Fiala all alone
Nothing illustrates the current position of Czech PM Petr Fiala better than a picture his team posted on X on Sun. He sits all alone in a bare office looking into a computer. "The coalition of the willing video conference was important for coordination ahead of tomorrow's meeting at the White House," the post says. It tries to make Fiala look like the "decider," to use George W. Bush's word, yet Fiala wasn't invited to the White House, and we know from a Deník N interview with National Security Adviser Tomáš Pojar that other people were in the room with Fiala during the video conference. The picture is a sort of double lie. Moderator Jana Peroutková twisted the knife last night on Czech TV when she asked Foreign Min. Jan Lipavský if it doesn't hurt that the CR wasn't invited to Washington after taking the lead on the ammunition program and after Fiala became one of the first to travel to Kyiv. Of course it hurts. Fiala played a useful geopolitical role for a short period, but he isn't able to adapt to the new reality.
Glossary of difficult words
the decider - until used in this way by George W. Bush, this word was not generally accepted as an animate noun meaning someone who makes the decisions;to twist/turn the knife (in the wound) - to say or do something that causes additional pain to someone who is already suffering.