LAGARDE THE CYNIC

THERE MAY NO DOUBT be good reasons for Greeks to be outraged and insulted by Christine Lagarde’s statement suggesting that they are less than law abiding. Indeed, the announcement by burly Evangelos Venizelos, the leader of PASOK, that Greeks are honest and that the history of Greece is one of decency, aestheticism, art and literature may ring true today even on the sidewalks of Athens, where thousands of pot-bellied, bare-chested men sit getting drunk and spitting pistachio shells all over the place every day.

YET AS A RENOWNED INTELLECTUAL and someone well versed in current and past political and social philosophy, people often come up to me and ask, “David, why is Greece doing so badly and why is that fruity French lady in charge of the IMF saying that Greeks are dishonest?”

THE SHORT ANSWER IS THAT BOTH political figures are correct. The history of Greece is indeed a source from which we may take lessons about the Greece of today and Lagarde does have a point. The issue revolves around what part of Greek history and philosophy we should cast our eye upon.

THE COUNTRY’S MOST RECENT contribution to European culture upon which I have cast my eye was the song “Aphrodisiac” by Eleftheria Eleftheriou, described by at least one commentator of the programme as the lady with the most “approachable” rear end in the competition; but Greece’s history is replete with excellent examples of figures that should be followed closely.

DIOGENES THE CYNIC (404 BC – 323 BC) was a major figure in Greek and European philosophy. His father was a minter of currency, and somehow Diogenes “debased” it, and was then punished with exile. He ended up in Athens, where he decided to set himself up as a moral leader, seeing that Athens was a corrupt society. He took it upon himself to show extreme austerity, seeing true virtue in being poor. He thus begged for his food and slept in a bathtub in the street.

THE MOST FAMOUS OF HIS MANY public actions was when he wandered around Athens for days and days on end carrying a lamp. Whenever anyone stopped him and asked what he was doing he would reply that he was looking (in vain) for an honest man.

MY TOP PICTURE SHOWS THE PAINTING “Diogenes Looking for an Honest Man” (c. 1780)(probably) by JHW Tischbein, one of the remarkable moments in Greek history that Greek philosophical historians apparently choose to ignore, and the second one, “Diogenes” by Jules Bastien-Lepage (1873), depicts what most Greek people will look like if Lagarde has her way.

HUMPTY DUMPED

“ALL THE KING’S HORSES and all the King’s men/ Couldn’t put Humpty together again” we are told in the nursery rhyme about the fact that once an egg is broken it can’t be put back together. It has an interesting parallel in the statement made by Lord Wolfson, referring to breaking up the Eurozone as “unscrambling an omelette”. He has backed up his belief that this will be impossible to do safely by offering £250,000 of his own money to anyone who can come up with a sensible plan to do so.

FURTHER, THE NEWS THAT HOME SECRETARY Theresa May is drawing up contingency plans to prevent mass migration to the United Kingdom after the collapse of the Euro, announced today in most major newspapers, coupled with the statement by the ever-tanned Christine Lagarde that Greece has “had it good for years” and now it is “payback time”, have together more or less pulled the plug on the future of the European Currency, if not on the European dream itself.

IN ADDITION, THE ADMISSION by the Spanish government yesterday that it dreads a victory in Baku in the European Song Contest tomorrow, as Spain does not have the money to stage the final next year shows that there is not really any point to Europe anymore now that the highest accolade of our culture means nothing.

FRANCE’S THREAT TO REINTRODUCE border controls on its Italian frontiers may also be a sign of the inevitable break-up of the freedom of movement within the Schengen countries, and so, all in all, unless the Germans suddenly come up with the money to pay for the southern European countries to carry on doing nothing for most of the year, turning up late for work and clocking off early when they do work, enjoying an average of 18 bank holidays with extra days taken off when these holidays fall on a Tuesday or Thursday and receiving a full month bonus in December and August I suppose that the game is up, new currencies will be brought in and the only way up will be constant devaluation.

HOW DID THIS ALL GO SO WRONG?, people may ask. How did this wonderful, romantic notion of countries united in their common aim of freedom, truth, justice and equality, based on growth and respect suddenly turn into a nightmare of bitterness, mismanagement and failure?

THERE ARE MANY LONG ANSWERS to this question, but the short one is this: when Europe decided to let itself be run by a parliament of second-rate, second hand political failures who, having been unable to cut the ice and get elected in their own countries, ended up being nominated for the European Parliament. And then the European Parliament itself, with the wisdom only possible to a bunch of useless incompetents, “nominates” two of the most representative fools among it, Humpty Dumpty von Rompuy and Joseph “Stalin” Barroso to run its policies. These two incompetent has-beens then nominate a disgraced Italian economics “expert” to run the European Central Bank, supported by a failed Portuguese finance minister, and, as one can see, the rest is history. Or rather future.

