StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the 20 August 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the 14 August 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

Even the humble street light is a victim of Greek austerity (Photo: Dennis Yang / Flickr)

- There are no street lights in Thessalonika! Extensive areas of the city of Salonica are dark during the night because street lights no longer switch on at dusk. For more than a year, the streets and sidewalks have been completely dark at night.

According to city officials the reason is that there are no longer funds for light bulbs or maintenance of the city’s streetlights. Twice, the municipality has requested a procurement to rectify the situation and twice, their request was refused. They are currently waiting for a response to their third request for funds.

People who live in the city no longer feel safe at night and have asked the police to increase their presence on the streets.

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- An illustration of the deteriorating conditions in Greek society can be found in the struggles faced by the Greek athletes who took part in the recent Olympic games in London. They did so without coaches or equipment. Stella-Iro Ledaki, a champion pole vaulter, told reporters that due to the economic crisis in Greece, she was obliged to pay for all her own expenses.

She stated that not enough training is provided for Greek athletes, who must make an effort to hire and pay for their own coaches, in order to ensure they have the best preparation. Ms. Ledaki paid all of her own expenses, even though she has no income herself. She is mostly unemployed, working sporadically in her profession as a speech therapist.

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- On Monday, the Ministry of Finance issued a statement regarding their decision to transfer the rights to the ports to the Greek Privatization Agency (TAIPED).

Here is the list of the 23 tourist ports that will be privatized:

Zakynthos, Katakolon, Tourlos/Mykonos, Chios, Pylos/Messinia, New Epidaurus, Glyfada, Poros, Skiathos, Skyros, Agios Nikolaos/Crete, Itea, Phocis, Kalamaria (Aretsou), Kos, Alimos, Hydra, Rethymno, Rhodes (Mandraki and Akantia) , Suda and Argostoli.

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- It was reported that Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras has given sharp instructions to the Minister of Labor to proceed with drastic cuts across the board on pensions, even for those getting pensions below 600 euros a month.

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StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece on weeknights at 6pm Athens time @ http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the 10 August 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

- In a recent Guardian UK article, Greek unionists claim it will be ‘the hottest fall yet’ for Greece. The mass media outside Greece predict that the people’s movement will appear on the streets in huge numbers after the new austerity measures are implemented by the coalition government-of-the-regime. According to the Guardian, public servants, who will suffer most of the cuts, will join the mass demonstrations on the streets this fall. As reported yesterday, 40,000 public-sector workers are scheduled to join the growing ranks of the unemployed.

It will be very difficult for the coalition government to survive under the weight of the new austerity measures. The Greek people have not forgotten recent campaign promises. Candidates pledged that they would renegotiate the terms of the Memorandum with the Troika and that there would be no more cuts or lay-offs.

From the Guardian:

“[…] Word is spreading of an incendiary autumn with labour groups, backed by the radical left main opposition Syriza party, warning of protests in September. The prospect of mass lay-offs in the state sector and a spate of planned privatisations are setting the scene for the ‘hottest fall yet,’ unionists said.

‘Mass demonstrations are being prepared by both public- and private-sector unions,’ said Ilias Iliopoulos, General Secretary of ADEDY, the union of civil servants. ‘As long as the [governing] parties don’t respect their pre-election pledges of no more cuts and no more firings they will face the wrath of the people,’ he said.

With the country enduring a record fifth straight year of recession and unemployment hitting an unprecedented 23.1%, Greeks, he said, could ‘take no more’”. […]

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- The spirit that is penetrating the whole of Greek society is the anticipation of what is ahead of them. Presently, the Greek capital is semi-empty. Athenians who are financially able leave the sweltering city for a few day to spend time in the villages to visit friends and relatives and to rest in the mountains or by the sea.

Whether they remain in the city or travel to the villages, what is upfront and foremost in the hearts and minds of the Greek people is what will happen at the beginning of September. And they are looking forward.

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- The Greek radio station REVOLT reported today that anarchist Soteris Siftkas was placed in solitary confinement after his refusal to be placed in restraints on his return to the prison from a local hospital where he was undergoing an examination.

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- On his live broadcast of 10 August 2012, Giorgos Kosmopoulos of StopCartel made this statement regarding the status of undocumented immigrants in Greece: “They are NOT ‘illegal’. They are people who do not have the right documentation for their presence in Greece. The whole … the absolute responsibility for this lack of the right documentation lies with the Greek State.”

Mr. Kosmopoulos reports that rioting police have been deployed to the central railway station in Athens, in full combat gear. Dozens of rioting police formed a wall on the platform as they waited for the arrival of trains. They detain and arrested anyone with dark skin or anyone who speaks Greek with a foreign accent.

As 99GetSmart reported yesterday, more than 7,500 people whose documentation is not in order have been detained in Athens since last Thursday.

