The European Project: the future of the EU.

[EvaDK]

No one here showed any interest in the Romanian election, until it became a hot potato due to the ruling of the Romanian Supreme Court. The last couple of pages has strawman's arguments written all over it.

 

[Kyriakos]

The candidates did. "Romania's democracy is being trampled by the state" - and that's also by the non-promoted by Russia candidate.

Romanian election: What the hell is going on?

Here’s what you need to know after an alleged Russian hybrid attack prompted Romania’s Constitutional Court to cancel the presidential election.

www.politico.eu

Let's care about those who actually won and got to the second round of the election, let alone their voters.

 

[Ordnael]

Austria prepares to deport Syrian migrants after Assad regime falls​

Austria prepares to deport Syrian migrants after Assad regime falls

Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, the U.K. said they will halt Syrian asylum applications one day after rebel forces ousted the country’s dictator.

www.politico.eu

BRUSSELS — Austria has announced plans to deport Syrian migrants following the fall of the country’s dictator Bashar Assad to rebel forces after 13 years of civil war, while Belgium, France, Greece and Germany are pausing Syrian asylum applications.
“I have instructed the ministry to prepare an orderly return and deportation program to Syria,” Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told Austrian media, without clarifying which migration statuses would be targeted. Some 100,000 Syrians live in Austria, according to the country’s statistics agency.
One day after Syrian rebel factions, led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) — designated as a terrorist organization by the United States and the United Kingdom — took Damascus, Austria, Belgium, Italy, Germany, Greece and the Netherlands are using the success of the rebels to revise their migration policies, with all six closing their doors to asylum seekers. The U.K. has also said it will stop processing asylum applications from Syrians.
The decisions to revise the asylum policies come as anti-immigrant far-right parties have surged in popularity across the European Union in recent months. Germany, for example, faces snap elections in February, with far-right parties currently performing strongly in the polls.
Refugee rights and aid organizations cautioned that the decision to halt asylum applications comes too soon, pointing to continued fighting in parts of Syria and questions around political stability.
“With significant uncertainties and concerns remaining for Syria’s transition and its future, we call on all countries where Syrians are living as refugees to uphold the right to asylum, as well as the principle of safe and voluntary return,” said the International Rescue Committee’s Imogen Sudbery, senior director for Europe advocacy.
In less than 10 days leading up to Sunday, Syrian rebel forces ended decades of rule by the Assad family, which has run Syria since a coup in 1970. More than 4.5 million Syrians have made their way to Europe since Assad’s crackdown on protests and dissent in 2011 amid the Arab Spring, which led to a long, bloody civil war during which 600,000 people were killed.
Germany’s Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) said it will freeze asylum applications for more than 47,000 Syrian nationals, a spokesperson for BAMF told German media. Syria was the top country of origin for asylum seekers in Germany this year, according to BAMF.
On Monday, Greece put a hold on processing 9,000 Syrian asylum applications, a senior government official, who was granted anonymity to speak about the sensitive matter, told POLITICO. The official added the government will decide on Friday whether to stop processing applications from Syria completely.
Belgium also revealed to POLITICO that the applications of more than 3,000 Syrians have been put on hold.
“We decided today to stop handling Syrian asylum applications for the time being,” a spokesperson for Belgium’s Commissioner General for Refugees and Stateless Persons (CGRS) said.
Other countries are also now considering ending asylum for Syrian applicants.
An official from France’s Interior Ministry said it will seek “to put a stop to the avalanche of appeals on asylum applications from Syrians.” They are, the official added, “working on a suspension of current asylum applications from Syria.”
Even before the fall of the Assad regime, however, European countries reported they were struggling to accommodate Syrian nationals.
In 2015, more than 1 million Syrians made their way by land and sea to Europe at the height of the civil war in the country. Since then, millions have settled in Europe, unsettling politics in Germany, Italy and Greece. Cyprus paused asylum applications from Syria in August, saying it was struggling to cope with the “mass arrival” of migrants.
In October, some EU countries, led by Italy, pushed to normalize ties with Syria in order to facilitate the deportation of migrants. Assad, who held power for 25 years until fleeing to Moscow with his family, has been accused of torture and of using chemical weapons on his own people.
With the ouster of Assad, Europe must now deal with HTS, which is considered a terrorist group by many Western countries, including the United States and the U.K. (which confirmed the government will pause asylum claims from Syrian citizens late Monday).
“The Home Office has paused decisions on Syrian asylum claims whilst we assess the current situation. We keep all country guidance relating to asylum claims under constant review so we can respond to emerging issues,” a U.K. Home Office spokesperson said.
On Monday the EU’s executive arm announced the bloc won’t engage with HTS “full stop,” said its spokesperson Anouar El Anouni, raising questions as to how countries will reconcile their new migration limits with the EU’s policy toward HTS.
“As HTS takes on greater responsibilities, we will need to assess not just their words, but also their actions,” Anouni added.
Several politicians from Germany’s center-right CDU party have spoken out in favor of returning many of the country’s 800,000 Syrians to their homeland in the past 24 hours.
At a Greek government briefing Monday, spokesperson Pavlos Marinakis said Greece hopes for the smooth return of Syrian refugees to their homes. “The return to democratic normality makes us be cautiously optimistic, to expect the possible return of many refugees, people who suffered due to the situation in Syria,” Marinakis said.

