In Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the governing Social Democrat (SPD)s got whipped, to the tune of a 10 percent drop at the polls. In Berlin, by contrast, the SPD picked up 1.1 percent, received the most votes of any party, and now has the option of continuing its coalition with the Left (PDS) or forming a new one [...]

Sweden wasn’t the only Baltic area with an election yesterday. The voters of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, in Germany’s northeastern corner, dealt a heavy blow to the ruling Social Democrat-postcommunist (SPD-Left) coalition. The SPD dropped 10 percent, but still received the largest share of votes, topping the Christian Democrats (CDU) 30.2 percent to 28.8 percent. The postcommunist (or [...]

In 1979, Pope John Paul II traveled to his homeland, Poland, a visit that played a role in ending one-party rule. This weekend, Pope Benedict XVI will visit his homeland, Bavaria, where one political party has ruled for more than forty years. My impertinent query: Is Minister-President Stoiber making a mistake in welcoming the Pope?

The Onion: Bush Grants Self Permission to Grant More Power to Self. Funny, but also the best definition of the Kompetenzkompetenz I’ve ever seen.

Well, it now looks as if the window of opportunity for a ceasefire in the Levant has slammed shut on the fingers of its proponents. With the destruction of a UNTSO observation post, the mobilisation of three Israeli reserve divisions (by contrast, the total force employed so far has been one division-plus), Hezbollah’s successful defence [...]

…this time? The signs do appear to being pointing to a possible employment of European forces in Lebanon, not least with Israeli PM Ehud Olmert and others expressing a preference for “EU countries” or NATO - which is mostly the same thing, especially militarily - to supply troops to any peacekeeping/peace enforcement mission there.
The reason [...]

Sometime during the group phase of the last World Cup, a lefty German newspaper, the Berlin-based taz, compared Poland’s current president to a potato. I’m sure that there was more to it than that, but the original version has disappeared into pay-per-view is here, and my reading knowledge of Polish isn’t what it was a [...]

Penalty kicks. I guess it’s a known issue, but still what a terribly unsatisfying way to determine the champion of the world’s most popular sport.
It’s a shame Zinedane wraps up his World Cup career with a head butt. Not that egregious fouls by Italians are unknown in World Cup competition, either.
Here’s hoping that 2010 will [...]

Bleh.

Well, it looks like one of the questions from this post may have been answered indirectly. It now matters little whether or not the Clearstream affair is ever cleared up, as some of the people most responsible for it have anyway been disgraced. Since the last post, the only real news on the Clearstream story [...]