The dictatorship in Greece is alive and well. Rioting police have replaced the Nazi brown shirts, but the tactics are the same. As a matter of fact, 50% of the rioting police force voted for the notorious neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn, who won 6.92% of the vote in the June election

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- Through the controlled media, the government-of-the-regime bombards the Greek people with the same daily propaganda. The goal is to give the appearance that the government-of-the-regime are Very Important People making Very Serious Decisions. The truth is that they are nothing but Troika-owned clerks, a status they accepted when they willingly acted as traitors to their country for their own personal financial gain.

It has been widely reported that the immediate target of the government-of-the-regime are the 40,000 public workers who are about to be listed on the “labor reserve,” which means they will be placed in the preliminary stage – resulting in a 60% salary cut – before being permanently dismissed from their jobs a year from now.

The Greek Minister of Justice publicly questioned the Constitutional legality of the so-called ‘labor reserve’ process as well as issues concerning austerity measures, but a well-trained TV journalist ‘reframed’ those issues by ‘informing’ people that the government-of-the-regime continues to work feverishly to crunch the numbers to make the ‘necessary’ cuts.

It’s all theater. We all know the final decisions have already been made by the Troika, who are returning to Athens on 20 August  – 1 September.

People are terrorized daily with reports of drastic new austerity measures which include cuts to social services across the board. Drastic cuts in pensions, including those above 700€, which will be cut up to 40%, which are coming on top of dramatic cuts only two years ago.

Giorgos Kosmopoulos of StopCartel TV had this to say about the present conditions in Greece, “Every day things deteriorate in Greece. Every day we are terrorized by revelations of new dramatic austerity measures against the Greek population.”

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- UPDATE: StopCartel has been hacked! Again!

Giorgos Kosmopoulos made a short video statement explaining the recent electronic attacks on StopCartel. The video starts in Greek and changes to English at 3:09.

LINK @  http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr/video?clipId=flv_81a9ee78-166f-4547-b760-34fdc9fd0f30

As 99GetSmart reported yesterday:

The Greek version of StopCartel’s blog was hacked yesterday morning. But thanks to StopCartel’s excellent tech team, it is up and running again. Many thanks to the tech team!

In the course of the repairs, the tech team discovered a spying program embedded in one of StopCartel’s computers. As soon as it was discovered, the stealth spyware was removed.

StopCartel believes this was the criminal work of the Greek ‘intelligence’ agency and that this event was an attempt at preventing the free circulation of political ideas in Greece.

StopCartel called the Department of Electronic Crime Prevention and requested an immediate investigation of the hacking and malicious spyware installation. Despite the fact that it is part of the Greek Intelligence Agency, StopCartel expects the Department of Electronic Crime Prevention to fulfill its duties – to prevent and investigate electronic crime.

If the Department fails to proceed with an investigation within 24 hours, StopCartel plans to file a complaint with the Public Prosecutor of Athens against the Greek intelligence agency and request a full investigation.

StopCartel announced that its voice will not be silenced and that they will continue the work of informing the people inside and outside of Greece.

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- The Thessaloniki International Fair will be held at the beginning of September. The festival is an annual tradition in Greece and it is customary for the Greek PM to officially open the fair. It is also his duty to address guests with a formal statement in the evening to kick off events. The following day, the traditional program for the PM includes a press conference with local and international media.

It has been announced that this year the PM will go to Thessaloniki to officially open the fair, but plans to reject the decades-old traditions that have been in place since 1950, after the civil war. He will not deliver a formal statement, nor will he give a press conference. Many interpret this to mean that this government is dead.

In Thessaloniki, huge demonstrations are being planned for 8 September 2012 in response to this new affront, as well as the new cuts and austerity measures.

StopCartel TV will broadcast LIVE from the demonstrations in Thessaloniki on 8 September @  http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the 9 August 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snakearbusto, 99GetSmart

- The Greek version of StopCartel’s blog was hacked yesterday morning. But thanks to StopCartel’s excellent tech team, it is up and running again. Many thanks to the tech team!

In the course of the repairs, the tech team discovered a spying program embedded in one of StopCartel’s computers. As soon as it was discovered, the stealth spyware was removed.

StopCartel believes this was the criminal work of the Greek ‘intelligence’ agency and that this event was an attempt at preventing the free circulation of political ideas in Greece.

StopCartel called the Department of Electronic Crime Prevention and requested an immediate investigation of the hacking and malicious spyware installation. Despite the fact that it is part of the Greek Intelligence Agency, StopCartel expects the Department of Electronic Crime Prevention to fulfill its duties – to prevent and investigate electronic crime.

If the Department fails to proceed with an investigation within 24 hours, StopCartel plans to file a complaint with the Public Prosecutor of Athens against the Greek intelligence agency and request a full investigation.

StopCartel announced that its voice will not be silenced and that they will continue the work of informing the people inside and outside of Greece.

SOLIDARITY with StopCartel!

StopCartel blogs:

Greek version @ stopcartel.info/

English version @ stopcartel.net/

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- A year ago, the unemployment rate in Greece was high, at 16.8%. Today, it was reported that unemployment in Greece currently stands at 23.1% from 22.6% a month ago, and nothing seems to be able to stem the tide.

