Καλά τα στοιχεία του παρακάτω άρθρου αλλά γιατί η Ευρώπη παρ'ολη την διαφθορά στην Ελλάδα συνέςχιζε να την δανείζει; Μήπως και η Ευρώπη έχει την δική της διαφθορά; Μήπως θα πρέπει και αυτή to put its house in order?
http://kourdistoportocali.com/post/45384/megalilistia
Showing posts with label Corruption. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Corruption. Show all posts
Friday, July 10, 2015
Friday, October 17, 2014
New Immunity Provisions Cast Doubt on Greece’s Efforts to Fight Corruption
ATHENS — The omnibus bill, more than 100 pages long and titled “Measures of Support and Growth for the Greek Economy,” won passage here in the middle of the night in March, as Parliament raced to meet a deadline set by Greece’s creditors.
Only afterward did a legislator from the governing New Democracy party notice an unsettling provision. Buried on page 78 was language that essentially gave retroactive immunity to thousands of workers in state-funded organizations that could shield them from future corruption prosecutions.
That change is among a flurry of new immunity provisions, often slipped into complex or unrelated bills this year, that have triggered outrage among law enforcement officials and critics of the government, who fear that long-awaited efforts to clamp down on corruption are being stymied.
Thursday, May 1, 2014
Just How Much Beyond the Presidential Salary Do The Obamas Spend on Travel and Vacays?
According to public information: “As of 2001, the president earns a $400,000 annual salary, along with a $50,000 annual expense account, a $100,000 nontaxable travel account, and $19,000 for entertainment. The most recent raise in salary was approved by Congress and President Bill Clinton in 1999 and went into effect in 2001.”
Obtained via a Freedom of Information request, here are some of the Obama presidency’s spending items:
- Since 2009, a total of $40,000,000 has been spent.
- This year’s Presidential golf outings to California and Florida, including $3,000,000 in flight expenses.
- 2013′s Africa trip and Honolulu vacations for the Obamas cost $16,000,000- for flight expenses alone.
- 2013′s Ireland trip tab: $8,000,000.
- Michelle Obama’s 2-day side trip to Dublin cost $250,000, including a $3,500 per-night suite.
Friday, April 18, 2014
A San Francisco Billionaire Just Bought Obama and Delayed the Keystone XL Pipeline
From Fox News:
The Obama administration once again has punted on a final decision for the Keystone XL pipeline, announcing ahead of the holiday weekend it is extending a key review period indefinitely — a move that could push off a determination until after the midterm elections.What you won’t hear about in mainstream media is how Billionaire Tom Seyer drove the decision by promising to spend $100 million to help Democrats in the midterm election who help defeat the project:
Republicans, as well as red-state Democrats who want the proposed Canada-to-Texas pipeline approved, slammed the administration for the delay. Democrats even threatened to find ways to go around the president to get the project approved.
“It’s absolutely ridiculous that this well over five year long process is continuing for an undetermined amount of time,” Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., said in a statement.
Thursday, April 10, 2014
Australia’s Richest Person and America’s Export-Import Bank
Australian press is buzzing over the strange nexus
between the country’s richest person and American taxpayers. The
headline in The Australian Financial Review even invokes the phrase “welfare queen.”
How Australia’s richest person, mining heiress Gina Rinehart, secured a $US694 million ($764 million) loan from American taxpayers is surely one of the great ironies of the capitalist system.The case is the latest example of a flaw in the United States political economy: what some see as crony capitalism.Rinehart’s mining group, Hancock Prospecting, last week signed off on a $US7.2 billion debt package for her highly anticipated Roy Hill iron ore project in Western Australia’s Pilbara region.Why are American taxpayers subsidizing a financial transaction involving an Australian billionaire’s iron ore project?
The Australian Financial Review explained
“Government export credit agencies including the Ex-Im Bank in the US,
as well as Japan and Korea, were crucial in helping the massive
debt-funding deal over the line” because “Commercial banks and bond
investors were reluctant to shoulder all the risk.”
When announcing the deal,
U.S. Ex-Im Bank downplayed the risk, instead touting the “$694.4
million loan to Roy Hill Holdings of Australia [was] contingent upon the
purchase of U.S. mining and rail equipment from Caterpillar Inc., GE,
and Atlas Copco.”
So taxpayers have two plausible, though not mutually
exclusive explanations for guaranteeing a $700
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
Good News: Michelle Able To Keep Taxpayer Cost Of Ireland Junket Under $10 Million
Air Force documents obtained via a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act lawsuit reveal that taxpayers shelled out $7,670,476.80 on flights to, from and around Ireland during their June 17-19 trip.
