Damn that's a lot of replies. Gilan, I assume you did that thing where you make a post, then a few hours later you think of what you totally should've said, so you make another? The timestamps seem to suggest it; avoiding this problem is why I take so long to reply. …Hey, if it gets you to finally defend your own fucking positions, I think defending muh magyar man is worthwhile. Let's see what you've got.
Considering part of my three posts were having to do your own legwork on Grenell, the NATO threat issue & Hungary's parties, maybe you could take longer.
But yeah, I've wanted to have someone attempt to defend their entanglements with Hungary for a while now.
-He calls for a protest within Brussels
-He accuses the EU of being like the imperial powers that oppressed Hungary in the past, especially the Habsburgs
-He accuses "the West" of starting senseless wars that cause unnecessary destruction and result in borders being redrawn
Nothing particularly dictatorial here, unless you consider populism and disagreeing with Eurocrats to be "dictatorial", which would be dumb.
That video was in lieu of response to the whole NATO bit, when that was still being contested.
I'd think the context of the Ukraine war would change a lot of this up, there's something to be said of crying tyranny that his veto of aid to Ukraine (and none of his or Hungary's own money was in there, they've been a net contributor), but I've spent this whole page talking about that. As I said, considering the last failed "crusade of the American Right against the Eurocrats", I'd think it proves my point of the league between these factions.
In fact, I should probably check out what I said the last time magyar man got brought up because of the CPAC, I half-remember Hungary being predicted as a liability back than.
He accuses "the West" of starting senseless wars that cause unnecessary destruction and result in borders being redrawn
Who do you think he's referring to? Do you think "the West" started the War in Ukraine?
Next are your comments about outside observers claiming that Hungary is a one-party state. Let me do a deep dive into this subject real quick
The claim that you missed in your first 'deep dive', and there's some that you neglected here. While you mentioned the missing or with electoral seal tampered ballots (and accusations of wholesale manipulation of results such as the burnt ballots n Romania by Fidesz affiliates in countries such as Serbia), there's also the issue of reworking the electoral system, inconsistent populations in voting rolls, accusations of voter & officials intimidation, reports of vote buying in areas like Jász-Nagykun-Szolnok (which is a rural village) and state control of media and a judiciary with dubious independence.
(The misuse of state & EU funds for cronies is another issue more in-line with corruption, and a mismanaged economy).
He's also cited China, Russia, Turkey and Singapore as potential role models.
None of this is new, Erdogan and Putin has done this before, it's just a case of boiling the frog to it's death. Considering the accusations of Hungary being a blueprint of the American Right that I think I remember making last-time, that it's being proven true is not particularly reassuring.
Now onto the indices. Tbh I generally don't give these much sway, as trying to apply numbers to the innately uncountable is, at best, an exercise in one's own biases.
The good thing about math, is that there's not only numbers (even for the debatable, but than there goes the whole field of sociology), but also tools such as trends and limiting the range to specific officials. See the transit of Orban from when he took power to now. The effort of a leader and their trends is important. Hungary before Orban and after, Ukraine before Maidan, Zelensky before war and after. Say what you want about Merkel (and many have), but what have been the changes in Germany during her office? When you mentioned length of time in criticism, you forgot to point out effect.
To simplify, Hungary is going down the scale, Ukraine was going up. To compare, Afghanistan was complete stagnation. Or compare with other democracies going down the drain…
To throw some shade back at Western Europe, perhaps Orbán should start censoring his people to prevent hurt feelings so Hungary rates more highly?
He already does, for someone who's often complained about media the one party state dominance of media in Hungary should probably be more worrying. Also, to throw shade further West isn't that what's also been happening in the US? I don't know about Britain, but Germany banned Mein Kampf. How many books does the US have a problem with now, I recall one of them being the Diary of Anne Frank ironically enough?
See, that would eventually bite you all in the ass.
Yeah, I did. A fully up-to-date English version is harder to find than the original one without any amendments, but I managed.
You didn't mention the emergency powers (which can effectively not be removed anymore by a weakened judiciary with Orban's supermajority) on the first comment.