According to the official data, which represent only a portion of the unemployment rate in Greece, there are 1,147,372 unemployed. But the real number is over 1.7 million.

Within the last month, 34,141 more people lost their jobs.

The statistics are grim. The unemployment rate is higher for women at age 26.8 than for men at 20.3. For people between the age of 15-24, the unemployment rate is a staggering 54.9%. Employment prospects are not much better, at 31.6%, for those between the ages of 25-34.

34-44 year olds are experiencing unemployment numbers at 19.4% while the rate for those between 45-54 years old stands at 17%.

These high unemployment numbers illustrate the dire conditions that have plunged Greece into the current humanitarian crisis that ravages the country.

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- Today, Reuters reported an item the Greek media ‘neglected’ to report – the news that 40,000 public servants are about to be listed on the “labor reserve,” which means they will be placed in the preliminary stage – meaning a 60% salary cut – before being permanently dismissed from their jobs a year from now.

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- Nikos Manesis, a private citizen and the owner of the Hellenic Halyvourgias Steel Mill, is intensifying his orgy of terrorism against the steelworkers. Today he sent notice to the President of the Steelworkers’ Union, Giorgos Sifonios, accusing him of several trumped-up charges.

The trend in Greece is unfavorable to workers as several factory owners are following suit by serving workers with a threatening summons, in an act of economic terrorism.

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- The President of the Athens Medical Council was on TV talking about a social outpatient program organized by priests of the Greek Orthodox Church. UNBELIEVABLY, he is in favor of  a ‘STATE CHURCH’ in Greece.

The doctors of the social outpatient clinic have reported that within 6 months, they have examined over 4,000 uninsured people.

The social clinic offers the first level of medical assistance, but in instances where medication is required, the patient must fill the prescription at a state pharmacy.

If a patient needs hospitalization, they are referred to hospitals that will accept the uninsured. In many instances, people who suffer from serious illnesses such as cancer were not able to be hospitalized. And, in Greece 2012, unemployed pregnant women with no insurance will not be able to give birth in a hospital unless they pay for it.

On this issue, the Minister of Health is as clear as he is callous – people who are uninsured must pay for their own health care. The problem is that health insurance is tied to employment in Greece. What is obvious to everyone except the Greek Minister of Health is that the unemployed who are not insured have no money to pay for health care. The catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Greece rages on all levels of society.

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- The former Chancellor of Germany, Helmut Schmidt, appeared on German TV and made statements regarding Greece and the EURO zone.

From  EUReferendum:

On the day that Juncker said that a Greek exit from the euro would be “manageable,” the grand old man, Helmut Schmidt, appeared on a German TV program, cigarette in hand, to tell the world that letting Greece join the euro in the first place was “a mistake.”

[…]

Nevertheless, while manageable, Greece’s leaving is “not desirable” says Juncker, and he rules out the exit, “at least until the end of the autumn – and after that, too.” That could be never, of course – except that this man openly admits that “When it becomes serious, you have to lie.”

But how do we know when Juncker is lying?

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- The wildfires in Greece are as out of control as the political situation.

In central Greece, huge fires continue to rage out of control. For several hours, 20k of the main highway in the Peloponnese was closed due to unsafe conditions.

In Arcadia, authorities arrested a 45-year-old man suspected of starting one of the huge fires by carelessly disposing of a lit cigarette in the dry forest.

Wildfires are being reported on the island of Kefalonia in western Greece, in Corinth, 90 km from Athens, and in Kos, in the eastern region of the island. Currently, there are an estimated 45 wildfires all around the country.

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-  In reaction to the recent raids on immigrants in Greece, Amnesty International is sounding the alarm on the Greek police.

Amnesty International stated that Greek authorities have no right to handle people in the streets as if they were criminals based on the color of their skin. Their demands include that Greek authorities must terminate its attack on ‘irregular’ immigrants and are calling on the government to allow people to be granted asylum in Greece.

More than 7,500 people without legal papers have been detained in Athens since last Thursday.

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- The recent clashes in Ierissos in northern Greece persist. According to SYRIZA MP rioting police / armed forces are using rubber bullets against the local citizens who wish to exercise their right to protest the establishment of a gold mine by a Canadian company. Nearly all the trees in a nearby forest are to be cut down for the project.

For more information: 

THE IERISSOS RESISTANCE: Private citizen George Bobolas dispatched local riot police to act as his private army against Ierissos residents in northern Greece – VIDEOS @ http://99getsmart.com/?p=2883

This is not the first time the Greek riot police were dispatched as a private army against Greek citizens, by a private citizen. BOBOLAS IS A REPEAT OFFENDER!:

THE KERATEA RESISTANCE @ http://99getsmart.com/?p=2359

THE HISTORY OF GOLD MINES AND GREEK RESISTANCE - FULL DOCUMENTARY FILM:  http://99getsmart.com/?p=2969

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StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece on weeknights at 6pm Athens time @ http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the 8 August 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

Austerity Means Greek Hospitals Run Out of Medicine? (Photo: José Goulão / Flickr)

As the economic situation in Greece continues to worsen, reports indicate that hospitals and care centers throughout the nation are running completely out of medicines, and many healthcare workers are now voluntarily providing care services without pay.

