The Great Nordic Thread
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Question: Will Iceland and Norway ever join the EU?
#1
Iceland, but not Norway
 
#2
Norway, but not Iceland
 
#3
Both
 
#4
None of them
 
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Total Voters: 178

Author Topic: The Great Nordic Thread  (Read 201055 times)
swl
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« Reply #300 on: July 15, 2014, 01:16:48 PM »

A 36-year-old prime minister would be pretty damn impressive. Would probably be the youngest Head of Government of a democratic country?
The new Estonian prime minister is even younger. The three newest heads of government in the EU are Renzi (Italy, 39yo), Taavi Roivas (Estonia, 34yo) and Stubb (Finland, 46yo).

We'll probably have to wait the autumn to know whether Helle gets the job at the EU though.
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Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese
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« Reply #301 on: July 15, 2014, 01:58:21 PM »

A 36-year-old prime minister would be pretty damn impressive. Would probably be the youngest Head of Government of a democratic country?
The new Estonian prime minister is even younger. The three newest heads of government in the EU are Renzi (Italy, 39yo), Taavi Roivas (Estonia, 34yo) and Stubb (Finland, 46yo).

We'll probably have to wait the autumn to know whether Helle gets the job at the EU though.

She's apperently the prefered candidate of Merkel, Renzi, and Cameron. (selfie-buddies)
It wouldn't surprise me if it isn't made official until the autumn, but it's pretty clear that she will get a new ridiculously high salary to buy all the fashionables she has ever dream of, and Denmark will get a new likable Prime Minister.  
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ingemann
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« Reply #302 on: July 15, 2014, 02:14:32 PM »

A 36-year-old prime minister would be pretty damn impressive. Would probably be the youngest Head of Government of a democratic country?
The new Estonian prime minister is even younger. The three newest heads of government in the EU are Renzi (Italy, 39yo), Taavi Roivas (Estonia, 34yo) and Stubb (Finland, 46yo).

We'll probably have to wait the autumn to know whether Helle gets the job at the EU though.

She's apperently the prefered candidate of Merkel, Renzi, and Cameron. (selfie-buddies)
It wouldn't surprise me if it isn't made official until the autumn, but it's pretty clear that she will get a new ridiculously high salary to buy all the fashionables she has ever dream of, and Denmark will get a new likable Prime Minister.  

If HTS was after a high paycheck she would not be PM of Denmark. She's in it for the power, as such I have no doubt that she will take the job as President of the European Council, if it's offered to her. But to suggest it's over money is both ignorant and silly. 
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change08
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« Reply #303 on: July 15, 2014, 02:16:15 PM »

A 36-year-old prime minister would be pretty damn impressive. Would probably be the youngest Head of Government of a democratic country?
The new Estonian prime minister is even younger. The three newest heads of government in the EU are Renzi (Italy, 39yo), Taavi Roivas (Estonia, 34yo) and Stubb (Finland, 46yo).

We'll probably have to wait the autumn to know whether Helle gets the job at the EU though.

She's apperently the prefered candidate of Merkel, Renzi, and Cameron. (selfie-buddies)
It wouldn't surprise me if it isn't made official until the autumn, but it's pretty clear that she will get a new ridiculously high salary to buy all the fashionables she has ever dream of, and Denmark will get a new likable Prime Minister.  

If HTS was after a high paycheck she would not be PM of Denmark. She's in it for the power, as such I have no doubt that she will take the job as President of the European Council, if it's offered to her. But to suggest it's over money is both ignorant and silly. 

Why would Cameron want HTS?
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Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese
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« Reply #304 on: July 15, 2014, 02:37:20 PM »
« Edited: July 15, 2014, 02:41:28 PM by Swedish Cheese »

If HTS was after a high paycheck she would not be PM of Denmark. She's in it for the power, as such I have no doubt that she will take the job as President of the European Council, if it's offered to her. But to suggest it's over money is both ignorant and silly. 

Are you trying to channel Frank Underwood?

