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Greek Lawmakers Elect Country's New President in Fourth Attempt

Greek Lawmakers Elect Country's New President in Fourth Attempt

Yahoo12-02-2025
(Bloomberg) -- Greek lawmakers elected the country's new president in a fourth round of voting.
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Constantine Tassoulas, a close ally of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and his pick for the role, secured 160 votes and was elected in Wednesday's vote, when he only needed a simple majority of 151 lawmakers in the 300-seat parliament. In the previous three rounds he also received 160 votes mostly from Mitsotakis's center-right New Democracy party, which has 156 members of parliament, but failed to get elected as the threshold was higher.
Tassoulas will replace Katerina Sakellaropoulou, the first Greek woman to serve in the role. He was first elected as a New Democracy lawmaker in 2000 and has since served as deputy defense minister and minister of culture and sports. He was elected as speaker in 2019 and reelected to the post twice in 2023 until he resigned when Mitsotakis named him as his candidate to be president of the Hellenic Republic.
Opposition parties had made clear that they wouldn't support Tassoulas's candidacy, accusing Mitsotakis of picking someone who's an active member of his party's parliamentary group.
In Greece, the role of president is largely symbolic but he can appoint and dismiss the prime minister, other ministers and deputy ministers. He also represents the state internationally and is the titular head of the armed forces. The president serves a five-year term that can be renewed once.
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Fort at Fort Caroline National Memorial to come down. Why I'm OK with this

Can you imagine Fort Caroline National Memorial without a fort? The National Park Service has been. The park service plans to take down the existing fort, a replica built on the banks of the St. Johns River in 1974. This replica was built to replace a replica that was built in 1964, the 400th anniversary of the French settlement, and promptly destroyed by Hurricane Dora. Today, issues with water continue, which actually might add some ironic and unwanted authenticity. There are records of Spanish soldiers, captured by the French, mentioning that the original fort would flood at high tide. We still don't know exactly where the original fort was located. But in recent years, the replica has been damaged again and again by storms and flooding. And between rising sea levels and the deepening of the river, that's only going to get worse — and more costly to repair — in the coming decades. So the park service decided it's time to use some available funding to remove the replica fort, let the native vegetation grow where the fort has stood for more than 50 years, and build a new memorial exhibit on uplands, out of the floodplain. The small Timucuan village at the park also will be removed — but, if anything, the indigenous history should become a larger part of the story told at Fort Caroline. There was a public meeting in July. And there has been a lot of public comment on social media, with quite a few posts expressing disappointment with the end of a fort visited by generations and fear that this is the start of something more sinister. 'Return to 'native vegetation' means waterfront condos in a year,' one said. I certainly understand these types of fears, particularly considering what has happened recently with attempts to develop state parks, pull off a land swap involving Guana River Wildlife Management Area and — relevant to a National Park Service site — chip away at our national parks. There not only have been cuts to staffing and funding for our national parks. In some cases, the actual parks have been targeted. So I understand the cynicism and the connection to the fort. But even in these times, I feel confident this piece of land is going to remain our land. And I'm OK with a Fort Caroline without a fort. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I like it. 'Fort Fake-ee' I certainly appreciate Fort Caroline National Memorial and what it represents, not just historically but for the city today. In many ways the 138-acre site is at the heart of our grandest local park, the 46,000-acre Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve. This national memorial was Congressman Charlie Bennett's baby. He lobbied, fundraised and even personally donated money to purchase the land that was donated to the park service and in 1953 became Fort Caroline NM. Thirty-five years later, Congress established the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, with Fort Caroline as part of it. The park's visitor center and administrative offices are there. There's a beautiful view overlooking the river. There's a rolling, loop trail that I've circled probably hundreds of times. And, yes, there's a fort. But the fort never was my favorite part of Fort Caroline. And not because the original only stood for a small piece of this land's long timeline. Or because the replica seems modest compared to something like Castillo de San Marcos National Monument in St. Augustine. This is, to borrow a description, Fort Fake-ee. That's how the late Craig Morris, a longtime ranger at the park, once described the fort, a moment of candor that ended up in a book written by Tony Horowitz ('A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World'). Few people knew or loved Fort Caroline and the surrounding areas as much as Craig. And while he could give a more nuanced description of the replica fort and its place in the park, that flippant comment summed up some of my qualms with it. This isn't a fort built by the French in 1564. It might not be in the same location. And it almost certainly isn't the same size. It's a scaled-down version. So visiting this fort isn't like visiting Castillo de San Marcos or Fort Matanzas in St. Augustine or Fort Clinch in Fernandina Beach. This fort always felt artificial, like something more befitting a theme park than a national park. 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They will adhere to Congressional mandate for this park by creating a new memorial to the French colonists who came to North America in the 16th century seeking religious freedom, wealth and territorial expansion. And that will include the story (what we know of it) of the original fort, along with documentation to remember the replica. Kidd mentions some of the possibilities: large stones marking dimensions of the original fort to give visitors a sense of the actual size; elevated boardwalks with views of the river; access for those with disabilities; and some kind of natural amphitheater for programming and presentations. "We think the way we're going about this is appropriate and respectful — and will be there for the next century," Kidd said. 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A few decades it was more apt to speculate about what might have happened and repeat stories that might have been true (and, in some cases, were not). Now it is more willing to use words that we all probably should use more often: We don't know. At Flight 93 National Memorial — which soon will hold a commemoration for the 24th anniversary of Sept. 11 — the park service tells the story of United 93 and its passengers in excruciating detail. But just the details we know. It doesn't try to fill in blanks with things we don't know. In a different way, that is what the park service can do with Fort Caroline. mwoods@ (904) 359-4212 This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: End of replica fort and new plans for Fort Caroline National Memorial Play Farm Merge Valley

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