SAMARA’S INCREASING TROUBLES – AND IT’S JUST THE BEGINNING

THURSDAY, 19 JULY 2012 15:59

Tassos Symeonides (RIEAS Academic Advisor) Copyright: www.rieas.gr The Samaras administration has barely completed one month in power and it is already faced with impossible demands. With the austerity program fizzling out due to Brussels' austerity folly that  has driven Greece into deep and unmanageable depression, the Troikans have announced that  added cuts of EUR 11.8 billion (!) must be affected during  2012-2013. Frau Merkel, in her latest outburst of austerity-induced mania, has adamantly declared that  countries like Greece and Spain cannot be cured but with "more recession" and "domestic devaluation." Pasok's Venizelos has announced that the target of cutting another EUR 11.8  billion is "impossible" to reach given the state of the economy. Samaras though is calling his ministers to insist that more "economies" must be achieved -- even at the expense of salaries and pensions, something that is contrary to his insistent declarations during the election campaign that salaries and pensions "won't be touched" again. The Greek PM didn't have the time even for one, single "hurrah." Bu that was inevitable, and if he thought otherwise he is as unrealistic as the rest of his comrades of the ancien  regime, who still believe they can somehow navigate the Troika's impossible targets and  thus salvage part, at least, of the corrupt system of privilege and patronage that has  brought Greece to its knees. What is obvious (and expected) is that the Samaras government is incapable of dealing with the deluge surrounding Hellas. Just like his immediate predecessors, Samaras has overshot the runway with his promises of renegotiating the Troika's memoranda, somethings that the lenders flatly refused to consider. Now caught between the inevitable hammer and anvil, Samaras needs to decide not how but when he will throw in the towel. In  the meantime, he stands to cause further damage, like his predecessors, by indiscriminate "economies" and the selling out of public assets at bargain basement prices. If anything, Samaras's "victory" made Greece's predicament more glaring and more abrasive.  Greece is bankrupt and walks naked in a sea of thorns while continuing to borrow from "bailout"  funds in order to satisfy the creditors, a truly suicidal action. At some point soon, the situation will again grow into an all-embracing impasse which the  "coalition" now at the helm will be completely unable to manage. Once we reach that point, as Costas Lapavitsas recently put it, "There will.... be a genuinely new government, perhaps formed by the left, which will navigate the chaos and guide the rebuilding of economy and society. Once Greece has made its move, the unraveling of  the EMU will probably start in full earnest."  [emphasis added] Case closed.