Greek journalist arrested over exposing politicians’ alleged tax evasion

from RT

Greek police have arrested one of the country’s top journalists, after his publication Hot Doc released the so-called ‘Lagarde list,’ containing the names of some 2,000 Greeks with funds hidden in Swiss bank accounts.

The police arrested Kostas Vaxevanis, the owner and editor of Hot Doc, during a live radio interview on Sunday. “They’re entering my house with the prosecutor right now. They are arresting me. Spread the word,” Vaxevanis tweeted.

He is due to appear in court on Monday to answer charges of privacy violations from publishing the list of names, which dates to 2007. “Instead of arresting the tax evaders and the ministers who had the list in their hands, they are trying to arrest the truth and free journalism,” Vaxevanis said in an interview.

[read the rest, here]

Spanish Townsfolk, Our Monster: Now What Are We Going to Do About It?

by Scott Creighton

UPDATE 3: “The French, Spanish and Greek governments all announced multibillion-euro austerity plans yesterday in the face of massive popular opposition.”

UPDATE 2: Slavery in the UK. The unemployed are being forced to work for major British corporations, for free, just so they can continue to receive their unemployment benefits. This plan is the same as one attempted here in the states, one that still has a great deal of support in congress. Imagine the profits retailers could pocket if they got free seasonal workers during the holiday buying season.

UPDATE: In Dubai, one of our close economic allies, they call slave owners “sponsors” and fine their slaves if they attempt to take their own lives when the desperation of their true situation becomes too unbearable to live with.

“I found myself thrown away and I thought of my poor family back home. I felt desperate and decided I should die,” she said. The National

———

While Americans cheer for the return of  zebra striped officials to the NFL games today, the Spanish, the Greeks and many others across Europe are fighting for their very lives and the freedom to determine the quality of them on their own. Our apparent lack of concern is understandable when you consider that what they are desperately struggling against is in a large part, our creation. Not only is Dr. Frankenstein disinterested in the harm his creation inflicts on the people around him by choice, but the townsfolk themselves willingly turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the cries of their neighbors in nearby villages just so long as the monster feeds elsewhere.

Austerity kills: Greek Martyrs and the Economic Hitmen in Michigan

by Scott Creighton

Sooner or later, we are all Dimitris Christoulas.

Dimitris Christoulas picked a tree in a park in central Athens by the nation’s parliament. It took him 77 years to get to that point, to pick that tree. He sat down next to it, sat in the shady side at 9am in the morning as people were bustling back and forth getting on with the business of starting their day. Dimitris pinned a note to himself, some say he shouted a comment, others say he said nothing.

In Detroit yesterday the city council voted 5-4 to enter into an agreement with the state of Michigan to radically change the city and the way it works due to pending financial hardships which were brought on by the deliberate controlled demolition of the economy of the United States by the banks and huge financial houses whom we have poured money into ever since.

There’s a connection and it’s not pretty.

Video of brutal crackdown on Tahrir Sq protesters in Cairo

Protesters and police clash amid largest Greek strike

and read this article from the New York Times

Greece Moves Forward on New Austerity Bill

“When Injustice Becomes Law, Resistance Becomes Duty” – Jefferson

COMING SOON … TO A SQUARE NEAR YOU

.

.

In North America The Right to Dissent is Being Rescinded

“one of the things we point out in the book is that this stuff starts by the police and the military (and intelligence ops) months if not years before the demonstration. It includes infiltrating ALL of the organizations or many of the key organizations who are organizing the demonstrations… they infiltrate people into those groups”   Ratner

.

DEBTOCRACY (FULL – ENG Subs)

Neoliberalism is a crime, it’s a crime against humanity, and it is the now the established religion of the elite and political classes.

As is pointed out in this film, even if this odious debt we face here is in fact completely legitimate, which of course it is not, but even if it is, it is immoral and illegal to kill a nation’s own people in order to pay it off. And that’s exactly what they are doing when they attack the social safety net, the public education system, Social Security, and the health care policies of America.

“What they are in effect saying is that they are going to default in their obligations to the Greek people. And I don’t understand how a social democratic, socialist popularly elected government can turn to it’s own voters and say “we are going to default on you rather than defaulting on the financial institutions”

Watch the movie.

.

Rockefeller’s Dream: National Auto-determination Begins and Ends in Greece

by Scott Creighton

The new IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde announced the IMF’s approval of a 3.2 billion euro ($4.6 billion) loan payment for Greece. This latest payment is part of a 12 billion euro bailout package which is being doled out bit by bit as Greece hammers her population with draconian austerity measures and record setting privatization plans. Lagarde said of the “progress” being made in Greece that they are “delivering important results”. Let’s take a look at some of those “important results” she’s referring to.

