Monthly Archives: November 2023

“Bill Gates is a Problem for Democracy”

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The following article concerns an English-language book about Bill Gates. It was translated from the German, so some of the quotes from the book or the author may not be verbatim matches for the originals.

Many thanks to Hellequin GB for translating this piece from Boris Reitschuster’s website. The translator’s comments are in square brackets:

“Bill Gates is a problem for democracy”

New book: US journalist exposes the myth of the benevolent philanthropist

Hardly any other person is currently more polarizing than William Henry Gates III. For some, the kind-looking Microsoft founder is a shining light and benefactor. Others consider him to be a dangerous narcissist who wants to influence the course of time to his own liking with his billions and his absolutist fantasies of omnipotence.

The 68-year-old father of three children prefers to style himself as a philanthropist with a penchant for bringing salvation to the whole world. [If I were a Christian, I’d call him a serious contender for the “Antichrist”.] This is what happened during the Corona crisis. “We ultimately want to administer the vaccine to seven billion people,” he postulated verbatim in the Tagesthemen in April of 2020. The vaccines are great and he himself is one of the biggest supporters, he told the Süddeutsche Zeitung in February of last year.

The investigative journalist Tim Schwab has been working intensively with the programmer, who is currently worth an estimated $117 billion, since 2019 and in his book, which has just been published by S. Fischer Verlag, he dispels the image of Gates as a benefactor. One of the core statements in the 592-page The Bill Gates Problem — The Myth of the Charitable Billionaire: The supposedly greatest philanthropist of our time not only derives financial benefit from his foundation, but also uses it to influence political decisions worldwide in an undemocratic way.

Unyielding belief in yourself

The real Gates, Schwab believes, is still a “power-hungry, narcissistic control freak,” and the sprawling Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is little more than a vehicle through which he can amass and exert influence on a far greater scale than would be possible for him as a mere billionaire software mogul. “It is deeply undemocratic, and cements inequality,” argues Schwab.

Gates and his then-wife founded their foundation in 2000. As of 2022, it was better equipped to combat disease and malnutrition than many governments, with around $67 billion. His “unyielding belief in himself that he will do both right and justice in everything he does,” the author writes, led Gates to believe that he and only he knew best how to solve the world’s most complex problems.

The chapter in which Schwab highlights the foundation’s support for family planning in the Third World is particularly sobering. Gates’ preferred method of contraception is a hormonal implant that is inserted into a woman’s arm and is intended to prevent pregnancy for up to five years. His foundation entered into an agreement with drug manufacturers to encourage them to sell many millions of these implants at deep discounts. When the market was finally flooded, clinics in countries like Malawi and Uganda used aggressive sales tactics to get women to accept implants they didn’t want. Schwab describes this as a form of eugenically inspired coercion.

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The Greens Want It All

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Many thanks to Hellequin GB for translating this article from Junge Freiheit. The translator’s comments are in square brackets:

Party conference in Karlsruhe

The Green Party base wants to stop deportations and abolish “prosperity”

The federal government is moving too far to the right for the Green base. They want to go back to “no person is illegal” and open borders. She wants to take completely new paths in economic policy.

The social debate has changed. The Greens, with their fantasies of open borders, are no longer setting the tone. The Chancellor, a Social Democrat, recently announced deportations “on a large scale”. The Green base is angry. [A large scale? That’s a sick joke, since it will only be 600 additional deportations per year, with a daily influx of over 1,500. Do the math; it’s all hogwash.]

The 49th Green Party Congress begins in Karlsruhe on Thursday evening and could get heated. The party leadership is re-elected, the candidates for the European elections are determined and an associated election program is agreed upon. There are already more than 1,600 amendment requests for this.

The party leadership wrote in the main motion: “We want returns to be carried out in accordance with the rule of law. Not everyone who comes to Germany can stay.” A no-go for the base. [“Base” is the right word for these leeches.] “There are no humane deportations!” says one application. They are always violent and should therefore be rejected. [Don’t let them in in the first place and there will be no violence from their side. Quite simple, Dumbo.]

