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Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

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Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#171

Post by gattilorenz »

alkonaut wrote: post #147
paganel wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The EU funds and fuels a Belorussian-style regime Afaik Orban's party has won the last rounds of elections pretty conclusively, with no fraud allegations involved (unlike what currently happens in the US, I'm talking about election fraud allegations). What's with this "Belorussian-style regime" nonsense?

Democracy isn’t merely “majority rule”. It’s also the concept of everyone’s equal value regardless of ethnicity, sexuality, freedom of expression and so on. Merely getting 51% of votes by disregarding those values is neither acceptable nor democratic. And the EU can’t stand for it just like it could t stand for a regime that takes power through violence. “Belorussian style regime” I assume is in reference to freedom…

> Democracy isn’t merely “majority rule”. It’s also the concept of everyone’s equal value regardless of ethnicity, sexuality, freedom of expression and so on.

As much as I would like this to be true, I don't think it is. In practice - and to a certain extent also in theory, if you at least add add some nuance - in every democratic country the majority has power to decide who's granted full rights and value, and who isn't (think of voting rights for inmates or immigrants, right to be elected, right to obtain a job etc.). Even when the constitution sets those rights "in stone", a vast majority has the legal right to change the constitution.

Update: part of the nuance is that democracies won't technically change the value of a person, to use your term. But by removing their rights, the effects are hardly different.

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#172

Post by TheFreim »

poisonborz wrote: post #28

If there is one single lasting international effect of Orbán and his party, it's how he demonstrated how EU is completely helpless against rouge states (as well). The delicate political balance of its parliamental politics make it impossible to react to any complex, even if lethal threats. The EU funds and fuels a Belorussian-style regime in its own heartland for a decade now, and all they can do are angry notices an…

> helpless against rouge states

Is Hungary a rogue state?

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#173

Post by paganel »

greendesk wrote: post #154
paganel wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> their nation over larger groups of human beings who are just like them. Because when the going gets really tough that abstract "human being" from across the Continent won't care at all about you, while at the same time the person geographically closer to you and who might belong to the same nation might prove to be a better ally. Just think of the Greece crisis of 2012 when the "human beings" from The Netherlands w…

Or just think of the mirror statement. It is a practice to reverse a statement, to see if it logically consistent. Here, it will go: Or think of the Greece crisis of 2012 when the “human beings” from Greece were generally just assholes to their fellow human beings who happened to live in Slovenia, Munich or Denmark. Note that the Greek crisis included a transfer from poorer Slovenia to the richer Greece. Note that Gr…

> Note that Greece has a high corruption rate.

Merkel actively lobbied for the corrupt Wirecard company in front of China officials while the company had been under investigation, afaik the highest Greek official has done no such vile and corrupt things. Unfortunately what Merkel did does not get counted in various "corruption charts" for various reasons (Orientalism being just one of them).

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#174

Post by throwaway473825 »

reader_mode wrote: post #116
ginko wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only large countries that did better were the UK and US due to banning the export of vaccines. It's mainly the UK trying to spin this as a propaganda win after BREXIT.

What other comparable developed countries are there ? Australia had it's own isolation thing so it's a different context entirely. Russia had vacation faster, China as well.

> Russia had vacation faster, China as well.

No, they did not. Here's a site where you can see the share of people vaccinated against COVID-19: https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#175

Post by biscotte_ »

maigret wrote: post #57
reader_mode wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why not abolish nations within the EU and just become the EU with different provinces? Because outside of your bubble nobody wants this. A random person from Bulgaria is going to have a very different culture from a random person from Netherlands. What do you think happens with power in such conglomerate ? If you want to see what happens when you create a forced conglomerate of different nations (but still more simi…

Or Switzerland or Belgium. I'd argue that, by now, there are more differences (cultural, economic, political...) between parts of the countries, like cities vs countryside, than between countries.

Not really... take a look at the average salary in Romania and compare to France of Luxembourg ...

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#176

Post by chpatrick »

bkovacev wrote: post #82
xiphias2 wrote: post #3

Orban used EU money to take total control of the country (media, poor voters). If EU lets China come into Hungary, it will backfire for the whole EU in my opinion.

China has already targeted Serbia and Montenegro - infrastructure mainly. I can't find the source now, but I have heard they already started investing in Hungary.

Orban wants to build a massive Chinese university campus in Budapest, with a loan from China.

https://telex.hu/english/2021/04/22/hungary-china-fudan-univ...

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#177

Post by pjc50 »

zpeti wrote: post #137
roenxi wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If there is a part of the population that is radicalized and hate rhetoric is used that will destabilize any society. I'm going to point at this as an example of a very traditional, very political example unproductive thinking. One of the lessons people refuse to see in politics is that the people who vote for things they don't like might, potentially, be upset about something. There is a lack of reflection on how…

The word radicalized is also way overused. Orban is seen as hateful or radicalising because he is against illegal immigration. He has made a big marketing point about this. But that doesn't mean that there aren't legitimate concerns about illegal immigration that Hungarians might have. Just because Western european nations have decided they don't mind if they add 1-2% yearly to their populations of a culturally total…

There's almost seven million displaced Syrians. The real failure is to not have dealt with the Syrian crisis, and now the demand to kick out the refugees, no matter how impractical this is or how lethal it would be to them, is rising.

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#178

Post by barneygale »

zpeti wrote: post #137
roenxi wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If there is a part of the population that is radicalized and hate rhetoric is used that will destabilize any society. I'm going to point at this as an example of a very traditional, very political example unproductive thinking. One of the lessons people refuse to see in politics is that the people who vote for things they don't like might, potentially, be upset about something. There is a lack of reflection on how…

The word radicalized is also way overused. Orban is seen as hateful or radicalising because he is against illegal immigration. He has made a big marketing point about this. But that doesn't mean that there aren't legitimate concerns about illegal immigration that Hungarians might have. Just because Western european nations have decided they don't mind if they add 1-2% yearly to their populations of a culturally total…

There would be little reason to migrate if those European nations didn't exploit corruption and poor labour/environmental standards in other countries. Allowing free movement of goods and services without free movement of people entrenches inequality and makes the problem worse. Time to look at whether global capitalism is culturally "good", rather than shifting the blame to desperate people seeking safety or a better life for their family.

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#179

Post by b0rsuk »

TheFreim wrote: post #172
poisonborz wrote: post #28

If there is one single lasting international effect of Orbán and his party, it's how he demonstrated how EU is completely helpless against rouge states (as well). The delicate political balance of its parliamental politics make it impossible to react to any complex, even if lethal threats. The EU funds and fuels a Belorussian-style regime in its own heartland for a decade now, and all they can do are angry notices an…

> helpless against rouge states Is Hungary a rogue state?

From the perspective of EU, it is a rogue state. It acts in concert with Putin and Kremlin to destabilize EU.

Re: Hungarian journalists and critics of Orbán were targeted with Pegasus

#180

Post by volta83 »

dogma1138 wrote: post #34
trasz wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except they don't. Please don't spread polish government's propaganda.

Except they do https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-prepares-legal-action-aga... Overall the EU has about the same number of procedures open against Germany as they do against Poland, both are pretty high on the list Germany is #5 Poland is #4.

While the German court ruled against the EU, the German government immediately complied with EU law.

Those in the EU suing Germany for its court decision here are actually German, and are only doing this to establish legal precedent.

This makes it a completely different situation than what’s going on with Hungary and Poland.

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