The Off Topic Topic

[Tamas]

Thirdly, I don't think it is that odd  that we are still in the process of getting over it. If in 1920 the UK would have been forcefully dissolved, with Scotland getting Newcastle and everything north of it, Ireland reunited, and Wales receiving Cornwall, we would still not hear the end of it from the English. It was a massive national shock that required a complete retooling of the national economic and political setup, not to mention countless personal dramas. Of course it takes a few generations to forget it.

So I was right, a century has passed and you guys are not yet over it. 

Hey, if Catalonia and Basque-land ends up forcefully taken from Spain plus they receive some of like third of the ethnic Spanish population as booty, we can run the clock and see how quickly Spaniards will get over it.

Do you see us railing against the US for taking Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines back in 1898? 

But you don't get it. What is now called Bratislava, was capital of Hungary for centuries. Transylvania was not only the most independent Hungarian political entity for centuries but also a culturally buzzing core part of the country, with a massive amount of leading writers poets and artists coming from there. When the new borders finalised there was solid blocks of millions of Hungarians finding themselves in states of other nations.

Obviously Hungary had such a disaster coming for their leaders failing to acknowledge ethnic minority rights, and SOME form of a breakup was simply unavoidable. But it was never going to be non-shocking, even with a less unjust shit than the treaty of Trianon was.

[Duque de Bragança]

Come to Paris Tamas. No rue de Bratislava near the Arc de Triomphe, it's still rue de Presbourg. 

[Sheilbh]

Yeah - I mean didn't Orban and the Polish PM have a meeting where the border "should" be in Slovakia without informing the Slovakian government?

I swear a Polish colleague of mine mentioned something about this.

[Duque de Bragança]

Polish? Speaking of which, there is still a rue de Dantzig in Paris. For a Napoleon victory, mind you.

[The Brain]

...but lose ONE world war...

[Eddie Teach]

If in 1920 the UK would have been forcefully dissolved, with Scotland getting Newcastle and everything north of it, Ireland reunited, and Wales receiving Cornwall, we would still not hear the end of it from the English. It was a massive national shock that required a complete retooling of the national economic and political setup, not to mention countless personal dramas. Of course it takes a few generations to forget it.

...Can we do this please?

Why do you want to be Scottish? Haven't you seen Trainspotting? 

[Josquius]

If in 1920 the UK would have been forcefully dissolved, with Scotland getting Newcastle and everything north of it, Ireland reunited, and Wales receiving Cornwall, we would still not hear the end of it from the English. It was a massive national shock that required a complete retooling of the national economic and political setup, not to mention countless personal dramas. Of course it takes a few generations to forget it.

...Can we do this please?

Why do you want to be Scottish? Haven't you seen Trainspotting? 

Haven't you seen Billy Elliot?
We have it worse :p

[Maladict]

Costa Coffee has began expanding in Spain, it has a few coffee shops in Barcelona and I favor it over Starbucks when it comes to "chain coffee". Plus the establishments are pretty comfortable when I want to spend an afternoon working outside home.

I like Costa of the chains - not least because they pay their taxes in the UK unlike Starbucks

Costa is ok, Starbucks is just gross. Nobody who has their coffee black would voluntarily enter a Starbucks.

[The Larch]

Thirdly, I don't think it is that odd  that we are still in the process of getting over it. If in 1920 the UK would have been forcefully dissolved, with Scotland getting Newcastle and everything north of it, Ireland reunited, and Wales receiving Cornwall, we would still not hear the end of it from the English. It was a massive national shock that required a complete retooling of the national economic and political setup, not to mention countless personal dramas. Of course it takes a few generations to forget it.

So I was right, a century has passed and you guys are not yet over it. 

Hey, if Catalonia and Basque-land ends up forcefully taken from Spain plus they receive some of like third of the ethnic Spanish population as booty, we can run the clock and see how quickly Spaniards will get over it.

Do you see us railing against the US for taking Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines back in 1898? 

