The Weekly Forum - 16 January
17 januari 2025 | Forum for Democracy Intl
The question of sovereignty within the EU is well known. But does NATO also restrict the sovereignty of its member states? Last year, the deputy prime minister of the Netherlands made reference to ‘NATO obligations’ which, she said, prevented her from implementing certain policies, in this case concerning health. Very interesting. What are these obligations? FVD tried to find out. Pepijn van Houwelingen MP put down written questions to the government. It transpires that the new government was briefed about these in a meeting last July - at which no minutes were taken and whose content cannot therefore be communicated to the Dutch Parliament. So the policies of the government of the Netherlands depend on secret decisions taken by the previous Rutte government which cannot be scrutinised by the national representation. Worse, when Ralf Dekker MP called for a debate on this, ALL the political parties in Parliament (except FVD of course) voted against it. What kind of a world do we live in?
Thierry Baudet, Member of Parliament and party leader of Forum for Democracy, has had a second child, a baby girl, and will be taking paternity leave for several weeks. During his absence he will be replaced in the Chamber by Lidewij de Vos, with whom he co-authored a book, There is no one in the Cockpit, on the Netherlands’ bizarre policy against nitrogen – the pretext for forcing farmers to sell their land on which no doubt housing will be built for immigrants. Lidewij has given a brief interview laying out some of the book’s conclusions, the main ones being that the policy is both unnecessary and also stupid, to the extent that it demonstrates the herd mentality of politicians and scientists who for decades have been in hock to a bogus doomsday scenario. It is time to abandon it.
Watch Lidewij’s interview here
Is Christianity a religion for losers, as Nietzsche claimed? Jordan Peterson says no and Hans van de Breewaart, senior researcher at FVD’s Renaissance Institute, agrees. The Old Testament, in particular, is full of stories of success by those prophets who obeyed God’s law, and of the repeated failures of the ancient Hebrews when they did not. Christianity is the fulfilment of Judaism and is therefore in continuity with it: Catholics often argue that states go astray and fail as states when they abandon the faith. Russia is an example of a state whose national rebirth has been accompanied by, and is sustained by, a virile and muscular Christianity - which unfortunately is seldom visible in the West, whence perhaps the renewed belief that Jesus is only for wimps.
Read Hans van de Breevaart’s article here
We were honoured to host two eminent Romanians at The Forum this week, our weekly video podcast, to discuss the cancellation of the Romanian elections – former Foreign Minister Adrian Severin and political scientist Calistrat Atudorei. The discussion was fabulous. If you missed it, you can listen back by clicking below.