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Anne Applebaum Profile picture
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29 Nov, 4 tweets, 2 min read
Nobody wants to use the language needed to describe this kind of behavior, which belongs to the vocabulary of mental illness
washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
Also, there is something deeply wrong with many of the people who are attracted to the soon-to-be-ex-president. Look at Powell.
washingtonpost.com/investigations….
or Flynn
There is a chicken and egg question of course: Are they attracted to Trump because they have a loose grip on reality, or does their grip on reality loosen because they are working for this administration? I pondered that here
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

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More from @anneapplebaum

Anne Applebaum Profile picture
25 Nov
Under cover of the pandemic, while the outside world as distracted, the Venezuelan government is carrying out an evil act: It is seeking to destroy a pair of charities. One of them, Alimenta La Solidaridad, feeds more than 25,000 children every day...
The other, Caracas Mi Convive, fights against violence. I wrote about them both earlier this year:
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
Both were founded by Roberto Patino, who tells me that his parents' home has been raided by one of the many Venezuelan police forces. The bank accounts of the organizations have been frozen.
Read 6 tweets
Anne Applebaum Profile picture
25 Nov
Poland and Hungary are threatening to veto the EU budget because they don't want to be forced to adhere to the "rule of law." If the EU caves in to the blackmail, the results may be dramatic. In Poland, the consequences of a politicized legal system are already with us...
A few weeks ago, police detained (and handcuffed) a prominent Polish lawyer, Roman Giertych. They searched his house - looking, he has said, not for documents to do with his "case", but for evidence he had been gathering about government corruption.
nytimes.com/2020/10/16/wor…
A few days later, however, a court refused to uphold the detention. The judge said he didn't see that a crime had been committed. An appeals court came to the same conclusion. Restrictions on Giertych - he had been suspended from the practice of law - and others were removed.
Read 7 tweets
Anne Applebaum Profile picture
22 Nov
"Trump failed because he picked bad people" is an insufficient explanation. In truth, he failed because his so-called populist project was a lie. He never wanted to drain the swamp, he wanted to profit from it. ft.com/content/cc5636…
Like Orban, Kaczynski, Duterte, Erdogan, Putin and so many others, Trump created fake culture wars to hide his real agenda: Personal profit, personal power, personal narcissism. Le Pen et al would be no different.
Also Chavez. The politics of greed and cynicism can be either Left or Right.
Read 5 tweets
Anne Applebaum Profile picture
22 Nov
Why are so many senior Republicans going along with this farce? Why are so many of their friends in the media enabling this assault on democracy? I've tried twice to explain this phenomenon, once in my book, published last summer:
penguinrandomhouse.com/books/621076/t…
Also in this article for the Atlantic, also published last summer:
theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…
Both have been criticized, from the right, as overly harsh accounts of people who are "just doing their jobs." But as Trump's clownish attempt to steal the election continues, as other Republicans imitate him, I wonder if they didn't go far enough.
Read 7 tweets
Anne Applebaum Profile picture
19 Nov
This headline repeats a lie. The EU is not 'punishing' PL and HU for their conservative policies. They are requiring those two countries to abide by the law. Orban and Kaczynski are throwing up smoke, trying to create a culture war where there is none.
thetimes.co.uk/article/hungar…
In fact the whole story is ridiculous. It quotes Polish and Hungarian officials without pointing out that they are lying. Same kind of reporting that led to Brexit.
Orban's main goal is to continue using EU money to stay in power and enrich his friends and family. Kaczysnki's goal is to keep undermining Polish justice so he can arrest his enemies and evade corruption charges. No point pretending this is about anything else.
Read 4 tweets
Anne Applebaum Profile picture
18 Nov
Hungary and Poland have vetoed the EU budget because of a regulatuon linking payments to the "rule of law." Why was this linkage considered necessary? Because both countries are in violation of EU standards on apolitical justice.
Hungary is in trouble for corruption: the country misuses EU funds many times more than any other country. Poland has illegally subjugated its constitutional tribunal to party control. Other EU courts are now questioning the independence of Polish courts.
Now, how are the ruling parties explaining this issue to their voters? In Poland, the deputy justice minister has said "rule of law" means Poland would have to accept "children being sold at markets" and gay marriage
Read 6 tweets

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