My column with some video is up at PJM here.

Bruce Bawer's column, Europe's Champion of Liberty, is here.

UPDATE: For the Dutch-speaking contingent, here is an interview with Fortuyn recorded five years after his death. It is both amazing and accurate. Of course, these sort of recordings reflect the 'what if' and 'we miss him' sentiments, which are still very present in Dutch society.

Of course, the question has been asked who will take on the legacy of Pim Fortuyn now that the remnants of his old party have more or less disappeared. As I pointed out before, Rotterdam politician Marco Pastors who is a former business and political associate of the slain professor, is the most likely person to fill that ideological and political void. He launched his new party last month and last week I met Pastors at the old residence of Fortuyn. It is a beautiful and stately home that was purchased by a real estate tycoon who has seen to it that the house remains in exactly the same state as in the days Fortuyn lived in it until he was murdered. Even after four years, it was chilling to see the politician's schedule and the papers of that fateful day in May on his desk.

It was a great opportunity to dive into some pressing issues and I tried to figure out how Pastors has been able to gain a position of respectability within the Dutch political scene following the initial hostility towards its new right-of-center players. He explained that after his (and Fortuyn’s) party’s huge electoral win in the 2002 local elections in Rotterdam their main objective was to keep the rhetoric down and focus on results. That would not only neutralize the party’s eager critics, it would also directly address the deep frustration over the political arrogance that had created such a disconnect between the city council and the local population. For a city that is known for its hard work and action-oriented culture, it was a fitting approach and Pastors was pleased with the rapid decisionmaking that ended a culture of endless debate and bureaucratic standstill. That record of success however was not fully underwritten by voters in the 2006 election, a good example of how fickle Dutch voters have become in a time that both the left and right agree is one of deep uncertainty.

So Pastors’ timing to leverage his local experience on the national scene appears to be timely, although he and fellow founder Joost Eerdmans had to rush to launch their One Netherlands party following the early fall of the Dutch cabinet over the Hirsi Ali affair. The trick for them now will be to move the debate in the right direction as so far it is not very clear what the core campaign issue for most parties is going to be. Judging from news reports, it won’t be integration as the NRC Handelsblad last week noted that most parties are relatively quiet about the topic and the public at large appears to be equally unmoved. But as Pastors pointed out, there may have been some fixes to immigration, integration is virtually untouched. Again an erratic electorate was given an opportunity to vent and now that anger and frustrations have been released many have probably convinced themselves that the issue is gone. The focus appears to be shifting back to mortgage rate deductability and extending the retirement age beyond sixty-five. To his credit, it is the left’s foreman Wouter Bos who has been daring enough to raise these key issues, something the centrist Christian-Democrats and right of center VVD have been very keen to avoid.

If minimizing damage is going to be the central theme for most parties, then I would give Pastors a decent chance at winning a significant number of seats in parliament. His track record in Rotterdam indicates that voters eventually tire over obfuscating pressing matters - whatever they are - and are willing to take a risk on drastic change. The question is if two months are sufficient to accomplish that.

Whatever shape the campaign is going to take, its unpredictability and potency for political change will not only be the creation of its current contestants, but also of the man who never lived to see the current electoral challenge. When I closed the gates of Pim’s old residence behind me one thing seemed very clear: it is going to be an extraordinary campaign.

Related
The Divided Dutch Right
A Troubling Dismissal
Peaktalk's Fortuyn Files

Yes, my post remembering Pim Fortuyn was terribly short, but to be frank I believe that I have said most of what needs to be said about him. We wouldn’t be doing him any justice to replay the same mantras about deregulation, privatization and immigration without end – visit the Peaktalk archives for that - but we do need to remember him and the terrible way in which he died. Thanks to a reader I did discover a gem in relation to Fortuyn that warrants some attention, and believe it or not, this is a eulogy written by a member of the Dutch Labour Party, on their site, praising Fortuyn. Money quote:

I was one of the few within the Labour Party who considered some of Fortuyn’s ideas interesting. That didn’t always result in very pleasant reactions within my own circle, to put it mildly. And, yes, another coming out: I did enjoy in secret Pim’s glorious entrance into the Rotterdam city hall on March 6, 2002 (Ed: the night of his local electoral win). Many Rotterdam-based fellow party members with their appalling arrogance had asked for it.

The writer, Job van Amerongen, concludes that many things in Dutch politics have changed for the better, thanks to Fortuyn. I do believe that it requires a measure of braveness to speak out this way, even four years after Fortuyn’s death. There is still some hope out there, you would think.

Today, four years ago.

Today it is three years ago that Pim Fortuyn was shot by an animal rights activist, ending the life of a great political mind and someone who was very close to becoming prime-minister of the troubled Dutch nation. Pim’s impact today can probably best be summed up by the words that he must have spoken when his old friend Theo van Gogh showed up in the afterlife last year: “see Theo, I told you so”.

Rather than rehashing what happened or his legacy in Dutch politics I think it’s far more important to once more reflect on who Pim was and why he came to the positions and ideas that formed the basis of his short political career. Both Dutch and foreign media, and the blogosphere too, have not always done a great job here. One of the best pieces was written by Bruce Bawer who as an American in Europe probably had a far better perspective than Dutch commentators who were too close to the situation or poorly informed foreigners writing from a distance.

