Politics and Elections in the Netherlands: Rutte III era

[mvd10]

Baudet won the politician of the year award btw.

Meanwhile a Canadian diplomat gave a house in Scheveningen to D66 leader Pechtold. Pechtold has known the diplomat for more than 25 years and the diplomat retired in 2004. He didn't register this gift, but according to Pechtold he doesn't have a working relationship with the man, so that would mean that it's a private gift and that he doesn't have to register it. Still terrible optics.

The left-wing opposition proposed that employers should pay much higher social charges on workers with temporary contracts. Currently a lot of people in the Netherlands have temporary contracts, and while the coalition tries to stem this tide by decreasing the gap between temporary contracts and permanent contracts (by reducing employment protection for permanent workers and increasing regulations for temporary workers), but the opposition thinks the coalition is not going far enough. GL-SP-PvdA will probably introduce a lot of similar proposals the coming couple of years (before GL/PvdA wins big in the next general election, suddenly forgets everything and joins VVD-CDA-D66).

I've grown to think that the growing amount of temporary contracts might be an undesirable developtment after all. Employers tend to invest less in people with temporary contracts, so this should harm labour productivity and innovation. Then again, as a proud neoliberal VVD member I'd prefer making permanent contracts much cheaper (beautiful euphemism for slashing employment protection) instead of penalizing temporary contracts. Permanent contracts are very strictly regulated (too strictly imo), while temporary contracts are basically unregulated.

[DavidB.]

De Correspondent today revealed that last October Thierry Baudet had a meeting with American white nationalist Jared Taylor, fouder of American Renaissance. They met for five hours and left deep in the night. Not great optics.

[DavidB.]

A scandal in the category "holy sh**t": sheltered employment facility Alescon hired disabled people through a temporary employment agency in order not to have to pay their employers as much as they would under the law. Under the construction, employees did not only get paid less, but they also did not have a right to a full wage if they fell ill. Judges have now considered this construction to be illegal, as it is a flagrant violation of the main principle behind sheltered employment facilities: paying disabled employees a fair wage within a position of legal certainty.

And here comes the shocker: until October, William Moorlag was the CEO of Alescon. Now, Moorlag is an MP. For the PvdA.

(...)

A social democrat using illegal constructions to pay his disabled employees a lower wage. Wow. And the PvdA will not punish him for it, saying Moorlag had "good intentions" and accepts the verdict of the court (well, duh). Even though the PvdA have always vocally opposed this type of legal construction. Moorlag's "good intentions" were that "this construction enabled us to hire more people" -- spoken like a true capitalist. Domela Nieuwenhuis just turned in his grave.

[DavidB.]

The PVV today announced the 30 municipalities where they will stand in the local elections. In GE17 they did better than the national average (13.1%) in all of these except for Urk (11%), Arnhem (12%), Utrecht (7.4%), and Stichtse Vecht (12.7%).

[mvd10]

Being a PVV politician really hurts your career prospects. In 2016 an anonymous PVV MP apparently told a journalist that he had to remain in politics, even though he wanted to quit, because he was afraid he wouldn't find a job because of PVV background. I'm not sure whether it's that extreme, but being a PVV municipal council member doesn't help your career.

I'm not sure whether FvD has the same stigma. Baudet or Hiddema is on Business Class literally every time I happen to watch it (don't watch it frequently though) so perhaps being a FvD member isn't as much as a problem for businesses. Then again, I'm not sure whether Business Class is that relevant lol. I'm looking forward to senator Harry Mens though .

A lot of potential PVV candidates also complained about the tight controls imposed by Wilders. Wilders wants them to almost exclusively talk about "de-Islamization", but a lot of potential PVV candidates (especially the ones living in municipalities with a negligible amount of Muslims) felt like this would force them to ignore local issues.

[TheSaint250]

Being a PVV politician really hurts your career prospects. In 2016 an anonymous PVV MP apparently told a journalist that he had to remain in politics, even though he wanted to quit, because he was afraid he wouldn't find a job because of PVV background. I'm not sure whether it's that extreme, but being a PVV municipal council member doesn't help your career.

I'm not sure whether FvD has the same stigma. Baudet or Hiddema is on Business Class literally every time I happen to watch it (don't watch it frequently though) so perhaps being a FvD member isn't as much as a problem for businesses. Then again, I'm not sure whether Business Class is that relevant lol. I'm looking forward to senator Harry Mens though .

