Polls Spell Disaster for Dutch Social Democrats
September 3, 2007 by Michael van der Galiën
This article at MSN is in Dutch, so let me summarize the key findings of the latest poll: the social democrats would lose bigtime if elections were held today. The traditionally biggest - or nearly biggest - party in the Netherlands, the PvdA, would win a mere 20 out of 150 seats. At this moment, this party holds 33 seats in Parliament. They won these seats during the elections in 06. 33 seats meant failure on part of the social democratic leadership.
When I read the first paragraph and headline, I thought that this would mean that the Socialist Party (SP) would gain significantly: not so. At this moment the SP holds 25 seats in Parliament. If elections were held today, they would lose one. The Christian Democratic Party (CDA), meanwhile, would lose 3 (down from 41 to 38). The VVD, my party (liberal conservative), currently holds 22 seats and would continue to do so.
Where, then, will all the seats go the PvdA loses?
Amazingly, these seats will go to the Party for the Freedom (Partij voor de Vrijheid). Wilders’ party currently holds nine seats in Parliament. If elections were held today, however, the PVV would win 19 seats. In other words, it would become almost as big as the PvdA.
Now, I do not have a lot of sympathy for the PvdA, but I am not a big fan of Wilders either. In the past, he said some things that needed to be said, but these days, he only seems interested in insulting as many people as possible. His latest comments include:
- “The Koran should be made illegal”
- “I have enough of the worshipping of Mohammed and Allah in the Netherlands, not one more mosque should be build”
- “The root of the problem is the fascist Islam, the sick ideology of Allah and Mohammed as documented in the Islamic Mein Kampf: the Koran”
These are obviously idiotic statements and I worry about what it says about the Netherlands that this man is becoming so incredibly popular.
I suspect when illegal immigration becomes a major controversy, those most hostile to immigrants gain support.
Michael: Thank you for keeping us up to date.
I said it before, and I’ll say it again: Wilders is actually pretty moderate compared to millions of Dutch people. And yet I think that, just possibly, he might be the least bad choice available.
I strongly disagree with his statement: “The root of the problem is the fascist Islam”. The top 3 problems in the Netherlands are: proportional representation, proportional representation, and proportional representation. Abolish PR, and all other problems will go away.
[...] 4th, 2007 by Pieter Dorsman Michael posted some interesting Dutch poll numbers earlier today. They represent exactly what I have argued a little while ago in my essay called ‘Dutch [...]
How is the third statement “obviously idiotic?”
[MvdG: edited]
Obviously banning is a ridiculous conclusion, but one that reflects the desperate feelings of a lot of Dutch citizens that feel illegitimately silenced by elites like yourself.
For that matter, your party the “VVD”, has no clue what true classical liberalism is about either, as it opportunistically tries to maneuver between anti-immigrant sentiments and a concept of “freedom” that is absent in modern “majority democracy” to begin with. Hence the 55% tax rates.
RRE: your comment has been edited. We don’t welcome nor accept idiotic, yes idiotic, statements like that. Only those who don’t know anything about Islam can write nonsense like that. You’ve clearly never read the entire Koran, nor have you read Islamic literature, aside from the quotes used by Spencer et al.
Editing a comment and then stating it was idiotic is quite unfair, and authoritarian I must say. Isn’t an open debate at the core of the classic liberal ideology? Even after Ayaan’s departure the VVD has not learned its lesson. It is ironic that I have been posting on blogs for a long time and have never been edited, except by a “classic liberal” from the country I left. I shall not return.
If Europe had a history of freedom and individual rights we would not have problems like these.
Keep up the American studies.
Well, I support Wilders because the VVD is a mess that never delivers and it’s full of multiculturalists. It’s really just Labour-lite, without the true ambition to actually win an election or to give their voters what they want: small state, tax cuts, less immigration.
They prefer to drink beer and fight each other. A dying party, especially with the current leadership, which would have long been defenestrated in any serious political party.