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Tag Archives: New Nobility

Surrealpolitik: Orban & Putin & ‘Illiberal Democracy’

07 Saturday Jan 2023

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Extreme Brown vs Red-Green, Hungary, Psychology, Russia

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authoritarianism, autocracy, EU & Hungary, Hungary, Hungary & Russia, Illiberal Democracy is Tyranny, kleptocracy, malignant narcissism, Medieval v. Modern, New Nobility, Orban & Putin, Orban and Putin, political absolutism, Putinism, Russia, Viktor Orban, Vladimir Putin

BUDAPEST, Hungary—When Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban unleashed a racist tirade during an annual address to ethnic Hungarians in Romania on July 23, in which he argued that his supporters do “not want to become peoples of mixed race,” the international community recoiled in horror at the vitriol being espoused by the leader of a NATO and European Union member state. One of Orban’s longtime advisors, Zsuzsa Hegedus, resigned after the speech, calling it a “pure Nazi text … worthy of [former Nazi leader Joseph] Goebbels.”

Coakley, Amanda. “Putin’s Trojan Horse Inside the European Union: No matter what Moscow does, Hungary’s prime minister consistently carries water for the Kremlin.” Foreign Policy, August 3, 2022.

Amanda Coakley’s article also covers Orban’s deliberate development of dependence on Russia for Hungary’s energy supply. His disingenuous position within the European Union suggests he has had but one outcome in mind, i.e., to become premier in Europe’s “New Nobility” as encouraged by Vladimir Putin. At the base of the autocratic feudal-medieval bond–the same “Malignant Narcissism” that has so characterized former American President Donald Trump’s careers and politics that have turned out disasters for banks, contractors, and citizens.


In late November 2022, Ukrainian special forces arrested a suspected Russian agent at the Ukraine–Hungary border. The man had been attempting to smuggle secret information into EU member state Hungary on a flash drive that he had allegedly concealed in his anus.

The flash drive contained stolen personal information about senior figures and staff at the Ukrainian domestic secret service SBU and the Ukrainian military intelligence service GUR, as well as sensitive data on Ukrainian army bases, weapons and logistics.

Bogar, Zsolt. “Is Hungary becoming Russia’s spy hub within the EU?” DW, September 12, 2022.

Orban, contrary to the European Union’s posture, appears not to mind either the presence nor success of Russia’s spies in Budapest and elsewhere in Hungary. The penetration surpasses presence in numbers as allies believe Hungary’s “IT networks and internal communications” compromised. For a four-year period, 2013-2017, Orbán’s Hungary had even eased the access of Russian spies into the rest of the EU via a “Golden Visa” program (related and recent: Szabolcs, Panyi. “Russian spy chief’s son has a Budapest address–in a property owned by an old friend of Orbán’s chief of staff.” Telex, November 14, 2022).


In the now “surrealpolitik” constructed between Hungary and Russia, business includes the following:

  • Building two nuclear plant blocks in Paks financed by borrowing $10 billion from Russia;
  • Building railroad cars;
  • Hosting Russia’s dark International Investment Bank;
  • Supporting a 15-year gas delivery contract with Gazprom that bypasses Ukraine.

For further details, see the source–Rácz, András. “Authoritarian Ties: The Case of Russia and Hungary.” The Russia File, Kennan Institute, Wilson Center, October 22, 2021. Rácz also notes where Orbán’s spine has stiffened in relation to Russian performance not up to EU standards (and some “intelligence operatives” have indeed been ejected from Hungary).

Global Security‘s remarks fit the brotherly love model of modern despotism in Hungary: “Orban played tough, which might not turn out well for him in the long run. His games were turning into a high wire act, threatening to keep Brussels off balance. At times Orban made half-hearted promises to uphold the EU’s policy toward Russia; at other times, he allowed himself to be flattered by Putin, his self-declared political role model. Or, when it came to economic interests, he allowed himself to be put under pressure (Global Security, “Hungary-Russia Relations” as quoted January 7, 2022).

Putin’s realpolitik, plain old mafia leverage, came through for Russia this past year. From The Guardian—

Hungarians voted in general elections just weeks after the invasion, in April, and it seems reasonable to assume that the war next door had an influence on the result. Given the climate of fear that the devastating “special military operation” created, Hungarians voted to keep Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz in power rather than risk an untested six-party coalition. This assumption also underlies Orbán’s response, which is to stay out of the conflict to the point of being “exempted”, a position that has been condemned as a betrayal by Hungary’s western allies. Hungary refuses to allow arms shipments destined for Kyiv to transit Hungarian territory and blocks the extension of EU sanctions against Russia to the energy sector. This latter stance is intended to enable an already controversial Russian-Hungarian project to build a nuclear power plant on the Danube (Paks II) to go ahead unaltered.

