Partners of the Ukrainian coup d'etat prime minister...

[polly7]

2. and those 'partners' couldn't have found a better tool for the job if they'd tried.

Last edited Tue May 13, 2014, 01:13 AM - Edit history (1)

INVESTING | 2/27/2014 @ 4:58PM |14,510 views
Washington's Man Yatsenyuk Setting Ukraine Up For Ruin

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2014/02/27/washingtons-man-yatsenyuk-setting-ukraine-up-for-ruin/

“Recall the phone exchange between the Ukraine ambassador and Victoria Nuland (Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs) that got leaked out, where she basically said ‘we want Yats in there.’ They like him because he’s pro Western,” says Vladimir Signorelli, president of boutique investment research firm Bretton Woods Research LLC in New Jersey. “Yatsenyuk is the the kind of technocrat you want if you want austerity, with the veneer of professionalism,” Signorelli said. “He’s the type of guy who can hobnob with the European elite. A Mario Monti type: unelected and willing to do the IMFs bidding,” he said.

Ukraine’s new 450-seat parliament approved the appointment of the former Central Banker Yatsenyuk on Thursday by a vote of 371 to 1. Oddly enough, earlier this month, the pro-Western Yats trailed behind popular opposition leaders such as former heavyweight boxer Viltali Klitschko and the leader of the nationalist, Svoboda Party, Oleh Tyahnybok. But Yats had friends in high places and while he does not have strong support of the electorate, and would have no chance of winning an election, he is pro-IMF austerity and apparently the bulk of parliament is as well.

“Yatsenyuk was saying that what the Greeks did to themselves we are going to do ourselves,” said Signorelli. “He wants to follow the Greek economic model. Who the hell wants to follow that?”

Indeed.


Austerity Kills—Case in Point: Greece

Truthout / By Julien Mercille

What happens when everything that keeps people healthy is cut.

May 6, 2014

A string of academic reports documenting in detail the impacts of austerity on health care and health outcomes in Greece have recently been released . They show how European authorities, IMF and Greek government policies implemented in response to the economic crisis have led to deaths and attacks on the health of ordinary people. But there was nothing inevitable about those consequences. As the medical journal the Lancet stated: "Experience elsewhere in Europe shows that those countries which prioritise social protection (including health) in the midst of austerity, and favour fiscal stimulation, secure better outcomes for their populations."

Austerity implies a combination of government spending cuts and tax hikes to shrink public deficits to revive economies facing the current downturn. But it doesn't work, as Europe's ongoing economic stagnation makes clear. Moreover, whatever government savings result from expenditure reductions, it is important to point out that they are built on "blood money," as argued recently by Yanis Varoufakis, the well-known Greek economist.


As if this was not enough, stillbirths rose by 21 percent between 2008 and 2011 because of scaled down prenatal health services for pregnant women, while the long-term fall in infant mortality has been reversed, surging by 43 percent between 2008 and 2010.

The general deterioration of social life due to austerity is clear when the following statistics are considered. There are 2.8 million households in Greece, and 2.3 million have a debt to the Tax Office that they cannot service; 1 million households cannot pay their electricity bill in full; households' disposable income has contracted 30 percent since 2010; the minimum wage has been reduced by 40 percent; social transfers have been cut by 18 percent; there are now 3.5 million employed people who support 4.7 million unemployed or inactive ones; and 35 percent of the population live at risk of poverty or social exclusion.

No wonder that deaths by suicide have thus increased by 45 percent between 2007 and 2011.......

Full article: http://www.alternet.org/economy/austerity-kills-case-point-greece?akid=11793.44541.Ck7lmV&rd=1&src=newsletter990910&t=21