Democracy Comes Home
Roberts, Cokie
of the inflation, unemployment and strikes have been widespread. Tacitus, the name used by a liberal Christian Democratic group in writing for the Madrid Catholic newspaper, Ya, said that...
...People in the U.S...
...The old Center Union of the late George Papandreou, which had won the last pre-coup election, joined with the New Political Forces, a group of somewhat younger men and women, many of whom had been jailed by the junta...
...The campaign was devoid of other issues, and any that emerged Karamanlis quickly defused...
...Some members of the Center even hinted darkly that Papandreou had been hired by the CIA to split the opposition and ensure Karamanlis' victory...
...Running in dream fields, are you...
...0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 MADELEINE MYSKO ARGOS Poents aren't made of the likes of you, old Dog, And yet I strap you on, along with a dozen Other things bumping against my mind All the way down the hill to the post office And back...
...The Communist party, legal for the first time since 1947, also saw Papandreou's socialist stand as a threat to its vote...
...But only the left was divided...
...The words would reCommonweal: 257 peat themselves in conversation after conversation, from the old men in the Cafenion to the young women in the park, "peace and quiet," "stability" and "now Greece needs strength, maybe next time Papandreou, but this time we need Karamanlis...
...That, quite simply, is what happened in the Greek election...
...He used the term constantly as a codeword--in much the same way Nixon used "law and order"--implying that his opposition was immature and inviting the return of the military...
...It was an unusual election where the only real question was whether the Greeks would give a personal mandate to Constantine Karamanlis...
...And leftists are saying they have a base to build on...
...He will have such an overwhelming majority in Parliament (221 out of 300 seats) that it will be hard for the other voices to be heard inside the system...
...Many people fear that Karamanlis' mandate for stability could bring about the opposite...
...COKIE ROBERTS ( Cokie Roberts, a previous contributor, is an American newspaper and radio journalist living in Athens...
...Your nose was trained to trash cans and neighborhood cats...
...The bus to Ardmore Labors up the street...
...Above all, he recognized the people's need for stability...
...Children whiz by on bicycles In a yellow storm of leaves...
...After the fox...
...So he will make it clear to his friends that he is their equal, not their client, and the relationship must change...
...Only in the salons of Athens, which ironically came under Papandreou's criticism, was PASOK considered a threat...
...Papandreou tried to expand anti-Americanism into a rejection of the Common Market and a chance to consolidate ties with Eastern Europe...
...for support on the Cyprus issue and it is fully expected that the leases will be renegotiated...
...The theory went that if you were going to oppose Karamanlis you would go all the way and vote for Papandreou, a sharper alternative than the Center's more moderate George Mavros...
...Karamanlis is a friend but he is a strong and independent character...
...With all this infighting onlookers began to believe that Greece was back to politics as usual with no cooperation and possibly no government...
...The election doesn't mean that Greece has taken a dramatic shift to the right, even though it was a setback for the left...
...The only other candidate of the Right-Peter Garoufalias, a pro-monarchy, pro-junta joke-posed no threat to New Democracy...
...The people relish their new freedom and don't want to jeopardize it, so they voted for Karamanlis as a guarantee against the tanks...
...Grey and ragged, you hug a scrap of sunlight To your bones...
...But Karamanlis understood that in a country where the word for east is the classical word for Turkey, the people consider themselves Westerners...
...On election night a somewhat besotted Russian correspondent called it a "victory for America...
...Ah, you were never so noble, old mongrel Dog...
...But the party was dealt a major blow when Andreas Papandreou, son of George and hero of youth, returned from exile and formed the Pan-Hellenic Socialist Union (PASOK...
...New political alignments are likely to result...
...HARRY W. FLANNERY (Harry W. Flannery, a long-time contributor, is an American journalist now living in Spain...
...When the Center implied that a New Democracy Parliament could reinstate the king, Karamanlis set a date for a popular referendum on the monarchy...
...Karamanlis called the elections early, while still at the peak of his popularity from triumphal return last July, in order to ensure a majority...
...In Greek elections ticket-splitting is forbidden and when the people voted for Karamanlis they had to take his party in the package...
