Most incumbent governments and leaders in Europe have seen their approval ratings increase since the outbreak of coronavirus disease. Read more “Europeans Trust Incumbent Governments in Pandemic”
Europeans Trust Incumbent Governments in Pandemic
Support for Quarantine Weakens in Spain
Support for maintaining the coronavirus quarantine is weakening in Spain. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has partly lifted a two-month lockdown, allowing small stores to reopen and restaurants to serve takeaway, but the opposition is calling for a quicker return to normalcy.
Deaths from coronavirus disease have stabilized at under 200 per day. The infection rate is also slowing.
But Spain still has more known cases of COVID-19 than any country except the United States.
The government fears that without strict controls, the virus might rebound in the next six to eight weeks. Read more “Support for Quarantine Weakens in Spain”
Setting the EU Up to Fail
First coronavirus itself was going to kill the EU. Now we are told the bloc’s fate was sealed in the first weeks of the outbreak, when creditworthy nations in the north refused to pool their debts with crisis-struck Italy and Spain.
Ulrich Speck, one of Germany’s top foreign-policy analysts, cautioned against jumping to conclusions:
With the corona crisis we see the return of a slightly hysterical discourse about the EU: if X, Y and Z do not immediately happen, the EU will be dead. We should have learned during the crises of the last years that the EU rests on quite solid foundations.
Not everyone has. Read more “Setting the EU Up to Fail”
Trump: Absolute Power, Absolutely No Responsibility
The outbreak of coronavirus disease in the United States has, if little else, given us an encapsulation of Trumpism.
As Patrick Chovanec of Columbia University puts it on Twitter:
According to the president, he has absolute power but absolutely no responsibility.
On Monday, Donald Trump falsely claimed he, not governors, have the power to impose and lift restrictions to contain the spread of the virus:
When somebody’s the president of the United States, the authority is total, and that’s the way it’s got to be.
Yet when he was asked earlier this month why he hadn’t issued a nationwide stay-at-home order, Trump did remember, “We have a thing called the Constitution,” and said, “I want the governors to be running things.”
Which was accurate, but also an abdication of duty. Chancellor Angela Merkel and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez regularly consult with the leaders of German and Spanish states to coordinate the closing and reopening of businesses and schools, even though that is not strictly their responsibility. Trump could have done the same.
Now some neighboring states opposite policies in place and they are bidding against each other, as well as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, for medical devices and gear. Trump could have federalized the procurement of medical equipment, but didn’t. He could have distributed medical equipment from the Strategic National Stockpile to the states that need it most, but didn’t.
He has found time to criticize Democratic governors, including Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Andrew Cuomo of New York, from their handling of the crisis.
The president’s attitude is best summed up by the answer he gave in March, when a reporter asked him about the shortage of testing kits in the United States: “I don’t take responsibility at all.” Read more “Trump: Absolute Power, Absolutely No Responsibility”
British Rediscover Normalcy in Abnormal Times
“Normal” may not be the best word to describe the situation in the United Kingdom, where 60,773 people, including Prime Minister Boris Johnson, are known to have contracted coronavirus disease and 7,097 with the infection have died.
Yet after years during which Britain’s exit from the European Union overshadowed everything, there are also signs that political life on the island is returning to normalcy.
As the government has tightened restrictions on public life in order to contain the outbreak, communities across the country are helping each other out. Almost every neighborhood now has a “COVID-19 Community Group” that organizes care for the needy and most vulnerable. Bitter divisions over Brexit have been set aside. Read more “British Rediscover Normalcy in Abnormal Times”
Dutch Opposition to Eurobonds Is Not Unreasonable
If Italians and Spaniards are under the impression that the Netherlands is refusing to help them cope with the impact of coronavirus disease, their own leaders share the blame with the Dutch’s lack of tact.
Giuseppe Conte and Pedro Sánchez have unwisely elevated the one policy they should have known the Dutch could not accept into the test of European solidarity: eurobonds. Read more “Dutch Opposition to Eurobonds Is Not Unreasonable”
Orbán Abolishes Democracy in Hungary
I try to avoid Nazi-era comparisons, since they’re seldom appropriate, but Viktor Orbán isn’t making it easy. The only thing that could make his power grab in Hungary more like the Enabling Act of 1933 is if, like the Reichstag fire, COVID-19 really had been manufactured (in a Chinese lab funded by George Soros, if we are to believe Russia’s disinformation).
Using the coronavirus pandemic as an excuse, Orbán has dissolved parliament and postponed all elections — indefinitely.
The Constitutional Court technically still functions, but it is packed with Orbán loyalists and provides no real oversight. For all intents and purposes, Orbán now rules alone. Read more “Orbán Abolishes Democracy in Hungary”
The EU Is Not About to Collapse, Again
You would think after it survived the euro crisis, commentators would be a little more cautious about predicting the EU’s demise. But no.
As usual, American and British media are the worst. Their typical commentary is so sensationalist, it sounds just like Russian propaganda. Read more “The EU Is Not About to Collapse, Again”
Coronavirus Puts Extra Stress on Russian Economy
The outbreak of coronavirus disease has put an additional stress on the Russian economy. It was already coping with a slump in oil prices.
Russia has ample reserves to weather the storm, but average Russians could feel the pain. Read more “Coronavirus Puts Extra Stress on Russian Economy”
Democracy Must Be Resistant to the Coronavirus
In a crisis, calls to do something, quickly, can be hard to resist. Politicians must still try.
On both sides of the Atlantic, governments are planning some of the largest peacetime interventions in the private economy to cope with the outbreak of coronavirus disease.
- Familiar battle lines have been drawn in Europe, where conservative northern countries, led by Germany and the Netherlands, hesitate to free up EU funds for the crisis.
- The roles are reversed in America, where once fiscally prudent Republicans are trying to rush through a stimulus twice the size of Barack Obama’s, and Democrats, who traditionally support a larger role for government, are stepping on the brakes.
The stallers are not unreasonable. We can take a few days to debate how to spend trillions of euros and dollars. Read more “Democracy Must Be Resistant to the Coronavirus”