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benjamin novak

@bnovak.bsky.social
748 followers 142 following 47 posts

used to ✍️ about Hungary for nyt, SAIS alum — bnovak@protonmail.com

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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 02/03/2026
Join Amnesty Intl's David Vig and me in Washington DC for a chat on Hungary ahead of April’s elections! We’ll discuss how Hungarians are approaching it and what HU can teach countries where human rights and rule of law are at risk. 📅 March 4, 3PM 📍 GMF, 1744 R St NW RSVP: ssiemek@gmfus.org
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 11/02/2026
Mike Johnson in 2024: A man is a man, and a woman is a woman. And a man cannot become a woman. Mike Johnson in 2026:
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 07/11/2025
Trump and Orban will meet at the White House today. David Pressman, former US Ambassador to the UN Security Council and Hungary, explains what Orban is doing in Washington, and offers a very strong take on what Trump and Orban really have in common. time.com/7332003/vikt...
time.com
Viktor Orbán and Donald Trump’s Attacks on Independence
Independence is "fundamental to the health of any democracy—and it has been systematically dismantled in Hungary."
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 25/10/2025
media.tenor.com
a man with a mustache is sitting in a chair smiling .
ALT: a man with a mustache is sitting in a chair smiling .
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Kim Zetter @kimzetter.bsky.social · 23/07/2025
Former US ambassador to Hungary: "After years watching Hungary suffocate under the weight of its democratic collapse, I came to understand that the real danger of a strongman isn’t his tactics; it’s how others, especially those with power, justify their acquiescence." (h/t @bnovak.bsky.social)
nytimes.com
Opinion | I Watched It Happen in Hungary. Now It’s Happening Here.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 10/06/2025
Szabolcs Vörös is one of a handful of HU journos whose UA reporting provides a critical public service to Hungarians living in Orbán’s disinfo echo chamber Here’s his interview w Zelenskyy — the first w a HU journo since RU’s invasion began over 1,200 days ago www.valaszonline.hu/2025/06/10/v...
valaszonline.hu
“Viktor is making a historic mistake.” An exclusive interview with President Zelenskyy | Válasz Online
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 16/05/2025
Absolutely great news!!!
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 17/12/2024
A prize well deserved! George is a great guy. A true honor to know him. If you’re interested in Hungarian literature, I highly recommend picking up one of George’s many translations.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 15/12/2024
Christmas jazz. Fire in the fireplace. Kiddos playing with legos. Adults playing Rummy. Leberkäse.
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Chris Bing @chrisbing.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
Some personal news: I am very excited to be joining ProPublica as an investigative reporter covering national security and technology starting in January.
buff.ly
ProPublica Hires Three Veteran Journalists to Join DC bureau
ProPublica is an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 25/11/2024
In the rust belt of north-eastern Hungary, a new economy is thriving – one built on human blood. www.theguardian.com/world/2024/n...
theguardian.com
Hungary’s most deprived people donate blood plasma to survive – photo essay
The documentary photographer Béla Váradi spent months photographing the lives of people who see plasma donation as a way to get by
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 23/11/2024
Fascinating investigation. www.volexity.com/blog/2024/11...
volexity.com
The Nearest Neighbor Attack: How A Russian APT Weaponized Nearby Wi-Fi Networks for Covert Access
In early February 2022, notably just ahead of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Volexity made a discovery that led to one of the most fascinating and complex incident investigations Volexity had ever w...
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
First fire of the season
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
Let it be known that I invited @kalmantibs.bsky.social here well over a year ago. He politely declined and said he wouldn’t give up fighting the good fight at the other place just yet. Glad to see him here today. His presence on social media doesn’t do him justice. Great guy if there ever was one.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
It’s the little things in life… Had the boys (6 and 2) join me in the living room for a pre-bedtime screening of Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf narrated by David Bowie. They loved it. What a pleasant experience. youtu.be/Va8Uz6MoKLg?...
youtu.be
David Bowie Narrates Disney's Peter And The Wolf (Full)
YouTube video by Lucy Whiskers
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 13/11/2024
Prediction: The next Surgeon General of the United States
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 13/11/2024
“The Black Death was therefore a rare event, ‘with only one generally accepted precursor and no equivalent successor’. Belich has revisions to make to the traditional account. . . .Belich’s answer inculpates the humble gerbil.“ www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Tom Shippey · Blame the gerbils: After the Plague
In The World the Plague Made James Belich has a hard case to make, and a somewhat heartless one: that the Black Death...
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 24/10/2024
What does the 2017 “Unite the Right” protest in Charlottesville have in common with Hungarian embassy in Washington? www.szabadeuropa.hu/a/amerikai-m...
szabadeuropa.hu
Szélsőjobboldali fiatalt alkalmaz a washingtoni magyar nagykövetség, feladata az egyeztetés a trumpistákkal
A 29 éves amerikai tüntetett a fehér felsőbbrendűségért, és kapcsolatban volt Magyarországon is ismert fajvédővel. Ma már a CPAC-re jár, és Magyarországnak dolgozik a washingtoni nagykövetségen, felad...