I'm pretty sure she won't mind either the power or having a salary higher than Obama. Mostly of course she will take the job because staying on as PM would (most likely) lead to her being thrown out next-year, and quitting while ahead by taking a secure guaranteed power position for five years is preferable to humiliation at the ballot box. I too would prefer being the President of the European Council to being leader of opposition in the Folketing salary or no salary.




I don't know. But it's pretty clear he does want her in a top EU-position.

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And before Council President he was touting her as an alternative to Juncker.

No. 10 backs wife of Kinnock's son for top EU-post.

 
 
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ingemann
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« Reply #305 on: July 15, 2014, 02:45:13 PM »

A 36-year-old prime minister would be pretty damn impressive. Would probably be the youngest Head of Government of a democratic country?
The new Estonian prime minister is even younger. The three newest heads of government in the EU are Renzi (Italy, 39yo), Taavi Roivas (Estonia, 34yo) and Stubb (Finland, 46yo).

We'll probably have to wait the autumn to know whether Helle gets the job at the EU though.

She's apperently the prefered candidate of Merkel, Renzi, and Cameron. (selfie-buddies)
It wouldn't surprise me if it isn't made official until the autumn, but it's pretty clear that she will get a new ridiculously high salary to buy all the fashionables she has ever dream of, and Denmark will get a new likable Prime Minister.  

If HTS was after a high paycheck she would not be PM of Denmark. She's in it for the power, as such I have no doubt that she will take the job as President of the European Council, if it's offered to her. But to suggest it's over money is both ignorant and silly. 

Why would Cameron want HTS?

Pro-British politician from a country outside the Eurozone which tradional (before the British began to behave like raving lunatics) was one of usual allies of UK in EU. Yes she's more pro-Labour than Tory, but with the choices Cameron have limited himself to in EU, she's the best he can get.
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ingemann
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« Reply #306 on: July 15, 2014, 02:56:55 PM »

If HTS was after a high paycheck she would not be PM of Denmark. She's in it for the power, as such I have no doubt that she will take the job as President of the European Council, if it's offered to her. But to suggest it's over money is both ignorant and silly. 

Are you trying to channel Frank Underwood?

I don't channel anything, but any politician who have made it to the first row in one of the big traditional parties, could make more in the private sector or in one of the union affiliated companies (like the big pension companies).

Also anyone who have followed her career can see she's a ruthless career politicians.

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Except I would say that right now, if she's not elected President of the Council, her chance to be reelected are rather high as the government. She can more or less just wait for the next scandal in Venstre. It doesn't look like there are any negative surprises in the economy, the unemplyment are falling, the economy are growth. So right now it's a waiting game, to see what skeletons are hiding in LLR's closet.
 
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Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese
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« Reply #307 on: July 15, 2014, 03:27:01 PM »

Also anyone who have followed her career can see she's a ruthless career politicians.

Oh, that part, I wouldn't question for a second.

Except I would say that right now, if she's not elected President of the Council, her chance to be reelected are rather high as the government. She can more or less just wait for the next scandal in Venstre. It doesn't look like there are any negative surprises in the economy, the unemplyment are falling, the economy are growth. So right now it's a waiting game, to see what skeletons are hiding in LLR's closet.

Waiting for what exactly, voters trickling down from Venstre to DF? Because LLR's scandals so far hasn't really seemed to benefit the government much, and with Enhedslisten barking at the Social Democrats' tail it would, to use your own words, be silly and ignorant to think that President of the Council isn't a more safe job to have. Especially since HTS has barely been able to keep her dysfunctional coalition together.

