Economist Papademos to lead Greece's unity government … Economist Lucas Papademos will be Greece's next prime minister, the Greek president's office announced Thursday, giving a non-politician the job of passing an unpopular bailout plan before elections are held next year. The selection by the two main political parties ended four days of squabbling over how to structure a unity government. Papademos, 64, and the rest of the government are to be installed Friday. – Washington Post

Dominant Social Theme: Thank goodness we have unity at last. Now Greece's troubles will be over.

Free-Market Analysis: Oh, wow, a Greek unity government. Unity. A less polite term would be "communism" in our view – for we and thee, not of course for the top Greek elites. Communism. Sure. Or close to it … The state runs most of Greece now one way or another. And a politburo runs the state. A "unity government." Hah!

This is a long held dream of the elites as they struggle to move this woeful, recalcitrant world toward global governance. The idea is to do away with messy policy questions over the STRUCTURE of government. In fact, the idea is to ensure, via such unity governments, that everyone is on board with the basics.

Simple really. The elites run the government and the government runs the corporations and the corporations and government jointly run everything else. Way up at the top, the REAL power resides, with a handful of elite families and associates that own the corporations and secretly control the government.

What's the optimal elite state? Well, it would include a strong state judiciary, a strong authoritarian police force, a strong military to support and defend the "unified" government, a strong public school system, a high tax rate, a big corrosive welfare state, etc. etc.

It's government by bureaucracy (with the really Big Men behind the scenes). A kind of communism. The state may not entirely "own" the means of production (along with hand-picked, crony-led corporations) but it might as well.

This is surely the goal. It's a meme that breaks out more boldly as time goes on. Last time we recall hearing about this kind of construct was in the US where New York's Michael Bloomberg began a short-lived campaign for it during the last presidential election. Here, from the Washington Post, way back at the beginning of 2008:

Moderates Unite! Bloomberg To Lead Unity Government Summit … New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, a potential independent candidate for president, has scheduled a meeting next week with a dozen leading Democrats and Republicans, who will join him in challenging the major-party contenders to spell out their plans for forming a "government of national unity" to end the gridlock in Washington.

Those who will be at the Jan. 7 session at the University of Oklahoma say that if the likely nominees of the two parties do not pledge to "go beyond tokenism" in building an administration that seeks national consensus, they will be prepared to back Bloomberg or someone else in a third-party campaign for president.

Conveners of the meeting include such prominent Democrats as former senators Sam Nunn (Ga.), Charles S. Robb (Va.) and David L. Boren (Okla.), and former presidential candidate Gary Hart. Republican organizers include Sen. Chuck Hagel (Neb.), former party chairman Bill Brock, former senator John Danforth (Mo.) and former New Jersey governor Christine Todd Whitman.

See? These are not spur-of-the-moment inventions. It's a long-running dominant social theme, in fact. Government should be managed by the best technocrats. Policy doesn't matter (freedom and all that) only what "works" best. In fact, it's a part of a larger meme, having to do with technocracy, transparency, etc. And now it has found the Greeks.

The Greeks. They've been rioting for six months and what do they get? A government that will do exactly the opposite of what they want. The government is committed to austerity, committed to Euro-loans, committed to the euro and the EU. The Greeks themselves oppose austerity measures, oppose the Euro-loans, even oppose the euro. Heck, at this point they probably WANT their drachma back.

The top Greeks – the ones that will compose the unity government – basically intend to ram through a restructuring of Greece's entire society. It's already begun with the raising of taxes, spying on people and throwing them in jail if they don't pay up – while putting more and more people out of work in both the private and public sector.

When the state controls money, the state controls much of what life is about, certainly economic life. This is the idea behind all this. The elites that seek one-world government are using the crisis to continue to consolidate power. Consolidate, consolidate. And use the good, gray men to do it. The bankers.

Lewrockwell.com is carrying a short article pointing out that Papademos is not alone in his banking credentials. Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank as of November 1, was vice chairman and managing director of Goldman Sachs Int. Mario Monti who may well succeed Silvio Berlusconi as prime minister of Italy, is European Chairman of the Trilateral Commission and a member of the Bilderberg Group. Here's some more from the article excerpted above:

But Papademos assured Greeks and anxious Europeans elsewhere that he would push through the austerity measures that are a condition of the $177 billion bailout plan announced at the end of October. The country is weeks away from running out of money, officials have said. Greece's "problems will be solved with unity, understanding and prudence," Papademos told reporters after his selection was announced. He called Greece's membership in the euro zone "a guarantee for monetary stability."

As governor of the Bank of Greece from 1992 to 2002, Papademos helped usher Greece into Europe's currency union, an achievement that the country's financial crisis has threatened … Papademos's aversion to corrupt dealmaking could be a good thing amid the highly charged process of making painful cuts, although some Greek commentators said the incoming prime minister's cautious nature would not necessarily inspire the country in a time of crisis.

The most immediate issue facing Greece is securing an $11 billion installment of its original May 2010 bailout package. Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said last week that without the bailout, the country's coffers would be empty by Dec. 15 … In a nationally televised address Wednesday evening, to Prime Minister George Papandreou said farewell to the Greek people before meeting with Greece's president. "Today, despite our political and social differences, we are setting aside sterile conflicts," Papandreou said. "A government of political forces is taking over that goes beyond parties and personal biases. . . . We will take the necessary steps together, with national unity."

Hey, funny thing. We're not sure anxious Greeks want reassurance from Papademos. As for solving Greece's problems with "unity, understanding and prudence," we figure many Greeks would disagree with that as well. Only one thing is certain, from what we can tell. Out of chaos, order. The elites ALWAYS use civil disturbances to advance authoritarian measures. This "unity government" is just one more example of that.