“No person is illegal” instead of “repatriations”

Even the creation of the word “repatriation” instead of “deportation” would not change this. Rather, one must oppose the “progressive shift to the right”. The human right to asylum and the human right to freedom of movement — probably intended as a synonym for open borders — should not be restricted. “What we should fight for is a change in how we deal with migrants and refugees — towards fighting for every single person to be able to lead a new life here.” [Allahu Akhbar!]

Another amendment is directed against the phrase “humanity and order”. Instead it should say “No person is illegal”. Because people are not illegal, only their behavior can be illegal. For the Green base, unauthorized entry into Germany does not seem to be illegal.

Greens want to abolish “prosperity” [But only for those who aren’t in the higher echelons of the Politburo, and an abysmal “quality of life” will be for the rest.]

The Green base wants to say goodbye to the word “prosperity”. The party leadership named an entire chapter after it: “What Protects Prosperity”. The applicants argue that the term is outdated. As a synonym for material standards and goals, it is incompatible with the election program. Rather, the term “quality of life” should be introduced. Because the new wording contains much more than just material standards. “Healthy nature and food, external, internal and social security” is what the Greens stand for and also the new term quality of life. “It’s also a sign that the goals have to change.”

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Gates of Vienna News Feed 11/26/2023

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Tommy Robinson was arrested in London while he was acting as a journalist covering the march against anti-Semitism. Tommy was pepper-sprayed and detained for failing to obey police instructions.

In other news, the latest tranche of hostages released by Hamas included a 4-year-old American-Israeli female orphan, whose parents were murdered by Hamas during the attack on October 7.

To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.

Thanks to Daniel Greenfield, Dean, DV, LP, MM, Reader from Chicago, SS, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. I check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

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Muslim Subjugation of Women is the Same the World Over

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The following report by Clare Lopez was published earlier this month by Sharia TipSheet.

Women Under Sharia

Muslim Subjugation of Women is the Same the World Over

by Clare M. Lopez

This month, we include follow-up on the unspeakable atrocities HAMAS jihadis inflicted on Jewish women and girls on 7 October 2023 during the Shabbat Massacre. Including also a few other reports from elsewhere in the world, including Western Europe and right here in the USA.

First, a 5 November 2023 Twitter/X posting from a woman identified as a “Female Islamic Scholar” on the permissibility of taking sex slaves from among non-Muslims and raping them. In this way, they attempt to justify rape during the Shabbat Massacre.

[See the original post for embedded video.]

“Hamas Targeted Israeli Women With Rape and Unspeakable Atrocities, Israelis Say” by Dan M. Berger at Epoch Times, 11/16/2023

“Kingwood teen allegedly beat, choked by own mother for not wearing hijab in social media post” by Bryce Newberry at Click2Houston.com, October 4, 2023.

This took place near Houston, Texas.

“Pakistan: Abducted and Forcibly Married Christian Girls Seek Justice in Courts” by Marco Respinti at bitterwinter.org, October 24, 2023

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“The People Will Get Their Country Back”

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As you all know by now, Geert Wilders, the leader of the Party for Freedom (Partij voor de Vrijheid, PVV) won a major victory last Wednesday in the general election in the Netherlands. The following video shows a brief victory speech given by Mr. Wilders to his supporters on the evening after the election.

Many thanks to Gary Fouse for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes and RAIR Foundation for the subtitling:

Video transcript:

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Soppy

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Below is an overview by our Israeli correspondent MC of the current hostage exchange deal between Israel and Hamas.

Soppy

by MC

‘Soppy’ was one of those words of boyhood which described all girls (except the ones that weren’t soppy) and those boys who behaved like the soppy girls.

Soppy boys had difficulty with boyish behaviour, the risky bits like climbing trees and scrumping apples. One of the things we did as boys was to go out on the mud flats and retrieve cannonballs to sell as antiques. There were cannonballs in the mud because HMS Excellent, the Royal Navy gunnery school, was about a mile away and for several hundred years had been shooting live cannonballs whilst teaching sailors how to man the guns.

