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How the world sees Greece
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
The Fascism of Ignorance... One More Greek Story
In my country, everyone squeals and whines about politics and how this or that party is exploiting the people, pocketing their money or never respecting their rights. In my country, a young man was killed in the middle of the street in broad daylight with the police and bystanders looking on as his despairing girlfriend begged for help. In my country killing has nothing to do with need or poverty, it has to do with ignorance... and sadly it begins in every single neighborhood, every small community, every little-known corner of the city, village or town.
Today, I woke up to find three dogs, five cats and three birds had been poisoned by a friendly neighbor. The one dog, the four cats and the birds all died a terrible death. The two others barely survived. Why? Because many of my fellow countrymen (and women) have never realized that they are but a speck in this whole called the universe. They believe they own nature and can kill whatever gets in their way and doesn't fit into their limited worldview. So the two-legged animal - also part of this universe we call home - who was confronted by animal lovers the other day, when he began a frenzied attack on two dogs playing on the beach next to him, decided to simply use rat poison and kill off the creatures which deprived him of his fun in the sun while achieving power (or so he thinks).
Why then, I ask, should this individual not do the same on a higher level and simply stab, shoot or beat to death a fellow human? In all this talk of fascism, with sophomoric reporters making claims, insiders making accusations, know-it-alls reaching conclusions, no one has stopped to simply state the obvious: as long as people remain uneducated and ignorant they will continue to believe that they ARE the universe, they will continue to hurl stones at animals and pet lovers, they will continue to vote ignorantly for fascists, racists, sexists, users and abusers, they will continue to slaughter whatever does not fit into their universe.
In the poignant words of a friend, horrific acts are exclusively the realm and achievement of humankind. The saddest realization is that most of us are living in virtual times, unaware of our real feelings, not knowing the true reasons we do things and yet doing these with an undying passion and a sense of right and all this to the backdrop of laugh tracks, sensationalist articles, terrorizing news bulletins, all guiding us to act accordingly and then serving as alibis for all sorts of despicable behavior.
And so the very sick person who killed off these animals is the very same man who avidly supports democracy and speaks up against fascists and fascist acts (like his).
Dark days can only come to those who continue to ignore the lessons of time, those who use politics as an alibi for their egotistical behavior, who remain cowards treading the road of ignorance that has been paved by the cowardice of others, who commit their crimes and then go home to cuddle in their beds.
It is indeed true that the sophistication of a nation is evident in the way its citizens treat living creatures. In this, I dare say, that my homeland and a large number of my fellow compatriots have failed, giving this once great nation a terrible but true reputation for both ignorance and cruelty.
Greek Banks Face Two More Years of Recession
Even as the Greek government touts a coming primary surplus and predicts the beginning of a recovery next year, The Governor of the Bank of Greece Giorgos Provopoulos said he expects the country’s deep recession, now in a sixth year, will last another two years and that its banks will face a series of “adverse […]
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Drugs Found in Omonoia Police Station
On October 8 the evening officers of the Internal Affairs Division of the Greek Police raided the police station of Omonoia, as part of their investigation for policemen connected with Golden Dawn. According to Greek media reports, the IAD found quantities of drugs that had been illegally withheld by police during the searches, arrests and […]
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Greek banks to be tested for two more recession years, says Provopoulos
KathimeriniGreek banks to be tested for two more recession years, says ProvopoulosKathimeriniGreek banks will have to prove they have enough capital to withstand another two years of recession under the «adverse» scenario of stress tests being carried out in Athens, Greece's central bank governor George Provopoulos told Reuters. The tests on ...Write-offs lurk as Greek banks tackle default mountainReuters UKRPT--Action time at Greek banks as crisis shadow fadesReutersGreek Banks Face Two More Years of RecessionGreek Reporterall 6 news articles »
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Firefox OS gets major feature boost as second rollout wave looms
Source: gigaom.com - Wednesday, October 09, 2013 Mozilla has updated its Firefox OS smartphone operating system to enable features such as push notifications and MMS, while also sprucing up the new platform in other ways. In a blog post on Wednesday, the firm best known for its Firefox browser said Firefox OS 1.1 will come to existing phones “soon”, and would also be installed on new phones. It also gave some updates on the next wave of the Firefox OS rollout. Second wave The rollout has also been limited thus far: Telefonica is offering the platform in Spain, Colombia and Venezuela, and Deutsche Telekom in Poland. According to Mozilla, operators’ announcements and other recent reports , the next wave, to take place in the run-up to the holiday season, looks like this: Telefonica: Brazil, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay Deutsche Telekom: Germany (with Hungary and Greece “soon”) Telenor: Hungary, Serbia and Montenegro Of course, because Firefox OS is all about web apps, Android users can also get a flavor of what the apps are like now (spoiler: they’re a wildly mixed bag) by installing the Firefox browser on their smartphones and playing around with the marketplace built into it. Right now, there are only two Firefox OS handsets on the market, namely Alcatel’s One Touch Fire and ZTE’s Open . Both are cheap, coming in at around $80-$90. Mozilla still hasn’t said whether the second wave of Firefox OS’s rollout will involve new devices — Huawei, LG and maybe even Sony will also be making hanAll Related
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Two different views
Something quite peculiar is going on. On the one hand, a number of leading international experts have been voicing their optimism regarding the course of the Greek economy, either investing in the country themselves or urging others to do so. On the other... ...
