"The time to pay the bill has come”

International Business Times: Socialism causes yet another massive failure with Greece

Living in a comfortable and debt financed socialism for many years, Greece reacted with a mix of resignation and outrage on Monday to a painful austerity package from the government. It foresees a massive fiscal adjustment driven primarily by cuts in the country's bloated public sector, which makes up roughly a third of the workforce.

"The time to pay the bill has come, the time of responsibility for all of us tackling this crisis must become the big opportunity to modernize our public life, even if we have to bleed," said financial daily Kerdos.

Even if only on the terms of there eventually being no-one left to soak, Socialism always leads to failure, and usually results in a tumultuous or even violent collapse before you have any kind of “change you can believe in”.

Center-right newspaper Eleftheros Typos said the government was telling Greeks that they must die in order to live, describing the economic medicine it was doling out as "more harmful than the disease."

If the notion of not receiving state payments until you’re 65 draws comparisons with death, then you know where things are going.

Center-left Ethnos said the austerity would mean "asphyxiation" for the Greek people and a "violent modernization" for the economy, which according to new government projections will contract by 4.0 percent this year and 2.6 percent in 2011.