Fortuyn was above a child of the 1960s, politically on the left, openly and proudly gay and an academic with a PhD in sociology. Hardly the material that makes a conservative but it was the collectivist and politically correct environment at Groningen University, in particular the Marxist leanings of his faculty, that contributed to Pim’s steady rightward journey. One of the most notable incidents that influenced his political thinking was a situation where Pim as member of the university board had worked both hard and creatively to achieve some cost-savings measures where all parties had been allowed input – it dealt with the catering services - but where at the very last moment the employees union nixed the plan as it meant they would lose their treasured status as government employees. Fortuyn was furious and it encouraged him to abandon the publicly funded academic world, literally by striking out as a self employed consultant in Rotterdam, the nation’s most culturally diverse city. His consulting work rapidly transformed itself into writing books and speaking engagements and he became a celebrity, especially among entrepreneurs and business owners with his eloquent speeches about the stifling impact of the omni-present welfare state. Pro-business talk show hosts gave him room on TV and a media star was born. His message wasn't limited to economics though. At the same time he started to take on the negative impact of a rapidly growing Muslim population in The Netherlands with well reasoned books and articles, pointing out that the greatest difficulty people often face is social change.

His critical notes on immigrants and his economic conservatism may have contributed to the label ‘right’ or for his many friends in the traditional media, ‘fascist’, but Pim was at heart a true liberal in the original meaning of the word. For a self-employed gay man who had lived through the tumultuous 1960s and had witnessed at first-hand the value of the achievements of these years, he was the first one to point out that maybe it was time to start defending them rather than continue the journey into the abyss of cultural and moral relativism. For the media and the political establishment to brand him as a dangerous and extreme-right zealot hurt deeply, although he never showed it. Instead he smiled, his message gained momentum after 9/11 and despite the ongoing vile attacks of the Dutch media and the political establishment he gained an incredible amount of popularity.

While his critics tried to demonize him they at the same time pointed to his likely inability to manage the nation as a cabinet leader. Pim always replied that he would manage the nation by speech and if you think about that it is hard not to compare him to Ronald Reagan. Both men had traveled from the left to the right over a long period of time and were able to use their unique gift to connect with the public and translate their political journeys into compelling messages that struck a chord left and right, leaving their opponents dumbfounded. Fortuyn was intellectually more gifted than Reagan and would probably have become quite pro-active in running the nation on a day-to-day basis as opposed to the hands-off management style of the American president. But both men however recognized that changing political attitudes can only be effected by actively guiding citizens through times of social and economic upheaval through an endless repetition of ideas and a vision for the future. That implied that at one point the highest office in the land needed to be captured so that it could be used as the pulpit for incessant message delivery. Fortuyn never got there, but Reagan did and it seems that Americans have indeed had some more exposure to the low-tax, peace through strength message than their Dutch friends.

That brings me to one last striking similarity. Both men took bullets, although Pim didn’t survive. That’s what we’re remembering today.

Further analysis of the final sentence in the Fortuyn case tells me that the judges have delivered a typical Dutch compromise in order to placate all parties involved. For new readers, here is the post that introduced the appeals phase and this is also the post that links to all other pieces that I have written about Fortuyn, his murder and the following trial of his killer, which essentially came to an end last Friday.

The sentence has remained the same, 18 years, but the judges now acknowledge in their motivation for that sentence that the killing of Fortuyn did indeed damage the democratic process and also included the fact that Fortuyn’s killer was indeed guilty of the illegal possession of a gun and explosives, the latter were found at his home. All of these considerations were omitted by the judge in first instance. In this manner the judges have addressed the concerns raised by the prosecution while at the same time ensured that the defense team could be pleased with the result by not increasing the sentence and stop them from yet another appeal. The judges have, by including all these considerations, effectively shut down the route to a final appeal to the Dutch Supreme Court, De Hoge Raad. What they have said is: case closed.

The case may closed but it leaves a very bitter taste in the mouth of many, but especially those that were close to Fortuyn. To see his killer walk away with a smile on his face knowing he will be out in 11 years (Dutch law allows parole after two-thirds of the sentence have been served and time in custody is also deducted) is galling. It is interesting to note that even the left-liberal newspaper NRC Handelsblad raised its eyebrows over the course of justice in one of its editorials on Friday, commenting that Van der Graaf will be as dangerous and disturbed when he walks free after completing his sentence since mandatory treatment is not part of the final sentence. The editorial concludes wryly that once he re-enters society there will no doubt be many who want to inflict upon him the same treatment he inflicted upon Fortuyn. But what to me is the single most disturbing fact is that the court acknowledges that the motive for the crime combined with the killers inflexible personality might open the possibility that Van der Graaf will re-offend in the future. Knowing that, why on earth do you send him away for just 11 years?