On Tuesday morning, the mainstream media was on location at a central hospital in Athens to report on how the crisis is affecting the country’s hospitals.

Doctors, nursing staff, and administrative personnel stated that the lack of medical personnel at the nation’s hospitals has made it impossible to function properly. The hospital staff who remain at their jobs have gone unpaid by the state for months.

The President of the Hospital Workers was on the scene, but as an ironic twist, he was acting as a government-of-the-regime representative. He stated that he was under the impression that the Minister of Health would be there to begin a dialogue and expressed his regrets that this was not the case. Stunningly, he admitted that he receives his information about the problems in the hospital from the mainstream media!

He repeatedly lied to reporters, saying that the government is trying to sort out problems that have existed for years with experimental solutions. He did not elaborate on what those ‘experimental’ solutions were. He also said that it is not clear what sort of health system is wanted in Greece. He continued to dismiss the obvious truth by stating that local hospitals are serving the needs of the people of Athens, but conceded that there is an ongoing battle with the outpatient clinic.

The reporter asks if him if this problem exists due to the lack of personnel. Again, his reply was less than honest, stating that the health system does not function properly due to the lack of a good healthcare system outside Athens. Patients flock to Athens to be treated, he said. While that may have been true many years ago, it is not true now. The country’s hospitals were working very well until the crisis hit.

A doctor on the scene also expressed his disagreement and stated that there is a critical lack of personnel, causing a crisis in hospitals around the nation. He explained that the government has cut hospital staff by 35% and that the remaining staff have not been paid by the state for several months.

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Read the rest of this entry →

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the August 7, 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

OWS Greek Solidarity protest in Liberty Square (Photo: Sunset Parkerpix / Flickr)

- In the second week of August, things are quiet in Athens. The Athenians who can manage it financially are leaving the city for the villages, to visit relatives and to forget, if only for a few days.

The situation in Athens remains the same, in the government offices and in the city’s flats where life continues. Many people live in flats without electricity, some without water. In a major European capital, people are starving and in despair. The daily suicides continue – yesterday another two. For every two official suicides reported, another ten go unreported.

There is a common feeling of deep disappointment and heightened expectations. Many people are expecting an explosive situation in the next few weeks. Conditions in Greece are visibly deteriorating daily and no one knows how long the Greek people will remain tolerant.

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- Clashes between local citizens and the rioting police persist in the town of Ierissos, located in northern Greece. On Tuesday morning, local citizens gathered in the town square for an organized march down the road to the gold mine to defend the region from the personal gold mining interests of Greek industrialist George Bobolas.

Read the rest of this entry →

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the July 31, 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart 

- On Tuesday, 31 July, SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras announced his proposal concerning the Greek universities. His main point is that in September, the universities must be reopened.

Tsipras stated, “Whatever we are suffering in this country, we cannot accept that the universities will not be open this September. If the universities are closed, it will be the spiritual death of Greece.”

Tsipras’s proposal includes appointing an intermediary for one year, whose position is designed to function as that of a student advocate, with the support of the university. This also provides an opportunity for a necessary dialogue in order to form a new University Constitution.

Tsipras, the main opposition leader, has submitted his proposal to the Greek Parliament.

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- A new taxation will be imposed on drivers without insurance. There are over 1.5 million uninsured drivers in Greece due to high unemployment and lack of funds. People choose to use what little money they have left to buy food to feed themselves and their families.

On the news, ‘reporters’ try to ratchet up the fear by fretting, “What happens if you are in an accident with someone without insurance?”

The answer is simply that people with insurance will get paid by their own insurance companies. Another option is, if you don’t wish to file a claim with your own insurance company you can file a claim through a government fund, but the process will be difficult and payment will be slow.

A representative of the insurance industry put his spin on the issue by stating that the cost of the punitive tax is nothing compared to what it will cost to be in an accident without insurance.

The majority of people who do not have automobile insurance are the newly poor. They wonder where the government thinks the money for a penalty tax will come from. Sadly, the government continues to be blind, deaf and dumb when it comes to serving the people they were ‘elected’ to represent.

The kind of thinking reflected by the government-of-the-regime completely ignores the plight that the newly poor find themselves in, after being pummeled by failed IMF policies for the last 5 years. Most economists admit that brutal austerity measures DO NOT lead to growth. Even the IMF admits that their policies always fail.

The Digital Journal reports:

Former Greek finance minister and Greece’s representative to the IMF until January, Panagiotis Roumeliotis, has spoken of the bail-out Memorandum imposed on Greece by its Troika of lenders, the IMF, EU and ECB. Roumeliotis accused the Troika of underestimating the negative affects the austerity program would have on the Greek economy, pushing it deeper into recession.

In an interview with the New York Times Roumeliotis revealed officials at the IMF knew the program was doomed to failure. He said “We knew at the fund from the very beginning that this program was impossible to be implemented because we didn’t have any – any – successful example.”

