SAUDI ARABIA: Women ñot driving in Saudi Arabia hurts the Saudi Arabia economy

Prince Alwaleed says women driving ban hurts Saudi economy - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38157565.

For full report click here

Turkey: Turkish Expatriates and Diaspora abroad lack the courage to speak out for Democracy

It must be difficult today for the Turkish expatriate community around the world, specially those who believe in Democracy, Secularism and the ideals of Kemalism, created by the founder of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, and to watch what is happening politically in Turkey.

 Specially, if personal friendships have developed between expat Turks, Turkish dispora and Turkish Diplomats

Regardless of that fact, and whatever way you turn it, these diplomats are the mouthpiece of the Turkish Foreign Ministry, which is an integral part of the Erdogan Government. As the saying goes: "He who pays the piper calls the tune". 

Case in point  re: The letter of H.E. Serdar Kılıç, Turkish Ambassador to the US, to the Wall Street Journal on November 16, 2016, which is a "rambling" defense by the Turkish Ambassador in Washington to justify that in effect all is "hunky dory" in Turkey and that democracy and freedom of the Press are, alive and well. Reading the interview, the feeling can't escape you, if he believed what he was saying himself.

As one Turkish citizen living in Paris, who often entertains and socializes with Turkish diplomats noted: "I have some very good friends among Turkish diplomats here in France, but that does not stop me in questioning them about the state of democracy in Turkey, or in signing petitions against the Erdogan Government ".

"This is not disrespectful, it is in fact the duty of every Turk, who lives abroad and believes in Democracy".

"Turkish diplomats, like any diplomat around the world, have to write numerous reports to their Ministry, including those on issues like "what their nationals are thinking and saying  about their home country and government".

"Consequently you are not doing your country a favor, by keeping your mouth shut on matters that are of importance to you and your country . Democracy in Turkey is on a steep descent and you have got to speak out".

©  EU-Digest

US - EU relations: Europe forced off the US lap and Alone in Trump’s World

Will Trump signal the end of the Trans=Atlantic Alliance

Alone again. Since World War II’s end, Europe has looked at the world through a transatlantic lens.

There have been ups and downs in the alliance with the United States, but it was a family relationship built on a sense that we would be there for each other in a crisis and that we are fundamentally like-minded.

Donald Trump’s election as US president threatens to bring this to an end – at least for now. He believes more in walls and oceans than solidarity with allies, and has made it clear that he will put America not just first, but second and third as well. “We will no longer surrender this country, or its people,” he declared in his one major foreign-policy speech, “to the false song of globalism.”

Europeans will not only have to get used to Trump; they will have to look at the world through different eyes. There are four reasons to expect that Trump’s America will be the single biggest source of global disorder.

First, American guarantees are no longer reliable. Trump has questioned whether he would defend Eastern European NATO members if they do not do more to defend themselves. He has said that Saudi Arabia should pay for American security. He has encouraged Japan and South Korea to obtain nuclear weapons. In Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, Trump has made it clear that America will no longer play the role of policeman; instead, it will be a private security company open for hire.

Second, global institutions will come under attack. Trump fundamentally rejects the view that the liberal world order that the US built after WWII (and expanded after the Cold War) is the cheapest way of defending American values and interests. Like George W. Bush after September 11, 2001, he views global institutions as placing intolerable constraints on US freedom of action. He has a revisionist agenda for almost all of these bodies, from the World Trade Organization to NATO and the United Nations.

The fact that he wants to put the “Art of the Deal” into practice in all international relationships – renegotiating the terms of every agreement – is likely to provoke a similar backlash among America’s partners.

Third, Trump will turn all US relationships on their head. The crude fear is that he will be kinder to America’s foes than to its allies. Most challenging for Europeans is his admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Should Trump, cozying up to Putin in search of a grand bargain, recognize Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea, the EU would be placed in a near-impossible role.

Fourth, there is Trump’s unpredictability. Even during the 18 months of the presidential campaign, Trump has been on both sides of almost every issue. The fact that he will say the opposite today of what he said yesterday, without admitting that he has changed his mind, shows the extent to which capriciousness is his method.

One of the benefits the US political system is that it provides a two-month grace period to prepare for Trump’s world. So what should Europeans do about it?

First, we need to try to increase leverage over the US. We know from Trump’s writings and behavior that he is likely to resemble other strongmen presidents and treat weakness as an invitation to aggression. We saw from the Iraq experience that a divided Europe has little ability to influence the US. But where Europe has worked together – on privacy, competition policy, and taxation – it has dealt with the US from a position of strength.

The same was true with the so-called E3+3 policy on Iran – when the big EU member states shifted the US stance by standing together. To get on the front foot, the EU now needs to launch a process to agree on common policies on security, foreign policy, migration, and the economy. This will be difficult, as Europe is deeply divided, with France fearing terrorism, Poland dreading Russia, Germany inflamed by the refugee issue, and the United Kingdom determined to go it alone.

Second, Europeans should show that they are able to hedge their bets and build alliances with others. The EU must reach out to other powers to help shore up global institutions against Trumpian revisionism. And it also needs to diversify its foreign-policy relationships. Rather than waiting for Trump to marginalize the EU over Russia and China, Europeans should fly some kites of their own. Should they, for example, begin consulting with the Chinese on the EU arms embargo to remind the US of the value of the transatlantic alliance? Could the EU develop a different relationship with Japan? And if Trump wants to cozy up to Russia, maybe he should take over the Normandy process on Ukraine?

Third, Europeans need to start to invest in their own security. From Ukraine to Syria, from cyber attacks to terror attacks, Europe’s security is being probed in different ways. Despite an intellectual understanding that 500 million Europeans can no longer contract out their security to 300 million Americans, the EU has done little to close the gap between its security needs and its capabilities. It is time to put meat on the bones of the Franco-German plan for European defense. And it will be important to find institutionalized ways of binding the UK into Europe’s new security architecture.

In all of these areas, Europeans must keep the door to transatlantic cooperation open. This alliance – which has so often saved Europe from itself – is bigger than any individual. And, in any case, Trump will not last forever. But the transatlantic relationship will be more likely to survive if it is built on two pillars that understand and defend their own interests.

This will be a tough agenda to adopt – not least because Europe is facing its own brand of populist nationalism. France’s far-right National Front leader, Marine Le Pen, was among the first to congratulate Trump on his victory, and Trump has said that he would put the UK at the front of the queue after Brexit. But even Europe’s most Trump-like leaders will find it harder to defend their national interest if they try to go it alone. To survive in Trump’s world, they should try to make Europe great again.

Read more: Europe, Alone in Trump’s World | European Council on Foreign Relations

Donald Trump: The US has elected its most dangerous leader. We all have plenty to fear - by Jonathan Freedland

''The American Dream Is Dead"

The thought the United States would step back from the abyss. We believed, and the polls led us to feel sure, that Americans would not, in the end, hand the most powerful office on earth to an unstable bigot, sexual predator and compulsive liar.

People all around the world had watched and waited, through the consecutive horrors of the 2016 election campaign, believing the Trump nightmare would eventually pass. But today the United States – the country that had, from its birth, seen itself as a beacon that would inspire the world, a society that praised itself as “the last best hope of earth”, the nation that had seemed to be bending the arc of history towards justice, as Barack Obama so memorably put it on this same morning eight years ago – has stepped into the abyss.

