Let's talk about Orban losing in Hungary and what it means.... - Belle of the Ranch

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about Orban losing in Hungary and what it means.

Okay. So, Hungary's longtime nationalist strongman leader Victor Orban lost his most recent election. There's been a lot of questions about what his loss means for various groups, factions, people, countries, and so on. What we're going to do is try to give a brief overview of what his loss means for those outside Hungary, but before we get into that, we should probably try to place his replacement. Peter Magyar, spelled Magyar for your own research.

In the US, there seems to be an undercurrent of people thinking that since he beat the Trump-like guy over there, that he has to be a liberal. Eh, if Orban is Trump, he wasn't beaten by a Hungarian Bernie. He was beaten by a Hungarian Reagan. The new guy is still pretty right-wing.

There are two huge losers. The first is Vladimir Putin. Orban was friendly to Putin and often threw up resistance inside the EU, which Hungary is part of, to moves that would hurt Russia. Putin's loss of an ally inside the EU is huge.

The other big loser is Trump. Big surprise. Putin and Trump found common cause with another nationalist strongman. Orban was the kind of electoral autocrat Trump wants to be. He even had Vance go over just before the election to show support. It's another international humiliation for Trump. It turns out having his support overseas means as little as it has in the recent US special elections. Orban's loss reminds people that you can in fact simply vote them out.

Who's the big winner? The EU. Many would say Orban made Hungary Russia's puppet within the EU. It's more complicated than that, but it's not like the people who felt that way didn't have a basis for it. With Orban gone and Magyar who is openly pro-EU in his place, they stand to have a more cohesive block. In fact, the European Commission president came out after the results and said, "Hungary has chosen Europe. Europe has always chosen Hungary." That sounds like a line from a romantic comedy. You complete me.

For his part, it wasn't quite as sentimental. Magyar said the election was “a choice between east or west, propaganda or honest public discourse, corruption or clean public life.”

Another winner is Ukraine, but by how much is yet to be seen. Orban was downright hostile to Ukraine. The new guy is a bit of an unknown, but definitely seems more friendly. He's had to walk a bit of a tight rope to keep his coalition together. We'll see what happens now that he's in office.

That's actually true for a lot of his stated policies. They're kind of a mystery. There's a pretty big assumption that he's going to be more friendly to the LGBTQIA people, but how much more friendly is kind of up in the air. He'll be more friendly to Ukraine and the EU, but by how much is kind of anybody's guess.

At the international poker table, where everybody is cheating, we know who the losers and winners are. We just don't know how much the pot was on this hand.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.