He added that whilst the IMF uses Greece’s failure to implement structural reforms as an excuse for the programs failure, the real cause “is that the severe cuts contributed to the downward spiral by decimating economic demand within Greece.”

Roumeliotis’s words reiterate those of German Chancellor Angela Merkel who admitted in June that Greece’s program of austerity was important even if it did not succeed, in order to set an example to other European countries to adhere to their future obligations within the EU.

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- Many unemployed tradesmen in Greece (plumbers, electricians, etc.) are leaving the country in droves and are heading to Germany.

German construction companies are aware of the crisis in Greece and are offering massive job opportunities to Greek tradesmen. Knowing the German language and having a current CV gives a Greek tradesman an advantage in that job market.

Many Greeks are drawn to this offer because they have been unemployed for over a year and believe they have no future in Greece.

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- SYRIZA claims that the government-of-the-regime has already decided on new anti-social austerity measures. They are currently meeting to reach an agreement about when and how they will announce the new cuts to the citizens.

A favorite meme of the government-of-the-regime is to repeatedly tell the Greek people that they must fulfill the terms of the Memorandum, and afterwards the government will renegotiate with the Troika.

This is just one more ridiculous piece of propaganda to fool Greek citizens into accepting cuts first and renegotiation later. It’s a bogus plan because after the terms of the Memorandum are fulfilled, there will be nothing left of Greece and nothing to negotiate for.

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- Fewer and fewer Greek people are able to go on holidays this summer. A 50% drop in holiday revenue has been reported.

After 5 years of brutal austerity measures, high unemployment, homelessness, starvation and daily suicides, holidays in Greece are unattainable for the majority of Greek people. Only 3 in 10 will be able to afford a small holiday this year.

Of the 30% of Greeks who are taking a holiday, most are not renting a hotel room or an apartment. They are choosing to save money by staying with friends or relatives instead.

Last weekend, the number of people leaving the cities was 15% lower, compared to previous years during the same time period. Reports state that 7,000 fewer people traveled via Piraeus, the port of Athens, than last year at the same time. Not only are fewer people taking a holiday, they are going for a much shorter period of time, in order to keep expenses as low as possible.

The head of the Greek Hotel Owners union said that this year, the drop in Greeks going for holidays is 50% compared to last year. The union is hoping that August will show an improvement.

Prices have dropped dramatically to attract local tourism, but despite the myriad of discounts, the vast majority of Greeks cannot afford to take a holiday anymore. Most people are spending their holidays at their local beaches, because they simply don’t have the money to spend on transportation and accommodations.

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- Bakeries in Greece are reporting a 10% loss of sales this year. Thing are so bad that Greek families are even making cuts in their daily bread consumption!

Ignoring the reality of how difficult daily life has become for people, the criminal Greek government scrambles to please the Troika by promising to implement 21 new austerity measures. What fresh hell is this?

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StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece on weeknights at 6pm Athens time @  http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the July 30, 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

- The steelworkers from the Hellenic Halyvourgias Steel Mill in Aspropyrgos held a general assembly of their union on Friday, 27 July and Saturday, 28 July and voted to officially terminate their nine-month strike. One hundred fifty workers were reported present. 107 voted to end the strike, while 14 voted against and 29 abstained.

The workers voted to strike last October, protesting layoffs, cuts in working hours and a decrease in pay to 500 euros ($615) per month. The heroic nine-month strike was interrupted at 5:30 a.m. on Friday, 20 July, in a brutal raid by rioting police, who were working in the interest of a private owner, Nikos Manesis.

Again, during the early morning hours on Monday, 23 July, the Greek rioting police used chemical weapons to disperse a group of striking steelworkers gathered outside the gates of the mill. The workers were there to protest the reopening of the steel mill.

Supporters of the steelworkers, who quickly organized an impressive rally - 10,000 people gathered in Omonia Square and marched to Syntagma Square on Monday (23 July) evening – were stunned at the decision to end the strike.

The details are still unclear, but it appears that the strike has ended without any of the steelworkers’ demands being met. Longtime supporters feel that the struggle of the steelworkers represents the larger struggle for workers’ rights in Greece and that this was not their decision to make alone. Supporters feel an especially deep disappointment that the strike seems to have ended without any gains for Greek society.

Kritios Katsionis, an MP from the Communist Party, asks “What are the demands from the union now?” He also responded to the steelworkers’ supporters, who are asking “Who is giving orders to whom?”

The arrangement with the government was that once the strike ended, the rioting police would be removed from the steel mill because there would be no reason for their presence. The Minister of Justice said that the rioting police would be removed by Monday morning. But despite promises from the government, the rioting police remain on guard.

According to Mr. Katsionis, industrialist Nikos Manesis, a private citizen and the owner of the Hellenic Halyvourgias Steel Mill, is giving direct orders to the Greek government, who then pass down his orders to the rioting police. Manesis has instructed the government to leave the rioting police at the steel mill, in order to marginalize the workers.The rioting police were also instructed, by Manesis, to let the workers into the factory one by one, in a show of control.

