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Illusions of Grandeur

from The Wall Street Journal, Greece and the Flight From Reality [1] by Bret Stephens

excerpt:

What’s more remarkable is how Greece’s flight from reality persists. Since Athens defaulted on its IMF loan last week, the Greeks have gotten a taste of what their future holds: shuttered banks, ATM withdrawal limits, pensioners lining up for their €134 weekly allowance. And yet they voted overwhelmingly for a government that is leading them, almost inevitably, to a swift exit from the euro and possibly the European Union, their only lifelines. Pride goeth before destruction, goes the proverb. So does stupidity.

Perhaps in a few weeks, the Greeks may notice that their vote has put them at the mercy of Mrs. Merkel and other European overlords as never before. Or they might not. If the demagoguery of the Syriza government has worked, it’s because the Greeks were a people who wanted to be demagogued.

The conceit of democracy is that people will eventually learn from their mistakes—even if they must first make those mistakes—and that experience is the ultimate teacher. But suppose it is not? Argentina shows that people can get it wrong generation after generation; that illusions of grandeur can sustain a politics of failure.

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