I'm not saying that she couldn't possibly survive if she stayed on. There have been far greater turn-arounds for unpopular incumbant governments in recent history. But her chances would obviously be less than 50%, whereas securing this job would guarantee her five years without having to deal with bickering coalition partners, voters or digging journalists, leaving her free to tour the Union taking selfies with world leaders and getting autographs from the cast of Sex and the City.     
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politicus
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« Reply #308 on: August 02, 2014, 08:26:51 PM »

Former Icelandic Prime Minister Geir H. Haarde (IP), the only politician convicted after the crash, is going to be Icelands next Ambassador to the US. Yuck.
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Diouf
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« Reply #309 on: August 07, 2014, 05:01:17 AM »

New leader of the Danish Conservatives



Søren Pape Poulsen, the 42-year old mayor of Viborg, is the new leader of the Danish Conservative Party. Lars Barfoed, who became leader in 2011, decided to resign after three years of stagnation or even decline. The Conservatives are still, as in 2011, hovering around the 5% mark. The local elections in 2013 and the European elections in 2014 were rather good for the party, but that didn't neccessarily help Barfoed as many interpreted the results as showing that their policies were fine and could be sold by their good local and european candidates, so what was lacking was a good "salesman" at the national level again. Some media claim that Barfoed was told to leave by a number of high-ranking Conservatives, but it is quite difficult to determine how much it was Barfoed's own choice.

Søren Pape Poulsen is not a MP currently, which is quite unprecendented. It will not last for too long though as he will run for parliament in the next election and resign as mayor. The main reason for choosing a non-MP was probably that there was no other really leader alternatives among the MPs which is mostly made up of has-beens.
He is educated within shipping at Grundfos, the world's largest pump manufacturer, and has worked a shipping agent, but has also worked in a couple of years as an uneducated teacher. He has been a member of the Council in Viborg since 2002, and became mayor after the 2009 local elections. He decided to seek an alliance with the red parties in the council so that he could become mayor despite the Conservatives only having 3 out of 31 seats. Furthermore, there actually was a right-wing majority in the Council, and the Liberals were the biggest party, so they were very angry with him. In the 2013 local elections, the Conservatives' and Søren Pape Poulsen's personal votes were doubled and he could continue as mayor; this time with support from all parties in the constitution of the council.

On his press conference today he mentioned three subjects that would be important for him. He wants to fight hard against the new school reform with longer days and compulsory "homework cafes". The main argument against it that it takes away time from the families, and makes it too difficult for kids to have a leisure time activity or a job. He repeated the well-known Conservative opposition to the top tax rate. Finally he declared himself a "typically conservative tough on crime" and especially wanted to reduce the number of break-ins. He is also known to be among the more eurosceptic parts of the party, but the repeated that he is completely behind the party's programme.
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #310 on: August 07, 2014, 09:41:39 AM »

What, exactly, is the point of the Danish Conservatives these days? Lobbying group for right-wing municipal machines?
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ingemann
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« Reply #311 on: August 07, 2014, 10:24:43 AM »

What, exactly, is the point of the Danish Conservatives these days? Lobbying group for right-wing municipal machines?

Honestly I don't think anybody know at least not on national level, through I don't think it's "Lobbying group for right-wing municipal machines", it's more lobbying for Gentofte, Lyngby and the other municipalities in the Whisky Belt. Ironic the Conservative have always been in the traditional market towns around the country, but they have more or less ignored that groups interest. Which is why I find this choice interesting, as he come from Jutish market town and he are not as most Danish party leaders a economist or lawyer, but a freight fowarder and teacher. Also the fact that he's the mayor of Viborg also make him rather different from the other party leaders.

While I'm not sure he's going to be a success, I think that based on his CV alone, he's a good choice, the question are whether that translate into him being able to get success as party leader are the big question.

Through I would say I was impressed with his speech to the press, while he didn't say anything new, or anything which would get me to vote for him. He did make the Conservative position clear and showed how it was relevant for the individual Dane something Barfoed have not succeed at after 3 year as leader of the Conservatives.
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ingemann
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« Reply #312 on: August 08, 2014, 12:30:20 PM »

There are a interesting rumour going around about Søren Pape Poulsen, that he's gay and in fact married to another man. He was asked about by the tabloid Ekstra Bladet in a interview and his answer was that he didn't talk about his private life.
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politicus
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« Reply #313 on: August 08, 2014, 02:25:39 PM »

No less than three out of eight Conservative MPs are now former party chairmen, must be some kind of record. But since Pape isn't an MP at least they wont make it to 50% ex-chairmen.
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ingemann
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« Reply #314 on: August 09, 2014, 04:32:11 PM »

Compared to Schlüter times, which kind of voters Conservatives have lost.

