Greece. Rebirth of a nation?

Modern Greece is going through a major financial crisis along with a number of other mainly south European countries. There are many reasons for this and of course the media here have jumped on the band wagon in an attempt to portray the country as the mad lady of the continent. This is of course not correct.

Greece is trying to deal with the fallout from overspending for the last 30 years. Successive governments from both wings found it easy to borrow money on the open markets to buy voters. So the country had a relatively good standard of living with low unemployment and very good public service provision. They also managed to get together the Athens Olympics, built a brand new modern airport, win the European cup and the Eurovision song contest. I am only mentioning these little things as I strongly believe that the euphoria the Greeks felt for the last 20 years and especially during the Simitis years, helped them achieve. Every child over the age of 14 would get, for example, a laptop to help them with their studies and hospital waiting lists were very short. So the country had a good 20 years but it was all paid for by borrowing. The unemployement rate there is still 21% compared to 28% in Spain but no one is getting hysterical about Spain?

So we have now come to the situation where the Greeks have been told they can't continue giving themselves a good life and they have to find ways of paying it all back. And of course that's how free market forces work in a capitalist system.

There are no excuses for allowing the political class to mismanage the economy and for finance ministers not to have any control over the level of debt but Greece is not a failed country, as the BBC would like us all to think. I have noticed for example BBC reporters refer to Greece as a small country and have no idea what they mean by that? If they mean small in size then it is not true, they are bigger than England, Scotland, Denmark, Belgium and many other Euro states so Greece is in fact a medium size country. Its population is also in the medium size category, larger than Norway, Sweden, Belgium, Scotland, Denmark etc. So I think that there is a psychological war being waged against the Greeks and the aim is to hit them at a time when they need help and support and not negative criticism. I also think that the crisis will force the Byzantine system they use to be updated and it will help with the rebirth of a nation that knows how to fight when facing a crisis! The Euro crisis will, in fact, be the second Marathon for the Greek nation only they won the battle and the war at the end.