Kick Hungary Out of the EU and NATO
If these alliances are going to have any meaning, dictatorships can have no place in them.

It is time to kick Hungary out of the European Union and NATO. The country entered the Western alliance in the aftermath of the Cold War as a fledgling democracy, but has since reverted to autocracy.

Hungary crossed what should be a red line on Monday, as the country’s Parliament granted Prime Minister Viktor Orbán the power to rule by decree indefinitely. Opposition parties tried to set a time limit on those powers, but Orbán’s ruling Fidesz party pushed through his motion without restriction.

The EU Commission is looking for more effective ways to punish member states that undermine the rule of law — namely Hungary and Poland, whose archconservative governments have raised the EU's hackles by tightening control over the judiciary and media.

The currently available punishment, Article 7, under which a member state’s EU voting rights can be suspended, isn’t working. “It’s been shown to be a toothless tiger so far,” said Franz Mayer, an expert on European law who has advised the German government. “Decisions require unanimity minus the affected member.” And that unanimity is virtually impossible to attain if problem countries have each other's backs, as Hungary and Poland presumably would.

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has responded to the dilemma by proposing new rules that would make it easier for the EU to cut off funding from recalcitrant members.