(My photo shows the President of Europe making one of his stirring, rousing speeches)

EURO 2012

LIKE A GOOD MANY PARENTS, I am indulging my younger son in his desire to collect the Panini stickers to be inserted into his album of the Association Football national teams involved in the forthcoming UEFA Nations Challenge Cup competition, this year held in the unitary state of Ukraine and the Republic of Poland.

THE MAIN REASON BEHIND my attitude is somewhat like my approach to having had him baptized; it is a matter of social insertion. The youngsters at his schools collect these badly-photographed stickers of footballers who will never play in the final competition, as well as omitting some who will, and the exchange of “swaps”, with the ensuing bargaining process, will bring him into contact with the basic rules of capitalism. Or so I had thought.

ON THE ONE OCCASION when he took a similar album to school he returned minus most of the “star” players from the teams of Everton, Liverpool and Manchester United. I, shocked, pointed out that this was not the intention of the game. “I gave them,” he told me, “to other children. Who needed them.”

IF THIS IS THE SORT OF COMMUNISM allowed to go unchecked in our schools nowadays then I can easily see why our countries are on the road to ruin, which brings me to the real “Euro 2012”.

IN THE FUTURE, when one refers to this competition, “Euro 2012”, the term will be clouded in acknowledgement to the events of 2012 which led to the debasement of and ultimate eradication from our collective shopping experience of the chirpy “Euro” as a spendable monetary issue.

IT IS MORE OR LESS COMMON knowledge now that Germany is having Deutschmarks printed in secret at mints in Switzerland, Greece is producing new Drachmae, Portugal is soon about to come forth with a totally new currency, still shrouded in secrecy, and that the Euro is doomed, but for many people the “Euro” may still be saved.

AND THE ONLY WAY THIS CAN HAPPEN is if the England team play to the best of their abilities, thrashing all those in their way and managing (I do not know the logistics of the competition) to come face to face with Germany in one of the later stages of the tournament. The toss-up before the game, which could easily be the final tie, should be over whether Germany accepts the free market economy or the United Kingdom leaves Europe altogether. And then it will probably go to penalties. (My photo shows England warming up before the European Union)

PLEASE RELEASE ME

BIZARRELY, THERE ARE MANY PEOPLE who pooh-pooh the Eurovision Song Contest, believing it to be of little or no interest culturally and much less so in musical terms. While I respect people’s opinions and understand that de gustibus non est disputandum, it is plainly beyond me that sensitive and sensible souls will not see this annual feast as ranking on the same level as the Queen’s speech on Christmas Day, the Football Association Challenge Cup Final Tie and the Grand National Steeplechase at Liverpool.

IT IS NOT THAT ON THIS OCCASION we collectively celebrate our European heritage but more the fact that British people, and more specifically English ones, can see what an unholy, corrupt, ramshackled, pasteboard and gaudy mess Europe is when one gets down to the nitty-gritty.

THERE IS NO MORE ABSURD, tacky, trashy, soulless occasion that one can see for free, on one’s own television set. Such a show of sub-vaudeville, cross-dressing, tight-satin-trousered, over-made-up bad-glam would normally cost a fortune in most major capitals in Europe, and a visitor to such an establishment would surely be risking being accosted by burly security guards, pimps, drug-pushers or people selling contraband sunglasses when one went to witness such an event.

BUT THE MAGIC OF TELEVISION brings us the wonder of the spectacle live, once a year, directly into our own homes. Although it is still five days away I have started “eyeing up the talent”, as the common folk sometimes say, in order to place a bet on the winner.

AS ALWAYS, IT IS QUALITY of the lyrics which attracts me, and I thus predict (and am betting serious money) on the following top three due to the qualities of the songs:

1. Loreen “the Vampire Donna Summer”, Euphoria, (Sweden), with the clever lyric “We’re going up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up”. A cert. Never has a song been such a guaranteed money-winner.

2. Engelbert “the” Humperdinck (UK), with Love Will Set You Free. How can anyone vote against a 76 year-old man who sings about making love to women? (Perhaps we should wait and see who actually does vote against this; but it won’t be any men)

3. “Diamond” Nina Zilli, L’ammore è Femmina (Italy): “You leave me crying at home while you play pool” (a classic lament in the Italian neo-realist style).

ANYONE WHO MAKES MAJOR MONEY betting on these three in this order will perhaps remember me and my sagacious predictions. Donations to the contacts above. (My photo shows the winner trying to look sultry)

SHIELD AND BUCKLER

Comércio de Borba aceita escudos este fim-de-semana

Os comerciantes do concelho alentejano de Borba recebem, desde esta sexta-feira e até domingo, a antiga moeda de escudo nas transacções comerciais efectuadas, numa iniciativa que pretende dinamizar o comércio local. Trata-se da "Iniciativa Escudo", promovida pelo município e pelos estabelecimentos comerciais do concelho, sendo as notas recolhidas posteriormente trocadas no Banco de Portugal.

