Jacob Christensen

What does it say about a campaign when the most prominent victim so far is a journalist? Editor and political commentator Henrik Qvortrup has promised to stay quiet during the rest of the campaign after yesterday’s very public bust-up with Naser Khader.

The Iraq war has been manifestly absent from the Danish political agenda since 2003. Now opposition parties call for an investigation of the decision to support the US-led invasion of Iraq – but disagree about the format. I doubt if it will make any impact on the larger campaign.

Tonight TV2 screens the first debate between Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Helle Thorning-Schmidt. I will just note that the format wasn’t Ms. Thorning-Schmidt’s preferred. Interestingly commentators interpret this – I think correctly – as a sign of weakness of the Prime Minister and looking at opinion polls these are actually two contenders who are both in the defensive. An unusual situation.

Another case of defensive campaigning: The Conservative leader Bendt Bendtsen promises not the abolish the early retirement benefit and the general child benefit.

Über-pollster Søren Riisbjerg Thomsen calculates that the Unity List is in real trouble and likely to lose representation in the Folketing.

Across Øresund, the Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt looks shaken after his deputy secretary Ulrica Schenström resigned yesterday (formally, she first asked for a leave and then handed in her resignation a few hours later). It turned out that she was on duty that fateful night.

That’s Torbjörn Bergman, in case you wondered: European Representative Democracy Data Archive and Författningsreform 2010: partierna och politikens spelregler (Constitutional reform 2010: The parties and the rules of politics) received 5,8 mill. SEK in support from the Tercennary Fund of the Swedish National Bank.

Press release (in Swedish only…)