Tue, 04 May 2010
On clue and opinions
How does one define one's "national identity"?
One way is to look at where a person is born. By that definion, I could be called Flemish, Belgian, or European, whatever you think about it.
Another way to look at it is how one feels about one's own identity. This, of course, is a much more accurate way to describe a person; and by that definition, I am either Belgian or European. I do not feel any affinity with much of the so-called "flemish" identity, nor do I wish to be associated with it any more than is strictly necessary. Obviously, some people feel different about that for themselves.
This I can understand.
In fact, the statement to feel more Belgian than Flemish is probably not one that is very common in this general area. I am not stupid; I know that Belgium is not a Nation (it is a state, but that is a different matter). I just do not feel a lot of warm fuzzy feelings about Flanders. Naturally, other people have other feelings about that.
This, too, I can understand.
The logical result of the above is that my personal opinions about the somewhat convoluted politics in this country are not shared by many; that when I state my opinion, I may expect opposition, or at the very least someone stating why they disagree with me.
This, of course, I can also understand.
But what I cannot understand is that every time I state my opinion, someone must come out and insult my intelligence by telling me I "do not have a clue". Please do not mistake my disagreement for misunderstanding.
Martijn asks me to "check the facts". Let's do that, shall we?
- There's been a judgement by the constitutional court that the current situation regarding which party may run for election in the BHV region is unconstitutional.
- One group of politicians wishes to resolve this issue by splitting the BHV region in two. That would certainly solve the issue.
- Another group of politicians dislikes this solution. They may be willing to go along, but they want other concessions before they will do so. This is what I referred to when I said that there were "a huge heap of all kinds of side issues" in my previous post.
- The first group does not wish to make such concessions. Some of their numbers have even stated in the press that there is no need to make them, because, given the first point, there's only one solution and that is to split.
That last point is, of course, complete and utter bullshit. It would hold merit if there was only one way to solve a constitutional crisis; but by definition, there are always at least two ways: one is to change the law to comply with the constitution, the other is to change the constitution to make the law no longer be unconstitutional. So a group that feels strongly about one of these two possible solutions should be prepared to negotiate with the other group so as to hammer out an agreement that benefits both parties. In some cases, this will mean doing things that they do not completely like; but if they're not willing to do that, at all, they have no business being politicians. For the longest time during the early negotiations, however, both parties have stubbornly refused to even acknowledge the other position, let alone talk about it.
Now, for clarity, I'm not advocating that the latter of the two options in that previous paragraph is what should happen. Frankly, I don't even care what happens, so long as they manage to resolve the issue at hand in some way. What I do care about, however, is that this country has been in a near-constant state of stalemate over these past few years for an issue that only matters to politicians; I don't care who or what a group of people in a (to me) obscure part of the country can vote for. This country needs a stable government which can act on things that actually matter. Like, say, the international economic crisis of the past two years; I think it matters much more whether the man in the street has a job than whether John Q. Politician will past these next elections.
Mon, 03 May 2010
Yves Leterme, Belgian minister for resignation.
At least that's what it looks like right now. No less than five times did he offer his resignation as prime minister of Belgium to the king. Looks like fifth time is a charm now, too—we get to go elect a new parliament in a month or two. Sigh.
The 'fun' bit is, there's no real reason why this is necessary. The main issue that they've been talking about these past few years is the 'BHV' thing. While the issue is somewhat complex and, I'm sure, involves a huge heap of all kinds of side issues, the crux of the matter is that there's one group of politicians who wants to forbid another group of politicians from running in a region of the country around the capital.
Now I'm sure that's hugely important to politicians—after all, their career depends on it—but beyond a few fanatics in and around that very capital, I'm pretty sure nobody actually cares what the particular names are of the particular groups of people that appear on the list of people they can vote for. Because, you see, this isn't actually about politicians wanting to forbid other politicians from running; it's about politicians wanting to forbid other political parties from running. Which, of course, makes a whole world of difference. Yeah, right.
