Final Word from Tuesday, October 11, 2016
Mandatory refugees quotas are dead, Bohuslav Sobotka tells us. Perhaps so in their original form, but so are the 40% gender quotas that Sobotka pushed through for ČSSD's election tickets. ČSSD did, in fact, have 40% women on its individual candidate lists for the regional elections, as approved by an internal party referendum, but the actual elections turned out much differently. ČSSD won 125 seats in regional assemblies, of which 26 are women. That's 20.8% - far short of the dangled 40% carrot. Without quotas, ANO has 46 women among its 176 new regional representatives, for 26.1%. ČSSD's 20.8% is further evidence that the real purpose of its referendum was to strengthen Sobotka's position at a time of weakness. To push through the fake quotas, Sobotka even ignored a major error in the referendum rules that should have annulled the vote. The media that make up ČSSD a.s. also ignored it. ČSSD is now paying the price of Sobotka's deceptions. [Czech Republic PM]
Glossary of difficult words
(quotas) shmotas - a nonsensical word formed as a rhyme to express disagreement with the predeeding word; first attributed to Sen. Ted Kennedy;
ticket - list of candidates;
to dangle (something in front of someone) - to offer (something enticing) to someone (as an incentive);
to annul - to declare invalid;
deception - the act of deliberately causing someone to believe something that is not true, esp. for personal gain.