Former Valve Economist Resigns as Greece's Finance Minister After Just Six Months

@pcostix: http://news.yahoo.com/greek-finance-minister-varoufakis-resigns-statement-054451910.html

http://news.yahoo.com/greeces-departing-finance-minister-brash-end-183222026.html

https://in.news.yahoo.com/greek-finance-minister-quits-creditors-ponder-post-no-142618003.html

Look I get passionate debate and negotiations, even trying to be edgy but during negotiations for something as important as bailout for the fine people of Greece and the interests of the EU, a certain level of respect and professionalism needs to be practiced. While most of his fellow negotiators kept quiet with no behind the back press releases, some of them did report Yanis was unprofessional, disruptive, grandstanding, and even childish. While he made statements to the press like 'terrorists' name calling, he made it impossible to progress any kind of work. If I was representing my country for such a historically important issue that would effect not only my country men but also their children, I would worry less about my own publicity and own agenda, and instead concentrate more on the people of Greece. Drama, drama, drama, pundit on 24- hr news channel.

This is not a pro german, pro EU, pro Greece discussion, it is nothing more then a little man with a history of flamboyancy prostituting himself in front of the press in hopes of his own reality show like young Chefs on the food network. I believe they call it Donald Trump-ing, now.

@Verenti:

Macedonia is today inhabited by slavic peoples but in the time of Alexander the Great they were Greek.

@nl_skipper: That's the impression I got as well. He sounds like a real diva.

@CaptWaffle The problem isn't as simple as you claim. Yes, the economic policies of Greece are a contributing factor to the crisis, but few people recognize the dangerously destabilizing economic policies of Germany. Fifty percent of Germany's GDP comes from exports. That is a figure no other country in Europe can hope to compete with. Germany manufactures more high-end products than it can consume, and that is no less perilous than spending money you don't have. The only reason Germany can get away with doing this is because of the Eurozone, which can't help but buy all of the products Germany makes. Greece is addicted to debt. Germany is addicted to exports. The difference is that Germany has the clout in the EU to uphold their interests, which is maintaining a Eurozone that can consume German products regardless of the imbalances it creates elsewhere.

I'm no expert on economics, but I understand when a situation, and a system, is unsustainable. The whole economic system of the EU is imbalanced. Every nation in the south, what some people call the "club Med" nations (Greece, Italy, Spain, etc.), is suffering from recession or outright depression. The normal response to such economic misfortune is for a nation to devalue its own currency until the situation stabilizes, but since "club Med" is all under the Euro, the nations of the south are stuck in an economic death spiral they cannot escape. (Greece is only the first nation to enter this black hole.) Simply asking them to accept austerity doesn't solve the underlying problem. You cannot cut your way to prosperity. Prosperity only comes through growth, and growth is exactly what they cannot do because Germany's vast manufacturing base is impossible to compete with under a unified currency. I would argue that the real problem is the Eurozone itself, rather than any particular country. Each country uses the Eurozone to further its own interests rather than the health of the system as a whole. This is what happens when multiple sovereign parties - each with its own agenda - try to play the same game. It doesn't work. The only viable solution for Europe is a political union similar to that of the United States, but this isn't likely to happen due to all of the cultural and language differences of the region, to say nothing of historical conflicts and grievances. How this will ultimately play out is anyone's guess.

@Dark_Wr4ith: That isn't ironic...

Eventually they do. One way or another. We are in a bubble period where all the leftist leaning countries in the west are borrowing/printing money to pay for excessive social programs. Greek credit rating is: junk bond status. The US has been downgraded because the world is beginning to see that we won't pay back a dime. We are in uncharted waters..... everyone untying from gold/silver standards and printing money has created an Alice in Wonderland scenerio where everyone is just pretending everything is all right while everything goes to hell. China constructs empty cities to give resources a place to go.....you really think our unemployment rate is back to 5-6%? Wrong. They manipulate the numbers. Out of work for long enough? Don't show up in the stats. Gave up? Don't show up in the stats. We have LESS people working now than we did many years ago. It's all a shell game run by professors usion unproven "economic theory" that would put any "real" business out of business very, very quickly. Socialism does not work. It never has. It depends on all factors staying the same after true capitalistic traits have been stripped away. Politicians always were terrible at knowing secondary and tertiary consequences of their "theories."

@Dark_Wr4ith: Greece willingly took the bailouts, and the IMF will certainly start seizing assets. The raiding of deposits is only the start.