Expanding the Legacy
Dutch Parliament Rips into Prime Minister Schoof
It was only his third day in office, however, parliament showed no mercy for Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof. In a tumultuous session, the opposition let it rip, leaving Mr Schoof gasping for air amid a veritable assault on his cabinet. The leaders of the opposition, acting in concert, demanded to know what the prime minister thinks of two of his cabinet members who have expressed concerns over ‘population replacement’ (‘omvolking), a supposedly deliberate policy to replace the native Dutch with immigrants.
Tory Omnishambles Awaits a Reckoning
On Thursday, voters in the UK will render their verdict on fourteen years of Tory rule. It is expected that the Conservative Party will receive an electoral clobbering of note. Some polls predict that the party may even be relegated to third place, behind both Labour and either the Liberal Democrats or Reform UK, the new kid on the block of Brexit provocateur and Trump-wannabe Nigel Farage.
NATO Boots-on-the-Ground in Ukraine
This is how a continent sleepwalks into war. It’s not that Europe desires war, or pines for it after a hiatus of seventy years. Rather, the continent is slowly being ushered into one by immutable circumstance over which it no longer has control. It happened before. In 1914, the German...
Political Upset in The Netherlands
In an election upset without precedent, Dutch voters on Wednesday chastised the ruling coalition of longtime prime minister Mark Rutte and handed the levers of power to political provocateur Geert Wilders whose Party for Freedom (PVV) unexpectedly secured 37 seats (+20) in the 150-strong Lower House.The PVV thus became the...
PiS Hold on Power in the Balance
Clutching at straws. With the slimmest of margins, voters in Poland opened a narrow path for the pro-EU opposition to reclaim power after eight years in the proverbial wilderness. With fear and ill-disguised loathing, the European Union watched as the national-conservative Law and Justice party (PiS) of deputy prime minister...
Germany Prefers Coal over Nuclear
At about the same time Germany shuttered its last three nuclear power plants, five lignite-burning ones were recommissioned. In another disconcerting sign of times past, earlier this year in North-Rhine Westphalia, energy producer RWE Power began dismantling a wind farm to make way for the expansion of an open-pit lignite...
New Security Reality in Europe
The peace dividend, now exhausted, delivered the countries of Europe a windfall of some €4.2 trillion (£3.6 trillion) over the past thirty years – a sum roughly equivalent to a quarter of the European Union’s GDP. The number comes from Bruegel, a non-partisan policy think tank in Brussels. The institute...
After Fiscal Prudence, A Reckoning
In Germany, trains no longer run on time. This is a big issue for a country that derives its national identity from punctuality, order, and ‘Gründlichkeit’ – a thoroughness usually applied in a ruthless fashion. The neighbouring Swiss now refuse to grant late-running German trains access to their network for...
On the Battlefields of Ukraine, Mass Trumps Tech
On the undulating plains of Eastern Ukraine, a region largely devoid of topographic features, tech wizardry powers and shapes the ultimate, and most lethal, cat and mouse game ever. Here, loss of human life and military kit is accompanied by an upset and the unravelling of modern military doctrine. Whilst...
Extremists Lose but Nobody Wins
Voters in Spain shied away from the extremes and handed a pyrrhic win of sorts to the opposition conservatives whilst also rewarding Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’ socialist party with a few extra seats in a hung parliament. Markets reacted with dismay at the inconclusive result of the vote which precludes...