Today the higher court issued its ruling following the completion of the appeals phase in the Fortuyn case and there’s no change in the sentence for the murderer. Again, he was sentenced to 18 years, which means he will be out in 11 year (parole after two-thirds is served, less one year already served during the investigation and trial phase). The judges did however, as opposed to the initial ruling by the lower court, take into account the damage done to the democratic process but did not honor requests from the prosecution for a life sentence. Needless to say, the defense team is pleased with the outcome and the media have billed it as a victory for the killer. I will need to look at the motivations of the judges over the weekend and see the rationale behind all this, but my initial reaction is that murder in Holland is now essentially an economic proposition. If you can manipulate the already lenient courts and if you really want to get rid of someone and you’re willing to offer up 12 years of your life for it, why not? And what’s more, after those 12 years you might do it again and even get away with it. I wonder whether the courts even considered that. Again, more later.

For American readers the following may be hard to believe: someone intentionally puts five bullets into another person, walks way, gets caught, confesses and ends up being sentenced to 18 years in prison which after a standard parole nets a result of 12 years in prison. It was indeed also hard to believe for the district attorney that prosecuted the murderer of Pim Fortuyn and it was no surprise that the prosecution team filed an appeal against this ridiculous sentence. Not only was this a premeditated and cold-blooded murder, it severely disrupted the democratic process in The Netherlands given the fact that the murder took place 9 days before a general election in which the assassinated Fortuyn and his followers stood a very good chance to become the largest party in Dutch parliament, with Fortuyn as Prime-Minister. The appeals process started last week and as I promised earlier I would report on the developments during the appeals phase.

Although I have left The Netherlands a long time ago, the Fortuyn case has kept me pre-occupied as he represented that unique political stream that is now labeled “Libertarian-Right”. I have told you about the background of Pim’s rise to political success in Fortuyn’s Case and have also spent time reflecting on feelings twelve months after his murder and his lasting impact on Dutch politics. The subject brought out some reader response, which I addressed carefully. Also, I followed the trial here and here, and the resulting sentence, which included some background as to why sentencing in The Netherlands is so incredibly light.

Last week's appeals process consequently focused on the light sentence and the new prosecutor - like her predecessor during the first trial - making a case as to why environmental activist Volkert Van der Graaf should deserve life in prison. It is interesting that during the appeals phase three things happened. First, the mental capabilities of Van der Graaf were explored to an extent that did not occur during the initial trial. It was argued that he suffered from a disease linked to autism which to some extent would have exonerated him from what he did, but that would open the route to add a common feature to a sentence for violent criminals, which is that after his sentence he could be kept incarcerated until such time that a team of government psychiatrists would declare him cured. This is a dangerous course. Many disturbed delinquents have managed to get out of prison and mandatory treatment, convincing those who were treating them that they had been cured and were able to navigate in the free world again, which very often was not the case. It remains to be seen how the judges will weigh this aspect in their new sentence. Secondly, Van der Graaf for the first time showed serious remorse over what he did. This may very well result from the fact that he is now once again exposed to sentencing and a sentence that could well land him in jail for the rest of his natural life. And finally, the prosecution argued that Van der Graaf acted not so much out of compassion for those who he felt were threatened by Fortuyn’s proposed policies, but that Van der Graaf was jealous of and disgusted by the eloquent and charismatic politician. The killer and Fortuyn had a lot in common: intelligence, ambition and a measure of inflexibility but Fortuyn had been able to translate that into a successful career as a professor, writer, businessman and finally a politician, whereas Van der Graaf was a marginal figure who had achieved very little compared to Fortuyn. For the murderer to show his strength, he had to get rid of Fortuyn, or so the argument went.

Needless to say, the defense team (consisting of lawyers who in the past have acted for other left-wing terrorists) argued that the murder of Fortuyn should be treated like any other. Given the publicity and extreme security regimen Van der Graaf was placed under they have asked for a reduction of the sentence.

The requirement for justice for Pim Fortuyn is evident, yet the issue is more than just his tragic death and the person responsible for it. The Dutch criminal justice system is now being tested and it remains to be seen if it can effectively deal with political violence that has deathly consequences. My bet is that it is not equipped for that as the Dutch justice system in general has had a very hard time dealing with the consequences of an increasingly violent society. Pim had very little time for government interference and passionately believed in personal freedoms, but one of the basic duties of government was, as he mentioned in a radio interview a few minutes before he was shot, was to provide safety for its citizens. Absent that safety, there should be justice.

The court will issue its ruling on July 18.

My generation grew up in a time when all parents knew exactly where they were and what they were doing when they heard that JFK was shot. I was expecting that my generation was probably destined to live in an age of little historical significance and that we would not experience dramatic events that would shape our lives and our thinking. Well, I was wrong and there have been quite a few moments of historical significance of which I can say that they compare to the JFK moment.

The first time was in June 1989 when I was having breakfast at my father’s house and learned on the radio that the People’s Liberation Army had massacred hundreds and perhaps thousands of students on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. I was especially devastated because all of our analysis prior to that date had indicated that the Chinese leadership under Deng Xiaoping would not gamble away all the progress that had been made under his leadership in China. Well, it was precisely for that reason that Deng ordered troops into Tiananmen, as he was not going to have his legacy jeopardized by a group of rebellious students. The week that followed we stayed glued to the news only to learn that the crackdown was complete and that any chances of certain PLA units siding with the protestors were false hope. This was, a pretty devastating news sequence and I can picture the moment I heard it to this very day.

