Elections, Elections, Elections

[TonyE]

I was bred and raised there, and raised well by the standards of....

 

....and it shows...

[Simon Tan]

Maxx....I always factor in the black economy. Who really cares if busloads of Greeks come to the border and buy Slovenian passports? I pay the Grenzers peanuts and pocket all those Euros. If someone complains, we run a 'hard' border for a couple of days and ask them...is this what you really want? Everyone is happy. The Greeks, who are poorer but can escape, the Grenzers, who are getting black and legit income and the Germans, who are 'doing something'. And management... HQed in the Croat Riviera.

 

The best thing is that I don't even have to train people up. And I can get good deals locally for most of the stuff I need...pistols from HS, rifles from Zastava, ammo from Prvi (Igman.....pffffttttt!).

 

Yes...no frakkin tiger cubs.

Edited May 17, 2012 by Simon Tan

[Typhoid Maxx]

Even with Janissaries or SS troops, no luck. The terrain is Hell to effectively over watch.

 

Back in the days of the Vienna Siege (first), Turks kept back 200'000 just for the area of Serbia.

 

Its fucked, always will be.

[Simon Tan]

That is why you use local talent. They live and work locally. WIN!!!

[Wobbly Head]

Even with Janissaries or SS troops, no luck. The terrain is Hell to effectively over watch.

 

Back in the days of the Vienna Siege (first), Turks kept back 200'000 just for the area of Serbia.

 

Its fucked, always will be.

 

The first time on a convoy with the Useless Nations spectator force through that region the first though was if they wanted to pull a ambush we would be F@#ked. The first taste of the local alcohol also for shadowed what kind of opposition was there.

[Simon Tan]

The plum stuff? They do make it out of virtually anything that will ferment. The stuff runs the whole gamut of sublime to paint thinner.

ETA:- better than Ouzo....which I will not miss.

Edited May 17, 2012 by Simon Tan

[Wobbly Head]

The plum stuff? They do make it out of virtually anything that will ferment. The stuff runs the whole gamut of sublime to paint thinner.

ETA:- better than Ouzo....which I will not miss.

 

With the taste going more to the paint thinner end. The coffee is good to eat as well.

[Simon Tan]

How frikkin hard is it to prosecute Ratko Mladic? How many years did they have to prepare the case?

[Typhoid Maxx]

Simon....are you SERIOUS? When did you turn naive?

 

[Mobius]

You'd end up with more Greeks in Munich, Berlin, Amsterdam, Paris & London than Poles or Albanians.

You came to zeee Balkans...now the Balkans is coming to YOU

Greeks and Turks together again. I can't see Greeks being any worse than anything else jumping the border.

Maybe they'll catch a little work ethic.

[Simon Tan]

Maxx......About Ratko? Rakija? Or the Grenz?

[Simon Tan]

The Greeks cannot compete with the Poles in any market. The Poles have always struck me as a very unlucky and tragic lot. They never seem to have it easy for very long.

[Typhoid Maxx]

Ratko. Come on, the guy was picked up in a village where the villagers never saw the guy before...

 

...and have an annual exchange/visit tourist program with the descendants of Germans who once lived there, prior to pogrom...

 

...in a routine police check by ordinary muppets, where they never see ordinary police...and said muppets have no explanation as to why ordinary uniformed police drove up, openly...

 

...to the house of a relative of Ratko Mladic...who NOBODY in the village had any idea of...

 

...and said Ratko Mladic, at a relatives house, with an ID with his picture in it and a similar name...both him and cousin less than overwhelmed by the police...Ratko promptly surrenders....

 

As a Serb, I was embarrassed at the lack of effort made to make the damn thing look credible even to a monkey.

 

Ratko is in the Hague, where he dies, un convicted. Much of what happened - especially Srebrenica - is mismanaged, or prolonged, contested and made banal in its coverage.

[Simon Tan]

Screw Ratko. Anyone who can go to Athens and convince the Greek Army to declare martial law WILL be able to demand almost any amount of money that they want from Chancellor Merkel.

[bojan]

And 12 years for nothing. Not that I did not actually expect that but still it is unpleasant news.

[Ivanhoe]

Greeks and Turks together again. I can't see Greeks being any worse than anything else jumping the border.

Maybe they'll catch a little work ethic.

