US President Barack Obama has won a victory in the House of Representatives, the weekly magazine The Economist writes, but adds that the health-care reform now needs the Senate's blessing and that will prove more difficult to attain: "The passage of the bill represented welcome news for Mr Obama. He was unable to escape some of the blame for the Democratic losses of governors' offices in New Jersey and Virginia earlier in the week and there were more gloomy figures on jobs. In the past the president's hands-off approach to health-care reform has raised pertinent questions about his leadership style, but, despite the narrow margin of victory, passing the bill marks solid progress and at last gives the Democrats something to cheer. A big question remains in the Senate, however, where the action will now lie. Republicans insist that the current legislation restricts individual choice, but it is conservative Democrats in the chamber who could do most damage to the hopes of the reformers. A narrow victory in the House is not necessarily a harbinger of success in the Senate.” (09/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Health Policy, » U.S.

The US healthcare reform bill has been passed by the House of Representatives thanks to a compromise reached on the issue of abortion. Nevertheless debate continues and is having grotesque spin-offs, writes the Neue Zürcher Zeitung: "The Democrats are being overtaken by a topic that divides America like no other: abortion. ... The debate on healthcare reform is now assuming alarming proportions, for example when right-wing protesters compare the reform with the Holocaust or say Obama is part of a global Jewish conspiracy. When this happened recently in front of Congress Republican representatives mingled among the crowd without distancing themselves from the lunatic slogans. This issue is of national significance and has major economic and political consequences, nevertheless the political class seems incapable of reforming this weak link in their society in a collected, level-headed way." (09/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Health Policy, » U.S.
All available articles from » Beat Ammann

The left-liberal daily To Vima says it can understand to a certain extent the negative reactions to US President Barack Obama's health care plan: "The reaction of those who have secured a comfortable position for themselves within the system of distribution of goods and rights is understandable. It was to be expected that entrepreneurs would worry about having to pay fines if they don't insure their employees. It's only natural that workers don't want to be integrated into a public insurance system when the concept of state institutions is foreign to them. The average, comfortably-situated US citizen asks why the state is forcing him to pay contributions [for health insurance]. Obama's response is an interesting comparison: it's unacceptable that car insurance is obligatory while a person's [health] insurance is not." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Health and Medicine, » U.S.
All available articles from » Laurie Keza

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has now decided to back the candidacy of British Foreign Secretary David Miliband for the post of EU Foreign Affairs Minister. According to the left-liberal daily La Repubblica this change of heart is down to Brown's fears that the UK could fail to achieve either of the two major EU posts: "Gordon Brown has realised that it was pointless to continue fighting for [ex-prime minister Tony] Blair's candidacy. … Furthermore Europe's two most important parties, the Conservatives and the Socialists, had long since made other arrangements for the distribution of the posts. The post of president is to go to the EEP [European People's Party] while the post of Foreign Affairs High Representative, who will also be the vice president of the EU executive, will go to a representative of the PES [Party of European Socialists]. … By insisting on Blair's candidacy the British ran the risk of losing out altogether." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » EU Constitution, » United Kingdom, » Europe
All available articles from » Andrea Bonanni

Approximately 15 months after the war in the Caucasus the Russian Duma has given its approval for Russian armed forces to be deployed abroad for the purposes of preventing piracy and protecting its own people. This legal basis for international deployments could however be abused, the conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung notes: "Under [this legislation] the armed forces could also be deployed to protect Russian citizens living abroad against armed attacks. Bearing in mind that Moscow first of all generously handed out Russian passports to the inhabitants of South Ossetia - which declared its independence from Georgia - and then sent its troops to help them, for those of Russia's neighbours with Russian population sections this law will be a source of concern rather than relief." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Security Policy / Crises / War, » Russia, » Global
All available articles from » Horst Bacia

Bulgaria's Minister of the Interior Zvetan Zvetanov has announced complex measures in the country's fight against corruption. The daily Dnevnik is sceptical: "The strategy … is supposed to show the EU how its recommendations are being put into practice. The news comes at precisely the right moment to put paid to the sinister intentions of those who want to take stock of the last 20 years by seeking the differences between the situation back then and the situation now. … According to the Interior Ministry its all-encompassing anti-corruption battle is aimed at restoring the citizens' trust in the state. For now, however, the citizens would be satisfied if there was an end to the current nepotism and they could see evidence of correct handling of [tendering procedures] for public services and contracts." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Europe, » Bulgaria

Jean-Dominique Giuliani, chairman of the Robert Schuman Foundation, and Joachim Bitterlich, former foreign policy advisor to Helmut Kohl, praise the political and economic relations between France and Germany in the daily Le Monde: "The stakes are high. Germany and France are the two foremost economic motors of the European continent. ... They embody a certain model of economic and social development ... that is envied right across to Asia. Our two states have the same weight on the international scene. They cannot accept that the future pillars of international relations should be decided without them regarding economic, financial, monetary, political and security matters. It's up to Germany and France to defend and promote this European model. The concertation between our two countries has already reached a level of confidence and consultation unparalleled across the world." (09/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Economic Policy, » Germany, » France
All available articles from » Joachim Bitterlich, » Jean-Dominique Giuliani

Commentator Niklas Ekdal writes in the authors' blog Newsmill on the generation of 89ers, those who have been strongly influenced by the events of 20 years ago: "With a bit of good will you could say that this revolution was a German thing and had nothing to do with us. Yet the conflict between democracy and Soviet communism was universal to the highest degree. There is a basic ideological difference between 1968 and 1989. And on an anniversary such as this such differences can't help spreading a mood of gloom. The student revolt was a utopian uprising, whereas the fall of the Wall was anti-utopian. Ultimately the escapist revolt [of 1968] exerted more appeal on people than the dismantling of the despotic and elitist castles in the air. That should be a lesson for the next generation of twenty-year-olds who want to overturn everything to build their own dream world." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Social movements, » History, » Sweden
All available articles from » Niklas Ekdal