In 1995 when Irene and I returned from a long weekend in Kuala Lumpur (we were living in Hong Kong at the time) we caught up with events watching Hong Kong’s TVB Pearl evening news and learned that Yitzhak Rabin had been shot. We were both deeply shocked; Rabin for me had a hero status because of his achievements on both the battlefield and in the political arena. As a child I was actually deeply taken by his nonchalance as a Prime Minister that did not wear a tie and was very often seen casually smoking a cigarette while coming from or going into a cabinet meeting. The event and my respect for Rabin prompted me to sign the condolence register at the Israeli Consulate in Hong Kong but by the time I had found out where they were located and at what times there were open I was already too late to sign to express my grief.

On September 11, 2001, I was, living on the West Coast, sound asleep when a group of islamofascists attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. It was a call from my native Holland, of all places, while I was preparing a bottle of milk for our baby girl that alerted me to the tragic events that were taking place in the eastern part of the North American continent. I was holding Nora when I took the call on what was going to be a sunny September day, you just do not forget these things.

Today, exactly a year ago I was walking in a local IKEA store to pick up some miscellaneous items for the house, important enough to disrupt a day of business activity, when Irene called to tell me that Pim Fortuyn had been shot. I was devastated and I stayed in a haze of pain and disbelief for a number of days afterwards, much like the week that followed September 11. Regular visitors will know I have written quite a bit about Pim so to mark the occasion of what happened exactly a year ago today, here is some background on the man and his politics and a response to reader mail. Here, here, here, and here is what I have written about the trial of his murderer, appeals from both the prosecution and defence will be heard by a higher court starting in July.

Around this time commemorations are taking place on a number of locations in The Netherlands.

The judges during the Fortuyn trial would not take it into consideration during the sentencing stage, but the disruption to the political process in The Netherlands continues to this day. I have described the difficulties that result from a system of proportional representation, which primarily center around the need to form coalition governments. Since Fortuyn’s death a year ago, The Netherlands have had one failed coalition of the right-leaning Christian Democrats, the free market Liberals and the remains of the List Pim Fortuyn, a coalition that collapsed late last year and which prompted a new election in January this year. The last election was a call by the aforementioned Christian Democrats and Liberals, gambling that disenchanted voters would abandon the List Pim Fortuyn as the party had disintegrated since the premature death of its leader and thus was no longer a viable and credible coalition partner. Well, they gambled wrong, Fortuyn’s list existed only by virtue of the man and voters flocked back to the traditional parties but against expectations a fairly large proportion moved to Labour. The Christian Democrats and Liberals were as a result not able to form a coalition again. Labour has attempted to form a government with the Christian Democrats but that effort failed and now the Christian Democrats and Liberals are back at the table trying to get a majority cabinet in place with support from Democrats ’66 (really, this is a political party), a moderately left leaning group of intellectuals whose platform is centered around constitutional reform. The latter party however was decimated in the two recent elections and they now represent approximately four percent of the electorate, not exactly providing a solid footing for a new government. I can say without hesitation that the Dutch would have been in a completely different spot had Fortuyn been alive today.

The other important part of the free thinking professor’s legacy is that the traditional parties have taken many of Fortuyn’s issues on board. More than a year ago anyone (and that of course included Fortuyn) talking about restricting muslim immigration would have been branded a nazi, these days all parties have been able to incorporate the concern over this issue into their programs. Safety and security, a matter that had fallen completely off the table during the left leaning purple coalition governments of the 1990s has now firmly regained a foothold on the list of both central and regional government priorities. The traditional parties learned from Fortuyn’s rise to power where there weaknesses were and quickly adapted to the new world by adopting some of Pim’s central campaign themes.

Fortuyn made a deep impact on Dutch society and beyond. The latter is evidenced by the many e-mails I get from North American readers who find the entire Fortuyn phenomenon very interesting and thank me for giving a bit more background to the events before and after his tragic murder. Although I no longer live in The Netherlands the affair has had a major impact on me for at no time during my absence from my native country have I spent so much time following and analyzing Dutch news. The fact that a bright man with a very distinctive view of the future was violently gunned down by a deranged left-wing environmentalist continues to have a phenomenal impact on me and many others all over the world who saw Pim as a vanguard of a new political stream that merged traditional conservative themes with a liberal approach to life.

As I committed to keep you fully up to speed on this trial it is my duty to inform you that following the prosecution appealing the lenient sentence last week, the defense team has done the same today. The latter appeal however focuses on the severity of the sentencing, needless to say. Expect a long drawn out battle that may even find its way to the Dutch Supreme Court.

The prosecution in the Fortuyn trial has decided to appeal the light sentence, as expected, and the appeal will be heard by the higher court in August. The sentencing was considered to be so lenient that even the Dutch Minister of the Interior felt it was necessary to breach the separation between the executive and the judiciary in order to record his dismay over the 18 year sentence. Not a wise move from a legal and political perspective, but it tells you something about the mood in The Netherlands.

One more thing on Fortuyn, his death now over a year ago left Dutch politics in disarray and there is still no government with a clear mandate as I reported earlier. Dutch blogger Jurjen in Washington state has a good overview of what happened over the past 12 months.

Update: Dilacerator also has an interesting analysis.

