First up, Izzy (and Ben Munster) at Politico.eu, September 28:
The Polish government is facing accusations it artificially lowered consumer prices — especially on core goods like fuel and medicines — to allow the central bank to make a crowd-pleasing interest rate cut before an election on October 15.
National Bank of Poland Governor Adam Glapiński, an appointee of the incumbent Law and Justice (PiS) party, terrified financial markets earlier this month by cutting benchmark rates by a full 0.75 percentage points to 6 percent on the seemingly shaky grounds that Poland’s sky-high inflation was finally cooling.
But now the data has more than vindicated Glapiński’s gambit, with the rise in Polish consumer prices slowing to 8.2 percent in September, down from 10.1 in August and 0.2 percentage points lower than forecasts, data showed on Friday.
The question of how these prices are coming down, however, is turning into a political quagmire — with the opposition suggesting a state-dominated energy giant is deliberately keeping fuel prices low in the run-up to the general election. The government has also pushed through a measure lowering power prices for consumers as well as expanding the number of people able to get free medicines....
....MUCH MORE, it's quite a story.
And from Notes From Poland a bit of the old Lysistrata sex strike notion:
Don’t go to bed with men who vote far right, left-wing leader tells women
(maybe it's just me but that order sounds a bit patriarchal coming from a guy)
Also at Notes From Poland, some irrefutable logic I wish I had thought of when I lost my bid for 7th grade Class President:
....A senior government security official has accused opposition leader Donald Tusk of seeking to “manipulate” his followers into believing that defeat at this month’s elections could only come if the government falsifies the result. The aim is to stoke “chaos”, “social unrest” and a “revolt”, as well as to create “pressure from abroad”.....
"If I don't get the most votes it is proof-positive that the election was rigged."
Recently:"Polish ruling party turns elections into referendum on Tusk"
(not to be confused with the Silicon Valley political fixer Bradley Tusk)
