Eastern European Politics

That one could launch malicious/selective prosecution against politicians you don't like. If memory serves such has happened in Turkey.

...I was about to say that Jobbik has nothing to fear from itself by virtue of never having been in power and thus never having had the opportunity for corruption.

But then I remembered a news article from earlier this week. You remember the gigantic fine the treasury smacked Jobbik with early this year after they acquired propaganda billboards under the list price for their counter-propaganda against Fidesz last year? Turns out the cash they acquired via public support for paying it off, they blew it all on the failed election campaign, ie. not on what they claimed they would and what their supporters gave that money for, which I believe is within the definition of fraud. Payments have been suspended until after the elections and now, the treasury started docking it from Jobbik's govt funding as a parliament fraction, meaning that starting from this month, Jobbik is not getting a single penny from above until their debt towards the treasury is paid in full.

@amitakartok: That's what I meant, though. Now that the fascists have abandoned Jobbik, do they have any other program beyond "throw out Orban?"

I'm not sure that their counter-corruption position will be enough to build a real party around.

Edited by Ramidel on Jul 5th 2018 at 3:33:54 AM

Jobbik is in very big trouble. They cannot pay off their debt in one go and none of the banks gave them a loan, so if they can't negotiate with the treasury about paying in installments, the authorities will initiate bankruptcy proceedings that will end with Jobbik ceasing to exist. And if the party goes, the parliament fraction goes as well; even if all Jobbik MPs were to join a new party, they cannot form a fraction and thus won't be eligible for govt support. That's a worst-case scenario but definitely possible because the treasury already announced they aren't letting up on this.

Whatever happens, Jobbik cannot campaign for the upcoming EP elections. Even financing their Facebook ads is a serious financial burden now. For that matter, there are rumors in Jobbik that this entire situation is the result of a conspiracy against Jobbik. If you recall, a few years ago, there was a major break between Orbán and his then-primary financial backer and old schoolmate Simicska. Simicska then proceeded to financially support the opposition to fuck up Orbán wherever he could. Him giving Jobbik billboard space under the list price is what got Jobbik into this financial mess and earlier this week, it came out that Simicska apparently gave up and sold all his interests to his former right-hand man, who is and always has been Orbán's supporter. Thus, Jobbik's narrative goes, the whole Orbán-Simicska conflict was probably a trick meant to entrap and ruin Jobbik.

So I understand there's a situation in Poland with the Supreme Court?

Yes. From what I heard, the govt lowered the retirement age for Supreme Court judges to remove and replace the current head of the court, who just happens to fall over the new boundary and hasn't applied to be allowed to stay because there was no reason to until now. Thing is, he refuses to accept being stripped of his position on these grounds, citing that his mandate lasts until 2020, so that's how long he's gonna stay.

Fidesz proposed an increase in MP salaries and benefits. Surprise surprise, the parliament vote was a nearly unanimous yay from Fidesz and opposition alike, with only DK voting nay.

Edited by amitakartok on Jul 13th 2018 at 12:38:33 PM

I'll bet they're going to send themselves thank you notes for their raises.

Actually, Jobbik has since revealed that Fidesz extorted the opposition into it: the cash for the pay raise was supposed to have been taken from the cash paid to parliament fractions (that is, the MPs get paid more but their parties get paid less), but the opposition managed to negotiate with Fidesz to have that part dropped in exchange for opposition support.

The Polish situation has escalated. President signed a law that election of the head of the Supreme Court now requires only a two-thirds majority rather than 110 out of 120, which gives the govt a far greater ability to control the courts.

Protests broke out in two dozen cities at the news, with protesters at the presidential palace screaming shame and that the president will rot in prison for this.

New York Times is saying that Trump is apparently buddying up to Orbán. According to the US ambassador, Trump considers Orbán a "very strong leader"; media says Trump is approaching Orbán specifically because of the latter's anti-EU stance making him an excellent proxy to find a chink in the EU's economic unity. The ambassador stated to Bloomberg that they'll continue criticizing Orbán, but only in private, not in the media, because "criticism is not a strategy by itself". This June, the US government cancelled a 200 million HUF tender for financially supporting independent media in Hungary, evidently because of this.

