The Unstoppable Rise of Polish Democracy and PiS's Fatal Mistake

As a Pole I follow this so closely as it's a part of my personal life but for some reason I still am excited to listen to your commentary 😆

I'ma be real with you: this is the first time I actually realized that Lech and Jarosław weren't the same person.

Impressive work, great understanding of the Polish politics, which is usually missing among Western commentators, publicists, even scholars.

IIRC from history classes, Poland's democratic roots go back further than the Commonwealth. Sometime in the 1200's the king's council persuaded (forced?) him to sign an agreement stipulating that his council could veto his decisions if a large enough majority (3/4?) disagreed with him. I recall that the king's decision to invite the Knights of the Cross to come in and handle the Prusi was a major factor in this but I don't remember exactly how.

This comment was a response but I think it may also be in the main thread because I put too much effort into it. It's a perspective of a conservative Pole to why PiS didn't get a 3rd term. I also list my personal issues with the party. If you read carefully you can differentiate between my personal opinions and description of public mood. So why did PiS lose, when in 2019 they had over 40% support? It started with covid, they introduced stupid policies like banning people from going to forest, put severe restrictions, broke constitution as health minister can't just overwrite civil liberties, they didn't introduce state of emergency, didn't pass nessecary legislation in parliament, it was all done by health minister who could decide wherever you can leave your house or not, wear a mask or not. Police had authority to judge if you left your house for a nessecary reason. For example, when I went joggin back then, I took a bag to pretend I went shopping if police stopped me. I met my friends in the middle of the forest, we couldn't show up together in urban areas. There was big mess with vaccines, medical equipment, minister paid millions of dollars to his wife's ski instructor "for covid purposes". They bought respirators from a f*cking arms dealer in Africa and then were shocked when they didn't arrive. In July 2020 Morawiecki announced we "have beaten coronavirus and we don't have to fear it not more" just to close everything again on autumn, after presidential election. At the same time they changed abortion law. Since the 90's abortion was illegal unless a woman was raped, it endangered her life or the fetus was damaged. Under the new law women had to give birth to damaged fetus, sometimes doctors missed when it became a danger for a woman's life so some of them died. It angered lots of people and sparked mass protests in 2020. Since then PiS support never reached 40%. Later many corruption scandals caught up with them. Inflation was at the highest since 90's, partially because of dumb policy of central bank and overspending on social programs. For example PiS wasted 60 million on election that didn't happen, spied on opposition with pegasus, gave their people mansions, etc. Meanwhile Tusk came back, solidified PO and people forgot about faults of his previous govt. Right before the election there was a visa scandal where PiS officials were caught on selling Polish visas for bribes and also accused of uncontrolled migration. Tusk played almost a nationalist who wants to protect borders from PiS incompetence. He also promised people not to take migrants from EU while still reparing relation and some believed him I guess. In Poland people have a rosy view of EU and think of it as the rich, free, capitalist west that defeated USSR and wants to share it's prosperity with Poland. Also as a rich daddy that gives us money for free. And those who are mad about ecological stuff rather vote for Konfederacja as PiS quietly agreed for fit for 55 and everything else. The main conflict with the EU was rule of law in Poland which they indeed f*cked up by appointing judges unconstitutionally. Meanwhile they couldn't defend real Polish interests in EU, making them ineffective. They got played by the commission, agreeing to link funds to rule of law, as a result Poland got no money from Covid renewal funds while bearing the responsibility of paying this debt. To give credit PiS for some things, I think they made some good investments, especially in energy sector. They tried to strengthen the army, even if it was very late. They responded to Belarussian immigration crisis properly. They responded well to the outbreak of Ukrainian war. They aren't woke, funded Polish culture instead of LGBT. They cooperated well with local partners and the US, had some vision of Polish international politics. They didn't allow illegal migrants into Poland, though gave away too many visas without a thought. Their faults (in my opinion) were overspending on social programs, corruption scandals, damaging rule of law, f*cking up taxation with "Polish deal", it's so messy right now. Breaking constitution and civil liberties, especially during covid. Turning state TV into Polish version of KCTV and spending billions of it. Ineffective EU policy, wolf warrior diplomacy when they screamed a lot but bent over in many crucial areas. But 'm afraid Tusk's goverment might be even worse. It appears he won't fix what PiS broke but tear down what PiS did right. But only time will tell. Right now I support Konfederacja, they are deeply flawed but all parties are and we must choose lesser evil.

Writer of the script here, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed researching and writing it (plus watching the final thing)

Love learning about such an important country

Well done 👏

Once again, stellar research way above any other foreign sources looking into Polish internal affairs. Now the biggest challenge I expect from the current government is make most of the institution demicratic and independent from any rulling goverment including themselves, perhaps there is a need for some mixed comities rulling over media and such? I don't know, the challange is pretty tremendous and I doubt they will succeed.

Interesting video.

Funny the way the comments from Polish viewers gives one an even deeper picture. Excellent video

Lech is pronounced Leh No idea why you spelled Jarosław like that

hi a polish person here, as much as I am glad to see foreginers talking aabout our situation and what's going oo in Poland, it's clear to me that you didn't talk to any polish people when making this video even just to ask how to correctly pronounce the names of the people you are speaking about, also a tip for the future, cause you might have not known (I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt here) but "gender ideology" is a term that dehumanises trans and nonbinary folk and is a tool used by conservatives and the right wing to convince people that we (trans person here) are an ideology and not people who deserve equal rights

❤❤❤❤❤ ❤❤❤

One important thing - 1989 elections were not really free, 300 out of 460 seats were given to the communist party and its allies, while only 160 remaining seats were contested. The Senate elections had all 100 seats contested, but Senate is less important than Sejm (equivalent to the HoC (UK)/HoR (USA)

I wholeheartedly agree with Kaczinsky‘s animal rights bill.

We will see just hope they dont go the same way as my Sweden

A very well reaserched and made video. Though there is one thing i think should be addressed, don't translate or transliterate names and surnames. And since, understandabely, it's hard for you to pronounce polish, maybe try using tools to pronounce it for you. Because it May lead non-polish speakers to get a false sense of polish pronounciation

The tittle is beyond childish and ridicilous. Both parties PO and PIS are very very similar in most matters, promises broken weeks after elections, total opposite moves than presented during the elections, devastating corruption, politicly taken and totally dependent media and justice systems, party brownnoses being pushed into every chair avaible anywhere possible, working against national interest to please this or that foregin institution and so on and so forth. The problem in Poland is not that democracy won, becouse democracy always wins, but the fact that both parties are doing exact same things, the problem in Poland is that pepole vote for the same faces, the same two parties that screw pepole time and again but somehow the population belive that this time they won't get fucked over. And they already are being fucked over with new taxes, totaly one sided media propaganda that even a lot of left wing pepole are disqusted with, scandals with new legislatures written by lobbists and PO officials that can't recall how their signature even appeared on it after one day... How can anyone take such one sisded video as anything ealse than someones wishful thinking of reality. Seriously, this must have been made by die hard PO fanatic. I really hope you will get profesional next time.

There are some mistakes here. Liberum veto wasn't initially created because of Lithuanians for example. And it's weird mentioning Kaczyński brothers' career in anticommunist opposition but failing to mention Tusk's participation in it. Tusk was jailed by communists and thrown out of university - he had to work as a blue collar worker till the communism ended. Meanwhile Jarosław wasn't jailed by communists and did a PhD on Marxism during that time. I'd say it's pretty obvious Kaczyńscy were less important in early Solidarity or at least the communist regime perceived it like that.