(no subject)
Poland's government collapses, new elections called.
At last, the Polish government collapsed!
The reason I'm so happy about it is that the government was really bad for Poland. It launched a witch hunt for ex-Communist members, managing to among other things castrate their own secret service, pursued nationalist anti-EU policies while the EU was chiefly responsible for growing their economy (I hope even some of you Eurosceptics will join me here in decrying biting the hand that feeds them), backed extremist Christian politics including extreme abortion bans (leading to one person becoming blind from policy) and homophobia (including banning Gay Pride in Warsaw) and generally managing to undermine Poland's reputation abroad (and in the EU) quite effectively. I think you can see why I'm not sorry to see them go.
The current government is composed of a religious right party called the Law and Justice party, allied in coalition with two extremist fringe parties: the Self Defence party (farmers against the EU) and the League of Polish Families (the ugly side of Catholicism in politics). The good news is that polls show that neither of the two extremist parties have enough of the vote to get back into Parliament, which would hopefully restore some centrism to the politics. What would be nicer is for the opposition, the centre-right Civil party, to get in and we'll be rid of the Kaczynskis.
At last, the Polish government collapsed!
The reason I'm so happy about it is that the government was really bad for Poland. It launched a witch hunt for ex-Communist members, managing to among other things castrate their own secret service, pursued nationalist anti-EU policies while the EU was chiefly responsible for growing their economy (I hope even some of you Eurosceptics will join me here in decrying biting the hand that feeds them), backed extremist Christian politics including extreme abortion bans (leading to one person becoming blind from policy) and homophobia (including banning Gay Pride in Warsaw) and generally managing to undermine Poland's reputation abroad (and in the EU) quite effectively. I think you can see why I'm not sorry to see them go.
The current government is composed of a religious right party called the Law and Justice party, allied in coalition with two extremist fringe parties: the Self Defence party (farmers against the EU) and the League of Polish Families (the ugly side of Catholicism in politics). The good news is that polls show that neither of the two extremist parties have enough of the vote to get back into Parliament, which would hopefully restore some centrism to the politics. What would be nicer is for the opposition, the centre-right Civil party, to get in and we'll be rid of the Kaczynskis.