As we all know the theory of the two extremes in Greece is not just rhetoric because every one knows that all political forces whether they be left and/or right -anywhere in the world- always have always had radical components within them. The Republicans in the US have the Tea Party, the Political science terms this as the horseshoe theory, and the earliest use of this term appears to be from Jean-Pierre Faye's book Le Siècle des idéologies. In fact Faye argues that rather than the far left and the far right being at opposite and opposing ends of a linear political continuum, they in fact closely resemble one another, much like the ends of a horseshoe. Specifically, the two ends share an authoritarian element.
Example: In extreme left political systems (such as communism) the government takes control of the economic resources. In extreme right political systems (such as fascism) the government also takes control of the economic life, creating a central planning. With both extremes, this theory asserts, the power elite are opposed to genuine clean elections, genuinely free media and speech, and similar democratic institutions that characterise the political center.
In Greece, and for many years, the Right has/had the far-Right hardliners Golden Dawn, while the Left has -and still does- the radical ANTARSYA group, as well as other radical leftist elements.
In the aftermath of the recent arrests of Golden Dawn members, a new debate has started in Greece.
Specifically, last Friday, Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras sent an indirect message to SYRIZA by launching an attack on opposition parties that fail to categorically denounce violent acts, and he was particularly strict with his words on those parties that maintain that there is good and bad sort of violence.
While addressing New Democracy’s political committee, and while referring to the arson attack on the Skouries gold mine earlier this year, Samaras said that it is unacceptable for Greek citizens to differentiate between good and bad violence adding that illegal activity and criminal behavior should never be viewed as good, praiseworthy and moral.
(So far so good, we totally agree. Violence does not have a pretty or ugly side, it is still violence!)
But his statements did not sit well with the main opposition SYRIZA party which responded by characterizing Samaras as the “high priest of political division and the theory of the two extremes.” In fact SYRIZA MP Dimitris Papadimoulis said that the theory that draws parallels between his party as well as the far-right Golden Dawn party only damages the country and democracy.
Obviously after these statements, the issue dominated most of the headlines over the weekend which escalated on Sunday when a shocking report sparked a new heated debate.
Specifically, an article by the Athens daily ProtoThema titled "A bug has stung him" concerns the allegations from SYRIZA which claim that the telephones of their MPs were being tapped into by Greek intelligence officials and at the same time opens a debate about the theory of the two extremes.
The issue, which has sparked fierce political confrontation between the government and the main opposition SYRIZA party, and is being viewed by some political analysts as a prologue to a new political crisis.
According to what was suggested in the article, the debate about whether or not SYRIZA engaged in violent acts -or other such operations- involves five cases, which the paper suggested may soon be closer investigated by the Greek judicial system.
* The first case involves the arson attack at the Skouries gold mine in Halkidiki. Those involved in this attack apparently contacted a SYRIZA MP of the area.
* The second case involves the fatal arson attack and at the Marfin bank on Stadiou Street several years ago, which resulted in the death of three people (and an unborn child), with rumors that claim thare there are two people involved here that have been identified to be components of SYRIZA.
* The third case -according to ProtoThema- involves a regional member of SYRIZA of some Aegean island who is shockingly associated -and/or involved with- the Turkish secret service MIT (this according to the surveillance that has been conducted from the National Intelligence Service -EYP- and to the information cited by the newspaper).
* The fourth case concerns another SYRIZA member which the newspaper notes has contact with organizations engaged FYROManian propaganda in Northern Greece.
* The fifth case involves the night of the murder of Alexis Grigoropoulos. According to the paper, Greek intelligence has evidence that in the first two hours after the incident a former component of SYRIZA sent out 55,000 text messages from her phone to students with content that can be considered as encouraging them to take part in a violent uprising. (December 2008 riots against the government of Costas Karamanlis).
With such strong allegations, the newspaper probably has -and/or is basing its information- on evidence that Greek intelligence has.
And if all the above information is true, then SYRIZA has a lot of explaining to do.
Exactly for whom and for what purpose has SYRIZA been working for because with such crimes they have not only betrayed the Greek state, this country's foreign policy, as well as caused massive destruction for tens of hundreds of shops and store owners in Athens and other areas of the country, but they have also threatened lives and may be covering up the murder of three innocent people (including an unborn child).
If authorities have such evidence in their hands, or basically material that implicates members to any of the above cases, then we are dealing with an extremely dangerous situation here, and it should be cleared up by the justice system as quickly as possible.
We have often slammed SYRIZA from HellasFrappe for being too Turk friendly, or too FYROM friendly, for but we would have never imagined that its members would betray this country's foreign policy by siding with the other side.
