Cogs can think.

I was just watching State Secretary of Defense Jack de Vries (is that a Tom Clancy name or what?) on TV, explaining how he wants the Dutch people to show more appreciation and respect for our military and its personnel, despite whatever you might think of our mission in Afghanistan. And I couldn’t agree with the guy more.

I’m against us being involved in the mess the Americans and Brits created over there. It’s not our war, let them sort it out.

But, that’s a political issue. Our democratically elected politicians have decided that our men and women of the army should be there, and even though I fully disagree with that decision, it was not made by the army itself. They get stuck with doing the hard, dangerous, and intensive work over there, trying to do their goddamn best to help the people there, to create better living conditions. They are putting their lives on the line every day, and they do it with such commitment, passion, and determination that I can feel nothing but respect and pride for the work they do.

It of course helps that one of my best friends is in the Royal Military Academy (cavalry). The way he details life at the Academy, what they learn, the toughness of the job, the intense preperation they receive for being officers in the Dutch armed forces makes you realise more than ever how much respect these men and women deserve.

It’s easy to stand on the sideline, and critique our military. It’s easy to sit in your lounge chair, bag of Doritos, a beer, and 6 remotes to control your DVD, Blu-Ray (or, HD-DVD if you’ve been stupid), 50″ plasma, and whatever, while knowing you have to get up at 7am the next day, only to start up your 1.4 Opel Astra, to traffic jam your way to your boring 9-to-5, for the rest of your life, ever and ever, until you die.

Our guys and girls in the military are doing their very best to deliver, and they work hard, much harder than most of you will ever realise. And because of that, I support our troops in Afghanistan. Good job, guys.

You know that feeling, you’re lying on the couch after going to university and playing some squash, you’re closing your eyes, reality drifts off, your thoughts sizzle out, and you relax fully. The news is on TV, but it doesn’t really interest you. Until you hear these words. In one sentence.

Sex. Animals. Lower house. Debate. With.

Yes. Our lower house had a serious debate on whether or not to declare bestiality illegal. As I learned today, The Netherlands is the prime exporter of bestiality pornography, and that’s of course totally unacceptable (I’m for real here. People that get off on that nonsense should be put away in mental institutions). I mean, relaxed drug laws, legalised prostitution, gay marriage, that I can handle. But sex with animals? That was actually not illegal here? What the fcuk is wrong with this country? And they say the influence of Islam is a problem? While at the same time, people were allowed to have SEX WITH ANIMALS?

There is something very, very unnerving about seeing distinguished, Christian politicians speak about sex with animals. I’m SO not going to sleep tonight without a double dose of Temazepam.

May I note that I can see what Google query you used to get here. Remember that before you comment.

You may not know it, but even your hero, leader, and source of endless admiration (that would be me) draws his inspiration for this weblog from somewhere else. Regular readers will know - Dooce.com.

She won four ‘Bloggies’. ‘Bloggie’ is a word I would use to describe my state of mind last weekend after a litre of Martini, half a bottle of Amaretto, and some Malibu rum, but apparantly, it’s also a series of awards for bloggers. She won Best American Weblog, Best Designed Weblog, Weblog of the Year, and Lifetime Achievement Award. And she got my vote on all of them, which means I’m probably more average than I anticipated.

Or, Dooce is the only weblog I visit every day.

In any case, Heather, congratulations on the four Bloggies, and especially the life-time achievement thing is one you deserve more than anyone else. There are few (if any) out there that can take the most boring of daily things, the most mundane conversations, the most average objects, and turn them into something that puts a smile on my face, no matter if I’m already very content, or if I’m feeling down and out. Heck, you made me realise that one day, I’ll have a kid of my own.

And that kind of power is something to cherish. Please, continue to do what you do. Your weblog alone justifies the horrible concept of the bllllloaaaaaggggg.

I love the Dutch media. Not because they’re the best in the world (because they’re most definitely not) and I’m proud of them for it (couldn’t resist) but because they fell on their ass so bad during the night.