 

There's been no shortage of Greek immigrants in science & engineering in the US already, probably in northern Europe as well; I imagine with their domestic troubles, the diaspora will only accelerate. Which is an ugly economic feedback. As their economy unravels, they'll lose more and more of their few workers that produce exportable intellectual product.

 

I can see it now; the EU passes a law requiring all northern Europeans to vacation at least 4 weeks a year in Greece.

[Simon Tan]

Which brings us back to......annexation. You might as well own the damned place if they are in your debt and you have to spend money on their repayments. Spain is worse...it is still overspending as a population and not as a government.

Serbia has just elected Nikolic.

[Ivanhoe]

Which brings us back to......annexation. You might as well own the damned place if they are in your debt and you have to spend money on their repayments. Spain is worse...it is still overspending as a population and not as a government.

 

I don't follow continental Europe's politics, but if the traditional mainstream parties in GB, Germany, and France keep their taxpayers in hock for the next two generations to refinance the PIIGS, at some point I would think some new centrist parties would emerge offering the nein/non/bugger-off-all economic plan.

 

Again, I get back to looking at the debtor nations like they were insolvent corporations. Which debtors can be turned around, and which can't? I'm not reading anything which makes me think Greece will ever make good on interest obligations. You can re-fi all you want, and give extreme haircuts to lenders all you want, they don't seem to have any interest in limiting spending to revenue.

[DKTanker]

You can re-fi all you want, and give extreme haircuts to lenders all you want, they don't seem to have any interest in limiting spending to revenue.

And why should they with Obama and Hollande in their corner suggesting that everyone should borrow, spend, and party like it's 1999, with repayment schedules having a horizon of ∞.

[Typhoid Maxx]

And 12 years for nothing. Not that I did not actually expect that but still it is unpleasant news.

 

"sigh" Any federation with Serbia in it is....?

 

Besides, even our own don't GAS, and could care less about the EU par se, more about adopting the institutional levels, standards and practices along the line of the prime EU nations.

 

Nikolic as pres is a surprise - a nut house, perhaps, pres...wait, it is a nut house...but Tadic controls parliament.

[DKTanker]

Well it worked for us in the 1950s. And we only just paid that off 10 years hence.

If that was such a huge success, the next question which is pleading to be asked, why not continue the borrowing ever more so that all can enjoy an equally high standard of living? And why do you continue to speak of paying off that debt? The entire objective is to NOT pay off the debt. The objective is to borrow ever greater amounts with no repayment schedule. That's what Greece is demanding, and that is what Hollande and Obama are advising lenders to accept. Oh, and by the way, that is what our Leftists, from the GOP and the Democratic party, are demanding for the USA.

 

It's a con game everyone knows and recognizes when comediens do it on stage. Week 1, Borrow fifty dollars. Week 2, Borrow fifty dollars to repay the original fifty but only pay back thirty telling the lending agency they owe you twenty more dollars. Week 3, borrow fifty dollars, repay thirty telling the lending agency they owe twenty on this loan plus the twenty from the previous week. Now if you haven't yet recognized it, the twenty dollars "owed" by the lending agency, in the grown up world we call that ever greater taxation and, turn on the presses.

[bojan]

...but Tadic controls parliament.

 

We will see, but Dacic has a last word to say. With his "look, Greeks are doing well, why don't try same thing here" program.

BTW, I think this might actually be lowest voter turn out since 2000...

Edited May 21, 2012 by bojan

[Max H]

I don't follow continental Europe's politics, but if the traditional mainstream parties in GB, Germany, and France keep their taxpayers in hock for the next two generations to refinance the PIIGS, at some point I would think some new centrist parties would emerge offering the nein/non/bugger-off-all economic plan.

 

In GB we don't need new parties to offer the "fuck those guys" plan, it's been on offer for ages by many. Even the ruling party thinks that a break up is possible

[bojan]

It sums everything:

 

[Typhoid Maxx]

...but Tadic controls parliament.

 

We will see, but Dacic has a last word to say. With his "look, Greeks are doing well, why don't try same thing here" program.

BTW, I think this might actually be lowest voter turn out since 2000...

 

We are an extremely advanced country - others had to establish participatory democracies and independent institutions, become first world nations , then loose interest and turn to apathy.

 

We just jumped ahead a few steps