The masks are off

"The masks are off and the programs and plans of the political parties are revealed," the prime minister said in a television interview a few days ahead of the upcoming local government and European Parliament elections. Alexis Tsipras is right: The masks are off and the whole political troupe is on stage, waiting for Sunday's applause. His comment, though, pertains not so much to the 70,000-or-so candidates in local elections, nor the 1,950 vying for Greece's 21 seats in the European Parliament, nor to the opposition parties. As Tsipras revealed in the same interview, it reflects mostly on his own government.

"The vote in the European Parliament elections is a vote of confidence in the relief measures [that the government has taken in favor of pensioners] and pensioners must know that their pension will depend on the ballot that they put in the ballot box on Sunday," he...