Deutsche Welle: Russia drops Eurovision after Kyiv bans singer

Ukraine, the last year's Eurovision winner, is set to host the competition next month. However, the Ukrainian security services have decided to deny entry to the contestant from Russia, the 27-year-old, wheelchair-bound Yulia Samoylova. The reason, according to Kyiv, is that Samoylova toured Crimea after it was annexed by Russia in 2014.

Last week, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko reaffirmed the ban, saying his country acted consistently towards all who entered Crimea without asking Ukraine's permission. [...]

The rules of the Eurovision Song Contest ban political gestures, and the organizers said they were "deeply disappointed" by the ban. Ukraine might find itself excluded from future Eurovision events if the ban stays in power, the EBU warned.

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Political Critique: How Serious are CEU’s Troubles? And Why is it Being Attacked Now?

Since the Fidesz government began its attacks against Central European University (CEU), Hungary’s streets have filled with protesters in opposition. Marta Tycner of Political Critique sat down with Szilárd István Pap, an anthropologist, political analyst, and member of the editorial team of Kettős Mérce, for a discussion on the meaning and seriousness of the CEU protests, in addition to what possibilities Hungary’s political landscape has in the future. [...]

I’m pretty sure that CEU does not pose any meaningful threat to the government. But, just like in Poland, the government is always trying to identify actors who are not in accordance with the official conservative, nationalistic, Christian ideology and demonize them. One of the biggest issues in pro-government media is that CEU has a gender studies department, and that it “teaches” feminism and other subjects that are against traditional family values. This rhetoric was already present in right-wing politics even before Orban. But with Orban, something started that I would call a proto-fascist discourse, about how healthy Hungarian society is endangered by ‘diseases’ that exist within it. It has been presenting CEU as a cosmopolitan, anti-national foreign element on the body of the nation. Obviously, a lot of Christian academics are working there, and a lot Fidesz’ members also were taught at CEU, including the current spokesperson of the government. One political official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is a student there, and the government is paying his tuition. Why would they do it, if they believed that the CEU brainwashes Hungarian students, or makes them into fighters against the government? The general ideology of the university is, of course, different and opposed to the Hungarian government ideology, but it doesn’t mean that there is no pluralism within. [...]

In the case of CEU the government was not much focused on this anti-elitists part, but rather on the anti-foreign and anti-cosmopolitan part. What Fidesz is trying to do is portray the government as representative of the entire Hungarian nation. To criticize the government is to criticize the Hungarian nation. Attacking the government is the same as attacking the Hungarian nation. This is such a dominant, discursive frame that you don’t even notice it anymore after seven years of Orban. But it is not anti-elitist. Fidesz used to be anti-elitist in the sense of overturning all corrupt elites. But after being in power for so long, it is much more difficult to present yourself as anti-elitist, and much easier to keep up nationalist rhetoric. And on the level of public policy it becomes  obvious that they are not on the people’s side. Their entire social and economic policy screams elitism, screams favoring the rich. The elements of the welfare state are being destroyed, and it’s the same with the public education or the public health system. The corporate tax was decreased from 19 percent to nine percent last year, a 10 percent drop, while there were no tax cuts for ordinary people.

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Nautilus Magazine: To Fix the Climate, Tell Better Stories

That we love heroes is something we can all intuitively understand. Less obvious is that climate, too, has a considerable narrative weight and is something we understand through storytelling. “Climate cannot be experienced directly through our senses,” writes Mike Hulme in his book Why We Disagree about Climate Change. “Unlike the wind which we feel on our face or a raindrop that wets our hair, climate is a constructed idea that takes these sensory encounters and builds them into something more abstract.” That abstraction has a moral and a historical quality: from the portrayal of flood myths as part of our relationship with the divine, to the birth of fictional monsters like Frankenstein in the wake of climate events, to our association of storms and earthquakes with emotional states—climate has always been more than a mathematical average of weather. In fact, Hulme says, it is only recently, and primarily in the West, that the cultural and physical meanings of climate have become so separated. [...]

Faced with an absence, we revert to old narratives, and there are few older than utopia and dystopia. The skeptic storyline of the rise of a dictatorial world government usurping American values must be considered not as a unique reply to climate change but as the latest instance of a well-established dystopic trope, stoked by the climate narrative vacuum. Something similar can be said for attacks on the capitalist enterprise from the left. The public, for its part, is served visions of an apocalyptic future, whether it’s from politicians or from Hollywood—and, simultaneously, the utopianism of far-distant science fiction, which as a category is consumed in greater quantity than science journalism and which reflects and encourages what sociologists call “optimism bias” or “technosalvation.” These utopian instincts are strengthened by a historical data point obvious to all: Our species has survived every obstacle we’ve encountered, and we are still here. [...]

philosopher Richard Rorty, “We understand knowledge when we understand the social justification of belief, and thus have no need to view it as accuracy of representation.”4 In the absence of social justification, the public ends up being called on to be the judge of accuracy of representation—in other words, of scientific content. Sure enough, quasi-scientific arguments based on misinterpreted data fragments abound in the skeptic community.5 Why did temperatures stay flat during World War II, despite an emissions increase? Was there an 18-year hiatus in temperature rise? The only reasonable answers to these questions lie with the scientific community, but they will be ignored if that community hasn’t earned an authoritative public voice. That is especially true when the answer is, “We’re not sure yet.”

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Al Jazeera: The Trump Show

From his long, unwieldy press conferences to the nomination of a Supreme Court Justice in prime time, Donald Trump delivers on spectacle.

There is conflict, there is humiliation, and there is supreme confidence - dramatic elements pulled straight out of a reality TV playbook that for Trump has been years in the making. The Apprentice, a show fronted and co-produced by Donald Trump, established him as a gospel of success, despite being plagued by bankruptcy and scandal.

Building on this image, and through similar projects, Trump has arguably become a brand unto himself, endearing himself to a segment of the American public that supported him all the way to the White House.

Now in the early days of his presidency, the showmanship continues, as 24-hour news channels race to cover his every move. Is Donald Trump in his own reality show? And what does it mean for the United States?

Josh Rushing explores Trump's reality TV rise from a C-list New York celebrity to the most powerful office in the world.

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Al Jazeera: Will Iranians re-elect Rouhani?

Ranking third from the bottom was the country's former chief nuclear negotiator, Hassan Rouhani, who polled at 6.5 percent - double-digits behind the early favourite, Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, mayor of Tehran.

By June 10, Rouhani had improved his ratings, but was still stuck in the middle of the pack. But as he gained momentum, he got hit by disqualification rumours, raising doubts he could even finish the race.

Yet on election night four days later, Rouhani had surged to the top, shocking political observers. In the final tally, he beat Ghalibaf by a 34.42 percent margin, winning the presidency with more than half of the votes, avoiding a second round. [...]

Since 1981, every Iranian president had consistently won a second term including Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during the contested 2009 election. But there have been suggestions that Rouhani could break that streak this year. [...]

A look at the real numbers offers a mixed bag for Rouhani. Latest figures from the Statistical Centre of Iran showed over 12 percent unemployment. But the economy also posted a 7.2 percent GDP growth mostly driven by post-sanction oil production. Inflation is also at its lowest in 10 years, according to the Central Bank of Iran.

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