Additional documents obtained from the Department of Homeland Security show that the cost for “security and/or other services” for a side trip to Dublin by the Obama ladies and their her entourage was $251,161.86. That total included $55,004.85 spent at the Shelbourne Hotel and $70,855.44 at the Westbury Hotel.
So the grand total – footed entirely by taxpayers – was $7,921,638.66. But hey, if it’ll make you feel any better, that’s only $110,022.76 per hour!
As The Daily Caller reports, this most recent revelation comes on the heels of a release of additional
Thursday, March 13, 2014
A Waste - For Everyone But Obama's Donors
Not only is that a terrible idea, it's particularly galling given that President Obama has wasted $120 billion on global warming over the past five years. That's more than twice the annual Social Security deficit. That's enough to have bought 1,400 F-35's -- or even "buy an iPad for every kid in school, pay for a months worth of gas for every American or give a $323 tax rebate to every American."
Angry yet? Keep in mind that fully 80% of the Energy Department's "Green Loan" program went to Obama backers. Cozy.
Monday, February 3, 2014
Corruption across EU 'breathtaking' - EU Commission
From country to country the pattern of corruption varies a lot
The
extent of corruption in Europe is "breathtaking" and it costs the EU
economy at least 120bn euros (£99bn) annually, the European Commission
says.
EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem has presented a full report on the problem. She said the true cost of corruption was "probably much higher" than 120bn.
Three-quarters of Europeans surveyed for the Commission study said that corruption was widespread, and more than half said the level had increased.
"The extent of the problem in Europe is breathtaking, although Sweden is among the countries with the least problems," Ms Malmstroem wrote in Sweden's Goeteborgs-Posten daily.
The cost to the EU economy is equivalent to the bloc's annual budget.
For the report the Commission studied corruption in all 28 EU member states. The Commission says it is the first time it has done such a survey.
Bribery widespread
In the UK only five people out of 1,115 - less than 1% - said they had been expected to pay a bribe. It was "the best result in all Europe", the report said.
But 64% of British respondents said they believed corruption to be widespread in the UK, while the EU average was 74% on that question.
In some countries there was a relatively high number reporting personal experience of bribery,
In Croatia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Romania and Greece, between 6% and 29% of respondents said they had been asked for a bribe, or had been expected to pay one, in the past 12 months.
Friday, January 10, 2014
Justice Dept to Spend $544,000 on a...WHAT!? You Won't Believe This.
According to the government website FedBizOpps.gov, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Criminal Division is spending $544,000 on a new LinkedIn profile:
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Criminal Division is paying $544,000 for a shiny new LinkedIn profile, in the wake of a partial government shutdown that followed a top Democrat’s assurance that ‘the cupboard is bare, there’s no more cuts to make.’
The LinkedIn contract, first reported in the Washington Free Beacon, includes ‘Work With Us’ banner ads and ‘gold’-level user pages commonly purchased by private companies, all designed to drive job-seekers to Attorney General Eric Holder’s law enforcement agency.
The DOJ provided its contractor, the Reston, Virginia-based Carahsoft Technology
Friday, December 27, 2013
Thursday, December 19, 2013
10 Stupid Things You Won't Believe Congress Blows Our Money On
Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) has released his annual report, “The Wastebook,” which he calls “a compilation of about $30 billion of stupidity, incompetence, and waste” by the federal government.
Here are some of the “greatest hits” from Coburn’s 2013 Wastebook report:
#1. $390 thousand to NASA to create a cartoon superhero – “Green Ninja” – to teach children about “global warming”
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
A Big Message from a Little Country
I have seen it before –
people thoughtlessly renouncing their individual liberties upon the promise of
gaining a little collective security. I have seen it happening through the
corrupt ways of the government, the politicians, the welfare system, the
national single-payer healthcare system, the social security system and the
leviathan of debt that was created by all these governmental programs that were
supposed to promote and protect the wellbeing of the public. This country is
Greece. I grew up and lived there during the earlier part of my life. Now, I
see it witlessly dragging itself into the spiraling chasm of economic collapse
because it refused to release itself from the bounds of economic protectionism
and social nannyism.