This was not soppy work. The cannon balls came in different sizes from 4 lbs to 100 lbs, plus, if you were lucky, a spherical (explosive) shell up to ten inches diameter.

Getting the cannonballs meant going out in the mud at least about six inches deep, and if it got soft, one could go in up to the waist. For an 11-year-old boy, handling a 32-pounder in the mud was tricky. One came across a mound about twelve inches across, then hit it with a hammer, and it started to disintegrate. Inside the mound was a six-inch diameter cannonball which then had to be carried to the boat, maybe a hundred yards of hard going in the mud, the extra weight causing one to sink twice as deep. This was not stuff that soppy kids did.

Of course, one now gets soppy politicians. Soppy politicians don’t do the nasty hard bits, but they sit and criticise those that do. Not for them selling cannonballs at 10 pounds a shot (sorry that one just got away from me).

And soppy policemen who beat up on the pro-Israel march because the pro-Hamas marchers will probably hit them back.

Soppy politicians are concerned about ‘innocent civilians’ in Gaza. 60% of said innocent civilians support the actions of Hamas on 7th October, and if appeased, are going to ensure the 10/7 massacre happens on a regular basis. Soppy politicians, male or female, are deadly because they very rarely (if not never) allow their military to finish the job.

General Pershing was the officer in charge of the American Expeditionary Force in France in 1917-18, and he was against the idea of an armistice in November of 1918. His troops were all set to carry the war into Germany to obtain a full surrender rather than an armistice. If the politicians and allied generals had listened, WW2 would probably been avoided.

Same with the Paris Accords of 1972 in which soppy politicians thought they were dealing with ‘gentlemen’ who kept agreements. Within two years, South Vietnam was annihilated…

Curiously, President Roosevelt (and then President Truman) were not so soppy. FDR insisted on unconditional surrender, and President Truman authorised the use of the atomic bombs. There were no comebacks from WW2. Churchill was soppy, and would have accepted another armistice had he not been overruled. The unconditional surrender cost tens of thousands of allied lives and the lives of countless enemy ‘innocent civilians’, children, babies, mothers and fathers.

Israel has been dealing with Gaza since 2006 when they de-occupied it, making it Judenrein as demanded by supposedly anti-fascist forces in Europe and the US. All to begin a cycle of violence in which Hamas strikes Israel, Israel goes into Gaza, and is forced by soppy international politicians to withdraw without settling the issue.

As of writing this essay, that looks to be the scenario we are facing again (this was written before the current imbroglio about hostages).

Hostages make this one very complicated, and in my opinion, the Hamas invasion of October 7th crossed a line, and has to be dealt with, with utmost severity.

The rumour here in Israel is that 10/7 was meant to be a co-ordinated three-prong attack with Hezbollah, the Palestinian Authority in Judea and Samaria, and Hamas all attacking/invading at the same time. That could have been catastrophic.

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Gates of Vienna News Feed 11/25/2023

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Concerned that there may be more anti-migrant riots in Dublin, the Irish government borrowed water cannons from the UK via Northern Ireland. Meanwhile, it emerged that the suspected perpetrator of the Dublin stabbings (who is rumored to be an Algerian immigrant) was charged with knife possession earlier this year, but not convicted.

In other news, Hamas initially delayed the release of the second tranche of hostages, citing Israel’s alleged violation of the cease-fire agreement, but eventually released them under international pressure.

To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.

Thanks to Dean, JW, LP, MM, Reader from Chicago, SS, Upananda Brahmachari, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. I check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

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Stop the Mosques!

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Finally, after more than fifteen years, a leader of the Sweden Democrats is saying in public what needs to be said about the Islamization of Sweden.

I think it’s too late — the process is already too far advanced. When I first met with the Sweden Democrats back in 2007, a reversal of the trend was still barely possible. But not any longer.

