New Day, Old View in Ελλας

Two days into the Syriza era in Greece and the world economy has yet to collapse!

Though Greece is still in the eurozone new Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has shaken things up a bit already, starting with his inauguration. As the son of a Greek Orthodox priest and the nephew of two more, including one in the motherland, it is still hard for me to believe that an atheist could get elected Greek prime minister. Tsipras solidified his non-creed cred by holding a secular swearing-in service without a Bible or priest. 

Another change is that Tsipras appointed Greece's first cabinet minister to root out and fight corruption, a laudatory move that elevates solving one of the country's most intractable and urgent problems. Hopefully the minister's job will also include shaming/ cajoling/forcing Greece's wealthiest citizens to actually pay their taxes. [Republicans like to point to Greece as an example of a failed welfare state but as I blogged before it is a GOP paradise: the rich simply don't pay taxes.]

An atheist PM. Fighting corruption. Those are two new, never-been-seen-before qualities for a Greek prime minister. One other change proposed by Tsipras, an end to the European sanctions against Russia, looks new and bold but is actually an old, tired and failed policy. 

During the 400+ years that Greece was part of the Ottoman Empire, Greeks repeatedly looked to the northeast, to our Orthodox coreligionists in Russia, to come liberate us and restore a Byzantine Orthodox Empire with Constantinople as it's capital.

As you may know, that never happened. Nevertheless, too many Greeks have inexplicably always looked to Russia. It didn't matter if Russia was ruled by czars, Communists, dictators, or thugs; many Greeks continued to look longingly - and unrequitedly - to Moscow. 

It's ironic that a guy who wants to do things differently in Greece - which is admirable - includes a tired, old and failed attitude towards Russia on his to-do list, and that an atheist wants to nurture an old relationship built on Orthodoxy.