Now I wouldn't care about this much, except that it interferes with the smooth running of this country. The fact that they've come up with "problem" after "problem" related to this BHV "issue" for these past years has made it hard(er) for the government to actually to any real work. So although I hate the current situation, I'm actually quite relieved that an election is coming up. Perhaps this time we can get the fanaticals out and have a real government.
(no comments allowed on this item; please use your own blog)
Wed, 10 Jun 2009
Elections: followup
My somewhat emotional message from earlier this week got some response from Dag, who, let's say, does not seem to share my ideas about flemish separatism.
First, Dag, yes, I agree that the flemish Greens could do much better. The fact that the walloon greens are, in fact, doing so much better than the flemish ones is part of why I believe I live in the wrong part of Belgium; it's not just these elections. I'm not saying I don't understand why they happened, but that doesn't make me feel better about it.
I'm also not saying that there are no issues in Belgium, nor that more autonomy for Flanders can't possibly be the solution for at least some of them. There are cases where doing something at the regional level will make more sense than doing it at the federal level.
What bothers me, however, is the fact that parties such as the N-VA seem to think that everything can be solved by more authonomy, and that an ultimate goal of chopping up this already too small country into a yet even smaller one is desirable. To me, it is not, and that's what my post tried to express.
To give just a bit of background: My mother grew up in Kuringen, a small town near Hasselt, while my father grew up in Ekeren. After they married, they went to live in the province of Antwerp (in Ekeren eventually, after a short stint in Mortsel). My father's twin brother moved to Wijgmaal near Leuven after his marriage, while my mother's oldest sister married a guy from West-Vlaanderen and moved there. As a result, I have aunts and uncles in all flemish provinces (apart from East-Flanders), which gives me a somewhat unique perspective on the differences that exist within Flanders.
People sometimes say that there are monetary flows between Flanders and Wallonia, and that therefore we should split up, since that would allow a higher budget for Flanders. I say that there are such differences between Flemish provinces, too; should we therefore boot out some of those provinces as well?
People sometimes say that there are cultural differences between Flanders and Wallonia, and that therefore there is no link between the two. I say that there are cultural differences between Flemish provinces too; should we therefore boot out some of those provinces? As a very stupid example of this one: in Limburg, it is traditional for guests to give a standing ovation to the bride and groom when they first enter the location where the dinner is going to be held. No such tradition exists anywhere else in Flanders. There are more such differences, however.
People sometimes say that Flanders and Wallonia do not speak the same language. Arguably the best argument in favor of separatism, I would still challenge you to put a person from Limburg in front of someone from West-Flanders, and have them talk to eachother. It's going to be similarly hard for them to understand eachother as it is for them to understand someone from Wallonia.
Anyway, I'll not further bore my readers with Belgian politics. But I'm still unhappy about the election's results.
Mon, 08 Jun 2009
I live in the wrong part of Belgium.
Compare this against this: the flemish greens (Groen!) are losing even more of their base (6.77%, from 7.6%), while the walloon ones (ecolo) more than double their support, to come in at an impressive third place. In Flanders, the left side of the political spectrum (Groen! and SP.A) has mainly lost voters, while in Wallonia, they are stronger than ever.
Some people (Dutch only) seem to think that being a separatist is going to solve everything, to the point of even campaigning with things like 'more autonomy in flanders will allow us to solve the current economic crisis'. Utterly delusional, of course; Flanders, more than ever, is part of a European economy. To get that economy running again, what we need to do is to coordinate with neighbouring regions. More autonomy for Flanders will not bring that, on the contrary.
Yes my fellow Dutch-languaged Belgians seem to disagree.
I live in the wrong part of Belgium.
(No, I'm not going to be moving south any time soon. But yes, I'm angry)
Note: the above is my opinion, and I'm not planning on changing my blog into a political forum. Therefore, any comments on this blog item will be moderated away into oblivion.