A lot of potential PVV candidates also complained about the tight controls imposed by Wilders. Wilders wants them to almost exclusively talk about "de-Islamization", but a lot of potential PVV candidates (especially the ones living in municipalities with a negligible amount of Muslims) felt like this would force them to ignore local issues.

That seems to be one reason (along others) that PVV can’t branch out much. It seems to be the most fervent anti-Islam of the mainstream right-wing populist parties, and it seems that exclusively focusing on a religion doesn’t help them further their appeal

[mvd10]

William Moorlag (the PvdA MP with the shady constructions) might resign after all. The PvdA youth wing has collected enough signatures for an internal referendum on his position. Gijs van Dijk (PvdA MP and former union leader) defended Moorlag, which is hilarious as they got van Dijk with his union experience in in order to "claim" these issues (employers finding loopholes in labour laws).

Meanwhile Erdogan wants to repair relations with the Netherlands, he even called Rutte, Michel (Belgium) and Merkel "old friends". A cynical person would say Rutte and Erdogan were completely fine with the diplomatic row in March. Newfound nationalism and a rally around the flag effect helped Rutte to win the general elections in a landslide while it helped Erdogan with his referendum.

Only 32% of voters think Pechtold should have resigned because of the gift he received. The Telegraaf ran a story on how 70% of right-wing voters though Pechtold should resign, but luckily for Pechtold not everyone in the Netherlands is right-wing (yet). And they didn't even count the VVD as part of the right, if you add the VVD in you get a completely different number (only 9% of VVD voters wanted Pechtold to resign). D66 still lost 2 seats in the weekly peil.nl poll though.

[DavidB.]

Pressure on Moorlag to resign is increasing. Following the campaign by the PvdA's youth wing, the executive board of the PvdA now wants Moorlag, who succeeded former Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem in October, to step down as well. De Volkskrant reports that there is a risk that Moorlag may refuse to resign. In that case, the PvdA would be left with only eight seats, one of them occupied by the Speaker. I don't really expect this to happen in his case, but you never know.

[mvd10]

There have been problems with fireworks all over the country. Even as a right-winger raised in a relatively rural place I must say that I'm tired of it by now, maybe the call for banning or more strictly regulating it will grow now. Yesterday a man died in front of his children because he f**ed up with fireworks, but most of the victims are bystanders.

Also wanted to shamelessly abuse this thread for announcing that this will be my last post of 2017 on atlas, I have to get back to my parents and the oliebollen now .

[DavidB.]

There have been problems with fireworks all over the country. Even as a right-winger raised in a relatively rural place I must say that I'm tired of it by now, maybe the call for banning or more strictly regulating it will grow now. Yesterday a man died in front of his children because he f**ed up with fireworks, but most of the victims are bystanders.

Also wanted to shamelessly abuse this thread for announcing that this will be my last post of 2017 on atlas, I have to get back to my parents and the oliebollen now .

Happy New Year!

Polls indicate that there has been a silent majority that is highly critical of consumer fireworks for years. According to a TNS NIPO poll (2017), 69% of the Dutch never buy any fireworks. And then look at the victims and the costs. Proponents always say that the problems stem from illegal fireworks, but apparently approximately 20% of legal consumer fireworks are defective. Fireworks, not Zwarte Piet, should be the most controversial Dutch "tradition". I have always supported a ban, but it seems things are finally going to change now, though I expect it to take a few more years and a lot more hands, eyes and lives.

This is an issue I definitely take into account when deciding whom to vote for in the local election.

[DavidB.]

The Islamic party NIDA, currently represented on the Rotterdam local council with three seats, will establish a branch in The Hague and stand in the municipal election in March. This will undoubtedly hurt the two existing Islamic parties on the local council in The Hague, the Islam Democrats and the more radical Unity Party (PvdE). NIDA have managed to fence off scandals in Rotterdam and operate in a professional way, which cannot be said about the crooks of the Islam Democrats and the salafis of the PvdE. It still remains to be seen whether DENK will also stand in The Hague.

[DC Al Fine]

There have been problems with fireworks all over the country. Even as a right-winger raised in a relatively rural place I must say that I'm tired of it by now, maybe the call for banning or more strictly regulating it will grow now. Yesterday a man died in front of his children because he f**ed up with fireworks, but most of the victims are bystanders.

Also wanted to shamelessly abuse this thread for announcing that this will be my last post of 2017 on atlas, I have to get back to my parents and the oliebollen now .

Happy New Year!

