PASOK, battered from pillar to post at the recent elections, has no wish to sign its death warrant by associating itself with more brutal measures. In fact, its leader Evangelos Venizelos wants to distance himself as much as possible from the even deeper cuts to salaries, pensions and benefits that the troika has apparently demanded. His only hope of survival is that the worst of what is in this latest package is associated with Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and Stournaras rather than himself and Kouvelis. This seems one of the few ways PASOK, currently fourth in the polls, behind neofascist Golden Dawn, could stop its slide into oblivion.