Dalos, György.  “Orban says Hungary is ‘exempt’ from the conflict: tell that to his friend in Moscow.”  The Guardian, October 29, 2022.

György also notes the “similarities between the two leaders: authoritarian posturing and illiberalism underlying their respective concepts of the state.”


Since then, Orbán has been accused of fostering resentment. Tensions flared in 2018 over a video that apparently showed diplomats illegally issuing Hungarian passports to people in Transcarpathia. Later, in 2019, Hungary was accused of trying to influence the outcome of elections in the region, and blocked Ukraine’s NATO membership negotiations over the row. |

Today, from the Donbas to Kosovo, events are again proving the potency of nationalist narratives over lost territory and peoples separated by the claimed injustices of history. Yet, in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the simple fact that many Hungarians have negative views of both Russians and Ukrainians is pertinent.

Nattrass, William. “Hungary’s ‘pro-Russia’ stance was inevitable.” Politico, September 15, 2022.

The wholly reactionary New Nobility (a member of which Orban might wish to be counted) rather like the old, appears fascinated by its own super-duper bloodline and culture, enough so to demonize hosts beyond their own boundaries, engage in passportization, and when possibility arises, redraw maps by way of wars driven by the conviction of racially-based cultural supremacy.


Comparing Orban to Putin might once have been hyperbole. But when Fidesz seems determined to expel a high-quality educational institution from the country on the grounds of political views of its funder, it is hyperbole no longer.

The attack on CEU, furthermore, is not happening in isolation. It is part of a broader effort to squeeze out “Soros and the powers that symbolize him,” to use Orban’s own words.

Rohac, Dalibor. “Hungary Is Turning Into Russia: On the CEU, Orban Mimics Putin.” Foreign Affairs, April 12, 2017.

America’s Anti-Defamation League has classified the demonizing of George Soros as expressive of anti-Semitism, a return to the rhetoric of Jew as Globalist. In fact and far back in the day, George and his father, Tivador, used social camouflage to survive the Holocaust while providing other Jews with forged papers for escape. Their resistance would continue against Stalin and Communist Russia, and so through George Soros it has been sustained through the Cold War and throughout Russia journey into kleptocracy and, on this day, politically absolute tyranny.


ADL. “The Antisemitism Lurking Behind George Soros Conspiracy Theories.” October 11, 2018.

Bogar, Zsolt. “Is Hungary becoming Russia’s spy hub within the EU?” DW, September 12, 2022.

Coakley, Amanda. “Putin’s Trojan Horse Inside the European Union: No matter what Moscow does, Hungary’s prime minister consistently carries water for the Kremlin.” Foreign Policy, August 3, 2022.

Dalos, György.  “Orban says Hungary is ‘exempt’ from the conflict: tell that to his friend in Moscow.”  The Guardian, October 29, 2022.

Global Security. “Hungary-Russia Relations”.

Nattrass, William. “Hungary’s ‘pro-Russia’ stance was inevitable.” Politico, September 15, 2022.

Oppenheim, James S. “FTAC: A Short Note on the Demonizing of George Soros.” BackChannels, August 8, 2020.

Rácz, András. “Authoritarian Ties: The Case of Russia and Hungary.” The Russia File, Kennan Institute, Wilson Center, October 22, 2021.

Rohac, Dalibor. “Hungary Is Turning Into Russia: On the CEU, Orban Mimics Putin.” Foreign Affairs, April 12, 2017.

Szabolcs, Panyi. “Russian spy chief’s son has a Budapest address–in a property owned by an old friend of Orbán’s chief of staff.” Telex, November 14, 2022.


While #PutinFullTonto strives to return Russia to some version of the KGB revisits the Russian Imperial mode, few believe the Phantom of the Soviet will restore a monstrous near past; however, he has well succeeded in leveraging cooperation from malign and piratical personalities similar to his own–in power Viktor Orban and Recep Tayyip Erdogan most notably–and thereby weakening the political cohesion and coherence of the Atlantic Alliance and the European Union.

–33–

FTAC: South Africa: Look Twice Before Leaping on the White Right Bandwagon

17 Monday Dec 2018

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, Africa, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, South Africa

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Tags

Historic Reversion, modern democracy, Moscow, New Feudalism, New Nationalism, New Nobility, Putin, Ramaphosa, South Africa, Sovereignty and Domain, White Right

There is also a democracy that needs to update in relation to national sovereignty from earlier and apartheid days.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2018/08/27/unfiltered-south-african-president-ramaphosa-on-land-reform-parliament-on-the-same-earlier-this-year/

Although citing political motivations serve White Right claims, black raiders may as well be brigands for all anyone really cares. That police and other SA domestic defense services are inadequate may be true. The frontier qualities have not receded from the land space nor the need with it for fierce independence to be there.

