Tag Archives: Gaffe-o-Meter

Does Topolánek have no shame?

Sorry to go on about the Czechs again, but they provide so much ammunition. Topolánek: your government has just fallen in the middle of the EU Presidency, the very same Presidency that has already stumbled from gaffe to gaffe, and then you make an all out attack on the President of the United States? As reported by the BBC:

He attacked the US’s growing budget deficit and the “Buy America” campaign, saying “all of these steps, these combinations and permanency is the way to hell”.

Now the Buy America stuff might be nationalistic and protectionist, and indeed the Czech government has spoken out against the economic nationalism of France. But to state that the US policy is a way to hell? I think the guy could have chosen his words more carefully.

It’s also interesting to keep an eye on how this comment by Topolánek is covered (or not) by ‘EU can do no right’ bloggers such as Daniel Hannan, England Expects and Bruno Waterfield. Let’s not forget that Topolánek’s ODS party is a likely partner for the Tories in a new political group in the EP after the elections, and pro-Americanism is often the flip-side to euroscepticism among UK Tories, UKIP voters, and readers of the Daily Telegraph. However the fiscal stimulus proposed by the Obama administration is the very sort of neo-Keynsianism that those very same groups find abhorrent…

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Are the Czechs heading for the worst Presidency ever?

Mirek-Martian - CC / Flickr

Mirek-Martian - CC / Flickr

Euractiv is today reporting that the Czech government might be on its last legs, with 2 rebel MPs threatening to bring down Mirek Topolánek’s administration. One of the rebels, Vlastimil Tlusty, said the government had made errors and it was time for it to quit. Not sure if he means at EU level, but what happens to a Presidency if the government falls in the middle of the 6 month period?

The Euractiv article claims the government would stumble on in an administrative capacity until the end of the Presidency (so much for Vaclav Klaus stating how he values parliamentary democracy in his EP speech – irony?) If that were to happen the Topolánek would be even more of a lame duck than currently. The only time a government has fallen during a Presidency was in 1994(?) 1996 (see the bottom of this article from Euractiv) when the Italian government collapsed – that was well before my time in EU affairs. If any of my readers know what happened there perhaps they could be so kind as to add comments? In any case the Czech Presidency is going to be one of the worst in recent times.

gaffe-o-meter-2s1In that vein Topolánek has added a new gaffe to the gaffe-o-meter – when asked why there were no women on a panel at the end of the European Council meeting last week in Brussels he replied “Were you expecting martians?” So much for 2009 being the year that the EU raises awareness of gender issues.

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Topolanek on the Treaty of Lisbon (Czech Gaffe-o-Meter score: 2)

gaffe-o-meter-2s1As reported by the Irish Times:

[...] all eyes were on the new president of the European Council, Czech prime minister Mirek Topolanek. Outlining his priorities for the next six months, he surprised MEPs by announcing that if a referendum were held on the Lisbon Treaty in the Czech Republic, the Czechs would reject it like the Irish.

He described the treaty as average and “somewhat worse than the Nice Treaty”

What is Topolanek on about? While what he might say about the Czechs and a referendum might be true, but is he deliberately setting out to damage the prospects of a Yes in Ireland? As for the statement that the Treaty of Lisbon is somewhat worse than Nice – that’s just daft from a politician whose party has helped its passage through the Czech Parliament.

Apologies it’s taken me so long to notice this – rather hidden by all the art exhibition stuff.

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Introducing the Czech Presidency Gaffe-o-Meter

The dreadful errors made by the Czech Presidency of the European Union go on and on… They don’t know who’s who in the Kremlin, they think Israel is defensive, and now they’ve caused all kinds of fuss by hanging art in the Justus Lipsius building in Brussels that depicts national stereotypes about the EU Member States. Germany looks like it has a deconstructed swastika on it, and the Bulgarians are annoyed that their ‘symbol’ is a toilet. This is the Presidency PR about the installation, and this is how the BBC covers it and there are more photos here.

Anyway, as the Czech Presidency seems to have mede plenty of gaffes already, and we’re only 2 weeks into their 6 month stint in the chair, I thought I would make a small toolkit for EU bloggers – the Czech Presidency Gaffe-o-Meter, based on the idea of the Joe Biden Gaffe-o-Meter from the US elections. The idea is simple: when the Czech Presidency does something silly, you give the gaffe a score – 1 if it’s just stupid, 2 if it’s damaging, and 3 if it’s totally unacceptable. You can download all of the images (inc. Praise-o-Meter), including a layered Photoshop file, here (8mb). The image is adapted from Czech street art of Vaclav Klaus from Flickr, creative commons attribution license.

Anyway, the art exhibition gets a big 3 on the Gaffe-o-Meter!

gaffe-o-meter-3l

[UPDATE]
As a result of a comment from Ivava I’ve amended the Gaffe-o-Meter to also include a ‘Praise-o-Meter’ – a positive one to three score that can be used in the case that the Presidency does something good. Frankly I don’t expect to use the Praise-o-Meter graphics very much but we’ll see. Graphics, as before, are available for download.

praise-o-meter-1spraise-o-meter-2spraise-o-meter-3s

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