Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.
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Notes -
A major element of Orban's perceived badness was his alignment with Russia. He has more recently attracted attention in the US because a number of conservatives put forward Orbanism as a template for Republican governance.
A trait that Chavista Venezuela (pre-Maduro, who turned into an old-fashioned dictator) and Orbanist Hungary share is being illiberal democracies, a perennial favorite of people trying to challenge liberal globalism. You end up defending these illiberal governments because the alternative is to admit that your ideology is not fit for purpose (or you go mask-off authoritarian, but that's pretty unusual in developed countries).
Orban's a hero to his country, IMO. Of course the west and especially the EU dislike him. Their priorities run orthogonal to his own. Illiberal movements come and go but they rarely directly translate into political power, although you have guys like Martin Sellner trying to change that. In a lot of ways I wish we had an administration more like his own.
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