Or maybe I’m being too pessimistic. Maybe, despite the fact that young Mohammeds now outnumber young Svens and Olafs in Modern Multicultural Sweden, the situation can somehow be salvaged…

Many thanks to Gary Fouse for translating this article from Samtiden:

Åkesson: Takes a stand — demolish Islamists’ mosque construction

by Dick Erixon
November 25, 2023

It was a strong speech for Swedish values, and with it, against Islamists’ pretenses. Sweden must stop excusing Islamists and their progress. Instead of more mosques, Åkesson wants to demolish mosques that harbor extremists.

During the Sweden Democrats’ National Days in Västerås, Jimmie Åkesson gave his speech after he was entrusted with the party leadership for two more years. The election committee said that there was not even a discussion over the issue of party leader. His position was so clear.

On Swedish streets people celebrated that women and children were slaughtered and raped.

After giving thanks for the trust and giving a situation report on everything that was going to happen through the Tidö Agreement and cooperation with the government, Åkesson went onto a hard attack against those in Sweden who celebrated the attacks and murders of children, women, and men in Israel.

“On the 7th of October this year the Islamist terror organization Hamas staged a cruel and inhuman attack directed primarily at civilian targets in Israel. Women and children, small children, were slaughtered, raped, and kidnapped.”

“People celebrated this in Sweden! With fireworks.”

“People who chose to move to this country. People, who, for some extremely unclear reason, have been allowed to move to our country.”

“They celebrated. They cheered. It is so macabre that it is hard to take in.”

Stop mosque construction

It is noticeable that this behavior disturbed Jimmie Åkesson deeply. He wants to take a hard line against the Islamization that has been allowed to happen in Sweden.

“We need an immediate and total stop in the establishment of new mosques in Sweden,” Åkesson said to strong applause.

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Klaboosterbach Demands Consensus on the Vax

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German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach — known affectionately in this space as “Klaboosterbach” — isn’t getting the results he wants from the Standing Commission on Vaccination. His solution? The time-honored practice of firing the independent thinkers and packing the commission with reliable toadies.

Many thanks to Hellequin GB for translating this article from Junge Freiheit. The translator’s comments are in square brackets:

Three-Quarters Have to Go

After vaccination objection: Lauterbach fires almost all Stiko members

Health Minister Lauterbach is making tabula rasa. After the Stiko [Standing Commission on Vaccination] contradicted his constant appeals for corona vaccinations, he is now replacing 71% of the members with more compliant people.

Berlin

Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) will almost completely replace the Standing Vaccination Commission (Stiko). Twelve of 17 members have to go. This corresponds to 71%, or almost three quarters. Lauterbach wants to appoint new members in February. He leaves other committees out of the picture.

Critics suspect that the SPD politician is sketching the consequences of the Stiko’s objection to Lauterbach’s “unauthorized vaccination recommendations”. For months he has been unsuccessfully calling on Germans to be “immunized” against Corona again.

Lauterbach changes staffing rules

In July of 2022, Commission head Thomas Mertens rejected Lauterbach’s dogma that young people should be vaccinated a fourth time: “I think it is bad to make medical recommendations under the motto ‘A lot helps a lot.’” Even then, the Health Minister demanded more vaccination recommendations from the commission. But they refused.

In order to get rid of the apparently unpleasant Stiko members, the Social Democrat changed the rule according to which he appoints the members. These should only be appointed for three appointment periods of three years each. Under this new regulation, twelve current experts could no longer be there, Mertens told Die Welt.

“Stiko transformed into the minister’s instrument of applause”

Former Stiko member Gerd Antes makes it clear: “This massive intervention gives the impression that the intention here is to restrict the Stiko’s independence, with the aim of turning it into a science confirmation body instead of independent scientific counsel, and to remodel it into an instrument of plaudits for the announcements by the Minister of Health.”

According to Antes, he “suspects that Lauterbach wants to form his scientific background choir behind him. Contrapuntal voices only get in the way.”

