Please not Mr. D as I'm coming back through it next week to spend Christmas in Londres, whoops, London. It's not the tunnel's fault, it's who you let in through it. You know what begins at Calais (although these days its more a case that they stop at Calais.
Disclaimer: I find the Border Agency staff manning the Eurostar terminus friendly and always perfect gentlemen. Anyone know if there is a selection process which results in the nasty ones being sent to airports and the nice ones to St Pancras and the G de Nord ?
I see Merkel's junior partners are in even more of a fix than the Lib-Dems. At least Clegg hasn't had to resign yet...... FDP general secretary Lindner resigns
Christian Lindner, the general secretary of Germany’s Free Democrats (FDP), resigned on Wednesday amid controversy surrounding a grassroots attempt to derail the euro rescue fund by party members.
There are moments where one has to make way in order to make new a dynamic possible,” Lindner said in a statement. “My realisation led to the consequence that I relinquish my office out of respect for my party and my engagement for the liberal cause.”
The move is another blow to the beleaguered pro-business party, which is the junior partner to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives in her centre-right coalition.
The 32-year-old Lindner faced growing pressure in recent days for attempting to torpedo an internal party vote against Germany’s support for the euro rescue fund known as the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). Both Lindner and FDP chairman Philipp Rösler, who is also economy minister and vice chancellor, declared over the weekend that the motion had failed to reach a necessary quorum even before the deadline had run out.
Lindner had also heavily criticised the initiator of the anti-ESM vote, parliamentarian Frank Schäffler. “He’s sort of like the David Cameron of the FDP,” Lindner recently told the Hamburger Abendblatt, making a derisive comparison to the eurosceptical prime minister of Britain.
And FDP boss Rösler on Wednesday emphasised there would be no anti-European shift under his leadership.
“Those in the ranks of the FDP that want to change the terms underpinning the rescue of the euro will not be successful,” he told the Passauer Neue Presse.
He also said he was confident he would remain FDP chairman even though the party continued to wallow at all-time lows in opinion polls. A survey released on Wednesday by Stern magazine showed the Free Democrats garnering just three percent – below the threshold necessary to win seats in parliament.
“I’m certain the FDP will return to its old strength in 2012,” Rösler said.
[quote] It's going to keep happening, it's going to get worse, the right wing resistance is going to become an increasing danger to everybody, until governments listen to what the original inhabitants of their countries want, and don't bend over and it take it up the backside to appease the left wing contingents and the immigrant pressure groups.
I believe 50% of all babies born in Belgium are Muslims. Does that tell you something? Is that a cause for concern? [quote]
Those who live in denial of the facts, re immigration, need only to look at the descent of the UK into a 3rd world hellhole and cast their minds back to the warnings of Enoch Powell ( for which he was unjustly vilified....) and how true they have become.
It's interesting to remember that the Swiss population voted to expel any " auslanders " ( and their families ) convicted of serious crimes. I predict thet there will be a call in many EU countries to institute such laws after the Liege atrocity.
Switzerland is an island of sanity in a malestrom of PC influenced leftist stupidity.
The Swiss have got so many things right. I spend a fair amount of time there and I love so much about it.
The problem with expelling 'auslaender' is in defining what is an 'auslaender'. The Liege man (Armani?), for example, was born in Belgium of Moroccan parentage. He probably had a Belgian passport. Is he a foreigner, subject to expulsion, or not?
The Swiss, once again, are smarter, and unfettered by the lunatic rules of political correctness and the EU, they make it almost impossible for the first generation of immigrants to get Swiss passports. This serves a double purpose, it helps to reduce the tide of permanent immigration, and it allows non citizens to be deported.
I believe 50% of all babies born in Belgium are Muslims. Does that tell you something? Is that a cause for concern?
Yes it does, it means you would rather spout the racist bullshit propagated by the far right ignoramuses than actually look for facts so that is a cause for concern when thinking someone is actually intelligent enough to be above that level of person.
Here's one for you to figure out. 6% of the Belgian population of 10.75 million (2009) is Muslim. There were 127,297 births in Belgium in 2009. That means that out of 645,000 men, women, boys and girls, old and young, etc, there were in excess of 60,000 new babies in 2009 alone, according to that racist claptrap.