Today the United States stands not as a source of inspiration to the rest of the world but as a source of fear. Instead of hailing its first female president, it seems poised to hand the awesome power of its highest office to a man who revels in his own ignorance, racism and misogyny. One who knows him well describes him as a dangerous “sociopath”.

And what awesome power he will soon have. Republicans did not just defy almost every projection, prediction and data-rich computer model to win the presidency. They also won the House of Representatives and much of the Senate. Trump will face few checks on his whims. A man with no control of his impulses will be unrestrained, the might of a superpower at the service of his ego and his id.

The most obvious impact will be on the country he will soon rule. Just think of what he has promised. A deportation force to round up and expel the 11 million undocumented migrants who make up 6% of the US workforce. A ban on all Muslims entering the country, later downgraded to a pledge to impose “extreme vetting” on anyone coming from a suspect land. A giant wall to seal off the Mexican border. “Some form of punishment” for women who seek an abortion. And prison for the woman he just defeated.

People will say that all that was just talk. But they said that throughout the campaign, insisting that Trump would “pivot” to a more moderate stance, that he would become more “presidential”. He never did. And surely he will see this victory as proof that he was always right, that his instincts are perfect and never to be challenged. There is no reason for him to moderate at all. The office of Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt and John F Kennedy is now his playpen. He can do what he likes.

This will be America’s ordeal primarily. But it will affect all of us. A reality TV star with no experience of either politics or the military will have the nuclear button as his toy. This, remember, is the man who reportedly asked several times, during a military briefing, why the US didn’t use nuclear weapons since it had them. This is the man who has said “I love war”. Whose proposed solution to Isis is “to bomb the shit out of them” and steal the oil.

Think of the anxiety this morning in Riga, Vilnius or Tallinn. In the summer, Trump told the New York Times he did not believe in Nato’s core principle: that an attack on one member should be met by a response from all. He seemed to see Nato as a mafia protection racket: unless the little guys paid up, they should be left undefended. Vladimir Putin – Trump’s hero, admired as the very model of a leader by the president-elect of the United States – will not need more of a hint than that. The Russian dictator will surely see his opportunity to invade one or more Baltic states and expand his empire. President Trump would only admire the macho swagger of such a move.

A trade war looms with China, the imposition of tariffs that could imperil the entire global trading system. America is about to turn inward, towards protectionism. The markets have already delivered their verdict on that. They plunged.

And what about our planet? Trump believes climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese. He will do nothing to reduce emissions: he does not believe they exist.

But beyond all that, there is another consequence of this terrifying decision, no less dark. Trump’s success has delighted white nationalists and racists in his own country and beyond. His victories in the key battleground states were hailed by David Duke, a former luminary of the Ku Klux Klan: “God Bless Donald Trump,” he tweeted. “It’s TIME TO TAKE AMERICA BACK.” The Dutch nationalist Geert Wilders was in similarly cheery mood: “The people are taking their country back,” he said, “So will we.” Marine Le Pen will feel the same jubilation, as will every other populist or nationalist who traffics in hate.

For they have seen the power of a message built on fear and loathing. It’s not good enough to say this is all about the economic anxiety of those who have been left behind, though that clearly played a part in winning rustbelt states for Trump. But it’s an incomplete explanation because Trump did not only win those voters. He won 63% of white men and 52% of white women. Not all of those were the left behind. A lot of them were people drawn to a message that was, in part and however thinly coded, about reinstating white privilege.

Who is to blame? The list is so long, from the Republican party to the media, from the pollsters and data nerds who got it so wrong to the Clinton campaign team that took onetime Democratic bastions for granted, including Clinton herself, who for all her strengths was a flawed candidate. You can condemn all of them, but on a day like this who really cares about blame? The most powerful country in the world is to be led by its most dangerous ever leader, a figure who could have walked out of a school textbook narrating the darkest history of the 20th century. The wartime holder of the office that in January will be Trump’s once told Americans they had “nothing to fear but fear itself”. That is not true today. America and the rest of us have plenty to fear – starting with the man who now stands on top of the world.

Note Almere-Digest: Maybe also time to give Trump the benefit of the doubt. Donald Trump - Amazing, and shocking for many, but not unexpected. First Brexit and now Trump. Get ready for Marie Le Pen in France and Geert Wilders in Holland. It will certainly create a chain reaction of popular movements around the world against a totally corrupt political, and corporite establishment who slowly dug their own grave. It will be either the beginning of a new era or the beginning of the end. Will Trump be able to deliver and satisfy this popular movement? One thing is certain, the status-quo has been hit by an earthquake. "Business as usual" is no more. QUE SERA SERA!  

Read more: The US has elected its most dangerous leader. We all have plenty to fear | Jonathan Freedland | Opinion | The Guardian

The Ideal Nation State: Free Universal Health Care, Free Quality Education and a Fair Share Tax System-does it exist?

Sounds too far fetched - not at all.

When we look at Unversal Health care there are thirty-two of the thirty-three developed nations have universal health care, with the United States being the lone exception . The following list, compiled from WHO sources where possible, shows the start date and type of  system used to implement universal health care in each developed country .

Note that universal health care does not imply government-only health care, as many countries implementing a universal health care plan continue to have both public and private insurance and medical providers.

If we look at Free Quality education and live in a country where it is not free but costly, like in the US, or if you fail to qualify for fully-funded university scholarships, consider enrolling in universities that are tuition free or universities that charge low tuition fees. Countries like Finland, Austria, Norway, Germany, and Sweden offer different types of free/low tuition schemes for international students.

scholars4dev.com has compiled information and provided links to tuition-free Colleges and Universities in these countries.

According to studyinfinland.fi: There are currently no tuition fees charged in Finland, regardless of the level of studies and the nationality of the student however tuition fees for non-EU/EEA students will be introduced from autumn 2017 onwards for English-taught Bachelor’s or Master’s programmes. Doctoral level studies will remain free of tuition fees.

Updates concerning the forthcoming non-EU tuition fees and related new scholarships options can be found at www.studyinfinland.fi/tuitionfees2017.

Remember that even when there are no tuition fees, you still need to plan your finances – you are expected to independently cover all your everyday living expenses during your studies in Finland.

At the moment, scholarships there are mainly available only for Doctoral level studies and research.

There are now a number of Universities also offering online degrees/courses for free.  The first such University is University of the People which is a tuition-free, non-profit, accredited online university dedicated to opening access to higher education globally.  University of the People offers online Associates and Bachelors Degrees in Business Administration and Computer Science.

This was followed by an initiative of MIT and Harvard called edX which is a learning platform that gives students from any country the opportunity to take free online courses offered by three premier Universities in the US – Harvard, MIT, and UC Berkeley and about 50+ Universities and institutions.

Following this trend, Coursera was introduced which is an online learning platform that partners with the top universities in the world to offer online courses in many fields of study for anyone to take, for free.

Last but not least: which countries have a Fare Share Tax System? For the US one place to turn for factual information on who pays how much percent of the total in income taxes is a report posted on the American Spectator’s blog on May 6, 2015. The data come from 2014, and are reported by the Tax Policy Center, which is the creation of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, two entities not known for right-wing sentiments. According to the IRS, in 2014 the top 1% of all income earners paid 45.7% of all federal income taxes, but earned 17.1% of all income in the U.S. The top 20% paid 83.9% of all federal income taxes, after earning 51.9% of all income in America. The middle 20% of income earners – who the American Spectator claims are the true middle class in America – paid 5.9% of all federal income taxes, but earned 14.8% of all income.