You see, the Dutch media are quite obviously supporters of the Democrats. During the coverage of the primaries, the Democrats get all the attention, after which they quickly say something along the lines of “oh and yeah, McCain did this and that but all of you Dutch people shouldn’t give two shits”. Of course, I made the second part up, but you can almost hear them say it. Not that I’m in any way a Republican, but still, I expect impartiality.

The second problem is that they are also quite obviously supporters of Obama. Famous journalists, TV presenters, newspapers, other public figures: most of them are pro-Obama, and this shines through quite clearly during TV shows and in newspaper/magazine articles. Whenever they interview someone pro-Clinton, he or she has to defend himself. Whenever they interview someone pro-Obama, the journalists and media people go easy, and talk about how Obama makes celestial choirs sing (thanks for that one, Hillary).

Yesterday evening, they were all more or less certain Hillary would be out, over, and done with. She wouldn’t win Texas and Ohio, and you could see the twinkle in the media people’s eyes whenever they talked about it. Obama would win, and right from then on, roses, lilies, and marshmallows would sprout all over the United States. Suddenly, there’d be no more poverty, crappy unaffordable healthcare, and hate towards the US.

Until Clinton won Ohio. And Texas. And Rhode Island. And despite her not being any closer to winning the nomination than last night, she did win them. And gone is the twinkle. The battle is still on, and I’m sure that we’ll see Clinton win the primaries after all.

Let’s hope the Dutch media can start reporting on the whole thing with more objectivity now. Obama will be a good president, but he ain’t the 2nd coming of Christ. It’s time the Dutch media realised this too. The honeymoon’s over.

Björk ftw. Seriously. During a performance in Shanghai in China, she shouted “Tibet! Tibet!” a couple of times while performing the frantic and utterly crazy “Declare Independence“. The Chinese could not handle this; they left the hall, and millions of Chinese are now all offended. The state media (as if there are any independent media in China) are ignoring the incident.

Thank you Björk. You have the guts to do what most here in the west do not dare to do: go into the lion’s den, and say it like it is.

“Declare Independence” has almost become my ‘motto’ - every people has the right to belong, to govern themselves in a way they deem fit, to protect their sovereignty, to declare independence. I fully support the people of Kosovo, the people of Schotland, the people of Tibet, and so on. This world will be a better place if people and cultures get the freedom and breathing room to develop themselves, to make their own decisions, while working together for the greater, common good under organisations like the EU and NATO. There’s no need for a global, bureacratic megagovernment in order to create world peace - all it takes is to give cultures independence and sovereignty on a local level, while working together closely on a global level.

It has worked pretty darn well in Europe. Except for the fact that the EU has invaded the local level a tad bit too much.

It’s official. People are like sheep.

But, did we really need to investigate that? I could’ve told them this without spending so much time on research.

I mean, the climate hype, UFOs, Lost, Geert Wilders; people are sheep alright.

How about this.

Choose a certain period in your life; say the coming week. Then, write down every instance something that happened in your life, something that happened to you, or with you, made you feel annoyed, uncomfortable, or unpleasant. Reading something in the paper and feeling annoyed does not count, since the thing you read about in the news did not happen to you.

Then, for every item on your list, write down if it was caused by someone from Dutch/West ancestry, or by someone from Muslim ancestry.

After a week, you’ll see that most of the things that make you feel annoyed, sad, or angry, are caused by Dutch people, with a Dutch background. Doing a test like this (you have to have the guts to be honest with yourself!) will show you that no, your grieves are not caused by people with a Muslim background. They are caused by your fellow Westerners.

The reason I devised this simple test is that I see a lot of people who have zero interaction with Muslims that still see Muslims and the Islam as the cause for the problems in The Netherlands. I live in a very small, and cosy little town, and no, there barely are any Muslims in here, and most of the people I know here barely ever leave this town - they see my casual trips to Amsterdam which I make a few times a week as something special. Dude, that’s like, the other side of the world.

If these people do not see Muslims as the cause for their problems based on their own experiences with them, it must mean that this is caused by something else. The obvious suspects? The media, and our politicians. They give much more attention to the whole Islam debate than it deserves, talking their cattle buyers/voters into unsubstantiated fear and hatred; fear and hatred that will make them vote for them or buy their newspapers.