Any fool can see that, if "the muslims" were producing that many kids, that the women who were fertile would be giving birth to an unheard amount, if not an impossible amount, of children.
Do you still want too go down that road, Cape, do you still want to spout the racist line? That is what you have done, and I thought you were above that.
In Belgium, the average native couple (Christian or secular) has 1.7 children, the immigrant Moroccan couple (Muslim) has 3.25 children, i.e. nearly twice as many
Quote:
Belgium’s Muslim population is projected to rise from six per cent to 10.2 per cent over the next 20 years
Within one lifetime, the population and demographic of Belgium has changed completely. Did the indigenous inhabitants of the country have any say in this? 50 years ago would they even have comprehended the change that was to be forced on them?
The bedrock of a nation is its culture If you forceably change that culture to the detriment of the existing population, is it surprising that the result is civil discord and strife. When you have religous leaders instructing their followers to have as many children as possible to overwhelm the non-believers how do you expect the existing population to react?
Don Melvin writes that, excluding Russia, Europe's Muslim population will double by 2020. He also says that almost 85% of Europe's total population growth in 2005 was due to immigration in general. Omer Taspinar predicts that the Muslim population of Europe will nearly double by 2015, while the non-Muslim will shrink by 3.5%, if the higher Muslim birth rate persists.
Middle East, Europe
Ömer Taşpınar, Nonresident Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy, Center on the United States and Europe Foreign Policy March/April 2003
Islam may still be a faraway religion for millions of Americans. But for Europeans it is local politics. The 15 million Muslims of the European Union (EU)—up to three times as many as live in the United States—are becoming a more powerful political force than the fabled Arab street. Europe?s Muslims hail from different countries and display diverse religious tendencies, but the common denominator that links them to the Muslim world is their sympathy for Palestine and Palestinians. And unlike most of their Arab brethren, growing numbers of Europe?s Muslims can vote in elections that count.
This political ascendance threatens to exacerbate existing strains within the trans-Atlantic relationship. The presence of nearly 10 million Muslims versus only 700,000 Jews in France and Germany alone helps explain why continental Europe might look at the Middle East from a different angle than does the United States. Indeed, French and German concerns about a unilateral U.S. attack on Iraq or Washington?s blind support for Israel are at least partly related to nervousness about the Muslim street at home.
Whether Brussels, Berlin, Paris, or Washington like it or not, Europe?s Muslim constituencies are likely to become an even more vocal foreign policy lobby. Two trends are empowering Europe?s Muslim street: demographics and opportunities for full citizenship.
It?s worth remembering that Europe?s Muslim population is an unintended consequence of actions taken nearly a half century ago. During the postwar labor shortage in the 1950s and 1960s, Turks, Algerians, Moroccans, Tunisians, and Pakistanis were called to help spur Europe?s economic recovery. No host country expected these ?guestworkers,? as the Germans called them with characteristic frankness, to overstay their welcome. Like all good guests, they were supposed to leave, preferably when the recession hit and the party was over in the 1970s. They didn?t. Instead, their families joined them, and new generations of European Turks, Algerians, Moroccans, Tunisians, and Pakistanis were born.
More are on the way. Today, the Muslim birth rate in Europe is three times higher than the non-Muslim one. If current trends continue, the Muslim population of Europe will nearly double by 2015, while the non-Muslim population will shrink by 3.5 percent.
A parallel process of Muslim enfranchisement is accompanying this population surge. Nearly half of the 5 million to 7 million Muslims in France are already French citizens. The situation is similar for most of the 2 million Muslims in Great Britain. Most recently, in 2000, Germany joined the countries where citizenship is granted according to birthplace instead of ancestry. The new German citizenship laws added already a half million voters to the rolls and have opened the road to citizenship to all other Muslims in Germany. With currently 160,000 new Muslim citizens a year, the number of voters might total 3 million in the next decade.