In Europe The EU Commission suggests that tax policy should be geared towards meeting more general EU policy goals. Tax policy must contribute to achieving the goal established at the Lisbon European Council of March 2000 and confirmed at the Stockholm European Council in March of this year of making the Union the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world by 2010. This means that efforts must be made to achieve a durable reduction in the overall tax burden in the EU, by ensuring a balance between cutting taxes, investing in public services and sustaining fiscal consolidation. At the same time, tax policy must be fully consistent with other EU policies such economic, employment, health and consumer protection, innovation, environmental and energy policies. But in particular tax systems must allow individuals and businesses to benefit fully from the Internal Market. This implies a need to focus on eliminating the inefficiencies due to the co-existence of 15 different tax systems within the EU and on making those tax systems simpler and more comprehensible to taxpayers.\

At the recent European Commission’s “Debate on the Future of Europe” event in Luxembourg there was a comment from the audience arguing that corruption and tax evasion in some European countries was one of the root causes of the economic crisis in Europe, and it should be up to individual member states to solve their own problems:

One thing the people can do to promote changes on any of the issues listed above is to use their voting power and their brains to vote in gthose politicians who are in favor of Free Unversal Health Care, Free Quality Education and a Fair Tax System, and vote out those who do nothing else than give you promises and more promises.

It is high time for voters around the world to clean-up those political systems which have brought us non of the above,  but instead, constant warfare, environmental disasters, while they empowered corporate entities to infiltrate and manipulate prevalent political systems.

© EU-Digest  

Freedom of the Press? As Turkey confiscates DW footage of interview with Minister Kilic

Immediately following the recording of a television interview with the Turkish Minister of Youth and Sports, Akif Kilic, for DW's talk show " Conflict Zone," Turkish authorities confiscated the video footage. The interview with DW host Michel Friedman took place in Ankara on the evening of September 5.

The interview at the ministry of youth and sports in Ankara included questions which had been divulged to the ministry in advance.

Host Michel Friedman asked about the coup attempt in July as well as the mass layoffs and arrests that took place in its aftermath. He asked about the media situation in Turkey as well as the position of women in Turkish society. The minister was asked to further explain several quotes made by President Erdogan regarding these subjects.

Immediately following the interview, the minister excused himself. As soon as he had left the room, the minister's press officer announced that DW would not be allowed to broadcast the interview. When Friedman and his editorial colleague protested, the video material was confiscated by employees of the Turkish ministry of youth and sports. It was made clear to the TV crew that they would not be able to leave the ministry in possession of the video footage.

DW Director General Peter Limbourg spoke out about the behavior of the Turkish authorities today. He said: "This incident is proof of a blatant violation of press freedom in Turkey. What we are experiencing constitutes an act of the Turkish regime's coercion. It no longer follows the rule of law and has nothing to do with democracy. It cannot be that a minister willingly responds to an interview and then tries to block the transmission in such a manner just because he did not like the questions posed. We are requesting the Turkish authorities to return the video material straightaway and we will consider our legal options."

Immediately following the incident, DW appealed to the Turkish ministry of youth and sports as well as to the Turkish directorate-general for press and information and demanded the release of the video material. A deadline set for today at noon local time expired without any response. During several phone conversations with representatives of the ministry of youth and sports this morning, Deutsche Welle repeatedly requested the video footage. The response has remained unchanged: the ministry is not in agreement with the broadcasting of the interview.

In his statement made to DW's Turkish language department Übeydullah Yener, press officer of the Sport Minister said "There was no authorisation for the interview. The questions asked were not the ones that were planned. Mr. Friedman himself knows exactly why this happened. Some statements were right out allegations. In such a situation, there was no authorization granted."

Read more: Turkey confiscates DW footage of interview with Minister Kilic | World | DW.COM | 06.09.2016

EU Rule of Law Crises: Europe’s Rule-of-Law "obstructed by Hungary and Poland "- by Guy Verhofstadt

Rule of Law - one of the basic princiles of Democracy

From the rubble of two world wars, European countries came together to launch what would become the world’s largest experiment in unification and cooperative, shared sovereignty. But, despite its impressive achievements over the decades, the European project now risks disintegration.

An unresolved financial crisis, a refugee crisis, a deteriorating security environment, and a stalled integration process have created throughout Europe a toxic, unstable political environment in which populism and nationalism thrive. Perhaps the clearest manifestation of this is the erosion of the rule of law in the European Union.

Two EU members in particular, Hungary and Poland, are now jeopardizing hard-won European democratic norms – and thus undermining the very purpose of European integration.

In Hungary, liberal-democratic values have come under systematic attack from Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s government. Since his return to the premiership in 2010, Orbán has committed Hungary to an authoritarian nationalist path, and he has exploited the refugee crisis to cement a “siege mentality” that helps him sustain popular support.

In the process, fundamental rights have been ignored, media freed refugees have been demonized, and Orbán is doing everything in his power to weaken the EU. Attempts by EU institutions to convince Orbán to change course have only emboldened him to commit further outrages against democratic norms.

Meanwhile, a democratic crisis has emerged in Poland as well, starting last October, when the Law and Justice (PiS), a Euroskeptic party that also opposes immigration, secured an outright parliamentary majority by promising to implement populist economic policies and “put Poland first.” Yet, since the election, PiS has launched a series of attacks on the Polish constitution itself.

Government legislation aimed at reforming Poland’s Constitutional Court has been condemned by the Court itself and the European democracy watchdog, the Venice Commission. The government has effectively precluded the Court from ruling on the constitutionality of legislation. This weakens a key pillar of the democratic rule of law – and thus is highly problematic for Poland and Europe alike.

Hungary and Poland are the leading edge of a far-right agenda that has taken hold throughout Europe, pursued by parties that are exploiting the political vacuum created by the EU’s failure to address the financial and refugee crises. So how can the tables be turned?

In democratic countries, it is vital that democracy’s enemies be fought with democratic means. It is vital that the outside world impress on the Hungarian and Polish people themselves that in a globalized world, nationalism offers only false security and economic irrelevance. Both countries, at the heart of Europe, have profited enormously in every sense from EU membership; they must not throw away their opportunity to make further progress.

Hungarians and Poles rejected international isolation in 1989. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, both countries became staunch NATO allies even before they joined the EU. The geopolitical and security arguments for European unity are overwhelming, and there can be no united Europe without Hungary and Poland.

But all of us, and in particular the peoples of Hungary and Poland, must remember that NATO, like the EU, was founded on the fundamental principles of democracy, individual liberty, and the rule of law. A government that flouts those principles jeopardizes the coherence and solidarity of the alliance. It is therefore vital that the United States and other NATO allies speak out now and insist that functioning democratic checks and balances are safeguarded. It would be unimaginable for NATO heads of state to go ahead with their planned leadership summit in Warsaw in June if Poland remains in its constitutional crisis, with the government disregarding the rule of law and the opinion of a respected international body.

Hungarians and Poles must be reminded that Russian President Vladimir Putin is actively attempting to divide and weaken the EU and NATO. If Europe is to face down aggression from the Kremlin, it is essential that Poland and Hungary adhere to these groups’ fundamental values and principles.

But it is also necessary that the EU itself develop a more comprehensive mechanism for safeguarding the rule of law within the Union. The EU has mechanisms to regulate economic policies, safeguard the environment, and police the Single Market. But Europe has always been much more than an economic project; it is also a union of values, which no member can be allowed to repudiate without consequence.

