My comment on the article Poland on brink of a new, pro-EU politics by Maria Wilczek in The Times, 28 June 2020.
This is merely a spectacle about elections and democracy pretending to be the real thing. It is not.
It is useful to refresh the memory somewhat. The first so-called ‘non-Communist’ Polish PM in 1989 was Tadeusz Mazowiecki, a Catholic Communist functionary, a three-time member of the Communist ‘Parliament’. In 1961 he won 97.42 percent of the vote, 96.60 percent in 1965, and 98.92 percent in 1969. Quite an achievement.
The first female PM 1992-1993 was Hanna Suchocka, who also was an MP in the Communist ‘Parliament’. She won 97.52 percent of the vote in 1980.
Mazowiecki and Suchocka were both members of the Freedom Union, a party to which Duda also belonged in early 2000s. Trzaskowski’s career revolves around people from the same environment. The Civic Platform he is associated with was created by people who were in the Freedom Union.
One more example of this nonsense. Earlier, Trzaskowski was a political assistant to Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, former member of the Communist party, who was firmly tied to the Freedom Union and the Civic Platform. However, Saryusz-Wolski was supported by the Law and Justice party in the 2017 contest for the President of the European Council against Donald Tusk, former PM from the Civic Platform.
I can imagine your head may be spinning by now. It should. This political goulash does not make any sense. It does not, because it is fake. The western readers get a tiny dose of this nonsense at any one time and are completely unable to follow this mess over time.
The Times prides itself on stimulating critical thinking. I don’t think this is true.
And don’t look for rescue to Oxford or Cambridge folks, because they are among the worst offenders. Those involved in the studies of Eastern Europe should rather be lecturing on How Not To Ask Obvious Questions.
@LechSBorkowski