UNE SAISON EN ENFER

Il devient trop facile de décrier ces années comme épouvantables. Le "rien ne va plus" a définitivement ébranlé les certitudes et les solidarités. Celà est surtout alarmant dans la territorialité atlantique qui semble frappée de stupeur.

Déjà les dégats dans les marches - Gaza, Ukraine, Soudan - affaiblissent l'organisme. Les avatars extérieurs finissent par affaiblir l'immunité. 

L'Union Européenne se retrouve perdue dans un noeud de contradictions. Les anciennes alliances sont devenues bancales et les quelques accomodements qui restent sont d'ordre opportuniste. Le coeur n'y est plus.

La grande alliance occidentale est devenue académique. Trump n'obéit qu'au dépit. Il n'éprouve aucun intérèt pour les alliances passées, leur préférant des accomodements dans lesquels le court terme  prévaut. Les anciens liens privilégiés avec des partenaires africains ou asiatiques quittent le terrain au profit d'arrangements  ad hoc.

L'Ukraine bénéficie encore d'une  sympathie  partagée, mais les meilleures intentions ne changent rien à la situation sur le terrain. Israel se voit attribuer la palme d'or de l'antipathie. Le Soudan n'est plus qu'une vision de l'enfer, trop éloignée pour activer la conscience.

L'Europe est comme un film sans tête d'affiche. Macron devient "le roi se meurt", malgré sa grande intelligence. Ses collègues allemand et britannique sont peu rassembleurs. La Commission est devenue aussi ennuyeuse que la capitale où elle siège. Pourtant l'UE n'a d'autre choix que de retrouver un second souffle. Elle doit impérativement se doter d'un projet à long terme, à la fois ouvert aux tiers et porté par le soutien et l'intérèt à l'intérieur. Il faut tourner la page des réunions à répétition comme du règne des hommes et femmes entre deux àges. Les idées ne poussent pas dans un terroir arride.

Il est clair que l'Europe doit se réinventer pour redevenir pertinente. Il serait opportun de revisiter et d'actualiser les stratégies des grands, Delors et Draghi. La saison en enfer n'a que trop duré et la sortie ne se découvrira que de l'intérieur.

GAZA

How has Israel become the heartless hybrid we endure today?

After a difficult start, the Jewish state nevertheless achieved a remarkable achievement on all fronts. Its military might was unparalleld in the region. The US was able to normalize its disputable historical claims.

All this is broken and lies under the rubble that Israel uses to kill Palestinians who endure a war, after having lived under the unpleasant years of Hamas monopoly.

What happens in Gaza today is inexcusable. The range of the Israeli military operations spares nothing, including Israel's own progressive ideals, a thing of the past for now.

It is becoming doubtful that the Palestinians will ever have a chance to overcome this new "Nakba", displacement and dispossession. Netanjahu and consorts are driven by some form of hatred that no longer has a name. After the October 7th 2023 Hamas deadly incursion, the world at large chose to forget Israel's shortcomings and supported fullheartedly the harsh punishment inflicted on Hamas. Now that we have entered a phase of ethnic cleansing and some Trump's aberrations, we had better regroup. Europe should stand with the willing.  Arab states want a solution but do not want Palestinians. Others prefer to vote pathetic resolutions and forget...(sounds Ukranian).

The Holocaust is too large an existential stain to allow for this tragedy to become an alibi for an intervention coming out of a lunatic bin. The EU is often a cacophonic gathering but democracy was never an easy path. In Israel there are enough voices that can reach the corridors of EU's mutiple meetings. They should not remain unanswered. Neither should the Palestinians be forgotten under Israel's unrelenting indiscriminate folly.

PRIDE IN BRUSSELS

La derniere édition de gay Pride à Bruxelles est ratée.

Les clichés étaient embarassants, le public absent. Ce cortège passéiste était pénible, surtout pour les gays qui ont tourné la page des complexes.

Aujourd'hui les défis imminents requièrent des réponses plus ciblées que des slogans et comportements dépassés, voir même inappropriés.

La société a assez évolué pour pouvoir se passer d'imagerie caricaturale. Le monde qui se défait devant nos yeux a besoin de thérapie. Les Gays ont assez d'hommes et de femmes partout pour pouvoir contribuer à une revision humaniste et créative des défis contemporains, sans se perdre dans le labyrinthe de l'ordinaire.

HABEMUS PLANUM

Trump gets a plane. This lavish gift is a reminder of the creeping redistribution of wealth in today's world. His America becomes the resort for zombie parvenus.

The president is envious of the glitter, and he tries unconvicingly to emulate. He only copies. His Mar-a-Lago faux rococo is invading the White House which might end up looking more like a decor than Jefferson's magnum opus.

Problems are piling up and the tricks that are the trademark of this Maga clique only delay, distract or hide. Even the second clown-in-chief, Elon Musk, starts to look distraught. Let's not dwell on the women in this administration who look like they're auditioning for The Housewives of Washington DC.

