Greece 2012

[Landslide Lyndon]

Why the Dimar collapse ?

No idea, and we need px to wean himself off boring American elections and devote his attention here, but I would figure they'd be a logical intermediate host for disappointed PASOK voters floating back?

Obviously you don't need my help. You pretty much nailed it.

More pressingly, WHY the "Golden Dawn" (Nazi) surge?

Because immigrants are always the easiest scapegoats during an economic crisis.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Why the Dimar collapse ?

No idea, and we need px to wean himself off boring American elections and devote his attention here, but I would figure they'd be a logical intermediate host for disappointed PASOK voters floating back?

Obviously you don't need my help. You pretty much nailed it.

But the question is, why are they floating back ?

For the same reason 90% of Republicans will vote for Romney even though they don't like him.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Why the Dimar collapse ?

No idea, and we need px to wean himself off boring American elections and devote his attention here, but I would figure they'd be a logical intermediate host for disappointed PASOK voters floating back?

Obviously you don't need my help. You pretty much nailed it.

But the question is, why are they floating back ?

For the same reason 90% of Republicans will vote for Romney even though they don't like him.

Considering that the choice isn't PASOK vs ND anymore but rather Brussel's government vs Hard-left alternative vs Hard-right alternative, I really don't see why anyone disappointed by PASOK would consider coming back.

If the alternatives were worthwhile then PASOK would have been in even more trouble. But most left parties are jokes. Besides their fervent anti-EU rhetoric they have nothing substantial to say, not a single serious proposition about how to handle the current crisis.
Anodyne platitudes and a stringent refusal to enter any kind of coalition government just vindicate PASOK's argument that a vote for SYRIZA, DIMAR or KKE is a vote wasted.

And don't forget that PASOK had a hard core of around 35% of the electorate between 1977-2009. It's not that easy for these people to vote for another party after a lifetime of being staunch supporters of PASOK. Most of them haven't voted for another party in their entire life.

[Landslide Lyndon]

How is it that PASOK is winning back dissatisfied voters while led by the guy that was FINANCE MINISTER throughout the entire term (and still is)? 

Venizelos became finance minister last June after threatening Papandreou that he and his group of deputies would topple the government. Giorgos Papakonstantinou was until then and he took the blame for virtually everything by the media and his colleagues, even though he was constantly undermined by the likes of Venizelos and the rest of the old guard which didn't lift a finger to help with the necessary reforms.

[Landslide Lyndon]

like france, seems greeks want another dose of liberalism...

There are no real liberal/conservative parties in Greece and that's our biggest problem. Everybody from the far left to the far right favors our current system of elephantine government, absurd regulations and bureaucracy, and crony capitalism.

[Landslide Lyndon]

What's the threshold to get any seats?

3%.

[Landslide Lyndon]

What's the date of the election, again?

Also, does Greece plan to do anything about this ridiculous "give the winner 50 free seats" bulls**t at some point?  When the "winning" party may well get <25% of the vote?

It appears that the right rigs the system every time they take power.

Nah, PASOK was even better at that when they were in power.

Also, does Greece plan to do anything about this ridiculous "give the winner 50 free seats" bulls**t at some point?  When the "winning" party may well get <25% of the vote?

There would be a point to that if the smaller parties had shown a willingness to form coalitions and participate in governing.
But almost all of them (especially the left wing ones) have done the exact opposite and ruled out from the outset any such possibility. They are going after the protest vote and they couldn't care less about helping our country in any way.

[Landslide Lyndon]

PASOK did introduce a fully proportional system in the late 80s. That led to three elections in a year and to the abandonment of the idea by the Greek political ruling class.

They did it after the Koskotas scandal erupted, to prevent ND from getting a majority in the parliament. They never really believed the idea of coalition governments and certainly the way the left behaved that period did nothing to prove them wrong.

[Landslide Lyndon]

one of last polls :

01-ND........................21.5% (liberal)
02-PASOK..................14% (social-liberal)
03-SYRISA.................13% (radical left)
04-ANEL....................11% (national-conservative)
05-KKE......................11% (communist)
06-DIMAR....................9.5% (social-liberal)
07-XA..........................5.5% (nazi)
08-OP.........................3.5% (green)
09-LAOS.....................3% (nationalist)
10-DISY.......................2% (liberal)
11-ANTARSYA..............1% (?est.)(liberal)
12-DRASI....................1% (?est.)(liberal)
13-EPAM.....................1% (?) (no information. on their site, they speak about FYROM, but, can't determine his political ideology)

PASOK has always been considered socialist/social democratic, but if we're going to call them what they really are, than you may as well call them neo-liberal.  But DIMAR is socialist/social democratic rather than left-liberal, no?

Nobody really knows. Besides their opposition to austerity and some rather innocuous, garden variety leftist slogans, DIMAR has refused to make any concrete proposals about how we should deal with the crisis. And their position about staying in the Eurozone can be described at best as ambiguous and at worst as muddled and incoherent.   

[Landslide Lyndon]

Basically "try to renegotiate with the EU because this is clearly not acceptable; but we don't really want to burn all bridges either so exiting the Eurozone is very much only a last resort even though it needs to be at least sort of on the table", which isn't all that different from Syriza, right? While the KKE stance is of course "we told you so. Now let's giddout".

Does anyone happen to have results be nomos for 1993 or earlier years?