 

[Gorbles]

"the return to democratic normality" ye gods. A ragtag coalition took back the country from Assad after a quarter-century of him being in power. It's nothing more than that yet.

 

[Ordnael]

Nice read and insight into our new head of foreign affairs

Europe’s next top diplomat is ready to be undiplomatic​

Europe’s next top diplomat is ready to be undiplomatic

Will Kaja Kallas be able to make her voice heard?

www.politico.eu

In June 2021, just five months into her stint as Estonian prime minister, Kaja Kallas walked into the headquarters of the European Council to confront Europe’s most powerful leader.
As media headlines warned of Russian troops massing on the border of Ukraine, then-German Chancellor Angela Merkel wanted to invite Russian President Vladimir Putin to an upcoming summit of European Union leaders in Brussels.
The idea had the backing of French President Emmanuel Macron, and Merkel intended to push it through during a meeting of the European Council in Brussels.
Kallas wasn’t having it.
“A summit on what?” she asked in front of all the EU leaders, according to two diplomats. Putin, she stressed, could not be trusted, and should be neither accommodated nor appeased.
“What is it for?” repeated Kallas, who could count on the support of several other Eastern European countries.
Merkel, unable to pull off her plan without at least the grudging consent of her fellow leaders, backed down.
As the German chancellor left the room, Macron was in disbelief that a new leader from a small EU country had dared humiliate Merkel, at that time the bloc’s main power player.
According to one diplomat, the French president turned to Kallas and, hinting she might face backlash, asked: “Will you still be prime minister tomorrow?”
Three years later, it’s Merkel who has had to make way and Kallas who’s gotten a promotion. On Dec. 1, Kallas became the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, making her the bloc’s top diplomat.
Nominated in June by her fellow EU leaders — including Macron — Kallas will have her work cut out for her. Not only is she taking office during a period of historic geopolitical upheaval, but the job itself is one in which her predecessors have struggled to make a mark.
Her portfolio will require her to balance the interests of the EU’s 27 countries, each of which has traditionally enjoyed a veto on matters of foreign affairs. With a reputation as one of Europe’s fiercest Russia hawks, Kallas — who declined to be interviewed for this article — will have to overcome the widespread preconception that she’ll be a single-issue foreign policy chief.
“If you ask Kallas where Africa is, she might tell you it’s south of Russia,” quipped a senior European diplomat earlier this year.
The Estonian firebrand has one important advantage, however: Expectations are low. Very low. The outgoing officeholder, Josep Borrell, is an aging Spanish socialist who spent most of his tenure at odds with his boss, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
A former foreign minister who tends to shoot from the hip, Borrell will be remembered both for his passion (such as in condemning Israel’s attacks on Gaza) and for his missteps, including a press conference in Moscow where he stood mutely as Russia’s foreign minister spouted propaganda and described the EU as an “unreliable partner.”
Top aides to 10 EU foreign ministers, current and past, who spoke to POLITICO anonymously, were hopeful regarding Kallas’ appointment, noting the impact she had had on the world stage as prime minister of Estonia, a country of 1.4 million people sandwiched between Russia and the Baltic Sea.
Under Borrell, EU diplomats complained that meetings of the EU’s 27 foreign ministers were long, discursive or scripted. Kallas, according to a senior official, is expected to ask the ministers to come to the meetings with fresh ideas, to encourage spontaneous conversation and to zero in on strategic issues.
“Kallas will be a breath of fresh air,” a foreign minister from a Western European country said.

