Bloomberg: “Lula would receive 47.7% to Bolsonaro’s 47.4% in a runoff scenario, according to an AtlasIntel survey conducted for Bloomberg News. The result is little changed from the previous survey released last week, and keeps the race within the poll’s 1 percentage point margin of error.”
“Lula would win 45.8% to Bolsonaro’s 43.4% in a first round scenario, the survey showed.”
“In a recent video widely circulated online, Israel’s top justices and its attorney general are seen being dragged by security guards from a chaotic anti-government protest that never took place,” Bloomberg reports.
“The 33 seconds of emotionally-charged footage was originally posted by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a fierce opponent of the judiciary, and triggered an immediate backlash. Critics said it incited violence, while supporters said it was justified because they accuse the leaders of Israel’s legal system of a left-wing plot to stymie the government’s policies.”
“But the depicted scenes are fake — no such protest took place and the video carries a tell-tale watermark to identify content made using artificial intelligence. Smotrich’s post was just the latest example of a deluge of AI-crafted distortions that are saturating the Israeli information environment just weeks before the country’s most consequential elections in decades.”
“Surging fuel prices driven by the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East are remaking global politics. Though benchmark oil prices have stabilized after a recent jump, a shortage of fuel tankers and limits on global refining capacity have driven increases in the costs of diesel and other oil-based products,” Semafor reports.
“U.S. average diesel prices reached $6.50 for the first time ever, adding to President Donald Trump’s worsening economic approval rating ahead of November’s midterms, Brazil’s government implemented measures to lower prices ahead of presidential elections next month, and European leaders have scrambled to use their limited fiscal capacity to cushion the blow ahead of polls in France, Germany, and Italy in the next year.”
“Friedrich Merz says he intends to stay on as the leader of Germany and his party after a string of state election defeats. But it’s unclear how much room for maneuver the chancellor still has, only 16 months after he took office,” the Associated Press reports.
“The 70-year-old sought within minutes of polls closing Sunday in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin to shore up his position in his center-right Christian Democratic Union. He made a highly unusual election evening appearance to insist that he would press ahead with reforms meant to get the sluggish economy moving.”
Said Merz: “What has to be done now requires backbone, steadfastness and patience. I will demonstrate that as the CDU party leader and above all as chancellor of our country.”
Bloomberg: Germany’s Merz vows to stay after record election loss.
“The rise of a far-right party in Germany, the Alternative for Germany, represents a skewing of history, fueled by its own, sometimes imaginary vision of the past. It feeds, analysts say, on widespread alienation from a liberal, multicultural, united Germany committed to the memory of the Holocaust and Nazi crimes,” the New York Times reports.
“The AfD is now the most popular party nationwide, polls say, close to governing a German state for the first time, and did well again in two more state elections on Sunday. It has benefited from economic and industrial decline and a sense of insecurity, which the party blames on the extensive migration of young Muslims in the last decade.”
“Chancellor Friedrich Merz reinforced his message that he’ll see through his reform agenda as Germany’s leader after his Christian Democratic Union crashed out of a regional parliament for the first time in the country’s post-World War II history,” Bloomberg reports.
“Merz said he secured his party’s backing to stay on after he gathered the CDU’s leadership in Berlin to gauge his position — and extended an offer to the Social Democrats to continue their 16-month coalition as it seeks to implement an overhaul of Germany’s pension, health and tax systems.”
“President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Flávio Bolsonaro are neck and neck ahead of Brazil’s election, a new poll showed, as a simmering Supreme Court crisis weighs on the race,” Bloomberg reports.
“Lula would win 46% to Bolsonaro’s 45% in a runoff scenario, according to a BTG/Nexus survey published Monday. The advantage was within the survey’s 2 percentage point margin of error.”
“German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is trying to convince leaders from his conservative party to stick with him at a Monday morning meeting after his Christian Democratic Union suffered its worst-ever result in a state election,” Bloomberg reports.
