Lately I gave the reader a recipe for achieving effortlessly extremist status. The gist: speak the uncorrected truth and bear the blame.

The specific matter used as a peg holding up the generalized point was the case of the Swiss People’s Party (SVP). Since then the SVP won the elections and the Reds lost. Most of the Socialists’ losses went to the Greens. (Translation: same camp, different color.) Some of the SVP’s gains came from the parties of the center. These are the folks who lacked the courage to commit themselves to anything but the bold middle between “wishy” and “washy“. Stubbornly, even the Economist – the best of the weeklies – persists in calling the SVP “right-wing” as in “extremist”. In itself, the libel by international journalists who regurgitate information furnished by locally embedded partisans does not matter. However, the misuse of the term as a club confers legitimacy on genuine extremist – not all of which belong to the nutty right but also represent the lunatic left.

What did the SVP say to be smeared while coasting to success? It claimed the right of society to move in a color-blind manner against criminals. It did so while affirming that a right to self-defense exists. Even in case of impostors that as a visible minority claim to have a “different culture” implying immunity. In their instance not background but behavior was what the SVP suggested as the standard against which individual comportmen should be measured. As this is written, Italy’s left-of-center, therefore automatically blameless, government has decided to act against the growing alien criminal class whose actions shocked that nation. Let us wait for the outrage provoked by this “Fascist” behavior.

On Election Day in Switzerland, I flew to Hungary to honor October 23. That is now a national holiday that recalls the anti-Communist revolution of 1956. Last year the anniversary provoked a mounted police-attack with swords, aimed tear gas grenades and rubber bullets to humiliate citizens home-bound from the memorial. Fitting the pattern depicted in the case of the Swiss SVP, the international press reported that the forces of order responded merely to rightist ultras. (My original report appeared here in November 2007).

Before, during and since the incident, Hungary’s right-of-center opposition earns condemnatory adjectives. The mildest of these alleges that it is criminally rightist. Bad news if one believes the foreign reports whose distributors rely on the local Left for impartial information. Presumably, the same crowd will use the result of the next elections to discover a completed “Fascist” take-over. This is a likely event as the FIDESz (Young Democrats) lead the MSzP’s “Socialists” of “converted” Communist functionaries 2:1.

This year’s celebration went over without much violence. The clashes were limited to isolated incidents pitting rowdies who never miss a chance to cause trouble against the police. The main rally organized by the FIDESz at last year’s venue ended without police attacks. The rain poured and it was cold; that could be the reason why there were fewer people than last year’s 200,000. Many might have been kept away by the fear of reprisals. Playing officially with the terms “violence” and “order” and “vigorous” action regrettably imperiling folks who might feel “innocent” must have frightened the timid. So, unlike last year, families with small children were underrepresented.

The government, too, remembered the Revolution of 1956 on the eve of the 23rd. presumably, it did so overcoming its inner reluctance. An honest but clumsy Socialist legislator, also a member of the multi-millionaire PM’s clan, revealed the real view of the Communists. She declared that the date makes her think of criminals and Nazis trying to take power. Not being able to afford the truth as he must see it, the PM organized an homage in the opera where the people’s representative could celebrate in the name of the people. Ironically, the people were forbidden to attend the gala event honoring it. More: hours earlier, in a wide circle around the opera the streets were blocked. Even local residents were accompanied home by guess-who. Kafka would have been inspired because its own representative excluded the praised people from its own celebration and its vicinity. After this, it can hardly be a surprise that all the official celebrations lacked one component assumed to be attending outside of Absurdistan. At the “obligatory” locations, there were flags, army bands, honor detachments, a few protocol-driven diplomats and selected dozens of functionaries. These were largely the offspring of parents who shot at and then executed the heroes formally honored. Absent was the “people” which was excluded as being inconvenient at a memorial celebrating it.

The incongruous does not end with this and proves that Communists have seldom ethical problems. These arise only in two situations, namely, when in opposition and when in power.

Some consequences are amusing in their details. Still, when cumulated they reduced the leading country at the time of the end of Communism in ‘89 to the region’s laggard. Such a case is that of a firm’s managing director who became a cabinet member. The enterprise is now criminally convicted but the man that led it when the crime occurred claims not having known of anything. (He will survive the scandal.) These days I saw documents that reconstruct part of the illegal foreign holdings of a many-times-millionaire. Remarkably, the owner files tax returns claiming to earn the minimal wage. I opined that the papers must, if presented in court, have a devastating effect. Not necessarily, I was told. Their presentation must not even provoke an inquiry by the tax people. A good man high up can cover up anything.

