While political festivals are not unique per se, there is something unique about how the Hungarian right organizes its gatherings. Their continuing success is not due to populist chauvinism, or to making them mere echo chambers. In fact, plenty of world views, including opposition voices highly critical of the Orbán administration, clashed on stage in front of captivated audiences many times this summer.
‘The divisions inside the conservative movement are less over what should be done, and more over how far we might go, and the right answer is always as far as possible. In a democracy, the path to political success is always practical: for us, that means identifying the problems that worry people most and finding credible and pragmatic ways to make change for the better.’
‘What should Hungarians do? The question—and Orbán’s visionary answer—has meaning beyond Hungary, in ways that Americans and other Westerners only dimly recognize now. And it goes back to the prime minister’s 2014 advocacy of “illiberal democracy” for Hungary.’
In the West, there are a number of remarkable, colourful traditions linked to Christmas that vary from country to country. But what cannot be missing from any home where Christmas is celebrated is a decorated pine tree.
At the year-end press conference, PM Orbán explained why he chose to veto the €50 billion aid package to Ukraine at the recent EU Summit, how he views the potential Ukrainian and Swedish NATO accession, and what he believes the biggest struggles of 2023 were. He also talked about what hopes he has for the new year of 2024.
Editor-in-chief of the Toronto Independent Hungarian Radio, co-founder of the Paraméter Club and owner of the Toronto Pannonia bookstore Zsolt Bede-Fazekas spoke with Hungarian Conservative about the challenges of reviving the cultural life of the Hungarian community in Canada, and the efforts he makes to turn the tide and build bridges between diaspora Hungarians and the motherland.
‘In addition to his positive foreign policy track record, Donald Trump often promises in his public speeches on his current campaign trail to bring peace to Ukraine and Israel, and restore global security once elected president again. Therefore, it is clear that for Hungary, Trump is the number one choice as the ideal leader of the free world from the point of view of global peace.’
‘Europe should have woken up already when millions of people swarmed through its borders, and absolutely nothing was done, with the responsible agencies simply welcoming migrants and not enforcing border control,’ Israeli security expert Or Yissachar told Hungarian Conservative.
The Prime Minister said the EU was in the habit of making bad decisions, and he listed the 2008 financial crisis and migration as examples, as well as the decision regarding the war in Ukraine to go ‘towards war and sanctions’ rather than in the direction of peace.
In a missive addressed to European Commissioner for Budget and Administration on Thursday, the Hungarian Minister of Finance recalled that there is a long-standing consensus that the defence of the European Union’s borders is a collective responsibility of the member states, and yet, Hungary bears almost exclusively the financial burden of the protection of its southern, Schengen border.