It is a despicable tactic, but in today’s political climate, there are few who dare to properly stand up against it, there are few who dare to openly do their duty as Dutchmen and women to fight for equality, tolerance, and respect. The Muslims in this country carry a Dutch passport, just like we do, and as such, they automatically have all the rights we have. They have the right to believe their own believes, to wear the clothes they want, to send their children to a school they want. Denying these basic rights to people carrying the Dutch passport (what some of our politicians openly advocate) is, as far as I’m concerned, treason. Those politicians, as well as their sheepish followers, are stepping upon the graves of our ancestors - ancestors who have fought for all that we have today.

Do the test, and you’ll see.

The Netherlands has a very intricate and complicated television landscape. To even be able to grasp this landscape, we need to dive deep into this country’s history.

The Netherlands is a very diverse society; words like open, tolerant, and respect for individual freedom come to mind. This is not something of the last few decades - this has actually always been the case. The Netherlands has always been on the forefront of social equality; we were the first modern republic, the first state not to be based on either religion or a monarchy. The Republic Of The Seven United Provinces, as it was called, became the most successful state of its time, becoming the biggest economic, military, and colonial power, with the Dutch having an empire that stretched the world. We call this The Golden Age, but this is a rather cruel name since during this period, we not only advanced the world of science, art, and economics, but we also deported millions of slaves from all over the world to the Americas, killed thousands of native people all over the world, and so on. I always try to keep this in mind - we must never forget the price the rest of the world paid for our wealth.

The Republic lasted from 1581 to 1795, and set an example for all modern democracies in the world today - the founding fathers of the United States of America were influenced heavily by The Republic, and so any claims made about the US being the first modern republic are debatable, at best.

Anyway, the fact that The Republic was not based on religion paved the way for a rudimentary form of religious freedom, where Protestants and Catholics lived side-by-side in one country. I specifically say ‘rudimentary’, since even though Catholicism was allowed, they had to practice their religion in relative silence, leading to “secret” churches - churches everyone (including the government) knew were there, but none acted upon. Over the course of time, religious freedom got stronger and more absolute, leading to a society where you had multiple Protestant churches, and a strong Catholic presence, augmented by non-religious people - liberalism has always been prominent in this country, as have leftist and Labour parties, and even communists.

So, when radio came along, and the airwaves had to be spread evenly and openly among the different population groups, columnification began. We speak of columnification when different groups of people in a society live in their own separate columns; they have their own newspapers, magazines, radio stations, TV stations, schools, political parties, sports clubs, and so on. This lead to quite an orderly society, where you had a Protestant column, a Labour column, a Catholic column, a Liberal column, and so on. Elections were predictable, and only the top layer of each column (politicians) interacted with the top layers of other columns in order to form a government and run the country.

As a consequence of columnification, each column had their own radio/TV station. If you could get enough members as a station, you could earn airtime on one of the (now) three (tax-funded) public TV channels, and thus, various broadcasting networks shared the same three channels. Ironically, this also meant the end of the columnified society: people in The Netherlands finally had a window upon other columns via their television sets, and they started to realise that the other columns weren’t as wrong and ‘evil’ as their leaders and education had made them out to be. This started the ‘decolumnification’, which lasted until somewhere in the ’90s; we are now at the point where the columns are basically all gone, and this has led to the situation we have now where election results are highly unpredictable.

However, our television system is still in place, the original television stations from the columns still exist, and still broadcast to this day. Their ideological base has eroded over time, and the differences between them have faded - but some of them are still quite religious, and have a very religious programming. Being tax-funded also allows smaller stations to get airtime, such as the Muslim station we have, which airs stuff on Sunday mornings.

Why did I give you this quick history lesson? Well, something funny has been happening the past few weeks. Two non-religious, youth-oriented major stations want to air a ’70s pornographic film - Deep Throat. And now, the religious folk in this country (and contrary to popular belief, this country is actually quite Christian and religious) are all over each other to condemn this, and politicians have even tried to force the public channels to not broadcast the film - they obviously failed, since the government cannot influence the contents of the three channels and their stations.