At the same time, NYT posits the possibility that it might be because the Obama administration repeatedly calling Orbán out for his anti-democratic and anti-human-rights antics has driven Hungary towards Russia and China, which Trump intends to counterbalance to keep Hungary in the Western camp. A different opinion by a former Czech cabinet leader who's currently working at the Prague division of the University of NY is that Trump's approach of Orbán works to legitimize Hungary's pro-Russia politics and the growth of Russian influence in recent years.

Speaking of human rights. The legislation concerning the acceptance and rejection of refugees was amended early this July. Now any refugee who arrives to Hungary after having passed through a safe third country is automatically refused refugee status and deported; along with this, the government declared Serbia a safe country despite the UN not agreeing in the slightest, for which Hungary was slapped by the EU with an infringement procedure because according to EU law, refugees cannot be deported for such a reason. While the refugee in question can appeal the decision, the appeals procedure will not delay the actual deportation because that part was intentionally left out of the amendment.

Anyway. It recently came out that the authorities overseeing the transit zone at the Serbian border interpreted the law as "if these people are going to be deported anyway and we're not stopping them from going back to Serbia, we're not obligated to provide them with sustenance either" (do note that the refugees in question are already kept under prison-level conditions and subjected to constant psychological terror to the point where the Strasbourg human rights court declared last year that the entire transit zone is a huge human rights violation).

Thus last week, every member of two Afghani families except a nursing mother and the <18 children were denied food and even those who did get food were escorted away to ensure they cannot share with the others, while the adults were encouraged to just go back to Serbia already. When human rights people caught wind of it last Friday, they immediately notified the Strasbourg court of human rights who told the government to cut that shit out right now. The very next day, the families got the food.

Another two victims are a pair of conscription-age Syrians who were similarly starved, then given food from Saturday until Tuesday, at which point they were denied again and told to go complain to Strasbourg. Human rights people are now asking Strasbourg to tell the government to not deny food from anyone.

Things are going downhill elsewhere as well. An independent newspaper owned by an LMP member of parliament began release this Wednesday; the owner wanted to put up some posters to advertise the fact but before the day even ended, he was called on the phone by the guy he contracted to do it that the deal is off because the latter is afraid of stepping on certain toes.

Also, have this enlightening podcast.

Orbán and co. got a major kick in the teeth today from the EU's direction, as the European Parliament voted overwhelmingly in favor of the Sargentini Report that democracy and European values are under systemic attack in Hungary. Results are 448 in favor, 197 against, 48 abstained.

Fidesz is rejecting the ruling on the grounds that it requires a two-thirds majority to pass, but it only met (70%) that requirement by not counting abstentions; including those as well would make the vote fall short (64%). FYI, this method of counting has been in place since 1979, instead of being pulled out of nowhere for this occasion as Fidesz insists. As usual, Fidesz are also pushing their rhetoric that this is the work of Communists and that this is proof that the EU is under the control of migration-friendly politicians who want to flood the continent with immigrants - but their crap is increasingly falling on deaf ears, as two-thirds of the EPP whom Fidesz are a member of voted in favor of the report and demands to have Fidesz expelled from the EPP are increasing in number. Even Poland is saying now that if Hungary were to apply to become an EU member state today, they would be turned away.

Hungary is also now on the UN's blacklist of countries antagonistic to human rights activists, next to countries like Russia, China, Saudi Arabia and Israel.

Wait...POLAND has moved against Hungary? That is surprising...I actually expected them to be in Hungary's corner, considering their own attempts to undermine democracy.

Poland is currently undergoing the same procedure themselves.

Guess they’re figuring that the best way to save their own skin is to throw Hungary under the bus.

