Word: polished
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Outside Poland the Kaczynskis are often portrayed as figures of fun, a duo of unprepossessing country bumpkins who govern by sentiment and sanctimony. They have been pilloried for their obstinate defense of Polish interests in Brussels and for their seeming paranoia about enemies at home. But the PIS is no joke, and it would be a mistake to underestimate its domestic appeal, which is rooted in widespread anxiety about the blistering pace of change since the fall of communism in 1989. Many Poles feel that change was forced on them by corrupt, distant and overeducated leaders. "There is a huge...
...foreign service; Jaroslaw says he needs four more years to root out the uklad. Pawel Zalewski, a senior PIS official, likens the effort to the French purge of Nazi collaborators after liberation in 1944. "It's a question of security and trust at home and abroad," he told TIME. Polish social historian Adam Mielczarek observes that the PIS appeals to ordinary Poles in the same way that the Solidarity movement did in the early 1980s: by telling them "that there is a problem of élites ruling the country...
...Solidarity enhanced Poland's image abroad, while the twins' style has bruised it. Their insistence on defending Polish interests with no apparent regard for a broader European vision has frustrated negotiating partners, most notably in ongoing talks over the shape of a new European constitution. "They don't know the rules of the game," says Stephen Bastos, an analyst with the German Council on Foreign Relations. "They don't have a vision of the kind of Europe they want to promote." The twins' combativeness has also left Polish society deeply polarized. Lech Walesa, the Solidarity leader, Nobel laureate and former...
From fiddling to singing, the music of “Republic of Dreams” is touchingly mellifluous. Jacek Ostaszewski, a world-renowned Polish composer, composed the musical parts for the different actors, which are sensibly reminiscent of Schulz’s past and present. The vocal performance of Hayley Brown as Bianca, Schulz’s love interest, is especially outstanding...
...former trade unionist and Polish President Lech Walesa is the city of Gdansk's most famous son, then its second-most famous progeny is probably the Nobel Laureate German writer Gunter Grass. Grass, of course, was born in Danzig, as Gdansk was known before it reverted to Poland at the end of World War II. And while Walesa became internationally renowned for leading the shipyard strike that led to the formation of the Solidarity trade union and proved to be a decisive blow in the collapse of Polish communism, Grass was honored for his passionate and clear-eyed excoriation...