Reports out of Riga about the negotiations between Greece and other Eurozone members have been rather curious. There has been much emphasis on how the other fin ministers do not like or get along with Yanis Varoufakis, the Greek one. He did not go to dinner with them. He is the only one not wearing a tie. Draghi does not look him in the eye. Djesselbloem calls him by his first name in person and refers to him as "the Greek finance minister" when not in person. The others do not like him "lecturing" them with his British education and his time in Australia, and, gosh darn it, why does he not just up and accept their demands for full austerity for Greece!
It looks like this is more about him breaking the rules of a fraternity than about seriously coming to an agreement that most observers think is not that far away. Time for these clowns to grow up.
Barkley Rosser
"It looks like this is more about him breaking the rules of a fraternity..."
ReplyDeleteExactly. Isn't that what it is always about?
Another funny aspect of this is that Tyler Cowen at MR has periodically been seriously referring to Varoufakis and Tsirpas as Not Very Serious People, somehow not aware that pretty much all of us use the term "Very Serious People" as a mock on Washington types who spout nonsense but think of themselves as being, well, Very Serious, the VSPs. So, Deutscheland Uber Alles Schauble seems set on fulfilling the worst version of this VSP nonsense. But, hey, Yanis better get a tie!
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