Elderly pensioners biggest tragedy in Greek Bailout

Any country whose financial problems leave thousands of elderly pensioners having to queue up in front of banks is an abysmal failure. Any system that doesn’t put vulnerable pensioners first is heartless. Governments worldwide and their bureaucracies continue to treat people like cattle. For all of their hype as saviours, the European Union is über government. Ditto for the out-of-control United Nations, whose bumper sticker approach of “saving humanity” is a decades-old farce. People have become herds of cattle and statistics to tax-rich governments and bureaucracies.

“Following marathon overnight talks between 19 eurozone leaders, Greece caved in and accepted a range of reforms to secure a deal worth up to €86 billion - the country's third bailout in five years. (DailyMail, July 12, 2015)

“While striking a deal was considered vital to securing Greece's future within the euro and preventing the country's economy collapsing, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras agreed to rush key measures on tax hikes, pension reforms, and a debt repayment fund through parliament. “The hard left Athens leader - who was elected on an anti-austerity platform - faced an immediate backlash over the deal, with many Greeks furious at Tsipras' reluctantly accepting even tougher reforms than those categorically rejected by citizens at last week's bailout referendum. “Some have already taken to social media using #thisisacoup to decry the terms of the deal, with many attacking the creditors terms as unfair. Users even accused Germany of 'destroying Europe once again', adding they 'could not do it with tanks so now they try it with banks'.”

For anyone with a conscience, it is not the photos of austerity protesters tossing bricks out on the streets; not the Cheshire cat grins of European Union high-rollers in media photo-ops; not the pictures of mainstream media scribes (poor darlings!) falling asleep at the table waiting for the news of the latest 86 billion EU Greek bailout, that wrenches the human heart.

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It should be the photos of elderly pensioners lined up at Greek banks, all in the hope to be able to cash out €120 ($130 US) a day from their pensions after interminably long waits. The €120 is the allowable amount so callously arrived at by the government-pressed banks. According to the Greek government 45% of pensioners receive monthly payments below the poverty line of €665. During the long months pensioners had to queue outside banks for their meagre withdrawals, none of the 19 eurozone leaders at last night’s 11th-hour “marathon” session, including the hardline German Chancellor Angela Merkel, put in a word for the plight of the pensioners. We live in a world where little people like Greek pensioners barely get a mention in a Greek tragedy where the Socialist Greek government and the EU point the finger of blame at each other, patently ignoring the masses; in a politician selfie world where European, American and Asian leaders virtually dominate the news with empty, useless rhetoric; a world where the only ‘action’ these leaders are shown taking are out on the ski slopes, the golf course, visiting each other’s palatial headquarters, smiling from photographs at lavish celeb weddings--but NEVER doing anything about the poor other than talking about them. Of the endless pictures viewed worldwide from what seems to be the never-ending Greek bailout, the most indelible one is the photo depicting the outstretched hands of pensioners hoping for lineup tickets dispensed by bank personnel. Greece, the Cradle of Democracy, the home of Socrates and the Spartans, the country whose language gave us the original Bible; today a land whose elderly pensioners are rounded up like so many cattle at branding time in the hope of getting to withdraw $130 a day. Greece, whose wisdom comes from its modern-day elders, just like it does in most other countries, is an every day nightmare of ongoing instability. It doesn’t take too much imagination to see Greece coming to North America in those heart-rending bank lineup photos. While the spotlight’s on faraway Greece, North America is already keeping war veterans waiting on pensions and health care; with America already hiring employees for the dreaded death panels in the ongoing ObamaCare odyssey. With the cost of prescription refills going out of sight in Greece, 120 euros a day doesn’t go far. And every one of us who knows a Greek grandmother, the family’s beloved “Yaya” also knows that most Greek grandparents spend much of their pension money on their children and grandchildren. Greece, and any other country adopting the same attitude, is headed for abysmal failure, not primarily because of debt, bankruptcy and drawn-out political battles over remaining in the eurozone, but because of the heartless treatment of its own elderly. God help elderly pensioners eking out daily existence in the Greece of today because their government and the European Union won’t.