Politico: 5 fronts in the coming eurozone battle

The possibility of the German liberal party FDP entering into a governing coalition with Chancellor Angela Merkel means Macron’s plans to overhaul the eurozone have suffered a serious setback. The FDP has made it clear throughout the campaign that it would draw a “red line” in front of any plans to further integrate the eurozone, as France advocates. [...]

As always, Macron’s speech will be loaded with symbolism. It will take place at the Sorbonne, Paris’ oldest university and once the center of France’s intellectual life, in front of European students. The choice of the date was more controversial: The French president went against the advice of some in his entourage, who cautioned that this overt attempt to set part of the German political agenda might backfire if he falls way short of his ambitious goals.

The new French leader notably wants Europe’s economic and monetary union to have some form of common budget under the authority of a so-called eurozone finance minister. Although Merkel and even her hard-line Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble have greeted Macron’s general ideas with the appearance of polite interest, many German officials and parties oppose “fiscal transfers,” or the pooling of budgetary resources, even in a limited way.

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Politico: Support grows for second Brexit vote

Just over half of those surveyed said they back some form of a second referendum, with the most popular scenario being a vote to either accept the government’s Brexit deal, or to stay in the EU — an option backed by 34 percent. That is up from 28 percent in a similar survey in March, according to new findings from Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research (GQRR). In the earlier survey, 45 percent of people backed a second referendum — although these figures include public votes that would still mean the U.K. leaves the EU under either outcome.

The pro-EU Liberal Democrats are the only U.K. political party now backing a second referendum, but they hold just 12 seats in parliament. The opposition Labour Party, which meets for its annual conference in Brighton this week, has so far ruled out the idea — and decided Sunday not to have a debate or vote on the issue during the gathering. The Scottish National Party is not formally pushing for a vote, but leader and Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon hinted it still might, telling the New Statesman last week that the case for a second vote “may become very hard to resist.” [...]

Among Labour voters who responded to the survey, support for some kind of second referendum is at 70 percent, with a referendum on accepting the Brexit deal or staying in the EU the most popular, backed by 51 percent. [...]

Overall, 39 percent of respondents reject the idea of a second referendum — and 7 percent want a “hard Brexiteer’s referendum” in which people would choose between the government’s deal and leaving the EU without a deal. Another 10 percent back a referendum that would give voters the chance to reject the government’s Brexit deal, but send it back to the negotiating table. [...]

While there is broad support for the fundamentals of the U.K. government’s negotiating position, it is the increasing interest in revisiting the entire question of Brexit that will be of most interest, particularly to the opposition Labour Party, which gained much of its support from voters drawn to its softer stance on Brexit. The Lib Dems will also take heart from the findings, after failing to cut through with voters at June’s general election with their second referendum message.

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Politico: Time for Brussels to ‘go nuclear’ on Warsaw

It should be obvious by now that PiS won’t back down easily. It is implementing a plan, devised 12 years ago, that sets Poland on the road to a one-party autocracy with the judiciary as its pawn.

The party has attacked the country’s democratic institutions and judiciary since 2005. With fervent, conspiracy-laden rhetoric, PiS blamed the country’s negotiated transition and ex-communist elite for all of Poland’s ills and took concrete steps to rid public life of them. [...]

Between 2005 and 2007, the coalition government led by PiS purged public media and pressured private outlets, under the claim by then Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński that they were owned by “oligarchs.” At the same time, it launched a ferocious lustration campaign against the country’s intellectuals and waged a war on the judiciary. [...]

Such a short-sighted approach is dangerous. Other members and members-in-waiting could feel emboldened by Warsaw’s renegadism, and having rogue countries in the EU’s backyard would pose a danger to the bloc — especially if those rogue countries are geographically close to Russia.

The EU has no choice but to keep pressuring Poland if it wants to prevent the risk of further contagion and the certain demise of the Union as a community of values.

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The Conversation: Attitudes to same-sex marriage have many psychological roots, and they can change

Attitudes to same-sex marriage appear more malleable than we might have expected. In a 2013 survey by US think-tank the Pew Research Center, 28% of US supporters of same-sex marriage reported they had changed their mind on the issue. Most often change occurred as a result of contact with someone personally affected by it. [...]

The idea of nature is rhetorically powerful, and the two sides in the Irish same-sex marriage debate harnessed it to advance diverging causes. Opponents focused their objections on the supposed unnaturalness of same-sex parenthood, marriage and gender relations. Proponents advocated for a more inclusive sense of what is natural. [...]

This research indicates that much of the opposition to same-sex marriage is grounded in sexual prejudice, despite that opposition often being publicly justified on different grounds. But, a modest proportion of conservatives’ opposition was not explained by prejudice. This fraction may reflect principled objections based on conservative political or religious beliefs.

One account of political conservatism proposes that it rests on two pillars: resistance to change and opposition to equality. The first values the preservation of tradition and social order. The second maintains that differences in social outcomes are natural and inevitable.

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Al Jazeera: Greece and economic recovery: Fake news in action

Indeed, now into its eighth year, Greece remains entirely dependent on international bailouts (three bailouts involving the European Union and the International Monetary Fund have been arranged since 2010), has lost a quarter of its GDP with no realistic expectations of recovering it for decades to come, experiences unemployment levels which have oscillated between a high 27.8 percent (in July 2013) and a low 21.2 percent (in June 2017), and has seen the standard of living decline to 1960s levels.

Worse, Greece's debt-to-GDP ratio has exploded since the start of the bailout programs, rising from 128 percent in 2010 to over 185 percent in 2017, and, with no debt relief in sight, the small Mediterranean nation has become truly a permanent debt colony inside the world's richest region. In the meantime, a mass exodus of young and educated people has been in motion for several years now (youth unemployment rate in Greece stands currently at 43.3 percent), a process that is bound to have long-term effects on demographic trends and a significant impact on future economic developments. [...]