Honestly I don't have the numbers, but from that I can see most of those people vote Venstre or SocDem today.
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Lurker
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« Reply #315 on: August 10, 2014, 05:26:49 AM »

Has there ever been any kind of serious discussion about a merger between the Conservatives and Venstre, in the parties themselves?
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Diouf
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« Reply #316 on: August 10, 2014, 07:53:54 AM »

Has there ever been any kind of serious discussion about a merger between the Conservatives and Venstre, in the parties themselves?

Erik Eriksen, leader of Venstre from 1950-1965 and PM 1950-1953, proposed a merger in 1965, but he couldn't gather a majority in his own party, so he had to resign and the plan never got any further. Since then I don't believe there have been any serious discussions about a merger
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politicus
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« Reply #317 on: August 10, 2014, 02:43:43 PM »
« Edited: August 11, 2014, 05:57:10 PM by politicus »

Compared to Schlüter times, which kind of voters Conservatives have lost.

In the 80s, where Conservatives was bigger than Venstre, they had large groups of public employees (types like customs officers, policemen and postal workers), small business owners and generally a majority of centre-right voters in suburbia and most towns outside of the Liberal heartland in Western and Central Jutland. Those types mainly vote Venste these days.

Venstre shred its image as a country party and conquered suburbia in the 90s and (re)established itself as the major centre-right party. Basically the Conservative window of opportunity was after the post war urbanization had left the Liberals vulnerable in the 60s and until the Liberal leadership managed to modernize the party.

The Conservatives wasted most of the 70s on a bitter internal feud between a left winger with strong business credentials Erik Haunstrup-Clemmensen and a right wing lawyer, Erik Ninn-Hansen. So the 80s was really their one shot. In the mid 70s when Erik and Erik had almost destroyed the party, Schluther took over and made them strong again. But after Schluther was forced out of office on the Tamil scandal (illegal denial of refugee status to Tamils) another civil war broke out between the "social conservative" (in the Euro sense, not the American) left wing and the true blue right wingers and the compromise candidate selected, a provincial police detective named Bemndt Bendtsen, was a flop. More flops followed and in the meanwhile the Liberals secured their position as the mainstrem centre-right party for good.
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ingemann
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« Reply #318 on: August 11, 2014, 04:06:29 PM »

How about Centrum-Demokraterne. When I first read about Danish politics it was Schlüter winning second term in late eighties.

What about CD? If you want to know why they died out, it was because they more or less was a family party, who build on some issue several other parties also adopted. The party was estabnlished because in Erhard opinion SocDem had moved to far to the west, and it was really a party for "right wing" (compared to the rest of the party) social democrats, so from the movement Nyrup became PM, it was just a matter of time before the party would die out. It tried hard to build a new platform as a centre party with the right opinions (not xenophobic), but at the time that platform belonged to the social liberals and the kind of people voting for CD, suburban social democrats was the people least likely to buy into that platform as they lived as neighbours to the immigrants.
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ingemann
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« Reply #319 on: August 13, 2014, 07:27:42 AM »

There are a interesting rumour going around about Søren Pape Poulsen, that he's gay and in fact married to another man. He was asked about by the tabloid Ekstra Bladet in a interview and his answer was that he didn't talk about his private life.

It seems that it's not a just rumour

http://www.thelocal.dk/20140813/conservative-leader-im-gay-so-what

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politicus
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« Reply #320 on: August 13, 2014, 07:39:46 AM »

There are a interesting rumour going around about Søren Pape Poulsen, that he's gay and in fact married to another man. He was asked about by the tabloid Ekstra Bladet in a interview and his answer was that he didn't talk about his private life.

It seems that it's not a just rumour

http://www.thelocal.dk/20140813/conservative-leader-im-gay-so-what



Well, its not an issue if you are open about it, but still not a thing you can just say is irrelevant if you are leader of a party with at least some reservations aobut full equality for homosexuals.

