[redthrowaway]

> past European governments shouldn't have lent them the money

It wasn't really European governments lending Greece money, at least not until the bailouts. It was European banks. Incidentally, that's why France and Germany broke the EU's rules and bailed out "Greece": they were protecting the European banking system by offloading bad Greek debt from European banks to European taxpayers.

The only workable solution I can see at this point is implicit restructuring through extending loan terms tied to the implementation of reforms and saddled with snap-back provisions. Raise the retirement age? Some portion of the debt is extended 5 years and inflation takes care of reducing it. Ditto tax collection, etc. Then every reform would be politically manageable in Greece because each one would carry with it some measure of debt forgiveness.