First, the actual facts about the broken promises and the continuous lies of and the dissemination of fake news by the Syriza government. For starters, not only did Alexis Tsipras deceive the Greek people by winning the popular vote with passionate pleas that, if elected, he would do away with international bailouts, secure a debt write-off, and put an end to the vicious cycle of debt-austerity-recession-unemployment, but ended up signing a third bailout agreement with the country's international creditors and has even consented to the enforcement of Procrustean economics, which entail additional cuts in excess of five billion euros (about $6bn), even deeper pension reductions, and the attainment of outrageously high primary surplus targets - well into 2020. 

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CityLab: Berlin After the Elections

This stark national picture was mirrored quite clearly in Berlin, still Germany’s largest city by far. Here too the CDU’s votes fell somewhat, the Social Democrats plummeted even more steeply, and the AfD also saw large gains. Within city limits, however, there’s another trend that is deeply rooted and glaring for anyone who knows the city. Politically, Berlin remains overwhelmingly divided along the line of the Berlin Wall.

Electorally, Berlin’s East-West separation is almost as clear as ever. In the West, leafy outlying suburbs and some wealthier inner neighborhoods voted for the CDU, while citizens in the inner city voted in largest numbers for the SPD and Greens.

In the East, some suburbs also voted CDU—Merkel’s party seems unusual in having appeal across the East-West divide. Beyond that, however, the contrast is stark. By far the largest number of electoral districts voted for Die Linke, a leftist party originating partly from former communists and partly from left-wing defectors from the SPD. Meanwhile, AfD gained a footing out in the eastern suburbs. In keeping with national patterns, this anti-immigration party did better in Berlin districts that have fewer foreign-born citizens. [...]

Western boroughs have, as a whole, voted for either the CDU (represented by black) or the SPD (represented by red), while in the east they have gone for Die Linke (purple)—which has outperformed AfD when presented in terms of boroughs alone. The one exception is the central borough that voted Green (guess which color?), though on close inspection even this proves to be less exceptional than you might think. This is Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, a borough created from one western and one eastern borough amalgamated into one. The western part of the borough, a place with a strong counter-cultural tradition, voted mainly Green, while the eastern part voted mainly for Die Linke. In other words, the East-West divide here remains essentially the same as elsewhere.

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Vox: After decades of decline, the murder rate went up in 2016

As criminologist John Pfaff pointed out, most of the increase in the murder rate in particular — which is widely considered the most accurate proxy for crime — was linked to cities with a population of 250,000 or more. Chicago alone contributed to about 22 percent of the increase in murders.

One point of caution: Crime is still below what it was several years ago. Even at 5.3 per 100,000 people, the murder rate, for example, is still below what it was in 2008 and the years before that, and it’s nearly half of what it was during its peak in 1980. [...]

There are essentially two hypothesized versions of the Ferguson effect: One is that Black Lives Matter protests have scared law enforcement officers from doing the proactive policing necessary to prevent crime, while at the same time criminals have been emboldened because they now know police are backing off from aggressive tactics. The other theory is that these protests have reinforced communities’ distrust of law enforcement, making it harder to solve and prevent crimes. It’s also possible both of these versions are playing a mixed role. [...]

It’s also possible that the murder rate alone gives a distorted view of violent crime. Since the murder rate is generally very low, it’s prone to large statistical fluctuations. As one example, New Orleans–based crime analyst Jeff Asher previously told me he expected the 2016 mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, in which 50 died, to lead to a massive increase in the murder rate in the city, even though it was just one particularly bad event.

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Political Critique: This German election marks a tidal change in European politics

Germany voted. Almost 13% of the electors chose the Alternative für Deutschland. Another populist victory, another success for the right wing, as so many before since last June’s fateful Brexit referendum. With a voter participation rate of over 76%, we cannot even say that people didn’t care. Voters cared, they were fed up, and disillusioned with the established parties. 13 % demonstrated that they want the future of their country in the hands of a racist, reactionary troop. [...]

But while the AfD was celebrating its victory –greeted by 1000 protesters outside their election night party – the CDU and SPD were starting to grasp their losses. The SPD has suffered its worst election result in its history with 20,5% of the vote. The biggest loser of the last four years, however, seems to be the CDU/CSU coalition. Their results dropped by over 8% compared to the 2013 elections. [...]

As a leader of the opposition, Martin Schulz could show where his power truly lies: as an experienced European politician. A freed Schulz could defend the values of an open-minded continent in the face of xenophobic hatred.

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Haaretz: Behind Far-right German Party’s Successful Scare Campaign: Adviser to Netanyahu, Trump

The far-right Alternative for Germany party, which will soon enter the Bundestag for the first time after Sunday’s elections, hired the services of an American media consultant who has worked for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump. [...]

Its election campaign stood out on social networks and used prominent billboards, focusing on a threat of an Islamic takeover of Germany. 

Behind the scenes, the AfD used the services of Vincent Harris, CEO of Harris Media, an online communications consulting firm founded in 2008. The company is based in Austin, Texas and is known for its provocative campaigns. It has also worked for a number of conservative Republican candidates, such as senators Ted Cruz and Mitch McConnell, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin. Harris also worked with the right-wing UKIP party in Britain. [...]

Harris has used the growing “Muslim threat” before online. During Trump’s presidential campaign Harris produced a video clip warning of the dangerous implications of electing Hillary Clinton. Germany lost control of its borders, we must not let that happen in the United States, he said. The clip shows a Germany in the not distant future that has become part of Islamic State. The Cologne Cathedral, one of the symbols of Germany and German Christianity, has become a mosque and the Oktoberfest festival, another major symbol, now bans the sale of beer and pork.

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