Would South Africa become another Zimbabwe (God bless the farms of New Zealand and reference When A Crocodile Eats the Sun for that story)? That threat has been used as a bludgeon to stoke white fear, but the ousting of Jacob Zuma this past year may address that question, and the leader of accomplished businessman Cyril Ramaphosa should quell capitalist doubt.

President Putin appears to want a feudal world of absolute power repleted with racial and other forms of segregation. I urge taking a second look at South Africa’s working democracy and Cyril Ramaphosa’s concerns for the further development of a modern democratic African state.



NATO’s “New Nobility” – Erdogan, Orban, (Trump?) – and Peonage

11 Wednesday Jul 2018

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

aristocracy, autocracy, contemporary feudalism, Donald J. Trump, medieval v modern, New Nationalism, New Nobility, plutocracy, political analysis, political science, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Viktor Orban

BackChannels acknowledges the book in which it first encountered the term:

Soldatov, Andrei and Irena Borogan. The New Nobility: The Restoration of Russia’s Security State and the Enduring Legacy of the KGB. New York: Public Affairs, 2010.

However, this post is not going to be about powerful and self-enriching KGB/FSB spies and their bureaucracies.

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Viktor Orbán,  and Donald J. Trump seem to this blogger more the “New Nobility” that Russian President Vladimir Putin may have had also in mind as he launched his revenge on the western world for the demise of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991 — a very good Christmas morning indeed for the United States of America and in the defunct godless realm then represented by the Kremlin a not very special day at all.

In the 26 years that have passed since that morning (for political purpose, it was over at noon), Russia and her leadership have had to think about what it has meant to be “Russian”.

“Old Vikings”?

Formed of conquest, contracting and expanding through the brutality of feudal wars, unable ever to police — mere civil policing — its territorial writs, Russia has been a state that has better known barbarism and the depths of inhumanity through violence (give a nod for the extra special dose brought by the Mongols) than civility through accommodation and trade.  In that regard, the “Vory”, the once brutalized mafia within, may in their inglorious legend represent the pure expression of the heart of the state.

Backing the tyrant in Syria?

Invading a settled Ukraine and baldly lying to the world about its purpose?

Bombing hospitals?

Pursuing feudal absolute power — unquestionable ownership of persons as things — with the Assahola in Tehran?

All of the above: true.

So what good new things has Russia brought to the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization?

Applying the concept of “Reflexive Control” with “Islamic Terrorism” for the convenient stimulus, BackChannels may suggest the four infamous retrogrades:

BREXIT: While Great Britain has been happy to pile on “Asian” labor, it has not been so happy with grooming gangs, suspect neighborhoods, and “Allahu Akbar” explosions, much less the impositions posed by the refugees of war in Syria.  Response: the Newest Nationalism expressed in renewed insularity and refreshed Anglican pride.

While it’s good for a state to recall what it’s about, some among the most zealous should factor in how they have been played by Moscow.

Erdogan: Prime Minister, President, and now, apparently, President for Life has never encountered serious resistance for his taking apart what Mustafa Kemal Atatürk bequeathed in bureaucratic and military legacy.  The empire’s back, baby, and dig the symbolic significance of the leaders new crib.

Impressed?

Dig this cool new statistic on press freedom in Erdogan’s new estate (italics added).

The 2018 index ranking marked Turkey’s 58 point-decrease over the past 13 years, lagging just behind Rwanda, Belarus and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkey-ranks-157-in-rsfs-press-freedom-index-down-two-places-from-last-year-130898 – 4/25/2018.

Pretty cool, huh?

If Erdogan’s New Old Turkish estate makes it all the way down to the bottom of the list, BackChannels will certainly make note of the prize.

Orban: In addition to other self-aggrandizing and self-enriching schemes, this NATO president has been working on an old home and estate.  Fave header from related online searching: “How Viktor Orban will tap Europe’s taxpayers and bankroll his friends and family: Plans for a lakeside development show how Hungary’s leader enriches those who stand behind him” (Reuters, Martin Dunai, March 15, 2018).

