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ATHENS: A biblical calamity befell the Attica region last Monday. I saw its first sign in the late morning at Athens airport, where I was seeing off my daughter to Australia. A strong whiff of burning wood caused me to look up to the sky, where a whitish-yellow sun beckoned, surrounded by the tell-tale eclipse-like daytime darkness that only thick, sky-high smoke can cause. By the early evening the news had cascaded in. Many of our friends’ and some of our relatives’ houses were destroyed in northeast Attica.

ATHENS – A biblical calamity befell Attica last Monday. I saw its first sign in the late morning at Athens airport, where I was seeing off my daughter to Australia. A strong whiff of burning wood caused me to look up to the sky, where a whitish-yellow sun beckoned, surrounded by the telltale eclipse-like daytime darkness that only thick, sky-high smoke can cause.

Joe speaks with former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, the man who defied Europe to save Greece – and failed. Yanis, the suave economics professor turned unexpected politician, has recently announced he will run for Prime Minister of Greece at the next national elections. He is the author of multiple books including And The Weak Suffer What They Must?, Adults in the Room, and Talking to My Daughter About the Economy.
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No one can be free if one person is in chains, let alone a whole people. It is in the interests of all, Jews & Arabs, Europeans & Americans, Asians & Africans that the blockade of Gaza and the collective abuse of its people ends now!

Yanis Varoufakis, ancien ministre des Finances grec, auteur de Et les faibles subissent ce qu’ils doivent ? : comment l’Europe de l’austérité menace la stabilité du monde, chez Actes Sud.

L’ancien ministre des finances grec Yanis Varoufakis lors de la manifestation internationale du 1er mai 2018 à Athènes. •Crédits : GIORGOS GEORGIOU / NURPHOTO – AFP

The official version reads as follows: Europe is on the road to recovery, the consequences of Brexit are under control, Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Emmanuel Macron would now create the new foundations on which Europe will establish a stronger alliance. Even the Greek debt crisis, it is said, was over after the decision of the Eurogroup last week! Unfortunately, a closer look reveals a deep gap between propaganda and reality.

Even before Donald Trump drove to tears of dismay NATO’s leaders, Theresa May, the EU’s officialdom and Washington’s own ‘intelligence community’, the writing was on the wall: Trump is methodically dismantling a world order that he no longer believes to be in the interests of the United States’ ruling class.

Mon 11 Jun 2018 16.23 BST

As you grow up and experience more of the ups and downs of the economy, you will notice a piece of mindbending hypocrisy: during the good times, bankers, entrepreneurs—rich people in general—tend to be against government.

How do we choose between what is fair and just, and what our debtors demand of us? Yanis Varoufakis was put in such a dilemma in 2015 when he became the finance minister of Greece. In this rousing book, he charts the absurdities that underpin calls for austerity, as well as his own battles with a bureaucracy bent on ignoring the human cost of its every action. Passionately outspoken and tuned to the voices of the oppressed, Varoufakis presents a guide to modern economics, and its threat to democracy, like no other.