Yeah, something like that, even though they are much more vague when they actually talk about it.
SYRIZA actually has drifted much closer to KKE when it comes to Europe, that's after all the main reason why Kouvelis and the others left it and formed DIMAR.

I will try to find something for you Lewis.

[Landslide Lyndon]

There you go, not exact results but maps from 1974 to 2009.

http://www.kathimerini.gr/4dcgi/_w_articles_kathpolitics_1_25/09/2009_1289690

[Landslide Lyndon]

'found a poll....but i'm not certain the date is right

http://www.vprc.gr/uplds/File/teleytaia%20nea/Graphs_PoliticalSurvey_Kontra_April2012.pdf


only 68.4 % of people answering voting a party. So I take the results on base 100 upon base 68.4


SYRISA   18,42
ND   15,2
DIMAR   13,6
KKE   12,72
PASOK   8,63
ANEL   7,89
XA   6,29
LAOS   4,97
greens   4,24
DISY   2,05
DRASI   1,17
ANTARSYA   0,88
autres   3,95

That's a month old and you got the numbers wrong.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Good job Mr. King.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Given the high likelihood of an incredibly fractured Parliament, here's the procedure for forming a government in Greece in the absence of a Parliamentary majority:

What if XA, for some improbable reason, became the largest party?

That's about as probable as a member of the communist party being elected President of the US.

Anyway, they've been under constant attack from the entire political spectrum during the last month and I expect them to underperform the last polls.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Given the high likelihood of an incredibly fractured Parliament, here's the procedure for forming a government in Greece in the absence of a Parliamentary majority:

What if XA, for some improbable reason, became the largest party?

That's about as probable as a member of the communist party being elected President of the US.

Anyway, they've been under constant attack from the entire political spectrum during the last month and I expect them to underperform the last polls.

I don't think they will underperform, but I think they won't get more than 10%.

Despite being attacked from all the parties it didn't stop the other Right-wingers in Europe from overpolling by a few points, because their supporters are still very motivated to go out and vote. So, probably no underperforming (less than 5%).

There are plenty other more "respectable" right-wing, anti-immigrant, anti-EU parties to vote for and XA's support is VERY soft.
Praising the 1967-74 dictatorship is one thing. But praising Hitler and the Nazis is a big no-no in a country that suffered immensely during WWII and the German occupation. 

[Landslide Lyndon]

Without reading through their Wikipedia article, I would be interested what the XA's position on the German-led austerity measures for Greece is. Do they favor the annexation of Greece to Germany ?

Of course they are opposed, they are nationalists so they consider the measures imposed by EU as an infringement of our independence and freedom.

They only polled at 5%, so in order to become largest party they would need another 15% or so, maybe even 20% because the ND might get easily as much as 25%.

And even if they get 1st (bad for Greece's image, I know), but then there are the more normal partys that can form a government and XA will probably fade into nothingness in the next years.

I was imagining XA-LAOS-?, but I can't find anyone willing to be "?".

I think LAOS is a totally different construction site than XA (but maybe I'm wrong). I always thought of LAOS as a very rightwing FPÖ/BZÖ-like party without the Nazi component. But maybe Lyndon knows more.

There will be no coalition of anybody with XA. Everybody has denounced them as Nazi-loving thugs and pleaded with the voters not to send them in the parliament because that would be an embarrassment for our political system.

[Landslide Lyndon]

I will probably vote DISY if for no other reason because they are the only reasonable and responsible voice in the current political cacophony.

[Landslide Lyndon]

I will probably vote DISY if for no other reason because they are the only reasonable and responsible voice in the current political cacophony.

That's probably not a terrible choice, despite them being ideologically far more right-wing than I am. All the other parties, from a serious standpoint, are irresponsible douches. Now, I don't know if I could resist not voting for the KKE, which is truly a party with so much comedic talent and skill.

Yeah, I don't agree with some of the neoliberal policies on steroids they advocate for. Heck, I even got in a facebok brawl with one of their candidates because when I pointed out that one of his proposed policies would increase unemployment he said that he "didn't care" and that some people losing their jobs would be a small price to pay for complete economic freedom.

But compared to the socialist utopias, fascist dystopias or the waffling that comes from the other parties, I'll take it. Greece has drifted too much to the left (or rather a caricature of the left) and parties like DISY are necessary so as to have an ideologically balanced debate here.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Does Greece do exit polls? Or do they have another ridiculous election law against those?

We do. They will be released at 7PM local, which I guess is 12PM Eastern.

[Landslide Lyndon]

I voted 10 min. ago.
Waiting now for the exit polls in five minutes.

[Landslide Lyndon]

[Landslide Lyndon]

When will we start getting actual numbers?

Small precincts have already started to report.
Conclusive results we'll have in 2 hours.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Hey guys, do you know how to get a permanent visa for Canada, Australia, the moon?

[Landslide Lyndon]

KKE hasn't benefitted at all.

They will say as usually that they did everything right but the people were hoodwinked by the media and their puppetmasters.

[Landslide Lyndon]

KKE hasn't benefitted at all.

They will say as usually that they did everything right but the people were hoodwinked by the media and their puppetmasters.

And, as usual, the second part of the statement will be technically correct (if a little... well not irrelevant exactly...) And the first not. At all.

ΚΚΕ has its own newspaper, radio and TV station.