Subj : How Greece Failed.
To   : ALL
From : BOB KLAHN
Date : Wed May 22 2013 07:37:54


 Read the full article at this link. Just edit back together with
 no spaces in the link.

 URL to article:
 *http://www.gregpalast.com/lazy-ouzo-swilling-olive-pit-spitting-
 greeksor-how-goldman-sacked-greece/*

 **************************************************************************
 *Lazy Ouzo-Swilling, Olive-Pit Spitting Greeks Or, How Goldman
 Sacked Greece*

 by Greg Palast for /In These Times/

 Here's what we're told:Greece

 Greece's economy blew apart because a bunch of olive-spitting,
 ouzo-guzzling, lazy-ass Greeks refuse to put in a full day's
 work, retire while they're still teenagers, pocket pensions fit
 for a pasha; and they've gone on a social-services spending
 spree using borrowed money. Now that the bill has come due and
 the Greeks have to pay with higher taxes and cuts in their big
 fat welfare state, they run riot, screaming in the streets,
 busting windows and burning banks.

 I don't buy it.  I don't buy it because of the document in my
 hand marked, "RESTRICTED DISTRIBUTION."

 I'll cut to the indictment: *Greece is a crime scene*.  The
 people are victims of a fraud, a scam, a hustle and a flim-flam.
 And, cover the children's ears when I say this, a bank named
 Goldman Sachs is holding the smoking gun.

 ********

 This is an adaptation of an excerpt from *Vultures' Picnic* Greg
 Palast's new book,

 ********

 In 2002, Goldman Sachs secretly bought up $2.3 billion in Greek
 government debt, converted it all into yen and dollars, then
 immediately sold it back to Greece.

 Goldman took a huge loss on the trade.

 ...

 Goldman had cut a secret deal with the Greek government in power
 then.  Their game: to conceal a massive budget deficit.
 Goldman's fake loss was the Greek government's fake gain.

 Goldman would get repayment of its "loss" from the
 government at loan-shark rates.

 The point is, through this crazy and costly legerdemain,
 Greece's right-wing free-market government was able to pretend
 its deficits never exceeded 3 percent of GDP.

 ...

 To give you all the answers would require me to write a book.  I
 have: Vultures' Picnic



BOB KLAHN bob.klahn@sev.org   http://home.toltbbs.com/bobklahn

.... Paul Ryan's budget: Ryan's vision depends an awful lot on unicorn sightings
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