christine Lagarde, the IMF boss who caused international outrage after she suggested in an interview with the Guardian on Friday that beleaguered Greeks might do well to pay their taxes, pays no taxes, it has emerged.

As an official of an international institution, her salary of $467,940 (£298,675) a year plus $83,760 additional allowance a year is not subject to any taxes.

The former French finance minister took over as managing director of the IMF last year when she succeeded her disgraced compatriot Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who was forced to resign after he faced charges – later dropped – of sexually attacking a New York hotel maid.

Lagarde, 56, receives a pay and benefits package worth more than American president Barack Obama earns from the United States government, and he pays taxes on it.

The same applies to nearly all United Nations employees – article 34 of the Vienna convention on diplomatic relations of 1961, which has been signed by 187 states, declares: "A diplomatic agent shall be exempt from all dues and taxes, personal or real, national, regional or municipal."

According to Lagarde's contract she is also entitled to a pay rise on 1 July every year during her five-year contract.

Base salaries range from $46,000 to $80,521. Senior salaries range between $95,394 and $123,033 but these are topped up with adjustments for the cost of living in different countries. A UN worker based in Geneva, for example, will see their base salary increased by 106%, in Bonn by 50.6%, Paris 62% and Peshawar 38.6%. Even in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, one of the poorest areas of the world, a UN employee's salary will be increased by 53.2%.

Other benefits include rent subsidies, dependency allowances for spouses and children, education grants for school-age children and travel and shipping expenses, as well as subsidised medical insurance.

For many years critics have complained that IMF, World Bank, and United Nations employees are able to live large at international taxpayers' expense.

During the 1944 economic conference at Bretton Woods, where the IMF was created, American and British politicians disagreed over salaries for the bureaucrats. British delegates, including the economist John Maynard Keynes, considered the American proposals for salaries to be "monstrous", but lost the argument.

Officials from the various organisations have long maintained that the high salaries are a way of attracting talent from the private sector. In fact, most senior employees are recruited from government posts.

Pot, kettle, black.....

about: "What are our leaders doing? Why, they are watching football, and Chelsea has just beaten a German team...", I wonder why PT pm is not there, since he agreed with troika´s issues related with Portugal.

Don't ask me what any of them are doing, Pedro, besides not a lot while ordinary people suffer. Oh wait, we do know what Ms Lagarde's predecessor was most occupied with - attending sex parties.

I was annoyed about Ms Lagarde's remarks anyway; to find out she herself is in the privileged position of not paying any tax while lecturing others, makes it even worse.

I don't know what to say about this, but I don't think she is the only one, and not just from France.
But lecturing others does seem a trifle insensitive.
But Greece does have a problem which could involve non payment of Taxes. But then so does Portugal. When was the last time Goncalo Amaral paid his Taxes?

Yes bb1, I agree with you.

Thing is, Sabot, there's no point in squeezing the little people, when in the UK alone, companies like Amazon and the Top Shop group are using assorted dodges to avoid paying taxes to the tune of hundreds of millions.

Some guy moonlighting as a taxi driver, say, and not declaring it, pales into insignificance beside the fortunes these companies are avoiding paying.

It may be legal, but it sure isn't moral.