The vast span of the
government’s power and control over the lives of the Greek people has fostered
a culture of corruption and irresponsibility throughout society. Nepotism is
rampant, accountability is non-existent and bribery is the name of the game. Need
an operation? The doctor from the state-run healthcare system will be
conspicuously busy until you convince him that handling your case could be
quite profitable. Want to have water, power and phone service installed in your
home? The bureaucrat from the respective state-run company will overlook your
application unless you refresh his memory with a friendly ‘gift’. Politicians
and government ministers, unsurprisingly, do not lack this characteristic
either. In effect, one cannot go about one’s daily business without
contributing to some bureaucrat’s personal ‘pocket padding fund’. Naturally,
this element of corruption does not cease to exist when it comes to the issue
of government contracts, nay, it is merely magnified and enlarged to match the
sums of money at stake. And that is not all, the worse aspect of this issue is
that since the government
With free money, why would anyone work in America?
The failure in the welfare system is clearly illustrated in the phrase, "Who would want to work in
Sunday, December 8, 2013
Liberal ‘media’ group gets $520k dark money donation for war on right
By Tori Richards | Watchdog.org
MADISON, Wis. — Two weeks ago, the liberal Center for Media and Democracy kicked off a national campaign to reveal the identities of anonymous contributors to conservative groups in an effort to unseat the GOP governor here.
Photo courtesy of C-Span 3
I’M RIGHT AT HOME: CMD’s Lisa Graves appears on C-Span 3 discussing money and politics
A Watchdog.org review of financial documents reveals the Madison-based CMD, which bills itself as a journalism organization, received $520,000 in 2011 from the Schwab Charitable Fund. That’s 60 percent of the $864,740 CMD received that year.
CMD lists no donors on its tax returns, but its website identifies numerous financial backers without any financial data. Several are highlighted in bold and labeled “current donors.” But one important name is missing: Schwab.
RELATED: Center for Media and Democracy says liberals are morally superior to conservatives.
Schwab is a so-called donor-advised fund, a financial institution that manages contributions to nonprofits so that donors remain anonymous. Such donor-advised funds are legal. Like many nonprofits, Watchdog.org’s
Friday, November 29, 2013
Greece: The history behind the collapse
Historically positioning themselves between an
unruly, oriental population and the western powers, since 1981 Greek
elites have siphoned off EU funds into a bloated public sector favouring
corruption, patronage and social climbing. The threat posed to Europe
by the breakdown is less contagion to the centre than a wave of
anti-western feeling that could exacerbate geopolitical instabilities in
the region.
It all started two years ago, in the autumn of 2009. Having won a
convincing victory at the head of the Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement
(PASOK) in the parliamentary elections, the new Greek prime minister,
George Papandreou suddenly opened a real Pandora's box. Forced to admit
to his electors that he would not be in a position to keep his manifesto
promises, he accused his New Democracy opponents and predecessors of
having concealed the extent of the deficits and debt. To explain the
contradiction between his resounding declaration prior to the election
("There's plenty of money!") and the inevitable austerity policy that
would follow, he deliberately exaggerated the position and compared
Greece to the Titanic.
His announcement had serious consequences. The markets took
fright; the government found that it was unable to finance its deficit
or to honour debt repayment dates. Threatened with bankruptcy, the
effects of which would destabilize the entire European economy, the
European Commission, the ECB and the IMF set up a troika that came to
Greece's aid by standing in for it in the markets. In exchange, the
Greek government was asked to stabilize the situation by reducing the
deficit and undertaking structural reforms. This was in spring 2010.[1]More than a year later, in summer 2011, there was no mistaking the fact that these measures had failed. Reforms had been carried forward only minimally; the public sector was still acting in a spendthrift fashion, despite cuts in salaries and pensions, whilst the public spending deficit had been only slightly reduced and the ratio of debt to GDP was rising. The Greek government, bogged down in its own contradictions, had taken steps that were too late, utterly inadequate and, very often, counter-productive. The administration, already ineffectual and dysfunctional, was now immobilized by incoherent political reactions. The economy slid into a deep recession that could only partly be accounted for by the absence of state stimulus measures and a shrinkage in the purchasing power of civil servants and pensioners. A series of contradictory statements from the government posed threats to various sections of the population (doctors, lawyers, civil servants, and so
Before the Greek Debt Crisis, Karl Heinz Roth
Apr 10th, 2013 | By Zero Books Editor | Category: Extract
From Greece: what is to be done? – A Pamphlet
In
the spring of 2012, the euro crisis intensified dramatically. The
epicenter of the crisis is Greece, a country that has been experiencing a
severe recession since the beginning of the world economic crisis. What
outcome this recession will yield is a decisive question not just for
Greece, but for all of Europe and indeed for the entire world economy.