Politics in her blood​

“Breathe the air of freedom,” Kallas’ father told her in 1988. The family had been allowed to leave Estonia to holiday in East Berlin; from where they stood at the Brandenburg Gate — marking the boundary of Soviet-occupied Europe — they could see West Berlin.
Patriotism and political defiance run in Kallas’ blood. Her great-grandfather, Eduard Alver, was the commander of the Estonian Defence League, leading the battle against the Soviet Red Army during the country’s 1918-1920 War of Independence.
After Estonia was occupied by the Soviets during World War II, her grandfather was sent to a prison camp. Her mother, then a six-month-old baby, was deported to Siberia.
Following the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991, Kallas’ father, Siim Kallas, became foreign minister in 1995, then prime minister in 2002 before being named Tallinn’s first-ever European commissioner in 2004 when Estonia joined the EU. He held the post for a decade.
Kallas’ initial instinct was to stay far from politics. In an interview with POLITICO, Ülo Kallas, her older brother, recalled: “What was a crucial point for both Kaja and me is that we both wanted to establish our own career, not on the back of our father.”
Kallas specialized in competition law, a field that at the time, like many others, was dominated by men. But “she always blended in and felt like an equal,” said Sten Luiga, a lawyer who first met Kallas when she joined his firm as a trainee in the 1990s. The two were later partners at a different firm. “She was very energetic. I don’t remember ever seeing her tired or exhausted.”
Despite her success as a lawyer, it was clear to those who knew her that Kallas wanted something else. “I remember her being at the peak of her career and saying, ‘I’m not feeling satisfied and I want to do something completely different,’” her brother said. “She was big on golf at the time, and one of the things she was thinking [was], ‘Maybe I want to go and become a golf caddie for some time in Australia.’”
However, the lure of politics proved more attractive than Bondi Beach. Kallas was elected first to the Estonian parliament in 2011 and then to the European Parliament in 2014.
“The life of a partner at a law firm is: You earn money, time becomes billable hours,” said Luiga, the former legal colleague. “I think these types of things didn’t motivate her that much. She wanted to have a bigger impact.”

Russia hawk​

That idealism, on top of her staunch dedication to the values of democracy and openness, makes her the antithesis of the realist, strongman politics embodied by the United States’ next president, Donald Trump. But it’s another man, Putin, who is her main political foil and, paradoxically, her biggest political asset.
As Western European leaders fretted about provoking the Russian president by supporting Ukraine in the wake of his 2022 full-scale invasion, Kallas was relentless in calling them to task and coming as close as she could to explicitly saying: “I told you so.”
“Putin will come to test us, and yes, we will have to resist,” Kallas told the European Parliament in 2022, two weeks after Russian troops invaded Ukraine. “We also have some experience with Russia — which we have been trying to share with the European Union since we joined.”
In a widely circulated video filmed in 2022 at the Munich Security Conference, she broke down — in less than a minute — the Kremlin’s negotiating tactics: “First, demand the maximum … Second, present ultimatums. And third, do not give one inch in negotiations, because there will always be people in the West who will offer you something.”
Under Kallas, Estonia pushed the EU to set quantifiable targets in its support for Kyiv. That included advocating an EU target to send Ukraine 1 million rounds of ammunition, and earmarking frozen Russian assets for its reconstruction. Estonia has also been spending above 3 percent of GDP on defense since the war started — well over NATO’s goal of 2 percent — and earmarking 0.25 percent of GDP solely for the purposes of aiding Kyiv.
“I wanted Estonia to lead by example,” Kallas wrote in a letter to members of the European Parliament before her nomination hearing. “Russia’s imperialistic dream never died.”
The Kremlin has taken notice. In April 2023, it put Kallas on its wanted list, formally for her government’s decision to take down Soviet-era war monuments. It was the first time an EU leader was included on the blacklist, which also named Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
“This is yet more proof that I am doing the right thing,” an unfazed Kallas wrote on X. “The Kremlin now hopes this move will help to silence me and others — but it won’t.”

