-- JAROSŁAW KACZYŃSKI TURNS 70 TODAY. In the evening, he will participate in a mass at Wawel Cathedral in prayer for the 70th birthday of the late President Lech Kaczyński. -- SASIN AND KARCZEWSKI ON THE PROGRAM FOR THE NEXT TERM, WHICH PIS WILL ANNOUNCE IN KATOWICE: https://300polityka.pl/live/2019/06/18/ -- KACZYŃSKI AND MORAWIECKI COMPLEMENT EACH OTHER - KRZYSZTOF ŁAPIŃSKI IN CONVERSATION WITH AGATA KONDZIŃSKA IN GW: “The gentlemen complement each other. On one hand, there is President Kaczyński, who makes specific electoral promises, and on the other, the Prime Minister, who fulfills these promises and guarantees that there will be funds in the budget for them. Let’s remember that the dynamics of a campaign can be unpredictable. We must also remember that PiS will no longer have individuals on its lists who were locomotives and achieved record results.” -- PIS HAS STARTED WINNING IN THE WEST - CONTINUES ŁAPIŃSKI: “The opposition in these elections had poorer social listening; they did not feel the emotions and needs of society. If we look at the post-election map of Poland at the municipal level, PiS won not only in its traditional strongholds but also managed to win in the west of Poland. Just ten years ago, PiS won in three eastern voivodeships, Małopolska, perhaps Świętokrzyskie, but today it also includes: Śląskie, Łódzkie, Mazowieckie, and Warmińsko-Mazurskie. Wyborcza's 'Sonar' very well showed, using the example of the Wałcz municipality, how PiS is strengthening its position step by step in rural communes. Each subsequent election brings new voters.” – THE OPPOSITION MUST DO THE WORK THAT PIS ONCE DID - CONTINUES ŁAPIŃSKI IN GW: “Moreover, it is now more preoccupied with itself than with the elections, and still doesn't know what configurations it will go into this autumn. Time is running out, and on the other side, PiS is on a roll. If the opposition wants to compete, it must do the work that PiS once did: get out of its media bubbles, illusions, and prejudices, listen to what people want from the government, what their needs are, and what their problems are.” http://wyborcza.pl/7,75968,24910537,lapinski-wynik-jesiennych-wyborow-nie-jest-przesadzony.html -- A MILLION VOTERS WITHIN REACH - ADAM SZŁAPKA IN CONVERSATION WITH PIOTR PACEWICZ IN OKO: “We need to shake ourselves off, roll up our sleeves, and get to work seriously. Well over a million of our voters, who did not vote and were just short of matching PiS, are within reach. We just need to reach every voter in every Polish commune.” -- NONE OF US WILL GIVE UP - CONTINUES SZŁAPKA: “We have learned our lessons from the European elections. I can promise that in the upcoming election campaign, none of us will give up. Krzysztof Brejza certainly won't, and he is known for never giving up. But we have an entire generation of younger politicians in age and spirit, both in .Nowoczesna and in Platforma. Polish local government officials are also like that, and they know well how to win. We have too much to lose. We will not give up the Poland of our dreams. We will reach out to everyone who has doubts whether PiS is fulfilling all its promises, whether it is credible. It will be hard work, but we have the strength and determination.” -- WE NEED TO DO TEN TIMES MORE WORK THAN THEY DO - CONTINUES SZŁAPKA IN OKO: “We realize that they are not playing fair, that they talk among themselves about public television as their battleship, whose barrage is intended to destroy the opposition. The only response is mobilization. We must do ten times more work than they do.” https://oko.press/szlapka-pis-generuje-glupie-strachy-i-daje-na-nie-tanie-odpowiedzi-trzeba-sie-otrzepac-wziac-do-roboty/ -- RUMORS OF TUSK'S END ARE EXAGGERATED - MICHAŁ SZUŁDRZYŃSKI IN RZ: “Monday's interrogation should therefore be a warning for PiS. For now, the President of the European Council is keeping a foot in the door regarding his declaration to run in next year's presidential elections, and wants to keep all options open. His activity so far – speeches on May 3rd and June 4th – did not prove to be a turning point in the campaign. On the contrary, the event in early May, when Leszek Jażdżewski’s aggressively anti-clerical speech preceded Tusk’s lecture, harmed the opposition more than it helped. However, the course of the parliamentary interrogation showed that the former prime minister can still cause considerable disruption in Polish politics. And that is not good news for PiS.” https://www.rp.pl/Komentarze/190619466-Szuldrzynski-Przesadzone-pogloski-o-koncu-Tuska.html -- TUSK'S RHETORIC AND PR DESTROYED THE PLATFORM - JACEK KARNOWSKI: “All of Tusk's abilities, his skills in obscuring the essence of matters, in dismissing everything with a glib remark or a bon mot, were a drug that gave a 'kick' but simultaneously, for a long time unnoticed, destroyed the organism of the entire formation. Above all, it killed credibility, unlearned real work, numbed it to signals coming from below, and confined it to artificial bubbles. Tusk gave the opposition two terms of unchallenged rule, but he also brought upon it all its current misfortunes. Misfortunes that may mean 4 years in opposition, may mean 8 years without power, but may also mean its end in the form we know. This is probably how it