basquebromance
Diamond Member
- Nov 26, 2015
- 109,396
- 27,067
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- Banned
- #1
For Orban, Hungarian unity is a dominant theme about which he talks all the time. the togetherness he envisions is defined by bloodlines, not borderlines. to him, a person of Magyar ancestry living in Serbia or Romania is more authentically Hungarian than a Roma or Turk born and raised on Hungarian soil
jacobinmag.com
excerpts:
A united opposition damns Orbán for his lawbreaking and ties to Vladimir Putin — yet has struggled to articulate an alternative of its own.
Since the Hungarian far-right leader returned to the prime minister’s office in 2010, he has met the Russian president some eleven times — the most recent a February 1 summit to negotiate energy imports, just weeks before the Kremlin-ordered invasion of Ukraine.
Orbán has often insisted that his ties to Moscow are just a matter of pragmatism. In a 2015 interview, he told Politico: “What I represent is not my opinion but the interests of the Hungarian nation. […] So, we have to have a good balanced relationship with the Russians. […] Putin is someone you can cooperate with.”
Such claims have been shaken in recent weeks by Russia’s brutal assault against Ukraine, which directly borders Hungary. Not only has the invasion destroyed the lives of millions, but some four hundred thousand people have fled to Hungary itself. Orbán has mounted something of a change of tone — insisting he stands “neither for Russia or Ukraine,” only for Hungary. Yet even this neutrality clearly sets him apart from the European Union’s otherwise united front behind Kiev.
Orbán’s main challenger for the prime minister’s job is Christian-conservative Péter Márki-Zay, at the head of United for Hungary, a coalition of six opposition parties. He shames Orbán’s ties to Putin and explicitly seeks a closer alignment with Hungary’s EU and NATO allies. His alliance brings together a variety of forces on the basis of opposition to Orbán: but, even should Márki-Zay win the election, his blandly neoliberal vision is unlikely to break with the orthodoxies of recent Hungarian governments.
Orbán’s right-wing American cheerleaders such as Tucker Carlson praise his system as “pro-worker conservatism.” This couldn’t be further from reality. According to recently published research, lower-income Hungarians pay 6 to 8 percent more taxes than their higher-income peers. As a result, income inequality is skyrocketing in Hungary with extremely limited social mobility. The ruling party also implemented an inequitable flat income tax and massive tax breaks for global corporations. Evidently, Orbán’s fiscal policies benefit the wealthy and favor oligarchs — both East and West.
Why Viktor Orbán Could Survive His Embarrassing Ties to Moscow
Sunday’s Hungarian election will decide if far-right premier Viktor Orbán can continue his already decade-long rule. A united opposition damns Orbán for his lawbreaking and ties to Vladimir Putin — yet has struggled to articulate an alternative of its own.
jacobinmag.com
excerpts:
A united opposition damns Orbán for his lawbreaking and ties to Vladimir Putin — yet has struggled to articulate an alternative of its own.
Since the Hungarian far-right leader returned to the prime minister’s office in 2010, he has met the Russian president some eleven times — the most recent a February 1 summit to negotiate energy imports, just weeks before the Kremlin-ordered invasion of Ukraine.
Orbán has often insisted that his ties to Moscow are just a matter of pragmatism. In a 2015 interview, he told Politico: “What I represent is not my opinion but the interests of the Hungarian nation. […] So, we have to have a good balanced relationship with the Russians. […] Putin is someone you can cooperate with.”
Such claims have been shaken in recent weeks by Russia’s brutal assault against Ukraine, which directly borders Hungary. Not only has the invasion destroyed the lives of millions, but some four hundred thousand people have fled to Hungary itself. Orbán has mounted something of a change of tone — insisting he stands “neither for Russia or Ukraine,” only for Hungary. Yet even this neutrality clearly sets him apart from the European Union’s otherwise united front behind Kiev.
Orbán’s main challenger for the prime minister’s job is Christian-conservative Péter Márki-Zay, at the head of United for Hungary, a coalition of six opposition parties. He shames Orbán’s ties to Putin and explicitly seeks a closer alignment with Hungary’s EU and NATO allies. His alliance brings together a variety of forces on the basis of opposition to Orbán: but, even should Márki-Zay win the election, his blandly neoliberal vision is unlikely to break with the orthodoxies of recent Hungarian governments.
Orbán’s right-wing American cheerleaders such as Tucker Carlson praise his system as “pro-worker conservatism.” This couldn’t be further from reality. According to recently published research, lower-income Hungarians pay 6 to 8 percent more taxes than their higher-income peers. As a result, income inequality is skyrocketing in Hungary with extremely limited social mobility. The ruling party also implemented an inequitable flat income tax and massive tax breaks for global corporations. Evidently, Orbán’s fiscal policies benefit the wealthy and favor oligarchs — both East and West.
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