Irish privacy regulator picks ex-Meta lobbyist as third commissioner
euractiv.com
euractiv.com
Despicable behavior, Ireland should be considered similar to Hungary in their obstruction of EU laws at the cost of everyone else.
Now on this topic here, this story is as old as time, with big-corpo and government regulators being just different elements of the same revolving door, yet somehow it's not considered corruption because you can't prove it in court. So what's the solution here?
I don't want Ireland kicked out of the EU, and that isn't even legally possible to begin with, but I also don't want a member state enjoying EU benefits while sabotaging the other members States for personal gain, even if that wouldn't be the first and last time an EU country engages in self centered activities at the expense of everyone else.
Agree on Von der Leyen also masquerading as a democratically elected politician, when in reality she was just slotted into place by German politicians who wanted her so far away from the Bundestag because she was just that much incompetent.
Pretty sure he's not immortal.
> gives the same money to his cronies or to himself
So like every politician ever? I don't think the ones in my country are any better than Orban, they just have better PR.
https://www.spiegel.de/ausland/eu-wie-ungarns-agenten-in-bruessel-informanten-anzuwerben-versuchten-a-a44776c8-c8a6-4bf1-a7d1-7e92f643b748
I am so tired of these "they are all bad anyway" stances. AFAIK, Ursula van der Leyen is not actively supporting a country who invaded a EU neighbour some years ago or routinely performs assassinations on EU territory. Also, I do not think she is actively criticizing the EU whenever she has the opportunity while pocketing as much money from it as she can. Maybe we could talk about Orban stance wrt democracy and people rights.
I don't especially like Ursula van der Leyen, I think she is the usual misdirected pro-market believer the kind we had too much in EU so far. But she is not that bad.
I guess they are the same anyway.
All that said, Ireland action is bad but not that bad.
I agree van der Leyen is a corrupt, lobby friendly politician with some strange ideas (in my opinion).
But she isn't "evil" or someone who would commit treason or anything like that.
She also isn't incompetent in the way a lot of media in German loves to paint here. Actually she even seem quite competent wrt. some of the core skills of politicians. This doesn't mean I don't think a lot of here decisions are supper misguided, but that is a clash of beliefs and ideals which is not the same as incompetence.
What evidence do you have they are not all bad? I can't think of too many major high level EU leaders that people would consider to be a net positive.
>Hungary suspected of spying for Russia
Are you aware that former German and Austrian politicians are on the payroll of Russian oil and gas companies and Putin even came to the wedding s of some of them? Are you aware Austrian banks still operate in Russia profiting?
Yet I never hear anyone blaming Austrian every 5 minutes the same way they do Hungary.
Why the double standards where all the blame in on Hungary yet other EU members fly under the radar for much more pro-Russia cooperation and profiteering?
>Also, I do not think she is actively criticizing the EU whenever she has the opportunity while pocketing as much money from it as she can.
Then why did she delete her messages with Pfizer? You're right, she's not profiteering, she's just helping her puppet masters profiteer. Big difference.
A net positive compared to what? To have nobody at the head of the state and have anarchy? Or compared to the next one who wants the job?
Let's be concrete. I live in France, which currently is not going to give anyone lessons about governance. Current president is Macron. Is he evil bad, super corrupt? I do not think so. He is a bad mix of arrogance, naivety and brilliance in some domains. In the end, his run will end with average results as best, but not for lack of trying. It does not make him evil bad.
Previous one, Hollande was nice guy out of his league. Mediocre at best. But not evil or corrupt.
Previous one, Sarkozy, was brilliant and corrupt. He is going to jail next month. Still nowhere as bad as Orban on the civil rights front.
Regardless, all of them are better than having Le Pen (far right) as president. Who is already known to be corrupt populist and a Russian puppet.
I am afraid this is another of these "perfect is the enemy of the good" conversation.
Same with Van der Leyen. Fair enough she may have taken money from Pfizer and whatnot. But you are comparing that to someone who literally suggests violent action against people of his own country. I am sorry but things are not white and black.
I find it funny that most people on HN despise politicians but on the other hand are very happy to keep their cosy job for ad-tech/vc-fueled/well-paid companies instead of doing their part.
