Greece 2012

[tpfkaw]

(Source: YAHOO News)
Greek coalition government expels 43 deputies, over dissent in crucial debt vote

Can anyone tell me what the tallies are at the moment (or is that impossible)?

PASOK 132
ND 62
KKE 21
LAOS 14
Left Coalition 9
Independents 62(!)

Has there been this much disloyalty anywhere in the history of partisan parliaments, ever?

I can think of a few US examples where the majority of backbenchers opposed the party leadership, but then in the US the party whips aren't nearly as strong as in other countries - there's no procedure to expel people from the party.  If David Duke wants to be a Republican or Lyndon LaRouche a Democrat, they can't do anything about it, nor can they remove them as candidates if they win the primary.

[tpfkaw]

Is it even going to be possible for anyone to form a government with the current numbers?

[tpfkaw]

Holy fwuck... the *actual* Nazis are polling at over 5%?

[tpfkaw]

And probably a big no-no because they were...uh...Nazis. Though it is especially peculiar in Greece and even more ironic considering current Greek-German relations.

It's quite simple really:

1. Merkel is a Nazi.
2. Germany is doing fine.
3. If we vote for Nazis, we'll do fine!

[tpfkaw]

The guys on Something Awful argued that the ND's best hope is to encourage bribe individual members of ANEL to jump ship to ND and members of DIMAL to join PASOK.  It'd be a tough sell (who wants to climb onto a sinking ship?), but with the right kind of inducements, it doesn't seem too far out.

That's exactly what I was thinking.  (Also, what's so conservative about ANEL anyway?  Socon/anti-immigrant?)

An anti-austerity coalition would have to include either one of the two 'system' parties or the Nazis, and one including the Nazis would have a majority of 2 seats, unless Tsipras thinks a few ND or PASOK MPs can be lured away. A couple dozen defections would keep the Nazis out but I'm not sure if anybody considers that at all likely or not.

Perhaps everyone-but-Nazis with the Nazis giving confidence and supply?  (Although I imagine anything involving the Nazis will cause DIMAR or SYRIZA deputies to defect to PASOK, giving the grand coalition a majority).



My Greece, you are a clusterphuck!  Thanks for sinking the US economy, assholes!

[tpfkaw]

It's not the same thing (reserve currency status), but it's not like the U.S. is in much better financial shape than Greece. Look at the American deficit.

Well of course, but it's not it's caused an international financial panic yet.

[tpfkaw]

20% for parties below threshold - and it didn't even fulfill the supposed goal of "keeping Nazis out."  Can we please abolish such things?

[tpfkaw]

If a "fiscal union" is created for the purpose not of clamping down on profligacy but using German/Germanic credit quality to increase it, then 3-7 years later we'd be talking about the entire-EU debt crisis.  While such an event would undoubtedly be hilarious in several ways, it would probably provoke a worldwide depression.

[tpfkaw]

So they have The Jerry Springer Show in Greece?

[tpfkaw]

And now ND(!) is first in Eastern Crete and PASOK is third.

[tpfkaw]

It would be nice if someone would actually step up to the plate in that country and not constantly try to shift the burden to someone else.

ND has, sort of.  (Besides the whole pandering/preparing to blame the Germans by saying they'll "renegotiate" the bailout agreement).

[tpfkaw]

13 out of 14 SYRIZA districts have a lower % reporting than nationally, good news for them.

Edit: Nevermind, seems some parts of the Greek elections website update faster than others.