Tag: politics

Blabbing Kati Marton’s book about Angela Merkel

This wasn’t supposed to be one of my vacation reads, but being at my parents’ house, they had it out of the library, so I read it during the few days I’ve spent home in August. First of all, I am a huge fan of Kati Marton’s writing. I am also a huge fan of political biographies, so this book was definitely on my list for later reading. My only complaint is that if I’ve waited, I would have probably wanted to read it in its original language, and not in Hungarian (its Hungarian title is simply ‘Merkel’), but I…

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Thoughts coming from a book I didn’t even want to read

I had the story of Russian protest group Pussy Riot on my shelf for quite some time, but only in the last few months have I felt inclined to take a look behind the workings of the Russian state machinery. The book was actually a friend’s copy, and I had it for an embarassingly long time. About two years ago she gave it to me saying it’s something I need to read, and I was meaning to, but there was always some other book to be read first (you know how it is with books). I even tried to give…

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Reflections on the Hungarian elections

As I mentioned in earlier posts (here and here), I was a counting officer on the April 3 parliamentary elections and referendum. It was hard to even start writing this post, I gave it a lot of thought in the past three weeks, because it’s almost impossible writing about this topic in a neutral tone, and that’s the only tone I should use here. I am not (never was, never intend to be) involved in party politics. I went to great lengths during this whole thing to emphasise that although I was delegated by “the opposition”, I am not affiliated…

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Blabbing world affairs

Back when I started blogging, I only knew I wanted to write. After a bit of experimenting I knew I had to pick a theme I was genuinely interested in. So why indeed is it world affairs I decided to be blabbing about? Right after high school I went to learn sociology. At first it was only to prepare for law school and I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to finish it all the way through, but then I became really interested in the topics we’ve learnt about. To this day, I love reading and studying behavioural sciences, mostly…

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Sunday Smack

Happy Sunday! This year is getting weirder and weirder, I guess and one can only hope we will come out of it into an improved and healed world in every way.  In Hungary official communication suggests we are over the pandemic (COVID-19, there is no communication about the other one, i.e. racism), theaters are opening, beaches are crowded, people are out and about like nothing happened, while there are still several new cases every day. I can’t really decide whether I am overly precautious for not wanting to mingle with people for a while or they are irresponsible for doing…

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Sunday Smack

Happy Sunday and happy June!  I can’t believe it’s almost June already, it feels like we’ve skipped several weeks of this year, I don’t even know where they went. Like this pandemic wasn’t enough already, further grave things are happening in the world. Aren’t we supposed to move forward and not backwards with this kind of stuff? Everybody, who thinks this is not their problem, please educate yourselves (I loved this post for resources) and find ways to do good in the world. It needs us.  Let’s get to reading. Why the WHO is failing and how to fix it…

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Sunday Smack

Happy Sunday! I hope you are well and safe this weekend! Here’s some reading for you. Am I the only one to think that most of this list should be applied all the time, regardless of world health emergencies? 🤔 The source is of course the World Health Organization, be sure to check out their website clicking here for many more useful information (and some myth-busting) about the coronavirus. Brexit Endgame: Britain’s EU Departure Marks the End of Brexit’s Beginning The day has come and Monday will probably look very similar to the days past (expect for British MEPs maybe),…

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Sunday Smack

Happy weekend everybody! I am trying to slowly get back into the habit of zeroing my Feedly by the weekend, so I started collecting some worhty blog posts to recommend during the week for you. Although I’ve taken quite long breaks between posts lately, this is actually the 250th Sunday Smack, believe it or not! I’d really like to revive it somehow, but I’m not making promises, just see how it goes. Here is a small collection of good reads in the topic of world affairs/international law for this weekend! What do you think? Let me know which one did…

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Blabbing good reads: Tim Marshall’s Prisoners of Geography

The full title is Prisoners of Geography: Ten maps that tell you everything you need to know about global politics, and I can’t believe I only got around to read this great book now. Although I wouldn’t describe it as a summer read, I enjoyed reading it out in the sun on a long weekend off recently. 📷: Goodreads I couldn’t exactly tell what I’ve expected from this book, but it sure exceeded my expectations in many different ways. It is almost like academic writing in a journalistic style, reciting history and stories of world affairs about how much geography…

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Sunday Smack

Happy Sunday, everybody! I hope you are enjoying the last bits of summery weather as much as I do. In fact I will be off for a late vacation for a few days next week. Here’s what  I’ve read before leaving. WHERE DO THE ROHINGYA GO? I never change the spelling of titles, and in this case perhaps all-caps is a well-deserved emphasis. The ICC investigation is good news, but given how long it usually takes, we need more. President Trump Will Preside Over a UN Security Council Meeting About Iran. Iran’s President May Be There, Too This might be…

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