“The conditions imposed on Greece under the terms of its new bailout make its government little more than a puppet, tasked merely with implementing policies imposed by the EU institutions. But this fundamental denial of democracy has been welcomed by financial markets and ratings agencies. Despite the frankly incredible nature of the new bailout deal, Greece’s credit rating has been upgraded and its bond yields have fallen.
Greece has learned its lesson. In September, the Greek people re-elected the newly compliant Syriza government, knowing that this means more harsh austerity and only a faint glimmer of hope for debt relief and economic restoration. They decisively rejected the new party of Syriza dissidents that proposed leaving the Euro. Better poverty and privation than loss of European identity, it seems.
This has not been lost on other countries. Portugal’s President, Cavaco Silva, has just overturned the result of a democratic election that would have brought to power a coalition of Left parties dedicated to ending austerity and restoring the Portuguese economy through increased spending, claiming that Portugal cannot have an “anti-European” government:
‘In 40 years of democracy, no government in Portugal has ever depended on the support of anti-European forces, that is to say forces that campaigned to abrogate the Lisbon Treaty, the Fiscal Compact, the Growth and Stability Pact, as well as to dismantle monetary union and take Portugal out of the euro, in addition to wanting the dissolution of NATO.’
Just as the crushing of the Prague Spring ended overt opposition to Soviet state communism for a generation, so the breaking of the Syriza government has ended overt opposition to the dominance of Brussels. No-one dare oppose the European institutions. True, they are unlikely to send in tanks, or shoot civilians. But the ECB can impose deprivation on whole populations if it chooses. And after the breaking of Greece, no-one is in any doubt that it would do so if it believed that would prevent failure of the Euro project.
In 1968, the President of the U.S., Lyndon Johnson, had this to say about the crushing of the Prague Spring:
‘It is a sad commentary on the communist mind that a sign of liberty in Czechoslovakia is deemed a fundamental threat to the security of the Soviet system.’
It is indeed a sad commentary on the European mind that a sign of liberty in Greece is deemed a fundamental threat to the security of the Eurozone system.”
Nog vragen over het democratische gehalte van de EU iemand?
Quote uit Forbes.