Trump: “You all just got a lot richer,” Trump tells friends, referencing tax overhaul  (CBS News, Kathryn Watson, December 23, 2017).  Who else: “Ivanka Trump’s Fashion Brand Will Not Be Impacted by Donald Trump’s Chinese Trade Tariffs” (Teen Vogue, Amira Rasool, July 9, 2018).  While the “optics” don’t look good in relation to nepotism, let’s be fair: negotiating business is a continuous process for both sides in complex transactions: other variables may apply to setting tariffs in Ivanka’s region of commercial interest: other brands are in the mix too.

https://shenglufashion.com/2018/02/09/pattern-of-u-s-textile-and-apparel-imports-updated-february-2018/

Nonetheless, the American President’s behavior, personal as well as political, has left him also, as with the Erdogan and Orban, associated with the terms “autocratic”, “narcissistic”, and “nationalist”.  While it’s good to take pride in one’s nation and defend her interests with tough negotiations, it may not be so good for the head of a modern democratic state to promote the image of himself as a feudal lord, securing prizes for family and friends on the basis of loyalty, and doing out favors (“You all just got a lot richer”) to surrounding nobility.

President George W. Bush also made light of the “have and have mores”, but for Americans struggling with fixed retirements, healthcare premiums, perhaps the full suite of basic and complex costs of survival, and, for the young, jobs that fail to deliver even a modicum of financial  independence and pride, much less security, the implied further reduction to peonage must sting.


Posted to YouTube December 26, 2017.


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Epigram

Hillel the Elder

"That which is distasteful to thee do not do to another. That is the whole of Torah. The rest is commentary. Now go and study."

"If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, what am I? If not now, when?"

"Whosoever destroys a soul, it is considered as if he destroyed an entire world. And whosoever that saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world."

Oriana Fallaci
"Whether it comes from a despotic sovereign or an elected president, from a murderous general or a beloved leader, I see power as an inhuman and hateful phenomenon...I have always looked on disobedience toward the oppressive as the only way to use the miracle of having been born."

Talmud 7:16 as Quoted by Rishon Rishon in 2004
Qohelet Raba, 7:16

אכזרי סוף שנעשה אכזרי במקום רחמן

Kol mi shena`asa rahaman bimqom akhzari Sof shena`asa akhzari bimqom rahaman

All who are made to be compassionate in the place of the cruel In the end are made to be cruel in the place of the compassionate.

More colloquially translated: "Those who are kind to the cruel, in the end will be cruel to the kind."

Online Source: http://www.rishon-rishon.com/archives/044412.php

Abraham Isaac Kook

"The purely righteous do not complain about evil, rather they add justice.They do not complain about heresy, rather they add faith.They do not complain about ignorance, rather they add wisdom." From the pages of Arpilei Tohar.

Heinrich Heine
"Where books are burned, in the end people will be burned." -- From Almansor: A Tragedy (1823).

Simon Wiesenthal
Remark Made in the Ballroom of the Imperial Hotel, Vienna, Austria on the occasion of His 90th Birthday: "The Nazis are no more, but we are still here, singing and dancing."

Maimonides
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Tanit Nima Tinat
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What I Have Said About the Jews

My people, not that I speak for them, I nonetheless describe as a "global ethnic commune with its heart in Jerusalem and soul in the Land of Israel."

We have never given up on God, nor have we ever given up on one another.

Many things we have given up, but no one misses, say, animal sacrifice, and as many things we have kept, so we have still to welcome our Sabbath on Friday at sunset and to rest all of Saturday until three stars appear in the sky.

Most of all, through 5,773 years, wherever life has taken us, through the greatest triumphs and the most awful tragedies, we have preserved our tribal identity and soul, and so shall we continue eternally.

Anti-Semitism / Anti-Zionism = Signal of Fascism

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One hopes for knowledge to allay fear; one hopes for love to overmatch hate.

Too often, the security found in the parroting of a loyal lie outweighs the integrity to be earned in confronting and voicing an uncomfortable truth.

Those who make their followers believe absurdities may also make them commit atrocities.

Positively Orwellian: Comment Responding to Claim that the Arab Assault on Israel in 1948 Had Not Intended Annihilation

“Revisionism” is the most contemptible path that power takes to abet theft and hide shame by attempting to alter public perception of past events.

On Press Freedom, Commentary, and Journalism

In the free world, talent -- editors, graphic artists, researchers, writers -- gravitate toward the organizations that suit their interests and values. The result: high integrity and highly reliable reportage and both responsible and thoughtful reasoning.

This is not to suggest that partisan presses don't exist or that propaganda doesn't exist in the west, but any reader possessed of critical thinking ability and genuine independence -- not bought, not programmed -- is certainly free to evaluate the works of earnest reporters and scholars.

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