The most extreme form of that reorganization is embodied in the two major trade agreements that the US is trying to impose on the Pacific and European worlds, the TPP and TAFTA. As a telling example of the scope of these agreements, they would establish a framework for the re-privatization of the one of the European Union's most significant features: free health care for all.
Notwithstanding the vast cultural and political differences between 'Kronstadt' and 'Occupy', the commonalities are striking. The austerity imposed on citizens by the world's bankers to recoup losses created by their own reckless behavior has pulled the left out of decades of disarray. Parties like Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain are fomenting a modern equivalent to the Kronstadt rebellion. All over Europe, demonstrating has become an almost full-time occupation. Last week, as the European Bank's new 1.27 billion dollar headquarters was being inaugurated, thousands of protesters from across Europe staged a violent protest in Frankfurt. According to the NYT:
The 600-foot-high tinted-glass tower is a more potent symbol of the central bank's power than the generic gray high-rise in central Frankfurt that it previously occupied" In his speech Mario Draghi, president of the bank, acknowledged that Europeans "are going through very difficult times." As a European Union institution "that has played a central role throughout the crisis, the ECB has become a focal point for those frustrated with this situation," Mr. Draghi said in prepared remarks. "This may not be a fair charge -- our action has been aimed precisely at cushioning the shocks suffered by the economy. But as the central bank of the whole euro area, we must listen very carefully to what all our citizens are saying." http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/19/business/european-central-bank-protests-frankfurt.html
Fischer's reference to Kronstadt was about Lenin's repression, but Draghi was admitting that 'austerity' is modern Europe's 'Kronstadt' and that the people will only put up with so much. According to a detailed report by the German Deutsche Welle news service: http://www.dw.de/rage-against-the-ecb-whats-blockupy-against/a-18321709:
Blockupy isn't some rag-tag little group of anarchists. It's a leftist alliance composed of more than 90 organizations from across Europe - some big, some small - that have united in opposition to what Blockupy calls "the European crisis regime". Some of the bigger member organizations include the activist group Attac, founded in 1998 to advocate a financial transaction tax; the German political party 'Die Linke' (The Left), which currently has a little over ten percent of the seats in the national parliament; and even Germany's second biggest union, Verdi, which has over two million members.
Syriza, the leftist alliance party that won Greece's national election in late January, is also a Blockupy member. But in contrast to the earlier, mostly mellow protests, there was a distinctly violent element on Wednesday, reflecting the political polarization that has built in the eurozone after four years of harsh cuts in government spending and astronomical unemployment in Greece and other troubled countries.
The organization describes itself as a broad Europe-wide movement whose aim is to "build democracy and solidarity from the bottom up". It's against the economic policy stance of most current eurozone governments, which Blockupy describes as 'austerity,' or a push for balanced budgets at the expense of the poor and middle class.
When it became apparent in 2010 that Greece would not be able to refinance sovereign debts coming due, the Troika bought large amounts of Greek sovereign bonds from the private banks and institutional investors holding them - thereby largely holding investors harmless, though it did impose a partial 'haircut' on some of Greece's creditors in March 2012. The Troika's intervention effectively prevented Greece from having to declare bankruptcy. It also transferred the risk of Greek bond defaults or any additional 'haircuts' away from the owners and creditors of banks or investment funds, and onto European taxpayers.
In exchange for refinancing a substantial chunk of Greece's debt, which currently stands at about 175 percent of GDP, the ECB - as one of the country's three main creditor institutions - has had an important say over the list of structural reforms and budget cutbacks the Greek government has been required to agree to in exchange for the Troika's refinancing support.
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