That depends on how far they go...but then, it has been pretty quiet from Poland recently. Not sure if that is because everyone was distracted by Trump and Brexit or because all the protests within the countries have lead to the ruling party becoming more careful or if they have realized that the EU is their best ally in defence against Russia....

Internal conflict continues in Jobbik. Just yesterday, MP and former head of fraction Volner sharply criticized the party's leadership for their stated intentions of making closer ties to LMP, as he believes that Fidesz won the April elections because Jobbik went too far to the left treating with the other opposition parties and Fidesz was left with no contenders to the right. He also announced his intention to call for internal elections within Jobbik to take control of the party. He's not against Jobbik becoming a people's party; he just, in his exact words, "didn't sign up to be a whore" and support the left after having been bitter enemies for years.

Before the day ended, Jobbik kicked him out of the fraction and ordered him to give back his MP seat, which he refused and two other MPs quit the fraction alongside him.

As for Fidesz, they're doing their usual shenanigans. A while ago, the EU started seriously considering a proposal to maximize VAT at 25% EU-wide, which wouldn't seriously hurt any member state except for Hungary, where VAT has been a record-high 27% ever since Fidesz took power. So naturally, Fidesz started pushing propaganda that the EU wants to raise taxes and reduce family support while not saying a word about the VAT thing.

Also in recent news, Momentum members of a major city with upcoming elections started running a poster campaign expressing their dissatisfaction that the city's been receiving next to no development funds from the govt. They were promptly slapped with a fine by the election committee, with the explicitly-stated reasoning that precedent from the Supreme Court says that what they're doing is illegal because it influences voters in such a way that it reduces Fidesz' chances of winning the election. You know, the exact same thing Fidesz did to Jobbik before the April elections by spreading rumors that Vona is homosexual and of Arab descent?

I don't think there is any country in Europe that adopt the far-right attitude come out better, and I'm not just talking about their image. Their economy and citizen's welfare also suck and keep getting worse with each day. That is one hell of a spite for those guys to be willing to suffer and let their loved ones suffer just to be able to prove that they are right and spite "the left" and immigrants. Those people are weird and either a complete hypocrite or just suffering from some extreme form of selective memory.

This remind me of a few years ago, I got into an argument with some guy who told me to check some far-right website. I don't really want to check it, but I check it, so this guy can stop bothering me and I see a lot of stupid shit there. That website is essentially about the invasion of immigrants to Europe. It focus on the Nordic ones. Nordic countries for Nordic Joe and Jane. Most of them are pretty much the usual evil, rapist immigrants, but there is one shit that is so dumb, I still remember it.

There is this one white dude that is so worried about what will happen to his Thailand wife if those evil, rapist immigrants come. And I am just: "Thailand wife!? What the f*ck happened to the entire 'Nordic countries for Nordic Joe and Jane' spiel!?" These people are all f*cking pathetic and delusional.

I don't get White supremacists obsessions with Nordics. They are less important in history than Mediterranean Europeans are (Roman Empire, anybody?), and haven't contributed much to the world outside of video games and internet/wireless tech.

Edited by CookingCat on Oct 5th 2018 at 10:10:29 AM

You can think the propaganda of the "Aryan" ideal (blonde, blue-eyed, etc.).

It's shallow as fuck.

Edited by M84 on Oct 6th 2018 at 1:08:39 AM

Mystical powers given to us by the Old Gods.

In a more serious vein, there's a lot of pseudoscientific and esoteric thought that went into defining "Aryan". So even the blond and blue-eyed thing wasn't entirely set in stone.

Edited by TerminusEst on Oct 5th 2018 at 10:14:03 AM

Which is funny considering Thor was a redhead.

Most Nordics also aren't violent assholes like white supremacists are. The last time they were was when they were Vikings (and, if you count Finland, the Winter War).

Edited by CookingCat on Oct 5th 2018 at 10:13:15 AM

It's almost as if bigots aren't too interested in actual facts and history.

There was a lot more wars than that initiated from these parts. And way earlier.