Back in February the American magazine, The Week, had an image of Alexis Tsipras as Prometheus Bound breaking the chains of the austerity measures.
You can ignore all the
talk of a "Grexit," the bluff and bluster of right-wing German ideologues such as Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble who would celebrate it, and repetitive, stubbornly dire warnings that time is running out.
Did you notice that the much-hyped June 5 deadline for the Greece's payment to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) came and went, Greece didn't pay and nobody fell off a cliff? Trust me, this is not a cliffhanger.
Although there have been numerous
references to game theory in the ongoing commentary, it's really not necessary if you look at the revealed preferences of those whom the Syriza government is polite and diplomatic enough to call its European partners. Take partner-in-chief German Chancellor Angela Merkel: If there's one thing she doesn't want to be remembered as, it's the politician who destroyed the eurozone.
Of course, we don't know if a Greek exit would do that, but there's a chance that it could. Even if the European Central Bank would be able to contain the resulting financial crisis, it is possible that
Greece would, after an initial shock, ultimately do much better outside the euro, which might convince others to want to leave. Whatever the probability of that scenario, Merkel is, like most successful politicians, a risk-averse creature who won't roll those dice.
And there is an elephant in the room that she is not going to ignore: the United States. There are scattered press reports that Barack Obama's administration has put pressure on Merkel to reach an agreement with Greece, but the importance of that has been vastly understated. Unless it is a request that could get a German government voted out of office — such as George W. Bush's bid for support of his invasion of Iraq in 2003 — something that is strategically important to Washington is extremely likely to find agreement in Berlin. And in this case, Merkel and Obama are basically on the same page.
Comment: There are two things worth noting about this story. First, the reason that no evidence has been provided to McCain is that because there is no evidence to give. Second, that McCain would think he is so important that he should personally be given the evidence from the Ukrainians. The guy's self-importance is in the upper atmosphere. Also, the fact that McCain has "no doubt" about Russian involvement without any evidence showing that should give pause to anyone who thinks he is capable of any kind of objective thought. He's going to stick to the "Russian aggression" narrative whether there is evidence or not.