Greece General Discussion

[Famous Mortimer]

Holy shyt. They renamed themselves after the Democrats to seem MORE left-wing?

[Famous Mortimer]

If SYRIZA, PASOK, and the KKE have a majority, they will form a government

SYRIZA isn't going to reject PASOK if it makes the difference between forming or not forming a government, they're not stupid.

Same with the KKE. You can't use their past behavior to predict how they would react in this situation because there's never been a situation like this in the past.

[Famous Mortimer]

If PASOK doesn't enter into a coalition with SYRIZA, it will probably split into two parties over the issue.

[Famous Mortimer]

I was thinking a more major split between Papandreou and Venizelos.

[Famous Mortimer]

I can't imagine how they wouldn't be needed. It would be risky to depend on The River alone.

I also think it's odd you people keep talking about SYRIZA "not wanting" PASOK. They don't want PASOK because they've been promoting austerity. If PASOK joined a SYRIZA led coalition, they wouldn't keep promoting austerity, at least not nearly as much as they do now.

SYRIZA doesn't like PASOK because of PASOK's policies. If PASOK's policies changed, SYRIZA would have no reason to keep disliking them.

[Famous Mortimer]

If you're unaware, KKE is the last remaining old-style Stalinist party in Europe. The median age of its Politburo is in the 70s. The leadership have repeatedly denounced SYRIZA as revisionists and splitters (SYRIZA left KKE in the 90s to form a new party) and refuses to work with them in any way. A few years ago, when KKE joined with the police to beat the hell out of protestors, a lot of the people they were beating on were SYRIZA members and voters. The two do not play nice.

Those clashes took place in 2009, when ND and PASOK were still the largest two parties and no one had any idea who, if anyone, was going to break the two party system. KKE and SYRIZA were both minor parties competing with each other to see who would lead the left. That battle is over now, SYRIZA won and the dynamic is now changed.

[Famous Mortimer]

Papandreou seems legitimately left-wing, although he's certainly a power monger as well. I am reminded of how this whole mess started, when Papandreou called for a referendum on austerity, which was basically his way of coming out against austerity at a time when that was considered politically unrealistic.