Tue, 05 Aug 2008
Re: Government
One of the things of getting too much mail is that you will get swamped in it, sometimes to the level of not even managing to figure out there's been replies on your blog for the past several weeks. Oops.
Apparently quite a number of people answered to my blog post about the belgian government issues, and I only found out right before leaving for Argentina. They're now all accepted from moderation, but that doesn't mean I can't follow up on them anymore.
Most of them just agree with what I have to say, or posit another opinion (which is fine), but some clearly show a misunderstanding of what I was trying to say. So, since I don't want to appear as one posting gibberish, allow me to clarify:
"I could say that some other things about the past debâcle also puzzle me, such as the insistence of some people to get an unconditional split of BHV, thereby destroying all chances of even remotely reaching a compromise."
You are saying that you would accept giving in to the demands of the Francophones that the Flemish give up territory. (Think about it, what century are they from? In what other country does one community demand the enlargement of its territory as an exchange for fixing a situation which the constitutional court has ruled to be illegal?)
Thanks for asking, but no, I'm not saying that. Let's be clear about this: there's a huge difference between a position that says "we need to split BHV, period" on the one hand, and "we need to give territory to the francophone community" on the other. It should be perfectly possible to, say, have the flemish community come up with some benefit to the francophone community in some respect somewhere that does not include "giving territory to the south of france"; but apparently the "negotiators" think not. To quote just one example: at some point Reinders (MR) suggested that a federal election circle be created to replace BHV, so that francophone politicians could still be elected in flanders, but also the other way around. This proposal was however killed by flemish politicians before the press as "not even negotiable" without even having discussed it. This, and other similar examples, I do not understand.
After all, the fact that the constitutional court has ruled the current situation to be illegal does not change anything about the fact that this is still a request from the Flemish part of the country, and not from the Francophones; anyone telling you anything else is simply lying. There's nothing wrong with wanting something and being declared correct in court, of course; but there is something wrong with wanting that unconditionally. Unless you won a war, that is. And then still.
Of course, not caring about much of the definitions of many political parties and not being a politician in any way, I ticked off someone who just happens to be a member of one of the parties I don't even like in the first place. Amedee, in case it matters: I didn't call CD&V a "Catholic" party to imply anything, but simply because I'm blissfully ignorant of the difference between Catholic and Christian. And happily so, too, given the CD&V's current behaviour. Oh, and the SP.A is not my favourite party; it's just that they seemed to be the more sensible of the lot during the last elections' campaigns. What's really my favourite party isn't something I'll tell you (or anyone), though.
Wed, 16 Jul 2008
No more 'government'
So apparently the Belgian 'government' has failed to meet its deadline; and as a result, the prime minister has handed in the 'government's resignation to the King. I say 'government', because these people have been doing quite a lot of things—all except governing...
I must say I can't be surprised. I never liked Leterme; not before the elections, and not after. Now that more than a year has passed since his winning the elections, they have managed to accomplish exactly nothing.
Well, that's not exactly true. There's a pattern here:
- June 2007. Leterme wins the election, and starts talking. He accomplishes exactly nothing.
- August 2007. After months of talking, Leterme gives up. The King hands the initiative to some other people, who manage to get basic agreements about things in the course of a few weeks.
- September 2007. Leterme is put at the wheel again.
- December 2007. After months of talking, Leterme gives up a second time. The King asks Verhofstadt to form an interim government. He does so in 2 weeks.
- March 2008. Leterme gets parties to agree on some basic things, and promises "a second package of state reforms by July 15, 2008".
- July 15, 2008. Surprise: Leterme has accomplished exactly nothing, and has to hand in his resignation. A third time.
And even after that horrible track record, CD&V/N-VA is still not willing to put Leterme aside as a candidate for the prime ministry.