Governments are created and fall apart, and politicians come and go; but democratic institutions should be spared from political interference. The sad reality is that, were they to apply for EU membership today, neither Hungary nor Poland would be admitted. Their people should weigh carefully what that means. 

Their current leaders claim to be defending national interests. But is it really in their countries’ interest to be sidelined by the US, NATO, and the rest of Europe?

Note EU-Digest: Guy Verhofstadt, a former Belgian prime minister, is President of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Group (ALDE) in the European Parliament. 

NATO's Planned June Leadership in June should be cancelled if Hungary and Poland  both continue to obstruct  the fundamental principles of democracy, individual liberty, and the rule of law on which not only the EU was founded but also the NATO.

EU-Digest

EU - TTIP : Big business and US to have major say in EU trade deals, leak reveals - by Paul Gallagher

Say No To TTIP

The European Commission will be obliged to consult with US authorities before adopting new legislative proposals following passage of a controversial series of trade negotiations being carried out mostly in secret.

A leaked document obtained by campaign group Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) and the
Independent from the ongoing EU-US Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiations reveals the unelected Commission will have authority to decide in which areas there should be cooperation with the US – leaving EU member states and the European Parliament further sidelined.

The main objective of TTIP is to harmonise transatlantic rules in a range of areas – including food and consumer product safety, environmental protection, financial services and banking.

The leaked document concerns the “regulatory cooperation” chapter of the talks, which the European Union says will result in “cutting red tape for EU firms without cutting corners”. It shows a labyrinth of procedures that could tie up any EU proposals that go against US interests, according to analysis by CEO.

The campaign group said the document also reveals the extent to which major corporations and industry groups will be able to influence the development of regulatory cooperation by making what is referred to as a “substantial proposal” to the working agenda of the Commission and US agencies.

The plans revealed by the document will give the US regulatory authorities a “questionable role” in Brussels lawmaking and weaken the European Parliament, CEO argues.

Read more: TTIP: Big business and US to have major say in EU trade deals, leak reveals | Business News | News | The Independent

Poland: Protests as Poland's Radical Right Wing Government Rejects Top Court Ruling

Poland's Government overrules top 
court and Council of Europe

Poland's Right Wing Law and Justice (PiS) government on Saturday, March 12, said it would ignore a Constitutional Tribunal ruling invalidating its legal reforms, a day after a European rights body argued the controversial changes to the top court threatened democracy and the rule of law.

Since winning October elections, the PiS has pushed through a number of reforms in the media, constitutional court and other institutions that have garnered criticism and concern from the EU, United States and other rights institutions.

The latest battle lines have been drawn over the constitutional court, after PiS passed amendents in December increasing the number of judges to make a ruling, requiring the court to review cases in the order they were received, and changing the threshold for a decision from a simple majority to a two-thirds majority.

Critics argue the changes are designed to slow down the court and render it dysfunctional in order to prevent judges from blocking controversial PiS legislation.

On Friday,March 11 the Venice Commission, an advisory body of the Council of Europe, made a non-binding judgment that the changes had "crippled" the Constitutional Tribunal and "endangered not only the rule of law but also the functioning of the democratic system."

The Council of Europe also said the government must follow the constitutional court's decision.

That judgment is likely to put Poland on a fresh collision course with the EU, which has referred Poland to a review at the European Commission over concerns of a retrenchment of democracy and rule of law.

A negative decision from the EU's executive body could lead to Poland losing its voting rights at the EU level.

On Saturday, Poland's government said it would ask parliament to review the Venice Commission's judgment but would still not recognize the Constitutional Tribunal's ruling.

The government has refused to officially publish the top court's findings, effectively blocking them from going into force.

Read more: Protests as Poland rejects top court ruling | News | DW.COM | 12.03.2016

Turkey: EU Must Cancel March 7 Meeting With Turkey - and grasp the fact that Erdogan is an egomaniac dictator

Dealing with the Erdogan Government

The European Union is facing increasing pressure to speak out against the erosion of Democracy and media freedom in Turkey following the takeover of the country's largest-circulation newspaper, but few expect it to take a bold stance toward Ankara while trying to assure its help in dealing with the migration crisis.

The Istanbul court's appointment of trustees to manage Zaman and its sister outlets further reduced the number of opposition media organizations in Turkey, which is dominated by pro-government news outlets. It raised alarm bells over the deterioration of rights conditions in the NATO member nation, which also aspires for EU membership, just days before a March 7 meeting, in which EU leaders will try to convince Turkey to do more to curtail the flow of migrants traveling to Europe.

"The EU countries are preoccupied with their migration crisis, they are no longer concerned by rights violations in Turkey," said Semih Idiz, columnist for the opposition Cumhuriyet and independent Daily Hurriyet newspapers. "They'll say a few things as a matter of form, but they know they are dependent on Turkey."

As an undisclosed member of the Turkish opposition noted: ' the illegal takeover of the Zaman newspaper by the Turkish Government is a disgrace and a disregard  by the Turkish Government of all basic Democratic Rights.

The EU must put their money where their mouth is, specifically when it comes to Democracy, Freedom of the Press, and Human Rights, which have all been flagrantly violated by the Turkish government,  and postpone the upcoming March 7 meeting with Turkey.

The EU also will need to close all its Southern borders with Turkey and repatriate refugees back to Turkey which have recently entere,  or those that are still making the crossing from Turkey into the EU, until Turkey comes forward with, or agrees to a verifiable agreemen as to solving the refugee crises.  

Last but not least, if the Erdogan Government continues to resort to intimidation tactics in its discussions with the EU, by making unreasonable demands,  the EU should as a last resort, consider suspending diplomatic relations with Turkey.

The question, however, that is also foremost on everyone's mind  is "when will the EU finally come to grasp with the fact that Erdogan is really an egomaniac dictator, who is dragging not only his country but also the Middle East into further chaos ?

In dealing with the Erdogan government the EU must not only carry a carrot, but also a stick.

EU-Digest

US Presidential Elections: More countries are destroyed by their own politicians than by foreign armies - editorial

Montesquieu,

“The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principles on which it was founded.”, said  Montesquieu, (Charles Louis de Secondat)  (1689-1755), a  famous French political philosopher who lived during the European "Age of Enlightenment".

In fact, putting this in the context of the US Constitution and the intended way America is supposed to function, it follows,“Congress makes the laws, the president carries them out, judges decide controversies, and the citizens may be penalized only by a jury of their peers”,

Unfortunately, in reality, this is not how the US functions as a political entity anymore.

America is now ruled by a uniformly educated class of persons controlling the commanding heights of bureaucracy, of the judiciary, education, the media, large corporations, and that force wields political power through the political establishment.

Its control of access to prestige, power, privilege, and wealth exerts a gravitational pull that has made the political elites its major accomplices.

As to the economy : “Think of the American economy as a large apartment block. A century ago—even 30 years ago—it was the object of envy. But in the last generation its character has changed."

"The penthouses at the top keep getting larger and larger. The apartments in the middle are feeling more and more squeezed and the basement has flooded. To round it off, the elevator is no longer working. That broken elevator is what gets people down the most.” said Lawrence Katz, Harvard University economist, already back in 2010.

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (1874-1965) once noted that “democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”  Indeed, democracy is a very fragile political system that can sometimes fail the very people it is designed to serve.

American president Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) defined it as “a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.” He would turnover in his grave if he saw how his Republican party defines the functions of Government today.

