News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


"Overthrow" is a strong word for talking about the dissolution of a famously inept and lost minority government...

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]

how long were you interred for, mr bigshot?

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


Racist garbage. Adam Michnik is ten times the Pole you'll ever be.

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


I'm pretty sure that JK does. He made his career by attacking LW, why change a winning formula?


Now now, I thought the official party line is that he was in cahoots with the party (already planning the events of 1989 in 1980), which is why he was allowed to jump the fence into the factory. Didn't you hear about the meeting on the yacht? Don't you keep up at all?

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


If you think anyone in PiS cares about "historical truth" then you're more brainwashed than I thought.

I'm completely in favor of impartial historical analysis (and don't invest any public figures with superhero moral status). But using things that did or didn't happen over thirty years ago to score cheap political points is .... cheap politics and I don't respect that and never will.

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


Yes. Yes it does. Thank you for asking. You may now put this useful knowledge to use.


I don't think PiS will govern well because they're too obsessed about getting revenge for past slights (real or imagined) and they realize their supporters are largely economic losers who might stop voting for them if they became economic winners.

Reasoned criticism or bashing?

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


Cause Lord knows what Poland absolutely needs more than anything else are never ending squabbles about the past.

News / Poland to return to Catholic tradition? [177]


Try talking to a bunch of people in their early 20s and see what they think about it - mandatory religion classes drives them from the RCC

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


Yes. There is no functioning constitution and there is rule of party rather than rule of law.


You realize, for a soi disant Polish patriot you make Poland seem like the most pathetic country in the world and Poles like the biggest dupes - constantly oppressed and deceived and exploited (and PiS does't want it any other way) why would anyone want to be associated with such a huge lot of losers is beyond me.

Fortunately I live in a different place - which has had and continues to have problems but which is mostly developing pretty well.

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


Maybe taking a dump on the constitution and rule of law had something to do with that....

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


The problem is that evaluating the documents needs disinterested analysis but those pushing the issue are far from disinterested.

I know there are paper experts who can tell the provenance of paper and ink so they might be able to accurately guage the age and source of the paper (I don't know how fine tuned their determinations are).

I'm all for disinterested historical analysis but not in favor of using that to hit people over the head.

And.... any responsible political opposition in the PRL (such as the church and solidarity) would need to strategically use moles. I assume the church ordered some priests to "cooperate" with the SB for a vareity of very good reasons (with the understanding that they would receive no support from the church if their cooperation were revealed).

The PRL was crooked timber all the way through - there's no way to reconstruct it into a simple straight thing (to borrow a quote from Herr Kant).

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


Every nation state in the world is built on lies, illicit deal and injustices at some level.


I just don't see it. Sorry. The economic problems of Poland (which are real and serious) cannot be traced to backroom deals. Partly Poland is in an enviable position* where the economy is doing mostly very well (before the socialists were elected at any rate) but there's always a lag time between economic progress and increased income. Other problems are more based on factors like education and life choices (there's no way for cashiers at Biedronka to have the same compensation as doctors for example).

Think of it this way. Every small business started by one or two people reaches a phase where there's more work than the founder(s) can do but they can't afford to actually hire someone new. The business either gets through this stage somehow or it folds. Poland is in that stage now nationally. I don't think that economic policies that had failed by 1980 are going to help it get through that stage.

*compared with countries where there's no hope of income increase


The party was (among other things) the place where people who could do things congregated. Of course they're going to do better than most after communism.


The converse is that 'głodny nie zrozumie sytego' many of those worse off at present are not aware of the economic forces that are actually at play (or how fragile most profit margins are for most businesses).

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]

At this point facts hardly matter, Polish society falls into a few broad camps (I hesitate to assign even rough percentages).

Apathetic - don't much care either way

Future oriented - We got rid of communism, and things are lot better now for most people, let's move forward rather than wallow in a past that cannot be changed.

Martyrologists - Cannot stand the idea of Poland not being oppressed and are determined that every significant event be turned into another item in the catalogue of suffering (these are people who never gave up on the idea of the Christ of Nations - suffering for the sins of the world - since the world is still sinning Poland has to keep suffering).

As a non-Pole who's happy to live in Poland I'm primarily in the second camp. The current government is in the third.

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


The bell-weather of the rural vote is support for PSL (ime they mostly won't vote for PO but they'll vote for PSL over PiS when they're unhappy with them).

News / The dossier of TW "Bolek" - Poland's IPN assisted by police enters the home of the late general Kiszczak [306]


There is a certain kind of person who claims to hate the entire PRL system but who absolutely believes in the accuracy and believability of PRL documents.

These are data points, nothing more nothing less.

Of course he had contact with the SB what high profile figure in the PRL could avoid contact with the SB? It's in a lot of people's interest to 'prove' active collaboration of Wałęsa and the SB (ironically this is a case where ex-commies' and Kaczyński's interests dovetail though for different reasons).

Since I have no vested interest in seeing LW as either a blessed saint or a national traitor I don't especially care, he was important in ending the PRL and he deserves a lot of gratitude for that.

News / Poland to return to Catholic tradition? [177]


I'd say CONVINCE for each of those examples. I have nothing wrong with the church trying to CONVINCE people to follow their doctrines (or using whatever coercive power they have with their followers), I have a major problem of them wanting to use the coercive power of the state to make non-catholics follow specifically catholic doctrine (regarding things like abortion, in vitro etc). I also think mandatory religious lessons in public schools is immoral but it's also been a major tactical mistake as its actually driven many, many young people straight from the church...