Try running for mayor of a small/medium city and see how well you respond for corruption after a few years of constant harassment.
What's worse? Suggesting violence against someone, or actions of corruption that loose taxpayers shit tones of money, which if it wasn't stolen by politicians would have gone to things like healthcare to keep people alive? If only there was a way to quantify money lost from corruption to deaths from underfunded healthcare, it would start to sink in for you, but you care more about optics than about actual harm done.
Same for Austrian and German politicians being in bed with Putin to tie Europe's energy security to Russian oil and gas but noooo, Orban is the real evil because he said hurty things.
>Fair enough she may have taken money from Pfizer and whatnot.
When massive corruption leading to deaths is just "and what not" to you, then I can't argue anymore with you. The problem isn't she taking Pfizer money, its she selling out the taxpayer's money every step of the way in her political career. Pfizer's money comes with strings attached, same for every other lobbyist.
>but on the other hand are very happy to keep their cosy job for ad-tech/vc-fueled/well-paid companies instead of doing their part.
Is that a self report? Because I don't have any of those.
Citizens elect politicians, then pay them to run a city/country as their main job, they don't have time to be a politician beyond their regular jobs that put food on their table.
Source?
> Why the double standards where all the blame in on Hungary yet other EU members fly under the radar for much more pro-Russia cooperation and profiteering?
There are no double standards. Besides Orban and Fico, there are no EU ministers or governments going to Minsk, Belarus, or Russia, to meet with Putin.
When the war started, MOL, the state-owned petrol company of Hungary, said it would take about 3 years for them to shift all their refineries to move away from Russian oil. It's 2025, and they are still heavily-dependent on Russian oil. They did nothing to end this dependence [0].
Orban settled a deal with Russia to buy gas and oil, whose terms are confidential and will probably be so for the next decades. What every Hungarian news portal reported was essentially Hungary was being scammed, as it would be much cheaper to buy the same oil/gas from the Dutch stock exchange [1].
Regarding Austrian banks, Raiffeisen was just on the news this month because they are still operating in Russia. So, no, I wouldn't say it's a double standard. Besides, the Austrian politicians are certainly not making a fuss and blocking or vetoing any decision regarding Ukraine or Russian sanctions because of that [2]. Meanwhile, we have Hungary who keeps creating excuses to apply their vetos on such decisions, and Fico, who's doing the same, because the EU (von der Leyen) showed the world anyone can blackmail the EU and get away with it.
[0] https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/worldwide-healthcare-trust...
[1] https://dailynewshungary.com/shocking-hungary-lost-hundreds-...
[2] https://insighthungary.444.hu/2023/05/19/hungary-blocks-500-...
The austrian bank is Raiffeisen. Politicians of germany like Gerhard Schröder and austria like Karin Kneissl.
also the chance that they a) don't have a sentiment about meta, b) ex-colleges they have good relations too and c) now about some internal workings is close to nothing
a) a is bad no matter if it's a positive or negative
b) is very bad, it pretty much guarantees some degree of non objective actions. Like in positions like lobbyist it's never "just bussiness" it's always about positive connections reinforced by positive interactions not "big" enough to be bribes but also not nothing. Which might be related to how they got this job.
c) is a potential even bigger problem, if the sentiment is negative this insider knowledge could be used to harm meta, which in turn gives meta munition to sue and hinder regulatory actions and for a positive sentiment they might subtle change decisions because they know how they "happen to unluckily collide with how meta does things" and similar. But they really shouldn't do that.
Worse even if the person acts perfectly neutral meta can try to fight/delay legislation just by "claiming" this person did abuse insider knowledge.
Lastly how do you know that there isn't an unofficial deal that meta will pick them up again with a superb salary after they happened to do subtly meta friendly politics.
Like don't get me wrong, the person might be cable to act neutral and there might not be any under the table agreements. It's even quite likely. But it's a pretty bad idea anyway because it stinks of corruption no matter if it actually involves corruption.
And it's not like Irland has a problem with decisions biased in benefit for big US tech they have even been sued over by the EU....
Meanwhile the socialist Syriza party were obviously former activists who were going to fight for the Greek people, and Brussels knew they won't be persuaded to follow the script...