But democracy is at its worst when an oligarchy takes control of a country’s institutions and imposes its own agenda. Such is the case, unfortunately, in today’s United States. Money interests, not the sovereign people, control the political system; they control the corporate media system, they control the U.S. Supreme Court and much of the judicial system and, one can even argue that they control a large chunk of the academic system.

The U. S. economy, like most industrial economies, is an open economy. This means that goods and services can be exported and imported while facing a minimum of border taxes and other barriers to international trade. For a quarter of a century now, it has also meant that the U. S. economy is part of the economic globalization model.

The later goes much further than free trade: it means that corporations and banks can move their capital, technology and production plants around the world in search of the greatest profit and the best investment environment. Many economists believe that this globalization model has been pushed too far and has become a major cause of economic stagnation in the industrial economies.

In an open economy, keynesian-type stimulus policies of deficit government spending or of tax reduction do not work properly, essentially because stimulus policies of this type are the equivalent of heating a house in winter with the windows and doors wide open. The new deficit spending may help the world economy, since much of the new spending ends up abroad, but the domestic multiplier effect of such spending can be very low. This means that such an economic stimulus in an open economy may not be as effective in stimulating economic activity as hoped and, in some circumstances, it can do more harm than good.

Nevertheless, many politicians (and some economists cling to the old idea that lowering taxes for the rich when the government is in deficit or new non-infrastructure government deficit spending can stimulate the economy.

 This obviously does not work, at least not if the new deficit spending is not focused domestically. Spending deficit money in Afghanistan or in Iraq doesn’t much stimulate the U.S. economy!

What works in an open economy are policies geared toward changing relative prices in order to encourage domestic production and employment. First of all, a lowering of the real exchange rate can encourage net exports and stimulate domestic production and employment, provided the government does not sustain excessive domestic absorption through unproductive large deficits.

Another approach to move relative prices in favor of domestic production and employment is to use the tax system accordingly. Presently, many American corporations are hardly taxed at all on their profits when they operate abroad. Some appropriate taxation of these profits can encourage repatriation of capital and support additional domestic investments. It may be argued that the American political system is not flexible enough to allow for the use of tax policies to encourage domestic production and employment. If so, this would be another indication that the current state of the political system in the U. S. is inimical to economic progress.

The results of the present day US economic policies are everywhere to be seen. The United States has reached levels of inequality in wealth and income that used to be seen only in some backyard third-world countries.

Specifically, therefore, when it comes to politics, it is also in the best interest of any country to avoid giving power to idiots, ignoramuses, incompetents, devious and delusional characters or to demagogues. If not, watch out.

The records show — More countries are destroyed by their own politicians rather than by foreign armies.

Donald Trump’s claim to be an enemy of 'rule-by-inside-deal' is counter intuitive. His career and fortune have been as participant and beneficiary in the process by which government grants privileges to some and inflicts burdens on others. Crony capitalism is the air he breathes, the only sea in which he swims, his second nature. His recipe for “fixing” America, he tells us, is to appoint “the best people”—he names some of his fellow crony capitalists—to exercise even more unaccountable power and to do so with “unbelievable speed.” He assures the voter that, this time, it will be to “make America great again.” Sure, tell us another one Mr.Trump.

Hillary Clinton's approach is to "improve on the system" as she says. She's also embracing the label of "insider," declaring that she knows "what it takes to get things done". With Hillary it is probably the word "insider" which worries most Americans,specially those who believe that the US political system is rotten to the core.

Bernie Sanders's call for a political revolution is at the center of his political appeal. Progressives don't just love him because his policy proposals are more left wing than Hillary's. They love the fact that he calls America's political and economic system by what it is: corrupt.

America's choice for President in November 2016 will either be as significant as the declaration of independence on July 4, 1776, or the final chapter in the systematic destruction of the American Democracy..
.

EU-Digest

EU Migrant Crises: The EU must be able to face, acknowledge and fix the root of the problem - by RM

As the saying goes "concern yourself more accepting responsibility than with assigning blame".

US continuous criticism of the EU’s handling of the refugee crisis is the case in point .

Let's face it - the EU migrant crises comes as a direct result of a Europe which is still blindly following a US led foreign policy which is part of the so-called "allied commitments".

When these plans,however, as most of them usually do, turn into human disaster, Europe is required to carry the burden of fixing the mess afterwards..

The above specifically reflects on a totally flawed EU Middle-East foreign policy (a carbon copy of that of the US), specially in regions of the Muslim World, the Middle East and North Africa.

Where exactly is the line between inaction and complicity? The notion of neutrality, for a country as powerful as the United States, is illusory. Doing nothing or “doing no harm” means maintaining or reverting to the status quo, which in the Middle East is never neutral, due to America’s and Europe's  longstanding relationships with regional political actors.

Europe’s refugee crisis might feel a million miles away for many Americans, but there is something everyone can relate to: money:  and this ompletely messed up Middle East foreign policy could cost the United States several hundred billion dollars eventually.

That’s according to the Bertelsmann Foundation, a respected think tank here in Germany, which looked at the potential economic consequences if Europe were to reinstate border controls within its 26-country passport-free travel area.

As the continent buckles under the weight of the most serious refugee crisisever  since World War II, the breakdown of that zone, known as the Schengen Area, has loomed as a dark prospect.

Reinstating border checks are bad for European business, experts say. They would even stunt economic growth through a vicious cycle that starts with higher labor costs — thanks to long lines at borders — and ends with declining sales and lower production.

If this happens it would mean major economic losses for the EU could reach up to €1.4 trillion by 2025.

So what to do about it? It would basically need two essental steps to be taken by the EU .

The first would be to immediately decouple the EU foreign policy from that of the failed US Middle East foreign policy; secondly, invest in a  far reaching Euro-Mediterranean - North African Free Trade Area, which would aim at establishing peace and prosperity in the area by removing barriers to trade and investment between both the EU and countries in that area, based on mutual respect and recognition of all  freely elected governments, religious freedom and cultural ties.

It obviously would be a long and difficult process, but the results would certainly be far more rewarding, productive and beneficial to all the people in the area, and obviously less costly than the useless and destructive military campaigns most nations within the EU and the US are presently involved in.

EU-TTIP: Meet the Corporations Lobbying Hardest for TTIP and the End of Democracy - by Graham Vanbergen

It is quite incredible that the unelected bureaucrats of the EU Commission are even entertaining such an idea as the deeply unpopular TTIP trade deal amid huge citizen protest whilst already facing multiple episodes of social, political and economic unrest and crisis as the demise of the European project gathers pace.

TTIP: A secret and bad deal

The EU is experiencing extensive political threats and upheaval from left and right of centre political groups angry at EU imposed austerity. Greece is being raped by its so-called partners and it is just one of several other EU states en-route to ruin.

The declining global economic picture provides all the more reason for the corporations to look for new avenues of revenue. But which businesses are pushing most for the proposed EU-US trade deal TTIP? And who is really influencing EU negotiators? And just how are the rights of European citizens represented in the biggest trade deal in history?

Just in Brussels alone, there are now over 30,000 corporate lobbyists, shadowy agitators as The Guardian puts it, who are responsible for influencing three quarters of legislation in the EU. But even they are left in the shade when it comes to the power being afforded to corporations in the TTIP negotiations.