Polls indicate that there has been a silent majority that is highly critical of consumer fireworks for years. According to a TNS NIPO poll (2017), 69% of the Dutch never buy any fireworks. And then look at the victims and the costs. Proponents always say that the problems stem from illegal fireworks, but apparently approximately 20% of legal consumer fireworks are defective. Fireworks, not Zwarte Piet, should be the most controversial Dutch "tradition". I have always supported a ban, but it seems things are finally going to change now, though I expect it to take a few more years and a lot more hands, eyes and lives.

This is an issue I definitely take into account when deciding whom to vote for in the local election.

Wait, how bad is it? I find it mildly annoying on New Year's because I can't go to bed for a little while after midnight due to the noise, but it isn't that bad.

[Tender Branson]

There have been problems with fireworks all over the country. Even as a right-winger raised in a relatively rural place I must say that I'm tired of it by now, maybe the call for banning or more strictly regulating it will grow now. Yesterday a man died in front of his children because he f**ed up with fireworks, but most of the victims are bystanders.

Also wanted to shamelessly abuse this thread for announcing that this will be my last post of 2017 on atlas, I have to get back to my parents and the oliebollen now .

Happy New Year!

Polls indicate that there has been a silent majority that is highly critical of consumer fireworks for years. According to a TNS NIPO poll (2017), 69% of the Dutch never buy any fireworks. And then look at the victims and the costs. Proponents always say that the problems stem from illegal fireworks, but apparently approximately 20% of legal consumer fireworks are defective. Fireworks, not Zwarte Piet, should be the most controversial Dutch "tradition". I have always supported a ban, but it seems things are finally going to change now, though I expect it to take a few more years and a lot more hands, eyes and lives.

This is an issue I definitely take into account when deciding whom to vote for in the local election.

I find fireworx highly annoying, but I guess a ban would be hard to enforce: people would only continue to buy it via Internet and Poland. Here, it's the Greens and the Pilz List who want to ban it. I'm still leaning towards banning it, because fireworks are mostly retarded: they can lead to heavy injuries while being produced (often by children in Asia), or when fired off. They are filled with powder containing massive cancer-inducing substances that are poisoning the air. They are a plague to animals such as cats or dogs who are traumatized. They are a plague for agriculture, because the exploded rockets are coming down on fields who are used for making crops and hey. Cows are eating the stuff and the cancer-inducing crap can be found in our milk. And the PM10 and PM2.5 particle concentration is going through the roof every New Year's morning. Once you wake up on New Year, it's like you are waking up in Shanghai or Beijing, with a thick layer of disgusting crappy air outside.

This is a thing that the Greens should actually push and not being traitors to the country by putting illegal economic immigrants over hard-working Austrians or Europeans.

[DavidB.]

Wait, how bad is it? I find it mildly annoying on New Year's because I can't go to bed for a little while after midnight due to the noise, but it isn't that bad.

I don't mind the beautiful fireworks on the night itself, but on December 31st the streets just become a warzone, particularly in the cities but also to a smaller extent in suburban and rural areas. I currently live abroad, but last year I could not even ride my bike to the nearest supermarket without being bombarded with firecrackers, which is a scary experience. And I'm a young guy. Elderly people are particularly terrified of the annual sh**tfest, lots of pets escape every year out of anxiety, and it isn't exactly good for the air quality either. For most people, the "tradition" of fireworks is just no fun anymore. It's become an excuse for young guys to make as much noise as possible and scare people.

The timeslot to set off fireworks legally was reduced from 10:00-2:00 to 18:00-2:00 a few years ago, but it is simply impossible for the police to prevent people from doing it anyway. A lot of people from the Netherlands tell me that they changed their minds on a ban on consumer fireworks this year, so I assume that the situation didn't improve this year.

[mvd10]

Sylvana Simons presented her list of candidates for the municipal elections in Amsterdam. It's a goldmine .

It includes a former occupy protester who got arrested during an anti-Zwarte Piet rally and wants to represent an "internationally oriented decolonized anti-capitalist world", someone called vreer (without capital letter), a 47-year old white heterosexual cisgender male bus driver born in Purmerend, Anja Meulenbelt (most famous pro-Palestine activist in the Netherlands, she left the SP because she thought they weren't anti-Israel enough) and progressive documentary filmmaker Sunny Bergman who blatantly admitted ignoring crucial details in her documentaries.

I actually am more #woke on some of their issues than you'd expect for a VVD member (though they'd undoubtedly see me as a posterboy of fascist white male privilege or so), but I don't think they are helping their cause. Still, a combination of #woke UvA/VU students and latte liberals might propel them to a seat or two in Amsterdam. Artikel1 got 2.5% in Amsterdam during the general elections (0.3% in the entire nation) and I believe they only need to cross 2% to get a seat.

