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May 1st, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda A protester during a May Day demonstration in Athens
No one knows who the black T-shirts are for sure. Some wear anarchist emblems
and that is the group normally blamed by the media; some Greek
journalists on the march thought they were agent provocateurs trying to
start trouble that would discredit the Left.
There was the occasional bemused tourist wandering through the march; they
reminded me how different the centre of the city is from normal times.
Shops have been closed down and are encased in corrugated iron; graffiti is
everywhere. On Stadiou, leading to Syntagma Square, a cinema lies boarded up
and burnt out.
The protests may have calmed down from their peak volatility six months or so
ago, but tension persists and the anger at the situation that Greeks find
themselves in is almost tangible.
It was summed up by Nikos Charalambopoulos, an unemployed director, on the
march with his girlfriend. “We feel the country is under occupation, from
the EU, the troika, the German markets. We think the government of Pasok and
New Democracy sold the country without reading the fine print when they
signed the memorandum [bail-out]. This election is about winning our freedom
back.”
During a few hours speaking to people on the baking hot streets today, this is
a sentiment heard over and over.
Tuesday May 1, 11am (BST)
Voters are presented with a simple but agonising choice on Sunday: whether or
not to support parties that endorse the EU-imposed bailout, or parties that
oppose it.
Voting for the bailout means more pain for Greeks,
for the medicine has yet to work. Voting against means immense uncertainty,
a possible return to the drachma and the potential unraveling of the euro
zone.
I’ll be taking the temperature of a country facing its greatest crisis in a
generation. Unemployment is at a record 22 per cent; half of 15-24 year olds
are out of work. Suicide rates are soaring.
The flame-throwing riots may have subsided for now, but Greek middle class and
lower middle class believe they are heading for oblivion.
As I travel the country, gloom and doom won’t be hard to find, as well as
simmering rage against the political machine.
I have family in Greece (my name was originally Spillios but was slightly
changed somewhere along the way). For the past two years I have received
regular updates from family members in Athens of lost jobs, cousins
emigrating in search of a life and a deepening dread of years of scarcity
ahead.
But I’ll also be looking for reasons to be optimistic; perhaps some awareness
that it is not just the politicians who are to blame and some recognition
that an over-protectionist, over-regulated economy needs proper
liberalisation; perhaps a politician or party with the potential to convince
Greeks that true reform offers a way out of the mire.
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