From Warsaw to Lisbon, via Bucharest, millions of Europeans are called to the polls this Sunday to decide the political direction of Romania, Poland, and Portugal. This Super Sunday The election is taking place amid strong geopolitical, commercial, and economic tensions on the continent, due to the Russian threat and the trade war declared by US President Donald Trump. Brussels remains on tenterhooks, especially to see if Bucharest will shift to the far right.

There are a number of reasons not to go to the polls. In fact, there are potentially as many reasons to be discouraged as there are voters called to the ballots. For the generations that have lived in a democracy, voting is a matter of fact, a routine that rivals the routines of a pandemic Sunday. What if the fear of contagion, what if laziness, what if the rain, what if the aperitif? What if disillusionment and weariness with political representatives overwhelmed by reality and with worn-out prestige. In fact, it is nothing new, as JFK said, that mothers want their children to grow up to be presidents, but do not want them to become politicians in the process.