Striking Fear Into the Heart of Brussels

Rise of Populist Parties Pushes Europe to the Right. Making predictions is hard, especially about the future. Are a handful of small, rightist parties in small European states about to bring the European project crashing down? One can hope.

It is ironic that it is here in Finland -- a part of Europe that always seemed eminently European -- that a movement is now coming to power that inveighs against immigrants and abortions, considers Brussels to be the "heart of darkness" and rejects all financial assistance for what it calls "wasteful countries," like Greece, Ireland and Portugal. "We were too soft on Europe," says Soini, adding that Finland should not be made to "pay for the mistakes of others."

Not ironic, say I. The country with the best and smartest students in the world ought to be able to see better than others the grim future "Europe" is preparing for itself.

The election result from Europe's far north has alarmed the political establishment in Brussels. If Soini's party becomes part of the new government, there will be more at stake than Helsinki's traditional pro-European stance. The entire program to rescue the euro could be in jeopardy, because it has to be approved unanimously by the entire European Union.

The bailout is nothing but a means to protect the big banks from taking massive haircuts. The Irish are rebelling against putting themselves in financial bondage for generations, and so should the Finns and everyone else who would be forced to pay up.

Markus Ferber, a member of the European Parliament for Germany's conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), warns that solidarity among European countries is waning, a situation he calls "extremely dangerous."

Nonsense, IMO. European countries will not go to war against each other, for they know the cost.

The risk is substantial, as euroskeptics gain ground across the EU. In Denmark, the xenophobic Danish People's Party has supported a center-right minority government for almost 10 years. In the Netherlands, Prime Minister Mark Rutte is dependent on the goodwill of right-wing populist politician Geert Wilders, who, with his tirades against Islam and the EU, captured 15.5 percent of the vote in the country's last parliamentary election. In Sweden, the nationalist, anti-European Sweden Democrats crossed the 4-percent threshold to gain seats in the parliament, the Riksdag, and in Italy Umberto Bossi's xenophobic Lega Nord, or Northern League, is even part of the government. Although the party is primarily active in the north of Italy, it is the third-strongest party on the national level. [My emphases.}

There you have in a nutshell what the establishment thinks of people and parties who dare to take their own side. They're xenophobes and speak in tirades.

Marine Le Pen, daughter of National Front founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, is in the process of putting the fear of God into the country's traditional parties. She wants to shed the image of a racist, extreme party established by her father. As a politician, she appeals to middle-class and blue-collar workers, because she is young and wears jeans, and seems less aloof than the traditional elites that dominate politics in France.

Go, Marine!

It remains to be seen what effect all this will have, but it looks like a handful of those on the right are indeed striking fear into the new Soviet Europe. History is full of twists and turns, and the situation may not be as hopeless as many of us seem to think it is.