Now I'm sure some people will tell me that Leterme did indeed, accomplish something, such as the budget agreement of a few days ago. Well, here's a news flash: if you want to get a government set up, then not accomplishing that is pretty critical; something routine and simple as a budget is hardly noteworthy, then.
The one thing I do not understand, have never understood, and will not ever understand, is why the larger parties in Belgium feel so compelled to create "cartels" with small extremist fringe parties. They all fell into that trap; VLD (liberals) with Vivant (economic strangelings); CD&V (catholic democrats) with N-VA (flemish nationalists), and SP.A (socialists) with Spirit (left-wing something). I have no trouble understanding why the fringe parties want to do this (gives them power where occasionally they wouldn't have any), but the large parties? It only causes trouble (as the CD&V/N-VA cartel has now proven beyond any doubt); and I seriously doubt it causes them a net win in votes.
I could say that some other things about the past debâcle also puzzle me, such as the insistence of some people to get an unconditional split of BHV, thereby destroying all chances of even remotely reaching a compromise; but given the idiocy explained in the previous paragraph, I should hardly be surprised.
Sigh. I wish I had some decent politicians in this country; but the people I voted for lost seriously, and were not part of the negotiations. I guess that should mean I have to say: told you so; but then, that's not very productive either.
Here's for hoping they can still find some way out of this mess...
Mon, 18 Feb 2008
ID cards, followup
I should've known that posting something about ID cards would spark a number of reactions. In fact, I did—which is one of the reasons why I posted that; nothing like a bit of discussion every once in a while.
Brian M. Carlson writes:
The difference between the US and Belgium, for example, is that Belgium has comprehensive privacy legislation.
Well, yes. Obviously, ID cards require some privacy legislation in order to prevent abuse of said cards. In Belgium, only the police is allowed to require me to show them my ID card; everyone else can ask, but I can tell them to go screw themselves. Of course they can then also refuse to provide me with a given service, but I may be able to sufficiently prove my ID with other means. The point is, whether or not a designated ID card exists does not impact the need for privacy legislation; if you want to protect your privacy, you need such legislation anyway, ID or no ID. The fact that you don't have an ID card does not mean in any way that people can't ask you to prove your ID; and the existence of an ID card does not mean that all of a sudden all other ways for me to prove my ID are null and void.
"Anonymous" writes:
You seem to take as a given that we need an official government-issued ID card, and from there you draw the fairly reasonable conclusion that if we need one it ought to exist separately from a driver's license. I agree that your assumption leads to your conclusion, but I disagree with your assumption.
Well, no, I do not assume that we need an official government-issued ID card. I know we do. That's not to say we need government-issued ID in all cases where we need to provide proof of ID; but when we do, there should be a way that does not overload some document into something which it was never intended to be.
"bignose" writes:
You miss the main complaint of a national ID card system: that it would be *mandatory* for a person who wishes to operate in the country. That's the important part that is not true for a driver's license: not having a driver's license does not make the person an unperson.
It is not necessary for me to have an ID card to "operate" in Belgium. There are a few things where the ID card is indeed required; e.g., the last time I personally had to use my ID card was during the last elections. If I would have had an encounter with the police in that time, they could have asked for it, too; but that didn't happen. Also, when doing my tax declaration online, I used the electronic keys on the ID card, so that I could only update my tax declaration—and not, say, my neighbour's. But that's only doable when you have an electronic ID card system, which is not necessarily a good idea (in contrast to plain old paper ID cards, I do have privacy concerns with electronic versions—details on request)
Of course, the fact that I can "operate" in Belgium without the use of an ID card does not mean it is legal for me to walk around without one; but that is not entirely the same thing.
There were some more comments to my previous blog post, but I don't disagree with those.
Fri, 15 Feb 2008
ID papers
Bruce Schneier blogs about an issue that, in the context of the current vote craze in the US, seems to be pretty popular: the question of whether or not the US governments should give a drivers' license to illegal immigrants. Bruce argues in favour of giving a drivers' license to illegal immigrants, since requesting that the administration which issues drivers' licenses also check whether or not people are illegal immigrants is going to cost the government a lot of money (both from the extra amount of resources that needs to be spent on doing this job, and the lawsuits to make up for the errors).
