Wherever I go these days, it's a riot! Literally so, it would seem. Vancouver two weeks ago to attend the NDP's national convention in Vancouver, just in time for a disgraceful hockey riot. And then, this weekend, Athens for a Council meeting of Socialist International -- just in time for two more days of rioting, as the social democratic government of Greece wrestles with the bitter fruits of conservative misrule in this country.
As is fit and proper in any setting, the best poll is the "cabbie poll". The cab driver from Athens airport had much to say about things in his country.
On the rioting in Athens: "what was happening in the square in front of Parliament for weeks and weeks was a perfectly peaceful demonstration that people were taking their children to," he said. "People were there with their grandparents and their children, it was a family occasion and totally peaceful. And it was making our points. And then for just two days, the new ones showed up and started throwing bricks and rocks. It's disgraced the country. It's embarrassing. It's not Greece."
A familiar theme. Again and again, powerful and peaceful demonstrations by citizens are hijacked and disempowered by the violent. The same thing happened in Toronto during the G8 last summer. This is a serious challenge for progressives around the world -- to find a way to mobilize the power of civil society and peaceful protest, without losing that power to the lust for violence of young men of a certain sort.
On the Greek national debt: "Yes, maybe we borrowed some of that money and maybe we should pay some of it back. But not all of it. For some of it, maybe they need to go and look for the Swiss bank accounts and the tax havens in the Caribbean. People here are taking 25 per cent pay cuts, and losing their pensions and their jobs and we didn't see anything from all of that money. 'They' put it in their pockets and 'they' should pay it back."
People in Greece are acutely aware of the criticism being leveled at them in Europe and around the world. Like citizens in Iceland and Ireland, they are having a hard time understanding why a crisis that has its roots in a different kind of lust -- the lust for limitless wealth and power, which caused those who control the financial system to drive the world economy over a cliff -- means that ordinary people are morally bad; must pay much higher taxes; must take deep pay cuts; must retire into poverty; and must do without education and health care, in order to keep the party going for bankers and speculators.
Full Article
Source: Rabble.ca
As is fit and proper in any setting, the best poll is the "cabbie poll". The cab driver from Athens airport had much to say about things in his country.
On the rioting in Athens: "what was happening in the square in front of Parliament for weeks and weeks was a perfectly peaceful demonstration that people were taking their children to," he said. "People were there with their grandparents and their children, it was a family occasion and totally peaceful. And it was making our points. And then for just two days, the new ones showed up and started throwing bricks and rocks. It's disgraced the country. It's embarrassing. It's not Greece."
A familiar theme. Again and again, powerful and peaceful demonstrations by citizens are hijacked and disempowered by the violent. The same thing happened in Toronto during the G8 last summer. This is a serious challenge for progressives around the world -- to find a way to mobilize the power of civil society and peaceful protest, without losing that power to the lust for violence of young men of a certain sort.
On the Greek national debt: "Yes, maybe we borrowed some of that money and maybe we should pay some of it back. But not all of it. For some of it, maybe they need to go and look for the Swiss bank accounts and the tax havens in the Caribbean. People here are taking 25 per cent pay cuts, and losing their pensions and their jobs and we didn't see anything from all of that money. 'They' put it in their pockets and 'they' should pay it back."
People in Greece are acutely aware of the criticism being leveled at them in Europe and around the world. Like citizens in Iceland and Ireland, they are having a hard time understanding why a crisis that has its roots in a different kind of lust -- the lust for limitless wealth and power, which caused those who control the financial system to drive the world economy over a cliff -- means that ordinary people are morally bad; must pay much higher taxes; must take deep pay cuts; must retire into poverty; and must do without education and health care, in order to keep the party going for bankers and speculators.
Full Article
Source: Rabble.ca
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