But you don't get it. What is now called Bratislava, was capital of Hungary for centuries. Transylvania was not only the most independent Hungarian political entity for centuries but also a culturally buzzing core part of the country, with a massive amount of leading writers poets and artists coming from there. When the new borders finalised there was solid blocks of millions of Hungarians finding themselves in states of other nations.

Obviously Hungary had such a disaster coming for their leaders failing to acknowledge ethnic minority rights, and SOME form of a breakup was simply unavoidable. But it was never going to be non-shocking, even with a less unjust shit than the treaty of Trianon was.

I do get it, and I know the history of the region, and all the platitudes about historical capitals or cultural cores of the country don't change the fact that Hungarians were minorities in all those areas, maybe we could ask Romanians and Slovakians what they think about the issue.

And of course I know that such a thing would be traumatic, but the butthurtness that seems to still go on in Hungary about it is plainly ridiculous. I mean, a monument of national solidarity was just inaugurated in Budapest in front of the parliament on the centenary of the treaty, talking about "Greater Hungary" with the names (in Hungarian) of every village and town in the former Kingdom. We can at least rest easy that irredentism is not an issue anymore, but it is still exploited for nationalistic purposes with BS victimism.

[Josquius]

Doesn't Orban keep power by handing out Hungarian passports to Transylvanian Hungarians and spouting irredentalist crap to get them to vote for him?

[The Larch]

Doesn't Orban keep power by handing out Hungarian passports to Transylvanian Hungarians and spouting irredentalist crap to get them to vote for him?

IIRC Orban gave Hungarian passports like candies to Hungarian minorities in neighbouring countries back in the day, which I think caused quite some controversy, but I have no idea about how that impacts Hungarian elections. How are these Hungarian communities represented? Do they have their own MPs?

[Syt]

Really interesting video of the FT Investigations reporter who has been pushing the Wirecard story for the last two years - repeatedly threatened by the company's lawyers and accused of criminal offences by the German financial regulator. It turns out he was right:
https://www.ft.com/video/37cb70e6-72df-471e-943d-2d32c2785650

The FT has been running with this story - as is their right given the circumstances - but it feels like there's lots of institutional problems that need addressing here. The auditors failed, the German regulator seems to have been kind of in the pocket of Wirecard and there was an article by a former editor of Handelsblatt on the failings in the German financial media too.

As he points out in the video, you kind of have to feel for the guy who was hired as new Chief Compliance Officer, probably with a remit to tighten up compliance. He was meant to start in July but that got pushed forward as the scandal broke. He was announced in a late night press conference then the next day the CEO stood down and he was appointed interim CEO

The early signs point to very poor performance by the regulatory body and the auditing company. Needs a thorough investigation.

Austrian paper Die Presse (conservative) report that Marsalek, the missing Wirecard CFO (and Austrian) apparently had good contacts wo the Austrian domestic secret service BVT and the FPÖ, and previously to the ÖVP. It seems the BVT had employees who, as a sideline, helped him check the credit standing of porn providers. Said employees also fed him inside information that he then shared with FPÖ cabinet members for political favors. (One such info feeds led to a scandalous police raid on the BVT by the then FPÖ interior ministry.)

This being Austria, I doubt there'll be any real fallout. I mean, currently there's a parliamentary investigation into some of the claims raised by Strache in the Ibiza tape, and it's a sham with most people, "surprisingly," not remembering anything, not even whether they ever owned a laptop.

[Maximus]

Can a used fire extinguisher be recharged, or does one just toss them?

If so, where would I go?

It depends on the fire extinguisher. Some are made to be recharged. The cheap ones are usually disposable. I would look for a safety supply store.

[Savonarola]

I saw this headline on the BBC:  Is rum about to become the new gin? and thought:



Won't someone please think about the mothers?   

(As it turns out they meant something different.)

[The Minsky Moment]

You didn't include Beer Street though.

Hogarth was truly the Brett Kavanaugh of 18th century Britain.