The fun bit is, I think that they are creating a problem where there is none. By not creating an official, designated, identification system, the US government is forcing people to look for alternatives, effectively giving a drivers' license a double function; that of an ID card, and that of a drivers' license. This can't be a good idea.
Often the major argument against issuing ID cards is that it reduces people's privacy. I think this is wrong, for a very simple reason:
The US already has an ID card. It's calleda drivers' license.
No, really. For all practical matters, that little piece of paper is an ID card. Better get done with it and issue a real ID card, then.
Sun, 23 Dec 2007
They managed!
It took them half a year, but the Belgian federal politicians finally managed to come up with some form of government. I can't say I'm impressed.
Well.
In a way I am impressed. After trying for 6 months, Leterme still failed to produce some form of government. Since the situation was becoming quite dire, the King gave Verhofstadt the initiative, who then promptly produced a government in only two weeks.Granted, Verhofstadt's mission was not as hard as Leterme's. Verhofstadt was told to form a government only to handle the most urgent matters, and which will be disbanded at Easter; Leterme was asked to form a government to last for four years, which is how long a Belgian federal government usually holds office. And yes, Leterme's mission has most likely been one of the hardest one in the history of Belgian formation talks.
But even if all that is true, I'm baffled at the fact that the intention now still is to make Leterme the prime minister at or around Easter. In my opinion, he's had his chance and blew it.
Then again, maybe I'm biased. I've never liked Leterme; and when his party CD&V decided to ally themselves with a separatist party, I decided to gracefully extend my antipathy to his entire party.
Thu, 09 Aug 2007
Voting tactics, again.
In response to my blog post about voting tactics yesterday, Russell claims that there are no tactical voting problems in instant runoff voting, immediately following that in the next paragraph with an explanation of how there actually is tactical voting in Australia's Instant Runoff.
Err. In my opinion, every instance of tactical voting is a problem. Your mileage may vary, of course.
Next, "proportional representation" does not equal "everyone is a candidate everywhere". For the house of representatives, Belgium is divided into a number of "kieskringen" each of which elects a predefined number of candidates into parliament (the number of candidates per kieskring depends on the number of people living in that kieskring). This way, we have proportional representation while still having the members of the lower house representing geographic regions.
Note that I'm not claiming proportional representation is the best election system ever; it still doesn't allow me to fully explain what my vote preference is. However, proportional representation does not have the brokenness of Instant Runoff voting in that with IR it may happen that placing one candidate before another on your ballot may actually hurt the cause of the former in favour of the latter.
Wed, 08 Aug 2007
Voting tactics
Why is it that only people in a jurisdiction where they use a broken voting system (such as, say, first past the post or instant-runoff) know about 'tactical voting'? Frankly, I'd be surprised if anyone in my family even knew what it means to vote 'tactically'.
For reference, Belgium uses proportional representation throughout. In fact, it was a Belgian guy who invented proportional representation.
oh well.
Mon, 09 Oct 2006
Go Antwerp, Go!
Yesterday was Election day in Belgium; 318 municipal governments were elected, along with 5 provincial governments (of whom nobody really knows what they do) and in some large cities (such as Antwerp, where I live) also district governments.
One secret hope I had was that the extreme-right Vlaams Belang party would not get any more successful than they already are. The good news is that they in fact didn't. The bad news is that they didn't lose any votes either. They gained .6% (or so) on the 33% that they already had, which basically is a stagnation.
The very good news, however, is that Patrick Janssens, defending mayor of Antwerp, gained a good 16% in votes to arrive at 35%, becoming the largest party of Antwerp. Finally, sanity is beginning to return.
Go Antwerp, Go!