all had to unfold; there was no other way. It’s a miracle in itself that we have managed to crawl out of this as a country. It could have lasted much, much longer.” https://wpolityce.pl/m/polityka/451314-to-retoryczna-i-pr-owa-sprawnosc-tuska-zniszczyla-platforme -- EVERYONE IS BORED WITH THIS FARCE - PAWEŁ WROŃSKI in GW: “Everyone is getting bored with this farce. The PiS electorate is unlikely to be mobilized by interrogations before the commission anymore. Unfortunately, we also considered the parliamentary investigative commission, this mockery of democracy and parliamentarism, as 'normal,' just like the wandering trains.” http://wyborcza.pl/7,75398,24911621,przesluchanie-tuska-poslowie-pis-jada-w-pole.html -- TUSK'S INTERROGATIONS ARE MEANT TO DISCOURAGE THE UNDECIDED - JOANNA SOLSKA: “Interrogations before the parliamentary investigative commission are not addressed to people trying to understand the specifics of tax fraud, but to voters. Their purpose is clear – to discourage the undecided from voting for those who did not give 500+ [child benefit], because they allowed fraudsters to take that money.” https://www.polityka.pl/tygodnikpolityka/kraj/1797098,1,tusk-przed-komisja-czyli-polityczne-zapotrzebowanie-na-afere.read?src=mt -- AGATON KOZIŃSKI ON OBFUSCATING TUSK: “PiS is trying to do exactly the same with Donald Tusk. For three years, they have been making every effort to make the former prime minister less distinct, more blurred as a politician. Monday's interrogation of Tusk before the parliamentary commission on VAT fraud was another installment of this process.” -- TUSK VIGILANT AS A DRAGONFLY - CONTINUES KOZIŃSKI: “Tusk, as is his custom, tried to remain calm, but at the same time was as vigilant as a dragonfly – as soon as he noticed even a small opportunity to strike with words, he immediately took advantage of it.” -- PIS ENSURES TUSK CONSTANTLY HAS TO EXPLAIN HIMSELF - CONTINUES KOZIŃSKI: “This is not about Monday's interrogation, but about the broader context. Ever since PiS has been in power, it has consistently ensured that Tusk has to explain himself, that he has to fend off accusations, that something is always trailing behind him. Sometimes it is less effective, sometimes more so – but it consistently sticks to the chosen strategy.” https://opinie.wp.pl/kozinski-dekonstruujac-tuska-pis-rozbraja-polityczny-mit-bylego-premiera-opinia-6392990738855553a -- ADAM SZOSTKIEWICZ ON THE NAIVETY OF SYMMETRISTS: “So we have such a division: for some, led by the current authorities and their supporters, nothing is happening. It's ordinary democracy, elections are coming, the opposition is hysterical. But what if it's not hysteria, but a cold diagnosis? What if the fragmentation of the opposition paves the way for PiS to achieve its goal, namely a one-party state, a PRL a rebours, national-Catholic in form, authoritarian in content? What will the 'symetrists,' the radical left, the agrarians, the rational conservatives say then? All those who know well what Kaczyński's goal is, and yet refuse to cooperate with the main opposition force?” https://szostkiewicz.blog.polityka.pl/2019/06/16/gra-w-bloki-wypisy-ostrzegawcze/ -- KUKIZ IS FALLING APART - AGATA KONDZIŃSKA IN GW: “The atmosphere in the Kukiz’15 club is not the best. – I guess no one will spend their own money on the campaign anymore, because there isn't even confidence that we will manage to collect signatures for the electoral lists. The moods are dire, there is no contact with Paweł. He said we'll find out what's next in July – says one of the MPs. But some scoff at Terlecki's words: – Are any names known? Or are they only talking about Rzymkowski again, because he's constantly in the spotlight in the context of transfers?” http://wyborcza.pl/7,75398,24910950,kukiz-15-sie-rozsypuje-pis-jeszcze-nie-zdecydowalismy-czy.html -- ŁUKASZ PAWŁOWSKI WRITES IN KL THAT PETRU MIGHT BE RIGHT THAT THERE IS ROOM FOR LIBERALS: “In the current conditions, if indeed – as the head of the government's Centre for Strategic Analyses believes – Poles show reluctance towards the growing influence of state authorities, then the opposition should emphasize that its rule will be based primarily on trust in citizens and granting them maximum freedom of action. With the reservation, however, that for citizens to have peace in their private lives, the state should provide them with basic services – from efficient healthcare, through a decent educational system, to clean air and access to water. Because the party currently in power has not seriously grappled with these challenges at all. In other words, much suggests that, despite the mockery of opponents, Ryszard Petru might have been right in this one statement. Indeed, Poland needs a 'modern liberal party' – even if it doesn't want to call itself that. Copying PiS's program (and under the guise of 'anti-PiS'!) is no recipe for success, as the European elections clearly showed. The problem is that the path from diagnosis to implementing the idea is still long. The short political history of Petru himself is the best proof of this.” https://kulturaliberalna.pl/2019/06/18/pawlowski-pis-liberalizm-waldemar-paruch/ -- BIRTHDAYS: Jan Rokita, Piotr Niemczyk, Cezary Przybylski, Katarzyna Jachowicz, Natalia Wykrota, Sylwia Pusz.