The Netherlands fights back against populism

We are a prime example of where populism leads us. Up the creek etc.

Woke up this morning in France and heard the news at dawn. Wilders has gained 4 seats but nonetheless the wonderful, tolerant and rational Dutch have held on to their principles. Respect and admiration!

Humm - wonder why so few posts - I expect there's a lot of disappointed 'righties' on GN.

One of the few bits of good news out these days!
Thank goodness somebody is seeing sense.

Fingers crossed that France will reject Le Pen. The opinion polls predict that Macron will be the winner after the second round of voting.

Merkel is still slightly ahead in the German opinion polls. I guarantee that either she or Martin Schulz will be Chancellor after the September elections. It's still uncertain who the coalition parties will be. If the Greens do well, they could be part of a coalition along with the centrist FDP. The CDU and SPD will not want to form a coalition together,although Merkel's 2005-2009 government was a CDU/SPD coalition. It shows how different politics in Germany (and Holland) when the two main parties can work together. UK politics is too confrontational for the Conservatives and Labour to work together. The liberal FDP has hardly ever been out of government since the end of WW2.

The most likely scenario is that both France and Germany will have left/centre governments. Canada could have an increasingly important role with the EU.

Whatever happens, the EU will be stronger and the UK is going to find itself increasingly irrelevant. Don't let go of your lifebelt!

Yes definitely good news from the Netherlands, let's hope it augurs well for France and Le Penn loses ground.

Most countries want middle of the road/centre type politics, so it's not surprising really, France will most likely not go extreme right wing in the elections either.

I don't think it means the EU will be stronger at all, just that it won't fall apart just at the moment.

Blimey Rigby, the thread's only been up for an hour! How many posts to you expect? This isn't MN...

....and we can't be on GN all day either!

rigby There have been a number of comments on GN about the EU falling apart, especially after the Dutch, French and German elections. Well, it's one down - the German election won't produce an anti-EU government and it's not looking good for Le Pen. Never mind! I'm sure they'll suck it up.

Aha! Another evidence-free rosesareredism, projecting your wishes on other people.

Christine All the polls are predicting that Le Pen will narrowly win the first round,but without an overall majority. This will almost certainly be followed by a second round with Le Pen and Macron. Even if Fillon makes it to the second round (unlikely), the polls predict that the candidate who isn't Le Pen will win.

Unless you know differently...

Thank goodness, I don't think I could take another depressing election result.

.....another piece of daphnedil unpleasant comment more like.This is an opinion forum, so which bit of my post do you have a problem with this time I wonder, hmmm?

I wonder if the media bigged up Wilders more than support for him warranted and that the Dutch election results simply show reality, i.e. that there was never a huge amount of support for his politics?

I think you are right thatbags as probably happened with UKIP here.

Regarding the French elections, the polls may not be reliable. Here in SW France, many younger Socialist voters are disillusioned with their party, hate Marine Le Pen, detest Fillon, and dislike Macron because they see him as a traitor. Many of the people we know will vote for Jean- Luc Mélenchon in the first round, then spoil their ballot in the second round. Their intention is to prevent either of the second round candidates from getting the majority( 51 % of votes cast).

That's my understanding daphnedil but things can be unpredictable. Hadn't heard about the spoiling of ballot papers Rinouchka, interesting.

secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/thank_you_netherlands/?bkHcnjb&v=90265&cl=12138606274&_checksum=a36f702ddae02e0115bd5fcc358969c07d3cd2dcc28b139cc380db24a25c1ba7

For anyone who wants to thank the Dutch.

I expect there's a lot of disappointed 'righties' on GN.
I shouldn't think there are a lot who would support Wilders
If any!

You could still be right of centre but not agree with anything at all that he says.

Regarding the French elections, the polls may not be reliable.
Rinouchka the polls have proved less than reliable here too - in fact I am wondering what is the point of them.

I think thatbags could be right, there has been rather a media frenzy over him. He is quite noticeable and controversial politicians do attract attention.

There has been a lot going on in the Netherlands too, with the Turkish problems and the Dutch have probably decided that safe and steady is the best course.

why so few posts in that 19 minutes perhaps people were:
eating dinner?
washing up?
even having a ?

or watching the news?

There, that's four more posts