The government continues to insist that it had acted upon the wishes of the workers, while the radical-Left main opposition party SYRIZA and the Communist Party condemned the police action.

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- “When it becomes serious, you have to lie.” –  Jean Claude Juncker, May 2011.

From Suddeutsche Zeitung:

“No time to lose”: The chairman of the €-group feels that a crucial point in the debt crisis has been reached. Jean-Claude Juncker supports plans by ECB chief Draghi for the purchase of government bonds – and says that Germany is partly to blame for the crisis. Berlin treats the euro area “as a branch,” Juncker said, and that “chatter about the withdrawal of Greece” is not helpful.

Juncker confirmed that the euro countries are preparing together with the bailout fund EFSF and the European Central Bank to buy government bonds from struggling countries if necessary. Because there is no doubt, he said, that “It is still necessary to decide exactly what we will do and when.” This depends “on developments in the next few days and on how fast we have to react.”

Except that Germany’s Finance Minister “denied plans for a new aid program for Spain, according to newspaper Welt am Sonntag, after the media reported European Union leaders aim for Spanish government bond purchases by the European rescue fund and the European Central Bank.”

Tyler Durden, from zerohedge, summarizes:

i) since the head of the Eurogroup is back to outright refuting what Germany said a day earlier, Europe is once again back to Plan B – lying, which means things are again on the verge of an all-out collapse, and a plunge in the EURUSD (which, as a reminder, is precisely what the German export industry wants more than anything), and

ii) just as at the June 29 summit, beggars are again hoping they can be choosers, and force Germany – by way of a full-blown media onslaught in which they represent a vague possibility as a certain outcome, and thus have already set expectations about 5% higher than they it would be otherwise – to succumb to the will of the beggars, and allow full-blown debt monetization.

In conclusion, here are excerpts from a Spiegel magazine interview with Mr. Juncker, highlighting his hilarious attempts to justify his lies:

SPIEGEL: Mr. Prime Minister, you are a Christian Democrat and a Catholic, which is why we want to talk to you about the Ten Commandments.

Juncker: I already have an idea of what you are getting at.

SPIEGEL: Are you familiar with the Eighth Commandment?

Juncker: Of course. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

SPIEGEL: Apparently you don’t take it very seriously. More than two weeks ago, you denied a  report by SPIEGEL ONLINE about a secret meeting of several European Union finance ministers to discuss the situation in Greece, even though the official limousines were already pulling up in Luxembourg.

Juncker: The most important commandment is not to inflict harm on others. Although it isn’t stated quite that way in the Ten Commandments, it follows from them. The finance ministers of several Euro Group nations had agreed to meet on Friday with the president of the European Central Bank (ECB), Jean-Claude Trichet. Because the financial markets in Europe were still open and trading was still underway on Wall Street, we had to deny the existence of the meeting. Otherwise the rate of the euro against the dollar, which had already fallen as a result of your report, would have plunged disastrously.

SPIEGEL: With this false denial, you not only harmed your own credibility, but that of European financial policy as well.

Juncker: And it didn’t exactly enhance the credibility of SPIEGEL ONLINE to disseminate the false report that we were meeting in Luxembourg to discuss Greece’s withdrawal from the monetary union.

SPIEGEL: Forgive us for saying so, but SPIEGEL ONLINE had obtained information to that effect from government sources, as well as a working document prepared specifically for this meeting for the German finance minister.

Juncker: It is not unusual for finance ministers to have documents with them that contain all of the issues being discussed in public. And the question of Greece’s withdrawal from the monetary union is certainly being discussed in public. But that’s a far cry from saying that the issue is on the agenda of a meeting. As a result, I had to be all the more careful to ensure that no unnecessary turbulence would occur in the markets.

SPIEGEL: Are you saying that, as a finance minister in the age of global capital markets, you cannot tell people the truth?

Juncker: I do not have a ready answer to your question. My main concern is to protect people from detriment. That’s why I feel practically compelled to make sure that no dangerous rumors begin to circulate. I’m certainly not going to go to confession because of a false denial. God understands more about the financial markets than many who write about them.

…

SPIEGEL: When secret meetings are held and the truth isn’t always being told, people get the impression that there must be something wrong with this Europe.

Juncker: People understand perfectly well that politicians have to discuss sensitive issues behind closed doors. I had 10 seconds to decide how to react to the report in SPIEGEL ONLINE. Let us say, hypothetically, that I had said: “Okay, we are having a meeting, but I’m not going to tell you what we intend to talk about.” That would have triggered a tsunami in the financial markets. Instead, I chose to produce a small wave of outrage over a white lie.

SPIEGEL: Nevertheless, we’d like to try aiming for the truth.

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- Of the 11.5€ billion to be cut from Greece’s budget, employees, pensioners and patients are scheduled for 5€ billion in cuts. Some of the proposed measures include:

A cap for pensions: maximum pension would be 2,000-2,200 euro

Pensions: A 5% cut for pensions 1,000-1,400€. A 10% cut for pensions over 1,400€. The cut will be applied to the total amount, for those receiving more than one pension.

