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...
>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.
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.