In Politics, A Week Is A Long Time

As weeks go, the last one has been pretty bad for The Donald. It started with him tanking in the first presidential debate and ended with a revelation (presumably, the first of many) about his agressive tax avoidance. In between he managed to insult women, Latinos and fat people all in one go, had a 3 AM Twitter meltdown, brought up the Lewinsky scandal (which boosted Hillary‘s image in the 90s), has seen an investigation of his fundation expanded, and was venting publicly over his campaing people conceeding he lost the debate. You’d be excused for thinking that he’s over and done with. Only you’d be dead wrong.

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(source)

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Accountant-In-Chief

The term “hot political Autumn” is a staple of post-holiday media diet in Slovenia. It’s supposed to represent the exact opposite of the Silly season and signal re-entry of many-a-player into political orbit. Only that the Silly season was not really happening the past few years. In fact, until this Summer, Slovenia has been experiencing one long, drawn-out political and economic re-alignment, making the period between 2010 and 2016 one big political blur. Just think about it: four governments, just as many elections (on national level only) and seven referendums, with one being a 3-in-1 special. And then there was the euro-crisis and the migrant crisis and the Patria affair and a whole range of clusterfucks large and small. Thus many people were befuddled when the government of Miro Cerar declared a collective holiday and got the hell out of Dodge for most of August. Maybe it was the Olympics, maybe it was real, but no one really missed them, except for a few warning shots from the media and the opposition, but most of those were catching a few extra z’s around that time, too.

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Mateja Vraničar Erman, FinMin-to-be (source)

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Melania’s Speech (The Art Of Trolling)

Melania Trump‘s first (only?) major political speech of her career obviously made waves in the country of her birth as well. And not just because she plagiarised Michelle Obama quite audaciously. Or maybe precisely because of that, but from a different perspective. Sure, it looks bad enough from the US point of view. A would-be First Lady ripping off the, well, incumbent comes across as either too eager, inexperienced, brazen or shallow to pass the most basic of musters. After all, FLOTUS is an office (if one can call it that) one is married into rather than elected to. Which makes it all the more necessary to tread carefully lest accusations of usurpation of power be made. Just ask Hillary Clinton.

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Melania Knavs Trump giving her first and possibly last major political speech (source)

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Goodbye UK! We’ll Meet Again!

As countries go, Slovenia is a fairly sorry excuse for one, but she is celebrating her 25th birthday today. Hence the party, the flybys and salvos from the Castle hill, if you happened to be in downtown Ljubljana yesterday evening. And yes, despite putting on a brave face and some jovial attempts at ad-libbing it, President Pahor did not, could not avoid mentioning Brexit. He even shared some of his personal views on post-Brexit Europe.

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Schlager-singer Magnifico commenting on Brexit (source)

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I Just Can’t Even….

This was supposed to be a mildly self-serving blogpost on Brexit from an outsider’s perspective. You know, the kind that mixes a bit of historical narrative with a few ill-chosen links, all in the hope of scoring a few extra clicks and chipping off an eyeball or two for a second. It’s not that Brexit is not an important issue. It’s just that the arguments of both sides have been hashed and re-hashed time and again, the issue was approached from (what seemed at the time) every possible angle and, last but not least, it is for the Brits to decide. Unlike the referendum on Scottish independence, where this blogger could actually provide insight into the often-overlooked details of declaring independence (i.e. the hassle of a proper international border) and reiterating the historical role London always had keeping Berlin and Paris in check, there is awfully little for pengovsky to bring to the debate other than  a groveling “please, don’t go”. And then Jo Cox was murdered.

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Jo Cox in the House of Commons during her maiden speech. (source)

It’s been twenty-four hours since she died  and I am, to be honest, still at a loss for much words. I can’t even do sarcasm. I just can’t even… I mean, there you are, Brits and your United Kingdom, a country I always liked and, as I grew older (if not wiser), came to respect and even admire for its role in the world, past and present. Its cultural influence, pop and otherwise, its ability for innovation while nurturing tradition and – last but not least – its political creed and democratic values which much of Europe, especially post-socialist countries, often looked up to.

You see, when you mention the word “parliament” to a Slovenian, he or she will, obvs, first think of our own madhouse, but the very next thing to come to mind will the The House of Commons. Whenever the state of the media is debated, it almost always ends with “but they should be more like the BBC.” For the political aficionados in this sorry little excuse for a country, the House of Cards (the original with Ian Richardson) and The Thick of It were formative pieces of entertainment. Vanessa Redgrave recited the English version of Zdravljica, a Prešeren poem which constitutes our national anthem. You gave us fucking Monty Python. That’s just in case you ever wondered what has the UK ever done for us.

And then Jo Cox was murdered. I realize that it was a deranged neoNazi (a euphemism if I ever saw one) who pulled the trigger and wielded the knife. But the stage was set by someone else. As Alex Massie pointed out in the Spectator, events have a multiplier effect.

