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Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#11

Post by BenjiBG »

JacobAldridge wrote: post #2

Frankly, I would think it irresponsible if the Greek government did not have a Plan B in place - be it parallel payments or a return to the Drachma. If (when?) it becomes necessary to do so, such a plan would need to be implemented with haste - they won't have the luxury of telling the markets "we'll be doing this in 3 months, once we work out the details".

I agree that they wouldn't have the time to tell the markets or other countries. But Tsipras and Varoufakis didn't even tell the Greek Government. And hacking a bank is still illegal.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#12

Post by tptacek »

Tomte wrote: post #4
msandford wrote: post #3

I can't see how that's in any way treasonous. Treason is going against your country. Investigating an alternative monetary system -- at the request of the prime minister -- hardly seems like treason. Especially if you're the finance minister. Keeping it a secret doesn't make it treason either. Treason would be to defect from Greece to the IMF or ECB or Germany with information to sink Greece and eliminate any kind of…

No? Grabbing your central bank's reserves without any involvement of parliament and preparing to arrest its chief without any legal justification sounds fine to you? It would have been the ultimate power grab by Syriza, going against all laws and democracy. Just because Syriza got a majority in the elections doesn't mean the rule of law has been suspended.

People should stop downvoting this comment. He's not making this up. Hugo Dixon has been covering this drama, and his summary is much better than Telegram's:

http://hugo-dixon.com/2015/07/26/wild-plan-b/

This is so batshit crazy my jaw is hanging open.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#13

Post by BenjiBG »

This is how absolutistic ruling starts. Most often from crisis and always with the excuse to do good for the country. I agree to some comments here that they needed a plan B, but you can't overstep your even as prime minister or finance minister given authority. Kim Jong-un states that he's just protecting his people from the evil rest of the world.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#14

Post by tptacek »

JacobAldridge wrote: post #2

Frankly, I would think it irresponsible if the Greek government did not have a Plan B in place - be it parallel payments or a return to the Drachma. If (when?) it becomes necessary to do so, such a plan would need to be implemented with haste - they won't have the luxury of telling the markets "we'll be doing this in 3 months, once we work out the details".

Plan B in this case case seems to have been for the currently dominant political party to seize the Greek treasury, arrest the leader of the Greek central bank, and use their access to design by fiat, without parliament, a whole new financial system for the country.

This seems approximately akin to, say, Ted Cruz being elected next year, another financial crisis happening shortly thereafter, and Cruz (a) arresting Janet Yellen (b) seizing control of the Federal Reserve and (c) switching us from the dollar back to Continentals.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#15

Post by BenjiBG »

Tomte wrote: post #4
msandford wrote: post #3

I can't see how that's in any way treasonous. Treason is going against your country. Investigating an alternative monetary system -- at the request of the prime minister -- hardly seems like treason. Especially if you're the finance minister. Keeping it a secret doesn't make it treason either. Treason would be to defect from Greece to the IMF or ECB or Germany with information to sink Greece and eliminate any kind of…

No? Grabbing your central bank's reserves without any involvement of parliament and preparing to arrest its chief without any legal justification sounds fine to you? It would have been the ultimate power grab by Syriza, going against all laws and democracy. Just because Syriza got a majority in the elections doesn't mean the rule of law has been suspended.

I'm shocked by the downvotes.

> Just because Syriza got a majority in the elections doesn't mean the rule of law has been suspended.

This is excactly the problem. And it's not a little problem.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#16

Post by asgard1024 »

It's sad to see them (Varoufakis/Tsipras) being crucified for this. Ironically, it was the Eurozone "leadership" that used threat of Grexit in negotiations, by not accepting any compromise. It only shows they have the "punish someone" mentality, at the cost of Eurozone's future.

I guess that's politics, damned if you do, damned if you don't. Couple days ago, Tsipras was criticized for not having plan B.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#17

Post by tptacek »

asgard1024 wrote: post #16

It's sad to see them (Varoufakis/Tsipras) being crucified for this. Ironically, it was the Eurozone "leadership" that used threat of Grexit in negotiations, by not accepting any compromise. It only shows they have the "punish someone" mentality, at the cost of Eurozone's future. I guess that's politics, damned if you do, damned if you don't. Couple days ago, Tsipras was criticized for not having plan B.

It's not that they had a Plan B, but what that plan was. Their Plan B was essentially a coup, instrumented through the financial system.

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#18

Post by tptacek »

Here's FT's (much better) reporting:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/2a0a1d94-3201-11e5-8873-775ba...

(The headline is "Syriza’s covert plot during crisis talks to return to drachma" if you want to Google it because of the registration wall).

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#19

Post by nl »

I wish there was a really good source for analysis on the Greek situation that ignored value judgements of what "should" happen.

To me it appears that Varoufakis is the Bobby Fischer of economics at the moment[1]. Of course he had a plan to keep the Greek economy (somewhat) alive if Grexit occurred. It would astonish me if some details of the plan hadn't been leaked to the EU - the Greeks would want them to know about it.

Varoufakis's resignation/sacking was beautifully timed to setup the idea that the Greeks would make some concessions, but couldn't be pushed much further.

And the purpose of this latest thing isn't to protect Varoufakis against treason charges, it it to drive a bigger wedge between Germany and France before August 20.

(As an aside, Varoufakis used to be Valve's staff economist, and he's a published game theorist. He's pretty good a playing slight differences in motivations against each other)

[1] http://genius.com/3889915

Re: Varoufakis reveals cloak and dagger 'Plan B' for Greece, awaits treason charges

#20

Post by jacobolus »

tptacek wrote: post #14
JacobAldridge wrote: post #2

Frankly, I would think it irresponsible if the Greek government did not have a Plan B in place - be it parallel payments or a return to the Drachma. If (when?) it becomes necessary to do so, such a plan would need to be implemented with haste - they won't have the luxury of telling the markets "we'll be doing this in 3 months, once we work out the details".

Plan B in this case case seems to have been for the currently dominant political party to seize the Greek treasury, arrest the leader of the Greek central bank, and use their access to design by fiat, without parliament, a whole new financial system for the country. This seems approximately akin to, say, Ted Cruz being elected next year, another financial crisis happening shortly thereafter, and Cruz (a) arresting Ja…

Except to complete the analogy, add 5+ years of great depression with no end in sight (huge foreign debt, GDP in the dumps, 25% unemployment, etc.), the previous political leadership completely discredited after going back on their campaign promises and driving the country into the ground, and undemocratic foreign institutions dictating policy demanding we keep the country in permanent misery.

In such circumstances, I can well imagine a radical politician getting elected and taking drastic measures.

FDR winning election and taking the country off the gold standard is a not incomparable situation from American history.

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