Allowances, Social Benefits: More than 89 social and welfare benefits will be given according to income and social criteria. Only the unemployment allowance and EKAS (a welfare benefit for low pensioners) are “untouched’’ by the measures, even though a very low-income cap was set and applied last year for EKAS.

There have been some rumors that there will be cuts to unemployment allowance for seasonal workers (agriculture, tourism), but this has not been confirmed.

Lump sum: There will be a lump-sum cut of 22.67% for civil servants, and a total of 40% in cuts for insurance funds that pay a higher lump sum than the employees’ contributions.

Healthcare: Maximum annual spending per insured patient will be 1,500€! This amount includes expenditures covered by insurance funds for prescription medicine, 2 check ups per year and 1 hospital stay.

If this amount is exhausted before the year’s end, patients will have to pay 10€  per visit to a doctor and 15% of the daily cost for a hospital stay.

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StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece on weeknights at 6pm Athens time @ http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the July 27, 2012 broadcast. 

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

- Greek bank workers will hold a 24-hour strike on July 30 to protest decisions made by the Troika and enforced by the Greek government-of-the-regime about them, without representation

OTOE, the bank union federation stated:

“The government must realize it doesn’t have the ethical or political right to show weakness, ignore the historical moment for Greek banks and succumb to the pressures of the creditors,”

The bank workers ask the Greek people to stand in solidarity and support their strike.

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- EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras held a PRIVATE meeting in Athens on Friday, to discuss Greece’s progress with the terms of the Memorandum.

According to Giorgos Kosmopoulos from StopCartel TV:

Barroso’s visit to Athens plays a direct role in the psychological manipulation of the Greek people by imposing fresh directives to the puppet regime. Once again, the official threats state that Greece will not get the next infusion of cash unless the directives of the Memorandum are fulfilled. There will be no renegotiations. Barroso is in Athens to make it clear that there is no other way than to accept the ruthless terms of the Troika.

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- In a speech delivered on Friday, Mr. Pantelakis, the President of the Unions, had this to say:

The Troika came disguised as doctors who administered the medicine that was supposed to save Greece, but they were charlatans and their ‘medicine’ is poison. It is killing Greece. If the Troika were public workers, they would be fired from their jobs.

——————

- PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos stated that he will put forth austerity measures with cuts to be spread out over the next four years. He concedes that the measures are very difficult, with huge reductions in pensions, wages and health care.

However, the Troika has stated all along that austerity measures must be imposed within the next two years, as per the terms of the Memorandum.

——————

- A new poll reveals that only 40 days after the last election, the great majority of Greeks – 83% – do not trust the new government. Only 16.5% have a positive view of the current government.

This creates an atmosphere that will benefit the people’s movement. The next few weeks are critical, as the new austerity measures are imposed. If 83% don’t trust the government now, what will happen when the government proceeds with more crushing policies? It will be very interesting to see what will happen next.

——————

- The Troika’s clerks met with Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras on Friday. Once again, the Troika’s errand boys point out to the puppet government that their target must be to achieve the reforms that they signed off on in the terms of the Memorandum. When the Troika talks about “reforms,” what are really doing is declaring open season on Greece’s public assets.

The clerks will leave Athens over the weekend, but will return in September with the same old threats, in an effort to keep the Greek people feeling insecure and afraid. The IMF knew all along that austerity measures were not going to succeed. There has never been an IMF success story, to date.

Greeks are going to hear about huge cuts. Here are some of the ‘reforms’:

- Pensions over 1,400€ will be cut by 40%

- Cuts to health care will include a 1,500€ ceiling per person, per year.

- Tuition penalties will be imposed on university students who fail to complete their studies within 4 years.

- The pension eligibility age will be raised from 65 to 67 years.

- Christmas and Easter bonuses, the so-called 13th and 14th salaries, that have suffered huge cuts already, will be terminated altogether.

- 30,000 more public-sector workers will lose their jobs within the year.

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- 55% of hotel rooms and apartments for tourists in Greece are empty. This is the ‘success’ of the IMF, EU and ECB program in Greece. Europeans, and in particular Germans, reportedly fear unrest. Tourism receipts from European Union visitors fell by 28 percent for 2011 compared to 2010, and the trend continues. Tourism accounts for 15% of Greece’s GDP.

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- Greek hospitals are in dire straits. Not only is there a severe shortage of doctors, nurses and other vital personnel but medicine and disposable items are in short supply, as well. Patients must bring their own syringes and catheters to the hospital for their own personal use.

StopCartel is calling out for people to assist Greece by organizing collection drives to help supply Greek hospitals with medicines and medical supplies. Please contact Giorgos at StopCartel for more information: info@stopcartel.org

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Information is the backbone of the effort to liberate ourselves, not just in Greece or Europe, but the whole world. Independent media is an extremely important conduit of unfiltered information. We must build and support a network of information in order to succeed.