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Political Earthquake in The Netherlands

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Wednesday’s general election in The Netherlands was the most significant I’ve seen since I began covering Europe in 2006. In previous elections there was never any chance that Geert Wilders, the leader of the Party for Freedom (Partij voor de Vrijheid, PVV), would hold a cabinet office. This time, however, the PVV won massively, and there is a distinct possibility that the PVV may form a government.

Mind you, the announcement by Dilan Yesilgöz (what a typical Dutch name!) that the VVD (the party of Mark Rutte, the outgoing prime minister) would not be part of the new cabinet will make it difficult for Mr. Wilders to form a government. Difficult, but not impossible.

Below are two pieces from the Dutch media, both translated by Gary Fouse, that analyze the results and assess their significance.

The first article is from RTL Nieuws:

Moderate Wilders still controversial, but PVV government not ruled out

by Pieter Munnik and Arne Hankel
November 23, 2023

The Party for Freedom (PVV) was the big winner in the Tweede Kamer elections with 37 seats. To date, the party has always remained outside the cabinet. But this campaign saw a more moderate Geert Wilders. What does that mean? This time will the PVV join the government, and who will be the possible cabinet ministers? We lay it out.

1. How has the PVV grown into the largest party?

The Rutte IV cabinet fell over migration. Migration subsequently became one of the most important themes of this election campaign. It is a theme that the PVV, much more than the VVD (People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy), “owns”. Voters associate the PVV with that theme.

In addition, the VVD, according to the voters, has not delivered on that topic in recent cabinets.

Moreover, a vote for the PVV this time was not thrown away because the VVD said it was ready to work together in a cabinet. In the past years, the VVD excluded the PVV.

2. What makes the PVV controversial?

The PVV is controversial from the standpoint of its position on migration and Islam. Its election platform states: “Our beautiful Netherlands has seriously deteriorated through the ongoing asylum tsunami and mass immigration.”

And: “The Netherlands is not an Islamic country. No Islamic schools, Korans, and mosques.” A position that is contrary to the Constitution.

Other controversial positions include, among others, the plan to leave the UN Refugee Convention, no more money to the NPO [Dutch Public Broadcasting], and the abolition of the Eerste Kamer [Senate]. The party wants to immediately abolish all development aid. Wilders also wants a binding referendum on leaving the EU, and he wants all apologies for past slavery and police actions to be withdrawn.

In addition, the party is against Dutch support for Ukraine in the war against Russia. He called the Tweede Kamer a fake parliament and Sigrid Kaag a witch. Wilders also considers journalists — with some exceptions — scum.

3. Is Wilders now more moderate?

He speaks more moderately. In the campaign, Wilders said that he wanted to be a prime minister of all Dutch people, “no matter where you come from and what your belief is.”The PVV leader also said that his party will operate within the framework of the Constitution.

Wilders also said he is willing to put some key points of the party, so to speak, “on hold”. That would mean, among others, the ban on Islamic education and the Koran.

But the controversial points are still found in the party’s platform.

4. How great is the chance that Wilders will join the government?

The chance certainly exists. Although VVD and NSC (New Social Contract) let it be known before the elections that this would not happen any time soon, they did not repeat that after the polls. Pieter Omtzigt from NSC emphasized that his new party is available for the national government.

On the question about cooperation with the PVV, Omtzigt said that his faction is meeting for the first time this afternoon. “Then we will talk about how we can proceed from here. But we see the need for good governance.”

VVD leader Dilan Yeşilgöz kept her silence after the exit polls became known. This afternoon, she said after a faction meeting that the initiative to form a cabinet now lies with the “big winners” of the election, the PVV and NSC. While she had earlier said she was unwilling to join a cabinet with “Premier Wilders”, she is now talking of a “new reality”. She still provides no clarity on whether she is now willing to govern with him. She wants to let the results sink in.

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Gates of Vienna News Feed 11/24/2023

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Dilan Yesilgöz, the leader of the “center-right” VVD party in the Netherlands, said that her party would not be part of the next cabinet. The absence of the VVD will make it very difficult for Geert Wilders and the PVV to form a government.

