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A
hard political background and lobbying with "Schulz's signature"
is being played behind the negotiations in Brussels Group - a
background that seems to be aimed directly at extending the credit
crunch and the delay of any agreement for Greece.
Some
sources close to the Greek negotiating team describe the climate of
the negotiations in Brussels Group as "quite good and
constructive".
However,
despite the disagreements concerning additional measures, the basic
problem is clearly political, as lenders demand from Athens to
present instantly specific figures for the fiscal targets of 2015.
The lenders insist on these figures without taking account the output
of the latest tax regulations, the expected income from the tax
fraud, or, the perspective of a debt relief claimed by the Greek
side.
The
pressure is enforced mainly by Martin Schulz's euro-socialists who
have a strong presence in the negotiating teams and appear to be
stronger hardliners than those of Angela Merkel's team. According to
some sources from Brussels, the "Schultz faction"
continuously lobbying the Greek positions, targeting Tsipras' policy,
as the president of the euro parliament is the number one candidate
for SPD and the chancellery.
A
potential success of the Leftist government under Alexis Tsipras is
considered a threat against the power of the Social democrats in
Europe, therefore a threat against the current political status.
This
specific "lobbying" appears to be responsible for the
recent leaks who blame the Greek side about "bad preparation",
"amateurism" and "lack of coherence" inside the
Greek negotiating team. These tactics, according to some sources, aim
to delay any agreement and worsening the fiscal situation of the
country. The ultimate goal is to drag the Greek government into a
heavy "third rescue package" in June.
Under
such a possibility, the result would be the weakening of Alexis
Tsipras' political "purity", who would be forced to
cooperate with systemic political forces, like Potami, as being quite
popular among the "hardliners" in Berlin and Brussels.
"Potami should be here", is one of the phrases being heard
recently in Brussels.
Source:
There
are two basic conclusions coming from the whole story. First,
obviously, the European Socialists are in panic as they feel a threat
by a potential general rise of the Left in Europe, which will fill a
large political gap. As the Socialists adopted the neoliberal
doctrine, suddenly, they are left with no role to play in the
European societies. The Socialists in Greece almost vanished, while
in Spain, France and elsewhere lost much of their power already:
“...
to me, the most important change and transformation over the last two
decades, as financialization went into overdrive, is the collapse of
all social democracy, the social democrats. [...] obviously, in
Europe and elsewhere, it has collapsed. And the reason it's collapsed
is because it basically accepted, lock, stock, and barrel, the
arguments of neoliberalism, the idea of the market, the idea of
financial growth, of financial expansion. It really believed in it.
And the ones who argue most forcefully still for that are actually
social democrats. It's incredible. And, therefore, their influence,
certainly in Europe, it's just a vanishing. The social democratic
party in Greece has disappeared. The social democratic party in Spain
is disappearing nearly as fast. Social democrats in Portugal are
nowhere to be seen. In country after country--in Germany, the social
democracy is hobbled because of that, because they've accepted
these--they've got nothing to propose which would be the equivalent
of what they used to propose back in the '50s and the '60s and the
'70s, ...”
(http://failedevolution.blogspot.gr/2014/11/signs-of-resistance-against-neoliberal.html)
Second,
the systemic establishment inside and outside Greece, tries to
"downgrade" the Left politically, by dragging it closer to
the dominant neoliberal doctrine. The lenders of Greece are taking
advantage of the devastated landscape caused by their policies and
use every mean to make Tsipras administration compromise. If they
succeed they will achieve a major victory for three reasons:
1st:
They will manage to continue the interrupted (for the moment)
experiment in Greece and expand it in Europe.
2nd:
They will hit heavily current Greek government popularity and
acceptance.
3rd:
They will probably prevent a further rise of the Left in Europe, as
the disappointed voters will realize that the Left is not able to
keep its promises for a different Europe away from bankers, lobbyists
and the new Feudalism.
“Scenario
2: SYRIZA will not gather the required percentage to form an
autonomous government. As the options are limited in the political
anti-austerity front, it may be forced to cooperate with the
Socialists (PASOK), which may be presented with a more populist
profile to persuade that they start to abandon neoliberal ideology,
and the River [Potami] party, which is clearly a creation of the
media to attract voters from the Left. These systemic parties will
try to control as much as possible the coalition so that some basic
'achievements' of the Greek experiment will not be threatened.
Subsequently, these parties may be used to destabilize the government
by breaking the coalition.”
(http://failedevolution.blogspot.gr/2014/12/various-scenarios-for-national.html)
I'm afraid Tsipas and Varoufakis are trying to resurrect some kind of "Old Europe" social democracy from the neo-liberal institutions (including the nominally Social Democratic parties) that were its assassins. See The SYRIZA Moment: A Skeptical Argument
ReplyDeleteSYRIZA needs Leftist coalitions. We are in a transition phase where societies try to defend themselves from the neoliberal hurricane which crushes every European nation and opens the road for the new Feudalism. SYRIZA is now in a defence position until it finds (if it finds), wider alliances in Europe to start the real Left counterattack for the European people.
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