Let's imagine Tocqueville returning to America in search of a follow-up to his Democracy in America. He would be devastated by the war that is being waged against all the principles he experienced earlier. The rule of law is gone, the separation of powers is no longer and most commands are in the hands of a group of corrupt amateurs. The president follows the script of the mad man who is institutionalizing unpredictability. This erratic pattern stands against any form of enlightened leadership.

The West copes, the world observes and the United States loses its compass. Europeans look trapped in a series of contradictory impulses from an American administration that lost its balance. This change affects both the heart of the matter and the external expression thereof. The Trump style looks more like a provincial beauty parlor out of Dynasty than a cool projection of reliable power and taste.

Currently Trump is being flattered to such an extent that he acts euphoric. His Middle East tour is his Prozac. He pretends not to have permanent enemies, without blushing....

At the end of the day, the world will eventually tire of the successive repetitive shocks. America gets lost in the Maga mist but it will eventually get tired of the "antics". The world at large keeps its cool for now. Europe has the most to loose and cannot count any longer on a partnership wherein the Maga antipathy versus everything European gets a free ride. Hillary Clinton warned against the "deplorables". Now they take over the pilot's seat. A bumpy ride lies ahead. Europeans had better fasten their seatbelts until the day the turbulence will have self-exhausted.

100 days Trump

Certain numbers stand out: Napoleon's 100 days after Elba, President Kennedy's 1000 days. Now we suffer 100 days of President Trump's orchestrated madness, some Season in Hell (without Arthur Rimbaud, sadly).

It is an undeniable fact that questions abound and that answers are non-existent or unconvincing. If the reality we undergo is also destabilising the mind, we should not forget that all this is bluff,  yoyo policies that lack a coherent strategy. The "apostles" around the mad king have neither credibility nor a moral/ intellectual compass. In between playing golf and looking at Fox News there is no "there" there.

Asians are regrouping, sub-Sahara Africa is left to its own devices, the Middle East follows the President's hotel trail, Russia and China have a hard time hiding their mépris, Canada, Mexico and Australia are increasing their distance. The EU has no other choice than trying to monitor the contradictions in its own midst, the the Hungarian joker, the Polish hard liner, the Danish Hamlet, the Bonapartist Macron and the sly Meloni. 

The cards on the table open a window of opportunities for Trump, who can create havoc with no effort. Nevertheless he must pay attention to slipping poll numbers or a growing frustration in Washington's elites, who are becoming impatient under the dureness of this other Marvel creature.

As long as in the second term Trump can avoid confrontation in his ranks he is relatively safe. He certainly doesn't want to risk the  problems created during his first term by the few establisment personalities in his administration. This time he deliberately chose to be surrounded by a claque of willing amateurs, chosen for servility rather than talent.

Soon we could witness a Strindberg scenario wherein he will be eaten raw by some of his partners who will anesthesize him through flattery and hotel licenses. By the way he has only the certified logistical support of  Steve Witkoff, his hotel concierge-in-chief.

FRIET MUSEUM IN BRUSSEL

De musea situatie in Brussel is tragisch. De verantwoordelijken zouden stage moeten lopen in o.m. Amsterdam.

Na de chocolade en  het bier wordt nu het friet epos in de verf gezet. De grote markt en omgeving zijn nu al totaal verloedert; stel U voor dat hetzelfde zou worden overwogen in Palais Royal of Place des Vosges in Parijs ?!

Misschien is de volgende stap een "vuilnis museum" of een façadisme beleving ?

Een andere troef in de kroon van "pauvre B(ruxelles)"?

THE BREZHNEV DOCTRINE IS BACK, A LA TRUMP

The doctrine of limited sovereignty after the Prague Spring became the cornerstone of the Soviet Union's foreign policy. Within Moscow's political realm the member states of the Warshaw Pact only received the smallest amount of autonomy, as long as the "socialist" priorities were not endangered.

Now Trump follows the same path, suggesting a conditional,  survival kit for Ukraine: reduced, humiliated, and servile. Mutatis mutandis ,the same goes for other unpleasant aspects of this salesman's dealings with the world. Never has such a vulgar, unprincipled, tasteless person presided over the destiny of what was not long ago the envy of all . 

Former generations saw America as a model, far from perfect, but ruled by the better intentions. Nowadays, one ends up seeing trough the "magic" of a smartphone a grotesque America ruled by amateurs on the payroll of a mean-spirited, awful president. 

Putin will get his prey and his way. Trump will oblige because he is clueless regarding history, taste or anything out of the sphere of self-agrandisement. He is the frog in a La Fontaine tale or the sociopath in a B movie.

Europeans had better stick together and avoid entering stormy weather. Others should follow the Chinese example and not play into the supplicant scenario that Trump likes to impose. Too bad that so many Americans fell for an idol of clay. The Democrats have no Moses in their rank.

Reality will finally bite. It is a multi-headed monster with a flair for hybrid warfare on all fronts: geo-political, economical and cultural. The former Bandung group will come together again, Taiwan will follow the Ukraine model, the EU will have a hard time shedding the image of a mild parish congregation, while the right/Maga forces will roar until they die for lack of oxygen.

In the short term Trump will try to steal Pope Francis'burial. Nothing can stop this Golem until some stroke gets the better of him. Until then, better run for shelter.