The US Chamber of Commerce, the wealthiest of all US corporate lobbies, and DigitalEurope (whose members include all the big IT names, like Apple, Blackberry, IBM, and Microsoft) are there.
BusinessEurope, the European employers’ federation and one of the most powerful lobby groups in the EU are there.

Transatlantic Business Council, a corporate lobby group representing over 70 EU and US-based multinationals. ACEA, the car lobby (working for BMW, Ford, Renault, and others) and CEFIC, the Chemical Industry Council (lobbying for BASF, Bayer, Dow, and the like) are all there.

European Services Forum, a lobby outfit banding together large services companies and federations such as Deutsche Bank, Telefónica, and TheCityUK, representing the UK’s banking industry are there as are Europe’s largest pharmaceutical industry association (representing some of the biggest and most powerful pharma companies in the world such as GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, Eli Lilly, Astra Zeneca, Novartis, Sanofi, and Roche).

FoodDrinkEurope, the biggest food industry lobby group (representing multinationals like Nestlé, Coca Cola, and Unilever) are sitting at the negotiating table as well.

However, 20% of all corporates lobbying the EU trade department are not listed on the EU’s transparency register. This amounts to 80 organisations. Industry associations such as the world’s largest biotechnology lobby BIO, US pharmaceutical lobby group PhrMA, and the American Chemical Council are lobbying in the shadows.

More than one third of all US companies and industry associations which have lobbied on TTIP (37 out of 91) are not in the EU register. Even Levi Jeans lurks in this murky group unwilling to publicly identify themselves.

The EU Commission even decided in its wisdom that its ‘transparency’ register was not mandatory or the issues being lobbied on do not require admission in any way. Hardly transparent.

The United States has achieved most of the privately held meetings behind closed doors. They represent the top ten of biggest spenders of all lobbyists. ExxonMobil, Microsoft, Dow, Google, and General Electric all spend more than €3 million per year on lobbying the EU institutions.

Big pharmaceutical organisations have stepped up their lobbying for TTIP and this is particularly worrying.

The pharmaceutical sector is pushing for a TTIP agenda with potentially severe implications for access to medicines and public health. Longer monopolies through strengthened intellectual property rules and limits on price-controlling policies in TTIP could drive up prices for medicines and costs for national health systems. Misery and death in exchange for profit.

The banking sector have lobbied hard for financial regulations that they would like to see scrapped via TTIP.

From US rules on capital reserves (which require companies to keep aside a proportion of capital available to avoid risk of collapse or bailout), to regulations on too-big-to-fail foreign banks. Big finance on both sides of the Atlantic is also lobbying for a dedicated TTIP chapter on financial regulation, which could lead to the delay, watering down, or outright block of much needed reform and control of the financial sector necessary to avoid another financial meltdown. Where is the sense in that?
 
When European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström took office in November 2014 she promised a “fresh start” for the TTIP negotiations, including more civil society involvement and listening to public concerns as her “top priority”. Lets not forget that the EU Commission undertook the largest ever survey of the EU bloc on the subject in 2014 and garnered 150,000 responses, more than 100 times more than any previous consultation on trade — and admitted that the majority of respondents expressed fears that the deal’s investment clauses would undermine national sovereignty. What the Commission did not say was of that 150,000, 97% were opposed to TTIP.

In the first six months since Malmström took office, she, her Cabinet and the director general of the EU trade department had 121 one-on-one lobby meetings behind closed doors in which TTIP was discussed. No less than 83% of these declared meetings were with business lobbyists – but only 16.7% were held with public interest groups.

The fact that Malmström and her team seem to primarily deal with the arguments of business representatives raises serious concerns that industry lobbyists continue to dominate the agenda of the TTIP talks and crowd out citizens’ interests. It is noteworthy that in ameeting with French employer’s federation (MEDEF) on 26 March 2015, for example, the EU trade department was warned that “the 19 million European SMEs which do not export will face increased competition” from TTIP.

To fully gauge who is being listened to one only has to read that of 597 closed-door TTIP meetings in the period 2102-14, only 53 or 9% were represented by public interest groups. And nothing has improved.

A small example of corporations over people, came about in 2012 when the trade department within the EU specifically contacted the crop pesticides industry who were actively encouraged to “identify opportunities of closer cooperation.” The response was that CropLife America demanded “significant harmonisation” for pesticide residues in food. Trade unions, environmentalists, and consumer groups did not receive such special invites.

Likewise, The Association of Automotive Suppliers (CLEPA), got an email from the EU Trade department thanking “you for your readiness to work with us”, and offering a meeting, “to discuss about your proposal, ask for clarification and consider next steps”. Again, public interest groups did not receive this special treatment.

Another example of the formidable alliance between EU negotiators and the corporate sector are the two most powerful lobby groups invited to ‘co-write’ TTIP regulations by the EU trade department. Another is the enthusiasm in the financial lobby community for the EU’s approach on financial regulation in TTIP. When the EU’s position on the issue was leaked in early 2014, Richard Normington, Senior Manager of the Policy and Public Affairs team at TheCityUK – a key British financial lobby group – applauded the Commission’s proposals, because it “reflected so closely the approach of TheCityUK that a bystander would have thought it came straight out of our brochure on TTIP”.

The largest single petition in history was against Monsanto with a staggering 2.1 million signatures that has since been eclipsed by the petition StopTTIP that has garnered 3.3 million signatures. But this single petition is massively overshadowed by the millions involved in protests groups all over Europe. The goal is to arrest the corporate coups d’état of Europe currently being facilitated by people like David Cameron, Cecilia Malmström and Barack Obama.

For Britain, in the firing line of that take-over by corporations is the NHS, food and environmental safety, regulations to stop an out-of-control banking industry, privacy, security and jobs to name just a few. Most importantly, our hard fought for democracy is not just undermined – it’s for sale to the highest bidder.

It is quite incredible that the unelected bureaucrats of the EU Commission are even entertaining such an idea as the deeply unpopular TTIP trade deal amid huge citizen protest whilst already facing multiple episodes of social, political and economic unrest and crisis as the demise of the European project gathers pace.

The EU is experiencing extensive political threats and upheaval from left and right of centre political groups angry at EU imposed austerity. Greece is being raped by its so-called partners and it is just one of several other EU states en-route to ruin.

The declining global economic picture provides all the more reason for the corporations to look for new avenues of revenue. But which businesses are pushing most for the proposed EU-US trade deal TTIP? And who is really influencing EU negotiators? And just how are the rights of European citizens represented in the biggest trade deal in history?

Just in Brussels alone, there are now over 30,000 corporate lobbyists, shadowy agitators as The Guardian puts it, who are responsible for influencing three quarters of legislation in the EU. But even they are left in the shade when it comes to the power being afforded to corporations in the TTIP negotiations.

The US Chamber of Commerce, the wealthiest of all US corporate lobbies, and DigitalEurope (whose members include all the big IT names, like Apple, Blackberry, IBM, and Microsoft) are there.
BusinessEurope, the European employers’ federation and one of the most powerful lobby groups in the EU are there.

Transatlantic Business Council, a corporate lobby group representing over 70 EU and US-based multinationals. ACEA, the car lobby (working for BMW, Ford, Renault, and others) and CEFIC, the Chemical Industry Council (lobbying for BASF, Bayer, Dow, and the like) are all there.

European Services Forum, a lobby outfit banding together large services companies and federations such as Deutsche Bank, Telefónica, and TheCityUK, representing the UK’s banking industry are there as are Europe’s largest pharmaceutical industry association (representing some of the biggest and most powerful pharma companies in the world such as GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, Eli Lilly, Astra Zeneca, Novartis, Sanofi, and Roche).

