The first paragraph of the article quoted below, which disparages a ‘libertarian political party which represents just 12 per cent of voters and barely 0.2 per cent of the eurozone’s voters’ reminds me of the old movie, “The Mouse that roared,” in which a mini principality goes to war with the US and through a series of unlikely events, wins.
The world is becoming used to the daily round of news of European nations in financial crisis, Greece being the current centre of attention. There are constant updates on efforts by the more solvent members of the Euro zone to prop up failing members in exchange for financial reforms. Meanwhile, long-suffering taxpayers are becoming increasingly outraged.
A current effort to expand the European Financial Stability Facility to 440 billion Euros has been blocked temporally by tiny Slovakia. The ruling coalition there failed to approve the measure when the libertarian orientated Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) Party, voted it down. The measure is expected to pass with the support of the opposition, probably requiring an early election as a condition.
This should give heart to angry voters across Germany, France, and the rest of Europe:
A recently-formed libertarian political party which represents just 12 per cent of Slovakian voters and barely 0.2 per cent of the eurozone’s 332 million voters refused to vote with the three other parties in the ruling coalition, bringing the continent’s bailout agreement to a halt.
With a population of just 5.4 million the small mountainous country in central Europe is now the centre of frantic efforts to revive the July 21 bail-out deal, which expanded the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) to 440 billion euros ($A603 billion) and gave it new powers to help Greece, failing banks and shaky nations such as Spain and Italy. …
But Radicova’s four-party coalition failed to muster the required numbers because the hardline free-market party Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) objected to the eurozone bailout as a profligate waste of money on bankers and Greeks who it says should be made to pay for their own mistakes and laziness.
Richard Sulik, the millionaire economist who helped to develop the country’s 19 per cent flat income tax and founded SaS in 2009, was unrepentant about his resistance to bailing out the Greeks.
“I’d rather be a pariah in Brussels than have to feel ashamed before my children, who would be deeper in debt should I back raising the volume of funding in the EFSF bailout mechanism.”
Slovakians had lower average incomes than the Greeks and “an honest solution” to the crisis would be “to let Greece go bankrupt,” he said.
Australian Libertarian Society (old site) 
No surprises that Richard Sulik being a “millionaire” was mentioned. Always stoking class resentment…
This is the power of the veto system embedded within the EU framework. What is lacking though is a political culture in which individual nations are willing to exercise the veto. It is good that Slovakia has played the hero. The notion of poor people in Slovakia bailing out relatively rich people in Greece is a bit obscene.
The economic record of the left is so discredited it has little other than class warfare going for it. In this case though it is possibly merely a descriptive observation.
A veto was always unlikely here as every other party seems to be in favour of bailing out Greece. The opposition only voted against it in order to bring down the government, while in reality they are combining to pass it now.
I hope that when the election is called, the SaS will not merely defend this position, but actually go on the attack over the issue. It could be a very good win for them.
People complaining about parties not voting with coalition partners in proportional representation? What next…