Tony_Tarantula on 20/4/2016 at 17:00
Quote Posted by Yakoob
In more fun news, the minister of justice, Zbigniew Ziobro, is working new police laws that would allow using illegally obtained evidence in trials, eves-dropping on unsuspecting citizens, and a greater degree of physical abuse to extort information. Oh look, it's the Polish version Patriot Act!
Meantime, the EU is about to issue a resolution urging Poland to stop effectively breaking the constitution by ignoring the Constitutional Tribunal rulings.
Not a good precedent. The only people who cheer those things are left/right wing partisans who are too stupid to realize that those powers cut both ways. Sooner or later it's going to be someone who you don't think is cool wielding the ability to imprison you without charges or torture you.
Yakoob on 20/4/2016 at 22:17
Interestingly, I spoke with one of my very progressive young friends and he assured me that... the situation is Poland is superb. In fact, better than before?
We still have our disagreements, but as he explained, the new government is actually tackling real issues like retirement funds or healthcare. Stuff no one before wanted to touch because they were afraid of impacting their sparkling public image and playing real politik. He also noted how the previous government lead by PO basically did the same illegal stuff with preferentially selecting Constitutional Tribunal members, yet received no flak for it.
While I'm not knowledgeable to comment on the validity of the claims, it was interesting to hear a refreshing counter-opinion from a progressive guy who could actually back up his claims. He still hates the party in control itself.
Tony_Tarantula on 22/4/2016 at 02:35
He does make a good point about the reciprocity. It may very well be the case that the new party is still an improvement over the previous one.
That said I am still inherently uncomfortable with giving the government any kind of unilateral judicial power not subject to review or challenges. Historical precedent is that it's only a matter of time until they begin to use that power against political enemies.
It is good to hear that they're trying to address the pension issue. It's a Global issue. Here in the US a good example is the state of Illinois which has massive pension obligations they can't hope to pay....coupled with a clause in their constitution saying that they can not default on pension obligations. It leads to shit like this :(
http://abc7chicago.com/news/illinois-comptroller-will-delay-pay-for-officeholders/1295850/....which) in turn leads to shit like far "left" or "right" wing protests and worse.
bukary on 25/4/2016 at 20:28
Quote Posted by Tony_Tarantula
It may very well be the case that the new party is still an improvement over the previous one.
No. It's not.
PiS (Law and Justice) is efficiently and gradually destroying everything that was still passable or already admirable in my country. The reason is simple: the politicians from this party are usually extremally incompetent and have no idea about the areas of their omnipresent interest (eg. culture, legislation).