FoodDrinkEurope, the biggest food industry lobby group (representing multinationals like Nestlé, Coca Cola, and Unilever) are sitting at the negotiating table as well.

However, 20% of all corporates lobbying the EU trade department are not listed on the EU’s transparency register. This amounts to 80 organisations. Industry associations such as the world’s largest biotechnology lobby BIO, US pharmaceutical lobby group PhrMA, and the American Chemical Council are lobbying in the shadows. More than one third of all US companies and industry associations which have lobbied on TTIP (37 out of 91) are not in the EU register. Even Levi Jeans lurks in this murky group unwilling to publicly identify themselves.

The EU Commission even decided in its wisdom that its ‘transparency’ register was not mandatory or the issues being lobbied on do not require admission in any way. Hardly transparent.

The United States has achieved most of the privately held meetings behind closed doors. They represent the top ten of biggest spenders of all lobbyists. ExxonMobil, Microsoft, Dow, Google, and General Electric all spend more than €3 million per year on lobbying the EU institutions.

Big pharmaceutical organisations have stepped up their lobbying for TTIP and this is particularly worrying. The pharmaceutical sector is pushing for a TTIP agenda with potentially severe implications for access to medicines and public health. Longer monopolies through strengthened intellectual property rules and limits on price-controlling policies in TTIP could drive up prices for medicines and costs for national health systems. Misery and death in exchange for profit.

The banking sector have lobbied hard for financial regulations that they would like to see scrapped via TTIP. From US rules on capital reserves (which require companies to keep aside a proportion of capital available to avoid risk of collapse or bailout), to regulations on too-big-to-fail foreign banks. Big finance on both sides of the Atlantic is also lobbying for a dedicated TTIP chapter on financial regulation, which could lead to the delay, watering down, or outright block of much needed reform and control of the financial sector necessary to avoid another financial meltdown. Where is the sense in that?

When European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström took office in November 2014 she promised a “fresh start” for the TTIP negotiations, including more civil society involvement and listening to public concerns as her “top priority”. Lets not forget that the EU Commission undertook the largest ever survey of the EU bloc on the subject in 2014 and garnered 150,000 responses, more than 100 times more than any previous consultation on trade — and admitted that the majority of respondents expressed fears that the deal’s investment clauses would undermine national sovereignty. What the Commission did not say was of that 150,000, 97% were opposed to TTIP.

In the first six months since Malmström took office, she, her Cabinet and the director general of the EU trade department had 121 one-on-one lobby meetings behind closed doors in which TTIP was discussed. No less than 83% of these declared meetings were with business lobbyists – but only 16.7% were held with public interest groups.

The fact that Malmström and her team seem to primarily deal with the arguments of business representatives raises serious concerns that industry lobbyists continue to dominate the agenda of the TTIP talks and crowd out citizens’ interests. It is noteworthy that in ameeting with French employer’s federation (MEDEF) on 26 March 2015, for example, the EU trade department was warned that “the 19 million European SMEs which do not export will face increased competition” from TTIP.

To fully gauge who is being listened to one only has to read that of 597 closed-door TTIP meetings in the period 2102-14, only 53 or 9% were represented by public interest groups. And nothing has improved.
A small example of corporations over people, came about in 2012 when the trade department within the EU specifically contacted the crop pesticides industry who were actively encouraged to “identify opportunities of closer cooperation.” The response was that CropLife America demanded “significant harmonisation” for pesticide residues in food. Trade unions, environmentalists, and consumer groups did not receive such special invites.

Likewise, The Association of Automotive Suppliers (CLEPA), got an email from the EU Trade department thanking “you for your readiness to work with us”, and offering a meeting, “to discuss about your proposal, ask for clarification and consider next steps”. Again, public interest groups did not receive this special treatment.

Another example of the formidable alliance between EU negotiators and the corporate sector are the two most powerful lobby groups invited to ‘co-write’ TTIP regulations by the EU trade department. Another is the enthusiasm in the financial lobby community for the EU’s approach on financial regulation in TTIP. When the EU’s position on the issue was leaked in early 2014, Richard Normington, Senior Manager of the Policy and Public Affairs team at TheCityUK – a key British financial lobby group – applauded the Commission’s proposals, because it “reflected so closely the approach of TheCityUK that a bystander would have thought it came straight out of our brochure on TTIP”.

The largest single petition in history was against Monsanto with a staggering 2.1 million signatures that has since been eclipsed by the petition StopTTIP that has garnered 3.3 million signatures. But this single petition is massively overshadowed by the millions involved in protests groups all over Europe. The goal is to arrest the corporate coups d’état of Europe currently being facilitated by people like David Cameron, Cecilia Malmström and Barack Obama.

For Britain, in the firing line of that take-over by corporations is the NHS, food and environmental safety, regulations to stop an out-of-control banking industry, privacy, security and jobs to name just a few. Most importantly, our hard fought for democracy is not just undermined – it’s for sale to the highest bidder.

Read more: Meet the Corporations Lobbying Hardest for TTIP and the End of Democracy : Waking Times

Dutch love democracy, dislike politics - by Graeme Kidd

Roughly 93 percent of the Netherlands thinks that democracy is the best possible form of government, and 95 percent think it is important to live in a democratically governed nation, a new survey from the Netherlands Institute for Social Research (SCP) revealed. Released on Friday, the report also found that 73 percent of people living in the country have a negative view of politics there.

“The main reasons put forward for dissatisfaction were that politicians do not listen and simply do what they want, that citizens have too little say and that politicians talk too much and act too little; or else they were dissatisfied with current policy at the time of the survey,” the research noted. Citizens are wanting to have a greater say through more public debate and the collection of public opinion information about democracy itself.

The SCP quoted one 30-year-old man as saying, “Generally Democracy as a state form works well, it is unfortunately the politicians that make a mess of it.”

Some 22 percent support more direct democracy where people vote on many referenda as oppose to representative politics, with 45 percent wanting to vote on a selection of referenda chosen by elected representatives. “This would seem to suggest that at least a proportion of the Dutch public see direct democracy mainly as a way of adding to or improving representative democracy rather than as an alternative to it,” the report noted.

The research was carried out by Dr. Diana den Ridder and Prof. Paul Dekker, and published under the title, “More Democracy, Less Politics?” The report was commissioned by the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relation to gauge the perception of the Dutch public into democracy and politics.

They also found that while people in the Netherlands deeply value equal treatment by the courts, opinion is divided about whether or not that exists. At the same time, 90 percent value both a free press and freedom to oppose government, with 70 percent saying they are satisfied with both.

Read more: Dutch love democracy, dislike politics - NL Times

Saudi Arabia: 10 Reasons the EU should Oppose the Saudi Monarchy - by Medea Benjamin

During the discussion on the Iran nuclear deal, it has been strange to hear US politicians fiercely condemn Iranian human rights abuses while remaining silent about worse abuses by US ally Saudi Arabia. Not only is the Saudi regime repressive at home and abroad, but US weapons and US support for the regime make Americans complicit. So let's look at the regime the US government counts as its close friend.

1. Saudi Arabia is governed as an absolutist monarchy by a huge clan, the Saud family, and the throne passes from one king to another.The Cabinet is appointed by the king, and its policies have to be ratified by royal decree. Political parties are forbidden and there are no national elections.

