Rejection of austerity has pressed a growing margin of Greek voters to support with audacity a political party which swears by "Mein Kampf" and offers up Nazi salutes as a send-off during political deliberations.
The sudden resurgence of the "Golden Dawn Party" is casting a dark cloud over a nation which has been labeled "The Birthplace of Democracy."
The financial crisis rocking the cradle of Western Civilization in the Aegean is slowly giving place to marginal views which not only refuse to rescue the state from massive bankruptcy, but have also decided to target the hardest-working in their country: the growing immigrant populations from Asia and Africa. Despite the questionable assurances that the Golden Dawn party has moderated its views, the slow ascent of extremism in a country fraught with deleterious options should not allay legitimate concerns.
Will the rise of the far-right now transform Greece into "The Graveyard of Democracy" in Europe? The diminished major parties that cannot cobble together a working coalition with their minor counterparts; the population's refusal of harsh but necessary economic remedies for Athens; and the breakdown of law and order in the streets: these dangerous phenomena are eerily reminiscent of the political and economic conditions that plagued the Weimar Republic in Germany, before another far-right figure came to power, one who advocated cracking down on immigrants and building labor camps for deviant populations in the country. Do we see a Greek counterpart of Adolph Hitler in the squat and sanguine demeanor of Nikolaos Mihalolaikos?
The Golden Dawn's anti-immigrant platform – complete with vigilante thugs harassing minorities, immediate arrest and expulsion of immigrants of undetermined legal status, and the outrageous policy of forced labor camps for immigrant criminals, could not be any more revealing or repulsive than a Nazi parade wrapped in stripes of blue and white marching through the Parthenon, complete with goose-stepping troglodytes dangling Swastikas from high-reaching poles.