Spetses, Greece

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In the meantime, Greece during the summer is a marvel. The soft, rose-tinted light of the Aegean, the cool breeze that starts promptly at four in the afternoon—such things block out the horrors of modern life. The Greeks are basically a good people, but the corrupt civil service and the kleptocrats who have enriched themselves these last 40 years by stealing the country blind and who are still in power make it very hard to live here. The very rich are immune, the middle class has been wiped out—thousands of doctors have left to work elsewhere—and nine democratically elected members of the Hellenic Parliament have been jailed by the crooks of the ruling center-left coalition in an illegal step that undermines the rule of law and increases the power of the executive. The third most popular party in Greece, Golden Dawn, has been declared a neo-Nazi party by the very crooks that have brought the country to its knees, and with only a majority vote in the parliament a ukase was issued bypassing the judiciary and imprisoning democratically elected members on trumped-up charges. If this is democracy, I am General Rosenberg reincarnated and in love with Paris.