We need therefore to consider the story behind this crisis, and the
restructuring programs imposed, since May of 2010, by the so-called
“troika” (the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the
International Monetary Fund). We also need to consider possible
alternatives to these restructuring programs.In 1981, Greece became a member of the European Community. A spirit of optimism prevailed in the country. The Socialist Party (PASOK), an offshoot of the Pan-Hellenic Resistance Movement against the 1967–1974 military dictatorship, had won the parliamentary elections for the first time. Due to its welfare-oriented platform, PASOK enjoyed widespread popular support.
As the conservative Karamanlis government stepped down, there began an era of social, cultural, scholarly and economic progress. This trend was in no way affected by the monetary restrictions associated with the European Monetary System that had been introduced within the European Community in 1979.[1]
Greece was not to join this system until 1993. Like the currencies of the other new southern European member states (Portugal and Spain), the drachma was kept outside the currency agreement. While the intra-European disparities in economic development entailed certain distortions of competition, the Greek government was able to compensate for their effects by periodically devaluing the Greek currency. Thus
The Origins of the Greek Financial Crisis
Letter from Thessaloniki
Before
the modern Greek state assumed its present day contours in the
aftermath of the first world war, communities in the trading cities of
Alexandria, Odessa, Salonika, Smyrna, and Trieste, already had a long
history of running their own school systems, hospitals, and orphanages.
This was partly a legacy of Ottoman rule. With the exception of
political stability, the Ottomans were not in the habit of providing
public goods so, when it came to public health and economic development,
citizens had to fend for themselves. That system worked. Through local
and communal organization, by the mid to late nineteenth century, the
Greeks were one of the most prosperous and dynamic groups in Southeast
Europe.
Once the Greek state was fully formed, however, a central administrative structure took over communal institutions. Powerful new national party machines displaced the local elites who'd successfully served as administrators. In Greece's second largest city, Salonika, this process took a bit more than a decade. Between 1912, when the city was integrated into the Greek Kingdom, and 1925, Salonika's schools, hospitals, and other institutions were nationalized and its local trustees were replaced by centrally appointed bureaucrats. Likewise, the responsibility for funding these institutions passed to the central government. To grasp how dramatic the change was, imagine that Washington nationalized all colleges and universities in the state of Massachusetts, Harvard included, and then ran them through political appointees.
So, as the Greek state expanded territorially it also expanded its responsibilities, undercutting old traditions of localism and community action. Herein lies the root of the country's current crisis. Long-established, autonomous local elites were displaced in the 1920s, their place taken by a new group of people adept at
Once the Greek state was fully formed, however, a central administrative structure took over communal institutions. Powerful new national party machines displaced the local elites who'd successfully served as administrators. In Greece's second largest city, Salonika, this process took a bit more than a decade. Between 1912, when the city was integrated into the Greek Kingdom, and 1925, Salonika's schools, hospitals, and other institutions were nationalized and its local trustees were replaced by centrally appointed bureaucrats. Likewise, the responsibility for funding these institutions passed to the central government. To grasp how dramatic the change was, imagine that Washington nationalized all colleges and universities in the state of Massachusetts, Harvard included, and then ran them through political appointees.
So, as the Greek state expanded territorially it also expanded its responsibilities, undercutting old traditions of localism and community action. Herein lies the root of the country's current crisis. Long-established, autonomous local elites were displaced in the 1920s, their place taken by a new group of people adept at
Monday, November 25, 2013
Caribbean Junkets: You Pay While Bureaucrats Play
To pick a more recent example, taxpayers have plenty of reasons to be upset about IRS bureaucrats partying at their fancy conferences (including line dances, the real message of which is captured by this Lisa Benson cartoon).The General Services Administration, meanwhile, had a good time on our dime at a posh confab in Las Vegas.
So did revelations about all this waste cause programs, agencies, and departments to be more careful with our tax money? As you can imagine, the answer is a big fat no.
The latest scandal to be unearthed is that “public servants” from a bunch of government agencies have been enjoying fun times in the Caribbean. Here are some excerpts from a Washington Times expose.
A group of federal officials skipped chilly Washington this month for a taxpayer-funded trip to the Virgin Islands in the name of protecting the world’s coral reef. The organizer, the U.S. Coral Reef Task Force, isn’t saying much about the total cost or reasons for the trip or why officials chose the St. Croix beachfront resort Buccaneer Hotel (made famous by an episode of TV’s “The Bachelor”) as their destination. But life couldn’t have been too bad for the G-men and G-women at the swanky resort, which is surrounded by a lush green golf course and boasts
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