Neoliberal Thugs

IMF and Germany Are Hell-Bent on Finishing Off Even a Moderate Left in Greece


(Truthout) Negotiations between Greece and its official creditors - the European Commission, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and European Central Bank - are currently in renewed deadlock.

Yet, only a few days ago, in the Euro summit on Monday, June 22, all indications were that Europe’s political beasts and the "criminal IMF" were ready to accept the latest capitulation on the part of the Greek leftist government, which, since coming to power in late January, has spent a lot of time doing nothing more than "yelling, kicking and screaming" against austerity and the bailout program (and treating senior-level EU officials with disdain in public as part of its well-orchestrated populist theatrics) while at the same time seeking to assure Greece’s euro partners that it is committed to keeping the country in the euro area and that it would fulfill all its obligations to the creditors.

If there has ever been a more lame strategy of negotiations and a greater self-defeating course of public diplomacy in recent history is really quite hard to say, but the incompetence of the Syriza-led government is beyond questioning.

The apparent contradiction of the political and diplomatic posture chosen by the Syriza-led government toward the architects of Greece’s economic and social catastrophe was motivated by two things: satisfying public opinion at home, which had grown quite restless with the obsequious stance of the previous Greek governments toward Europe’s political elite and Germany in particular; and presupposing, quite erroneously, that the Grexit scenario was an unthinkable possibility for Europe and the US. (Incidentally, as further evidence of the amateurism and dangerous political opportunism of the Syriza-led government, it seems to have reached the absurd conclusion that the US under the Obama administration was an actual ally in its struggle to challenge austerity and neoliberalism in Europe!). .................(more)

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/31596-imf-and-germany-are-hell-bent-on-finishing-off-even-a-moderate-left-in-greece