I think it was in the summer of 2001, after the EU Göteborg summit in June, that I realised something was not quite right with the European political establishment. If I remember correctly, that was the first time there was a major anti-globalisation protest at an EU summit, and the politicians barricaded themselves and dismissed the protesters. I thought to myself "those are your people trying to tell you something, you should be listening, not barricading yourselves". Since 1999 when anti-globalisation protesters were famously able to disrupt the WTO meeting in Seattle, major international summits have been increasingly isolated or held in an unbearably repressive atmosphere. What was the US Air force doing taking over the Czech airspace a few years back (was it for a Bush state visit, or a NATO summit, or what?) Since that eye-opening experience in 2001 (before 9-11) I've been convinced that "official politics" was going to quickly become irrelevant to the life of ordinary people. That is, I think, the case today, 6 years later. The real power centres are not in our national governments.
Since that eye-opening experience in 2001 (before 9-11) I've been convinced that "official politics" was going to quickly become irrelevant to the life of ordinary people. That is, I think, the case today, 6 years later. The real power centres are not in our national governments.
What was the US Air force doing taking over the Czech airspace a few years back (was it for a Bush state visit, or a NATO summit, or what?)
Maybe it was for the November 2002 NATO summit? Yes.
But the NATO summit was the one with little trouble. There was big trouble two years before, at the Prague IMF/World Bank summit in September 2002. That was when some friends of my brother, harmless hippies at the time, were arrested the day after the riots off the street, when they were just walking along some inner-city street, and after being held (and being kicked) for one and half days, while denying access to lawyers (during which time international and Hungarian media wrote about them like dangerous rioters who attacked police), they were expelled and got a multi-year travel ban to the Czech Republic... *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
Riots of 2000 are memorably, and the way police treated often innocent people, especially from Eastern Europe. What's interesting: Gross, interior minister at the time, became immensely popular, and was even prime minister for some time (almost killing social democrats in the process, but that's another story). Getting tough pays.
Was it also the first where a US president decided to butt in? At the time I thought of it as a pretty smart (and cynical) move by Bush's handlers. Compress what would otherwise have required several visits to Europe into one, and simultaneously reduce the chances of Bush making a complete ass of himself by reducing the amount and scope of one-on-one interactions with individual leaders. The protests were more anti-Bush than anti-EU. Unfortunately, as a result the way the protests were handled, EU meetings got tainted in a way they had not been prior to Bush's intrusion (as always, the gift that keeps on giving).