EU is concerned​

The question hanging over Kallas is to what extent she’ll be able to continue to make waves in her new role.
Estonia may be a small country, but when she was head of a sovereign state, she was free to speak her mind. As high representative, she’ll run the European External Action Service, the bloc’s diplomatic wing, a role which in practice comes with more limitations than actual power.
Technically, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs isn’t even in charge of foreign policy. To formulate an official EU stance, she’ll have to get every national government to sign off, including leaders who have opposing views on Putin, such as Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
“High representatives have not always been visible or effective or powerful,” Jeppe Kofod, a former Danish foreign minister, put it diplomatically. “It depends a bit on the personalities but also on how much space they get from the 27 member states.”
As a result, EU statements tend to be watered down to the point of weakness if not irrelevance, as noted by a popular account on X, @ISEUConcerned, which lists every time the high representative or other foreign policy officials respond to a faraway tragedy with “concern.”
“We sometimes lack muscles,” Kofod conceded. “It’s hard to always be taken very seriously when you also have member states running their own foreign policy agenda on the side.
A standoff at a NATO summit in July suggests Kallas, diplomat or no, will not be mincing her words when she faces Russia’s sympathizers.
As the military alliance gathered in Washington, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán was already in the doghouse for traveling to Moscow earlier that month. Adding fuel to the fire, he told the assembled leaders, which included Zelenskyy, that Ukraine should never be admitted to the alliance.
It was, in the words of someone in the room, a “very rude” moment.
Kallas was next to take the floor. “She dropped the prepared speech,” a diplomat recalled. “She answered Orbán directly, saying how wrong he was and that history and facts show that NATO’s aim is to avoid wars, and not to provoke [conflict].”
After Kallas, several other leaders followed her example by casting aside the notes prepared by their staff and speaking out against Orbán.
“She will be ready, and she has all the skills and all the knowledge that you need for that job,” said Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur, who worked alongside Kallas for most of her premiership.
He pointed out that Kallas is the first high representative to have been a prime minister: “So, by default, you have already brought a view on things — you’ve been sitting around all the big tables.”
In her first week in office, Kallas has already struck a more hawkish tone than her predecessor, hinting that she could seek to put sanctions on members of the Moscow-friendly ruling party in Georgia if they were to crack down on demonstraters protesting what they say was a rigged election.
She also adopted a shift in tone on the conflict in Ukraine, traveling to Kyiv on her first trip as high representative and writing on social media that “the European Union wants Ukraine to win this war.”

