Jacobin Magazine: Will the Saudis Go to War?

What he and his advisers (read: yes-men and sycophants) will decide is unknown. But three things seem clear. One is that the Saudis give all signs of gearing up for a showdown with their rival across the Persian Gulf. A second is that while the kingdom enjoys certain key advantages, the odds will turn increasingly against them if an actual shooting war erupts. The third is that if MbS loses, the royal family will likely lose too — bigly. Monarchy doesn’t go well with modern warfare, as a slew of royal families beginning with the Hohenzollerns, Habsburgs, Romanovs, and Ottomans discovered in World War I and after. The issue now is whether the House of Saud will join such half-forgotten dynasties in the great royal graveyard. [...]

The kingdom finds itself surrounded by a ring of fire of its own making. But Saudi Arabia is not only destabilizing others — it’s destabilizing itself. Power in the kingdom essentially rests on a three-way social compact among the House of Saud, the general population, and the Wahhabiyya, which is to say the overgrown religious establishment. The first is allowed an absolute monopoly on political power as long as it shares a portion of its oil wealth with the broad masses in the form of jobs and social benefits. The people, in turn, are allowed to collect such benefits as long as they grovel, keep quiet, and do not disturb the status quo. As for the mullahs, their job is to drum up support for the House of Saud as long as the royal family returns the favor by safeguarding shari‘a at home and promulgating the kingdom’s austere, violent, and women-hating version of Islam abroad. [...]

It also has the advantage of some 120 miles of water lying between it and its enemy, not to mention Kuwait and Iraq. A major air or sea assault across the Persian Gulf appears beyond Iranian capabilities while opening up a land corridor with a couple of sovereign states in the way is presumably a non-starter. So while Iran’s manpower reserves are greater, it has no clear way of delivering them to the battlefield. [...]

As a consequence, the relationship between the people and the state is completely different. Where King Salman and Muhammad are isolated not only from the masses but even from other members of the royal family (with whom they’re effectively at war), Iranian president Hassan Rouhani was re-elected in June with 57 percent of the vote, seven points more than he received four years earlier.

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The Atlantic: The Architect of the Radical Right

Why does all this matter today? Well, we might begin with the first New Yorker elected president since FDR, a man who has given new meaning to the term copperhead (originally applied to Northern Democrats who opposed the Civil War). Lost amid the many 2016 postmortems, and the careful parsing of returns in Ohio swing counties, was Donald Trump’s prodigious conquest of the South: 60 percent or more of the vote in Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and West Virginia, with similar margins in Louisiana and Mississippi. And the message is still being missed. We’ve heard much about the “older white men” in the administration, but rather less about where they come from. No fewer than 10 Cabinet appointees are from the South, in key positions like attorney general (Alabama) and secretary of state (Texas), not to mention Trump’s top political adviser, Steve Bannon, who grew up in Virginia. [...]

Today we remember ferocious civil-rights struggles waged in Birmingham and Selma. But ground zero for the respectable defense of Jim Crow was Virginia, where one of the nation’s most powerful politicians, Senator Harry F. Byrd Sr., ruled with the authority of an old-style feudal boss. His notorious “machine” kept the state clenched in an iron grip; the oppressions included a poll tax that suppressed black voter turnout so that it was on a par with the Deep South’s (and kept overall turnout under 20 percent). Byrd had allies in the president of the University of Virginia, Colgate Darden, and the newspaperman James Jackson Kilpatrick, who, long before his lovable-curmudgeon TV role on the “Point-Counterpoint” segment of 60 Minutes in the 1970s, was a fanatical and ingenious segregationist. [...]

That was Buchanan’s view, too. It wasn’t enough to elect true-believing politicians. The rules of government needed to be rewritten. But this required ideal conditions—a blank slate. This had happened once, in Chile, after Augusto Pinochet’s coup against the socialist Salvador Allende in 1973. A vogue for public choice had swept Pinochet’s administration. Buchanan’s books were translated, and some of his acolytes helped restructure Chile’s economy. Labor unions were banned, and social security and health care were both privatized. On a week-long visit in 1980, Buchanan gave formal lectures to “top representatives of a governing elite that melded the military and the corporate world,” MacLean reports, and he dispensed counsel in private conversations. But Buchanan said very little about his part in assisting Chile’s reformers—and he said very little, too, when the country’s economy cratered, and Pinochet at last fired the Buchananites.

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The Atlantic: This Isn't the End of the Merkel Era

The most alarmist of these doubts are overstated, according to Peel, who noted that while Merkel “is clearly wobbled and ... clearly weakened,” it’s still a far cry from her being replaced at the helm of German leadership—in part because she lacks a clear successor within her party, but also because she remains extremely popular among the German population. “She survived as her party’s champion as long as she was a winner,” Peel said, noting that more than half of Germans would prefer for Merkel to remain chancellor. “The moment she looks like no longer being a winner, the rebels will start to mutter. And that’s where you’re getting this muttering coming from, I think. But they’ve got no alternative candidate.”