The D66 youth wing will campaign against the "intelligence and security services act". The cabinet has said they will ignore the result of the referendum as they will abolish the referendum anyway. This might put D66 in a hard position because most of their voters (and their youth wing) opposes this law, while most of the VVD/CDA/CU voters support this law (especially the amount of VVD voters that support this law is ... concerning for a liberal party, peil.nl had it support among VVD voters at 85%).

[DavidB.]

I think Gretta "antisemite has almost become a badge of honor" Duisenberg is still the most famous pro-Palestine activist in the Netherlands, but yeah, Meulenbelt should be about as well-known and about as nuts. The pro-Israel cause needs more people like them.

The BIJ1 candidates introduce themselves here and, as mvd10 said, it is truly a goldmine, so check it out. Google Translate should work fine for the descriptions. The best ones: vreer (no capital letter, pronouns them/that, "gender wanderer") and former Lolberlin professor Gloria Wekker, who thinks objectivity in science does not exist and should not exist and who wrote a book called "White Innocence" to blame all Dutch ypipo for colonialism, capitalism and everything bad in the world.

I personally don't know about their fate. You need to be insanely woke to vote for BIJ1, and with GL leading the opposition to the national government from the left this is a much safer option for most lefties in Amsterdam. One seat (or maybe two seats if they have a good day) would be the likeliest option, but zero seats isn't completely impossible either, as turnout in the Bijlmer, where they did best in the GE, isn't the highest in local elections. They got 10,197 votes in the GE in Amsterdam with 78% turnout. With an expected 50% turnout in the local election (but this may be much higher, in line with the GE) and a much larger electorate (all EU citizens can vote) of about 700k, you need at least 7,500 votes or so for 1 seat. Simons should be able to make it in, but I doubt their second candidate will.

[warandwar]

former Lolberlin professor Gloria Wekker, who thinks objectivity in science does not exist and should not exist and who wrote a book called "White Innocence" to blame all Dutch ypipo for colonialism, capitalism and everything bad in the world.

I don't like criticizing academics by making caricatures of their arguments. Wekker is actually a decently well known anthropologist, and you should treat her arguments seriously.

[DavidB.]

Of course it was hyperbole, but Wekker's opinion of objectivity in science is something I completely unhyperbolically oppose. In "White Innocence" she literally states that she rejects the "untenable positivist position, with its requirements of neutrality, objectivity and replacability" according to which it should not matter who the person behind the scientist is and that someone's work should be duplicable. I do not have a PhD, but I have a decent scientific background and I find this to be an incredibly dangerous argument to make, potentially undermining any and all scientific findings; this truly plays into the hands of those who question universities and research in general (be prepared for those who think scientific findings on vaccines are "just based on the scientist's personal background"!). Perhaps this makes one a "decently well known anthropologist" in Lolberlin and on various other U.S. campuses, and I am prepared to take anyone's argument seriously regardless of their position, but according to me it makes her an activist more than a scientist.

[warandwar]

Of course it was hyperbole, but Wekker's opinion of objectivity in science is something I completely unhyperbolically oppose. In "White Innocence" she literally states that she rejects the "untenable positivist" position according to which it should not matter who the person behind the scientist is and that someone's work should be duplicable. I do not have a PhD, but I have a decent scientific background and I find this to be an incredibly dangerous argument to make, potentially undermining any and all scientific findings; this truly plays into the hands of those who question universities and research in general (be prepared for those who think scientific findings on vaccines are "just based on the scientist's personal background"!). Perhaps this makes one a "decently well known anthropologist" in Lolberlin and on various other U.S. campuses, and I am prepared to take anyone's argument seriously regardless of their position, but according to me it makes her an activist more than a scientist.

SMH dude, rejecting positivism does not mean anti-realism or anti-materialism... If you are to take positivism seriously, that means that Saturn's rings did not exist before Galileo saw them!
Like the majority of the Western canon of philosophy is not positivist or empiricist, does this mean you don't read any of them?
Remember: we're talking about social sciences here...

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[DavidB.]

