Nevertheless, the label "failed" in increasingly seen associated with Greece as the country sinks deeper in the "bailout" morass and experiences widespread breakdown socially, economically, and politically.
While outside observers concentrate on indexes, performance curves, unemployment figures, debt "restructuring" and the like, Greeks living in Greece have first hand experience of what their "partners" in Europe, and the IMF, have done to their country via the two disastrous memoranda of shame: genocidal austerity is destroying the fabric of Greek society and emasculating the Greek economy in ways that cannot be repaired.
Hence, we are presently spectators of a succession of events that could very likely produce unimaginable chaos and collapse in Greece thanks to intentional "total war" action by "united" Europe and the IMF. Consider the following:
1. The hapless Samaras administration is already being pummeled in the polls, the latest finding that the government's approval rate has collapsed down to an abysmal 16 percent. The decision to comply with yet another austerity order from the Troika Einsatzgruppe worth 11.5 billion euro has added to the outrage engulfing the entire Greek society. Samaras, by virtue of complying, is losing the last vestiges of legitimacy in the eyes of the people and thus growing weaker by the day. Desperation is combining with voter backlash to produce the "perfect storm" for yet another Greek government biting the dust in less than two years.
2. The deliberate, methodical disintegration of Greece under the pummeling of its "friends" is helping to congeal the impression that "united" Europe is now acting to the detriment of Greece with obvious and undeniable intent. the Troika Einsatzgruppe acts like a true occupation and liquidation command; questions about its legitimacy and, more importantly, about its direct intervention into the running of the state raise questions of acts of aggression camouflaged as "technical help." This is the best avenue of pushing the radicalization of Greek society to the next level and sowing the seeds of a violent outburst that will aim equally at Greek and foreign perceived culprits.
3. Unemployment and homelessness, the former a "controlled" problem in the past and the latter non-existent, are spreading like wildfires. Few from the outside truly appreciate the immediate social implications of these twin calamities. Unemployment and homelessness are both arrows aimed at the very heart of Greek democracy that has been ailing for years -- and now it is disintegrating faster than what even pessimists thought possible.
4. The public sector, never the home of operational smoothness, is falling apart at the seams. Stories of internal administrative fights over constantly shrinking funds have swelled. Entire departments are either idle or putting up a charade of being "busy." The trickle effect is in full bloom. Hospitals curtail emergency care and outpatient clinics. Schools close. Welfare organizations will be soon "merged" and then put out of their misery as part of yet another "streamlining" operation demanded by the lenders. The innumerable sections detailed to offer "help to citizens" in the jungle of Greek bureaucracy are simply falling by the wayside -- who's going to care to "help citizens" when his salary has been cut by 40-50%, his pension is in immediate risk, and the traditional separation bonus from the service has deteriorated from thousands of euro to a mere handful?
5. Suicide rates are burgeoning. This is an indicator that can be ignored to the grief of any society. Almost daily news broadcasts and newspapers speak of another young businessman hanging himself over taxes and debts, another elderly pensioner shooting himself in the head to avoid all-consuming immiseration courtesy of the Troika Eisnsatzgruppe, and another couple of "jumpers" either jumping or being saved at the last moment. This deluge of self killing has triggered feelings of desperation and revenge against those who are perceived as the engineers of the present collapse, i.e. the political class and its cronies.
6. Athens has been burned several times since the near insurrection of December 2009, when a conservative government stood by idle and allowed roving bands of arsonists, looters, and street thugs to literally possess the downtown section. The possibility of an even worse outburst is increasing by the day -- but this time around there may be counteraction from extreme rightist bands whose members do not hesitate to crack skulls or cause even worse.
Greece is thus amassing fast all the characteristics that would be normally thought as underpinning a "failed state" -- economic collapse, social unrest, institutional breakdown, government impasse, political incapacitation, and no option of discovering a deus ex machina to assume control. And with the lenders not expected to abandon their ruinous, genocidal attack against the country, the chances of a peaceful solution of the crisis are steadily growing distant.
The future historian of the collapse of the European experiment will no doubt pore over Greece in an effort to establish the firm timeline of the "end game." By then, of course, it will too late for the Greeks, now increasingly looking destined to live through yet another national catastrophe that could cause irreparable damage to this outpost of Europe.