Merkel’s confidence that she will not resign suggests she knows this. But it could also stem from the fact that she’s weathered crises far worse. “This is definitely a challenge and this has weakened her as a leader, but it’s not as big as the refugee crisis,” Marcel Dirsus, a political scientist at the University of Kiel, told me in reference to Merkel’s 2015 decision to open Germany’s borders to hundreds of thousands of refugees. That move prompted similar predictions of her political demise. “When the refugee crisis was unfolding, there was a legitimate fear … that Merkel was going to fall.” [...]

If Germany were to take the drastic step of holding another round of elections, there’s no indication it would lead to Merkel’s fall. If anything, polls suggest it would result in the same divisions delivered by the first election—an outcome that would force the parties back to coalition talks where they started. Dirsus said this could be avoided if the SPD withdrew their refusal to join the government for another grand coalition—a move the party’s leader Martin Schulz has thus far ruled out. “There is now a lot of pressure on the Social Democrats to at least start coalition talks with Merkel because people are reminding them of their responsibilities to the country,” Dirsus said, adding that: “there is no guarantee that [Schulz] would be the candidate again if there are new elections, so he doesn’t really have an interest in new elections.”

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Political Critique: Poland broke my heart

This march showed a rift that I didn’t know was there. My mom emailed me expressing her fears. My dad defended it as a hijacked gathering of nationalists. They marched with signs calling for a white Europe. For a second holocaust. For the removal of ethnic minorities. This wasn’t hijacked, it was meant to be this way.

The day after, we Poles had to condemn the march. Anything less would be a tacit acceptance of its message. I was confident that Catholic cousins would stand up for me. None of them did.  I asked my grandmother about the march. She felt that it was overblown and it would be unfair to categorize everyone there as fascist. I was stunned. And now I’m angry. [...]

The main obstacle for me aren’t the fascists themselves. It’s Poles who watched the march and did nothing. It’s my relatives who insist that those who march behind racist banners and shout anti-Semitic slogans are actually just guilty of being tricked. It’s the political cover granted to fascists marching with children. It’s people who don’t want to recognize that Poland has a problem with racism.

I can’t pretend that I saw the march like everyone else. Unlike foreign Jews, I didn’t think that this march represented Poles or even the vast majority of Poles. And unlike Catholic Poles, I couldn’t see this as a small, irrelevant nationalist demonstration. Both of my identities saw it as fascists staking their claim in the heart of Poland. They wanted to define what Polish patriotism looked like and both groups, Jews and Poles, let them. By reacting with fear and derision, Jews abroad are fuelling fascist ideas of an isolated Poland. Similarly by providing them with excuses and cover, Poles are letting fascists operate with impunity.

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Politico: In the line of fire: Poland’s digital ambitions

Even as Warsaw’s top brass has largely alienated the highest ranks of the European Commission, Council and Parliament, Poland’s digital policymakers have worked as part of a group of about a dozen “like-minded” liberal countries — including Sweden, Denmark, the U.K. and Estonia — leading the charge on digital issues.

With Britain preoccupied with its imminent departure from the bloc, Poland — known for its army of highly skilled coders and technical experts — has emerged as the group’s largest member country and a potential leader on major digital issues. [...]

Despite recent strides, Poland still has a long way to go before becoming a European leader on tech. The country ranks 23 out of 28 on the EU’s digital economy and society index, lagging significantly on everything from the use of social media by enterprises (only 9 percent) to subscriptions to fast broadband across the country.

Streżyńska’s lack of partisanship — she refused to join a political group or align herself with Jarosław Kaczyński’s ruling Law and Justice party — was a welcome signal to consumers, stakeholders and policymakers in Brussels, but increasingly put her at odds with her bosses. [...]

Replacing Streżyńska would also be a blow because it would likely also mean getting rid of the digital ministry’s secretary of state Krzysztof Szubert, who deals closely with EU affairs and whom many in Brussels see as a positive influence on the bloc’s digital agenda. He is credited in the EU capital with leading important lobbying efforts — including putting digital policy on the agenda at European Council summits this year, and pressuring the Commission to relax rules on the free movement of data across EU borders. [...]

It’s true that the upper echelons of the Polish government, including Prime Minister Beata Szydło, seem to have bought into Poland’s digital sales pitch. Szydło signed a letter including 17 EU heads of state asking to make digital a priority on the political level. She also claimed responsibility for helping to bring about this year’s Digital Summit in Tallinn, one of the first meetings where EU heads of state dedicated their time to discussing digital.

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Al Jazeera: Honduras election: Women's rights put on the agenda

Fed up with seeing their concerns sidelined, PoletikaH and more than 70 women's organisations came together to launch on September 12 a feminist political agenda to serve as a measuring stick to scrutinise the presidential candidates' focus on the problems women face ahead of the November 26 election. [...]

