The ruling elite in Greece and the EU are apparently convinced that they can best regain control over growing popular opposition to austerity measures with the help of SYRIZA.

More... (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/may2012/gree-m15.shtml)

So the Trots don't like Syriza, either. Twice a day the Trots are right...

So the Trots don't like Syriza, either. Twice a day the Trots are right...

WSWS don't like anybody but SEP. At least we were spared the usual cheap shot at KKE. Yeah, their analysis pretty much concurs with what Nikos said, we might wanna talk with him about that.....

Well, here's an easy fix, whadda ya think, Nikos?



When a company goes bankrupt, its creditors have the option of chopping it up into pieces to recoup their debts and claim their shares. Greece could do the same, offering all or part of itself to other countries in Europe and beyond. Along its northern and western edges are large, ethnically Albanian, Macedonian, and Turkish communities that have occasionally been the subject of extraterritorial claims by groups in neighboring countries. These countries might be willing to pony up a lot of cash in return for a change in Greece's borders. Foreign billionaires who enjoy their Mediterranean holidays might also be persuaded to pick up an island or two. There's plenty of precedent for cash-for-land deals — Seward's Icebox, anyone?

http://www.npr.org/2012/05/18/152990481/foreign-policy-5-easy-solutions-to-the-greek-crisis

They really do raise these guys in baskets, in dark closets.

This needs to be disseminated widely throughout Greece. KKE's ranks would swell over night. Jesus, the contempt, the disdain, the haughtiness. The streets are going to run red someday - in both meanings...

SYRIZA, as advertised


The purpose of Tsipras’ tour is to reassure the banks and the major imperialist powers that, despite his criticisms of the bailouts, he will be a safe pair of hands should SYRIZA win the elections and form a government. In a long interview Sunday with Reuters—excerpted in the Guardian and in France’s business daily Les Echos—Tsipras stressed that he supports the EU and intends both to repay the banks and to continue “reforms” begun by PASOK.

snip

Tsipras here returned to a position he has repeatedly advanced: that Europe has to adopt the policies the Obama administration adopted in response to the economic crisis. In a May 18 New York Times interview, he explained that his message for the G8 is that “we have to press [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel to follow the example of America, where the debt crisis wasn’t tackled with austerity measures but with an expansionist approach.”

snip

Nothing more clearly exposes the anti-working class character of SYRIZA’s program than Tsipras’ support for Obama’s policies. While the banks got hundreds of billions of public funds from Washington and some $7.7 trillion printed by the Federal Reserve, Obama is waging a bitter assault on the workers. Millions of workers lost their jobs, social conditions are disintegrating, education costs are rising sharply, and workers faced deep wage cuts—highlighted by the 50 percent wage cuts for new hires in the auto industry.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/may2012/syri-m22.shtml

No Mr Tsipras, we haven't even seen the fullness of Mr Obams'a policy yet, that will come next year, you just want his oily rhetoric.

Obama is waging a bitter assault on the workers. Millions of workers lost their jobs, social conditions are disintegrating, education costs are rising sharply, and workers faced deep wage cuts—highlighted by the 50 percent wage cuts for new hires in the auto industry.

This is dead-on.

And if any lurkers out there were wondering why KKE would not even talk to SYRIZA - this is why...

A tale of two dipshits...


Before flying to Brussels to attend a meeting of the European Peoples' party on the sidelines of tomorrow's EU summit conservative leader Antonis Samaras blasted Tsipras for what he described as "his arrogance and naivety."

"Only a naive and dangerous [person] would attack a politician whose views are so obviously in favour of our homeland," said Samaras. "He [Tsipras] has proved, yet again, how arrogant he is and how dangerous he is for the interests of the country which he is threatening with international isolation at such a critical hour."
Regular readers will recall that addressing reporters in Paris on Monday the far-leftist reminded the French president that "he will soon have to answer crucial questions. He will mainly have to answer whether all he said before the elections is valid after the elections because the French people sent Mr Sarkozy on vacation to Morocco not so he could be replaced by someone who will implement the same policy."