When the article was published, SYRIZA came out with a very harsh statement, and an unprecedented war of words began between the newspaper and the main opposition party. In a statement, SYRIZA outwardely exposed various cases with which the shareholders and publishers of ProtoThema are apparently implicated in.
SYRIZA may complain but in its Thursday edition of its own party newspaper Avgi claimed that the government was preparing a campaign of "political provocation" aimed at "social movements, the left and mainly Syriza by mobilising parastate elements but also state organs". (All this ofcourse one day before Samaras' speech against the two extremes).
In an article titled "they're setting up a provocation", the unsigned Avgi article claimed that a small group within Samaras' circle was preparing a campaign to "target the violence of the left". The team included the prime minister, his advisers, PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos, and the ministers of public order and justice.
The campaign, said Avgi, would have three elements:
- Firstly, a media campaign would be launched against "leftwing violence".
- Then this would be accompanied by the systematic surveillance of SYRIZA figures in order to establish direct links between the opposition and violence.
- A third element would involve the mobilisation of the judiciary to crack down on social movements associated with the left using the laws against criminal organisations that were utilised against Golden Dawn.
And while all this was going on, New Democracy MP and former minister, Aris Spiliotopoulos tabled a parliamentary question seeking to know when EYP's wiretapping of Golden Dawn MPs began and whether a prosecutor had authorised them to begin with. Spiliotopoulos also requested to learn how EYP ensured that only the criminal, and not the political, activities of the party were monitored, given that confidential reports from the Greek intelligence unit were leaked to the press that contained, among others, information relating to the sexual preferences of one of the indicted Golden Dawn MPs.
The obvious conclusion is that if they did this without Golden Dawn's knowledge, then we can accept that this may have also been done against SYRIZA.
In a nutshell: If we characterize Golden Dawn as a vile group then we can also safely assume that SYRIZA contains Maoist and other nasty anti-democratic elements within its party and it too must immediately relieve itself from these extremist and anarchic elements. Maoist elements do not sound as frightening and as offensive as the word "Nazi" does, but if one reads up about this then they will discover that it really does not differ that much. In fact its followers, known as Maoists, consider it as an anti-Revisionist form of Marxism-Leninism. Maoist organizations draw upon Mao's ideology of the People's War, mobilizing large parts of rural populations to revolt against established institutions by engaging in guerrilla warfare.
This from Wikipedia: Maoism has fallen out of favour within the Communist Party of China, beginning with Deng Xiaoping's reforms in 1978. Deng believed that Maoism showed the dangers of "ultra-leftism", manifested in the harm perpetrated by the various mass movements that characterized the Maoist era.Do you see any difference between Hilter and the era of Maoist thought?
The implementation of Maoist thought in China may have been responsible for over 70 million deaths during peacetime, with the Cultural Revolution, Anti-Rightist Campaign of 1957-58, and the Great Leap Forward. Because of Mao's land reforms during the Great Leap Forward, which resulted in famines, thirty million perished between 1958 and 1961. By the end of 1961 the birth rate was nearly cut in half because of malnutrition. Active campaigns, including party purges and "reeducation" resulted in imprisonment and/or the execution of those deemed contrary to the implementation of Maoist ideals. The incidents of destruction of cultural heritage, religion, and art remain controversial. For more discussion of this period, see the article Cultural Revolution.
We think not..
Conclusion: We agree with Samaras on the theory of the two extremes, and we noted this in our intro paragraph, but the political establishment is certainly not in a position to come across as the guarantor of democracy and stability in this country when we all know that they created this crisis to begin with. Our advice to them -and to all the forces in parliament who talk democracy but only define it by numbers that are friendly to the pocket and not in practice- would be to come to terms with all of their arrogant and malevolent hypocrisy and actions through the years, correct their mistakes and then begin cracking down on extreme left and extreme right elements.
We think this crackdown on both the radical left and the radical right is not about a balance of democracy, but is rather about a further penetration of control from the EU. And this is because radical right-wing and radical left-wing parties have consistently opposed the project of European integration and have succeeded not only in distinguishing themselves from mainstream parties on this dimension, but have also managed to mobilise voters in European Parliament (EP) elections and win consider-able support. This obviously scares the establishment which is trying to keep its control on the masses.
If the EU respects democracy, then it should respect all political ideologies. Condemning one party because of the actions of a few is not democratic. Because if we take this argument to heart, and with the information presented in ProtoThema, SYRIZA must too be penalized for its actions just like Golden Dawn was.
Now its too late...
Signed
Marina Spanos
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