2. Criticizing the monarchy, or defending human rights, can bring down severe and cruel punishments in addition to imprisonment. Ali al-Nimr was targeted and arrested at the age of 17 for protesting government corruption, and his since been sentenced to beheading and public crucifixion. Raif Badawi was sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes for writing a blog the government considered critical of its rule. Waleed Abulkhair is serving a 15-year sentence for his work as a human right attorney. New legislation effectively equates criticism of the government and other peaceful activities with terrorism.

The government tightly controls the domestic press, banning journalists and editors who publish articles deemed offensive to the religious establishment or the ruling authorities. Over 400,000 websites that are considered immoral or politically sensitive are blocked. A January 2011 law requires all blogs and websites, or anyone posting news or commentary online, to have a license from the Ministry of Information or face fines and/or the closure of the website..

3. Saudi Arabia has one of the highest execution rates in the world, killing scores of people each year for a range of offenses including adultery, apostasy, drug use and sorcery. The government has conducted over 100 beheadings this year alone, often in public squares.

4. Saudi women are second-class citizens. The religious police enforce a policy of gender segregation and often harass women, using physical punishment to enforce a strict dress code. Women need the approval of a male guardian to marry, travel, enroll in a university, or obtain a passport and they're prohibited from driving. According to interpretations of Sharia law, daughters generally receive half the inheritance awarded to their brothers, and the testimony of one man is equal to that of two women.

5. There is no freedom of religious. Islam is the official religion, and all Saudis are required by law to be Muslims. The government prohibits the public practice of any religion other than Islam and restricts the religious practices of the Shiite and Sufi Muslim minority sects. Although the government recognizes the right of non-Muslims to worship in private, it does not always respect this right in practice. The building of Shiite mosques is banned.


6. The Saudis export an extremist interpretation of Islam, Wahhabism, around the globe. Over the past three decades, Saudi Arabia spent $4 billion per year on mosques, madrassas, preachers, students, and textbooks to spread Wahhabism and anti-Western sentiment. Let's not forget that 15 of the 19 fanatical hijackers who carried out the 9/11 attacks were Saudis, as well as Osama bin Laden himself.

7. The country is built and runs thanks to foreigner laborers, but the more than six million foreign workers have virtually no legal protections. Coming from poor countries, many are lured to the kingdom under false pretenses and forced to endure dangerous working and living conditions. Female migrants employed in Saudi homes as domestic workers report regular physical, sexual, and emotional abuse.

8. The Saudis are funding terrorism worldwide. A Wikileaks-revealed 2009 cable quotes then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saying "Donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide....More needs to be done since Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Lashkar e-Tayyiba and other terrorist groups." In Syria the Saudis are supporting the most extreme sectarian forces and the thousands of volunteers who rally to their call. And while the Saudi government condemns ISIS, many experts, including 9/11 Commission Report lead author Bob Graham, believe that ISIL is a product of Saudi ideals, Saudi money and Saudi organizational support.

9. The Saudis have used their massive military apparatus to invade neighboring countries and quash democratic uprisings. In 2011, the Saudi military (using US tanks) rolled into neighboring Bahrain and brutally crushed that nation's budding pro-democracy movement. In 2015, the Saudis intervened in an internal conflict in Yemen, with a horrific bombing campaign (using American-made cluster munitions and F-15 fighter jets) that has killed and injured thousands of civilias. The conflict has created a severe humanitarian crisis affecting 80 percent of the Yemeni people.

10. The Saudis backed a coup in Egypt that killed over 1,000 people and saw over 40,000 political dissidents thrown into squalid prisons. While human rights activists the world over where condemning the brutal regime of Al Sisi, the Saudi government offered $5 billion to prop up the Egyptian coup leader.

The cozy US relationship with the Saudis has to do with oil, weapons sales and joint opposition to Iran. But with extremism spreading through the globe, a reduced US need for Saudi oil, and a thawing of US relations with Iran, now is the time to start calling for the US government to sever its ties with the Saudi monarchs.

Read more: 10 Reasonsthe EU  should Oppose the Saudi Monarchy | Medea Benjami

USA - Democracy on the rocks? The Super Rich Have a New Way to Buy Elections - by Robert Faturechi and Jonathan Stray

US Super PAC's

Super PACs bankrolled by a single donor quadrupled their share in the US of overall fundraising in 2014. And there’s no sign of letup in ’16.

The wealthiest Americans can fly on their own jets, live in gated compounds and watch movies in their own theaters.

More of them also are walling off their political contributions from other big and small players.

A growing number of political committees known as super PACs have become instruments of single donors, according to a ProPublica analysis of federal records. During the 2014 election cycle, $113 million—16 percent of money raised by all super PACs—went to committees dominated by one donor.

That was quadruple their 2012 share.

The rise of single-donor groups is a new example of how changes in campaign finance law are giving outsized influence to a handful of funders.

The trend may continue into 2016. National Review recently reported that Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s bid for the Republican presidential nomination would be boosted not by one anointed super PAC but four, each controlled by a single donor or donor family.

The Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling helped usher in the era of super PACs. Unlike traditional political action committees, the independent groups can accept donations of any dollar size as long as they don’t coordinate with the campaign of any candidate.

The Super Rich Have a New Way to Buy Elections - The Daily Beast

EU Parliament: More than 30,000 lobbyists and counting: Brussels under corporate siege

When the Polish MEP Róża Thun was elected five years ago, she thought the job would be fairly straightforward. She hadn't reckoned with the lobbyists.

Take mobile phone charges. She saw the fact that EU citizens pay eye-watering sums in other EU states as an anomaly that needed fixing. But it wasn't that simple. "We had telephone companies and lobbyists who started to invade us," she recalls. "They obviously didn't want to reduce roaming charges because it would hit them in the pocket."

To stroll around the vast, ugly and permanent building site that is Brussels' European district is to brush up against the power of the lobbies. Every office block, every glass and steel construction within a kilometre of the EU Commission council and parliament is peopled by some of the globe's biggest corporate names.

Thousands of companies, banks, law firms, PR consultancies and trade associations are there to bend ears and influence the regulations and laws that shape Europe's single market, fix trade deals, and govern economic and commercial behaviour in the European Union of 507 million people.

Lobbying is a billion-euro industry in Brussels. According to Corporate Europe Observatory, a watchdog campaigning for greater transparency, there are at least 30,000 lobbyists in Brussels, nearly matching the 31,000 staff employed by the European commission and making it second only to Washington in the concentration of those seeking to affect legislation. Lobbyists sign a transparency register run by the parliament and the commission, though it is not mandatory.

By some estimates, they influence 75% of legislation. In principle, lobbyists give politicians information and arguments during the decision-making process. In practice, the corridors of the parliament often teem with individuals, who meet MEPs in their offices or in open spaces such as the "Mickey Mouse bar" (nicknamed so because of the shape of its seats) inside the parliament.

They explain their concerns, provide a "position paper", and send in suggestions for amendments to legislative proposals. Of course, the final decision is taken by MEPs. But examples are legion of the tail wagging the dog.

Lobbying is such a crucial part of the climate in Brussels that it has spawned manuals, a documentary (Who Really Runs the EU?) and even "the worst lobby awards". Not surprisingly, the biggest movers and shakers agitate for the biggest industries with the most to gain – and lose – from European legislation.

Basically, if you are in Bruxelles or Washington - the lobbyists have taken over and politics have not much to do with Democracy anymore.

EU-Digest