I am not saying there are no legitimate criticisms of positivism, and I am not saying any science that is not based on positivism is inherently bad or problematic. However, I do think that if one is as prominent in activist circles as Wekker is and one combines this activism with one's non-positivist academic work within the field of anthropology, rejecting the traditional position regarding objectivity in science, then one could raise questions about the value of this person's work. I am not an anthropologist and it could well be that her anthropological work is decent, but if her analysis of Dutch society just consists of personal opinions (formulated in academic language) connected to non-positivist theories rooted in black activism and invented by other activist scientists who want to "deconstruct colonialism" or something similar, with the aim of accusing Dutch people of bad things and ultimately transforming Dutch society rather than producing objective knowledge to the benefit of everyone, then I will not exactly be inclined to take the argument as seriously as an article in a medical journal on the effectiveness of vaccines.

Edit as response to your edit: It goes without saying that the demands of Dutch politicians regarding the integration of minority groups have shifted over time and that integration policies have changed accordingly, and that migrant groups are not to blame for this (though neither are ethnic Dutch people). I doubt that this is fuelled by "racial" considerations, but apart from the last sentence I think Wekker is not necessarily wrong here.

[DavidB.]

The new party Ubuntu Connected Front (UCF) will stand in the local elections of both Amsterdam and Rotterdam, focusing on voters with an African and Caribbean background. It should be similar to BIJ1, but less intersectionalist and more exclusively focused on black interests. It has the potential to be a huge spoiler to BIJ1 in Amsterdam and hurt the PvdA in Rotterdam.

The Amsterdam branch will be led by Iwan Leeuwin, an activist and former member of the Amsterdam Southeast district council on behalf of GroenLinks. Leeuwin was basically kicked out of the party by GL Amsterdam leader Rutger Groot Wassink for saying an effigy of Nelson Mandela looked like Black Pete (hilarious story; can't really blame Leeuwin). The effigy was later burned down, which ruined the opening ceremony of the Nelson Mandela Park. Strikingly, Leeuwin is the cousin of BIJ1 leader Sylvana Simons.

[mvd10]

Kijken in de Ziel, a Dutch television programme in which a journalist interviews people from certain fields (like lawyers, doctors or journalists) featured prime ministers this time. Dries van Agt (former CDA PM) caught the most headlines. He criticized the CDA's new more nationalist course (he also said that the Netherlands has become too nationalist) and he admitted voting for GroenLinks (!). Van Agt is well-known for his pro-Palestinian activism, but he also was involved in some conservative think tanks in the early 2000s (some conservative intellectuals wanted to create a Dutch conservative party, eventually they thought the PVV was going to be that party but they left as soon as they realized Wilders' agenda didn't line up with theirs and the project died soon after that). To be fair van Agt backed out immediately when Wilders first got involved, but it's still curious.

[DavidB.]

I was a little surprised about the attention this received. Van Agt pretty much made it clear that he voted for GL already when the election took place. On March 10, he said in De Volkskrant that he would not publicize for whom he would vote, but that he had "great sympathy, yes, admiration even" for GL (really makes you think). Perhaps some people had been sleeping. Van Agt was a vocal opponent of the cooperation with the PVV in 2010 and solely seems to care about opposing Israel these days, so the announcement was not too surprising in the first place.

A more interesting aspect of the interview, in my opinion, was Van Agt's open criticism of the late Queen Juliana. According to Van Agt, Queen Juliana's "process of wear had started. There was little systematics, logic and method in [her thinking on] the subjects that were discussed" by the time that he had become Prime Minister (1977 until her abdication in 1980). This remark, in turn, was criticized by the former Speaker of Parliament Gerdi Verbeet (PvdA), as Queen Juliana cannot defend herself from Van Agt's accusations. Van Agt never had a good relationship with the royal family; Jan-Peter Balkenende and he are the only former Prime Ministers who are currently alive and did not receive the honorary title of Minister of State. Apparently Queen Beatrix and Van Agt did not like each other either: they have very different characters, Van Agt screwed up Queen Beatrix' first formation in 1981, and he had a rocky relationship with his successor Ruud Lubbers, who is liked by the royal family.

[DavidB.]

Peil.nl poll for the upcoming local election in Amsterdam:

D66 9 (-5)
GL 9 (+3)
VVD 6 (-)
PvdA 5 (-5)
SP 4 (-2)
DENK 3 (new, +3)
FvD 3 (new, +3)
PvdD 2 (+1)
BIJ1 2 (new, +2)
CDA 1 (-)
50Plus 1 (new, +1)
Elderly Party 0 (-1)

The current D66-VVD-SP coalition would lose its majority. Painful numbers for D66, suggesting that either their achievements as part of the local government or (more likely) their participation in the national government is not valued too highly by many of their 2014 voters in Amsterdam. Another cold shower for the PvdA as well.

[windjammer]

A SP+VVD coalition, dear god this is si trash