31 days of solitude: Welcome to Brussels in August

Welcome to Declassified, a weekly humor column. For those of you not in Brussels, the EU capital is deserted at this time of year. It’s emptier than U.S. President Donald Trump’s loyalty card for the salad bar. It’s quieter than a Zoom call with only Boomers (because none of them could find the unmute button, geddit?). It’s lonelier than Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez at the next European Council. This is because the EU point-blank refuses to give up on its summer vacation. There’s no crisis too big that it can’t be postponed a few weeks while everyone goes off to Tuscany, whether it’s Russia invading Georgia (2008), a devastating earthquake in Italy (2016), or the arrival of tens of thousands of unauthorized migrants in the Spanish exclave of Ceuta (a few days ago). Older readers may remember when in 2017 — back when the EU was entirely in black and white — then-European Parliament President Antonio Tajani wrote to Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker to point out that the Parliament was taking its summer break, and that no work should be sent over before early September. Tajani’s note was dated July 13. A note from our Irony Department: This column is off next week as I’m on vacation. Although, as Tuscany is out of my price range, I’ll be vacationing at the Schuman roundabout instead. But if major events happening while you’re on a beach or halfway up an Alp is a bad look, the alternative — working all through the summer just in case something happens — isn’t much better. In the hot summer of 2009, when Tajani — yes, him again — was merely the European transport commissioner, he drew the short straw of running the good ship Berlaymont while the other commissioners took a break. He then used the time to remind Europeans not to lose their luggage, describing the “phenomenon” of lost luggage as “very important” and “extremely worrying.” Tajani, of course, was a close ally of the late Italian leader Silvio Berlusconi, who had an awful lot of baggage (maybe even 10,000 suitcases full a day). The summer before Tajani’s plea to keep a closer eye on your suitcases, the EU had launched a bloc-wide labeling scheme for sunscreen. Günter Verheugen, the commissioner for industry at the time, called the scheme an example of “responsible business behavior.” And Verheugen had perhaps more of a need for sunscreen than most, as in 2006, photographs had emerged of him relaxing on a nudist beach in Lithuania wearing nothing but a baseball cap — oh, and he was with his chief of staff. CAPTION COMPETITION “This is Jordan, he’s my biggest fan.” Can you do better? Email us at pdallison@politico.eu or get in touch on X @POLITICOEurope. Last time, we gave you this photo: Thanks for all the entries. Here’s the best one from our mailbag — there’s no prize except the gift of laughter, which I think we can all agree is far preferable to cash or booze. “Volodymyr, when I sack a minister, they stay sacked.” by Tom Morgan