Reflecting over the sentencing today I realized what the three premises are of criminal justice: prevention, retribution and rehabilitation. In the Netherlands the first two have pretty much disappeared from the scene and the focus has been entirely on rehabilitation. I remember when I studied law that the criminal law faculty at my university was dominated by the so called “abolitionists”. The word says it all: their theory on criminal justice evolved around the idea that the criminal justice system as we know it should be abolished and be replaced with something that would focus entirely on rehabilitation, preferably a process that would involve both the defendant and the victim. It is unfortunate that in many cases that enter the courts these days the victim is no longer around to assist in the rehabilitation process. The abolitionist ideas have had a big impact on justice in The Netherlands although I believe their have been many other contributing factors to the Dutch lenient sentencing culture.

It is telling that on the same day Pim’s killer gets 18 years another murderer who beat someone to death in the southern part of The Netherlands is looking at a possible 10 years, as demanded by the prosecution. If the court follows that sentencing request, that killer will be out on the streets within less than 7 years. Do you know why he beat his victim to death? During a trip to the supermarket the victim asked the defendant while he was driving on a motorcycle in a pedestrian area to watch out for an elderly lady. He was killed for that. So within 7 years that person will be out on the streets again and do we have any illusion that he will be rehabilitated after that period?

In short, the principles of retribution and prevention have gone pretty much out of the window and that is something that deeply saddens me. While I realize that severe sentences are not always the solution in dealing with escalating crime rates, it does seem to me that the rights of the victim, the feelings of a victim’s family as well the overall safety of society at large should be paramount considerations in dealing with criminal elements. Rehabilitation is a worthwhile cause but success is often very limited and it should never be the priority.

In sentencing Fortuyn’s killer the court outlined that prevention is indeed an important part of sentencing but that a life sentence is not necessarily the way to achieve that. Well, what is it that the judges suggest can be done to implement some measure of prevention? The Dutch criminal justice system leaves little room as it can apply a life sentence (which the court did not do) or a maximum of 20 years (of which only two-thirds are mandatory) so the option effectively was between life and 13 years. There is nothing in between and given the Dutch abhorrence of life sentences and the seriousness of the crime it would have been better to go for that middle ground of, say, 30 years without parole. This would also have met with Fortuyn’s family expectations:

Simon Fortuyn, Pim Fortuyn's brother, told reporters he "was not so filled with rancor that I have to see him behind bars for the rest of his life."

I will keep you informed of the appeal that the prosecution team will file shortly.

Today the Dutch justice system delivered, as expected, a very lenient sentence in the Fortuyn case, sentencing assassin Van der Graaf to 18 years in prison. This effectively means that the killer will walk after having served two-thirds of his sentence, less any time spent in jail. In other words he'll be free in 2014. Needless to say, many were deeply disappointed by this sentence especially in light of the prosecution demanding a life sentence given the seriousness of the murder and the fact that it disrupted the democratic process in The Netherlands. Apparently, the judge did not accept the prosecution's argument that damage was done to democracy, nor did he believe that there was a chance of repetition. The judges also felt that there was a good chance for rehabilitation.

It seems to me that the judge has ignored the serious and premeditated nature of the murder and is underestimating the fact that such a light sentence sends an absolutely wrong message to other fanatics or potential murderers in society. And, I believe there is a case for repeat crimes, the killer is a cold blooded radical showing no signs of, or feelings of, remorse and may well be drawn into radical circles again. The family was deeply hurt that the judge had accepted Van der Graaf's defence and are hoping that the prosecution will appeal the sentence.

I get quite a bit of response, most of it very positive as both the content and the site design seem to go down well with the readership. I like however to get mail from readers disagreeing with me and it was not a surprise to find some taking me to task for ignoring the fact that many in Holland were not in favor of Fortuyn and that his agenda did not sit well with a large part of the electorate. His take on social security was deemed to be controversial by many, he was even dubbed “heartless”. Restructuring social security was indeed an important part of the Fortuyn message as he strongly opposed the “cradle to grave” care giving society that a country like Holland has become. It is somewhat hard for the North American readership to grasp but the extent to which the Dutch are being taking care of by their government is extensive: significant long term disability benefits, child care support programs, student tuition grants, community health care and extensive unemployment benefits are only a few of a long list. Do not get me wrong: I do believe that the weakest in society should be protected and I do see the merits of many social programs but the problem was – and this is where Fortuyn came in – that the level of care taking had reached such proportions that it had not only become a drain on the economy at large (government spending and high taxation levels to support it), it had also created a class of over-reliant citizens many of whom have been relegated to a life of apathy in which self-confidence, initiative and perseverance have all but been extinguished. The idea of self-reliance and taking matters into your own hands is very limited, when not too long ago I mentioned to my Dutch father in law that I had started saving for my daughters’ college education he looked at me bewildered: “the government will take care of that, do not worry about that”.