Corruption makes another fresh case to come to mind. Just recently, the organ in charge of auditing tax returns has announced two new inquiries. They will examine the financial situation and “enrichment” of Messrs Orbán and Kubatov. It so happens that they are the PM candidate and the director of the FIDESz. Probably because of their name’s proximity in the alphabet, their cases got consecutive numbers. (Mr. Orbán’s got the lower one.) Statisticians pretend that the chances of this happening are 1:500 millions. Nevertheless, the country that voted for its current keepers must not worry. The government assures the citizens that the choice is accidental and – anticipating the likely claim – the investigation has not been ordered by the PM, Mr. Gyurcsány. Actually, this is, if true, too bad. The PM, who provokes the public to hostile acts and is therefore now a prisoner of his luxury villa and his office, knows a lot about deals. He has purchased a “privatized” capital building from the “state” to lease it back immediately to the state that sold it to him for the purchase price. The rest of the road to become one of the richest men of the country was easy.

Absurdities are funny if you happen to be outside the space they define. The same applies when, as above, corrupted power legalizes the dishonesty that defines existence. Admittedly, corruption occurs everywhere. However, if it becomes immanent to the system and thereby a general rule, the attitude it radiates becomes a poison influencing all facets of life. Two health-care items might illustrate the point.

Case one: a doctor in a hospital displays a large bill on his desk and lets another one hang out of his shirt pocket. The locally obvious message is that “gratitude money” is expected. Case 2 is the upshot of a talk with a dentist. During Socialism, one used to pull teeth regardless of their condition. For the patients enjoying for-free care the time allotted was fifteen minutes. Decent blokes who took pity on poor clients worked up to the time limit. Then the patient was made to return for more sessions. The hasty job was all free unless you count the collateral costs such as travel and the repeated absence from work. Item three. Regardless of her condition, an old woman is ordered to leave a hospital. A helpless relative wants to know what to do with her. The physician: give me 50,000 (ca 200 E) and she can stay.

Budapest lives in a dichotomy. The cars grow larger. Meanwhile the poverty, caused in part by the policies of the governing ex-Communist millionaires (expressed in real money) spreads. Such assessments have to be impressionistic. The statistics do not tell the story. Large fortunes get away with anything a network can cover up. There is supposed to be a list of enterprises the local internal revenue must not to bother. The official deficit is 9% of GNP. It is supposed to fall by savings in education and health care. Whether it will or not is a mute issue as the figures published are manicured. Power is supposed to corrupt. In this case, the economic weight created by shady activities is power.

The sense of bitterness is widespread and intensive. On the surface, this favors the growing opposition. Looking beyond the numbers, dangers emerge. Mr. Victor Orbán seems to be pursuing two goals. He naturally tries to line up the disenchanted behind his candidacy. At the same time, he also seems to fear that desperation will lead to violence. That could be the excuse for the governing elite to solidify its order with means that open up unpleasant perspectives. Therefore, the opposition must gather votes and keep the steam from blowing off the lid. No small task since the election is two years away.

Now to the second challenge. The reader might think here of genuine right wing extremism rising as a reaction to the rule of the reds. If so, the Magyar Guard will come to mind. This organization of around a thousand – which makes me feel slightly uncomfortable – has received much international attention. It is clearly right of center and, accordingly – as would be the case in similar outfits of the right and the left anywhere – some members must be anti-Semites. However, this does not yet make it into a Nazi outfit. The cited proof of the contrary relies on their red-white stripes that go back eight centuries and that were also used by the local Nazis. So were the national colors (red, white and green were used to create a green Arrow Cross in a white circle surrounded by red) that no one complains about. Lastly, there is the proof of guilt expressed by their uniform. These men and women wear black. So did the SS. Only that the cargo slacks are hard to classify. Meanwhile the white shirt and the black vest over black pants reminds not of Himmler’s Black Corps but of the traditional Sunday best worn by peasants.

The opposition’s second challenge comes from high expectations and the limited means reality is likely to provide for their realization. The general population is economically illiterate. It thinks that governmental power can function as a magic wand. Consequently, a new governing team will be installed in the hope of immediate returns. Therefore, frustration will be unavoidable. Furthermore, the FIDESz is likely to discover that the economic mess is considerably deeper than the officially released doctored facts tell. Such confusion will make the recovery slow and hard. Through their votes, the Hungarians bear much responsibility for their lot. Regardless of where the blame may lie, the maturity to shoulder the burden of needing to overcome a missed decade of development will be hard to mobilize. Before things have a chance to get better conditions will deteriorate. Universal experience tells us that as the latter happens, theories claiming that there are free lunches gain in attraction.

By now, you might have decided that this piece focuses excessively on a local matter involving a country you know little about and whose size does no warrant knowing more. However, do remember that most of mankind is organized in small entities, thereby reducing the 100-million-club to an exclusive crowd. As usually, a general point was made based on a close-up which focused on a small sample. In this case, the main lesson suggests that emerging from a collectivist failure does not guarantee that the liberated community will head straight toward liberty. In the future a crowded list including Cuba, later Venezuela, Zimbabwe, the north of Korea and eventually even mainland China, might provide examples confirming the generalization derived from the central European case.