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Greece wants Germany to pay, this time for Second World War damage
Nonetheless, the demand for German cash is playing well with the Greek public, says Suzanne Daley at The New York Times. The call for reparations has elicited an emotional outpouring in Greece, where six years of brutal recession and harsh ...
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Greek Banks Ponder Debt Pile Write-offs
ATHENS - Greek banks are upping their game to contain a swell in delinquent loans that could threaten their viability.
But one senior banker admits that even after their best efforts, banks will have to cut debts owed by some businesses and households unable to recover from six years of recession.
'The debt load has to be revised ... we cannot refuse to do as a bank what we ask international creditors to do for Greece,' one senior banker said, referring to losses bondholders accepted on Greece's own bonds in 2010 as part of a bailout.
Tens of billion of euros of non-performing loans present a major headache for Greece's four largest banks, since they will struggle to get full repayment on the loans.
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Doctor rekindles 'ancient Greek spirit' in Athens free clinic
Cardiologist Giorgos Vichas, along with 90 other doctors and 140 volunteers, runs a free clinic in a middle-class neighborhood in Athens, offering free medication and health care in austerity-hit Greece.
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Businessman who proposed Greek university for Chester dies
Businessman who proposed Greek university for Chester diesThe ChronicleCHESTER — Michael Frank Parlamis, the Tenafly, N.J., businessman who wanted to build the country's first Greek university in Chester, died on Sunday, Oct. 6, from complications from pulmonary fibrosis, according to an obituary in The New York Times.and more »
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EU Regulators Approve Greek Airlines Takeover
European regulators approve Aegean Airlines' buyout of Olympic Air
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EU regulators clear Aegean Airlines to acquire Olympic Air
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union antitrust regulators cleared a second bid by Greece's Aegean Airlines for Olympic Air on Wednesday, saying that Olympic would go out of business without the 72 million-euro ($96.38 million) deal.
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IMF admits mistakes in Greece policy
Finance Minister Yannis Stournaras has even welcomed the IMF's self-critical assessment, saying that it offered "a chance to recognize mistakes in time so that they are not repeated." This ministerial statement does not come out of nowhere. With great ...
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Pensacola goes Greek for 54th year
Pensacola goes Greek for 54th yearPensacola News JournalThe parishioners of the Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church of Pensacola have been busy for months preparing for the 54th annual Greek Festival. The event is the longest running food festival in Pensacola, mixing Southern hospitality with Helenic ...
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Action time at Greek banks as crisis shadow fades
"They still look at bad customers and think they will return as good customers," he added, meaning they sit on cases for too long and don't take actions that could help them recover money. Banks are also failing to co-ordinate their efforts to ...
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Greek banks to be tested for two more recession years-central banker
Greek banks will have to prove they have enough capital to withstand another two years of recession under the "adverse" scenario of stress tests being carried out in Athens, Greece's central ...
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Write-offs lurk as Greek banks tackle default mountain
Greek banks are upping their game to contain a swell in delinquent loans that could threaten their viability. But one senior banker admits that even after their best efforts, banks will have to cut debts ...
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The Golden Dawn nightmare: The Orthodox Church and Greece's war against ...
ABC OnlineThe Golden Dawn nightmare: The Orthodox Church and Greece's war against ...ABC OnlineAntonis was a fellow student of mine at high school back in 1984. He believed in the superiority of the Greek race and belonged to a strange political organization called Golden Dawn. He and his like-minded friends were not violent, at least not at ...
