Hungarian Politics

[Tamas]

It seems the government have only ordered 1.7 million Moderna vaccine doses out of the 3.5 million availabke to them on the EU quota.

On media questions on this they said it is very similar to the Pfizer vaccine (of which they blamed the EU for not sending enough) but more expensive so they "saw no need to order more". All the while they have ordered millions of the untested Chinese vaccine at double the price of Pfizer"s.

[Tamas]

One of the weird things in Hungary is that the army has been deployed to hospitals fairly early in the pandemic. Although perhaps it is not so weird as men with guns have been the government's favourite "we are handling the situation, no really, trust us" move.




The other weird thing is that the government felt like a pandemic and a health system creaking under the pressure is the best possible time to push through an effective decrease hospital staff compensation.

As I understand, a significant portion of the money A&E / ICU nurses and doctors are taking home has been various salary extensions payable after working out of hours and that sort of thing. These have been guaranteed by law. Now these payments have been completely restructured and although technically still payable there are no guarantees left that they are going to get paid.

This has been pushed through rather abruptly and has been the last straw for many nurses and doctors.

A journalst was visiting a hospital today where the soldiers were actually making themselves useful by guiding patients and such. The hospital's A&E unit was shut down due to all the personnel who have quit in protest, and the doctors called in were triaging in an ad-hoc outside place. One phone call the journalist overheard was on a covid-suspected patient in an ambulance
"-So, the gist of it is, we don't have the room but we still need to take him?
-Yes"

All this of course while cronyism and questionable spending have reached never before seen proportions during the pandemic. It really is incredible just how resigned the whole country is to be putting up with all this.

[HVC]

i like the combination of camo and a high visibility vest. just to confuse the enemy, i guess.

[Tamas]

My favourite is the automatic weapon to help out managing hospital patients.

[Sheilbh]

So the EPP group in the European Parliament have finally adopted a rule change that would make it easy/possible for them to expel Fidesz.

Because of this Fidesz has left the group in the EP (from my understanding they're still part of the political family, so Orban will still go to the EPP pre-summit meeting etc), calling the new rules antidemocratic, unjust and unacceptable - especially when Europe should be focusing on the pandemic.

The EPP are (finally, partially) in the right, but it feels like they've still managed to create a scenario where Fidesz can spin it pretty well

[Zanza]

Good

[garbon]

The EPP are (finally, partially) in the right, but it feels like they've still managed to create a scenario where Fidesz can spin it pretty well

Given how little dissent Fidesz tolerates in Hungary, does that even matter?

[Sheilbh]

The EPP are (finally, partially) in the right, but it feels like they've still managed to create a scenario where Fidesz can spin it pretty well

Given how little dissent Fidesz tolerates in Hungary, does that even matter?

Maybe not necessarily in Hungary but I think so just in terms of optics. In my view the EPP should have then immediately held a vote to expel Fidesz to avoid them being able to walk out and spin it as leaving on their own terms - especially because Fidesz are excellent trolls so I think they even referred to the motion as an example of anti-democratic behaviour but also changing the rules like this as undermining the sort of rule of law within the EPP.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

The EPP are (finally, partially) in the right, but it feels like they've still managed to create a scenario where Fidesz can spin it pretty well

Given how little dissent Fidesz tolerates in Hungary, does that even matter?

Maybe not necessarily in Hungary but I think so just in terms of optics. In my view the EPP should have then immediately held a vote to expel Fidesz to avoid them being able to walk out and spin it as leaving on their own terms - especially because Fidesz are excellent trolls so I think they even referred to the motion as an example of anti-democratic behaviour but also changing the rules like this as undermining the sort of rule of law within the EPP.

new they only need to act against spain and it's holding of political prisoners...

[Valmy]

new they only need to act against spain and it's holding of political prisoners...

Oh? Have they acted against Hungary yet? Kicking out one party from a parliamentary group handles all the problems in Hungary eh?

[Crazy_Ivan80]

new they only need to act against spain and it's holding of political prisoners...

Oh? Have they acted against Hungary yet? Kicking out one party from a parliamentary group handles all the problems in Hungary eh?

focusing on Hungary but ignoring Spain just exposes the hypocrisy that is rife in the EU, that cesspool of failed politicians.

[Valmy]

new they only need to act against spain and it's holding of political prisoners...

Oh? Have they acted against Hungary yet? Kicking out one party from a parliamentary group handles all the problems in Hungary eh?

focusing on Hungary but ignoring Spain just exposes the hypocrisy that is rife in the EU, that cesspool of failed politicians.

Look Spain has problems but it is not a full out authoritarian mobster state like Hungary. It strikes me as paying less attention to that sprained ankle because you also have terminal cancer, hardly hypocrisy.

Surely you can come up with a better example than that.

[Sheilbh]

focusing on Hungary but ignoring Spain just exposes the hypocrisy that is rife in the EU, that cesspool of failed politicians.

I don't entirely disagree on the imprisonment of Spanish politicians, but I'd hardly ay the EU has focused on Hungary. Orban's been in office and we've been aware of these issues for a decade and the EU hasn't taken any measures against them.

The only action that's happened is by EPP to make it easier to kick Fidesz out of the parliamentary group (and they walked instead), but that is, from my knowledge, only about the parliamentary group - it doesn't apply to the gatherings of EPP leaders which Orban would still attend because Fidesz is (for now) still part of the EPP.

My take on the EU with Orban and Poland etc is that it goes to the core of what the EU is: it's either a liberal, democratic organisation in which case I think the emergence of authoritarian states within that framework is kind of an existential issue; or it's a tool for the member states and will reflect the decisions and values of the member states whether they are liberal and democratic or authoritarian. My own view is that generally the EU is the latter, still, but aspires to be the former - and hopefully will get there.

And I worry it might take quite a dark turn after Merkel leaves because I think there's several leaders in Europe now - Orban, Macron, Kurz, Duda - who are talking in sort of civilisational rather than value terms about Europe. Obviously there's loads of things that might change that.

[Valmy]

I don't entirely disagree on the imprisonment of Spanish politicians, but I'd hardly ay the EU has focused on Hungary. Orban's been in office and we've been aware of these issues for a decade and the EU hasn't taken any measures against them.

Yeah if the EU had also taken these non-measures against Spain would that make Crazy Ivan happy?

[celedhring]

Meh, the politicians will be pardoned soon without need for the EU to put us in the doghouse. All in all they will have served 3 years. And while we may argue about the severity of the original sentence, what they did was very hardly beyond reproach from the courts.