Long term disability is a point in case, even the left had conceded that something needed to be done here. That particular arrangement is abused both by employers (using it as a dumping ground for redundant employees) and employees, I know of many cases where perfectly healthy young people have been shipped off in to a life of no work and who have come to understand their lives in terms of being taking care of rather than taking matters into their own hands with a sense of responsibility. That responsibility extended also to Fortuyn’s belief that there should be a level of care, but if as an individual you wanted to receive more care it should be something of your own choice and you should therefore be able to buy additional insurance in the market rather than expect government to provide it for you. In other parts of the world this is a perfectly normal allocation of risks between the private and public sectors, in many European countries it is not and those that question it are in for a rough ride as they question the safety net that many not only depend on but are also so used to. Many have been lulled into a life of carefree living that is very far removed from the economic realities of this world and which comes at a significant cost to society.

Fortuyn correctly saw that in a free society only an optimal allocation of risk away from the public sector would in the long run enhance the quality of life for all. To make that point in a country were a comprehensive package of care giving by the government is so ingrained is not very easy as Fortuyn found out during his campaign. Yet, he was not heartless, he genuinely believed in the power of the individual to better one's life by taking initiative and assuming responsiblity.

So yesterday turned out to be the last day of the trial, sentencing will take place on April 15. The shortage of the trial is to a large extent a result of the way the Dutch criminal justice system operates as I described yesterday, but in this case the defendant’s attorneys put up very little in terms of a rebuttal. Ironically, their response started with the statement that the defendant did deserve punishment and that there were indeed no special circumstances that would prevent sentencing. However, the defense team went on to say that Van der Graaf deserved the standard punishment for a simple murder which is 12 to 16 years. Indeed, all life sentences handed out by the courts in Holland since 1945 applied to multiple murder cases and defendants with a criminal history. What followed was an exchange of words between the district attorney and the defense team over various aspects of the case but it appears that both the defendant and his team of attorneys were resigned to the fact that there was very little to argue in terms of culpability and responsibility. The council of judges will now deliberate over the proceedings and weigh the prosecution’s and defense team’s arguments over the length of the sentence. The defendant ended the trial with a final statement that concluded with his acknowledgement that sentencing was a logical step following his act. Yet, at no point did he show genuine remorse or concern for Fortuyn, his family or even his own family.

So it seems that we are close to justice being served, although I remain concerned over whether the judges will indeed follow the prosecution’s recommendation of life in prison. As I mentioned there is a long tradition in Holland of light sentencing. That appears to be changing however, and I believe the seriousness of the crime and the impact it had on Dutch society (and beyond, I am getting a lot of e-mails from various parts of North America from readers equally concerned over the Fortuyn case) will leave the council of judges not an awful lot of room to maneuver. The bottom line is that this was a case of murder, a murder that resulted in a severe disruption of the democratic process by a radical and intolerant fanatic who sought to implement a dictatorship of his making by terminating the life of an incredibly popular politician.

The Dutch criminal justice system is fundamentally different from the Anglo-Saxon model, primarily in that there is no jury to weigh the evidence in order to establish a guilty or non-guilty verdict. By the time a defendant enters the court there is already substantial evidence to make the case that he or she is guilty and the trial is rather a deliberation over the case and its facts, followed by the district attorney’s request for a certain sentence after which the defense team rebuts and a council of judges determines the final sentence. After sentencing the defendant can appeal to a higher court. This is a very simple outline of the process but it is important because my North American readers should be able to understand why we have already entered the sentencing phase in the Fortuyn trial.

Today the district attorney in the case called for life in prison, which in Holland is a very unusual sentence and if the court follows this request it does indeed mean that Van der Graaf will have to spend the rest of his life in prison unless he is granted clemency later on. The Dutch system is geared towards the rights of the defendant and that in the past has led to some absurd light sentencing, Dutch blogger Dilacerator did a great piece on that a while back and I encourage you to read it here.

In the sentencing request the district attorney emphasized the extreme criminal nature of the act as Van der Graaf had approached Fortuyn from behind to shoot him. It was further established that Van der Graaf, although capable to stand trial and unable to claim any insanity defense, suffered from “obsessive compulsive personality disorder” which in turn could lead to repeat offenses were he ever to be released. The district attorney highlighted the fact that (and I translate):

“He who commits the exceptional act of piercing the heart of the democratic process in a criminal and irreversible manner, deserves to be punished in an exceptional manner”

He went on to say that the assassination had had a lasting impact on Dutch society and that as a result politicians now required round the clock security (previously unheard of in Holland, some government ministers would go to work on their bike, I kid you not) and that regular citizens had become afraid to express their minds in public. In summary, the trial to date has been unambiguously clear in establishing the seriousness of the crime, the culpability of Van der Graaf and therefore the required sentence is a logical outcome of the facts as presented. I will report more on the rebuttal and final sentencing later, it is expected the trial will be concluded within the next two weeks.

It is important to re-emphasize that with Fortuyn’s death hopes for change in society were seriously dashed. Fortuyn had in addition to many portraits of himself (that’s the type of guy he was) two framed photographs of other politicians on display in his house. One was of former Dutch labor leader Den Uyl whom Fortuyn admired because he was one of the last Dutch politicians who connected to the people and had forged a direct bond with the people which he believed was the essence of the democratic process. With technocratic elites taking the place of “popular politicians” an important ingredient of a living democracy had disappeared according to Fortuyn which is why he so admired Den Uyl. The other politician on display in his house was JFK. Fortuyn was a teenager during the 1960s and to him JFK represented hope and change for a better tomorrow. Fortuyn’s fate was similar to that of JFK and as with JFK hope for a better and changed society was dashed in a brutal manner.