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO DO NOT understand Portuguese, the above little snippet was taken yesterday from the Correio da Manhã, the most popular Portuguese daily newspaper, and it is about the town of Borba in southern Portugal, hitherto most known for its wines, these being an acidic paint-stripper of a white wine and a full-bodied, dirt-smelling heavy red, usually euphemistically referred to in the sales jargon as “fruity and citric” in the first case and “oaky and noble” in the second.

BUT IT IS NOT THIS REASON that Borba is in the news this weekend. The local council has decided to make the town an “Escudo zone” in order to stimulate the area’s economy. For this weekend all the restaurants and shops will be using a currency which disappeared eleven years ago.

WHILE THIS MAY SEEM STRANGE for many sensible Europeans, the fact is that pockets of Portugal are going to try this experiment over the coming weeks, sponsored by local councils and tacitly encouraged by the hopeless and hapless government. This is in addition to the many shops which still only trade in Escudos – doing better business nowadays than ever before.

THE SIMPLE FACT IS THAT millions of Escudos still exist in private hands, held, usually, by people who refused to believe that the “new currency” would last. As much as twenty percent of the cash on the market at the time of the changeover to the Euro remained in Escudos; in the main the government and fiscal authorities ignored this phenomenon. Indeed, it was good for the economy.

THIS ATTITUDE HAS CHANGED somewhat of late, with a series of initiatives designed to mop up whatever Escudo spillage still exists in an attempt to regain the lost money. This would be a sensible policy during a high point in the economic cycle; given that Portugal is in the depths of recession, it can only mean that the government wants these Escudos off the map for other reasons.

AND THE REASON I SUGGEST is that the Portuguese government knows that as soon as Greece comes out of the Euro Portugal will follow suit within a month, returning to a “new Escudo”, and it will not be convenient to upset all these people who still harbour the notion that it will return to the old one.

THE TAKING OF EYPON

AS ANY SCHOOLBOY KNOWS, the Greek mythological story about the rape of Europe is a part of our Greco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian heritage here in the civilised Western world. The details of this corny tale may not be quite so well divulged among scholars who never got into the depths of the stories invented by old Greek men who had nothing better to do but invent things to tell to others over a glass of wine.

THE ‘FACTS’ ARE, HOWEVER, that Europe – meaning “bright-eyed” or “startled” cow in classical Greek, was led forward “forcibly from the rear” by Zeus in the 8th century BC, in the guise of a bull, from Asia Minor to somewhere corresponding to Macedonia in an attempt to subdue her and stop her interfering with the serious issues of politics in Tyre (now Lebanon).

THERE ARE THOSE WHO ENJOY proclaiming that history repeats itself or is circular. And the realities of today suggest that Greece, the country that has historically let itself be known as the “birthplace of Europe”, “the cradle of democracy” and other such bland nonsense, is now about to be butt-fucked out of Europe due to the fact that it is still, three thousand years later, full of men who have nothing better to do but invent stories to tell each other over a glass of wine, this being particularly true of the Greek government and its economics experts, yet extending down to the postman and the bootblack. The only constant in this history is the regular sodomising of each other. And the lack of any will to work as long as someone gives them money to let them take things up their Asia Minor.

SYRIAN MATTERS

THERE MAY WELL BE SUCH PEOPLE as wonder, as I do, why Syria is not quite getting the bashing that other states have been subjected to during the so-called “Arab Spring” (which is now in its second summer and has still not produced a Swallow) by our good offices in the Western World.

IT SEEMS RELATIVELY APPARENT TO ANYONE with a television set that people have been being mown down, blown up, gunned in their beds and sniped at in their tens of thousands by buffoon-faced Syrian President Bashar “Basher” al-Assad, for well over a year and that no one in the “free world” is doing anything about it other than sending unintelligible United Nations commanders and officials to make speeches on obscure channels late at night.

WHENEVER THIS HAPPENS WE KNOW that the UN is not really interested in the event or that something is standing in the way of the major powers to make them want to call a halt or cessation on proceedings.

MY GUESS IS THAT THIS IS THE CHARMING Asma al-Assad, the fruity, British-born totty who is First Lady of Syria, trophy wife to “Basher” and raised and educated in the United Kingdom. She is a good friend to our beloved Tony Blair and his wife Cherie. Were such contacts not enough to warrant a little benevolence on the part of the West in order to persuade us not to blow her mansions, swimming pools and leisure complexes to smithereens, we also have the fact that her contacts include many of the great and good in the field of medicine in London and, more importantly, the world of finance in the City.

WHILE EVERY DECENT CHAP THINKS that what is going on in Syria is jolly rum stuff, one would not want to do the dirty on one of our own, would one? Especially if one is the “special envoy” to the Middle East.