Although Europe's history weighs down heavily upon it, the Europe of the future will be strong, self-confident and open, writes Literature Nobel Prize winner Imre Kertész in the cultural portal Litera: "The salvation of man, understood in the higher sense of the term, lies beyond his historical existence - not however in the avoidance of historical experiences, but on the contrary in living through them, in assimilating them, and in tragic identification with them. Only knowledge can raise man above history. ... A civilisation which does not clearly declare its values, or which leaves its declared values by the wayside, is on the path to collapse and decrepitude. ... We are abandoned to our own devices and we have neither heavenly nor earthly signposts to guide us. We must create our own values, day by day ... and ... inaugurate a new European culture. When I think of the Europe of the future, I see a strong self-assured Europe which is always ready to negotiate but which is not opportunistic. Let us not forget that Europe was born out of a heroic decision: when Athens resolved to oppose the Persians." (09/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » History, » Remembrance culture, » Europe
All available articles from » Imre Kertész

Only around eight percent of the management positions at Belgian firms are occupied by women, and politicians are beginning to consider the introduction of a fixed proportion of posts for women. This could be a way to tackle the problem of inbreeding among managers, the daily De Standaard writes: "It has been proven that companies with a diversified work force and management perform better than their counterparts [with homogenous work forces]. … Clever companies therefore take the initiative and aim for diversity on their management boards. If they don't sooner or later they will be forced to anyway. There is of course a third option, the Belgian option: They promise to take action and then do nothing. … This would enable the current managements to continue with their selection of clones for a while: men wearing the same suits, who attend the same management schools and all think the same way, … who go to the same clubs - inbreeding, as it were. And as we all know that leads to degeneration." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Corporations, » Gender equality, » Belgium
All available articles from » Guy Tegenbos

Charging stations for Electric cars are being introduced in Warsaw. Antoni Szumanowski, an expert on new drive systems at the Warsaw University of Technology, writes in the conservative daily Rzeczpospolita that electric cars have a lot going for them despite their inconveniences: "Of course they don't produce CO2 emissions. But the energy loaded in the battery has to be produced. And the power stations in which the energy is produced burn oil among other things, and emit CO2 [but less CO2 than cars]. ... Users must change their habits, and car manufacturers are slow in getting them to do that. We must drive slower and travel shorter distances. We must plan our way exactly before setting out. All of that means electric cars are the ideal solution for city driving." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Environmental Policy, » Energy, » Poland
All available articles from » Antoni Szumanowski

Sesame Street turns 40 today. Lucy Mangan praises the programme for its educational and entertainment value in the left-liberal daily The Guardian: "'Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Sesame Stree-ee-t, how to get to Sesame Street?' But of course I can! Just turn on your television set any time after 10 November 1969 and there it is – the slightly tatty New York thoroughfare peopled with an exuberant mix of fuzzy puppets from Jim Henson's near-magical workshop, flesh-and-blood adults and children from different races and ethnic backgrounds, all of which was designed to reflect for pretty much the first time the ... real lives of the vast majority of intended young viewers. ... [Sesame Street] was the first to understand and successfully exploit television as a teaching tool for children. Its popularity was immediate and lasting … among children and parents alike. It has been broadcast in more than 120 countries and must have informed and entertained children in their millions." (09/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Audiovisual Media, » United Kingdom
All available articles from » Lucy Mangan

November 26 is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Romanian-born author Eugène Ionesco who after emigrating to France became one of the country's most renowned post-war dramatists. The weekly Dilema Veche comments on the ongoing dispute over his nationality: "Only dreadful naivety or dumbness could lead one to believe that by the time Ionesco went to France as a 33-year-old Romania had not left its stamp on him and the cultural atmosphere of interwar Bucharest could have passed him by without leaving a trace. … The situation is clear with regard to the celebrated author. Through his work he rose to such heights that his biography no longer counts, that he can no longer be exclusively assigned to a particular cultural sphere, be it the conventional centre of the literary world or the end of the world." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Literature, » Stage, » France, » Romania
All available articles from » Lucia Terzea-Ofrim

In the Netherlands fears about the side effects of the swine flu vaccination are growing. But fear is a bad counsellor, the left-liberal daily De Volkskrant warns: "Scientific evidence is the best information available - gathered by researchers who work to very high standards. … Distrust against everything and everyone often goes hand in hand with the willingness to give credit to the most improbable explanations. In the past such stories were announced from the soapbox. Nowadays they are quickly spread over the Internet. It's good that citizens no longer take as gospel everything a person says who 'after all studied' the subject. But the democratisation of knowledge has its limits. Because most people are not in a position to judge for themselves whether the flu vaccination is safe or not. In the end it's all about trust. And in this case scientists deserve more trust than scared lay people or paranoid conspiracy theorists." (10/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Health and Medicine, » Netherlands, » Global

With an eye to the fall of the Berlin Wall 20 years ago the business paper La Tribune analyses how media and modern information technology pose a major challenge to authoritarian regimes: "If the citizens of the East decided to shake off the yoke that bound them it's because they knew - thanks notably to the television - that their governments were lying to them. ... Twenty years later the unbelievable development of intelligent forms of communication continues to protect us from the abuse of power. In communist China the Internet has truly changed political life. Today Mandarin is the most important language on the Web. 400 million inhabitants of the 'Middle Kingdom' exchange information and read on the Internet under real but very imperfect surveillance. ... In Iran too, during the last anti-government demonstrations the Internet was used ... to mobilise the opponents of [President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad." (09/11/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Audiovisual Media, » Online media, » Global
All available articles from » François Lenglet