Challenges ahead​

For Kallas, the job appears to be coming at exactly the right time: just as her popularity at home has begun to wane.
The Estonian economy has just emerged from two years of recession, and is among the worst-performing in Europe. Her Estonian Reform Party, comfortably in the lead a year ago, has since been overtaken by the main opposition party.
Kallas’ local critics deride her as the ultimate nepo-baby, detached from the struggles of ordinary Estonians. The disdain seems mutual: Kallas has referred to media coverage of her husband’s business ties to Russia as a “witch hunt.”
“I hope the new job will offer a better balance,” said her brother, Ülo. “It’s still a tough job but in [domestic] politics you face constant criticism, negativity from all sides.”
Abroad, Kallas remains something of a media darling, charming many a reporter with her combination of unvarnished straight talk and high-brow love of literature (those who know her won’t have been surprised to hear her quoting Winston Churchill, David Ben Gurion and Plato during her commissioner hearing).
But how long will her international honeymoon last, as Putin continues to test Europe’s stamina and solidarity?
EU countries are also widely split on other key geostrategic issues — it’s not just Orbán’s Hungary throwing a spanner in the works of a united front. In the latest spat with China over electric vehicles, it was Germany that defended Beijing against France and Italy.
On the Middle East, Spain, Ireland and Slovenia have broken ranks with the rest of the EU to recognize Palestinian statehood, while Germany, Finland and the Czech Republic, among others, still trade arms with Israel.
Some have already criticized Kallas for immediately deciding to replace Stefano Sannino, the civil servant at the head of the EEAS, rather than relying on the Italian veteran as she learned the ropes.
“Several member states were quite irritated about this decision,” said one EU diplomat of Sannino’s dismissal. “You don’t let the pilot disembark the ship when a new crew has to navigate stormy waters.”
Then there’s the biggest elephant in the room: Donald Trump. Eurocrats have vivid memories about how the first Trump administration killed off a proposed trade deal. This time around the fear concerns Ukraine, as Trump seems to be looking to score with a quick peace deal (presumably on terms favorable to Russia).
Offering a sneak peek at how she will deal with the next American administration, Kallas said during her hearing that “if the United States is worried about China, they should first be worried about Russia.” Adding later: “If we look to history, isolationism has never worked well for America.”
“The world is on fire,” she said during the same hearing. “So we have to stick together.”
The time may come when Kallas will be wishing for the good old days, when all she had to do was stare down the leaders of Germany and France.

 

[Broken_Erika]

Georgia's turmoil deepens as ex-footballer named president​

A former Manchester City footballer has been appointed president by Georgia's disputed parliament, after 17 days of pro-EU protests that have swept this country's towns and cities.
Mikheil Kavelashvili, now 53, is a former MP from the increasingly authoritarian ruling Georgian Dream party and was the only candidate for the job.
On Saturday, 224 out of 225 members of Georgia's electoral college voted for him.
The four main opposition groups have rejected Kavelashvili and have boycotted parliament, insisting that the elections held in October were rigged.
Large crowds of protesters, facing freezing temperatures, gathered outside parliament from the early hours of Saturday morning ahead of the vote.
Georgia's outgoing pro-Western president, Salome Zourabichvili, has condemned Kavelashvili's election as a travesty, insisting she holds Georgia's only remaining legitimate institution.

Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze has accused Zourabichvili of trying to harm Georgia's interests, emphasising that when her term of office ends on 29 December, she will have to retire.
"We have very strong state institutions, so we certainly have no difficulty in bringing the situation under full control," he was quoted as saying on Friday.
Party colleague Nino Tsilosani told reporters that Zourabichvili was no longer president in the eyes of the public.
Georgia is a parliamentary democracy with the president the head of state, and the prime minister the head of Parliament.

Protests against Georgian Dream began immediately after the October elections but they burst into life on 28 November when the government announced it was putting EU accession negotiations on hold until 2028.
An overwhelming majority of Georgians back the country's path to the European Union and it is part of the constitution.
Every night, the main avenue outside parliament fills with protesters draped in EU flags, demanding new elections.
The night before the vote, the capital Tbilisi was convulsed by pop-up protests involving IT specialists, public sector workers, creative industry professionals, actors and lawyers.
"We are standing here to create a legal state once and for all, to respect the provisions of the constitution and human rights," said lawyer Davit Kikaleishvili, 47.

Kavelashvili is a founder of the People's Power party, known for being the main voice for anti-Western propaganda in Georgia.
He has accused opposition parties of acting as a "fifth column" directed from abroad, and described President Zourabichvili as a "chief agent".
Kavelashvili moved into politics after he was disqualified from seeking the leadership of the Georgian football federation because he lacked the qualifications.
Although his party ran alongside Georgian Dream in the October elections, it has now decided to act in parliament as a "healthy opposition", to fill the place of the "so-called radical opposition funded by foreign forces".
A People's Power party MP, Guram Macharashvili, who announced on 13 December that his faction would leave the ruling parliamentary majority, told the BBC that what was happening in the country was an "artificially created crisis characterised by the influence of foreign powers".
Macharashvili and Kavelashvili are the architects of Georgia's controversial "foreign agents" law, seen by the country's opposition as Russian-style legislation.
When asked what "healthy opposition" means, Macharashvili said: "Opposition does not necessarily mean opposition on all issues, it does not mean only cooperation with foreigners. It means competition with the ruling party to make better proposals on what's best for Georgia's future."

