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.

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