So, the Albanosphere: about 7 million Albanians in Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Greece and Montenegro, plus another million or so recent emigrants and gastarbeitern scattered across Europe and the US.
I’m going to leave the diaspora mostly out of the picture. They’re very important, but I can’t spent all my days writing blog posts. I’m [...]

From The New York Times, Pope Benedict XVI during his visit to the USA:
“Any tendency to treat religion as a private matter must be resisted,” he said.
Then, on the issue of child abuse within the Church (emphasis mine):
For the second day on his first official visit to America, the pope acknowledged the “deep shame” [...]

You remember I blogged a few weeks back about how Macedonia’s government was collapsing (because of demands from the Albanian party in the coalition).
Then a bit later I posted about how, no, it wasn’t collapsing after all — the coalition partners had reconciled.
Well, now it has collapsed again. Elections are on June 1.
I should [...]

Haven’t we seen this movie before? Will it be any better this time? Can Italy afford another round of Silvi B?
I know what could make this a great term of office! Start a new campaign: Tyrolia is only Italian! Because it’s worked so well for Greece…
Update: I see that David is as enthusiastic as I [...]

The old bastard pulled it off. Seems to get fairly solid majorities in both chambers. Veltroni just conceded.
There’s was even more disgust at the political process than usual this election. Lots of scandals and Beppe Grillo rallies. Some dude ate his ballot, etc. So turnout was lower than usual this year. I gotta assume [...]

In today’s Wall Street Journal Europe, Gareth Harding does a nice job describing the frustration of a UK citizen who has lost the right to vote as a result of long-term residency outside the UK — a feature that only dates from 2002 legislation.  It’s little consolation, but the Irish voting regimen for its many [...]

As Italians head to the polls this weekend in order to pick what will be their 62nd government in 65 years (in an election which is being held three years early to boot, due to the collapse of Romano Prodi’s outgoing administration) one odd detail seems to stand out and sum up the multitude of [...]

Gentle readers, afoe’s backend has been updated to the latest wordpress. So far, the transition seems to have worked well. Over the next couple of days, the frontend will also receive a little facelift - and make the site a little faster. So, in case you’ve got the feeling that something doesn’t work as it [...]

There is a well-expressed idea embodied in a dissident shareholder motion for the forthcoming Deutsche Bank AGM, as reported by the Financial Times.  It gets at the consequences for and role of shareholders in the global banking crisis.  The article explains –

Read more… [...]

Not too long ago, Doug Muir wrote about why Nagorno-Karabakh may be coming soon to a front page near you. Back in the mid-1990s, I wrote something much longer on the conflict there. (PDF, ca. 500K) Money quote:
Two of the least useful questions for consideration of the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh are “Who’s right?” and “When [...]