By K. I. Angelopoulos

Driven by despair, the spin doctors for the ruling Socialist party seem determined to try anything that might bolster PASOK’s image. The new team, whose job it is to improve the Socialists’ image, is faced with a daunting task. Things appear grim in the government camp, as, instead of a “second wave of modernization,” the party has been engulfed by a huge wave of public disappointment. The crisis has already prompted one blatantly propagandistic tactic: With Jean-Marie Le Pen’s success in France, PASOK should cultivate the view that Greece’s rightist extremist elements reside within New Democracy. Some dangerous Le Pen sympathizers, the story goes, grin sardonically behind the back of the New Democracy party leadership.

This striking decision — indicative of the vigor of PASOK’s reformist spirit — comes with another more profound policy: underscoring the dividing line between PASOK and New Democracy. Therefore, PASOK’s propaganda experts feel that since the government’s policies do not make the dividing line clear enough, it is up to them to take up this difficult task. Since the frivolous, naive and apolitical citizens have failed to grasp the clear-cut distinction between PASOK and ND, the use of political propaganda has become an imperative. Only the right propaganda will shed light on the, until now secret, differences that reality has refused to expose with clarity.

If the dividing line truly exists, why should it have to be delineated through political action? This question is of no concern to the Socialists. Perhaps, this is because the reformists deem it too late to deal with such an issue. If PASOK has, so far, failed to convince the public that a progressive party with leftist characteristics is clearly different from a conservative one, how will it succeed while on a downward trend? Communication tactics, then, until the local elections...