First of all, the $4.6 billion dollars is not going to the government of Greece to help them run the country or to make things better for the people of Greece. Oh no. That money, as was pointed out by Tyler Durden over at Zero Hedge, is going straight to hedge funds and the global financial institutions who caused this debt crisis in the first place. The people of Greece won’t actually see a dime of that money while they have to suffer with less wages, more taxes, and a government that is set on selling off their publicly owned assets for pennies on the dollar.

“Well, as explained a few weeks ago, in Greek Math: €12 Billion In, €18.2 Billion Out the entire amount will be promptly recycled by global financial institutions in the form of debt maturities and interest payments, which amount to €18.2 billion in the months of July and August. Simply said ECB, EU and IMF money in, money owed to bankers out.”  Zero Hedge

Keep in mind that this money, borrowed from various nations like ours ($780 million worth by Tyler’s accounting) by the IMF at a quarter point interest, is being LOANED, at gun point, to the people of Greece (who don’t want it), at 3% interest, creating a nifty little profit margin for the IMF and further enslaving the people of Greece to the banker’s favorite trick, the endless cycle of debt servitude. The people are on the hook for even more money and the bankers and their hedge fund manager drinking buddies get the cash.

Sweet deal, huh? Sweet deal for the bankers and the hedge fund managers. Sweet deal for the billionaires, shitty deal for the people of Greece. But Christine Lagarde seemed very pleased to make the announcement. She’s just her being true to her nature. You see, Christine Lagarde has been looking out for billionaires at the expense of the people for a very long time.

Over 50,000 Protest European Central Bank’s Assault on Greek Sovereignty

by Scott Creighton

see a photo of the protest here

Tens of thousands joined the protesters who have been camped out for over a week to protest the harsh draconian austerity measures being forced on the people of Greece by the global banking cartels.

Replacing Economic Democracy with Financial Oligarchy

(A must read)

by Michael Hudson, Information Clearinghouse

Soon after the Socialist Party won Greece’s national elections in autumn 2009, it became apparent that the government’s finances were in a shambles. In May 2010, French President Nicolas Sarkozy took the lead in rounding up €120bn ($180 billion) from European governments to subsidize Greece’s unprogressive tax system that had led its government into debt – which Wall Street banks had helped conceal with Enron-style accounting.

Banks demand savage austerity measures in Greece

by Patrick O’Connor, WSWS

Officials with the European Central Bank (ECB), International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the European Commission (EC) have been deployed to Athens this week to finalize plans with the Greek government for another round of savage austerity measures.

The initial round of mass public sector layoffs, wage cuts, and destruction of welfare and social infrastructure programs impoverished wide layers of the Greek population, but failed to satisfy the European banks. They are now demanding control over the country’s economy, with representatives of the ECB, IMF, and EC (the so-called troika) to be placed directly in charge of a privatization program that will see Greece’s public assets sold off and the proceeds funneled to the banks.

The Strauss-Kahn Set-Up and the Globalist Assault on Greek Sovereignty

by Scott Creighton

Now that Dominique Strauss-Kahn has been successfully removed from the equation, the globalist financial institutions are free to cash in on the Great Recession they created.  They’re attempting to hammer the people of Greece into submission with new “unprecedented” levels of privatization of public assets and even calls for “outside institutions” to take over some aspects of governing their country… like tax collection to start with. The buzz-word here is “sovereignty” and Greece is only the beginning.

“In order for the country to get future bailout money, the country will have to give up some sovereignty.

Specifically, according to a bombshell FT report, outside authorities will take over various functions related to tax collection (a big time problem in Athens) and privatizations.”  Business Insider

Photos of Greek Protests May 25th 2011

 

Photos from recent anti-austerity measures protests in Greece.

Videos of Police Brutality in Spain

(H/T Prison Planet)

Could you imagine the outcry if this were taking place in Iran? We would be at war in hours.

They are wearing riot gear, masks, no name tags, no faces… beating on children.

Go here to watch new videos being uploaded now.

In this video, watch the fascist thugs get chased from the square by thousands of protesters.

One of our “democratic” partners in the Global Free Market Wars shows us how they deal with protests (ie: the will of the people) when it comes to pushing their austerity measures programs on their own people.

Watch as Spain unleashes their own jack-booted thugs (dressed out like Storm Troopers in black) on young Spanish protesters.