So, they started a marathon prayer to ask God to stop the broadcast. And now we come to the sole purpose of this post, something I’ve been wanting to say here ever since I heard of the ‘prayathon’.

If the prayathon fails in its goals - does that mean God likes ’70s porn?

I have apologies to make.

I want to offer my sincerest apologies to Beth Holloway, concerning some of the nasty things I’ve said about her on my weblog in the past. I’ve just seen the entire confession by Joran van der Sloot, about what has happened to Beth’s daughter, and from this, it became increasingly clear that Joran’s involvement was real. She wanted sex with him, and right before they got to the act itself, she had some sort of seisure (drugs and alcohol don’t mix well). Joran panicked, called a friend, and that friend disposed of the body in the ocean. They didn’t even properly check if she was dead. She may have been tossed into the ocean alive.

And Joran even said, multiple times, that he didn’t sleep one second less of it.

Dear Beth Holloway, I know you won’t read this, but my sincerest apologies to you. I will not take back my words on what kind of girl your daughter was, but that does not mean she, in any way possible, deserved what has happened to her. I hope you can now start the process of mourning, and I hope you, your lawyers, the justice dpt. of Aruba, The Netherlands, and the US get that son of a bitch, and send him to prison for the rest of his life, to rot away, and when he dies, that he may end up in hell - I may not believe in heaven and hell, but I know you do.

Joran, you won’t talk your way out of this one, sonny. Bubba and his bar of soap is waiting for you.

Peter R. de Vries. A horrible man, an attention whore, with a disgusting voice, and the ability to annoy the living daylights out of just about anyone. I don’t like the man, but, I have to admit: he has been able to capture criminals and murderers that the ‘ordinary’ police couldn’t get. And for that, he deserves respect.

And now, he claims to have solved the Holloway case - you know, that white blue-eyed blonde haired drunk whore innocent perfect little straight-A girl that got America all so worked up because, well, she was white. And had blue eyes. And probably was head cheerleader too.

She vanished on Aruba, and the last person to have seen her was Joran van der Sloot - a rather annoying (but not more annoying than other boys his age) white (not black! America mustn’t have liked that bit) boy who claimed to have left her on the beach - or something. Anyway, no evidence supporting his involvement was found.

A few weeks ago, Joran and his parents went on a late-night talkshow to finally close off this chapter - but guess who was there. Our friend Peter R. de Vries, who taunted Joran so far (you’re guilty! You did it!) that Joran threw a glass of wine in Peter’s face. Fully deserved, of course, and anyone who saw the entire show (like I did) can fully understand why Joran did it. Armchair psychologists (read: the people who make me not like democracy) were quick to deduct that throwing a glass of whine makes you a murderer (I’d have to tell that to Nina Persson), and so, he must have done it.

However, that was by far not the most interesting moment of the show. That moment came a few seconds earlier. Joran asked Peter, “If it all comes out and it turns out definitely that someone else did it, are you man enough to offer your apologies?” Peter stared him straight in the eyes and said, “What do you think?”. Joran looked straight back, and replied, “I don’t think so.”

“We’ll see.”, was Peter’s tantalising response.

To me, it seems that yesterday’s news can mean two things. One, the most obvious one: Joran turns out to be guilty after all - not of murder, but of getting rid of the body. Rumour has it that Holloway died of an accident, and Joran disposed of the body. Unlikely, but hey, we don’t know the inner psyche of Joran.

The second possibility is more tantalising, and not at all far fetched: Peter and Joran cooperated. They were in it together all along: put the blame solely on Joran, so that Peter could investigate another suspect in relative peace - the other suspect would feel safe seeing how Peter so squarely accused Joran. Sounds black helicopter-y to you? It’s considered a real possibility by many. The “We’ll see” actually fits this story - since it referred to offering apologies, and not the guilty/innocent question.

Sunday, we’ll know. I can’t wait.