Posted on 04/20/2012 6:26:16 AM PDT by C19fan
Anyone anxiously waiting for the European Union’s death knell could do worse than circle May 6 on his calendar. That’s when Greece, a nation brought to its knees by an unprecedented economic crisis, is scheduled to hold what promises to be a turbulent parliamentary election. It’s an open question whether Europe’s fragile political balance—and Greece’s tenuous hold on membership in the Eurozone—will survive the subsequent aftershocks. What’s already clear is that life in Greece will never quite be the same.
(Excerpt) Read more at tnr.com ...
When the present parliament got its start, it had five political parties. Under the pressures of the economic depression that descended upon the country, those five parties have now split into a total of ten. Polls predict that the new parliament will include at least eight.
Shockingly, all recent surveys agree that one of these will be Golden Dawn (Chrysi Augi), a violently xenophobic and pro-Nazi organization which has exploited public anger over the uncontrolled influx of illegal immigrants into the country. The far left, meaning the unrepentantly Stalinist Communist Party and the fissiparous Marxists of SYRIZA, are also expecting their fiery anti-austerity rhetoric to pay electoral dividends—they are both vying for a third place finish. A more longshot but not entirely hopeless contender for third place are the newly minted Independent Greeks, a right-wing party that flirts with sectarian Greek-Orthodox rhetoric, which was founded just last February by Panos Kammenos, a disaffected demagogue who quit Nea Dimokratia because of its support for the tough measures accompanying Greece’s second bailout. Kammenos rails against the “foreign occupation” of Greece by its official lenders and calls for Greece’s debt to be erased.
More generally, these new parties, on both the left and the right, stubbornly resist any suggestion that the Greeks as a people share any measure of responsibility for the cataclysm that has befallen them. In their story, it is all the fault of foreign bankers and corrupt domestic politicians;
I can envision something similar here if we continue on our current path. More and more, the Dems and Reps appear to be just different wings of the same party. They have become disconnected from the people and see themselves as the arbiters of what is best for the people even if the people don't want it. Obamacare is a prime example.
Thus providing another example of the dangers of a democracy.
hell, it’s gonna take a death blow tomorrow when the Frogs vote for a 90 degree left turn...
Fissiparous
I learned a new word today. Thanks!!
I can envision something similar here if we continue on our current path. More and more, the Dems and Reps appear to be just different wings of the same party. They have become disconnected from the people and see themselves as the arbiters of what is best for the people even if the people don't want it. Obamacare is a prime example.
It's human nature. We have a built-in desire to rise above the real world into a idealized world of abstraction and purity. The products of Western science and technology allow elites - in every country - to create artificial worlds for themselves, to live in artificial bubbles. Within their bubbles, members of the elites can flatter themselves into the delusion that they can make reality do their bidding, even when what they bid goes against fundamental laws of economics.
Thus, we have a breach of trust. The elites just "float away" in their bubble worlds, pleasuring themselves as they contemplate the moon and the stars.
Fissiparous |fiˈsipərəs| adjective
inclined to cause or undergo division into separate parts or groups:
fissiparousness noun
>But the biggest victims of the Greek voters’ choice will be >themselves.
No it will be the banks that will see Greek debt they are holding go to zero value. But one could hardly call those institutions ‘victims’.
The real victims are those that see the inflation tax drive them from middle class to day to day existence. The structured devaluing of dollar/euro will continue as this debt is deleveraged.
So is the lawless behavior of our government regarding illegal immigration. Instead of instituting policies which create incentives for illegals to go home, liberals behave as if we should welcome them into our unsustainable entitlement system; free education, free food, free health care.
For many years someone has been using my daughters Social Security number. This is not a mistake or an innocent error. This is, no doubt, the purposeful theft of a part of my daughter's identity to enable an illegal to work in the U.S.; doing a job that some other recipient of entitlements won't do.
Ding!Ding!Ding! We have a winner! Today’s winner in the STUMP THE CHUMP CONTEST is Yannis Palaiologos with the word “fissiparous”. Hopefully, Yannis will split his winning with others.
Couldn't agree more. DOJ is suing AZ, SC, and AL for enforcing federal law while at the same time casting a blind eye to sanctuary states and cities that are violating federal law.
Thanks C19fan.
Impending collapse of the EU will usher Turkey (and maybe Russia) right on in the door, as Greece is given the boot.
C.S. Lewis used the word in Pilgrim's Regress: "Evil is fissiparous, and could never in a thousand eternities find any way to arrest its own reproduction."
Cheers!
C.S. Lewis used the word in Pilgrim's Regress: "Evil is fissiparous, and could never in a thousand eternities find any way to arrest its own reproduction."
Cheers!
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