Look. When you encourage rage you cannot then feign surprise when people become enraged. You cannot turn around and say, ‘Mate, you weren’t supposed to take it so seriously. It’s just a game, just a ploy, a strategy for winning votes.’ (link)

 

It wasn’t just Farage and Leave campaign, sowing fear and loathing of immigrants while harking to a 19th-century notion of an empire respected. It wasn’t just Boris angling for a win-win scenario where he either scores a senior Cabinet post as a conciliatory present should Remain win or kick David Cameron out of Number 10 and take his spot, should Remain lose. It wasn’t even just Jeremy Corbyn, looking to have the cake and eat it, by trying to make both the case for Remain and make political hay out of legitimate grievances many of Labour voters have with the conservative government (let alone stem the bleeding of his voters to UKIP). And it wasn’t even just David Cameron who started this whole referendum business simply in order to appease the eurosceptic element within the Tory party and, well, remain at the helm.

In addition to the above, it was everyone who enabled a toxic debate environment where what is euphemistically refered to as “post-truth politics” thrives at the expense of an honest and candid, let alone rational debate (yes, I’m looking at you, the media). But it was also, I am sad to say, everyone who did nothing against it.

For quite a while, the EU referendum issue was dismissed by the general public as a political game, an episode of Westminster twats doing their twatty stuff. You guys didn’t take it seriously. Because you couldn’t be bothered. Or, if you could be bothered, you didn’t really take the time to sift through the claims and counterclaims or even took a long, hard look at the issue. From what pengovsky understands, Jo Cox did. Drawing from her previous experience, she knew what was in play. And now she’s dead.

A family was robbed of a mother and a wife, a constituency and a parliament were robbed of a fine MP and a country and a society were robbed of an active citizen, in an era where these are few and far between as it is.

I really was going to beg you not to go. But now I’ve half a mind to tell you to just sod off.

This isn’t how things are suppose to work. This is not how you taught us.

SDS MP Walks Away From A Car Wreck That Is His Party. But Where Is He Headed?

While most of Europe sighed in a collective relief upon learning that Alexander van der Bellen was elected President of Austria and at the same time ignoring the fact that a crypto-Nazi won 49.7 percent of the vote (seriously, Austria, what the actual fuck?!) important changes, albeit of a lesser degree, are taking place just south of the Austrian border, too. Namely, early on Monday the SDS of Janez Janša saw its first top-tier departure. To be fair, putting Andrej Čuš MP in the top-tier is a bit of a stretch, but the 26-year-old was once the leader of the Party youth organisation and elected to parliament twice (as a replacement deputy in 2013 and a full-term deputy a year later) so by virtue of the position he holds, count the kid in the grown-ups column. Also, the fact that he is the first one to walk from a party that is increasingly looking like a bad car wreck is not unimportant.

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Andrej Čuš kind of walking away from an explosion. Picture is symbolic (duh), plopped togehter by yours truly. (source & source)

Now, in the past few weeks a lot was said and written about how SDS is bursting at the seams, pengovsky included. But almost invariably this was framed as the more sensible wing of the party jumping ship, leaving Janša increasingly isolated and dejected thus opening up space for Aleš Primc to upgrade his protest movement into a full-blown party and commandeer most of the right-wing. Čuš quitting the SDS signals that Primc may have opted for eating up the SDS from within.

You see, Čuš took on quite a visible profile during the autumn/winter refugee crisis. Fomenting protests against refugee centres in Kidričevo near his native Ptuj and later in Šenčur near Kranj, accusing the president of the parliament Brglez of high treason for advocating the location of the centre in his hometown of Logatec (where it was ultimately established), the kid toed the anti-imigrant line in a way that would make Norbert Hofer proud. And since the ChristDem NSi, the other parliamentary right-wing party is Angela Merkel‘s echo chamber on many issues including the refugees, Čuš is – for the moment at least – persona non grata for the NSi. So much for theories of in-parliament poaching. On the other hand, Primc has built up a relatively massive operation on the ground, full of anger, righteousness and populism in general, but is lacking direct access to the parliamentary arena. He can’t wait forever lest he loses the momentum and since elections aren’t going to happen any time soon, peeling an MP or two off the SDS is a sensible way to go about it.

For his part, Čuš claims to have been simply fed up with Janša obsessing over Milan Kučan and that it was time to think of the future, especially future of the young people whom he obviously sees as his constituency. As far as excuses go he could have done worse. But the whole thing is nevertheless so transparent that it hurts. Namely, the latest iteration of Janša so-not-being-over Kučan consists of a group of JJ’s blowhards diehards indicting Kučan for high treason back in 1990 when he allegedly failed to stop the Yugoslav Army from hauling away a lot of weaponry earmarked for the nascent Territorial Defence (precursor to the Slovene Army). The case doesn’t have a leg to stand on, but this was just a cue Čuš was waiting for to make his move.

