By Mike Scruggs
Category: Mike Scruggs' Column

The Most Important Election in Europe

On Sunday, September 9, Swedish voters have a chance to save their country from the astonishing social and fiscal decline wrought by ideological blindness to the nature of Islam and the inherent cultural and political dangers of massive third-world migration.

In the last two decades, and especially the last five years, Sweden has moved from a relatively homogeneous but tolerant society, famous for the law-abiding nature of its people, to one of the sex-assault and crime capitals of Europe with terrorist grenades, auto-burnings, and other street crimes becoming a normalized aspect of Swedish life. As the migrant population has increased, crime and vagrancy have increased. Women and girls fear to leave their homes at night. There are 61 areas of Sweden where emergency vehicles and even the police are in danger. Moreover, unless the mass immigration wave comes to a halt soon, native Swedes will be a minority in their own country within 20 years.

For most of the last 86 years, the leftist Social Democrat Party has been in control of Sweden’s government and has molded the educational establishment, the media, and even the dominant  Swedish Church (Svenska Kyrka) into a very liberal-socialist coalition.  The Swedish lock-step media has become the main “political correctness” enforcer in Sweden, and consequently cultural and political dissent among the people is usually whispered.  Besides being a sex-assault, and most recently, a street-crime capital of Europe, Sweden has certainly become the political correctness capital of Europe. This relentless political correctness is stifling free speech and even reason. This is how the Social Democrats and their allied leftist parties and the educational, media, and liberal church establishment are strangling freedom, bullying the Swedish people, and destroying Swedish culture.

Sweden is a nation of about 10.0 million people, and the fiscal consequences of Sweden’s irresponsible embrace of 650,000 Muslim migrants since 2013 have been disastrous. The vast majority of Sweden’s already huge social-welfare budget is spent on them.  Few of them are employed or making any effort to assimilate into Swedish society. This is having an impact on

ethnic Swedish retirees who have contributed heavily in taxes to enjoy a decent life after retirement. More than 200,000 have already fallen below the poverty level. You would expect Sweden’s social contract with its retirees would be more important than virtue-signaling generous asylum spending on un-assimilating migrants, but apparently the Social Democrats and other left-leaning parties have forgotten that obligation.

This week, Swedish and American voters have one thing in common. Immigration has become the number one political issue. One Swedish poll showed immigration to be the main concern for over 40 percent of the voters. It remains to be seen how that will reflect in the actual vote.

The Swedish media is pounding the immigration restrictionist Sweden Democrats with the usual accusations of racism, xenophobia, Islamo-phobia, and neo-Nazism. They are filling the web with derogatory articles and frustrating any attempt to view the Sweden Democrat Party’s very reasonable mandate for immigration and trade reform, which includes a proposed referendum on leaving the European Union.

Polls show that the Sweden Democrats will improve their showing considerably over 2014, when they got 13 percent of the vote. Most polls show them getting 20 percent or more in September. Some polls show them passing both the Social Democrats and Moderates to become the largest party in Sweden. The question is whether it will be enough to form a coalition government or at least be part of a more conservative coalition government.

Many polls are showing the Social Democrats hanging on to a narrow lead, but the latest poll by Sentio on August 30 showed the Sweden Democrats in front with 24.0 percent and the Social Democrats lagging with 22.1 percent. Historically, the Social Democrats have run over 40 percent and even over 50 percent. So times are changing, but are they changing enough? The Moderates have fallen to 18.2 percent.  Although the Moderates are considered part of the Center-Right coalition, their position on immigration was just as bad as the Social Democrats in previous administrations. In fourth place was the Left Party (formerly Communist Party) with 10.7 percent. The Center Party had 6.0 percent; the Liberal Party had 5.2 percent, and the Christian Democrats had 5.0 percent. The Greens, a leftist environmentalist party, had fallen to 4.4 percent. Most other polls showed them over 5.0 percent. The radical Feminist Initiative Party and the new conservative Alternative for Sweden Party were each below one percent. The Alternative for Sweden Party position is that the immigration solutions of the Sweden Democrats many not be drastic enough to save the country.

Although the Feminist Initiative Party is not a factor in this election, feminist issues are important in Sweden to an extent sometimes bordering on a distinctive ideology. It often seems a contradictory ideology in that its cultural leaders seem to have little sympathy for or inclinations toward protection of the women and girls who have borne the brunt of the sexual assault epidemic in Sweden. Their response frequently centers on sympathy and excuses for the perpetrators, and this has increased rather than reduced what has become a substantial public safety problem.

One critical factor in this election is the 5.0 percent minimum needed to receive seats in the Riksdag. The Greens are falling short and the Liberals and Christian Democrats are in danger of falling short.  That could make a critical difference in actual party strengths in the Riksdag. There are 349 seats in the Riksdag, and 175 constitute a majority. The Moderates, Center, Liberals, and Christian Democrats are considered more or less center-right, while the Social Democrats, Left, Greens, and the Feminists are definitely left-wing. The immigration issue even cuts across some normally left-leaning voters, who are furious over the sexual outrages being perpetrated against Swedish women and girls by migrants.

Some YouGov polls have showed the Sweden Democrats with 24.5 to 28.5 percent. It is difficult to place too much credibility in Swedish polls. First of all, the media and its allied polling firms have a definite leftist bias and are part of the leftist choir. More importantly in this election, is whether the extreme political correctness of Swedish media and society may suppress the polling results for the Sweden Democrats. There are also allegations that the way Swedish ballots and literature at the polls are handled is not consistent with a completely private ballot. Because of this, there will be some international observers present  

A further problem for the Sweden Democrats is that the other parties have refused to cooperate with them in the past. They have been treated as pariahs, with whom they would never share power.  However, if they do well, that resistance will probably break down.

Are things really as bad in Sweden as people say? The Swedish media and government establishment continuously deny there is cause for alarm.  But according to a July 13 Gatestone Institute article by Judith Bergman, Swedish police reports contained in a new study of Salafism in Sweden by the Swedish Defense University, revealed that Muslim children have told their classmates they will cut their throats, while showing them beheadings on their mobile phones. Salafism is the revivalist fundamentalist Islam of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is now powerful in Sweden.

How will the Swedes vote?  I hope they have the insight and courage to save their country from becoming a tragic memory and lesson to the world.

Hits: 2757

No comments

Leave your comment

In reply to Some User