In other news, Hamas released 24 hostages in exchange for 39 Palestinian prisoners. Thirteen of the released hostages were Israelis, and ten were Thais.

To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.

Thanks to Dean, DV, JW, LP, McN, MO, Reader from Chicago, SS, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. I check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

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Almost Time to Cash In

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Being a cabinet minister in Germany is nice work, if you can get it. ’Tis the season to be jolly!

Many thanks to Hellequin GB for translating this article from the online news portal Nius. The translator’s comments are in square brackets:

Big jump in pensions: Why all government ministers want to hold on right now

On St. Nicholas Day, the ministers of the traffic light government will certainly put out their boots*, because just two days later, in addition to chocolate, nuts and tangerines, a whole lot of tax money may rain in…

After the government’s debt tricks, which resulted in a devastating ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court, Germany is deep in a financial crisis: the 2023 budget is blocked, as are shadow budgets worth tens of billions of euros.

More and more people are asking themselves: Why doesn’t anyone in charge take the consequences of this misery and resign? One reason could be that December 8th is a date with gold in the mouth for ministers. [Anyone that asks such a stupid question deserves what they get.]

Hold on, wait, collect retirement money

On December 8th, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), his head of the Chancellery Wolfgang Schmidt and the 15 ministers will have been in office for exactly two years. On this very day they will have accumulated enough service time to have a pension of €4,660 per month safely in their pockets.

Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) is already in his second term in office — he would receive a pension of €5,460 per month from December 8th. Family Minister Lisa Paus (Greens) would have to be patient until April; she only took over from Anne Spiegel on April 25, 2022.

Paragraph 15 of the Federal Ministerial Act states that a former member of the federal government is entitled to a pension “if he or she has been a member of the federal government for at least four years” — but in reality, after two years, a so-called “legal fiction” that automatically applies from two years four years and therefore 4660 euros per month.

The law further states: “If the term of office is terminated […] and an uninterrupted membership in the federal government of more than two years, this is considered a term of office of four years.” If you leave early before the age of standard working hours, there is a maximum of a deduction of 14.4% allowed.

Pre-Christmas cash register ringing

In 2020, the FDP — then in opposition — wanted to remove this passage: “This is not about questioning the work performance of the federal ministers,” said the then parliamentary group deputy and current parliamentary group leader Christian Dürr . But it should “apply just as it does to all other people who work: pension rights must be based on the length of service.”

The draft amendment to the law was rejected with the votes of all other parliamentary groups. In 16 days the pain will not be too great for the FDP, because then the cash register will ring. If the traffic light manages to last that long…

Afterword from the translator:

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Gates of Vienna News Feed 11/23/2023

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A knifeman attacked multiple people on the street outside a school in Dublin city center today, wounding five people, three of them children, before being subdued by passers-by and arrested. A rumor spread on social media that the perp was an Algerian immigrant, and violent street protests erupted, with cars being burned and police attacked. Some protesters carried signs that read “Irish Lives Matter”.

In other news, pro-Palestinian protesters disrupted Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade in New York City. Some demonstrators glued themselves to the street during the protest.

To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.

Thanks to Dean, DV, JW, LP, MM, Reader from Chicago, SS, Steen, Upananda Brahmachari, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. I check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

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Landslide Victory for the PVV!

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Our Dutch correspondent H. Numan sends this report on yesterday’s stunning general election in The Netherlands.

Landslide victory for the PVV!

by H. Numan

Yesterday we had elections in The Netherlands. The results are mind-boggling. Stunning, completely unexpected. Possibly even revolutionary! Though the most difficult part of the elections will be forming a coalition government. While the establishment has lost the battle, they may almost certainly win the war. Let’s have a look at the elections first.

The PVV won by a landslide. I never expected they would win this big: out of a total of 150, no fewer than 36 seats! The PVV gained a stunning 19 seats. That means they more than doubled, coming from 18 seats. They are, by far, the biggest party now. That doesn’t make Wilders PM automatically. He’ll have to negotiate a coalition. That means other parties must be willing to govern with him. And that can be very difficult, if not outright impossible.

