Let's simply recall the ignorant, bigotted crap she came up with, shall we?
First we have a racist, xenophobic political party from Belgium, the reconstituted party of a racist, xenophobic party which had been hounded out of existence by the Belgian justice system but a year or so ago and with whom no other of the many mainstream parties in Belgium will speak. We note that said racist party actually loses seats in the recent parlaimentary elections. We note also that the Socialists are the biggest losers in said election, which is important because unlike other political groupings, Flemish and Walloon Socialists get on pretty well all things considered. Big winners are Flemish Christian Democrats on the right, and Greens on the left.
We note again that no one will speak to the racists in Vlaams Belang, thus complicating the making of a coalition, while the leader of the largest bloc in the new parlaiment, the Flemish branch of the Christian Democrats, is led by a man who is given to insulting Walloons (thus alienating prospective coalition partners) while at the same time demanding devolution of powers to the regions.
We note that even if such a devolution might be desirable (and leave this discussion 100% aside, also ignoring the thorny Brussels region issue, a big one that the Times reporter doesn't really get into), having a leader given to insulting the party likely to be hurt in the process is not a good way of moving forward in that process.
Now, given this dynamic, the last person I would expect to be quoted, first and foremost, in this environment is one of the leaders of the racist, xenophobic party no one else (save, apparently, the Times Paris bureau chief) will speak to.
Not only does the New York Times reporter do this, but she provides him a forum of legitimacy by quoting him, in a paragraph which sets up the rest of the article, citing some ahistorical bullshit which his party demogogically uses to justify its crude separatism, a separatism that she only by paragraph like 26 acknowledges is not even supported by a majority of Flamands.
This is crap journalism. Crap, crap, crap.
That it comes from the (supposedly seasoned) Paris bureau chief instead of someone with an excuse gives me pause. I knew the Times were on some real hard times, but not this hard. Very ugly indeed. Nil aon leigheas ar an ngra ach posadh
LOL. Indeed, good analysis. We've seen so much crap about Belgium we're becoming to tired to react anymore. The struggle of man against tyranny is the struggle of memory against forgetting.(Kundera)