First of all, I have to thank Pejman of Pejmanesque and David Janes for all the new visitors over the weekend. Thanks. It all coincided with the Fortuyn article and a lot of people responded to that. It appears there have been few balanced publications about Fortuyn in the English language and a lot of English speakers have been looking for more information about him. I have to check whether any of his books have been translated, as you may know he wrote many. David Janes' reaction was summarized as follows:

" . a cautionary tale about what could happen if political thought is partitioned into acceptable and non-acceptable topics, as defined by a very narrow elite of the population "

Well, exactly. In the meantime the trial of Pim's murderer proceeded today and the court has determined that Van der Graaf is not mentally incapacitated and was not temporarirly insane when he committed the crime which means a life sentence is now more likely. Today he commented he felt the need to act on behalf of certain groups in society and prevent Fortuyn from becoming Prime Minister. It also materialized he had some chemical substances in his garage: "not to be used for attacks, but just to experiment with". Of course, just like we all spend some time in the garden over the weekend, it is not unusual to experiment with some chemicals in the garage. The mechanical and rational approach with which Van der Graaf perpetrated his crime is scary and not unusual for radicalized elements, it comes straight out of the universal handbook for terrorism.

The district attorney wanted to find out how Van der Graaf felt about the feelings of Fortuyn's family, but he found it too difficult to talk about feelings. The Fortuyn family suffered deeply over the loss of their beloved brother but they have not lost their unique spirit: Fortuyn's sister in law resolved to attend the trial of the animal rights activist wearing a fur coat.

Earlier this week in Holland the trial of Volkert van der Graaf started, the murderer of Pim Fortuyn. Most of you will remember that Fortuyn was an up and coming conservative-libertarian who changed the Dutch political landscape with his party List Pim Fortuyn last year. He was killed 9 days before the election by an animal rights and environmental radical whose trial is now underway and I intend to follow the trial over the next few weeks. I think however it is useful to set the stage for that trial and reflect on who Pim Fortuyn really was.

Fortuyn created a political storm in Holland last year by convincingly taking the left-liberal government coalition to task for issues that had started to affect day to day life in Holland. These were issues that up to that point in time had either been covered with the veil of political correctness or had just not been adequately addressed by the ruling coalition or even the opposition. Like North America, Holland was booming in the 1990s and there was a complacent sense that the country was doing well, yet a number of developments in society were starting to eat away at the fundaments on which Holland was built. They included muslim immigration and radicalization of those very muslims, soaring crime rates and a healthcare system that had started to crack under the pressure of long waiting lists. The immigration issue was also an issue at large as Holland’s population density had increased to levels that had started to impact the quality of life in the country. Yet, Fortuyn’ agenda extended well beyond that. His frustration with the huge collective sector that so dominates life in Holland led him to actively promote far reaching privatization, his acceptance speech when he assumed his position as a professor at Erasmus University was entitled “Without Government Employees”. That to a large extent was fed by his experiences with collective, unionized or otherwise organized labor which had and has a very counterproductive grip on many institutions in Holland. Fortuyn had dealt with these issues first hand in the various roles he had before becoming a full-time politician, ranging from senior faculty member to consultant to CEO of a privatized government agency. In a way, Fortuyn was ahead of his time, he believed in a “contract society” that was governed by contracts rather than employment agreements and he believed in the ability of each of us to freely compete in a marketplace governed by these independent contracts rather than centralized top-down agreements. He believed in the flexibility of each individual to develop him or herself to the fullest in such a free society.

His socio-economic views went hand in hand with a liberal stance on sexual and cultural issues. He was openly homosexual and he had ensured that his entire private life was part of the public domain, denying any opportunity to his political opponents to use it against him during the campaign, to the extent that that is possible in Holland. Fortuyn had grown up during the 60s and 70s and was very much aware of the importance of those years for the liberation of women, gays and sexuality in general. While Holland is an extremely tolerant and liberal country, and this is something I hear over and over wherever I go in North America, these freedoms have not come without a fight and Fortuyn was one of the first people in Holland to emphasize that people should continue to fight to defend these very important and unique rights. They are not a given. This is where he clashed with muslims as he rightly became concerned over a radicalized muslim culture fueled by imams preaching in mosques in Holland. They preached the immorality of homosexuality and the belief that homosexuals were sick elements that deserved to be stoned to death. Fortuyn was not a racist, his argument was relatively simple: Holland is pretty full so let’s reduce immigration and to those immigrants that are here we say: fine, this is our country and this is our set of values, if you want to live here please respect them as you would probably ask the same of us if we were living in your country. It is here that he started to split the Dutch left and created a measure of confusion for it was the left that had always stood up for the emancipation of women and gays. Yet at the same time the left had always rejected a debate about immigration and muslim values as an examination of muslim values clashed with their culture of political correctness. Their promotion of a multi-cultural Holland ruled out any questioning of the status and values of strangers in Holland to an extent that some abuse of women, gays and children was ignored as “it was part of another culture”.

