The present neolib Commission is a creation of an overwhelming Council majority of present and recent neolib governments - and no EP majority wanted to kick commissioner candidates for this.

Here we have a combination of the IMF continuing its longstanding and self-perpetuating disaster capitalism policy (pushing reforms during crises, reforms that will of course give birth to future crises, when they push further); and brainwashed national political elites only too willing to implement the worst version of reforms, adding detail going beyond the IMF's demands. Voters in Lithuania who voted for at least two of the main governing parties last fall let themselves be duped, yet again: these parties campaigned with neolib reform plans, which they can now execute to a fuller extent by pointing to IMF pressure...

As for what goes on in Hungary, rather don't ask in detail... During the October crisis, when the EU/ECB provided a safety net without strings attached and the IMF with reform demands, there was a media row between the local 'left' and 'right', which forced the IMF to issue a denial that the government's specific reform plans would correspond to specific demands made, claiming it was all very general. (Then again, not much of the talk was public...)

And indeed, this month, without any IMF pressure, the 'Socialist' PM proposed the same idiocy as in Lithuania: pro-business tax cuts balanced by a VAT raise... Meanwhile, there was another row regarding the leader of the opposition, who attacks 'reform' plans as unsocial at every turn at home. But when he went to some business forum in Brussels, he proclaimed that the government is wasting its chance to attempt sweeping reforms while the crisis allows it... something the PM of course interpreted as a confirmation that his reforms would be the right thing after all.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}