Varoufakis: On the Euro Summit’s Statement on Greece: First thoughts

[DetlefK]

24. here are some other lines from that article:

[But] Schäuble was consistent throughout. His view was “I’m not discussing the programme – this was accepted by the previous government and we can’t possibly allow an election to change anything. Because we have elections all the time, there are 19 of us, if every time there was an election and something changed, the contracts between us wouldn’t mean anything.”

So at that point I had to get up and say “Well perhaps we should simply not hold elections anymore for indebted countries”, and there was no answer. The only interpretation I can give [of their view] is “Yes, that would be a good idea, but it would be difficult to do. So you either sign on the dotted line or you are out.”


That is not disregard for democracy. That is keeping your word.

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The EU keeping Greece from implementing partial reforms... that's interesting. But it clashes with a german politician complaining last week that Greece hasn't implemented reforms yet that were agreed upon in January. (-> with the old greek government)

Schäuble may have insisted on a comprehensive deal because he didn't trust Greece: Maybe he thought they would abandon the big picture once they had secured a partial way out.
I am german and I have seen Schäuble once during a public speech. He is no man who shows much of emotions. He's from the Southwest of Germany and this region has a culture that is laid-back and fiscally conservative. I think, the portrayal of him being evil is wrong, he's merely pragmatic and analytical. Being in politics for 30+ years does that to you. And he has held several ministerial positions through the years, which means he knows how to get shit done.

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HL: Did you try working together with the governments of other indebted countries?

YV: The answer is no, and the reason is very simple: from the very beginning those particular countries made it abundantly clear that they were the most energetic enemies of our government, from the very beginning. And the reason of course was their greatest nightmare was our success: were we to succeed in negotiating a better deal for Greece, that would of course obliterate them politically, they would have to answer to their own people why they didn’t negotiate like we were doing.


Laughable. Pure propaganda.