...Papandreou saw that Greeks felt humiliated and betrayed by America and took that to mean that they wanted to be rid of it...
...He is quite willing to use the American bases here as a lever on the U.S...
...And in recent university elections the left achieved a huge majority...
...I'm no Odysseus either...
...Apostua praised Pio Cabanillas, the dismissed Information Minister, and Barrera de Irimo...
...others will do it...
...A New Democracy Parliament might not be the best one to deal with these questions...
...But Karamanlis will be careful not to lose America's friendship, and here too he has sensed the mood of his people...
...No reason why you should lift your muzzle for me...
...More of this strength should be seen in terms of the vote next time around since all parties support lowering the voting age to 18...
...But Karamanlis understands that all Greeks really want is to be treated with dignity by this powerful state whose protection and money they still feel they need...
...Tacitus, the name used by a liberal Christian Democratic group in writing for the Madrid Catholic newspaper, Ya, said that "confusion and anxiety are at high levels...
...The Cyprus situation remains diplomatieally delicate and no one cared to make a point of it...
...Then the Court of Appeals announced an investigation into charges of high treason against Papadopoulas and 49 others...
...And the Communists had internal problems of their own...
...Karamanlis kept insisting that it was not politics as usual, that the people had reached a new "politieal maturity...
...And he proved right...
...Some Karamanlis advisers admit that second-rate candidates came in the landslide, pushing out superior members of the Center...
...0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 THE GREEK ELECTION DEICIOCRA Cu r HOICIE For the first time in ten years Greeks freely entered polling booths and marked the ballots of their choice-democracy was restored...
...Embassy here aren't so sure...
...When Karamanlis' opponents accused him of moving too slowly to punish the junta he banished the leaders to an Aegean Island...
...Partly because the people there still see the policemen and still fear them, and in some cases because they really believe him to be "O Sotiros tis Ellades" (The Savior of Greece) they would support their leader...
...Opposition parties mustered their forces and political pundits began talking seriously about whether any party would have enough votes to form a government...
...But even so the political wheels moved swiftly...
...And when they emerged they had given Constantine Karamanlis and his New Democracy party an astounding parliamentary majority...
...And university administrations can expect hard days ahead...
...Luis Apostua, the Catholic daily's regular political commentator, stated agreement with Tacitus that the death blow to Spanish liberalization had been dealt by Francisco Labadie in the Fascist meeting...
...No age breakdowns are available but it is generally assumed that the bulk of Papandreou's support came from the youth...
...So this time it is Karamanlis...
...Leaves fall and you blink them away...
...20 December 1974:258...
...The Americans are beginning to say that the bases aren't all that crucial after all, which is somewhat disheartening to hear after they served as the justification for support of the military regime...
...So one hears now much talk, as you did after the defeats of McCarthy and McGovern, that the youth might "take to the streets," force confrontation with the police and invite repressive measures...
...And you lie sleeping in the gutter...
...His campaign organizers privately admitted that their unspoken slogan was "No More Tanks" and the people believed it...
...In a time when almost any CIA plot seems plausible, this one doesn't, since anti-Americanism serves as the major plank in Papandreou's platform...
...In the villages and on the islands all you heard was Karamanlis...
...Sleep on, Boy...
...The low quality of deputies is particularly unfortunate now since this Parliament will revise the Constitution...
...Although Karamanlis specifically rejected it this time...
...But what it means for the future, both internally here and in policy toward America, is a more complex question...
...A Barcelona newspaper columnist warned that if the reforms are not enacted, "the next opening will not come from this regime...
...The parties that didn't have time to organize well before elections will have time now...
...The lid has been clamped on the pot of social change for seven years and now the demands are likely to come boiling out: equal rights for women-including changes in the Constitution and laws---reorganization of the labor unions, demands for higher wages, reform of the Church, standardization of the language...
...Many observers here thought PASOK might even finish second behind New Democracy...
...Squirrels scratch Down the elms...
...What am I to make of you, old Dog...
Vol. 101 • December 1974 • No. 10
