Leftist Leader in Greece Rules Out Coalition With Incumbents

[bemildred]

Source: NYT

ATHENS — Greece’s post-election political and economic chaos deepened Tuesday, when the leader of a leftist anti-austerity party that gained in the balloting ruled out a coalition with the two formerly dominant parties that had backed hugely unpopular budget cuts.

The announcement raised further doubts about the country’s future in the euro zone, as well as fears about the stability of the common currency itself.

In a meeting with President Karolos Papoulias, the leader of the upstart party, Alexis Tsipras, ridiculed his counterparts of the two other parties, Antonis Samaras of the center-right New Democracy Party and Evangelos Venizelos of the Socialists, whose coalition lost its governing majority in the Sunday parliamentary election.

None of the Greek parties won enough votes Sunday to form a majority. But Mr. Tsipras, whose Coalition of the Radical Left, or Syriza, won the second-largest percentage of votes after New Democracy, is entitled under election laws to try to form a coalition because Mr. Samaras said on Monday that he could not. Mr. Tsipras has three days to try.



Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/09/world/europe/radical-left-leader-in-greece-rules-out-coalition-with-losing-incumbents.html

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. They could only get a majority, then, by using the neo-Nazis

and I damn well hope they've ruled that out too. Out of 300 seats, the 2 parties in the former coalition have 149 seats, which is more than all the other parties, when you leave out the neo-Nazis. In which case, it looks like another election is needed.

I wonder if parties are allowed to re-align in a new election to try to get the 50 seats that go to the largest party? If, for instance, Democratic Left (DIMAR) joined with Syriza, they migfht become the largest party. Unless other parties joined with each other, of course ...

Seat figures:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_legislative_election,_2012

[ProgressiveProfessor]

2. Stalemate

IIRC no party got more than 20% of the vote. I would expect another round of elections

[4th law of robotics]

3. This should be interesting

no government right at a time when they need leadership the most.

[JackRiddler]

4. Greece has not had a legitimate government since the bankers' junta was imposed several months ago.

I'm glad you're deriving some entertainment from the bankers war on Europe.

[hack89]

5. So how do they get a legitmate government? nt

[4th law of robotics]

6. Ah so they did have a legitimate government until then

a government that wracked up an impossible debt that they won't easily overcome.

How is this so complicated for people? Greeks voted for generations for an unsustainable ponzi scheme. It worked fine until it collapsed. It was their own choice. Blaming the banks is silly: who asked for the money?

[tama]

7. Who didn't?

Whole capitalistic financial and banking system and money creation is a giant unsustainable - and destructive - ponzi scheme. Who made you believe in money?

[bemildred]

10. "Who made you believe in money?"

Another bullshit social fiction we could just as well do without.

[Eugene]

8. New Greek poll looms as government efforts founder

Source: Reuters

New Greek poll looms as government efforts founder

By George Georgiopoulos and Karolina Tagaris

ATHENS | Wed May 9, 2012 9:26am EDT

(Reuters) - Greece moved closer to a second snap election on Wednesday when the head of the biggest party launched a new attack on radical leftist Alexis Tsipras, saying his plans for a new government would push the country out of the euro zone.

New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras said in a televised statement that he hoped Tsipras would "come to his senses" before they met for coalition talks later on Wednesday.

Tsipras, riding a wave of public disgust with economic hardship in last Sunday's election, has demanded that Samaras and socialist PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos tear up their 130-billion euro bailout deal with the EU and IMF.

Samaras said this would be "a certain and immediate disaster".

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/09/us-greece-idUSBRE8440DG20120509

[cstanleytech]

9. I get that there are alot of Greeks POed over the austerity

issue but really how else is the country supposed to come up with the money exactly?
After all in the end doesnt it come down to math, if they have the money for the services then fine fund them but if not then arent they pretty much sol?

[tama]

11. Math

First the most basic - you put any interest % on (price of) money, you get a system that is dependent from and collapses without exponential growth of the money system. There is always more debt than money to pay the dept and the dept can be financed only with more money. And so for the numeric symbols of money system to have purchace power, the predatory "real" economy must destroy the carrying capacity of our planet at increasing pace.

This simple math of % and exponential curve is the reason we are in this shit and why the whole system is collapsing - Greece in the forefront.

Any community can create any money system it wants, and there are now many local interest-free money systems also in Greece. And communities can choose to barter or live in a gift economy, or some mixture of all three.

And as for Greek state, it's not getting any money from anywhere, only more debt so it can keep on paying debts. Which are worthless as are all debts in the whole capitalist system, unless debtors can keep on forcing people to stay debt slaves and give their product and natural resources to those who control the global money system. The non-productive parasite slavers and oppressors.

[bemildred]

12. You print it like everybody else does.

Or create it out of nothing on a computer.

[nanabugg]

13. That's the way you clean house and change the direction of a country. nt