Electric atmosphere at Divani Caravel Hotel as head of Greece's PASOK party, Nikos Androulakis addresses packed parley
Also present was the upstart mayor of Athens, Haris Doukas
These are wild times in Europe, politically (Americans, just wait a few months and it’ll be our turn). The left is about to take out the right in the UK, the right is about to take out the left in France, Italy has a new Margaret Thatcher in Giorgia Meloni and in Greece…actually things are pretty calm.
But there doesn’t have to be crisis à la Paris and London for there to be change in the air and that mood for change was definitely in the air on Sunday, June 30 at Athens’ landmark Divani Caravel Hotel — where important scenes from the iconic film For the Love of Benji were filmed — as the head of PASOK - Movement for Change, Nikos Androulakis, spoke to a packed house of party faithful. We donned our press badges and observed.
What Mr. Androulakis, who we met last summer over breakfast in his native Crete, really came for was to announce elections for PASOK leadership in October. What precipitated this was partly the fallout from European parliamentary elections earlier this month as well as a leadership challenge from Haris Doukas, the largely untested mayor of Athens — a position he has held for less than a year.
In his speech Mr. Androulakis made a number of interesting statements: “I have made it clear that I am not going to be made a hostage President by anyone. Either inside or outside PASOK,” he said, adding “The autonomy from the politics of special interests is the compass of my political path. I have paid for it, but this is non-negotiable. That is why the only correct solutions are clean solutions.”
There was also a not-so-glowing reference to politics-as-fashion-show: “The nominations and political positions of all of us [are] to stop the catwalk, to be presented to an open Central Committee three weeks before the first round of elections.”
There was no room in the conference area for elephants, but if there were, they might come as a set. One, Greece’s Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, is quite popular as politicians go and also a pretty likable guy. If his New Democracy party underperformed in European elections, it didn’t do all that bad either. Mr. Mitsotakis comes from a political family of considerable pedigree, unlike that of the other would-be pachyderm in the room.
That would be Stefanos Kasselakis, a former Biden volunteer who is the supposedly telegenic new face of radical left party SYRIZA. The last time we checked, the newbie was busy making social media posts about Greek politics from someplace in the United States, which seems rather odd. By some accounts he’s been fooling the Greek people — but in our view anybody who considers themselves a pro at TikTok or whatever latest “social” is has silliness built into their public-facing DNA.
In fact, Mr. Androulakis took a swing at Mr. Kasselakis when he mentioned the “defeat for Mr. Kasselakis’ TikTok politics” in June’s European elections.
Mr. Androulakis is an approachable centrist. That, of course, could cause him problems down the road — it seems like these days you have to either fail spectacularly, like senile Biden, or be an absolute neophyte with a well-lubricated Instagram account to stay on top of the news feed.
Somewhere out there is a book waiting to be written about how to make common-sense policies without a ton political posturing or ideological agenda sell again. Hillary Clinton tried and failed twice. But then marrying a guy from Arkansas was never a sign she was the sharpest tool in the shed, right?
Anyway thirsty reader, simmer because it’s summer. Grab a few bottles of crisp refreshing orange ginger ale, and discuss amongst yourselves.
