-- TRZASKOWSKI ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL, PLATFORMA LAUNCHES 'SILENT PRESIDENT' CAMPAIGN, PLATFORMA MPS DEFEND KIDAWAS AND DEMAND APOLOGY FROM HOŁOWNIA FOR "CORPSE", KAZIK ON THE DANGER OF POWER IN ONE HAND - 300LIVE: https://300polityka.pl/live/2020/05/22/ -- THERE'S NO SUCH POVERTY NOW – WHAT ARE PEOPLE SAYING ABOUT PLATFORMA IN THE MAZOVIA COUNTRYSIDE? – A REPORT BY KACPER SULOWSKI IN GAZETA WYBORCZA STOŁECZNA: “Raspberries 8 PLN per kilo, a head of lettuce 2 PLN, cucumbers 4 PLN. At Mrs. Maria’s, who sells vegetables at the market in Maciejowice, the prices are almost half of those in Warsaw. – In the capital, you have better customers, so you can afford it, but here we often have to give vegetables on credit. When there was no 500 plus [child benefit program], a mother with four children would come and ask for a meter of potatoes on credit. Everyone ate potatoes with milk for a whole month. And now she’ll even take lettuce, beets, or cabbage. The children are better dressed, there’s a car in the driveway, old, yes, but it's there. Or my neighbor. She used to come, her child would reach for grapes, and she’d be ashamed. – Come, come, we’re in a hurry – she’d say. There’s no such poverty now. And you tell me – has anyone taken an interest in such people before?” -- VOICES AT THE LOCAL MARKET: “– Do you know Trzaskowski? – Oh, go away with him – Mrs. Maria interjects again. – As soon as they announced he was running, he insulted everyone. He wants to abolish television, he threatens journalists, and he laughs while doing it. – I don’t like it either. He’s aggressive, as if he’s angry at everyone – adds Mr. Andrzej, paying for eggs and rushing to breakfast”. -- THEY BROUGHT ORDER – ANOTHER EXCERPT FROM SULOWSKI'S REPORT IN GW: “Mr. Zdzisław is buying half a kilo of cucumbers and half a bag of beans. He’s been retired for almost 20 years. – My whole life in one company for twelve hundred zlotys, then 800 PLN pension, only recently they gave me more. And I got the thirteenth pension recently. So who should I vote for? And they brought order to those who earned 15,000 PLN and still committed fraud with invoices. I can’t fathom the greed a person must have. If I earned 15,000 PLN, I wouldn’t know what to do with the money. I’d give a little to my whole family. And who committed these frauds? – Who do you think? Those from Platforma. – And how do you know that? – I know because I watch TVP Info”. -- IF YOU'RE AGAINST PIS, THEY SAY YOU'RE CRAZY – ANOTHER VOICE IN THE REPORT: “– You see for yourself – Mrs. Maria smiles, giving change. – People’s lives have improved. I see it with my children. I have two, and each has one child. For a few months now, they’ve been getting 500 PLN each. It used to be unthinkable. I had to work for every child, and now they hand out money for free. That’s why a few years ago, if someone voted for PiS, they did it secretly, so no one would see. They said that PiS only meant ignorance. Because they respected the rich and city dwellers. Today, everything has turned around. If someone is against PiS, they say they’re crazy. But I’ve talked so much, and you won’t even let me earn something. Would you buy something”. -- THEY WANT TO INTRODUCE SEXOLOGY TO SCHOOLS – ANOTHER EXCERPT FROM THE REPORT: “– What about the other candidates? – Hołownia, that presenter from 'Mam talent,' could be good, he’s articulate. Then Kamysz, because he’s from a farming family, but now he’s a doctor, so what kind of farmer is he? Bosak is good because he’s honest, and my grandson will vote for him. Biedroń is out because he wants to separate the Church from the state and introduce sexology into schools. But Duda is the best. He abolished visas to America, brought in troops, gives money. He’s a good guy, and he prays. You see him in church all the time. That’s what a president should be like”. https://warszawa.wyborcza.pl/warszawa/7,54420,25960885,jak-ktos-przeciw-pis-owi-to-mowia-ze-wariat-w-tej-gmienie.html -- AFTER 2015, THE CLOSED MEDIA MONOPOLY FELL, MANY PEOPLE GOT A CHANCE - JACEK KARNOWSKI: “After 2015, an unprecedented sealing of the media system in our recent history occurred. We experienced – for the first time on such a scale and for such a long time – the taste of real pluralism. Hundreds, thousands of people got a chance to enter large institutions, to develop their own ventures. Journalists who, in a closed media system, would have had to wait years, even decades for their chance, who would have had to hide their true thoughts lest they fall out of circulation, could spread their wings, get promoted, and develop professionally. The same applies not only to the media but also to the economy, politics, and administration”. -- THEY LEFT ON THEIR OWN BECAUSE THEY ARE PREPARING THEIR OWN RADIO – KARNOWSKI FURTHER: “The above does not mean that I accept every step taken by the heads of public radio. I wouldn’t have removed the hit lists, even the falsified one. I would have acted more calmly, more transparently. But fundamentally, I agree with them that one shouldn’t play with such pain so lightly. This is what it's all about: the revenge of the defeated and politics. On a side note: no one threw the Trójka team out. They left on their own because they are preparing their own radio. If they were as noble as they claim, they would have told us openly. They have the right to do so, they don’t need to lie”. https://wpolityce.pl/media/501320-dlaczego-tak-wielu-krzyczy-tak-niech-skacza-po-tym-bolu -- SZUMOWSKI IS THE NEW BANASIA – JUDYTA WATOŁA IN GW: “The accusations against Minister Szumowski are unfair – says Jarosław Kaczyński. For him, Łukasz Szumowski, who buys dubious masks from a ski acquaintance and overpays for ventilators from an arms dealer, is a model politician. Well, for a long time in PiS, they also said about Banasi