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Welcome to Declassified, a weekly humor column.
Congratulations to Bulgaria, which has received the prize each nation hoped to win … the EU’s highest flagpole!
The 1,110 sq. meter flag — chosen to represent the scale of Bulgaria’s territory, which is 111,000 sq. kilometers — was hoisted up a record-breaking 111-meter pole within the Rhodope mountains. Simeon Karakolev, the organizer of a historic annual people competition within the village of Rozhen, helped increase $560,000 for the pole in a marketing campaign championed by Bulgaria’s pro-Russia President Rumen Radev.
Not everybody was eager on the large flag. “I felt unwell once I noticed this rod protruding of the bottom in the midst of the meadows and the encompassing forests. That is human interference in nature,” enterprise advisor Sofia Botusharova, from close by Chepelare, instructed AFP.
Bulgaria takes the title from Finland — which has a puny, pesky 100-meter flagpole. But it surely stays a great distance off the worldwide file. In Columbia Falls in Maine within the U.S. (inhabitants 485), an much more divisive flagpole is deliberate that might be 445 meters tall (taller than the Empire State Constructing). The venture would value a cool $1 billion and permit guests to journey by elevator to the highest and have a look at, er, Canada. This query of why has but to be correctly answered.
Flags are in fact stunning but problematic — sort of like Brigitte Bardot. And it’s not simply nationwide flags that get folks agitated. Earlier this month, the U.S. Home of Representatives voted to prohibit the Protection Division from displaying non-approved flags, simply weeks after the Air Power and Navy drew criticism for tweeting photos of rainbow banners to have fun Delight.
And within the U.Ok., the Mirror reported that villagers within the ludicrously named Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, Oxfordshire have taken to flying the EU flag in a bid to harass their new neighbor, a sure Boris Johnson.
Johnson and spouse Carrie have simply moved right into a £3.8 million property with 9 bedrooms (virtually sufficient for all of his kids) within the leafy village. The ex-prime minister can actually afford it thanks partially to his Every day Mail column, which began off by speaking about consuming cheese at evening however has now shifted to weightier issues reminiscent of Ukraine’s ambitions to hitch NATO (presumably as a result of high-ups on the Mail despatched him an electronic mail titled “we pay you this a lot to speak about cheese???”).
By the way, the best nation flag on the earth belongs to the western Pacific island of Palau. Mild blue background with an enormous yellow circle on it. It says “the solar shines right here. The entire time.”
CAPTION COMPETITION
“Is it a chook? Is it a airplane? No, it’s one other meaningless summit in Brussels.”
Are you able to do higher? E mail [email protected] or on Twitter @pdallisonesque
Final time we gave you this picture:
Thanks for all of the entries. Right here’s one of the best from our postbag — there’s no prize apart from the present of laughter, which I believe we will all agree is much extra precious than money or booze.
“And he believed us once we stated it was a come-dressed-as-a-soldier social gathering,” by Clare Jones.
Paul Dallison is POLITICO‘s slot information editor.
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