Dutch politics – Page 21

No second EU referendum?

Published on September 22, 2007

Two years ago the Dutch voters overwhelmingly (63 percent iirc) rejected the proposed EU constitution, several days after France had done the same. This rejected put the European Union in deep crisis, as a new treaty had to be negotiated. So all the bell and whistles like a European anthem and flag were stripped out, the word constitution was crossed out and replaced by treaty, and some more substantial changes were made (more power to the national parliaments frex) all in order to placate the unruly naysayers. In France, they’re going to hold a new referendum; here the government has just decided not to.

Their reasoning is that legally, the new treaty does not require a referendum (and the highest court has agreed with the government in its official advice about this), while the treaty has changed so substantially that the objections against it two years ago have been overcome. Therefore getting their approval is no longer necessary.

Or might it just be that the government is afraid that a new treaty would also be rejected? Many of the objections of two years ago are still valid, while the skepticism about Europe has only grown. Which is why the government cannot afford to let the population give their approval, as a second no would “make our position in Europe untenable”. It shows how little democracy matters in these grand schemes.

The European Union may have grown from a honestly held ideal of a new Europe without borders or war, but it has grown into a technocratic nightmare whose main function is to make it easier for big business to operate. Through the EU, with its lack of democratic oversight, measures can be taken that would never get through a national parliament. Nothing must derail this project, least at all the voter.

Dutch broadcaster censors Attenborough on evolution

Published on July 30, 2007

The Dutch public broadcaster EO (Evangelische Omroep/Evangelical Broadcaster) has a reputation to uphold when it comes to broadcasting quality wildlife documentaries, both their own as well as series they’ve bought from other broadcasters like the BBC. One series they recently broadcasted was David Attenborough’s excellent (as per usual) Life of Mammals. However, something strange has happened with that series when it crossed the Channel: for some reason the Dutch version only has nine episodes, while the original has ten –and that’s not the only difference.

It turns out that the EO has deliberately removed all references to evolution from the series, as demonstrated by the three videos below. Which is not too surprising, considering the EO is after all a fundamentalist Christian broadcaster and adhers to the doctrine of the literal truth of the bible. What exactly the EO has censored in Attenborough’s series is now documented in several youtube movies, uploaded by somebody called Odurodon:

This shows two scenes cut from the EO’s version of the first episode.

More cut scenes, this time from episode two.

If the EO had problems with the views expressed in Life of Mammals, they should either have declined to broadcast it or put in disclaimers at the start of the programme, not censor it. That they have done so shows a lack of intellectual integrity worrisome in a public broadcaster. Especially since they are using public funds to do this.

UPDATE: confused Richard for David Attenborough; now fixed. Reinder was good enough to link to this post and he has more information about this scandal; go read… Also, forgot to mention I first saw this story at Michiel.

Socialists win Dutch elections

Published on November 22, 2006

I know y’all are waiting with bated breath for the results of the Dutch parliamentary elections, as the tensions and excitement of that tough election campaign slowly ebb away. Good news, the SP, the one true Dutch socialist party has won big, with 25 seats after about forty percent of the votes have been counted, almost tripling from their 2003 results of nine seats. The biggest losers are the freemarket liberals VVD, who lost about a third of their seats and became the fourth party after the SP. In other words, the socialists have won out over the liberals, especially as the other liberal party, D66, lost half its seats.

Meanwhile the Christian Democrats, traditionally the largest party in the Netherlands, have also lost but much less than their coalition partner VVD, going back from 44 seats in 2003 to 40 seats now. Profiting from their loss is the more outspoken Christian / leftist ChristenUnie, who may be against abortus and gay marriage but who at least remember Christ instructions about feeding the hungry and clothing the needy…

On the rightwing asshole front, the LPF (the grave robbers of Fortuyn) is finally going to disappear from parliament, but unfortunately the man with the hair, cryptoracist Geert Wilders, has picked up the LPF votes, with 9 seats for his Partij voor de Vrijheid, the Party for the Freedom of Anybody but Muslims. Another of the rightwing firebrands, Marco Pastors, has also picked up a seat. Though it’s disappointing these demagogues will enter parliament, at least the various splits on the right kept them from gaining more.

In the centrum of politics, the social democratic PvdA and Green GroenLinks, have lost just as big as the liberals have, reversing the situation in the 2003 elections when the social democrats picked up many of the votes the SP seemed to have in the bag until a few weeks before the election. Then people voted strategically and saw their hopes of a centrist government dashed, now they’ve realised it’s better to vote for the party they really support.

Some commentators have already said this is an election in which the middle has been deserted for the far left and rightwing fringes. They are wrong. It was the true left, the SP, who won to the disadvantage of not just the centrist left, but also the centrist right, while on the rightwing
fringe the seats have just been rearranged, rather than any having been gained. Wilders just picked up the votes lost by the LPF as well as some of the more rightwing of the VVD votes, but did not gain anything beyond it.

This is encouraging. It means that not just have the neoliberal policies of the CDA/VVD government been rejected, but the voters have not chosen for the easy, populist and bigoted siren call of the extreme right, but rather for principled leftwing parties. Not just for the SP, but also the Christen Unie and the Partij voor de Dieren (Party for the Animals), all parties that chose a principle course. A true rejection of the neoliberal consensus that has ruled the Netherlands for the past 25 years.

All of which however does not make the formation of a new government any easier. Neither the left nor the right is able to form a government on their own, so some sort of left-right coalition has to be formed, with my money being on a CDA-PvdA-SP coalition, or maybe a VVD-CDA-PvdA coalition. It’s going to be interesting.

News from nowhereThe Netherlands

Published on September 14, 20062 Comments

First, for the obsessive compulsives amongst y’all, Google has finally put their fingers out and updated their Google Earth photos for the Netherlands. It may not mean much to you but it means endless hours of fun looking for my house, my old house, my parent’s house, the office I currently work at, the previous offices I’ve worked at and so on und so weiter, all to get pictures like this:

My home town Middelburg.

Meanwhile, with slightly more relevance to people not called Martin Wisse, minister of Justice Piet Hein Donner has called the wrath of the entire Dutch right wing upon him, by explaining in an interview that of course, if two-thirds of Dutch voters want to introduce Sharia law to the country, that’s democracy and the vote of the majority counts. Cue all the usual anti-islamofascist white knights to wax indignantly and ask for his resignation, while his own party has made use of the opportunity to reiterate that they want a general ban on any party that wants to introduce sharia law (not that there is any) or might threaten to do so and oh yes, pedo parties should be banned as well. Not that this isn’t as big a threat to our democracy as having sharia law introduced here would be, of course not, no…

It’s all fairly childish as all people involved should know that a) few if any sane people want sharia law here b) the chance that at any point there will be enough people to vote it in is non-existent and c) even if a two-thirds majority could be found it would immediately run afoul of not just the Dutch constitution but also European law. The whole debate is just another snow job, a bit of posturing before the elections start. It would work too, if the Dutch voters weren’t sick and tired of Islamophobic fearmongering!

But mabye there is something to worry about, as Dutch protestant fundies found out their children think one fundie religion is as good as the other, by allegedly switching in their masses from Christianity to Islam. The big draw apparantly being the clear and simple moral guidelines Islam offers…

Dutch strike more

Published on July 18, 2006

According to a small item in local free rag Spits, the number of strikes more than doubled in the Netherlands last year, for a total of 28 strikes. So the Dutch are not that millitant yet, but it does fit my observation that there’s a new climate of union militancy. About half the strikes were about loss of jobs or worsening working conditions, which again fits with the strikes I’ve seen reported in the newspapers and commented on here.