In Germany and elsewhere in Europe, a Muslim swing vote is already having a critical impact. Consider the electoral push that newly enfranchised ?German Turks? gave to Germany?s incumbent Social Democrat (SPD)-Green coalition in last September?s down-to-the-wire election. These Muslim Germans punished the anti-immigrant Christian Democrats, who oppose Turkey?s membership to the EU. And they expressed their gratitude for efforts by the SPD-Green coalition to change the archaic laws of German citizenship. The bad news for the German Christian Democrats is that in the next general elections in 2006, roughly 1 million German Turks will be eager to cast their votes.
A big boost to the organizational capacity of Muslims in Europe came most recently from France, home to Europe?s largest Muslim community. The country?s diverse Muslim community is now represented by a unified French Council of the Islamic Faithu—a potential boon to its lobbying clout. French Muslims have also gained higher political visibility with the inclusion in Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin?s government of two cabinet members of North African origin.
Armed with the power of the vote and quickly learning the mechanics of lobbying, the Muslim street in Europe is on its way to having more political weight than the Arab street of Egypt or Saudi Arabia. But the attacks of September 11 have cast the growing influence of European Muslims in a more ominous light. Although the overwhelming majority of Muslims living in Europe (or, for that matter, the United States) are peaceful and law abiding, many European governments worry under their breath about the role of some European Muslims in past and future terrorist attacks—a concern stoked by the discovery of al Qaeda cells in Germany, France, Italy, and Britain. Given these not-so-latent suspicions and prejudices, one casualty of a major Islamic terrorist attack on European soil would likely be Europe?s budding multiculturalism.
Another major concern is the relationship between Europe?s Muslims and what is perceived in some quarters as Europe?s growing anti-Semitism. True, continental Europeans are much more critical of Israel and generally more supportive of the Palestinian cause. Overall, Europeans have a difficult time understanding how a small country like Israel can have so much influence over the sole superpower. But few in the United States notice that the communities most resentful of Israel in Europe are Muslim.
The perpetrators of anti-Semitic incidents in France are not right-wing extremists protecting the ?French race? from Jewish contamination: The 400 or so anti-Semitic incidents documented in the country during 2001 have mostly been attributed to Muslim youth of North African origin. Such incidents tend to spike upwards during times of Israeli-Palestinian trouble—further proof of the Muslim role.
I believe 50% of all babies born in Belgium are Muslims.
OK, hands up to this! It's a 'fact' I've heard doing the rounds. It's clearly wrong, at least according to the sources I have now checked, and your statistics. I didn't bother to check it before posting. The fact that it is 'doing the rounds' indicates the strength of feeling about the change in the demographic pattern, the Islamisation of BE and other countries, and I am sure you would admit that this is happening, even if it is not a concern to you.
I apologise for introducing a 'fact' that is bullshit, but it's not racist, it's just an exaggeration and a reflection of what people are thinking.
Friends of mine (Cape Coloureds) left South Africa about 20 years ago to go to live in Belgium, as that is where part of their family originally came from. They left 2 years ago, after being attacked twice in the street and on public transport in a suburb of Brussels, they were also subject to racist abuse from, believe it or not, Muslims. They went back to Cape Town where they claim to feel safer. They also quoted this figure of 50%, and they are educated people with no axe to grind.
I would also add that I used to go to Brussels quite a lot in the late 80's and early 90's. I always felt very safe, even late at night. Last time I went, about 2 years ago, I felt very jittery, and considering where I've spent most of my life, it takes a lot for me to feel unsafe.
I'm with Capetonian on this one. Brussels felt very unsafe last time I was there, North Africans glowering at me walking from the Borse late at night to my Novotel at the Black Tower.
I phoned an old friend of my parents, a retired teacher, while I was there - I've never met this lady but she's spent her retirement travelling the world >(Asia, S. America, Middle East) - and suggested she take the train over from her house in Bruges to meet me in Brussels. "Brussels ?" she said, "oh I never go there - far too dangerous."
[quote] Here's one for you to figure out. ........
Quote:
In Belgium, the average native couple (Christian or secular) has 1.7 children, the immigrant Moroccan couple (Muslim) has 3.25 children, i.e. nearly twice as many
Quote:
Belgium’s Muslim population is projected to rise from six per cent to 10.2 per cent over the next 20 years Within one lifetime, the population and demographic of Belgium has changed completely. Did the indigenous inhabitants of the country have any say in this? 50 years ago would they even have comprehended the change that was to be forced on them?
