Categories
ideological culture

The Wild Punch

Who hasn’t wanted to punch a politician?

But a fracas in Athens, Greece, yesterday, demonstrates that punching people, not to mention threatening them with firearms, is a bad idea, and too often apt to harm the wrong people.

In this case, the pugilist, Giorgos Germenis, was himself something of a “wrong person.” He’s one of 18 lawmakers in the Greek parliament representing the Golden Dawn Party, which is often described as “neo-​Nazi” for its ugly nationalist, anti-​foreigner sentiment — and for an awfully suspicious party logo.

Germenis had been part of a charitable effort held in Syntagma Square to hand out free food … but only to Greek natives! The government shut down the giveaway, and the scuffle, hours later, was part of the fallout. Reportedly blocked from reaching for his gun by security, Germenis threw a punch at Athens’s mayor, Giorgos Kaminis.

He missed the mayor, but hit a young girl.

Bruised, but not seriously hurt, the 12-​year old did manage to escape becoming the centerpiece of the showdown between the anti-​foreigner activists and the Athens City government.

Greece’s troubles don’t really have much to do with foreigners. Greek troubles, instead, have everything to do with Greek politicians, and the sad, once politically attractive but now quite bankrupt (fiscally and morally) habit of trying to live at the expense of everyone else.

Blaming foreigners is the wrong way out. (Here in America, too.)

Germenis’s group should have been allowed to give only to natives, but a hallmark of civilization is the respect for strangers, traders, wanderers. The Golden Dawners don’t have their hearts in the right place.

Which is shown by the wild punch and who it hit. An innocent. As usual.

This Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
government transparency

The Transparent Parthenon

Historians know how much it cost to build the Parthenon, but we still don’t know what’s been spent on this past year’s economic recovery packages and bailouts.

Yes, we still have the clay tablets upon which the accounts for building the Parthenon were tallied. What we call “transparency” today was simple common sense in ancient Athens. 

Athens was a democracy, and as every small‑d democrat knows, it is absolutely essential to make government records public if the people are to make important decisions.

Same goes for a democratic republic, like ours.

Now, I’m not saying that building the Parthenon made sense for Athens. I’m glad we have it now, but it was part of Periclean grandiosity, and the great statesman’s next step was to invade Sparta — and that was one war without a good ending for Athens.

By the way, there is a theory of business cycles based on how tall corporate buildings become. You know the boom is ending just when all the businesses are building huge skyscrapers. 

Something similar happened in Athens. The Parthenon was finished; next, it was sacked by the Spartans.

As fascinating as it is, we can’t live in the past. But we can learn from it. If transparency was required for Pericles, it should be required for Barack Obama.

Oh, and maybe we should be extra cautious about going to war.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.