“Merz has vowed to stay on as chancellor even though the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD, won the state election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania with 38.2%, while his CDU got just 4.9%. This marks the first time in Germany’s post-World War II history that the CDU has fallen out of a regional parliament, missing the 5% threshold.”
Said Merz: “We can’t sugarcoat it, it was a disaster.”
Financial Times: Germany’s Merz vows to stay despite “disaster.”
“Russia’s ruling United Russia party is on track to comfortably win a tightly controlled wartime election after Ukraine launched what is thought to be the largest drone attack on the Moscow region on the last day of voting,” CNBC reports.
“Ukraine launched what Moscow’s mayor called the biggest drone attack yet on the Russian capital on Sunday, as Russians voted on the final day of a parliamentary election that President Vladimir Putin has cast as a test of support for the war in Ukraine,” Reuters reports.
“Sweden’s Social Democrat leader Magdalena Andersson was given the first try at forming a new government after the opposition bloc she leads won Sunday’s election,” Bloomberg reports.
“Friedrich Merz has been haunted by a past boast that he could cut the support of Germany’s surging far-right party in half,” Bloomberg reports.
“Instead, the German chancellor watched this month as the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany trounced his conservative Christian Democrats in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt…”
“The fallout has shaken Germany’s political establishment and stoked calls within the party to push Merz out after only 16 months in office. With polls showing his personal popularity at a record low for any post-World War II chancellor, the crisis is set intensify on Sunday, when two more states head to the polls.”
“Russians are growing fearful that President Vladimir Putin may soon order a massive new mobilization for the war in Ukraine after this weekend’s parliamentary elections,” Bloomberg reports.
“That fear stretches to officials in the Kremlin and army recruitment centers, who’ve been looking to open foreign bank accounts and move assets abroad while encouraging friends and relatives to leave Russia in recent months.”
“While Putin denies he has any such plans, a European security official says Russia’s preparing to draft an additional 300,000 men into the army by the end of the year.”
“Russians began voting on Friday in the first parliamentary elections since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, an exercise carefully engineered by the Kremlin to project popular support for continuing a war now in its fifth year,” the New York Times reports.
“Since 2021, when the previous State Duma election was held, the country has changed significantly. The political system has shed its last vestiges of tolerance for dissent. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled the country, including most of its vocal opposition leaders and activists. Almost all antigovernment media outlets have been forced to shut down or operate from abroad.”
“Social Democrat Leader Magdalena Andersson is on course to become Sweden’s next prime minister as her left-wing bloc holds an unassailable lead over the right and far right with 99.9% of results declared,” Politico reports.
Wall Street Journal: “For years, Musk has used his social-media megaphone to boost antiestablishment parties outside the U.S. railing against ‘woke’ politics, immigration and tech industry-regulation across Europe, South America and Africa. But no other foreign nation has drawn such frequent, sustained attention from the world’s richest man as the U.K.”
“Musk has twice exceeded 200 monthly posts about British politics and culture wars, though the volume waxes and wanes with the news cycle. In June alone, Musk posted more than 160 times on the topic—over 10% of his posts that month. By July, he was back to his baseline, with just a few dozen tweets.”
Bloomberg: “The debate reflects bigger questions about where the country sees itself in a world of increasingly fractured international relations. For many on the right, it’s lost much of what made it special, and can’t afford to let neutrality be weakened.”
“It’s a head-to-head between two competing visions. One points to sovereignty, neutrality and distance from larger powers — particularly the EU — as the foundations of Switzerland’s success. The second sees international cooperation as essential for a small economy which can steer its own fate only so far.”
“Sweden’s high-stakes general election is heading for a tight finish in a contest to decide whether a new center-left prime minister takes over or the far right enters government for the first time,” Politico reports.
“With 95% of results now declared, the left-wing bloc of Social Democrat opposition leader Magdalena Andersson has a three-seat lead in the 349-member parliament — ahead of conservative Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson’s four-party right-wing alliance.”
“The outcome of Sunday’s vote may not be known until Wednesday. The two candidates for prime minister will now seek talks with other party leaders as they attempt to solidify their blocs into governing majorities.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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