As per Rules and Regulations, he is now counted as an independent. But it will soon become apparent whether his “this is why we can’t have nice things” manoeuvre is just a ploy or is he really that stupid. Namely, his life as of Monday will become enormously more difficult. Not only will he lose access to the resources of a very large parliamentary group and will instead have to share limited resources in money and personnel with other independents . He will also have to contend with more constrained speaking time alloted and get generally to the back of the line on many issues and scenarios. It sucks being an independent in Slovenian parliament.

Unless, of course, you have outside support that will generate media attention. And this is where Primc comes into play. Yesterday Čuš was saying something about forming advisory councils and soliciting expert opinions on various issues as his path forward. Left to his own devices, this is a nigh-impossible task for one man, especially as inexperienced as Čuš is. If, however, the attendees were brought in by someone else, say an emerging political party with a wide grass-roots network and if Čuš provides a high-profile venue, such as, dunno, a conference room in the parliament, then the whole thing is suddenly very doable.

So, the smart money is on Andrej Čuš MP, formerly of SDS, to soon become the poster-boy of a new political party run by Aleš Primc. And if a few other SDS MPs were to follow in Čuš’s footsteps, we could soon find ourselves with several nominally independent MPs forming an unofficial parliamentary group which then in turn becomes a fully fledged party. We’ve seen that film before.

 

 

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I’ve Got Some Prime Newspaper Real Estate To Sell You

So, this was suppose to be an expletive-laden rant about how newspapers don’t take good care of their resources and willingly get buttfucked by advertisers just to make the bottom line. Not that there is anything wrong with buttfucking per se, but you get the idea. Namely Delo, Dnevnik and Večer, the three leading Slovenian daily newspapers hit the stands today with what appeared to be near-identical front pages. Which would be sort of embarrassing by itself. But in this case the front pages were actually full-page adverts framed as articles about Mercator, the largest retail chain in Slovenia. And while there was small print attached indicating the pieces were actually adverts, the end result was that the three dailies all ran the same pieces with the same titles (Dnevnik being the exception with one shorter title, possibly due to space constraints), the same body texts and the same photos. Luckily, the front pages were actually faux front pages (or wraps) with a real front page and a real newspaper inside.

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Today’s dailies (source)

Luckily, because this means that the newspapers and their management had not yet completely lost their bearings and sense of decency. Before today, there were other cases of wraps, although (this needs to be said) either as classic full-page adverts or running a different colour scheme and/or typography. Thus it would be unfair to say that new ground was broken or a new low reached, although it is fair to say that the ad is misleading in the sense that it masquerades as a series of articles by using the layout and typography of the real front page. True, the fine print saying “advert” is included somewhere at the edge of the field of vision, but clearly the ad aims to present itself as a genuine article and catch eyeballs. This, however, is completely in line with guidelines of the Slovenian Journalists’ Association, despite the fact that the said association issued a strong protest against the move by the three newspapers (both links in Slovenian).

At the moment pengovsky doesn’t have access to print editions of Slovenian newspapers and was initially led to believe that the wrap was the actual front page. My bad for not checking it out by myself sooner, but there you go. Drinks on me, I guess. But even with the way things are, it should be said that loud and clear that newspaper accept this sort of advertising at their own peril. I mean, yes, they gotta make money, people need to put bread on the table and all that jazz. And if you want to look at a wrap like this solely as a poorly designed advert, then by all means, do so. Nothing wrong with that.

But in the age where circulation is going down but for the select few (none of which are Slovenian, obv), where the like-fueled economy of content proliferation has failed to monetize and where website real estate is sometimes oversold to the point where only 20-or-so percent of the screen is devoted to content, the idea of “moar ads!” is dubious at best. Advertisers apparently know this, otherwise they would not have tried to imitate newspaper content, however crudely. The question is do the newspaper people know this or – rather – do they see this as their leverage or their liability. To put it crudely, are they being pressured into doing it or are they actively courting advertiser with what is essentially a print version of native advertising.

Obviously, there is no clear-cut solution to the conundrum that presents itself. Both approaches have pit-falls that are not easily avoidable. Catching eyeballs is increasingly difficult, doubly so with print. We often block out the ad sections almost subconsciously. Ad-blockers do it for us online. But doing native advertising means running the risk of blurring the line between marketing and journalism too much. First at the expense of the latter but ultimately, the former will have failed, too. Just look at the hot water BuzzFeed landed in with its native adverts.

The audience are not stupid and they can in all likelihood distinguish between an advert and news content. The problem is that the trend is moving increasingly towards blurring the difference between the two. Which is why newspapers, although understandably trying to make money and stay afloat, would do well not to dismiss the criticism of their advertising practices in an aloof or offhanded manner. After all, there is such a thing as peak advertising.

If you don’t believe that, I’ve got some prime newspaper real estate to sell you.