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Quote of the Day: Is Europe Finished?
Let’s cut through the diplo-speak: If Mr. Biden and the Europeans don’t get Ukraine right, Europe’s future is finished.
Putin is Hitler. He is attempting the extermination of a people and the obliteration of their cities. World War II wasn’t fought in Europe to prevent a future nuclear exchange between Russia and the U.S. It was fought because Europe was experiencing the indiscriminate murder of civilians under Nazi military doctrine, now revived by Mr. Putin and the Russian general staff.— Daniel Henninger
In an ambitious flurry of activity, Europe is speaking out and taking action against Vladimir Putin, canceling some of their commitments to him and stepping in to help Ukraine. Most of the Ukrainian refugees are landing in Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia. The EU has established an emergency protection system, offering jobs, shelter, and medical treatment. They have also worked at streamlining their entry procedures. The invasion of Putin has been criticized harshly, and Europe has stepped up.
But how long will they enthusiastically deal with this new reality?
At this writing, 4 million people have fled Ukraine; another 6.5 million people are displaced. It’s impossible to know how long the conflict will drag on, or whether the EU countries will be able to support millions of refugees, or how many of the Ukrainians will stay. Will they be able to find work? Will they be able to adjust if they choose to stay? Will they be welcomed by the various countries?
And will the U.S. make a sincere and reasonable effort to supply arms and compassionate support, and for how long?
And yet . . . and yet . . .
Does Europe really have a choice? Over time will they try to ignore the threats that Putin poses to the European continent?
Will they realize that helping Ukraine and Ukrainians and standing up to Putin could determine the very future of Europe?
Published in Foreign Policy
There is plenty of room in Ireland as a whole, but Dublin is growing exponentially while large swathes of the country suffer from depopulation, whether it be through emigration or internal migration to the East Coast behemoth. Dublin people want it that way, even though they complain incessantly about the housing crisis that has inevitably ensued. There was an attempt at decentralisation, maybe twenty years ago, but Dublin was having none of it.
We have also had significant immigration, mostly from Eastern Europe. This has increased the population at a time when housing infrastructure hasn’t been able to keep up. And the same people who wail about the housing crisis are among the first to object to new housing developments in their localities. NIMBYism is rife. Parties on the left, who are strong in local authorities which control planning permission, won’t approve permission for private developers in case they might make a profit.
The Great Famine was the worst disaster ever to befall Ireland. We have a lower population now than we had in 1840. The effects linger today, particularly in the North-West. I know a town which had a population of 5000 immediately before, but has never reached 2000 since.
Ireland was part of the UK at the time. The Famine is a dark stain on the history and reputation of that entity.
On a more general note, one reason for the shrinking in family size across Europe generally is that the Climate Change crew have convinced parents that large families will destroy the planet. Having a large family is treated as environmental terrorism. I suspect there is an element of this in the USA also
Yes! But, it’s not just “large” families that are discouraged. It’s any family at all (unless you’re a gay couple and can afford to rent-a-womb or two). I know two lovely, bright, and capable sisters (who happen to be of Catholic-Irish descent) who chose to never have children because of this attitude. People are pollution, doncha know?
Yeah, I know. Always breathing out carbon dioxide for the trees to breath. There’re too many trees. I sure wish people would quit helping the trees. People are the worst.
Not just the environment. Just watch the news, world in chaos, WW3 already started. Morality and religion are twisted, perverse. I am not even sure I will be able to live until my retirement before being cancelled, jail, etc. How responsible is it to bring children into this? To watch government twist them so they do not even know if they are boy or girl. Much less the cost. Most can barely pay for themselves much less additional children. There is no ROI in having children the state is just going to teach to hate you.
This idea of it being bad to bring children into the world goes back at least 50 years in the United States. The first time I heard of it was when watching the television series “All in the Family” in the 1960’s. In one episode, Archie Bunker was angry because his daughter and son-in-law didn’t want to have children. Their stated reason was that it would be a bad thing to bring children into such a “terrible” world, with crime, injustice, environmental degradation and such.
They may say that, but if they didn’t have that excuse they would find another one.
There are conditions in which having a lot of children is an economic asset for the family. There are conditions in which it reduces the family’s standard of living. When you have the latter, the birth rate goes down, and has been doing that since long before there were all the contraceptives we have now.
Funnily enough, I know several Catholic families of 10 or more children, and they seem to manage. It’s all about priorities. If you simply must have the latest iPhone, a 46-inch flat screen TV, and a late-model automobile for every driver in the family, chances are you’ve prioritized material comfort over giving life to new people.
And I’m in the former camp (minus the iPhone), so this isn’t a criticism, although I would have had more than two if it had worked out. God knew what He was doing when He only gave me two children though. . .
I know people who don’t let the economic disadvantages stop them, either, and I agree that it’s a matter of priorities. But at the level of the larger population, the priorities are such that the birth rate goes down when children become an economic disadvantage.
Our Rabbi has nine children, but he and his wife are mere pikers. The Rabbi living two doors away from him has 13. The Rabbi living across the street from him, a dynastic leader, has 16 children. They take this “be fruitful and multiply” thing seriously.
Sounds like Ireland has one of the same problems as the US, which is that we don’t need to keep adding more people to cities, we need NEW CITIES. That used to happen organically, when a few houses and then a horse barn etc would pop up at a crossroads or along a river or something. But now people expect electricity and high-speed internet etc, as soon as they move in. Which means some advance prep work needs to be done. So far I don’t see anyone willing to do it.
Is there any particular reason why THEY are still alive? I guess it’s okay for THEM to ruin the planet…
True, being white people they would just be bringing more racist oppressors into the world.
I’m glad SOMEONE does.
They take care of animals. So they’re contributing to the environment.
Oh, those animals that emit methane etc? How awful of them!
Don’t let the state teach them.
There is a virtual population explosion among Orthodox Religious Jews, both in Israel and in America (and I suppose everywhere else). And they vote greater than 85% Republican!
Baptist.
Only 7 kids.
We’re a couple of amateurs.
Amen!
Give yourself time.
Well get to work, man! You look like you’ve got plenty of years left.
Government does not want any more cities. They want it go back to wild with no people.
Add to that whites are being turned into second class citizens. Would not be surprised if they are enslaved or killed off eventually.
But still… better not say more.
How can they tax and control no people?
Word is no MORE cities. They just want to keep the ones they have and make denser with their preferred mixture of minorities and illegals
And what if it’s our own CIA over there killing those civilians, which would not surprise me at all. For me, both Putin and Hitler are of course evil. But there was something different about Hitler’s genocide because it was concentrated on one religion/ethnicity that was always persecuted throughout history no matter what country they lived in. It just had a different feel about it for me. I think it can certainly be said that Russia’s killing of Ukrainians is systematic though. Just a different motivation. More political than ethnically prejudiced. Not that it makes any difference to those who are dead.
Well, 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis, but another 6 million were also killed–gypsies, gays, professors, doctors, and other innocent people.
Come on, you make the Nazis sound like radical muslims or something!