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February 20th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
Greece had endured five consecutive years of recession even before the looming
onset of this new round of deflation. Unemployment for those aged under 25
already stands at 48 per cent, having risen by more than a third since
November 2010. Perhaps most stark of all is a national suicide rate that has
doubled from 2.8 per 100,000 people in 2008, to about 6 last year.
Erasmia Dimoula, 25, qualified as a nursery schoolteacher two years ago. Since
then, she has not had a job, save for a brief stint as a waitress. She now
lives at home, in a state of enforced dependence on her parents, along with
her similarly unemployed sister who speaks three languages and has a
master’s degree in psychology.
“If there wasn’t a financial crisis, I would be working now. I’m sure of
it,” said Miss Dimoula. She will not vote in the elections expected in
April and, like many Greeks of her generation, expressed nothing but
contempt for the politicians of all parties who brought the country to its
current pass.
“I don’t expect anything from any government, from any politician. I can
only expect things from myself,” she said. “You have to take
responsibility if you give your vote to these people. Then you’d have to
shut up about what’s going on.”
Young Greeks cannot be blamed for their nation’s crisis, but what about an
older generation who voted for corrupt governments, handed out jobs
according to family or political ties, and artfully avoided taxation? This
generation launched a famous student revolt at Athens Polytechnic in 1973,
toppling a military regime and bringing in democracy. Then, arguably, they
went on to cripple the country.
“A lot of people my age are blaming the Polytechnic generation,”
said Miss Dimoula. “I found myself doing it as well. But you can’t
blame a whole generation.”
She added: “They are an optimistic generation: they thought things will
be better for them and for their children. But we can’t be optimistic. We
can’t believe in anything.”
Those from the Polytechnic era who played by the rules were not always
rewarded. Miss Dimoula’s father worked for 35 years and must now support two
unemployed adult daughters from his pension, which has inevitably been cut.
“I want to try and do better, I want to not let this thing get on top of
me, but it’s very difficult,” she said. “There are times that I
cry because of all this.” Miss Dimoula left for an interview for a
vacancy as cashier of an Athens taverna.
One possible answer for young Greeks is to emigrate. Kyriakos Soubasis, 28,
graduated in mechanical engineering four years ago and has been unable to
find a job. “In the last two years, I never went to an office. I send
my CV by email, but no one answers. I have no income right now, I live with
my family,” he said.
Those of his university contemporaries who do work have often left Greece. “Many
of them go abroad: to London, to Berlin. And those who stayed here, some
have jobs, but no pay. If the bosses have no money, they don’t pay you,
perhaps for two or three months.”
Half of all small businesses in Greece are unable to meet their payroll costs,
while a quarter of companies have gone bankrupt since 2009. Greeks have
shown how little they trust their banks by emptying their accounts and
stashing savings under metaphorical mattresses: about a third of the money
on deposit has been withdrawn.
The established parties of left and right, PASOK and New Democracy
respectively, have alternated in power since the advent of democracy in
1974. The leaders of both movements have pledged to implement the agreed
austerity measures in return for the bail-out package. Success will mean
reducing Greek national debt from today’s level of 160 per cent of gross
domestic product to a mere 120 per cent by 2020.
“The political system is incapable of handling the situation. The people
who created the problem are now going to solve the problem: that’s the
paradox,” said Stelios Kouloglou, a current affairs presenter on
national television.
“It is doomed to fail. This just creates more and more recession. It’s a
vicious circle between more recession and more measures.”
One policy, aimed squarely at the poorest members of the workforce, might
serve to symbolise them all: the minimum wage will fall by 22 per cent to
Pounds 490 per month, less than half of the Pounds 1,050 equivalent in
Britain.
In the meantime, Greece has suffered perhaps the most wounding blow of all –
its national dignity and self belief has been undermined.
Mr Kouloglou deeply resents the media caricature of the easy-living,
non-taxpaying Greek. “It’s becoming kind of racist,” he said. “You
cannot have an honest solution when you have an image as bad as that.”
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