Again, it's not just catholicism I feel the same way about all religions and varieties thereof. Do what you want in private (within the boundaries of individual rights) but don't try to boss other people around.

News / Poland to return to Catholic tradition? [177]


That is weird. I have no particular interest on the internal affairs of the catholic church as long as I'm left alone to be as non-catholic as I desire. this is pretty much my attitude towards all religions - practice them in private and stop trying to force others into observing your daddy issues.

Language / How well do Polish people understand Slovak? [88]


You mean pozor! and uwaga! (the Polish cognate of pozor is not pożar, but rather pozór - appearance (among other things) especially used in the expression 'pozory mylą' (appearances are deceptive).

Language / How well do Polish people understand Slovak? [88]


I mean "passively understand the general meaning" of even fairly official announcements without being able to do much actively besides speak Polish a little more slowly clearly than ussual and hope for the best.


Exactly.

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


She'll be dumped the second she's seen as a hindrance to the PiS leadership by disagreeing with JK about anything and/or developing a power base of her own (or if it just seems expedient for any other reason).

As long as she's compliant and is not her own woman she'll last in the job...

Language / How well do Polish people understand Slovak? [88]


probably the latter, partly because Slovaks are used to hearing different dialects of their own language on a daily basis (most Poles aren't) and they're used to Czech as well. They have broader reception skills.

IME Polish speakers can passively understand Slovak pretty well (though some of it sounds ridiculous because of the different meanings common roots have taken on).

As a non-native speaker of Polish I can understand some Slovak (was once on a project with a bunch of them - when they spoke together I understood most of the roots but couldn't put it together fast enough to really understand the content).

As for which to learn, Polish has a lot more speakers (about 6 times more) and so there will be more materials but Polish is less useful for learning other Slavic languages. Slovak will be harder to find materials for but it will be more helpful if you need to learn another slavic language (esp Czech, Polish or Ukrainian).

My advice is to start both and see which one takes your fancy more and/or look up some youtube videos (movies, audio books) and see which you like listening to more.

News / Poland to return to Catholic tradition? [177]


While those who support PiS and their whack-a-doodle policies are punished right here on earth (by getting just what they say they want and getting it good. and. hard.)

Love / Valentines Day & Polish men [130]


Genuine spirituality is personal and spontaneous and doesn't need a money-collecting institution telling people what to eat or how to live or who to love or a day set aside to collectively express it (or any building whatsoever).

I fail to see your point.

If mindless consumers didn't have VDay they'd find another thing to be silly about and spend money on. It's easier to ignore it rather than rant about it.

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


Didn't they have a chance already and royally screw things up? Why will things be better now?

UK, Ireland / The "Paracetamol Myth" - Polish people hesitate to visit UK doctors. [51]


I said as much but my friend was not calmed by this news (in his view the nurse was in danger of infecting anyone and anything they come into contact with and the idea of throwing the uniform in the family wash was kind of sickening to him).

UK, Ireland / The "Paracetamol Myth" - Polish people hesitate to visit UK doctors. [51]


It can and does happen anywhere, my point is that it's more likely to happen in a cultural setting where people think most patient complaints are probably trivial things that will work out themselves than in a place where anything out of the ordinary comes under immediate (often intense) scrutiny.

Side question for someone who knows Britain, do nurses wear their uniforms outside of the hospital? A friend (working in healthcare) was watching a British tv show in which a nurse arrived home in her uniform and was aghast at the lack of basic hygene (in Poland all medical personal change in and out of uniform at work).

UK, Ireland / The "Paracetamol Myth" - Polish people hesitate to visit UK doctors. [51]

do you have any evidence that the stories are untrue?

Perhaps the telegraph reporting same stories will reassure you, or probably not. If you simply don't want to believe then no evidence will suffice (rather like Smolensk to bring this back to Poland a bit).

telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1329487/Man-whose-cancer-doctors-missed-dies.html

telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/10866416/A-mother-of-four-died-after-doctors-misdiagnosed-her-cervical-cancer-30-times.html

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


My description (single process/event that hasn't ended yet but will) is a lot simpler and covers about 98% of the usage with bothering with stuff about present intent and the like.

(you would probably faint at my descriptions of Polish but they're effective).

UK, Ireland / The "Paracetamol Myth" - Polish people hesitate to visit UK doctors. [51]


Alas and alack, must take that back!

After about two whole seconds of googling....

dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2644019/Mother-four-33-died-doctors-missed-cancer-THIRTY-TIMES-blaming-nerve-pain-anxiety.html

dailymail.co.uk/health/article-44308/Cancer-missed-doctors.html

eveningtimes.co.uk/ne ws/13301027.Patient_died_after_doctors_missed_cancer_diagnosis/

mirror.co.uk/news/real-life-stories/why-are-cancer-signs-being-missed-three-1380806

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


My general rule, the present continuous describes events or processes that have an end point but which have not yet ended.

I'm reading an interesting book. (I've started but haven't finished)

I'm living in Brokesville now. (it's a temporary situation and I'll probably move)

I'm meeting George next week. (we haven't met yet).

What's interesting is that English doesn't have a clear equivalent of the simple present tense as it appears in almost all other European languages, as the English simple present is more gnomic or habitual tense, describing general things that happen more than once or that are generally true.

I read detective novels.

I live in Brokesville.

I meet George every Tuesday for coffee.

An underestimated difficulty for European learners is knowing what to do when they're thinking of their own simple present tense...