Oh damn…
Here’s the speech:
The Grauniad speculates that it’s political fallout from the failed referendums but I don’t think it is. The other main party in the coalition has since come out to say (individually) that they didn’t campaign for them and in fact voted against them. His party were pretty muted on it. It’s something different. I don’t want to speculate as I would have no insight at all into his party or their workings. Strangers in a strange land.
The Grauniad notes that all the EU jobs are selected anyway and von der Leyen is going up for re-election. It would be nice if their parliamentary grouping instead went with Varadkar as, whatever else he stands for (right wing economics), I do believe that he has a very different perspective on the persecution of Palestinian people than mainland European right wingers.
Russian news reports said that the assailants threw explosives, triggering a massive blaze at the Crocus City Hall on the western edge of Moscow. Video posted on social media showed huge plumes of black smoke rising over the building.
Update Ukraine
ISIS claims responsibility for attack in busy Moscow-area concert venue that left at least 60 dead
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/22/europe/crocus-moscow-shooting/index.html
“ All suspects detained and attackers tried to escape towards Ukraine, Putin says
Vladimir Putin has started speaking, calling last night’s shooting a “bloody and barbaric terrorist attack” and saying that those involved tried to escape and cross into Ukraine.
“All four direct perpetrators of the terrorist attack, all those who shot and killed people, were found and detained,” he says.
“They tried to hide and moved towards Ukraine, where, according to preliminary data, a window was prepared for them on the Ukrainian side to cross the state border,” he claims.
Ukraine has strongly denied any involvement.
A total of 11 people were detained, the president adds - with security services saying earlier that the other seven arrested were accomplices.”
Last I saw on the Guardian, that’s now up to 133… this fucking awful… those poor people. 
And it looks like Putin is going to use it as an excuse to double down on the fucking war…
Reasonably a terrorist attack would be a sign that your government is not protecting you properly, especially if it turns out they were forewarned. But authoritarians love to twist them into support for their wars, even if the countries are unrelated. America has been there, and it’s part of why ISIS exists in the first place. Kudos I guess to Israelis for not rallying behind Netanyahu after his spectacular failure, though it hasn’t stopped him yet… 
Here’s his replacement, apparently…
Latin America tour:
ETA
ETA
ETA
Generally this vitriolic rhetoric is used during the campaign, to attract more radical voters and show that they are different from the other candidates. Usually this blah blah blah is gradually abandoned because the real world is a little more complex than fifth grade student relations. But it seems that this strategy is working in Argentina.
