A recent case in Greece gives another proof for the fact that the neoliberal establishment becomes increasingly authoritarian
Political
heat rose for one more time in Greece on the occasion of the recent
bomb-attack against the former Greek PM
Lucas Papademos.
The
political opposition, mainly through the neoliberal right party, New
Democracy, attacked the current government, and mainly SYRIZA, for
its stance to criticize Papademos administration as being a
non-elected government, imposed by Greece's creditors from November
2011 to May 2012.
Such
political attacks have become a routine case from the side of the old
political establishment (mainly the Right New Democracy and the
Social-Democrats PASOK), constantly accusing SYRIZA (Coalition of the
Radical Left) that encourages terrorism.
This time,
however, the neoliberal establishment in Greece went one step
further. In one of the biggest TV channels which belongs to a top
Greek oligarch, some neoliberal pundits called
for censorship against Facebook and Twitter users
who expressed negative views against Papademos. Moreover, one of
them, called for prosecution against nearly 10,000 users! The social
media and various independent blogs fired back, pointing that these
pundits have come to the point of requesting Erdogan-type practices!
This is a
picture of a regime that becomes increasingly authoritarian. We can
imagine a 1984-type future where censorship could come at any time,
against anyone who dares to criticize even an unelected banking
puppet, like Papademos. With the pretext of terrorism, repression
measures and militarization of urban centers becomes something common
and people are getting used to it. In the authoritarianism of the
future, people could become suspects of terrorism just for
criticizing someone, even if that happens before any attempt against
him.
The
neoliberal regime in the West and elsewhere becomes increasingly
authoritarian, exactly because the old political establishment which
represents it, starts to collapse almost everywhere. Because its
brainwashing mechanisms start to collapse too. Authoritarianism is
the last resort of the elites when the old tricks don't work anymore.
It happens right now in Brazil,
for example.
Recall
that, the former president of the European
Commission, José Manuel Barroso, came up with the idea, back in
2011, that the then Greek PM George Papandreou could be replaced by
the technocrat Lucas Papademos, as eventually happened, when
Papandreou "dared" to think to hold a referendum on the
acceptance of the terms of the eurozone bailout deal with Greece, and
that, Papademos worked with Goldman
Sachs when Greece was trying to get its debts levels down so it could
swap its currency from the drachma to the euro. It later transpired
that that cross currency deals negotiated between Greece and Goldman
had helped mask Greece’s true levels of debt and contributed to the
current crisis in the eurozone.
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