One woman is murdered every 14 hours in a femicide crisis that has reached epidemic levels in the wake of the 2009 US-backed military coup, which briefly put Roberto Micheletti in power as president before Porfirio Lobo Sosa of the conservative National Party won national elections later that year.

Under strict rules outlawing abortion, women can face up to six years behind bars for seeking to end a pregnancy.

In the most unequal country in Latin America, according to World Bank data, women also disproportionately suffer the brunt of poverty, a global trend recognised by UN Women, the agency that deals with gender equality and women's empowerment worldwide. [...]

The agenda details policy demands related to seven issues: violence and femicide, feminisation of poverty, institutionality and budgets, non-sexist education, reproductive health, political participation, and indigenous rights.

Among other proposals, it calls for introducing comprehensive laws on gender violence, sexual education, and agrarian reform with gender equity. It also advocates repealing laws that limit women's access to common goods, such as the controversial Mining Law and Seeds Law. [...]

President Hernandez is the first sitting or former president to seek a second term in office after a contentious 2015 Supreme Court ruling changed the constitution to allow re-election. Critics say only the Honduran people have the power to modify the constitution, rendering Hernandez' candidacy illegitimate.

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Politico: France’s conservative ‘bad boy’ ready to take on Macron

He points to his own record in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, a region he’s run as a sort of mini-state refusing subsidies for jobseekers and slashing operating costs by 5 percent, as the antithesis of Macron-ism. The president, he argues, is making adjustments around the edges and refusing to take on the elephant in the room: public spending that accounts for 55 percent of the country’s GDP. [...]

Where Macron is moderate on public spending, Wauquiez stakes out a position to the right of Margaret Thatcher. Where Macron preaches eurozone integration, Wauquiez wants a “union of nations.” And where Macron is liberal on social issues, Wauquiez is ultra-conservative. [...]

It’s easy to see why that might be so. In 2005, Wauquiez voted in favor of the treaty that would have established an EU constitution, but he has since positioned himself as a Euroskeptic-lite, and sometimes not so lite. After Britain’s vote to leave the EU, he proposed to abolish the European Commission — a position from which he’s since distanced himself. [...]

The National Front party has long seen Wauquiez as a potential ally, someone who could bring the far right out of its isolation. But Wauquiez rebuffed Le Pen’s proposal to join forces this week, stating he would never enter an alliance with the far right.

Instead, he aims to steal Le Pen voters by echoing her tough talk on immigration, Islam and terrorism — he’s called for throwing all people suspected of being linked to terrorists into jail — with the added appeal that unlike her, he could one day end up in power.

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Quartz: As Robert Mugabe finds a new home, here’s where other African dictators went to retire

In Saudi Arabia, Amin received a monthly stipend and the respect of still being called “Mr President.” Until his death in 2003, Amin was often spotted wandering through grocery stores, going to the health club, and praying at his local mosque. It was a life far removed from one the world’s most brutal dictatorships, during which about 300,000 were killed under Amin’s regime.

Saudi Arabia continues to offer a comfortable retirement to Africa’s strongmen. Ousted Tunisian leader Zine El Abidine Ben Ali fled to Jeddah after the 2011 revolution that ended his 23-year rule. Ben Ali’s retirement has not been as tranquil as he may have imagined, with Tunisia’s new government continuously calling for his extradition.

Until now, Mugabe himself has provided a safe haven for fallen autocrats. In 1991, Ethiopia’s Mengistu Haile Mariam fled the capital Addis Ababa and into safety in Zimbabwe. His departure brought an end to his Marxist-leaning government, which for 14 years was bedeviled by war, famine, failed economic policies, and a mass crackdown on enemies known as the Red Terror. [...]

Until now, Mugabe himself has provided a safe haven for fallen autocrats. In 1991, Ethiopia’s Mengistu Haile Mariam fled the capital Addis Ababa and into safety in Zimbabwe. His departure brought an end to his Marxist-leaning government, which for 14 years was bedeviled by war, famine, failed economic policies, and a mass crackdown on enemies known as the Red Terror.

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Politico: Cross-party support grows for Merkel minority government

From the ranks of the SPD, which would provide external support for the conservative chancellor without re-joining her government as the junior coalition partner, one party official described such an arrangement as “far from ideal, but the lesser evil.” A minority government would avoid a snap election and also avoid angering grassroots SPD supporters who deeply dislike the idea of another grand coalition, the official said. [...]

However, SPD chief Martin Schulz was quick to announce Monday that the party would not reprise its role of the past four years and would instead not “shy away” from another general election.

That triggered a major backlash inside his own party, where a growing number of lawmakers are worried that a snap election — and the spectacle of Germany’s two biggest parties in disarray — would risk an even more disastrous result for the SPD and further strengthen the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD). [...]

At the same time, however, CDU officials in the Bundestag point out privately that a minority government would allow the longtime chancellor to fill all available cabinet posts with people from conservatives ranks, which could help her to silence a growing chorus of critical voices from inside her bloc.

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