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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

#201

Post by joelbluminator »

andrepd wrote: post #190
joelbluminator wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither of them was democratic as in liberal, free press, human rights etc etc. Iran afaik was a full blown dictatorship before the islamic revolution (it's still a dictatorship, but different), Lebanon's history is more complicated but I stand by my view that it was never a liberal democracy, definitely not in the last 40 years.

>Iran afaik was a full blown dictatorship before the islamic revolution Yes, but he was talking about before that wasn't he? Iran was a democracy (flawed, but still) before the US–UK alliance overthrew the parliamentary system and installed a puppet dictator, to keep stealing their oil.

I'm no expert on the history of Iran, but no, it doesn't seem it ever was (Most countries in the region ever were or are one now). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_the_Imperial_S...

"The reign of Reza Shah was totalitarian and dictatorial at a time when totalitarian governments and dictatorships were common in the Middle East and the world[8] and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was some years in the future."

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

#202

Post by fulafel »

iamnotwhoiam wrote: post #102

Does anyone have any idea how Pegasus actually works? I haven't found any teardowns or even a clear description of what the iMessage says. This is some kind of code injection attack that can go through a text message?

Pegasus is a name for their attack repertoire of the day plus whatever next stage payloads are run upon a successful compromise.

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

#203

Post by varelaz »

thinkindie wrote: post #167
zpeti wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

and just to clarify - joining the EU is an exercise of free will. Countries are met with some conditions and it's their decision to join or not. This is valid for both Hungary and Poland. If they don't want to be part of EU any longer I think Brexit showed the way, and all the consequences of that.

Brexit was a way to leave EU by country which wants this. But Hungary doesn't want to leave, they want all benefits and keep doing what they want. EU has very little power to punish Hungary. To do something serious all countries should vote for this, but Hungary and Poland have agreement on protection of each other. So EU is kind of hostage there.

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

#204

Post by blfr »

trasz wrote: post #29
desine wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How terrible that local laws, written and enacted by the voting population they preside over, take precedent over international laws written and enacted by legislators several times more distantly removed from the population. Hopefully the UN gets enough funding to occupy the roles of state and municipal police soon. Then we can free the common man from the tyranny of local government.

Erm, the root of the problem is that polish government is breaking polish law, in particular the constitution. It's not "polish constitution against EU", it's "polish government against polish constitution and the EU".

> polish government is breaking polish law, in particular the constitution

This is either not true or impossible to tell because Polish constitution was really poorly written with very many issues being delegated to lower acts. The Constitutional Tribunal gets to freely decide what is or isn't against the constitution and current Tribunal judges are favourable to the gov.

It's as if the US constitution was stitched from multiple Commerce Clauses. The SCOTUS could rewrite it on the fly (they already do to some extent).

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

#205

Post by pell »

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…

>Orban is seen as hateful or radicalising because he is against illegal immigration. He has made a big marketing point about this.

I'm not going to go into the topic of migration and the "legality" of it. But the reason Orban is considered "radical" by many is not because of his stance on immigration first and foremost but because he's been dismantling democratic institutions left and right, starting with NGOs, the media, academia and to some extend even the judiciary. The fact that his rhetoric is hung up on blaming everything on George Soros does also not help.

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

#206

Post by js8 »

rini17 wrote: post #62
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…

"Hungary has the full support of Poland and the V4" Oversimplified view. There was common interest of V4 against accepting refugees, but Czech & Slovak rep. generally support EU's side in judicial and media independence issues. Elsewhere, German automakers have vast investments in the eastern EU and they have been holding Merkel back against Orban, together with conservative faction of CDU.

> Czech & Slovak rep. generally support EU's side in judicial and media independence issues

In Czechia, I wish that was true, but our current prime minister Andrej Babis is actually openly admiring Orban, and playing up the same nationalistic politics (before the upcoming elections in October). I am not sure he would necessarily support media and judicial independence if it came down to that.

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

#207

Post by gghhzzgghhzz »

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…

I'd argue that it's in their interests. Right populist politics and bland status quo centrism need the other to justify themselves. Bland centrism needs the threat of the right to keep the left in their box (see Biden, Macron, Chirac), then through representing the interests of the status-quo and not addressing any systemic change they create the conditions for right populists.. and so it goes on.

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

#208

Post by krzyk »

thinkindie wrote: post #159
zpeti wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

because they are part of a community (Europe) with certain rules and they are deciding to enjoy the fruits of being part of this community (a lot of funds, free movements for people) and then you don't want to follow the rules. It's part of the basic principles of living in a community. You can't have your cake and eat it.

Issue is that when they joining EU there was no mention of large influx of immigrants to the country.

There is also a difference when you get immigrants of somehow similar culture vs large amount of immigrants from one that is completely different (and it being the same as ISIS, doesn't help, how one can differentiate infiltrator from legitimate refugee?).

It is all good if amount of immigrants is not large influx.

But what most Hungarians (and Poles) didn't take into account is that most of those immigrants prefer to get to western Europe, so blocking them was pointless. They would quickly go West.

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

#209

Post by goodpoint »

reader_mode wrote: post #75
C19is20 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a euperson i want it. And i know many more that would like the same. The bubble may be bigger than you think.

I think it doesn't matter how big the bubble is - you saw what happened with Brexit (and it got validated by EU handling of COVID crisis), now imagine what happens when the only option to leave is succession/civil war. There are independence tensions within European countries (eg. Spain/Basque, UK/Scotland). You have to be a blind idealist to think this would work. There are going to be a lot of crisis scenarios for…

> There are independence tensions within European countries (eg. Spain/Basque, UK/Scotland). > You have to be a blind idealist to think this would work

You are confusing independence from nationalism. They are very different things and you can have the first without the second.

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

#210

Post by dalbasal »

inglor_cz wrote: post #101
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…

EU is primarily an economic bloc and economic interests will carry the day any time, or at least 99 per cent of the time. Orbán has integrated Hungarian industry deep into German supply chains and milks this fact as much as he can.

Agree with "primarily an economic bloc." On that note though, I don't think German-Hungarian industrial integration is all that weighty. Hungary's economy isn't big enough to make it compelling.

The EU just doesn't have a political culture where Hungarian press freedom is "our problem." It's more of a "very unfortunate, next" kind of issue. No more of an EU concern than Uzbek press freedom.

This doesn't compute. I agree. The EU clearly is a very political union. But that's how it is. Press freedoms, human rights or minority freedoms outside of the EU are more likely to become politically hot than inside it.

Maybe this will change over time, but the EU has a weird trajectory. I have no idea where it's going. For the most part, "culture war" issues don't seem to have a grasp on it... as they do on most polities.

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