The runner-up is the combination Labor/Communists, PvdA/GL. They won 25 seats, coming from 17 seats. The VVD (they pretend to be our Conservative party) lost a lot; they now hold 24 seats, losing 10 seats. I expected them to lose. In Dutch politics, the party that breaks the coalition pays for it. That’s what the VVD did, dropping from 34 seats to now 24 seats. Pretty big, and something I expected.

Another confirmed loser was D66; they are upper middle-class yuppies who pretend not to be communists. They dropped from 24 seats to 10, losing 14 seats. Given their being the party of utter wokeness, this was fairly certain, too. D66 is a rollercoaster party. One election they are on top; the next one they fall down.

Pieter Omtzigt did well, but not as well as expected. His NSC (New Social Contract, check the link where he found that name) scored only 20 seats. With good reasons: Omtzigt didn’t want to become Prime Minister, he said that during the entire campaign. He never presented a candidate, keeping it a secret. Only at the very last minute did he change his mind to become PM after all. The voters didn’t like that. Another problem for Omtzigt is that he didn’t have a clear program. By being vague you don’t alienate voters; that much is true. But you won’t gain many, either.

The Christian Democrats lost impressively, as everybody expected. Dropping from 15 seats to… five. Before the elections I joked that the only major feat of their new leader, Henri Bontenbal, would be announcing his resignation. Not a joke: he’ll be doing that sometime in the coming days or next week. One cannot lose two-thirds of his seats and remain party leader.

The Farmers Party (BBB) did pretty badly. In percentages their win was huge: no less than 500%. But they only had one seat. Now they have five. They polled about 13 seats, but ran on a one-issue program, focused on farmer problems. Everything else was secondary at best. Yes, most people sympathize with our farmers. Only The Netherlands is not a rural country. Even if all farmers voted for BBB it wouldn’t win them much more. Being vague and disinterested in what city folks want cost them everything.

The two other conservative parties JA21 and FvD were trashed. I expected that. FvD lost four seats, keeping four, and JA21 kept one of their two stolen seats. JA21 is a split-off from FvD. Two splitters Joost Eerdmans and Annabel Nanninga moved out of FvD in 2021, hence the name. Nanninga has some credibility (other than her impressive waistline); Eerdmans is an ambitious politician who jumps from party to party. Wherever he thinks his chances are best. You don’t want that character standing behind you. Neither did the electorate.

FvD is led by Thierry Baudet. He recently made headlines and lost everything by bluntly stating in front of cameras that he didn’t believe in moon landings and doubted 9/11. I’m surprised he was able to keep four seats. A statement like that should give him a straitjacket right away.

The remainder, all small fry, lost or remained the same. But they don’t amount to much, so it doesn’t matter.

What’s next?

In The Netherlands we don’t have a winner-take-all system. We have a representative democracy. Meaning that all parties get seats in relation to their electoral results. If your party scores 10% of the vote, you’ll get 10 seats. Even though Geert Wilders won by a landslide, it’s by no means certain he’ll become prime minister or even part of a cabinet.

Just look at the recent Thai elections. Move Forward won a landslide victory but are still in the opposition, and the leader resigned. He tried his best; twice he presented his plans to parliament. The house accepted his proposals, but the military senators said no. The runner-up was next. They quickly struck a deal with the military and within three days the Srettha cabinet was formed.

Fortunately, things aren’t as grim here. It’ll be difficult to form a coalition, yes. All depends on that Mr. Pieter Omtzigt. If he sticks to the boycott of the PVV, as he said during the campaign, no PM Geert Wilders. However, it isn’t that rosy for a left-wing coalition, either. There is a marginal majority for that, but with four parties. If Omtzigt goes that way, he would lose all credibility. From very popular he would become the most hated politician overnight. The biggest problem here is that he is autistic enough to do that. His policy, within the CDA and later as an independent is: whatever I want, I do. Damn the torpedoes!

There are, based on the results, two workable coalitions possible:

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