Georgian Dream, founded by billionaire businessman and former Georgian PM Bidzina Ivanishvili, has been accused of dragging the country back into Russia's sphere of influence.
Both the EU and US have condemned the government for democratic backsliding and more than 460 people have been detained across Georgia over the past two weeks, according to Transparency International.
More than 300 have been ill-treated or tortured, the organisation says, including dozens of people from Georgian media. Last weekend, thugs were filmed attacking a TV reporter and cameraman.

The EU has condemned the "brutal, unlawful force from the police" and foreign ministers are due to consider measures against the government when they meet on Monday.
The US state department has already imposed visa restrictions on Georgian officials, including government ministers and police.
Protesters have called on the international community to impose sanctions on top government officials as well as Bidzina Ivanishvili, Georgia's most powerful man.
Pro-government groups have also waged a campaign of harassment towards civil society activists, beating them outside homes, and carrying out arbitrary arrests.

"There is systematic torture, inhuman and degrading treatment of citizens," said former public rights defender Nino Lomjaria.
Theatre workers who joined the protests on Friday chanted: "The police are everywhere, justice is nowhere."
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5ygejxej28o

 

[Zardnaar]

"the return to democratic normality" ye gods. A ragtag coalition took back the country from Assad after a quarter-century of him being in power. It's nothing more than that yet.

Yeah wait a year or so. Situation is very much in flux atm.

 

[Kyriakos]

Nice read and insight into our new head of foreign affairs

Europe’s next top diplomat is ready to be undiplomatic​

Europe’s next top diplomat is ready to be undiplomatic

Will Kaja Kallas be able to make her voice heard?

www.politico.eu

Let's be realistic; she is neither (apart from purely in name of the office) a top diplomat, nor someone that has political weight. Maybe if Harris had gotten elected, the effect wouldn't become painfully obvious. But now it will.

 

[EvaDK]

Let's be realistic; she is neither (apart from purely in name of the office) a top diplomat, nor someone that has political weight. Maybe if Harris had gotten elected, the effect wouldn't become painfully obvious. But now it will.

Strictly speaking, maybe Kallas is not really required to throw political weight behind pushing the EU towards a stronger and more determined stance regarding Russia/Ukraine, because Putin is doing that for her. NATO has never seen a greater salesperson promoting alliance membership, than Putin. His picture should be on the wall at their headquarters in Brussels under the plaque 'Non-Employee of the Decade'.

The conundrum that EU leaders find themselves in now and in the near future, is what to do when Trump's policy regarding the Ukraine war becomes clear. Putin's obvious weakness revealed with the fall of the Assad regime, may present an opportunity that can be exploited - or it may not. We just don't know yet.

 

[Kyriakos]

Strictly speaking, maybe Kallas is not really required to throw political weight behind pushing the EU towards a stronger and more determined stance regarding Russia/Ukraine, because Putin is doing that for her. NATO has never seen a greater salesperson promoting alliance membership, than Putin. His picture should be on the wall at their headquarters in Brussels under the plaque 'Non-Employee of the Decade'.

The conundrum that EU leaders find themselves in now and in the near future, is what to do when Trump's policy regarding the Ukraine war becomes clear. Putin's obvious weakness revealed with the fall of the Assad regime, may present an opportunity that can be exploited - or it may not. We just don't know yet.

Assad's fall, for all we know, may have been more than just Russia (due to Ukraine) being unable to station as many forces there. But at any rate, if we look so easily at countries as "regimes", we should expect exactly the same from "other teams"...

