Greek exit polls signal Syriza win
Stavros Theodorakis, leader of To Potami (The River) – the party which may hold the balance of power in the new Greek government – speaks on politics, reform and the possibility of a coalition with Syriza.
With most of the bailout money going to banks and creditors, the question isn’t whether Greece deserves debt relief, but whether it needs it.
Alexis Tsipras’ decision to put the write-off of a large part of the nominal value of Greece’s public debt and a moratorium on the repayment of the remaining part of the debt at the centre of his electoral program has sparked a lively debate on whether Greece ‘deserves’ debt relief or not. This is a mistake. As Paul Krugman has often pointed out, ‘economics is not a morality play… in which virtue is rewarded and vice punished’.
Share prices soared on Thursday in reaction to the ECB’s announcement that it will launch a multi-billion euro bond-buying programme. Meanwhile the euro dropped below 1.14 against the dollar. This trend will help the export trade, some commentators write jubilantly. Others see the Eurozone on its last legs now that the ECB has been forced to resort to the only instrument left at its disposal.
Truly radical change will only come when radical parties accept that they need to give power back to the people – not as a slogan but as a democratic process.
Flickr/Abode of Chaos
Before getting down to business lets allow ourselves a moment of uninhibited enthusiasm as the latest polls for Podemos, the new radical left party in Spain, show that it is now the most popular party in Spain. Well how fucking fantastic! After all, haven’t we all been waiting for such a genuinely radical and democratic party to come top in the polls of a European state at least since 1989 if not 1968? By any measure this is a momentous moment.
Beyond the eurocrisis – institutional consolidation and social fragility
Far from endangering European integration, the Eurocrisis has contributed to strengthening EU institutions. Thus, it should be seen as a strategic integrational step, not as a mistake. Nevertheless the social fabric of the emerging European society remains fragile.
Davos Myth 2: Big business runs things better
Political elites say they love the private sector because it’s so much more efficient than the public sector. In truth, the private sector only works by scrounging billions of pounds of public money in the form. It is the corporate elite, not the poor, who are the real scroungers.
Charlie Hebdo: stop pointing fingers and drop the reductive approach
It is time everyone stopped intentionally misinforming audiences with uninformed rudimentary analyses.
The most sobering analysis on the Charlie Hebdo attacks came from Gary Younge as he warned the international community of the dangers of polarized debate and a reductive approach in understanding the reasons and motivations behind political violence. Arthur Assaraf also pointed out how empirically inaccurate and quite narcissistic it is to assume that political violence exists only as a reaction against western values, while in actual reality a multifaceted web of realities do exist.
Can France integrate humiliated suburbs?
The quasi-lack of a European public sphere
Younger educated people are paving the way towards a cohesive Continent – let’s have many more like them in the future.
MAIN FOCUS: EU discusses counter-terror strategies | 21/01/2015
The sharing of air passenger data, cooperation among intelligence services, stripping suspected jihadists of their passports: these are just a few of the proposals that the EU foreign ministers dealt with on Monday in Brussels in response to the Paris attacks. Rightly so, some commentators write, and call for further steps to combat terror. Others believe the authorities must work closer with Muslim families to prevent youth radicalisation.
MAIN FOCUS: ECB to decide on bond-buying programme | 22/01/2015
The ECB’s Governing Council is widely expected to unveil a large-scale plan for the purchase of government bonds at its meeting today, Thursday. The decision could further divide the Eurozone if the crisis states abandon austerity and prompt rich countries to end their solidarity, some commentators fear. Others see the plan as an important step towards pulling debt-ridden countries out of their financial misery.
Since the touchstone of a free speech regime is in how well it protects speech that most find revolting, its defenders have to be willing to speak also for those whose opinions they don’t find respectable.
What can we learn from the recent terrorist attacks in Paris? Here are eight lessons.
Je suis Charlie Sheen. One of the many memes which surfaced online after the attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris earlier this month.
Hugo Chávez was elected President of Venezuela four times from 1998 through 2012 and was admired and supported by a large majority of that country’s citizens, largely due to his policies that helped the poor. King Abdullah was thedictator and tyrant who ran one of the most repressive regimes on the planet.
Leader of German anti-Muslim movement resigns after posing as Hitler in Facebook photo
The leader of an anti-Muslim movement in Germany resigned Wednesday after a Facebook picture of him posing as Hitler went viral and prompted heavy backlash.
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