Commentary
It has been less than a week since their most persistent dream became real as they were sworn in as (deputy) ministers. And yet, they showed up without any stage fright, behind the rigid and unmoving mask of power, as if they had been ready for a long time, as if they had rehearsed the same pose countless times. They stepped onto the red or blue carpets and walked out on the podium to watch the parade with the look of a victorious army commander who is tired of his many trophies, and then they stood before the television cameras to analyze the meaning of the anniversary. And all of them did so in the same manner, a way they seem to have been taught by their more experienced brothers in the government; that is the verbose way – by which the less it has understood and the less it can contribute, the more it unfolds and sinks into its own self-complacency. By coincidence, they all chose the big city of their constituency because such chances of glory are rare. In how many parades will they reign until the next elections? If one examined the anthropological aspect of the matter, he would definitely mark the irrefutable ability of Circe-Power to instantly age those who think themselves as its possessors, when they are nothing but its objects, or toys. If only we had heard, amid so much ministerial triumphalism, a slightly cracked voice; if only we had seen one face that has not frozen under the display of pomposity which has to resort to a tape of bombastic inanity only to express its excitement – then we could claim that some might be saved from getting old prematurely. But neither did we see nor did we hear something plain, anxious, or human. The role imposes total homogeneity, rules out spontaneity and allows private moments to the politicians only when these are up for sale, to help their promotion. It is worth keeping the video with the ministerial messages. It will be timely next year as well, for it never seems to lose its timeliness. Papantoniou said that there is no US request for Greek forces to join in the Afghanistan campaign. He repeated that Greece is taking part with the US in the framework of a broader political alliance in this struggle, in accordance with the spirit and the letter of decisions by the European Council in Ghent.