Also, the football financing thing actually sounds a bit worse than I thought.
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ingemann
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« Reply #321 on: August 13, 2014, 08:09:25 AM »

There are a interesting rumour going around about Søren Pape Poulsen, that he's gay and in fact married to another man. He was asked about by the tabloid Ekstra Bladet in a interview and his answer was that he didn't talk about his private life.

It seems that it's not a just rumour

http://www.thelocal.dk/20140813/conservative-leader-im-gay-so-what



Well, its not an issue if you are open about it, but still not a thing you can just say is irrelevant if you are leader of a party with at least some reservations aobut full equality for homosexuals.

While it's 100% better than being in the closet, I still think it's a bigger issue than we want it to be, I personal think that Denmark are a lot more homophobic than we tell ourselves, of course that homophobia are passive instead of agressive, so it's usual not an isue, but as leader of the Conservatives, we may see some of their traditional voters selecting other parties. Through luckily for the Conservatives, these people don't really have a alternative, as LA and V are just as friendly to homosexual, and if these people don't vote DPP already, they will not vote for them.

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I don't think this will end up an mayor issue, municipalities and mayors get away with these things all the time, and in the one case they didn't get away with it (Brixtofte), it was because he did something which very illegal. This is a gray area, and few voters care about such issues.
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politicus
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« Reply #322 on: August 13, 2014, 08:33:36 AM »
« Edited: August 13, 2014, 08:47:15 PM by politicus »

I agree that the football financing thing will likely not be a big issue (football is too popular for that..), its just that there is a bit more meat on that bone than I thought.

On the other hand it is the first time a party leader has been involved in those shenanigans and the Conservatives are branding themselves as the party for orderly, decent and moral folks, so they are more vulnerable about those tings than others.

I still think Pape could have used being gay as an advantage if he had just said it instead of the "that's a private matter" stuff, since having a gay leader makes the party appear more modern, which they desperately need.

EDIT: Pape has denied that his sexuality will have any influence on party politics. Officially the MPs are free to vote as they please on matters regarding gay rights, since its an "ethical question". He will not change that or make gay rights a priority in any way.

Its interesting that he is a devout Christian. The Conservatives skipped the "God" part of "God, King and country" in the 60s, but he has emphasized, that most people are more Christian than they think because Christianity and Christian values are so integrated in our culture.

Also, unlike his two immediate predecessors he doesn't rule out being in government wit the DPP, but states that the party is too small to be in government at the moment. This will ruffle some feathers among more class conscious conservatives, who despise the vulgar and primitive DPP.

Being the adopted son of a smallholder couple in rural central Jutland his class background is also clearly different from most conservatives.
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ingemann
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« Reply #323 on: August 13, 2014, 08:57:13 AM »

I agree that the football financing thing will likely not be a big issue (football is too popular for that..), its just that there is a bit more meat on that bone than I thought.

On the other hand it is the first time a party leader has been involved in those shenanigans and the Conservatives are branding themselves as the party for orderly, decent and moral folks, so they are more vulnerable about those tings than others.

I don't disagree, on the other hand the Conservatives brand themselves that way, it's mostly against poor people criminality not rich people criminality.

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I'm sorry I'm going to say it this way.

NO JUST NO

When people think about gay politicians, they think Bondam or Ammitzbøll . That really not people you want mentioned together with your name, especially not if you're Conservative. Yes it may seem modern,but it modern in same way RV was radicool in 2005, in a kind of Bohemian Copenhagener kind of way, the Conservatives really don't want that brand, they want something which say they're old fashion, stable and hard working.
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politicus
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« Reply #324 on: August 13, 2014, 08:42:43 PM »
« Edited: August 13, 2014, 08:53:35 PM by politicus »

Well, they have lost a lot of wealthy, young, urban voters to Liberal Alliance, so old fashioned is hardly the way to go. They need an image that can combine classic conservative values like personal responsibility and thriftiness with being modern and open minded.

Not that Pape will necessarily help with the WYU demographic, the guy may be more of a right winger on value issues than he first appeared (and those types hate the DPP).
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