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β€˜New era’: Tusk celebrates exit polls suggesting opposition win in Poland (www.aljazeera.com)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/europe@feddit.de
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[–] 43 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Unfortunately it comes just after Slovaks put a pro-russian-imperalism mafia-friendly and democracy-averse corrupt nationalist in charge of the country - in coalition with a far-right party that is so unconcerned with disguising their fascism that they are only one swastika away from co-opting all the Nazi symbolism.

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  • [–] 33 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Also Italy put a Mussolini fan girl in power

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  • [–] 11 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    A Mussolini fan who is weirdly fine with European integration, but a Mussolini fan nevertheless.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Doesn't the EU have safeguards to twart down such "regimes"?

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  • [–] 21 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    There's article 7, but it's deeply flawed, because it requires unanimity from the remaining members. So if 2 countries have authoritarian governments then they can protect each other. For the last few years it has mostly been Poland protecting the Hungarian government - by far the worst backsliding in democracy in the EU. Now Fico is going to Orban's best friend.

    In practice this leaves removing funds from the EU budget as a way to punish governments that are against democracy and the rule of law, but that's not been very effective and feels a bit icky.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago

    I agree, as that money is intended to go towards structural reforms, in the end line aimed at improving living standards but we all know that a good portion of it is lost to corruption, especially in such regimes.

    Witholding such funds does feel like blackmail but it's the regimes holding the hostages and I do think dealing with crooks tends to produce poor results.

    At this point, we can be happy one change has happened. Let's remain vigilant.

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