I’ve been waiting for the smoke to clear a bit before posting the Greek elections. I’ll have a detailed piece up tomorrow on how The Radical Left (Syriza) built themselves up from nothing to getting 26% of the vote in just eight years and came in second to New Democracy. And yes, Syriza are real radicals. This could be a sea change.
For now, consider this from Zero Hedge. None of the parties including Syriza really wanted to win because they know a train wreck is coming and would rather take power months from now when the other parties have been blamed for the imploded Greek economy.
New Democracy may still face a lot of trouble building a coalition to try to keep Greece in the bailout, and in the Euro . There has long been a rumour that Tsipras wanted to lose, so as to (rightly) blame the coming crush on the status quo parties. What fewer of us counted on was that the status quo parties wouldn’t want to win the election either. The pro-bailout socialists Pasok have thrown a monkey wrench into coalition-building by claiming they won’t take part in any coalition that doesn’t also include Syriza. This seems rational; when the tsunami hits, all parties in government will surely take a lot of long-term political damage.
The Eurozone will not survive in its current form and everyone knows it.