I was once told a story by a reliable source (the story is too good to bother verifying) that in the late 1980’s at a summit of European leaders, Greek prime minister Andreas Papandreou arrived by car in the courtyard of a sumptuous hotel. As he stepped out of the limousine, the windows of a suite on the fourth floor of the hotel were flung open and appeared Charles Haughey, Taoiseach or prime minister of Ireland, who at the top of his voice declared ‘Andreas Papandreou, you are my hero!’.
In many respects, Haughey was right, he and Papandreou were very alike – clever and corrupt, leaders of large grassroots political parties (political scientists compared Fianna Fail and Pasok, the party Papandreou founded, as the most enduring political machines in Europe).
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