Tsipras is believed to have been piqued that Hollande refused to see him. The French president reportedly declined talks with the Syriza leader citing protocol. He will be even more piqued today....
...First thing this morning, Evangelos Venizelos the Greek socialist leader who had openly supported Hollande's election, was among the first visitors to the French Elysee. At a 40-minute meeting called unexpectedly by Hollande, the former finance minister briefed the French president on the state of the Greek economy and enforcement of reforms in return for the country's latest €130 bn rescue package from the EU and IMF.
Venizelos also emphasised the missed targets and mistakes that had been made in the course of debt-stricken Greece's huge fiscal adjustment. Aides said he didn't miss the opportunity to give a bleak assessment of the despair and desperation many Greeks now feel after two and a half years of austerity.
Following the talks Venizelos also lashed out at Tsipras for his remarks, saying on Twitter: "You don't negotiate insulting foreign leaders and moreoever [insulting them] in their own countries."

http://www.thebellforum.com/showthread.php?t=74038

bolding added

The gall of this guy, he and Hollande will be singing a duet very soon.

Looks like the scrum to the center in Greece continues, both KKE and Golden Dawn have lost ground according to polls cited at the link. Seems like as PASOK has lost all credibility so must SYRIZA by showing it's true colors. People are reluctant to go for radical change until all of the more comfortable(and illusory) options are exhausted.

People are reluctant to go for radical change until all of the more comfortable(and illusory) options are exhausted.

And what is more depressing is that with every delay and every attempt to make austerity into something else, the peoples' misery will only increase...

And what is more depressing is that with every delay and every attempt to make austerity into something else, the peoples' misery will only increase...

It is more than that. It is more than simply going for radical change... it is also going for the lonely path. Once part of mighty Europe and then, overnight, tiny Greece... with no clear path as to how you survive. The old bipolar world gave you an exit. EU decomposition would give you company. Iran and Venezuela are probably not a practical overhang to live under.

It is hard to be the first.

It is more than that. It is more than simply going for radical change... it is also going for the lonely path. Once part of mighty Europe and then, overnight, tiny Greece... with no clear path as to how you survive. The old bipolar world gave you an exit. EU decomposition would give you company. Iran and Venezuela are probably not a practical overhang to live under.

It is hard to be the first.

This is an honest question and I don't mean it to be insulting to Nikos or anyone else but, what do you think happens if the KKE really comes face to face with that abyss?

I promised to tell you once what happened in Portugal. There is the answer.

NATO prepared to invade, the Soviets could offer little support, the Socialists had money pouring into them and they claimed the same "objectives" without war, civil and external, the Euro-communists acted as open saboteurs and the PCP blinked.

I'm still not sure what was "correct"...

I promised to tell you once what happened in Portugal. There is the answer.

NATO prepared to invade, the Soviets could offer little support, the Socialists had money pouring into them and they claimed the same "objectives" without war, civil and external, the Euro-communists acted as open saboteurs and the PCP blinked.

I'm still not sure what was "correct"...

The question is what will be the reaction of the EU and NATO. If there arises some possibility of a coalition government that includes the KKE, separating from NATO and the EU will be almost assured. When Portugal was faced with something similar, the fact of the USSR made stout reaction from NATO a requirement, now there is less alarm at a tiny, poor, "fringe" country dropping out and imploding (this is all from NATO - US - perspective). But, the Euro-American bourgeoisie has demonstrated so much panic and overreaction in the past three or four years, that who knows what they may do. What is the current belief in the "domino theory" among the Lords of the Universe?

Anax once said that he was not that "up" on predicting the future, but could do much better at looking at the past. Well, I am way in the back of the class in that regard, all I can do is root for our side...

The question is what will be the reaction of the EU and NATO. If there arises some possibility of a coalition government that includes the KKE, separating from NATO and the EU will be almost assured. When Portugal was faced with something similar, the fact of the USSR made stout reaction from NATO a requirement, now there is less alarm at a tiny, poor, "fringe" country dropping out and imploding (this is all from NATO - US - perspective). But, the Euro-American bourgeoisie has demonstrated so much panic and overreaction in the past three or four years, that who knows what they may do. What is the current belief in the "domino theory" among the Lords of the Universe?

Anax once said that he was not that "up" on predicting the future, but could do much better at looking at the past. Well, I am way in the back of the class in that regard, all I can do is root for our side...

The whole sorry assed drama gonna hafta play out, who should know better than the Greeks? In the next act SYRIZA looks in the mirror and sees Nemesis, KKE plays the part of the Chorus.