 

[Voidwalkin]

When I was young there were claims of Russian soviet gold financing lefties,
now there are claims of Russian fascist gold financing righties.
There may be some truth in these, but I doubt that it is significant.

Still in five to ten years time, it will likely all be about Chinese gold.

Interesting to see this phenomenon transcends the Atlantic.

I get a bit tired of the idea that propaganda of any sort can be so influential, generally. It makes one of the same assumptions conspiracy theories do: that the masses are so brainless they can be sculpted to believe whatever an elite want them to.

It also frequently shifts blame from the deficiencies of the ideology onto some "other" or another. Russia is often used, but so are many other entities in many other contexts.

The end result is an injection of cynicism into the body politic that is nearly always far more damaging than the propaganda could ever realistically be claimed to be.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

I get a bit tired of the idea that propaganda of any sort can be so influential, generally. It makes one of the same assumptions conspiracy theories do: that the masses are so brainless they can be sculpted to believe whatever an elite want them to.

Artificial intelligence, mass media, and big data has made propaganda stronger. Education has not kept up with social changes.

 

[Voidwalkin]

Artificial intelligence, mass media, and big data has made propaganda stronger. Education has not kept up with social changes.

Radio Free Liberty did not bring down the USSR, Trump did not win because of Russian propaganda, and Romanians were not deceived en masse by a propaganda campaign sufficient to necessitate the cancelation of an election.

In each case, there were real issues the publics had that fed discontent unaddressed or addressed insufficiently by political elites(who often acted contrary to those concerns)

Not buying education as a panacea to all social ills, either, but that's sorta beyond the scope of the specifics.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

The problems and concerns are real, the solutions are poison.

 

[REDY]

I am still confused how some should not consider it real. It perhaps matter how is Russian campaign manifested.
Here it means that on discussion channels on main news portals its impossible to dicuss now on Ukraine-Russia news. Russian bots took discussion under control.
The all rational and positive posts are ridiculed and downvoted and all negative and hateful posts are upvoted.
After Russian campaign most of Slovaks believe that Ukraine attacked Russia and that Earth is flat.

In West its perhaps more subtle.

 

[Akka]

I notice that the very vocal defenders of democracy that were very worried about Romania are loudly silent about what is happening in Georgia. How peculiar.

Interesting to see this phenomenon transcends the Atlantic.

I get a bit tired of the idea that propaganda of any sort can be so influential, generally. It makes one of the same assumptions conspiracy theories do: that the masses are so brainless they can be sculpted to believe whatever an elite want them to.

It also frequently shifts blame from the deficiencies of the ideology onto some "other" or another. Russia is often used, but so are many other entities in many other contexts.

The end result is an injection of cynicism into the body politic that is nearly always far more damaging than the propaganda could ever realistically be claimed to be.

On the other hand, when the goal of the propaganda is to instill cynicism and as such apathy...

 

[Gorbles]

Radio Free Liberty did not bring down the USSR, Trump did not win because of Russian propaganda, and Romanians were not deceived en masse by a propaganda campaign sufficient to necessitate the cancelation of an election.

In each case, there were real issues the publics had that fed discontent unaddressed or addressed insufficiently by political elites(who often acted contrary to those concerns)

Not buying education as a panacea to all social ills, either, but that's sorta beyond the scope of the specifics.

There are always real issues. It doesn't make disinformation not a factor.

Painting it as something that has to be the only factor is in of itself a form of disinformation. Or at least, a heavily skewed opinion.

 

[Kyriakos]

I notice that the very vocal defenders of democracy that were very worried about Romania are loudly silent about what is happening in Georgia. How peculiar.

On the other hand, when the goal of the propaganda is to instill cynicism and as such apathy...

Nevermind all else, this is the Eu thread

 

[Verbose]

Nevermind all else, this is the Eu thread

The EU is not what you think. Neither is Russia.

 

[Akka]

Nevermind all else, this is the Eu thread

And a major reason for these protests is about how the government has suspended EU membership, so kinda relevant to the thread. And completely irrelevant to the discrepancy.
But whatever allows to deflect and ignore the point, right ?