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 11/01/2024
Shoutout to the heroes who donate obscure old books to libraries.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 30/11/2023
Yes, Orban does plan to create a yet another agency to secretly investigate and dox the regime's critics. But while ppl whine about "rule of law" and "rights," they lose focus of progress elsewhere, e.g. Scythians are close to being recognized as a national minority and getting a seat in parliament.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 25/11/2023
Anna Vinnitskaya’s performance of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Budapest Festival Orchestra this evening was mesmerizing
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 23/11/2023
Orbán’s keeping busy. (Kudos to @hungarianhelsinki.bsky.social for the translation) helsinki.hu/en/wp-conten...
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Eugene Finkel @efinkel.bsky.social · 21/11/2023
www.nybooks.com/online/2023/...
nybooks.com
An Open Letter on the Misuse of Holocaust Memory | Omer Bartov
We the undersigned are scholars of the Holocaust and antisemitism from different institutions. We write to express our dismay and disappointment at
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 16/11/2023
The “Cyprus model,” a giant conveyor belt for Russian wealth to the West located in an EU member state Great story from Dean Starkman www.icij.org/investigatio...
icij.org
How Cyprus rose to become the beating heart of the Putin regime’s shadow financial system - ICIJ
Russia dominated the island’s banking system under the watch of the European Union.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 02/11/2023
This post claims Hungarians have been putting lights in carved pumpkins since 1081. Hard to see how this is true. Pumpkins and squash are native to the Americas. Hungarians would have had to find a way to procure them from the New World hundreds of years before Columbus got there.
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Chris Carothers @chriscarothers.bsky.social · 20/10/2023
New article out! I discuss how autocrats often exploit natural language barriers to say racist and xenophobic things at home while playing to an international audience... www.americanpurpose.com/articles/the...
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 18/10/2023
Still trying to wrap my head around Orbán’s body language during his meeting with Putin in Beijing yesterday youtu.be/AE4ReW3euME?...
youtu.be
Russian President Putin meets with Hungarian Prime Minister Orban
Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Beijing, the capital of China, where he came to attend the international f...
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 16/10/2023
It was a pleasure to moderate a panel on the challenges of redemocratization at the Budapest Forum last week. Spoiler: it takes effort Zagreb mayor Tomislav Tomašević's unexpected zinger had me chuckling on stage. He has no problem with people calling him a hippie, just don't call him a hipster.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 03/10/2023
In 2019, I asked my grandfather to put the story of his life on paper. He did it all — from handwritten notes to 29 carefully-edited Word docs. He even made mp3s of his voice as he read them aloud. He died a few days ago, one month shy of his 90th birthday. What a tremendous gift he left us.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 28/09/2023
Hungarian lawyer Daniel Karsai is 46 years old. He specializes in constitutional law and human rights. Daniel is also terminally ill. He was diagnosed with ALS last year and can no longer care for himself. He wants to shorten his life before it comes too unbearable, but that's illegal in Hungary.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 26/07/2023
Visited Castello di Miramare today. I spotted Andrey Melnichenko’s $600 million “Sailing Yacht A,” which Italians authorities seized last March when the EU sanctioned a bunch of Russian oligarchs. Maintaining the seized vessel reportedly requires a crew of 24, and costs about $900k per month.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 11/07/2023
Beautiful morning in Budapest
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 07/07/2023
Sitting across the room from someone who just wrote some code, tested it, jumped up and excitedly gave me a lecture about the beauty of crisp code and program optimization, then concluded with how this honors his German heritage.
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 02/07/2023
In-laws: “Don’t buy her a new bike. We still have the one she rode as a teenager. It’s in the garage.” Wife: “I loved that bike.” Me: 🕵️‍♂️ The tire on the bike: “MADE IN CZECHOSLOVAKIA”
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 28/06/2023
"The one intriguing exception to this in the data is Hungary" s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trac…
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 28/06/2023
Ist er für Sie ein Kriegsverbrecher? Orban: „Nein. Für mich nicht.“ www.bild.de/politik/ausland/politik…
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 22/06/2023
1995 edition of THE English-language phone book in Budapest AMADEUS RESTAURANT Excellent food, lousy service
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 22/06/2023
When you're a mercenary for the Confederation of Bar and Russians keep capturing you, so you commandeer a supply-ship sailing from Okhotsk when the crew and captain get drunk, then make a break for the "coast of Korea" but don't have a compass so you try iron and garlic and still end up in Kamchatka
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benjamin novak @bnovak.bsky.social · 21/06/2023
A bittersweet evening in Budapest. We celebrated the Swedish Midsummer, reflected on the achievements of Sweden's soon-to-end EU Presidency, and bid farewell to Dag Hartelius, Sweden's ambassador to Budapest. RU's war in UA and SE's pending NATO accession cast a long shadow.
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