The bedrock of a nation is its culture If you forceably change that culture to the detriment of the existing population, is it surprising that the result is civil discord and strife. When you have religous leaders instructing their followers to have as many children as possible to overwhelm the non-believers how do you expect the existing population to react? [quote] It is time for the one (and only...) worthwhile law the Chinese forced on their citizenry be given serious consideration here to restricting the immigrant birth rate in Europe.
The one child policy deserves careful study.................immediately.
The one child policy deserves careful study.................immediately.[/I]
The trouble is that a tyranical one party state like China can enforce a one child policy....
What we could do, of course, is restrict child benefits to the first child.
I've got a lot of confidence that future generations of immigrants will eventually assimilate provided that we shut the doors and thereby dilute some of the more alien and indeed medieval influences that might otherwise be imported. That would mean, amongst other things, cracking down on arranged marriages, withdrawing the right of children born in the EU to non EU parents to claim citizenship, and adopting a zero tolerance policy to those who illegally enter, remain or abuse the hospitality offered in EU member states.
Within one lifetime, the population and demographic of Belgium has changed completely. Did the indigenous inhabitants of the country have any say in this? 50 years ago would they even have comprehended the change that was to be forced on them?
The bedrock of a nation is its culture If you forceably change that culture to the detriment of the existing population, is it surprising that the result is civil discord and strife. When you have religous leaders instructing their followers to have as many children as possible to overwhelm the non-believers how do you expect the existing population to react?
How does that figure of yours equal "FIFTY PERCENT of all children born in Belgium are Muslim"? It DOESN'T, as the "Muslim" population in Belgium is so small. You are as well saying that Jewish or "devout" Catholic families are responsible for 50% of all children as they tend to have larger families too. In other words, you are pulling stats out of your ass which have no bearing on the reality of things whatsoever.
Indigenous Belgians? Define that. "Belgians" have been as much a bastard race as the English, unless you mean "Western European Caucasian" when you say "indigenous" and then that means you are ignoring a hell of a lot of different peoples settling here over the centuries. That, my friend, is ignorant nonsense showing through in your words.
As far as your part about "When you have religous leaders instructing their followers to have as many children as possible to overwhelm the non-believers how do you expect the existing population to react?" then you are showing your bigotry. Provide ONE shred of evidence to show that Imams here in Belgium (for that is the country we are talking about) are doing that en masse and that the intent of the vast majority of "Muslims" is to somehow "take over the country" and that the people here are "reacting" en masse against "Muslims". If you had a clue about what was happening, you would realise that, like in the UK and elsewhere, that ain't happening. What is happening is that more and more "Muslims" are "Muslim" in name only, they do not follow their religion fully (like most people in England call themselves "Christian" but have never seen the inside of a church, never mind actually look at the Bible), they are becoming "westernised". Also, most people don't bloody care about what the religion or ethnic background of someone is, they tend to believe in the simple motto of "Live and let live". As I say, you have no idea regarding what goes on here, so maybe you should stick to things you actually have some knowledge about instead of making us suffer your own fears and ignorance.
adopting a zero tolerance policy to those who illegally enter, remain or abuse the hospitality offered in EU member states.
One thing you forgot is that you would have to make sure that countries actually enforced the "rules" in place NOW, the ones that say that you "claim asylum" in the FIRST EU country you enter and not in the one you decide to stay in when you realise you cannot get to the UK. It also means that, for example, Belgium, should be sending almost every "asylum seeker" back to France/Germany/Holland who should then send them back along the chain of countries they have passed through to get there until they are in the country where they entered the EU.
You see, contrary to popular belief, making up new "laws" will not change a thing if the existing laws ain't applied. Let's start with the basics and, once people have gotten the hang of that, and people realise that they are not going to get to the "lands of Milk and Honey" but will be stuck in, for example, Greece, then there might be some changes to this issue called uncontrolled immigration. Anything else is just Alice in Wonderland thinking, it will never happen and would never be enforced if it did.
That's where the problem lies, not with those coming here and knowing they'll get away with it.