Please consider contributing:

ONGOING FUNDRAISER FOR StopCartel Livestream from Athens: http://99getsmart.com/?p=3667

——————

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece on weeknights at 6pm Athens time @ http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece weeknights @ 6 pm Athens time. The following post is a loose transcript of the July 25, 2012 broadcast.

By greydogg and snake arbusto, 99GetSmart

- Dictatorship is alive and well in Greece and it is executing the country. The local and foreign loan sharks control the mass media and are ratcheting up the fear factor. They are trying to manipulate the thinking and emotions of the citizens by terrifying them into accepting more austerity measures and the privatization of public assets. By repeatedly stating that they are afraid Greece will go bankrupt in weeks or months, the government-of-the-regime hopes to paralyze people with fear in an effort to get them to accept that there is only one way for Greece, even though that way will end in catastrophe. The foreign and local loan sharks of the Troika, the industrialists and multinational corporations are executing the entire nation by ensuring bankruptcy.

And all the while, not one word is ever mentioned about the super-profits Germany makes off Greece’s monthly interest payments.

The Greek people must realize that the crisis is deepening ever day. The so-called Prime Minister of Greece, Antonis Samaras, lies to the public without hesitation. Samaras says Greece will renegotiate when it’s stronger and in a more powerful position to do so. How does he expect a stronger, more powerful Greece AFTER he sells off all public assets to foreign interests for pennies on the euro?

The reality is that the Greek government-of-the-regime that is controlling the lives of the Greek people is semi-dead and lives in fear. We are coming to the most critical phase of this war against us. Let’s rise up and take back our lives and control of our government!

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- EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso will meet with Prime Minister Antonis Samaras today in Athens to discuss Greece’s progress with the terms of the Memorandum. His last visit was in June 2009. There have been 13 subsequent inspections.

According to Athens News:

Mr. Samaras and President Barroso… will discuss the overall situation in Europe and obviously particularly focusing on Greece,” EU Commission spokesman Alejandro Ulzurrun told reporters.

Barroso’s trip will coincide with a visit by EU/IMF inspectors to assess whether Athens deserves to receive more payments under the 130-billion-euro rescue program, as speculation mounts that Greece could be forced to quit the euro zone.

Barroso’s visit to Athens plays a direct role in the psychological manipulation of the Greek people by imposing fresh directives to the puppet regime. Once again, the official threats state that Greece will not get the next infusion of cash unless the directives of the Memorandum are fulfilled. There will be no renegotiations. Barroso is in Athens to make it clear that there is no other way than to accept the ruthless terms of the Troika.

——————

- On Wednesday afternoon, a phone call tipped off authorities to a bomb threat at the Ministry of Finance. The building was immediately evacuated and searched. Nothing was found.

A similar situation occurred at the Regional Court of Halandri, it was reported.

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- According to an official report from the Greek administration, 190,000 small businesses will close this year due to the recession and austerity measures imposed by the international community. Another 260,000 people will be left unemployed.

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- In view of the upcoming visit by the Troika’s clerks, the Ministers of Health and Labor announced to the public what cuts they will propose.

Of the €11.5 billion to be cut from the budget, the Minister of Labor proposed €5 billion in cuts. Main pensions will have a ceiling of €2,000 a month. This means that the government-of-the-regime is planning to cut pensions that pensioners have paid for entirely by themselves, with no government subsidies! The Minister of Labor will also cut social subsidies to Greek families with handicapped children.

The Minster of Health announced cuts of €300 million next year and another €300 the following year. The Ministry of Health will also establish a ceiling on medicine, allowing only a limited lifetime allowance for medication.

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- The steelworkers from the Hellenic Halyvourgias Steel Mill in Aspropyrgos will hold an assembly on Friday and Saturday to make decisions about their strike. They are also scheduled to meet with the Minister of Labor on Friday.

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- About 400 workers from Skaramangas shipyard held a rally and march last week. The workers are protesting their current schedule of work – one day per week. They are requesting an end to the ‘rotation work principle’ and demanding the back pay owed to them. The company’s management is refusing to accept requests to revoke the rotation work principle, where everyone works one day a week.

The strike will continue through Friday. On Monday, the shipyard will close again. A general meeting will be held by the workers to decide on their next course of action.

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- The Hellenic Sugar Industry S.A. was founded in 1969 and is headquartered in Thessaloniki, Greece. The HSI workers’ union is protesting the sale of this profitable state-controlled company to private foreign interests. They maintain that the 5 factories could not only cover local consumption, but could increase production for export. The workers are demanding to be spared from the politics of disaster capitalism.

——————

Information is the backbone of the effort to liberate ourselves, not just in Greece or Europe, but the whole world. Independent media is an extremely important conduit of unfiltered information. We must build and support a network of information in order to succeed.

Please consider contributing:

ONGOING FUNDRAISER FOR StopCartel Livestream from Athens: http://99getsmart.com/?p=3667

——————

StopCartel TV broadcasts live from Athens, Greece on weeknights at 6pm Athens time @ http://www.livestream.com/stopcarteltvgr