that he was crystal clear”. https://wyborcza.pl/7,75398,25963588,kaczynski-zaciekle-broni-szumowskiego-niedawno-pis-tak-samo.html -- PEOPLE ARE STARTING TO LISTEN TO THE OPPOSITION, SO DON'T FOCUS ON PIS'S MISERY, TALK ABOUT THE FUTURE – MAREK BEYLIN IN GW: “For now, PiS’s weakness has meant that opposition parties and Duda’s competitors are being listened to more willingly than before. Some undecided voters are repelled by the arrogance and incompetence of the government, so they are more openly waiting to see how much the opposition will show concern for their fate and what they specifically propose. It would therefore be a fundamental mistake for the democratic camp to focus its campaign on PiS’s current weaknesses and to neglect the most important battle: who will gain trust regarding the future”. https://wyborcza.pl/7,75968,25965334,nie-skupiajcie-sie-na-nedzy-pis-prezydent-musi-miec-wizje.html -- UNEMPLOYMENT LIKE NEVER BEFORE – RZ: "Rzeczpospolita" has obtained the latest data from the ZUS (Social Insurance Institution) register, which indicates an unprecedented wave of layoffs. In April, as many as 165,500 people disappeared from the system, for whom employers stopped paying retirement and disability insurance contributions. This means that in the very first month of the crisis caused by the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic, one in a hundred of the current 15,311.5 million insured individuals lost their jobs and legal source of income. https://www.rp.pl/Praca-emerytury-renty/305219894-Koronawirus-lawina-bezrobotnych-jakiej-w-Polsce-dotad-nie-bylo.html -- POLISH INDUSTRY IS MELTING AWAY BEFORE OUR EYES – title in GW. -- DANIEL FRIED CRITICALLY ABOUT TRUMP'S REACTION – in an interview with Sławomir Sierakowski in Krytyka: “ Democracies are not that efficient in responding to current problems and making quick decisions, but they are more flexible in adapting to situations in the long run. Take the coronavirus, for example. I have already retired and do not work for the U.S. government, so I can say what I think. The federal government, and especially President Trump, spectacularly failed to assess the scale of the challenge, but American society and our decentralized political system filled this gap. Governors, especially of New York, California, and the District of Columbia, took action as early as mid-March, regardless of the conflicting information received from the president, who then had to align with the governors’ actions. This is an example of a failure at the federal level that was compensated for by the actions of the states”. -- FRIED ON THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE CRISIS FOR PUTIN: “Signs of the Russian president’s declining popularity have been noticeable for some time. The coronavirus, combined with falling oil prices, could accelerate this trend. Similarly, the Soviet system lost its legitimacy towards the end of its existence. To paraphrase Hemingway, who spoke about how he went bankrupt: first gradually, then suddenly”. https://krytykapolityczna.pl/swiat/slawomir-sierakowski-dan-fried-wywiad/ -- JAKUB BODZIONY: THE SITUATION AFTER THE PANDEMIC WILL VERIFY POLAND'S POSITION IN THE EU – he writes in Kultura Liberalna: “The next few months will undoubtedly be a significant challenge for Mateusz Morawiecki’s government and its actual negotiation skills. It will also be a test of European responsibility, especially if Poland, which is not out of the question, becomes a net payer for this project. This period will verify PiS’s narrative of full sovereignty and show our real position in the Union”. https://kulturaliberalna.pl/2020/05/22/rewolucja-w-ue-merkel-macron-bodziony/ -- ORLEN MANAGEMENT BOARD IN ITS CURRENT COMPOSITION APPOINTED FOR ANOTHER TERM: https://wpolityce.pl/gospodarka/501285-kontynuacja-w-orlenie-zarzad-w-dotychczasowym-skladzie -- PHOTO: Good morning, Mr. Courbet, Gustave Courbet, Musée Fabre, Montpellier. Courbet created a painting considered to be an objective, almost photographic record of a real situation. -- JAKUB SZAMAŁEK IN POLITYKA ON THE ARTIST AND THE MESSAGE OF THE PAINTING: Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) was a true scandalist – compared to his life, the antics of all mandarins and other fruits seem childish. His canvas Le Sommeil, depicting two naked, embracing women, was so indigestible for contemporary Parisians that the merchant who dared to display it in his gallery had to answer to the police for offending public morals. Another painting, L’Origine du Monde, a faithful depiction of female genitalia, was even bolder; it was first publicly exhibited only in 1988. Add to this that Courbet was a narcissist, an arrogant person, a supporter of communists, and a drunk… For me, however, Courbet is interesting for another reason – his painting Bonjour, Monsieur Courbet! is an excellent starting point for a discussion about the status of the artist – today and in the past. Courbet depicted himself on the right side of the painting. As you can see, he went for a walk outside Paris, most likely – as can be inferred from the easel and brushes slung over his back – to paint some landscape or a scene from French rural life (how long can one draw naked women!). On the other side of the canvas stands Alfred Bruyas – a wealthy man, an industrialist, and incidentally, one of Courbet’s sponsors – and his servant. The message of this painting is simple to read, yet slightly surprising. Courbet seems to be saying – I am the artist here, I am important here, and you, sponsor, better not waste my time and let me work in peace; we have nothing to talk about, you won't understand me anyway. https://sztukaantyku.blog.polityka.pl/2011/09/17/dzien-dobry-panie-courbet/ -- BIRTHDAYS: Bogdan Święczkowski, Piotr Arak, Magdalena Wolińska-Riedi, Elżbieta Chojna-Duch.