High Stakes: Angry Greeks Vote in Cliffhanger Election

SINCE Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou declared his intention to hold a referendum in his country on the recently negotiated rescue plan, the situation in Athens has been somewhat volatile.

Assuming no defects in Pasok or the New Democracy parties, the pro-austerity may just scrape together enough votes to barely piece together a ruling coalition. How long it lasts is another matter as Pasok was humiliated with a third place showing. Reuters reports Angry Greeks reject bailout, risk euro exit

Greeks began voting in crucial national elections that are widely seen as a de facto referendum on the country's future inside the euro.

In the past week, as I expected, the ECB, Troika, German officials and others have all warned Greeks to not vote for Alexis Tsipras and his radical-left party Syriza. The question is will it backfire. I suggest it already has. The pertinent question is whether it backfire enough to matter. Please consider Greeks rail against 'crude' German editorial.

WHEN deciding whether to grant citizenship to an outsider, the Ancient Greeks would put the matter to a vote, tossing coloured pebbles into a clay jar. On June 17th almost 29.7% of voting Greeks picked the colours of New Democracy, a centre-right party that broadly supports the country's EU bail-out agreement. It was seen as a vote to remain citizens in good standing of the single currency. New Democracy narrowly beat Syriza, the "coalition of the radical left", which was threatening to rip up the bail-out agreement.

The question of the day, to which we all know the answer (but I want to ask the question anyway), Are the Nannycrats Afraid of Democracy? Here is a comment someone posted on the Guardian Greek Election Blog