Elections 2024: America debates … Algeria, Venezuela

A sigh of relief heard round the world … Debate headlines and commentary … Algeria elects a president (no surprise) … Venezuela's elected president flees.

Continuing our pledge at Andelman Unleashed to report and comment on every national election everywhere in the world, this week we are examining as the world watched a debate to end all debates… and more.

Kamala Harris takes the upper hand over Donald Trump in a bitter debate

The Democrat repeatedly Destabilized the Republican who unchained lies

Across the world, the operative grade for Donald Trump Tuesday night was D, or at times an E, even an F.

London / BBC: Defensive

London / The Times: Flailing

Paris / Le Point: Electrifies (Kamala)

Munich / Süddeutsche Zeitung: Embarrassing

Frankfurt / Frankfurter Allgemeine:  Doom (& Gloom)

Warsaw / Wyborcza:  Defensive

Tel Aviv / Haaretz:  Defensive

Cairo / Al Ahram:  Extreme, Fiery

In a performance that earned her the endorsement of pop superstar Taylor Swift, the Democrat clashed with the "extreme" Republican on hot-button issues from abortion to democracy and accused him of being a friend to dictators.

Jakarta / Kompas: Falls

Sydney (Australia) / Sydney Morning Herald: Sashimi

And then there were the outliers …..

Budapest, Hungary:  Magyar Nemzet

Viktor Orban's house organ could hardly refrain from highlighting Donald Trump's mindless praise of Europe's most toxic dictator as a model for his own second term leading America.

But it was Taylor Swift who ultimately stole the show

Turin (Italy) /  La Stampa

And then there's Ukraine

While neither Russia's Pravda nor China's People's Daily carried a line about the debate, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov couldn't resist…and in Kyiv, the daily Ukrainska Pravda couldn't resist the opportunity to put it all in context:

Dmitry Peskov, the spokesperson for Russian ruler Vladimir Putin, has commented on the debate between the US presidential candidates, saying that Russia does not like that Vladimir Putin's name is used "as a tool in the US domestic political struggle".

Quote: "The name Putin is being used as, let's say, one of the tools in the internal political struggle in the United States, and we don't like it, and we still hope that they will leave the name of our president alone."

Details: Peskov also added that "the United States in general, no matter what party the candidates are from, maintains a negative attitude, an unfriendly attitude towards our country."

Background:

·                Donald Trump evaded answering whether he wanted Ukraine to win the war during the debate.

·                Kamala Harris said that if Trump had been president in recent years, rather than Biden, it would have been a disaster for Ukraine and Eastern Europe.

On Russian news agency Interfax, Peskov elaborated on the Putin perspective:

Peskov stressed that the Kremlin had no opportunity to follow the debates, since they were held at night according to Moscow time. "But in the morning, of course, we saw news reports with various statements that were made during these debates," he said.

At the same time, the Kremlin noted that both candidates mentioned the Russian president and Russia, he added.

Speaking about the debates themselves, he stressed that the American voters should give an assessment. "Otherwise, it's probably all the American voters' concern, it's up to them to assess their candidates, not us, we have our own concerns, our own achievements and our own problems," Peskov said.

Not like Russian intelligence isn't already doing its best to have its thumbs heavily on the scales in America.

Meanwhile, in other Elections

Algeria has a winner, sort of…

Some observers called the reelection of Abdelmadjid Tebboune, 78, as president questionable, with the Spanish website Atalayar going perhaps the furthest:

In fact, Tebboune won the contest, if you can believe the result, with some 95% of the vote, two opponents dividing the final 5%. The big question, though, was the turnout. France 24 explained:

While Tebboune's re-election was certain, his main focus was to boost voter participation in Saturday's poll after a record-low abstention rate of over 60% percent in 2019….After polling stations closed this time, the state election authority ANIE had announced an "average rate" of 48% but called it "provisional".

In an unprecedented move, however, all three campaigns -- including Tebboune's -- issued a joint statement alleging "irregularities" in ANIE's results, adding they wanted to make the public aware of "vagueness and contradictions in the participation figures".

"The president has been keen to have a significant turnout," Hasni Abidi, an Algeria analyst at the Geneva-based CERMAM Study Center, told AFP. "It's his main issue," adding Tebboune's win was "a victory that looks like a warning." He pointed to the incumbent's failure to win over young people, who represent half of Algeria's 45-million-strong population.

As a result, Abidi added, the re-elected president has been "weakened".

Amnesty International said Algerian authorities were continuing to "stifle civic space by maintaining a severe repression of human rights". Five years after the Hirak protest movement, Algeria has seen "new arbitrary arrests", while authorities maintain "a zero tolerance approach to dissenting opinions", it said.

Venezuela….talk about zero tolerance

In fact, President Nicolas Maduro doesn't have to worry about zero tolerance at all. His opponent, who most of the world recognizes as the actual winner of last month's presidential election—if you could call it that—has fled to Spain. Indeed, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who held nothing back, wasted no time condemning the forces that led to Edmundo González Urrutia’s decision to leave Venezuela:

Edmundo González Urrutia remains an indisputable voice for peace and democratic change in Venezuela. His message of a democratic restoration in Venezuela has inspired the hopes and aspirations of the Venezuelan people and resulted in a powerful call for change in the July 28 presidential election. His departure from Venezuela is the direct result of the anti-democratic measures that Nicolás Maduro has unleashed on the Venezuelan people, including against González Urrutia and other opposition leaders, since the election.

On July 28, the Venezuelan people overwhelmingly and unequivocally expressed their desire for democratic change. The election results and the will of the people cannot be merely swept aside by Maduro and the Venezuelan electoral authorities. We stand with González Urrutia in his call to continue the struggle for liberty and the restoration of democracy in Venezuela.

The United States strongly condemns Maduro’s decision to use repression and intimidation to cling to power by brute force rather than acknowledge his defeat at the polls. In the past six weeks, Maduro has unjustly arrested nearly two thousand Venezuelans, used censorship and threats to silence opposition to his rule, and violated Venezuelan laws to remain in power against the will of the Venezuelan people.

Urrutia headed to Spain where El País explained the situation:

The candidate who, according to a large part of the international community, won the presidential elections on July 28 against the Chavista president, Nicolás Maduro, had been taking refuge in the Dutch Embassy in Caracas, the country's capital, and in recent days he spoke with Spain to find a way out of the difficult situation he found himself in, diplomatic sources told El País. Pursued by the Venezuelan prosecutor's office and fearing for his life and that of his family, González Urrutia decided to leave Venezuela on Saturday night. In an audio broadcast to the media by his coalition, the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD), the opposition leader confirmed his arrival in Madrid and explained that his departure from Caracas "was surrounded by pressure, coercion and threats" to prevent his departure.

 According to the Dutch government in a letter to its Parliament, the opposition candidate remained sheltered in its embassy in the Venezuelan capital until last Thursday when he moved to the residence of the Spanish ambassador. Former president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero played a key role in the negotiations….

[Urrutia] decided to seek asylum in Spain with his wife to avoid the prison that most likely awaited him. Spain is not offering it to anyone, but if there are more applications it will accept them. 100,000 Venezuelans have already taken advantage of a special regime for them put in place by Spain due to the tensions in the country.