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10+ 1 Most Popular Greek Products
9. Macedonian Halva Primarily produced in northern Greece, Macedonian halva has sesame as its basic ingredient, which is rich in vitamins E, B1, B2, calcium, potassium, phosphorus and iron. Greeks prefer to eat Macedonian halva during the Great ...
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Greek community discusses adding LGBT programs
The greek community took a survey in the spring 2013 semester about their acceptance of lesbian, gay bisexual, transgender and questioning students, and were presented the results at the Greek Communi
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Are We Seeing Greece's Recovery?
Can it be true that Greece's economy has begun its turnaround? This is the question posed on the front page of the Financial Times this week, with its surprising revelation that the well-known investor John Paulson is buying the bonds of Greek banks.
The numbers - at the moment ? do not bear this out: to the contrary, they paint a grim picture of continuous deterioration.
Unemployment, for example, continues to be rampant. The latest figures show that it is 28 percent for the general population and 60 percent among young people. The situation is the same with the debt level, which has reached 177 percent of the Gross National Product as tax hikes continue to assail property owners.
Immigration is also on the rise: restaurants owned by Greek-Americans in New York and other cities each have at least two new waiters from Greece.
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Greece's former defense minister jailed for 20 years for taking bribes
ATHENS, Greece, Oct. 8 (UPI) -- A former Greek defense minister has been sentenced to 20 years in jail for taking bribes laundered through offshore companies, court officials said.
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Greek journalist: Media integrity is on trial
Aljazeera.com (blog)Greek journalist: Media integrity is on trialAljazeera.com (blog)Middle class Greeks have borne the brunt of a $49 billion adjustment of state expenditure, which has allowed Greece to balance its budget. Nonetheless, many feel that the wealthy have not carried their share of the burden. The Lagarde list was a tool ...Greek journalist's retrial over Lagarde list postponedThe GuardianUPDATE 1-Greek reporter back on trial for publishing Swiss bank listReutersAcquited Greek journalist faces retrial over 'Lagarde list' of suspected tax ...Irish TimesGreek Reporterall 6 news articles »
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Editorial: Merkel stands firm with Greece
These revelations, disclosed by the Wall Street Journal, presumably are intended to bolster the IMF's effort to shame the rest of Europe into accepting yet another costly "haircut" of Greek debt at the expense of taxpayers in Germany and other ...
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Greek PM calls ties with Israel ‘strategic, long term’
long term partnership that is not dependent on the fate of Israel’s relationship with Turkey, Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras told Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Tuesday. The comments, according to diplomatic officials, came during a meeting ...
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20 year jail term given to former Greek defence minister
ATHENS, Greece - A court in Greece has sentenced a former minister to 20 years in jail after he was convicted for money laundering in a highly watched corruption case that has rocked the cash-starved country.
The former defence minister, Akis
Tsochadzopoulos, a prominent figure in previous Socialist governments, was ordered a jail term Monday along with 16 of his 18 co-defendants, including ...
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What's next? US paralysis may be delaying tour of the Greek band Keep Shelly ...
Public Radio InternationalWhat's next? US paralysis may be delaying tour of the Greek band Keep Shelly ...Public Radio InternationalThen, a few years back, she met a producer who goes only by the Greek initials RΠЯ. “I was looking for a band. He was looking for a singer,” says Psalti. RΠЯ, Psalti says, had it all worked out. He already knew the name of the group would be Keep ...
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Despite Iran, Greece and Israel Get Closer
Although Greece, which gets much of its oil from Iran, is said to be in favor of lifting international sanctions, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, meeting with Premier Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel on Oct. 8, said he wants closer ties as the two leaders discussed a range of issues, centering around energy and defense. Samaras, accompanied […]
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Overdue Tax Debts Increased in August
The inability of Greek citizens to pay their estate taxes has resulted in expired debts and the outstanding taxes owed to the Greek State jumped to 61.214 billion euros in August 2013 from 60.181 billion a month earlier. These data has been recently by the General Secretariat of Public Revenue. However, the General Secretariat of […]
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Mary Algers Farmakis, 101: Taught Greek traditions of food, family
Mary Algers Farmakis, 101: Taught Greek traditions of food, familyAtlanta Journal ConstitutionWhen the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Annunciation formed its history and archives committee, Mary Farmakis quickly reached out to the group's chairman. Thanks to her father, Farmakis had access to many original church photographs and artifacts.
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