Wednesday 11 January 2006

Pic of the day: "Can't you use your brain a little?" More to the point, how come that the longer you educate yourself, the weirder you become? Perhaps brains have a limited volume, so the deeper you stretch them, the narrower they become? For instance the amazing fact that the champions of the working classes tend to come out of universities with white hands to save the world...

Fun with socialists

Norwegian politics have become more entertaining after the general election this past fall. (And no, we don't elect generals. I have never liked that expression, but that's the official English name for it, or so we learned in school.) We now have a left-of-center government made up of a coalition (some would say "collision") of three parties.

The agrarian / provincial Center Party used to be considered right of center, but has lately moved to the left as they have found little sympathy for their views among conservatives. Their views are basically that people should be paid for living outside the cities, as the cities are creating more trouble socially than they are worth as economic engines. Unfortunately for them, most people like the cities. Conservative parties (around here) tend to think that people know best what's best for them.

The Labor Party, the social democrats, used to be by far the largest party and ruled Norway alone for most of the time after World War II and to around the turn of the century, with some well deserved breaks. They are much reduced now, as seen by the fact that they need two coalition partners. But they are still the big brother of the government, and the ones most used to the responsibility.

In contrast, "responsibility" seems to be unknown for the Socialist Left, a party that came into being sometime around my childhood as the left wing of Labor broke out, not least because they disagreed with the Norwegian foreign policy that Labor and the Conservatives agreed on. The Socialist Left wanted Norway out of NATO, which was seen as just plain crazy by almost everyone else, since it was the depth of the Cold War and Norway had a not too defendable border with Russia.

Well, the Cold War is over now, or perhaps it has just changed enemies. But the Socialists are still out of tune with the rest of the populace. This last week they decided that it was time to air one of their favorite ideas, a trade boycott of Israel. Because, you know, the evil Israeli don't respect human rights the way we do. They shoot back at the Palestinians in the Israel-occupied Palestinian territories, whereas we Norwegians don't shoot back at the Sami people in the Norwegian- occupied Sami territories. Admittedly the Sami don't shoot at us first when we build Norwegian settlements there, but then again we have been doing so for generations so it is kind of a tradition. Israel just started a few decades ago, so they don't have the right. The solution is evidently to not buy oranges. (And some of the world's most advanced cancer treatment, but I hear no mention of that.)

There is the small point that the Socialist Left is now part of the government, and their leader, who wholeheartedly endorses the boycott, is Finance Minister. Not exactly in a position to initiate international sanctions, but a pretty central member of the government. Generally when a central member of a government says something about politics, foreigners suppose that the government has talked about it first. Well, not the Socialist Left. They are still in opposition, even when they are in government. Some of their MP's have been observed outside the Storting (Parliament) protesting against their own government. But if you don't know that, you may be excused to imagine that Norway suddenly has changed its foreign policy so as to turn our back on the only near-western-style democracy in the Middle East. Only we haven't. Nothing has changed except that the socialists have got an attack of ants in their pants.

In the Middle Ages, it was common for the kings to keep court jesters. I guess in a manner of speaking we still do. I guess it can be a bit confusing, but just listen to my simple words of wisdom and all will be well:
1)Never take an unarmed socialist seriously.
2)Never fail to take an armed socialist seriously.
Follow this simple rule and much suffering will be avoided. Incidentally, the same rules apply to clerics. Which should surprise no one, since socialism is basically an irrational belief. It is nice to see them demonstrate it from time to time, in case anyone doubted.