To be true, Fortuyn’s love for Holland was also a bit of a weakness. His ideas on foreign policy were not earth shattering and the hordes of foreign journalists that interviewed him had to deal with someone whose command of the English language was, for someone with his intellectual abilities, disappointing. His other weaknesses extended in the interpersonal field. He was not exactly a diplomat and many of his friends and colleagues questioned his ability to see things through to the end. He was also not a big fan of the royal family (this is an understatement), which in Holland is a surefire way to damage yourself politically. It was therefore that there were serious doubts over his ability to lead as Prime Minister, a concern he swept under the carpet with the comment that he would “lead by speech”. Dutch newspapers reported on the day that he was murdered that polls showed his party would be the largest and Fortuyn in that case would have become Prime Minister. I believe that he would have been a credible Prime Minister, and his “management by speech” vision is Reaganesque in its essence, a well-spoken visionary lays out the path surrounding himself with a kitchen cabinet of business leaders and academics with the belief and skill to implement that vision.

It was all a little too uncomfortable for the ruling elites as Fortuyn’s message caught on with the public at large. The establishment had nothing tangible to attack him with during the election campaign, on the contrary, Fortuyn convincingly came out a winner during many of the pre-election debates. So the left-liberal clan resorted to an age old routine: slander. They threw everything at Fortuyn with the idea that some of it would stick and in doing that they were given all the help they could get from the Dutch media notably the NOS, the Dutch equivalent of the BBC and some of the Dutch top newspapers. The slander ranged from calling Fortuyn “Nazi” to comparing him to Mussolini, none of which was even close to the truth, yet as it was coming from people who had long been the respected face of government some of it stuck. What was even more galling to Fortuyn was that senior politicians who had been his friends and whom he had advised behind the scenes (so to some extent he was an ‘established’ politician) started to throw the same abuse in his direction. In one interview by the NOS, Fortuyn quietly laid out some socio-economic numbers on big city populations and his concerns that middle classes were abandoning the big cities in favour of the suburbs to which the interviewer reacted; “and that is something you dare saying on TV ? “, to which Fortuyn replied: “ I am just stating an obvious fact, if I can no longer state simple facts on TV what do you want me to do ? ”. Yet it set the tone and for many uninformed viewers a very unfavorable picture was created. His impeccable dress and confident style was also something that did not go down very well with a large segment of the Dutch population, some of you will remember my comments on the need to stay with the “average mean” in Holland, if you act normal you are considered weird enough. With his bald head and self-assured rants he came across as a conservative James Carville in Savile Row suits with a Hollywood flair for publicity. In Holland, that is completely off the map, beyond comprehension.

The other day I watched a DVD with a collection of weekly interviews Fortuyn gave in the months leading up to this death and I saw a man who was growing increasingly tired and frustrated, who was hounded in a most unreasonable fashion by politicians and media that were hell bent on destroying him. Fortuyn was not always the diplomat, but he was very often, if not always, right, he did not hate, he was open and looked for a “tough debate” yet, what he got in return was hate, invective and disrespectful undeserved slander. Many filed lawsuits against him, all of which were dismissed by the courts and when asked why he did not take some of his opponents to court for hate crimes against him he simply stated that he did not feel that a political debate should be settled in court and felt his arguments were strong enough to settle the case in an open debate. In fact he felt the courts had no jurisdiction in settling political discussions. Yet it all resulted in an incredible amount of stress and the strain showed during these interviews. It hurt me to see that someone who had such a unique message was taken apart in such a vile manner and it still does. Fortuyn did not deserve that.

So the climate of hate, of demonization as some called it, was created and it is impossible to say if that has been directly attributable to his death, yet many believe it played an important role. A report from an independent government commission found that both the government’s security apparatus that is supposed to act on threats to politicians as well as Fortuyn and his associates had failed to adequately address the threats on his life. He was shot 5 times by Van der Graaf shortly after a radio interview in Hilversum, right in the heart of Holland. It appeared Van der Graaf was acting alone, yet his membership of a radical animal rights group has raised serious questions about the planning of the murder.

Politics have gone back to normal yet Fortuyn’s ideas have found their way into the platforms of most political parties. To that extent he changed the Dutch political scene. Yet he paid the ultimate price and it is sometimes depressing to see that the political establishment has gone back to its usual routine. Not too long ago former Prime Minister Kok who was in office when Fortuyn was murdered, commented on Fortuyn’s death. Kok said that he was still haunted by the events surrounding Fortuyn’s murder especially street rallies where he, Kok, was identified as someone who had contributed to the murder. Reading that you have to wonder whether Fortuyn’s death had had any impact on him, as he was apparently more concerned about being implicated in the murder than in the fact that Fortuyn was assassinated. The former leader of the Liberal Party, Dijkstal, in a recent interview was concerned over the effect of Fortuyn on the political debate in the country, “it was possible to discuss everything all of a sudden” he said with disgust. Well, isn’t that the essential part of a democracy? It really is heartbreaking to see how Fortuyn’s legacy is sometimes dealt with in the Dutch media.

For me Fortuyn will always be a symbol of a set of political values that will become increasingly important in years to come. The slow collapse and increasing irrelevance of socialism as a socio-economic model and the changing nature of the “right” has opened the way to a new conservative-libertarian route. Fortuyn was one of its visionaries and he always will be.

May justice be served, Pim.