But there is still a long way to go.

Time To Think, 10 March 2010

The referendum for or against taking over the Ice-save debts unconditionally by the Icelandic tax-payer has brought a clear “No” vote with 93.2% of those who voted, while participation of voters in the referendum was at 62,7%.
Publicly both the British government, as well as the IMF, seem to have mellowed in their rhetoric and ready for a compromise in their demands.

However, after everything that has gone on before, I wouldn´t even trust them to tell us the correct time.
The British as well as the banking elites have in the past always followed two tactics at the same time. They smile and shake hands above board, and then kick those they deem weak and still not submissive enough below the table with spiked boots, while denying any responsibility for the harm they inflict. (Their spikes constitute either economic attacks or black-op intelligence operations)

As for the home-front, there had been a relentless campaign against the referendum from the very day Icelandic president refused to sign the law for the debt-take-over.
In the most widely viewed comedy program on the main publicly owned TV-station the president was portrayed as an idiot responsible for the country to burn down, while his wife was portrayed as an imbecile, and the Icelandic people, who had signed the petition for a referendum, as too stupid to know their own mind.

In time there eventually were a few other voices to be heard on Icelandic media, but the government itself didn´t budge.
No matter what reasonable and respected voices had to say on the matter. The government opposed the idea of a direct democratic decision.
Until the last minute the government had tried to discourage the voters from voting. The Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance both said they would not participate in the referendum. They saw it as a “waste of money” and a “farce”.
This disregard for the very people who had put them into office angered just about everybody who is the slightest bit interested in politics here.

Personally I really do not understand why those two government officials did this kind of a stunt. Quite obviously they were hurting themselves and their political parties in this way.
The only explanation, I could think of, is that they were threatened with dire consequences to the nation, if the referendum went ahead.

The Icelandic referendum, the voice of the people against the blackmailing power of the international financial elites might now have become precedent for other countries in similar situations.
What the bankers seem to fear above all things is a direct democracy in financial matters.

And no doubt that´s quite a reasonable fear, for such a democracy would lead to more and more people getting informed about financial matters and the money-creation process itself.
The knowledge about this process coupled with the instruments of a direct democracy would lead eventually and without any doubt to a monetary reform and a loss of power for the international bankers.

The Icelandic government officials were doubtless under great pressure not to support this kind of a direct democracy here, but they were also surely under the very same pressure not to tell the Icelandic people the truth. And that´s why few outside the government could understand their attitude.

If there were early elections the opposition parties would most likely win now, although the largest opposition party, the Independence Party, was the one which is actually responsible for the whole mess of the Icelandic financial collapse. Their government first privatized the banks and then did not regulate those private banks in a sufficient manner,which would have prevented the bank´s limitless expansion abroad and by doing so taking enormous risks for the Icelandic economy.

Before 2003 the Icelandic banks had been in public hands(either belonging to the national state, or local communities or public organizations like the public pension funds). No needless risks were taken this way. The banks´activities stayed inside the country and in this way all revenues from interests were recycled back into the Icelandic economy. And with this revenue the whole of the Icelandic public infrastructure was financed, propelling the country from one of the most under-developed countries in Europe before 1944 to one of the most developed ones, enjoying one of the highest living-standards for the general population (not just for the rich)

But then the Icelandic government was persuaded by British “advisers”(mainly from the ultra-large British investment-bank HSBC) to privatize the banks and allow them to grow beyond Icelandic borders. This, according to the “advisers”, would bring foreign investment money into the country by which Iceland could then expand its hydro-electric energy market and create jobs in the more remote areas of the country.
In the last few decades more and more people had moved from there to Reykjavik and the surrounding population centers for lack of working opportunities elsewhere.

Submitted by Sullivan on Thu, 2010-03-11 08:18

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